"A better idea would be a site where people who have ideas/designs/creations that they want releasing into the wild can do so that nobody else can monopolise them."
You've just invented copyright. Congratulations.
Posts by Andrew Orlowski
1435 publicly visible posts • joined 6 Sep 2006
One-click, net-modelled UK copyright hub comes a step closer
Is EU right to expand 'right to be forgotten' to Google.com?
Wednesday 3rd December 2014 14:03 GMT 
Re: Um... What Gonzalez vs Google Sp. actually said:
@Velv No - that ship has sailed. Google actually went to great lengths to structure itself so it could evade rulings like this. The Court judged that if it does business here and crunches data here, it must comply with the law here.
It's all because Google doesn't want to be classed as a publisher. In an alternative history, Google could have begun to minimise the risk as soon as it entered Europe, by arguing for special "search engine" exemptions, for being a "special kind of publisher," if you like. Given its lobbying muscle, it would have probably got them by now.
Wednesday 3rd December 2014 10:40 GMT
Um... What Gonzalez vs Google Sp. actually said:
It's easy to look up the CJEU Gonzalez ruling - but since you were in a hurry, I'll help you.
http://curia.europa.eu/juris/document/document.jsf?docid=152065&doclang=en
Tim: "The legal jurisdiction something takes place in is the legal jurisdiction where the browser being used to view the intertubes is. It is not where the server is, it is not where the company owning the content or the search is located, nor where the person who prepared it lives nor any other variation."
This is what the court said [43]:
Google does business in the member state and "possesses separate legal personality. Its activities are targeted essentially at undertakings based in Spain, acting as a commercial agent for the Google group in that Member State. Its objects are to promote, facilitate and effect the sale of on-line advertising products and services to third parties and the marketing of that advertising."
Google agrees, apparently, when it suits Google:
"Google Inc. designated Google Spain as the controller, in Spain, in respect of two filing systems registered by Google Inc. with the AEPD; those filing systems were intended to contain the personal data of the customers who had concluded contracts for advertising services with Google Inc."
Tim: "...paedophile mass murderer but it was only the once and I've been to confession now so nobody should know about it)"
Only information that is "inadequate, irrelevant or no longer relevant, or excessive in relation to the purposes of the processing" [92-94] maybe considered a breach of privacy and eligible for a deletion request.
If there is "a preponderant interest of the general public in having, on account of inclusion in the list of results, access to the information in question…" then the request for deletion should be rejected.
There is quite a lot of UK case law relating to interpeting what this means: the courts are not in unchartered territory.
Tim: "However, the way that this has been extended does rather leave the impression that there's some airbrushing of history going on."
Yes, and Google is doing so quite deliberately. The strategy is non-compliance. Google is entitled to bounce a request for a deletion up to the information commissioner - and let them sweat over it. If you look at the Telegraph's list you will see Google has now made hundreds of deletions of stories about criminal convictions which it did not need to make. All could, and should,have been bounced up to the ICO - we would expect a search engine that blathers on about freedom of information and "the public's right to know" to do just that, wouldn't we?
(As a digression - who but a numpty would rely on a search engine to be their "historian" - rather than a specialist information service? This actually looks like a market opportunity for LexisNexis to me. Nothing in this ruling airbrushes anything from real archives).
Ultimately, we may actually agree that privacy laws are awful and our lives as journalists would be so much easier without them. Or we may disagree. But if Europe is to have a law, then the Court rules that it must apply to everyone, not just the wealthy who can afford superinjunctions. The Court notes that the internet has a massive reputational impact, and so constantly republishing irrelevant information breaches a citizen's fundamental rights. Google wants an exemption from that law.
Wikipedia won't stop BEGGING for cash - despite sitting on $60m
Wednesday 3rd December 2014 13:04 GMT
Re: Bad press & hostility
In answer to your question: "Who stands to gain if Wikipedia slips off into the night?"
Wikipedia badly needs competition. It isn't hard to imagine an open access, free Wikipedia that simply prohibited anonymity (the single biggest cause of grief) and funded some fact-checking. Only ideology prevents Wikipedia doing this tomorrow, even though the quality would improve enormously, and the reach (into schools, for example) would also expand.
Nothing convinces me the world needs another monopoly.
Musicians sue UK.gov over 'zero pay' copyright fix
Thursday 27th November 2014 10:56 GMT
Re: Re: Want their cake and to eat it
"As soon as an artist signs to a label then they no longer own their own work (much like any job)."
Many artists retain master rights, and this is standard practice for independent contracts. In Germany it is not possible to assign copyright at all.
You claim to be the director of a label. I would advise artists to steer well clear of your company, if this reflects your understanding of music rights.
That's if your label actually exists.
Thursday 27th November 2014 10:42 GMT
Re: Re: Compensation?
"Not sure why Mr Orlowski's comments above were so heavily downvoted"
It's expected - people confuse the law with a license. The law merely sets the boundaries for trade, but it's the licensing permits what people can do with the stuff in the real world.
Pretty much everything is permissable with a license and two willing parties. The GPL wouldn't exist without very strong copyright law setting the boundaries.
Entitlement culture and Big Tech propaganda have done their job. And I'm still waiting for my "legal p2p file sharing".
Wednesday 26th November 2014 16:53 GMT
Re: Compensation?
"The fact it is now in two physical locations is not relevant. I bought the right to listen to it (or at least, that's how it should work)."
It's relevant in so far as you are not actually allowed to make a copy of something without a license to do so. The EU's 2001 directive sets out exceptions where this might be permitted. Personal use (of lawfully acquired etc etc) is one of themonly permitted where compensation is also introduced. It doesn't say what this compensation should be.
Would it make more sense to offer a "license to hear it anywhere" or even a "lifetime license"? Undoubtedly yes, and we're moving towards that.
"This won't solve the issue for piracy, as that would still be illegal if I chose to make my "copy" available to others."
Yes, spot on.
"Also, doesn't blank media have a so-called subsidy for the assumed copying that goes on? It used to if I recall."
Not in the UK. It's not a levy-friendly country which is why nobody is calling for one. The Copyright Minister:
"The Government do not believe that British consumers would tolerate private copying levies. They are inefficient, bureaucratic and unfair, and disadvantage people who pay for content."
http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/ld201415/ldhansrd/text/140729-0001.htm#14072947000224
FCC to Obama on net neutrality: We work for CONGRESS, SIR, not YOU
'Net Neut' activists: Are you just POSEURS, or do you want to Get Something Done?
Monday 17th November 2014 11:01 GMT
Re: I'll play the game with you Andrew
No, my job isn't to "incite emotion". I'll leave that to people who claim the internet has broken, or who compare regulation to Obamacare :-)
That's a long post - I am not sure what you are trying to say? The burden of proof for new regulation, or regulatory reform, is always on the people who want to introduce it. In this case, they're struggling to agree on basic definitions ("net neutrality") and coming up with assertions that don't map onto reality ("any packet discrimination is bad") and metaphors that are plainly absurd ("outlaw fast lanes"). Nor is the precautionary principle (eg, "if we don't do X something really bad might happen") particularly convincing: biofuels and the invasion of Iraq were both advanced using this.
My point is that if you want better broadband and a more competitive broadband market, you might want to think hard about how the market works. Structural reform of the wholesale market and enforcing strong business competition and consumer legislation may almost certainly be part of this. This is not the first time I have pointed out that people are lazy and prefer bumper stickers to engaging in real grassroots citizen activism, or thinking about the market.
And yours is...?
Monday 17th November 2014 10:39 GMT
Re: Calm, rational argument
"It doesn't make sense for a Senator to be opposed to the idea of net neutrality, only certain aspects of its implementation."
Not if he has been informed, by "the fathers of the internet", that the internet has never been neutral.
You're making a fairly transparent attempt to move the debate on from "do you Unicorns exist?" to "are Unicorns vegetarian?"
Personally I think Cruz may have overbaked his pudding: either way, we're talking about a regulated market. The degrees and nature of the regulation differ. But the red herring of neutrality causes far confusion than it brings clarity; "discrimination" and "fast lanes" are slogans for the technically illiterate.
Netflix and other OTT giants use 'net neutrality' rules to clobber EU rivals
Wednesday 29th October 2014 10:57 GMT
Re: Re: Providers pay too
"Re: "direct peering arrangement" == That's simply another way of saying: "We'll throttle traffic on your current transit provider unless you pony up for a 'direct peering arrangement'" -- and that's _exactly_ what happens."
Nobody is throttling. A modern packet switched network is a contested resource in which the greediest application wins.
See:
... "it is always contested even when it is not congested"
... "other internet users are not neutral to you. Every packet is pollution to someone else and the polluter doesn't pay. So really it's a war, a battle for resources, in which the greediest application over the biggest pipe triumphs. The strongest will always win"
http://www.theregister.co.uk/Print/2014/05/09/net_neutrality_explained_and_how_to_get_a_better_internet/
You don't understand how the internet works. When you do, we may then agree or disagree about what regulation it needs. (And in that article I raise genuine competition issues they're just not the ones people talk about very much).
Wednesday 29th October 2014 10:38 GMT
eh?
"You can manage the packets by type all you want. Doesn't have anything to do with net neutrality."
So "net neutrality" was never about packet discrimination or service discrimination, as everyone thinks. Including the person who coined the phrase "net neutrality". And the people who wrote the FCC's 2010 Open Internet Order. ("blocking lawful content, applications, services, or non-harmful devices") Or the EU's neutrality consultation aka "traffic management investigation".
http://ec.europa.eu/digital-agenda/sites/digital-agenda/files/Traffic%20Management%20Investigation%20BEREC_2.pdf
It was always about regulating peering arrangements?
@noominy.noom: "He's redefining terms in sneaky ways"
It isn't me who's redefining terms in sneaky ways. Neutrality means whatever neutrality activists want to mean, and that depends on whatever they want to regulate this year. I wonder what "net neutrality" will be about next year? It's anyone's guess.
(And remember: we have always been at War with Eurasia.)
Tuesday 28th October 2014 16:43 GMT
But who's whining? Netflix spent two years "whining" that it couldn't do direct peering with ISPs (or if you prefer, arguing that its CDN is super-duper and good enough). It produced a shit list that was very misleading, to help it.
This year direct peering is fine, Netflix signed direct peering deals with major ISPs.
Remember: we have always been at war with Eurasia.
Tuesday 28th October 2014 16:28 GMT
Re: Re: Providers pay too
"No one else does"
But they do, everyone who needs to move large amounts of video reliably does it. They either use L3 or (better) a direct peering arrangement, or build their own private network (Google). Video traffic is not like email. Conventional reciprocal pubic peering doesn't cut it.
Hey, YouTube lovers! How about you pay us, we start paying for STUFF? - Google
Wednesday 29th October 2014 08:31 GMT
Re: Global Phenomenon?
The personal value judgment argument ("I don't like X so I don't think it is worth very much") is fine - but not the point here. It's whether money follows popularity, as it does everywhere else. Sell a lot of cars, you get a lot of money. Sell a lot of insurance policies, you get a lot of money.
1 in 4 people on the planet can sing Gangnam Style. And he didn't even pocket enough to buy a decent yacht.
Lumia 830: Microsoft hopes to seduce with slim 'affordable' model
Meet Mr Gamification: He's got a NUDGE or two for you
US Senate's net neutrality warrior to Comcast: Remind us how much you hate web fast lanes
Tuesday 21st October 2014 13:18 GMT
Re: Akamai Technologies, Inc. et al vice 'Net Neutrality'
Good post Jeffy - but nothing will happen unless the congestion problem is cracked. I went from 20mbit/s to 120mbit/s here in London and I can't tell the difference. The network is still a scarce resource.
http://www.martingeddes.com/think-tank/future-broadband-workshop-presentation/
All good, but p.29 (The "investment cycle of doom") describes why Comcast, Verrizon and Google should keep their money in their pockets until this can be fixed.
ISPs handbagged: BLOCK knock-off sites, rules beak
Tuesday 21st October 2014 10:05 GMT
IPR is there to encourage the free market - without it, we can see what happens. Without the temporary exclusivity, everyone profits from that invention or creation except the inventor or creator.
Personally I'm looking forward to an African or an Indian kid making a brilliant invention that I can 3D print at home - and getting millions in tiny payments for it from around the world.
Tuesday 21st October 2014 09:06 GMT
Justice Arnold discussed the whack-a-mole question - the whole thing is well worth a read.
"Am I alone in thinking that it's time goods whose only intrinsic value is their branding and not their materials should not be defended by the state?"
Design is protected and brands are protected by IP. Whether you like the brand/poem/song/manbag in question is good or bad is irrelevant - protection means that things you don't like get protected along with things you do like. The idea being that you will get the same protection if you ever invent something that needs protection.
And I'm sure you can find another idiot - it's the internet.
GP records soon wide open again: Just walk into a ‘safe haven’
Apple's new iPADS have begun the WAR that will OVERTURN the NETWORK WORLD
'Dancing Jesus' file-sharer found guilty
Radiohead(ache): BBC wants dead duck tech in sexy new mobes
Tuesday 14th October 2014 14:27 GMT
Re: Swings and something else
Multicast would help.
http://www.sanog.org/resources/sanog7/eubanks-multicast-tutorial.pdf
Brandon was experimenting with this at the BBC in the 1990s: http://www.savetz.com/mbone/
And operators are experimenting with multicast now:
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/05/21/tv_group_seeks_attractive_operators_for_mutual_action_replaysnow/
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/06/23/lte_broadcast_mobile_operators_may_yet_get_it_wrong/
Really, there's no reason broadcasts have to travel over the transport/backhaul part of an operator's network at all.
Of COURSE Stephen Elop's to blame for Nokia woes, says author
Tuesday 14th October 2014 13:27 GMT
" A little published fact is that killing it was a hard requirement that came out of the microsoft deal. "
It's not a fact, it's an assertion - and a ludicrous one.
At the Feb 11th (2011) event Nokia said it expected to sell 150m Symbian devices as WP rolled out. It was depending heavily on S60 being viable for a while. Of course sales went off a cliff that year. Perhaps if Elop had stressed a "multiplatform strategy" it might not have looked Osborned, but he needed to refocus the company around the new platform as quickly as possible, and took the gamble.
Was Nokia's Elop history's worst CEO?
Nokia Lumia 735: Ignore the selfie hype, it's a grown-up phone
Huawei prez: A one-speed internet is bad for everyone
Thursday 25th September 2014 14:20 GMT
Re: Re: The difference is not traffic priority....
"As Andrew showed with the RFCs, the internet is already built to allow traffic to be prioritized based on need. What the ISPs want to do is to change it to allow traffic to be prioritized based on greed."
Paranoia strikes again.
Sadly people are not willing to exercise their power and switch - making life very easy for ISPs. They would rather whinge, or support Net Neutrality's goal of utility-style regulation - would enshrine Comcast forever.
Third rate internet is good news for Europe and Asia, but bad news for Americans.
iPhone 6: The final straw for Android makers eaten alive by the data parasite?
Friday 19th September 2014 12:19 GMT
Re: An unsually poor comment
"The idea that only Samsung and Apple make money from smartphones is wrong."
Huawei et al make money from smartphones - and if you had read the article, you would know this. But in mature markets, the numbers don't lie. Ask Sony, HTC.
Basically, you're rejecting all the evidence you do not like - so you can reject the arguments that follow. This is not the strongest position from which to construct an argument.
Comcast exec: No, we haven't banned Tor. I use it. You're probably using it
Phones 4u slips into administration after EE cuts ties with Brit mobe retailer
European Court of Justice allows digitisation of library books
BBC Trust candidate defends licence fee, says evaders are CRIMINALS
Wednesday 10th September 2014 08:54 GMT
Re: Think you overestimate goverments' fear of the beeb.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peacock_Committee
Hardball on funding? That's as hard as it got.
Hardball on political pressure: yes, an unelected official on behalf of the ruling party succeeding in forcing out the DG and Chairman. So much for independence, when push comes to shove.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
