IPcentral Weblog: July 2006 Archives

July 2006 Archives

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07.31.2006

Open source DRM back on track

From DRMWatch, an update on an open-source DRM project. . . And They said it couldn't be done.

posted by Solveig Singleton @ 3:43 PM | DRM & Watermarks, etc.

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Music lawyer Chris Castle, who was part of PFF's recent panel on The Role of Music Licensing in a Digital Age, explains Why You Hate Net Neutrality If You Love Copyright, in Music News.

He notes that a P2P application such as BitTorrent is:

an extraordinary bandwidth hog because the “overhead” required to keep it running is exponential to the number of connections and the speed of those connections on the peer-to-peer network. . . . . Some have estimated it is as high as 90%, and one would have to assume that nearly all of this traffic is illegal.

The effect is described by an ISP rep to whom Castle links:

Continue reading Copyright, Copyleft & Net Neutrality . . .

posted by James DeLong @ 1:52 PM | Telecom

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Switching to Open Source, Not Exactly Taking Candy from a Baby

SourceForge has an interesting article on switching to open source. Even reading about such a thing is painstakingly difficult. Wharton professor, Gerald Faulhaber, summarizes the issue well.

Linux would remain the system for techies but it won't be a mass-market product. The genius of [Microsoft Chairman] Bill Gates is that he understands that.

posted by Noel Le @ 12:07 PM | Free Culture Movement

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More Heresy (or at Least a Question)

Thinking about all the people who hold firm to the the dumb network, the end-to-end principle, net neutrality, and the rest of the conventional catechism, it seems to me that most of them are associated with universities or large tech companies that are connected to Internet2, which is

Led by more than 200 U.S. universities, working with industry and government, Internet2 develops and deploys advanced network applications and technologies for research and higher education, accelerating the creation of tomorrow's Internet.

Internet2 also seems to offer a opportunities for special services, which are not available in a a totally even-handed fashion as soon as one signs up.

PFF, along with the general ruck of humanity, is not on Internet2. So, to continue the religious theme, is this a case of the medieval monks living it up while preaching poverty, chastity, and obedience to the suckers? We all know where that led.

posted by James DeLong @ 10:06 AM | Internet: P2P, Search Engines...

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Heresy!

We all know, with a certainty once reserved for Christians reciting the Nicene Creed, that the Internet must consist of dumb networks, with all the intelligence at the edges. There is no other road to salvation. (Though a Cisco employee might occasionally grouse: "What d'ya mean dumb? Every one of our routers has about 30 million lines of computer operating code!")

Now, some DVR users are raising the possibility that perhaps the edges should be dumber and the network smarter. Where will this end?

Of course, there are a few legal issues to be worked out.

posted by James DeLong @ 9:49 AM | Internet: P2P, Search Engines...

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New Business Models

The NYT today reports that

At least three of the biggest broadband providers — Comcast, Verizon and Adelphia — are striking deals for television programs, music and video games that cannot be readily found elsewhere on the Web. In this way, they are applying the cable TV model to the Internet by providing a distribution vehicle for entertainment programming.

But it is not clear that this is the best strategy:

Not all broadband providers are making bets on proprietary content. Some, like EarthLink, BellSouth and Cox, are sticking to their technical roots.
“Exclusivity is one of many competitive strategies to consider, and you have to be very thoughtful about it,” said Bob Wilson, senior vice president for programming at Cox. “Otherwise you and your competitors can end up just trying to ‘out-exclusive’ each other, and all you accomplish is bidding up your costs and making the content providers rich.”

Naturally, yelping is already being heard in the land, but from here it looks like a creative response to technological and market changes. Place your bets, ladies and gentlemen, and let the great Schumpeterian wheel spin.

posted by James DeLong @ 9:23 AM | Markets: Business, Investment & Innovation

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07.28.2006

DRM For Consumers

InformationWeek has a pretty good article on Apple . Although it takes a funny position on the DMCA, the article rightly calls-out the benefits of DRM to consumers.

Apple's DRM has benefited the public and the music industry. It was Apple's technology platform that convinced the music industry to sell music and videos online. The iPod and its FairPlay DRM created a legal digital music market where none had existed before. While the iPod eco-system isn't without its problems, it's clear that Apple and its DRM have done some good.

posted by Noel Le @ 4:40 PM | DRM & Watermarks, etc.

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Video Games & Innovation

I suppose you could argue that a 37-year-old father of two shouldn't still be playing video games, but I love 'em and just can't give them up. I'll probably still be playing when I'm 80 inside a virtual holodeck down in some lame Florida retirement community. (God I hope my Golden Years are that exciting).

These days, I just don't have the time to play the more sophisticated action & adventure games that I used to love the most, so I now spend most of my time with "single-session" games, especially sports games that allow me to play a quick game and then put it aside for awhile. Last night, while I was sitting in my basement with my kids playing an intense Michigan vs. Ohio State matchup on EA's marvelous new "NCAA Football 2007," my mind started drifting back to all the other football games I've played through the years on multiple platforms. In particular, I remembered the very first sports game I ever bought was "Atari Football" back in the late 1970s. At the time, I thought it was about the most cutting-edge thing ever invented. Today, of course, it looks absolutely primitive. Just look at this! ...

Continue reading Video Games & Innovation . . .

posted by Adam Thierer @ 12:54 PM | Games

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GPLv3 &Torvalds

The C|Net News subhead tells the story:

The second draft of a revised General Public License has been released, but Linus Torvalds--founder and leader of [Linux], the best-known software project governed by the GPL, remains unconvinced of its merits.

As was true of the earlier draft of v3, Torvalds' concerns focus on the DRM provisions, as discussed here yesterday.

In one respect, though, Torvalds seems overly optimistic. He thinks he can hold himself, and Linux, apart from any undesirable changes in the GPL:

Linux, however, is not likely to be affected by the changes in GPLv3. Torvalds explicitly chose to license the operating system kernel under version 2--not version 2 or later as the Free Software Foundation suggests. "In a very real sense, the Linux kernel is perhaps the least relevant of all the projects that use the GPL when it comes to the new version," Torvalds said.

But the kernel of Linux, while crucial, is only a part of any complete Linux distribution, so other crucial code in a distribution might well be covered by the new license terms even if the kernel is not. The result may be a kind of super-forking of code, where users must maintain a database that shows line-by-line what code is covered by what version of the GPL, and whether the individual code writer added any terms that that affect Applications Service Providers, as would be permitted by GPLv3.

For lots of earlier IPCentral discussion of the issue, search the blog for GPLv3.

posted by James DeLong @ 11:48 AM | Software

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07.27.2006

Plans for Ireland

Ireland hosts some of the largest European based research centers for various US technology companies. Recently, its Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment outlined his government’s new Strategy for Science, Technology and Innovation. Objectives of the plan, which aims further to make Ireland a “leading knowledge economy by 2013,” include “driving industrial policy by simplifying the R&D Grants Scheme and a providing a new IP Commercialisation Fund for Irish Universities.” The Minister also addressed industry involvement in the plan:

…new in-company R&D initiatives will bring together for the first time, under a single heading within each Agency, financial supports for company-led research projects by the Agency clients, providing an integrated and unified approach capable of meeting their needs flexibly and efficiently…it is anticipated that, when these schemes are launched, they will not only facilitate companies in embedding a sustainable culture of innovation in their own organizations, through in-house R&D activity, but will, thereby, allow Ireland to reach its targets for increased R&D expenditure set out under the Strategy.

posted by Noel Le @ 3:54 PM | International

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07.27.2006

GPLv3 Discussion Draft #2 & DRM

posted by James DeLong @ 3:16 PM | Software

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