The 5th Estate: Citizen News » Copyright

File-sharing has weakened copyright—and helped society

Barbara Iverson — Sat, 26 Jun 2010 14:54:27 +0000

“Data on the supply of new works are consistent with our argument that file sharing did not discourage authors and publishers,” they write in their paper, “File-sharing and Copyright” PDF. “The publication of new books rose by 66 percent over the 2002-2007 period. Since 2000, the annual release of new music albums has more than doubled, and worldwide feature film production is up by more than 30 percent since 2003… In our reading of the evidence there is little to suggest that the new technology has discouraged artistic production. Weaker copyright protection, it seems, has benefited society.”

via File-sharing has weakened copyright—and helped society.

Telnor in Norway won’t block Pirate Bay

Barbara Iverson — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 15:48:20 +0000

: Image by biverson via Flickr

IFPI Loses: Telenor Will Not Block The Pirate Bay | TorrentFreak.

This March, IFPI – backed by several Hollywood movie companies – gave Telenor, Norway’s largest ISP, a warning: block your users from accessing The Pirate Bay within 14 days or we will take legal action.

Without any legal basis, Telenor refused to comply.

“This would be the same as demanding that the postal service should open all letters, and decide which ones should be delivered,” said Telenor boss Ragnar Kårhus.

The verdict in the case was due to be delivered October 30th, but was delayed until today.

IFPI has lost the case and Telenor will not have to block The Pirate Bay.

Court Says Telenor Doesn’t Need To Block The Pirate Bay (techdirt.com)
Norwegian Court Rules ISP Doesn’t Have To Block The Pirate Bay (yro.slashdot.org)
The Pirate Bay Sails To a New Home (tech.slashdot.org)

Amazon Apologizes For Kindle Flap — Amazon Kindle — InformationWeek

Barbara Iverson — Fri, 24 Jul 2009 23:29:44 +0000

: Image via Wikipedia

Amazon Apologizes For Kindle Flap

CEO Jeff Bezos said removing copies of e-books from customers’ Kindles was “stupid, thoughtless, and painfully out of line with our principles.”

via Amazon Apologizes For Kindle Flap — Amazon Kindle — InformationWeek.

Listen to Jonathon Zittrain, talk about this issue. Addressed the issue of a “copy” v.s a “license” to use.

Jeff Bezos Apologizes for Kindle Mistake (mediabistro.com)
Jeff Bezos issues humble apology over pulled Kindle title (engadget.com)
Jeff Bezos Issues A Personal Apology for Kindle Debacle [Kindle] (gizmodo.com)
Jeff Bezos’s Kindle apology: please tell us what the Kindle can do (boingboing.net)
Amazon’s Bezos Apologizes For The “Stupid” And “Thoughtless” Kindle Incident (techcrunch.com)

New Online Copyright Law Baffles Users

Barbara Iverson — Wed, 22 Jul 2009 17:57:14 +0000

“Copyright laws are all about balancing the protection of intellectual property rights and encouraging the consumption of those content in the right way. It is regrettable that the balance seems to be broke here, with too much weight concentrated toward the protection side,” the company wrote in its official blog.

“This broken balance will not help users, online service providers and also copyright holders in the long term.”

SK Communications, the operator of popular social networking service, Cyworld (www.cyworld.com), and Web portal, Nate (www.nate.com), has been alerting its users about the legal changes through messages on its Web sites since last week.

The company is telling its users that the use of copyrighted images and videos on blogs or Web communities will be strictly prohibited, and that also goes for movie lines, song lyrics and book excerpts.