IPTAblog

This post is a tribute to the greatest post in the blog

2009-10-13T21:52:49Z

If a tribute band uses choreography that's so original that it can deserve copyright protection on its own, what does that say about how good the tribute band is as a tribute band? ACES - Four Tops & Motown Tribute Show (1991-2002)

"This routine seen here is currently being used without consent in The Magic of Motown show and How Sweet It Is. Freddie Lee Peterkin is taking legal action against these shows for infringement of copyright of his original dramatic works."

And a gratuitous link to the video of Tenacious D's masterpiece, Tribute

Franken on Net Neutrality

2009-10-12T18:47:49Z

I missed the Future of Music Policy Summit this year, but Senator Al Franken gave a keynote address that summarizes concisely the key concerns about the need for net neutrality, framed in terms of a First Amendment free speech concern and secondly about creating entrepeneurial opportunities (rather than enabling and entrenching incumbents.) Al Franken Keynote Address to Future of Music Policy Summit 2009, "The stifling of openness on the Internet isn’t always about censorship. In the future, it could simply be a product of business at work – of ISPs turning a profit."

C-SPAN, The Future of Music Policy Summit 2009 - Keynote by Sen. Al Franken (D-MN), REM Songwriter Mike Mills, and FCC Chair Julius Genachowski participate in the Future of Music Policy Summit 2009, which examines the direction of the digital music industry.

Tasty, Tasty Sausage

2009-09-24T15:32:40Z

This story about the natural gas industry losing out to dirtier fossil fuels in the energy bill on NPR's Morning Edition demonstrates the fundamental problem with Federal policymaking today, With Little Clout, Natural Gas Lobby Strikes Out: "[Former Senator Tim] Wirth told the industry leaders that on Waxman-Markey, they blew it. 'Every industry was deeply engaged, except one: Yours,' he said. 'The natural gas industry, the industry with the most to gain and the most to offer, was not at the bargaining table.' It's an especially harsh verdict because the Waxman-Markey bill was drafted only after high-profile negotiations with proponents of coal, nuclear, oil, wind, solar and other energy sources."

If natural gas is so important to national energy policy, why does the industry need to advocate for inclusion in that policy? If it's so important, shouldn't that be advocated by the Congressional staffs and civil service experts who are engaging in policy analysis to determine the best policy outcome for the public interest, rather than the policy outcomes best advocated by the various lobbies?

FCC Set to Adopt Open Internet Rules

2009-09-23T21:52:06Z

In a speech on Monday at the Brookings Institution, new FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski proposed that the FCC adopt a stronger position and be more actively involved in regulating an open Internet.

To date, the Federal Communications Commission has addressed these issues by announcing four Internet principles that guide our case-by-case enforcement of the communications laws. These principles can be summarized as: Network operators cannot prevent users from accessing the lawful Internet content, applications, and services of their choice, nor can they prohibit users from attaching non-harmful devices to the network.… Today, I propose that the FCC adopt the existing principles as Commission rules, along with two additional principles that reflect the evolution of the Internet and that are essential to ensuring its continued openness.…

The fifth principle is one of non-discrimination -- stating that broadband providers cannot discriminate against particular Internet content or applications. This means they cannot block or degrade lawful traffic over their networks, or pick winners by favoring some content or applications over others in the connection to subscribers’ homes. Nor can they disfavor an Internet service just because it competes with a similar service offered by that broadband provider. The Internet must continue to allow users to decide what content and applications succeed.

The sixth principle is a transparency principle -- stating that providers of broadband Internet access must be transparent about their network management practices.

The FCC launched OpenInternet.gov to share information.

Reactions and Reporting:
William McGeveran, Info/Law, FCC to Propose Net Neutrality Rules "This will be a major fight, probably the most significant battle we have seen within the federal government over the structure of the internet."

Marguerite Reardon, CNet, Verizon, AT&T: Net neutrality not OK for wireless "Verizon and AT&T, which operate the nation's largest and second-largest cell phone networks, respectively, say the rules should not apply to wireless Internet access."

Comcast Executive Vice President David L. Cohen asks Does the Internet Need More Regulation? "The Internet in America has been a phenomenal success that has spawned technological and business innovation unmatched anywhere in the world. So it’s still fair to ask whether increased regulation of the Internet is a solution in search of a problem."

Nate Anderson, Ars Technica, ISPs react, sort of support network neutrality—with caveats: "In one important sense, the 'openness' advocates have already won the first round of the debate: the way the issue is framed. As you can see from the statements below, no companies will come out against the idea of being 'open,' at least when it comes to wired networks."

Ryan Singel, Wired, FCC Backs Net Neutrality — And Then Some: "FCC chairman Julius Genachowski delivered Monday on President Obama’s promise to back ‘net neutrality.’ But he went much further than merely seeking to expand rules that prohibit ISPs from filtering or blocking net traffic — he proposed that they cover all broadband connections, including data connections for smartphones."

Saul Hansell, The New York Times, F.C.C. Chairman Seeks to Protect Free Flow of Internet Data: "Perhaps most significantly, Mr. Genachowski will propose that the net neutrality principles be formally adopted as commission rules, a lengthy procedure that involves several rounds of public comment. His predecessor, Kevin Martin, avoided making formal rules, arguing that the industry changes too quickly. He preferred to respond to complaints when they were filed."

David Weinberger, NPR, Net Neutrality And Beyond: "But [regulation is] only necessary because the way we deliver Internet in this country waves at least three major Temptations to Discriminate in the faces of the access providers. 1. A provider may want to gain advantage over a competitor's services — like Apple not allowing Google's phone service on the iPhone. 2. It may honestly believe that its users want it to give the delivery of (for example) video priority over the delivery of e-mails or search results. 3. Or, it may view discrimination as triage necessary to handle high volumes of traffic."

And finally, a new blog focusing on these rulemaking proceedings from law professors Jim Speta (Northwestern), Tim Wu (Columbia) Christopher Yoo (Penn) is at Net Neutrality Rules.

Teaching Copyright

2009-09-17T20:43:19Z

According to the program's web site, Music Rules is "a free educational program designed to encourage respect for intellectual property and responsible use of the Internet among students in grades 3-8."

At Ars Technica, Nate Anderson takes a look at the curriculum, which happens to be sponsored by the RIAA, Back to school with RIAA-funded copyright curriculum: "If this sounds more like 'propaganda' than 'education,' that's probably because Big Content funds such educational initiatives to decrease what it variously refers to in these curricula as 'songlifting,' 'bootlegging,' and 'piracy."

I tend to think that copyright basics are part of the discussion about information literacy, plagarism and general internet skills that should be taught as part of teaching in the digital age, as copyright is not just recordings, but also text, images and movies.

This one goes to eleven

2009-08-11T19:37:03Z

As a 14 year old, Coleman Hickey made a stop-motion music video of Spinal Tap's "Tonight I'm Going to Rock You, Tonight" using Legos.

The New York Times reports that Spinal Tap sought to include the video on a new concert DVD, but that Lego denied permission. Lego Rejects a Bit Part in a Spinal Tap DVD

"As final editing was being done on a concert DVD of the tour, which included footage from the video projected on stage, Lego declined to grant permission to use its figures, which are protected by copyright.

"'We love that our fans are so passionate and so creative with our products,' said Julie Stern, a spokeswoman for Lego Systems, the United States division of the Lego Group, a Danish company founded in the 1930s. 'But it had some inappropriate language, and the tone wasn't appropriate for our target audience of kids 6 to 12.'"

The Times quotes Tap's attorney, Kia Kamran, saying that the band would have likely prevailed in a copyright infringement suit, because Hickey’s video "does not show the brand's logo and is satirical," but the band "did not deem the fight worth the expense."

Spinal Tap, Lego and copyright infringement together in one story, what could be better?

Variety reports that Warner Brothers and Lego are in talks to move ahead with a Lego film, Warner builds pic with Lego, "
WB is toying with plans to develop a movie around Lego and its popular building blocks. Scribes Dan and Kevin Hageman are penning the script for the family comedy that will mix live action and animation. Warners is keeping the plot tightly under wraps, but it's described as an action adventure set in a Lego world."

Accountability and the Public Option

2009-07-24T22:57:33Z

In the New York Times Magazine this past week, Peter Singer writes about health care rationing and determining the value of health care. Why We Must Ration Health Care. Towards the end, Singer writes,

"Will Americans allow their government, either directly or through an independent agency like NICE, to decide which treatments are sufficiently cost-effective to be provided at public expense and which are not? They might, under two conditions: first, that the option of private health insurance remains available, and second, that they are able to see, in their own pocket, the full cost of not rationing health care."

Under a state-run single payer national health program, as in the UK and Canada, the state is tasked with making this cost-value calculation. A national health service may not pay for a procedure where the life value is thought to be less than its cost.

But in the American system of private health insurance, don't insurers already place a value on life? And they are asking that question as "is this good for shareholders," rather than "does the public interest in general welfare support the cost?" Aside from the small minority of Americans who can afford to pay for their health care at retail cost, most Americans rely on the judgment of their health insurance carrier to determine whether a procedure is cost-effective or not.

In theory, a free market allows customers to pick and choose between insurance plans and coverage. But in the absence of stricter regulation, the public is fairly limited in which plans they can choose. In addition, individuals typically rely on employer-provided health insurance, which makes switching carriers to a more responsive carrier or comprehensive plan difficult.

A state-run single payer plan is accountable to the people. While it might be a bureaucratic mess, how could dealing with that bureaucracy be any worse than dealing with a private sector health insurance company? With a public plan, these cost-benefit decisions are ultimately under the control of Congress, and each elected representative or Senator is accountable to his or her constituents.

Private health insurances companies are primarily held accountable by their shareholders, for whom the primary reason for owning stock is profit (especially for the large institutional investors who hold enough stock to have an impact on electing the board.) State regulators do not have the same direct chain of oversight that Congress would have over a national public health insurance plan. So wouldn't a Federal health plan be more accountable to the people it covers than the private health insurance industry?

(In general, health insurance companies are serving their stockholders by insuring only the healthiest people to subsidize as little use of the health system as possible. Perhaps public health is a public good, and a goal of its own right that is never going to be an efficient market when incentivized by profit.

If you really want to hear about it

2009-07-01T21:49:51Z

The NYT City Room blog reports that J.D. Salinger won a preliminary injunction in his lawsuit against the writer of , Judge Rules for Salinger in Copyright Suit: "In a 37-page ruling filed on Wednesday, Judge Batts issued a preliminary injunction — indefinitely barring the publication, advertising or distribution of the book in this country — after considering the merits of the case."

Without reading 60 Years Later: Coming Through the Rye or the ruling, it's difficult to see what features made the book an infringing derivative work rather than transformative fair use parody.

Here is the order granting the preliminary injunction, Salinger v. Colting (09-Civ-5095, July 1, 2009)

The best fan video in the world?

2009-05-15T16:06:46Z

Via Top Gear's blog, I found this link to a fan-made Top Gear style search for the beat driving road in California:

The Californians were disappointed that Top Gear dismissed the entirety of North America while searching for the best driving road in the world. So, they went to look for the best driving road in California and ended up creating an hour-long film chronicling their journey, in the style of Top Gear.

And they get the Top Gear style dead on.

Three white male presenters embark on a road trip in different cars, each of which represents a different interpretation of a common theme. In this fan film, the theme is sporty cars purchased for less than $5,000. A driver in a racing helmet sets lap times and a marker to race against (ala The Stig.) The three presenters compete in various challenges and comment on their respective cars and how a particular drive represents a broader theme about motoring, masculinity, nationality, or some metaphor for life. During the road trip, the three presenters are filmed from dashboard mounted cameras. Often, a presenter's voiceover narration melds seamlessly into thoughts spoken while driving during the road trip. Scenes open with a camera zooming out from a car or panning across a landscape with the frames heavily vignetted vignetting. Liberal use of shots of the 3 presenters driving alongside on the highway and the way in which music is used in the soundtrack all follow the Top Gear style.

Does that make it a copyright infringement?

If enough of the elements that make up Top Gear are borrowed, is the style used in a manner consistent with fair use? This is a non-commercial, non-competitive work that responds to a particular segment filmed on Top Gear. The Search for the Greatest Driving Road in California adopts the style to respond to and parody Top Gear. The creators sought to call out Top Gear for their snub of California's roads-- in other words, to criticize Top Gear, by showing that Top Gear could have found a road in California worthy of comparison with those in the Alps.

Were this a pilot for a series commissioned by a network, would this be an infringing work? (A pilot for an American version of Top Gear, starring Adam Corolla, was made for and ultimately passed on by NBC last year.)

Shatner, Montalban, iPod and Kindle

2009-04-30T20:15:38Z

Dvice tests out the range of expression in the text-to-speech systems in the Kindle 2 and iPod Shuffle by having the two gadgets re-enact the most memorable scene from Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan:

Good audiobook readings aren't in any danger of being replaced by computers, yet.

Previously:
More Kindling (Mar. 9)
Fitter, Happier, More Productive (Feb. 27)
Take a look, it's in a book (Feb. 11)

A F#*&ing brilliant Supreme Court ruling?

2009-04-28T21:00:02Z

The Supreme Court released its ruling in FCC v. Fox Television Stations, et al. (07-582), in which a 5-4 majority found that the FCC acted on a rational basis in changing its policy on fleeting expletives. In an opinion penned by Justice Scalia, the Court declined to rule on the First Amendment question of whether indecency regulations are still constitutional. The majority decided the administrative law issue and sent the First Amendment issue back to the Second Circuit.

In his brief concurrence, Justice Thomas suggested that technology and today's fractured media landscape may not bode well for indecency regulation in a future case testing the constitutionality of broadcast indecency regulation.

Lyle Denniston, Scotusblog, Court partly upholds “dirty words” ban, "The main opinion stressed that it was dealing only with the question of whether the flat ban was “arbitrary and capricious” as a matter of law. The Court said it did not violate that standard, but that is as far as the ruling went. The Second Circuit Court, when the case returns there, will have a chance to pass upon broadcasters’ constitutional challenges to the ban. The lower court did not do so on the first review, but strongly hinted then that the ban would not survive a direct First Amendment challenge."

The Wall Street Journal, Court Upholds FCC 'Fleeting Expletive' Rule "The court reversed a lower court ruling that the Federal Communications Commission didn't follow proper procedures in adopting its new rule. But the ruling, by Justice Antonin Scalia, didn't address the underlying constitutional issue -- whether the First Amendment permits the FCC to punish such speech."

Los Angeles Times, Supreme Court upholds regulation of 'indecent' language on TV: "The Supreme Court said today that TV viewers should not be hit with the 'F-word' or the 'S-word' during prime-time broadcasts, upholding the government's power to impose huge fines on broadcasters for airing a single expletive."

Adam Bonin at Daily Kos, nicely summarizes the key points of the opinion and various dissenting and concurring opinions, SCOTUS Issues "F**king Brilliant" Decision

Previously:
FCC v. Fox Oral Arguments Today (11/08)
Court Grants Cert in FCC v. Fox (3/08)
Second Circuit strikes strict indecency regs (6/07)
Fox v. FCC Oral Arguments (12/06)

Food & Trademark News

2009-04-23T21:12:28Z

The New York Times reports, Lawyers Enter Twitter Tempest: "Mr. Rucinsky, a 30-year-old part-time art dealer who uses his middle name as his last name when he writes, sends silly blurbs on Twitter and writes inane blog postings that purport to reflect Ms. Freeman's musings about New York City restaurants, like 'Governor of Texas raving about Secession on TV all week. Must be great word of mouth for Bouley!' His fake Restaurant Girl also ventures into more cosmic concerns: 'Does anyone know what happens to all the chocolate bunnies no one bought for Easter? Are they put to sleep?'"

Freeman does have a trademark registration for RESTAURANT GIRL. Ruckinsky's Twitter account at twitter.com/restaurantgirl claims to be "an unaffiliated parody of Danyelle Freeman, the real Restaurant Girl who can be found at restaurantgirl.com. She's not this clever or ambitious."

NY Magazine's Grub Street blog reports, Hershey's Tells Jacques Torres to 'Kiss' His Champagne Bon Bons Good-bye -- Grub Street: New York Magazine's Food and Restaurant Blog: "Jacques Torres tells us that he recently received a letter from a lawyer for Hershey's Chocolate telling him that the 'Champagne Kiss' he's been serving for two years (a $1.50 bon bon made with pink Champagne) is an infringement of the Hershey's Kiss copyright (sic)." (That would be a trademark.)

Is Internet TV the Future?

2009-03-27T20:37:35Z

HDnet's Mark Cuban and Boxee's Avner Ronen have had an interesting public dialog about the future of TV: a lively debate with mark cuban. Ronen posits that viewers will flock to internet video because of the breadth of content while Cuban suspects that traditional distribution will trump all because of quality.

I suspect that they're both right.

Traditional broadcast/cable/satellite distribution is far better at broadcasting popular material to many people at once in high quality. Over-the-air HD broadcast far surpasses internet video in quality and scales easily.

With live events and the first airing of serial entertainment, the desire to watch live and then the correlated value in watching together for watercooler (or online watercooler) discussions keeps broadcasts relevant. If American Idol happened last night, you're going to talk about it tonight. For audio/video quality and currency, broadcast wins.

The internet opens up a vast variety of material available. Between archived material from legacy copyright owners and new material produced for the internet by small independent producers (often at shockingly low costs), the internet has a wealth of content that can't be matched by traditional broadcast or cablecast distribution.

On Tuesday, Boxee gathered 600 users, fans and partners at Webster Hall to learn about new features coming to the next version of the software as well as some of the internet-based content available through the platform. And to get free T-shirts. (Thanks, Boxee.)

Boxee is an internet video browser for a television. It makes it possible to sit on your couch and watch online video from a multitude of sources on your TV, instead of in front of your computer.

What's interesting is that Boxee users seem prefer to access sources approved by copyright owners. More users want to access Hulu than to download video files via Bittorrent. They want the program creators to be able to earn money (and continue to film new programs.) Boxee the company wants to offer the best experience to its users (for free) while also helping to drive revenue to the content providers. And the internet video content providers want to get their material onto TV. (Well, except for the networks who have traditional distribution which may be cannibalized by internet distribution. Since ads sell for higher rates on the broadcast or cablecast than for the same content streamed over the internet, taking the internet version to TV may simple replace higher-value audience with lower-value audience.)

Boxee is going to remain a niche product for the immediate future. Not many people have computers hooked up to their TV to watch internet programming. I have Boxee installed on my Apple TV. Installing Boxee is not the easiest process, since it requires creating a USB "patchstick" which then installs the Boxee software on Apple TV. Boxee provides a useful supplement to Apple's software, which works very well for downloaded and ripped content stored locally in iTunes, but is limited to streaming content only from YouTube, not from the rest of the internet. Boxee connects the TV to the rest of that streaming.

The alpha version can be confusing and frustrating to use, with the main menu hidden off to the side of the screen. Compared to the Apple TV's native interface, Boxee's can feel second-rate. In most contexts, Apple's interface uses larger fonts and higher-contrast text that is easier to read from the couch. Boxee's alpha software isn't nearly as polished as AppleTV's second-generation interface.

While I have an Apple TV and use Boxee to watch shows, I also still subscribe to cable television and will prefer to watch programs recorded on TiVo to programs streamed on Boxee. The picture and sound quality is far superior on cable TV. That isn't to say that internet distribution won't get better in the future.

How immediate is this future? Boxee is actively working to develop their software to make it easy to use. And the fact that it is slightly clunky now isn't much of a detriment to the early adopters and nerds who are using this young software. The viewer who doesn't have the patience to learn the software is certainly not going to take the time to patch an Apple TV or connect a computer up to their TV as a media player. This version of Boxee is a glimpse at the next generation of television, where Boxee is the default interface for a set-top box or a television itself. Ronen expects to see such boxes running Boxee available within the next year.

And that's when the masses are going to be disappointed with their broadband connection and the quality internet video.

Netflix is finding that some users of its streaming service get less than ideal quality because of the variables involved in the networks between the user and Netflix. Many US "broadband" internet connections simply don't have the bandwidth to stream HD video and so the quality falls back to something lower.

How good is good enough? MP3 suffices for most music listeners. But having recently upgraded to an HDTV, I can't imagine going back to fuzzy low resolution video.

Until the broadband networks in America catch up to those in the countries that have higher-bandwidth networks, internet video is likely going to remain a secondary niche. Of the two programs I watched online this week, The Amazing Race's stream had a few instances where motion became jerky and the audio and video fell out of sync. On Kings, the picture was noticeably blurrier than my HD recording of the pilot. Overall, these were pretty good viewing experiences, but still materially inferior to programs recorded from cable.

Cable companies have offered their own video-on-demand services since the advent of digital cable. Edge-caching content at a major ISP may be cheaper for streaming media than for the ISP to upgrade its service. In addition, bandwidth limits and caps drive video usage to legacy networks. Even with IP-delivered video, cable companies could favor in-house on-demand video over video sourced from the internet at large.

The internet is the future of video, with shows living there long after they've been broadcast. But that doesn't mean that broadcast is imminently disappearing.

Previously: Preparing for the Post-TV World

Subtitles and Meaning

2009-03-24T22:16:52Z

Consumerist, Movies: Dumbed Down Subtitles Ruin US Release Of 'Let The Right One In': "What if you started to watch Let The Right One In, a highly acclaimed foreign film from last year, and you discovered the US release had been renamed Open Up!? That's sort of the experience consumers are having when watching the new release of the movie on DVD and Blu-ray. At some point between the theatrical release and the DVD release, the distributor replaced the original, nuanced English subtitles with dumbed-down ones."

What was the situation that led up to replacing the original subtitles with second-rate subtities? A licensing issue? Does the filmmaker have a claim against the distributor for mangling the original intent of the film with bad subtitles? Does the structure of film distribution contracts leave the filmmaker with any recourse? Is there a moral rights concern?

More Kindling

2009-03-10T03:02:21Z

Even though Amazon agreed to allow authors and publishers the right to decide whether Kindle e-books can be read aloud, here are couple more (belated) links about Kindle 2 reading e-books via text-to-speech synthesizer.

LA Times, Amazon Kindle 2 makes authors' e-Books more compelling, "Innovators such as Amazon are and should be free to create devices that help consumers exploit all of the rights they obtain when they purchase books and other copyrighted material. And by the way, Authors Guild: Amazon sells e-books. The Kindle makes those products more appealing to consumers, which makes them more valuable to authors and publishers. If authors hope to compete in the digital era, they need the e-book market to succeed. Stripping features from the Kindle 2 won't help."

Derek Bambauer, Info/Law, Kindle Owners of the World, Unite!: "Roy Blount Jr., writer and president of the Author’s Guild, has a jeremiad in the New York Times about Amazon’s Kindle, and its ability to read books aloud. Blount thinks that is a violation of authors’ rights. After giving some thought to his argument, I can only conclude that Blount should stick to sports, because he’s pretty confused about copyright."

Ben Sheffner, Copyrights & Campaigns, Amazon compromises on Kindle 2's 'read-to-me' feature; who can blame them?: "Remember: Amazon can only offer books via Kindle because it has contracts with authors and/or publishers that permit it to reproduce, display, and distribute their books in digital form. I haven't seen such contracts, but I'm confident they contain myriad deal points: money, term of license, and exquisite detail about what Amazon is actually permitted to do with the digital copies."

On Late Night with Jimmy Falllon, Kindle 2 reads the classics:

Which is a similar, but opposite joke, as Late Night with Conan O'Brien's James Lipton reads the lyrics to Kevin Federline's Popozao.