Archives for December 2006
Rip, Mix, Sell?
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Sometimes, however, the content industry has a point. Today Todd Dominey posted on his excellent blog his experience getting rid of his 3000-CD collection and going completely digital. He ripped everything to his computer and then sold all the CDs on the Amazon Marketplace. Today’s post is a great howto for folks with big collections. The thing is that he kept the music, but every used CD he sold is arguably one new CD the recording industry didn’t sell. (There’s probably not a one-to-one correlation there, but probably pretty close.) As more folks move to digital, this practice will only grow.
As far as I can tell this is plain and simple copyright infringement. I don’t think DRM coupled with the DMCA is the solution. Given the new reality of the internet, the only choice the content industry has is to change its business model. But when you see something like this, you have to feel their pain. I believe ripping your CDs or DVDs for use on your portable devices is fair use, and I think the Copyright Office should have issued a DMCA exemption for the practice. That said, you can’t have your cake and eat it, too.
Cross-posted at TLF. You can leave and read comments there. →
Castro (maybe) dead
Babalú Blog is reporting rumors that Castro might be dead and that an official announcement may be in the offing soon. I only hope they can hold off until I’m in Miami next week. The city will be one giant party.Martin pushes 90-day shot clock
The FCC website being what it is (or maybe politics being what they are), an agenda is not yet available for the December 20th meeting of the FCC. All eyes are on this meeting because commissioners (including recently de-recused Commissioner Rpbert McDowell) will vote on the AT&T-Bell South merger. However, it now looks like Chairman Martin is also going to take the opportunity to push through a resolution to the cable franchising proceeding that’s been open since January. According to Multichannel News, Martin has circulated a proposed rule that would require local franchising authorities to act on an application for a franchise within 90 days.Martin, who waited for cable-franchising reform to fizzle on Capitol Hill before shopping his own plan, said FCC pressure on cities and towns to act promptly would produce several benefits, including spurring broadband deployment and lowering cable bills. The 90-day cap would apply to entities that had existing approval to occupy public rights of way presumably phone companies initiating service and cable incumbents seeking renewal. … Martin, who has circulated his plan among the other four FCC members, would like it voted on at the agency’s Dec. 20 open meeting.
There has been a flurry of activity in the docket for this proceeding, so it looks like it might happen. Not having seen the draft rule, I wonder what happens after the 90 days are up. In our recent law review article and comments to the FCC, Jerry Ellig and I proposed just such a regulatory shot clock. We proposed that if a locality doesn’t make a decision either way on an application, then the franchise would be deemed granted with a set of default terms, which could be set the same terms of the incumbent’s franchise, for example. Anybody seen the draft rule?
Cross-posted at TLF. You can leave and read comments there. →
UK: May we interest you in some spectrum?
While in this country we’re debating whether the government should hand over to a single entrepreneur 30 of the 36 MHz of prime radio spectrum slated for auction after the digital TV transition, in the UK they’re doing things a little different. According to GigaOm:British carriers might have spent over 20 billion pounds on 3G wireless auctions several years ago, but they will soon get a chance to spend even more for “the UK’s largest single release of radio spectrum”, says British regulator Ofcom. This morning Ofcom outlined a plan for wireless auctions, which will be technology agnostic, but could include spectrum for WiMAX, mobile TV, mobile broadcast and even 3G. Ofcom is asking for a consultation period until March 2007. Ofcom says the three bands that will be available are: 2010-2025 MHz, 2290-2300 MHz and 2500-2690 MHz, and a total of 215 MHz will be on the market. There will be two initial auctions which will be part of a bigger plan to sell off up to 400 MHz over the following years.
You heard right, 400 Mhz of technology agnostic spectrum. I invite my friends concerned about net neutrality to look at this. We all would like to see new competition in broadband, and spectrum reform seems to me to be the first obvious step in that direction.
Cross-posted at TLF. You can leave and read comments there. →
Devil food
Awesome article at WorldNetDaily by columnist Jim Rutz. Not at all a parody. A snippet: “Soy is feminizing, and commonly leads to a decrease in the size of the penis, sexual confusion and homosexuality. That’s why most of the medical (not socio-spiritual) blame for today’s rise in homosexuality must fall upon the rise in soy formula and other soy products.”Hello, I’m a Chrisitan
Great parody of the “I’m a Mac” ads by “with it” Christian church. They can all be found here.
Stoney’s
DC Fud reviews the new Stoney’s. It’s not the same, but how could it be? “I walked into a perfectly clean, crowded bar full of freshly-scrubbed young professionals. A bar that now has a larger wine and microbrew selection, a heck of a lot more seating, and no rickety stairs to negotiate when heading to the bathroom. None of the old guys were there at all. Conversation was more policy than prose, and the waitresses were actually attractive. As though my system wasn’t shocked enough, Stoney’s now takes credit cards!”Smoke-filled rooms
Awesome. Needs no comment. From the WaPo: “When the District goes smoke-free Jan. 2, at least one nicotine haven will remain: the U.S. Capitol. Lawmakers, several of whom enjoy a good cigar, have exempted themselves from the city’s smoking ban, not to mention rules that forbid lighting up in federal buildings across the country. … Smoking is permitted in lawmakers’ offices, in two cafeterias in the House and Senate buildings and in an unmarked, cramped room in the basement of the U.S. Capitol.” Smoking is also permitted in the Speaker’s Lobby, which sounds like a club room to me, but Nancy Pelosi might be changing the rules. Hat tip Kathleen.Atari games
Via Galley Slaves: “The geniuses at Intellectual Delinquent have posted a set of classic games you can play right in your web browser, including Frogger, Moon Patrol, Space Invaders, Asteroids, Donkey Kong, and Star Castle.”The Trippy Dream Factory of David Lynch
Inland Empire, David Lynch’s latest, opens today in NYC, and hopefully very soon here in the sticks. Here’s the NYT review. I’m looking forward to it, but with some trepidation. It weighs in at one minute shy of three hours.EMI to sell (some) music in MP3
According to today’s WSJ, Blue Note records (a subsidiary of EMI) will begin selling music in MP3 format via Yahoo. Hopefully this is a sign of things to come, but for now the plan is just for a couple of songs, including a single from Norah Jones’ new album. What’s amazing is that this hasn’t been done already. I’ve always been skeptical that no one at the record companies gets it. But the article explains,The MP3 announcements highlight a growing internal debate at EMI and other music companies over the correct approach to maximizing the impact of digital sales. Throughout the music industry, executives at record labels who suggested using MP3s for promotions spent years butting heads with their corporate superiors. … Mr. Hochkeppel confirms that he and other Blue Note executives had to overcome what he called “general resistance” on the part of senior EMI executives. He says they were ultimately persuaded there was a need to try fresh approaches to digital sales.
What I fear now is that if this experiment with just a few songs isn’t wildly successful, the suits still won’t get it. They should think about it this way: They have licensing negotiations coming up with Steve Jobs. What a better bargaining chip than the promise of a music store competitor to iTunes that sells MP3s, which play on iPods?
Cross-posted at TLF. You can leave and read comments there. →
Already for sale
Already for sale: The Iraq Study Group Report: The Way Forward - A New Approach by James Baker, Lee Hamilton and the Iraq Study Group.NYC bans trans-fats
They actually did it. According to AP: “The Board of Health voted [unanimously] Tuesday to make New York the nation’s first city to ban artery-clogging artificial trans fats at restaurants — from the corner pizzeria to high-end bakeries.”“Nobody wants to take away your french fries and hamburgers — I love those things, too,” Mayor Michael Bloomberg said recently. “But if you can make them with something that is less damaging to your health, we should do that.”
We can also make walking down the street safer by requiring everyone to wear padding and a helment. I wonder if he’s for that, too? Next Wednesday AFF will host a roundtable on the burgeoning nanny state. Baylen Linnekin will not be speaking at the event.
Blockbuster Lets Netflix Customers Rent Movies From Stores for Free
According to the WSJ: “Blockbuster Inc. is letting subscribers of rival Netflix Inc. rent DVDs free from Blockbuster stores as part of a holiday promotion. The Dallas DVD rental chain said Tuesday Netflix members can exchange the tear-off address flaps from the signature red Netflix envelopes for free rentals in its stores. The promotion runs through Dec. 21.”Nike+iPod = surveillance?
I’m a happy user of the Nike+iPod Sport Kit. It’s an add-on for iPods that tracks your running: how far, how long, pace, calories burned, etc. It also lets you track your progress toward a goal or challenge other Nike+iPod users to races. It works by paring a radio receiver attached to your iPod and a radio transmitter placed in your shoe.However, as those of us who follow such things know, there’s nothing that perks up the ears of privacy activists more than the words “radio transmitter” and “shoe” in the same sentence. Their ears must be at their perkiest as researchers at the University of Washington have issued a report claiming that the Nike+iPod kit can be used to track its wearer. Wired News reports in its usual alarmed tone,
If you enhance your workout with the new Nike+iPod Sport Kit, you may be making yourself a surveillance target.
A report from four University of Washington researchers to be released Thursday reveals that security flaws in the new RFID-powered device from Nike and Apple make it easy for tech-savvy stalkers, thieves and corporations to track your movements. With just a few hundred dollars and a little know-how, someone could even plot your running routes on a Google map without your knowledge.
Below the fold I’ll explain why there are no security “flaws” and you shouldn’t be worried if you own one of these devices. Continue reading this post »
On franchising, who needs Congress?
It looks as if now that national cable franchise reform is dead in Congress, the FCC is moving forward with its proceeding on the issue. According to USA Today, “Federal Communications Commission Chairman Kevin Martin has proposed rules to make it easier for phone companies and others to jump into the video business.” According to the newspaper’s sources, the new rule would require localities to rule within 90 days on competitive franchise applications by phone companies and others with existing access to public rights-of-way. In a new article in the Journal on Telecommunications & High Technology Law (and a public interest comment), Jerry Ellig and I tell the FCC not only that they should preempt unreasonable local franchise practices, but how they can do so. One of the points we make is that while requiring localities to act expeditiously in making franchise rulings, that’s just a start. The FCC also has the power to curb unreasonable denials of franchises.In our paper we calculate the cost of franchising to consumers, and it looks like the FCC has such costs in mind. According to the USAT article, “Martin is using the FCC’s upcoming annual report on cable TV prices as ammunition. FCC officials say the report shows that satellite TV and cable TV operators have settled into a cozy duopoly, keeping prices in a steady, upward climb. It shows the average price of cable TV in 2005 was $43.33 a month. Where satellite TV also was available, the average was $43.34. But in markets with another “wired” video provider, the price was dramatically less: $35.94. The upshot: Absent credible land-based rivals, cable TV prices will keep going up.”
Cross-posted at TLF. You can leave and read comments there. →
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