Category: Intellectual Property

from the it'll-be-the-Declaration-of-Independence-next dept.
From the SJ Mercury wire services: "Israel's Supreme Court ruled Wednesday that an Isreali scholar had a copyright on his recontruction of an important Dead Sea Scroll…". The messed-up "intellectual property" system will be debated at the Sept 8-10 Foresight Senior Associate Gathering in Palo Alto; join us.

from the pass-the-hat dept.

An interesting segment on National Public Radio's All Things Considered on 29 August 2000 describes some attempts by artists to use the Internet to sell their work directly to their audiences. Look for the segment on "The Street Performer Protocol", which compares some of these efforts to high-tech busking.

One of the challenges for applying open source concepts to IP areas other than software is: how do creative artists like writers and musicians make a living? While this piece doesn't directly address the issue of copyright, it does show that artists like author Stephen King are pushing the envelope a bit, and blazing the trail for others who want to offer ideas and creative works through advance subscription or auction. It's an idea that might catch on.

from the if-this-continues dept.
from Future Presence newsletter published by The Arlington Institute, these comments on some useful fiction: Melancholy Elephants by Spider Robinson — Extend our computer technology out just a little. Add an ability to quickly search for copyright infringement in a new piece of art you are creating. What if you keep getting back the reply that your new piece music or short story was too close to a copyrighted piece? What if copyrights lasted forever? Could new art become a thing of the past? With our limited senses how many unique combinations of worthwhile art are there? Check out this short story to explore some of these questions.

from the let's-not-worship-"IP" dept.
A really long article in The Atlantic thoroughly explains the Internet vs copyright issue, quoting Lawrence Lessig, a former Harvard Law professor now at Stanford: By granting a temporary monopoly on distribution to creators, the Founders hoped to stimulate the creation of new ideas. "The creator was rewarded for a little while, but then the idea passed into the commons, where people could do what they liked with it," Lessig says. Now, he says, the campaign against piracy is pushing toward "a massive increase in regulation over the distribution of culture, which is inconsistent with the conception of the commons that lies at the root of democracy." In the American tradition artists, writers, musicians, and audiences work together, creating the intellectual ferment that has helped this country adapt to change for more than two centuries. "People hear the cries of the industry about piracy, which are real and justifiable," Lessig says. "But they don't realize that simply giving the industry what it wants will have an impact on the entire public sphere." Thanks to slashdot for the pointer.

from the better-buy-some-stock dept.
Senior Associate ChrisPhoenix looks at trends in data mining and analysis: "I got to thinking about Netscape's SmartDownload reporting on all the files we download (and their Search button does the same thing). http://www.computeruser.com/n ews/00/07/17/news10.html

I've been told that IBM's patent server keeps track of queries, and IBM uses that information (surely among the most valuable IP in the world). At least one company has told its employees not to use the server for this reason.

Now think of a transparent society… it's nice to be able to spy on the government spying on you, but that's really beside the point. The point is that the _data miners_ will be the ones with the real power. As more information is gathered, it will be harder to sort through, meaning that only those with access to huge bandwidth and crunch resources will be able to get anything useful from it. As sensors become cheaper, and fiber advances faster than CPUs, the gap will only widen. Read More for further thoughts.

from the DaveK-says-"info-wants-to-be-frictionless" dept.
Paul Hughes writes "For those of you who don't already know, FreeNet is a peer-to-peer network designed to allow the distribution of information over the Internet in an efficient manner, without fear of censorship. Freenet is completely decentralized, meaning that there is no person, computer, or organization in control of Freenet or essential to its operation. This means that Freenet cannot be attacked like centralized peer-to-peer systems such as Napster. Freenet also employs intelligent routing and caching, meaning that it learns to route requests more efficiently, automatically mirrors popular data, makes network flooding almost impossible, and moves data to where it is in greatest demand.

Brian Atkins (posting to the Extropians List) has pointed out a new article about FreeNet. It appears to be spreading across the net at lighting speed, with many believing it spells the end of copyright as we know it. What do you think?"

from the Drexler-says-"Let's-patent-matter-&-its-use" dept.
Paul Hughes reposts from Transdot: It's quite possible the assembler won't be for sale, at least not to the general public. Large companies who can afford a 10-50 billion dollar price tag, may likely obtain licensing rights for its use, but that's a far cry from the average joe owning it…Hopefully, the first company to develop this assembler will not obtain all-inclusive patent rights thereby allowing a sufficient number of competitors to enter the race. Read More for the full post and a response.

from the don't-laugh-it-happens-here-too dept.
The Moscow Times reports: Intellect, a company specializing in legal advice on industrial property rights, secured the patents from state patent agency Rospatent and has sent letters to breweries offering a license so brewers can continue to use bottles and cans…Intellect general director Vladimir Zaichenko said the company was set up 1 1/2 years ago and has received hundreds of patents — on screws, ball bearings, flasks, cisterns, ampules, railroad lines and other everyday items.

from the hurry-or-they'll-copyright-our-memories dept.
Ownership of coming powerful technologies will determine how many are benefited, and how quickly. In a paper prepared for this year's spring Foresight Gathering, Senior Associate Markus Krummenacker presents four scenarios for how intellectual property laws could operate in the future: the two extremes (no IP, suffocating IP) and two compromise proposals. Let's pick one, or come up with a better one, and make it happen. Which scenario do you prefer, and why? Or propose another.

from the creators-create-cause-that's-what-they-do dept.
Dan Gillmor, columnist for the San Jose Mercury News and Foresight Senior Associate, looks at what happens to intellectual property when nanotechnology arrives. Foresight board member Glenn Reynolds is quoted: "When jets are so cheap I can make one in my back yard, it may be the case that society is so wealthy we'll do airplanes for free anyway." Foresight chairman Eric Drexler wonders "if I see something, can I make a copy?" Dan clarifies "In other words, will he be allowed to remember what he saw?" Dan concludes "Maybe, in 100 years, spaceship design will be an open-source project." Hmm, we could start that project right now…