29 May 2003

Collaborative Mapping INTERTWINGLY net -- Jo Walsh is attempting to map the world. Here efforts show the appeal that RDF holds to so many. Dave Winer has long proselyticised enabling people who want to jot down notes in the simplest means while wanting to work together. If they do this inside a properly wired blog, they will be able to discern relevant nodes and arcs directly from search engines. Sam Ruby: Collaborative Mapping Jo Walsh: OSCOM proposal x_ref1256

Apple castrates iTunes BOING BOING -- This morning, Apple's Software Updater notified me that there was a patch for my iTunes 4 installation, a 4.1 patch that, according to the release notes, offers: a number of performance and network access enhancements including that it only allows music sharing between computers using iTunes 4.0.1 or later on a local network (in the same subnet) So, in other words, Apple has "enhanced" iTunes so that it can't be used to play music from one computer on another if they're on different subnets (i.e., if you have a computer at home that you stream to from work). Apple's apologists say that this is to prevent "stealing," but there are many legitimate uses for the feature (imagine if Paul Frank "enhanced" his jackets by sewing the pockets shut to make them less useful for shoplifters). Apple has removed a useful feature from its software, and its customers are out in the cold. I paid $50 or so for downloadable iTunes tracks, with the understanding that Apple had sold me something that would stream over the Internet. Yesterday, they had. Today, they took it away. And they called it an "enhancement." As Winston Smith said to O'Brien, "Don't piss in my mouth and tell me it's Victory Gin." Sure, I could just skip the update, but how long will that work for? When 10.3 ships next year, will I be able to run an unupdated iTunes on it? Will I have to pickle a computer and keep from updating it in order to continue to use my iTunes music in the way I was promised I could? Apple wants to be the leader of the Digital Lifestyle pack. The digital lifestyle is all about the fluidity of bits, the fact that all computers on the Internet are, in some sense, in the same place, no matter where they're physically located. But Apple is choosing to screw its customers and kowtow to the entertainment interests who have, at various times, tried to ban the piano roll, the radio, the VCR, and the Internet. They're putting the desires of the companies that tried to ban firewalls ahead of the legitimate expectations of their customers. A digital lifestyle designed by Hilary Rosen and Jack Valenti is a world of "consumers" (us) and "producers" (them). It's the opposite of the iApps philosophy. It's a world I don't want to live in. Cory Doctorow: Apple force-feeds customers shit, calls it sunshine SlashDot: Apple updates, cripples iTunes BBC: Apple iTunes updates irritate fans Image of iTunes from BBC. x_ref128

American IP law leads to farcical results CYBERLAW -- A disabled veteran/information studies grad husband-and-wife team in Florida set up a noncommercial website called "Virtual Office Team." Then Robert Half International, a California company, sicced its New York lawyers on the poor couple, who have $100 in the bank and live on VA benefits. Robert Half International asserts a trademark on OFFICETEAM, and their lawyers want the couple to cough up $10,000 and forswear their use of the phrase "Office Team," or they will seek a farcically gigantic judgement against them in a New York court, which the couple cannot afford to set foot in. Robert Half International has made a racket out of this. A single mom in Texas who registered virtualgalfriday.com is also being shaken down for thousands by the same white-shoe aggro lawyers on behalf of the same carpetbagging clients. IP law is out of control, that much is clear. Intellectual Property suits have become a kind of meteor strike, a random event can that interrupt your daily round by punching a flaming hole through your roof and striking you dead where you stand. Cory Doctorow: Trademarks can ruin your life Larry Lessig has compelling bad law archives x_ref261519