The technology media has been filled with the story of the partnership dispute between One Laptop Per Child and Intel. For those unfamiliar with the story, OLPC is a non-profit organisation which produces affordable laptops to be sold to developing countries so that they can be distributed to children. The Read more…
The high-definition DVD war may be over as Paramount is set to choose Sony’s Blu-ray format. Earlier in the week, Warner announced that it was going to release its catalogue on Blu-ray, which analysts say pretty much spells the demise of HD-DVD. In my opinion, what really tipped the balance Read more…
(via Becky Hogge and others) The European Commission released last week a statement in which it seems to advocate for more DRM across Europe. Viviane Reding, the EU Commissioner for the Information Society and the Media, commented that: “We have to make a choice in Europe: Do we want to Read more…
Channel 4 has been airing a program called Picture This, where 6 members of the public who submitted their pictures to a competition were selected to compete for a gallery exhibition and a book deal. The program is being sponsored by Flikr, and I was pleasantly surprised to find that Read more…
Peter Jaszi, Professor at the American University Washington College of Law, has written to let us know of the release of a report on User Generated Content and copyright entitled Recut, Reframe, Recycle: Quoting Copyrighted Material in User-Generated Video. The study includes a blog. I’ll let the report’s press release Read more…
Various news sources have been reporting that the Beijing High Court has ruled in favour of popular search engine Baidu.com in a copyright infringement suit brought by major record companies. The dispute arose by the existence of a dedicated music search function called Baidu MP3, which allowed users to find Read more…
According to the BBC, Egypt will pass a new law which will require licence fees from anyone reproducing Egypt’s vast archaeological heritage, be it museum pieces or monuments. Although the article is not particularly clear on the details, the BBC interviewed Zahi Hawass, the chair of Egypt’s Supreme Council of Read more…
While this blog has achieved decent readership figures, the comment function is still rather under-used. There are several reasons for that: in my experience there seems to be a critical mass of readers vs comments, which I have not reached yet; Blogger’s interface does not encourage comments; and also most Read more…
Canadian bloggers and IT Law gurus Michael Geist and Howard Knopf have pulled an amazing feat using Facebook and Youtube. They posted a video on Youtube opposing a DMCA-like reform to Ottawa’s copyright law, and then created a group on Facebook that opposed the amendments, which managed to get 28,000 Read more…
(via Rena Gertz) When the scam becomes the scam, are we faced with post-modern fraud? This one pretty much redefines chutzpah. UNION BANK PLCCOMPENSATION OFFICE UNION BANK/ UNITED NATIONS 2007 SCAM VICTIMSCOMPENSATIONS PAYMENTS.ATTN: SIR/MADAM,REF/PAYMENTS CODE: UNB/06654 $150,000 USD.This is to bring to your notice that we are delegated from the Read more…