copyright – Page 4 – davelevy.info

I need 27 suppliers? Watching film in the UK

A UK movies fan has to subscribe to 27 services to get a full catalog of current(ish) releases. On the 27th Sept, Torrentfeak comments on an MPAA funded report on film distribution in the USA. It highlights the oddity that the most used service (Netflix) has the weakest catalogue. Later in the year, the researcher, KPMG LLP published a report on the UK market, and locally hosted here … which Torrentfreak commented on here…. The headline was that a film fan wanting the best catalogue would need to subscribe to 27 services, which seems a bit excessive. See below/overleaf for critical quotes from the reports … …

Three Laws, Doctorow at orgcon14

Orgcon14 was opened by its keynote speaker, Correy Doctrow, one of the UK’s leading digital liberty campaigners. This presentation was a bit of a reprise although he concludes by addressing recent developments in the politics of surveillance in the UK. …

The German Commissioner, Oettinger

Earlier this week Germany’s appointment to the Commission, Gunther Oettinger, allocated the Digital Economy portfolio blotted his copybook by blaming the celebrity victims of a porn leak as stupid prior to his EP confirmation hearings, at which he also didn’t do too well. However, if second division, and appointed for domestic reasons, he isn’t the only one. …

Value, Solidarity and Exchange

A couple of thoughts provoked by my trip to Labour Party Conference, one on the value of copyright, one on solidarity and one on the unfinished Hargreaves Review reform, the establishment of a digital exchange. …

Two sides to the coin

I decided to go for a drink at the creative unions reception. On my way over, I saw the ‘free cash’ sign. I think it was an advert for an ATM without charges rather than a campaign statement. When choosing a search engine, or curating a social network list it’s important to ensure you don’t only mix with those with whom one agrees. The reception consisted of a mix of speeches and sets. The speeches were by John Smith, Harriet Harman and Tony Burke. Smith, or was it Harman, …

Song, Stage, Subsidy and Copyright (of course)

I walked down to the People’s Museum where Unions 21 were hosting a series of meetings, the one I was planning to attend was about policy for the encouragement of SMEs in the creative industries and had been convened by the entertainment unions, the Musicians Union, Equity and BECTU, (Broadcasting Entertainment Cinematograph and Theatre Union) each represented by their General Secretaries. The meeting was opened by Helen Goodman, Labour’s shadow spokesperson on Culture Media and Sport.She opened with the mandatory eulogy to the attendees, that we have the most successful creative industry in the world. …

And FACT goes in again

Torrent freak reports that FACT are taking out another private prosecution. Again, like the Vickerman prosecution, it’s for a fraud charge. Is this to avoid a jury? Anyway it’s reported that the defendants have been arrested. Who by? I don’t think FACT have powers of arrest yet? Also the torrent freak article implies that a more normal process would be for the police to prosecute. In fact prosecution is the role of the Crown Prosecution Service, not the police, as any fan of Law and Order UK will tell you. …

Central Govt funds PIPCU

On 2nd Sept, Torrent Freak reports that Sajid Javid notes that central government is funding the City of London Police Intellectual Property Crime Unit. Javid’s speech is posted on gov.uk, and he says, …

Who do PIPCU serve?

Torrentfreak are following the activities of the City of London’s Police Intellectual Property Crime Unit; they reported one intervention in a story called “UK Police Accuse Domain Name Registrar of Facilitating Criminal Activity”. An extraordinary story in which a police force threaten domain registrars with action if they don’t take action on alleged infringing sites using their services. If you read the story, you’ll see the accusations and language used by the police seem to have forgotten the British legal principle of innocent until proved guilty. Many of the comments were the normal pro-piracy comments although there’s one or two more thoughtful. It provokes me to write the following, although I should shorten it if I choose to publish these views as a comment there. …

Not so open, a Bioware take on open source

This article represents some thoughts on how copy-left and permissive licences create value. It uses the story of Bioware and it’s use of the D&D™ and Forgotten Realms™ games & mythos as an example. There are two recent news items that make this current: that the community repository for Neverwinter Nights has just shut, and that Wizards of the Coast have just released Dungeons & Dragons V5 rules as a free to use .pdf, a small but significant step to a freemium business model. The story shows how an initially traditional author-publisher business model, leveraged a pre-made community, grew it and latterly enabled it. The point of this story is the way in which community and value grew, becoming significant author contributors and the way in which Bioware responded and learnt although some might say not as quickly or as generously as they might. …