All The World's A Bootleg General IP Issues9/15/2000; 4:28:29 PM '... Several of the Nirvana songs on Napster were live recordings of extremely poor sound quality, the vocals barely audible through audience noise. I assumed that these were bootlegged recordings, which by definition are hard to come by. I labeled the files "bootleg-rare." And I added them to the CD as lagniappe. 'Napster allows each member of the "Napster community" to search other members' hard drives for particular songs. My live bootlegs attracted enormous, even rabid interest--they were uploaded by dozens of people, who in turn passed them on to many others. Each time I went on Napster and searched for Nirvana I saw them on other people's machines. Not only did this further add to my guilt, it made me wonder what I had on my machine. Bootlegs are always in demand, but why were these particular bootlegs so special? Investigating, I discovered to my chagrin that these recordings were not bootlegs at all but songs from a perfectly ordinary live album that had been ineptly converted to digital form by enthusiastic but technically unsophisticated Nirvana fans. I had inadvertently reinvented them as precious bootlegs and passed them on to Kurt Cobain aficionados hungry for any unheard notes from the master.'... Although today copyright is mainly treated as a means to reward creators--or castigated as a scam that lets big media companies lock up culture--it has a second, rarely mentioned function: affixing the form of works of art and science. ... The closest thing I can imagine to a solution is for musicians to fix their music in some tangible, immutable form that can only be played on special, authorized machines. I've even thought of a name for it: the "compact disc."'In the phrase "to fix their music in some tangible, immutable form that can only be played on special, authorized machines.", the "that can only be played on special, authorized machines" part is completely superfluous. Once the music is in tangible, immutable form, it's already as protected as it's going to be.I'm certainly not used to articles about Napster that don't make a moral point about the rightness or wrongness of use, it just makes a practical recommendation against using Napster because of quality control issues. I kept futilely hunting for the "Napster good" or "Napster bad" part... felt kinda wierd.

Ruling Recognizes Limits to Online Rights of Trademarks General IP Issues9/15/2000; 9:17:06 AM 'In an important decision that recognizes limits to intellectual property rights online, a federal judge earlier this week ruled that a company's well-known trademarks may be used without authorization by search engines in some programming and sales practices.'I agree with the court decision; there's nothing illegal about asking somebody about a Ford product and having them respond with why Chrysler is so much better then Ford. Just because somebody types in a trademark on a search engine does not obligate the search engine to respond with only stuff approved by the trademark holder, not even advertisements. If the search engine choses to sell advertisements based on words, even trademarks, so be it. I can't say it thrills me, but such are the realities of the Internet market.Forcing the search engines to only respond with trademark-holder approved content is a restraint on free speech.(There are practical issues too... what do you do if someone types in "Ford Chrysler compare"... if Ford buys both Ford and Chrysler, and a Ford ad is displayed, can Chrysler complain? What about international trademarks? And why do we want to turn search engines into international trademark enforcers?)Can't find a copy of the decision.

The Coming Storm Misc.9/14/2000; 3:39:01 PM 'There's no conspiracy. Nobody has a master plan to keep us from having fun. But there is a basic and irreconcilable conflict of interest between those who see computers as user-programmable devices and those who see them solely as devices for delivering their content to their consumers. 'We have a fundamental paradigm shift on our hands, and it's going to get us into trouble. Since computers are user-programmable devices, trying to treat them like just another consumer-electronics device is a recipe for disaster.'I agree with this article, though I think there's more to it then that. Do read this, it's good stuff.

Privacy advocates write Web bug rules
Privacy from Companies
9/14/2000; 3:17:04 PM 'The Privacy Foundation, a nonprofit privacy group based in Denver, is proposing that Internet advertising companies and Web sites disclose the use of ''Web bugs'' wherever they are found online. Web bugs, or clear GIFs, are tiny images embedded in a Web page or HTML-enhanced email that transmit information to a remote computer when the page is viewed.'

Defame Game Serious in Canada
Country Watch: Canada
9/14/2000; 3:14:06 PM 'Canadian e-mailers can no longer hide behind a cloak of anonymity if reasonable grounds exist to show they've distributed defamatory statements over the Internet.'

Napster Goes on the Offensive Music & MP39/14/2000; 2:59:35 PM 'In what could be a last great act of defiance, Napster lawyers filed their final written brief before the copyright infringement case goes to trial. 'The brief accuses the recording industry of withholding licensing, and disputes claims that the company's file-trading application violates copyright law.'Here's the brief.

Update or the Lack Thereof Personal Notes9/12/2000; 10:53:23 AM My grandfather is in the hospital for a quadruple bypass surgery and a valve replacement. Updates may be sporadic or slow the next few days if it doesn't go well. Please bear with me.

Selling Yourself Bit by Bit Privacy from Companies9/12/2000; 10:27:54 AM 'Right at this moment, some marketing fat cat is selling your demographic data -- maybe your shoe size, your favorite color, or how you like your eggs cooked -- and you're not seeing a penny of the profits. 'But according to Jeff Oriecuia, a spokesman for a new company called Zimtu, you may soon be able to get some of that green.'Unfortunately, I can't say I have much faith in the company's marketing scheme, which is to create Yet Another Instant Messenger and use the registered users as a base to grow. Since they want their own registered users base, it probably goes without saying it won't interoperate with anything else. I'm not sure it will be compelling enough for Joe Public to switch.The site is four pages away from being non-existent, don't bother visiting.I hope this succeeds, despite my skepticism on their marketing and their lack of web page. If people gain the perception that their personal data has value, they'll start to scream loudly at those companies extracting it and not paying them for it. If Zimtu succeeds, half the privacy war against companies is over, because suddenly the public will have a clear understanding of the value of their $tati$tics.Please support it.

Congress Next in Copyright Tiffs
General IP Issues
9/12/2000; 10:17:17 AM '"When the outcome of the Napster case comes out, the losing side is going to be all over Capitol Hill next session and there will be your legislative battle," said Robert Kruger, vice president of enforcement at the Business Software Association.'

iRights isn't going out of business anytime soon, it looks like. I've guestimated my commitment to this site at 4-5 years before things settle down enough that there's no general need to cover then anymore.