To my mind, the RIAA's only legitimate beef is with businesses that sell music without first procuring a license.  If you're cutting CDs and selling them out of a stall, you're a pirate, and I respect the RIAA's right to go after you.  I may think it's a bad idea, but I won't try to stop them from doing it.

But if the RIAA thinks it has the right to rent individual songs to me, and doesn't want me to be able to share a song I've purchased on CD with my cousin, I say: "Let's see you make that business model stick first.  Then we can talk." 

The old DIVX disaster from several years ago is instructive.  They can't make that business model work, no matter how much they wish it would.  And I shouldn't be penalized for that.  It's called a Free Market.

6:39:50 PM   

The idea that compulsory licensing would make person-to-person, non-commercial music file swapping as legal as listening to the radio is a very powerful one.  File swapping is the modern-day equivalent of the radio.  Not only do people use it the same way, it has the same effect: it promotes music and artists.

I've been saying "file sharing is music promotion" for literally years.  I just dug up an email from September 2000 on the subject, where I asserted: "Piracy == Advertising."

6:29:38 PM   

News.com   Kazaa getting support from telecommunications companies like Verizon.  Why?  They recognize that downloading large media files drive DSL sales.  Without available content, this need dries up.  New terms for those catching up on this issue:  "compulsory licensing" and Intellectual Property User Fee (IPUF). [John Robb's Radio Weblog]

I don't care if you call is compulsory licensing or a user fee -- so long as it takes power away from the entertainment cartel.  Enough foot dragging already.

5:43:06 PM   

The unveiling of Creative Commons. Molly is presenting. The public domain: a lawyer-free zone. Islands of intellectual property in the sea of public domain. In the old days you had to put a copyright notice. The shift: Automatic copyright, leaving small islands of public domain. It's difficult for people to make their works more available than the default copyright allows. CC wants to cultivate the public domain. Restore the balance. They're focusing on non-software. Possible custom licenses: attribution req'd, noncommercial, no derivative works, non-public (this is already allowed by fair use, but it helps to clarify), copyleft. Simple icons to indicate what's going on. Not actually launching until fall. Pain is setting in early, so that's it. [Hack the Planet]

Okay, I don't have anything to say about this right now, and it hasn't been launched yet, but keep an eye on The Creative Commons.  It is, among other things, a way to kick the lawyers back off the Internet.  More later.

5:33:29 PM   

Spectrum is a nonrivalrous resource. David Reed, on the panel following Larry Lessig's talk, is speaking about a fundamental flaw at the heart of the FCC's management of spectrum. The FCC assumes that spectrum is rivalrous. It isn't: ... [Jon's Radio]

This is significant.  New research suggests that there exists a mechanism whereby spectrum (such as that used by cellphones and wireless handheld computers) can be shared between an unlimited number of users (by changing the topology of the network formed by these connected devices).

The public policy implication is that the FCC should quit auctioning spectrum.  This is potentially huge.  The US government is not good at auctioning spectrum.

5:25:25 PM   

Gummi bears defeat fingerprint sensors. McGyver would've loved this! [Adam Curry: Adam Curry's Weblog]

An article from the Register summarizing an essay from Bruce Schneier's latest Crypto-Gram newsletter.  The great thing about this story is not that the researcher was able to easily foil sophisticated fingerprint readers 80% of the time using off-the-shelf ingredients.  No, the great thing about this story is that the researcher is a mathematician.  He knows nothing about fingerprint readers.  Anybody could have done this.

Security engineering is tough.  Do the manufacturers of these fingerprint readers even try to break their own equipment?  It sure doesn't appear to be difficult.  The take-away from this research: no fingerprint reader on the market is secure.

5:16:13 PM