Richard's Favorite Techdirt Posts Of The Week

from the favorites-favorites-and-more-favorites dept

This week's favorites post comes from Richard, who's from the UK, but will hopefully forgive my removing of the extraneous "u's" from the word "favorite."

This is the first time I've done the favorites post, so it is a bit of an adventure for me. I've decided to start with the "Good News" because there was actually quite a lot of it this week.

Firstly, on the legal front, there have been a number of good decisions in the courts. In an echo of what happened to ACS law in the UK earlier in the year Righthaven has been slapped down a number of times, and there is some possibility that this could go further than just losing the cases. There are (as I write) actually three Techdirt stories on this, but the biggest (and most commented on) is this one. The key point about this particular story is that the judge has not just rejected Righthaven for lack of standing, he has also indicated that even if Righthaven had standing they would still lose on grounds of fair use. Sadly the comments on this story are swamped with largely irrelevant arguments, but you can get it down to a small number of useful contributions by selecting only insightful comments.

My second favorite piece of legal good news came early in the week with the decision in New York that safe harbours can apply in pretty broad sets of circumstances. It is really important that the creep of secondary liability is arrested before it gets too far, and this ruling draws a useful line in the sand.

Another kind of good news is when someone who previously had a reputation for IP maximalism takes a new direction. This category contains the somewhat unlikely combination of J.K.Rowling and the Mexican Congress. The Mexicans have apparently decided to reject ACTA, which is surprising, given Mexico's extreme copyright length of life+100. J.K. Rowling's good news is a move into ebooks with no DRM. Given her previous history, this is something to be celebrated.

Of course, it can't all be good, and so I have decided to institute the "Victor Meldrew Award" (for those outside the UK or unfamiliar with the TV character, his catchphrase was "I don't believe it!" and the character saw himself as a "normal man in a world full of idiots"). Righthaven figures in this category too in the guise of a bizarre argument made by "Plessy Ferguson" that the Righthaven rulings somehow threaten Open Source licenses. Clearly the author of this argument didn't understand Copyright law, Open Source Licences or the Righthaven ruling because it makes no sense on any of these counts. Righthaven lost because they attempted to transfer the right to sue without transferring any other exclusive rights. Opens source licenses don't even attempt to transfer these rights. The copyright for each component of an open source system remains with its original author (unless explicitly assigned to someone else such as the FSF in a separate transaction). Finally, Copyright law does not require you to hold the rights to every part of a program in order to sue for a breach of the license. You only need to hold the rights to some of it. Sadly, many commenters didn't seem to understand these points either, so the comments were full of "educational material"!

On a side issue regarding Righthaven's dealings with Stephens Media, it seems to me that the transfer of the right to sue only enables one scenario, which is as follows. Someone infringes on the Copyright (still held by Stephens Media). Righthaven can't sue them (according to the court ruling) but what if Stephens media sues them? Well, they've transferred the "right to sue" to Righthaven - so now Righthaven can sue Stephens Media for infringement of their right to sue! The net effect of the legal knot created by the deal is thus to effectively put the original material into the public domain because no-one can exert the copyright! I'm pretty sure that wasn't the intention of Stephens Media when they set this scheme up...

Another bizarre argument was put forward by a small UK lobbying organisation, claiming that a lack of software patents was damaging the UK software industry. Well, apart from the fact that the UK does in practice actually have some software patents, the logic here was unbelievable and the evidence lacking.

Other Meldrew contenders this week included the Winklevii, yet again pursuing Facebook after only recently appearing to give up and our usual suspects Apple and Disney who seem to think that there should be (is?) one law for them and another for everyone else! Microsoft was caught playing the same game last week - but that's outside my brief! Those who are familiar with Victor Meldrew will remember that the show had its darker side, and indeed finished in that mode. This week saw a "dark Meldrew event" when a woman was arrested by police for filming them from her own property. The antics of the TSA are often in the same vein and would probably win this award quite frequently if it was run every week.

This leads us on to events that are worrying -- but not bizarre enough to be surprising. There's usually quite a lot of this unfortunately, often from Sony who seem to be determined to stop any creative use of their equipment from happening. Abuse of the patent system is another common cause for concern; in this case BitTorrent is being sued on the thinnest of pretexts. Then there is our old friend the copyright lobbyist. The UK variety is in the news this week with an attempt to set up web censorship behind the public's back. The minister concerned, in a move reminiscent of Pontius Pilate, seems to want it to go ahead -- but without (visible) government involvement, presumably so he can give the lobbyists what they want but avoid the blame from the public. US lobbyists have been active too, this time trying to shift the cost of the Herculean task of copyright enforcement onto the public purse. Of course international lobbyists have not been quiet either, trying to get a monopoly on the process of deciding the exceptions to copyright.

After all this negativity, I thought I would end on a positive note with my personal favourites from the "DailyDirt" postings. The sock sorting robot seemed appealing, until I realised that the video is hugely speeded up. So my personal selection here is the post on Open Source Hardware. I've long believed that Open Source software really needs to run on open hardware, but this video showed how the collaborative ideal is extending beyond computing into other fields. Have a look at it. It will cheer you up!

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  1. identicon
    ShillTroll, 25 Jun 2011 @ 12:18pm

    Here, let me just save the trolls the trouble

    richard your just Mike's teachers pet this week. Will you ever become a techdirt "writer". Is that what your aspiring to be? Well youre doing a good job so far, by being mikes little pet and all

    Forget the fact that you have a Ph.D. in physics and and I can barly spell the word physics because nothing I've done even comes close. Forget the fact that Mike can create a successful blog and I can't

    Richard is a follower of Mike and he doesnt think for himself

    link to this | view in thread ]

  2. icon
    The eejit (profile), 25 Jun 2011 @ 2:00pm

    Re:

    Wow, even I can't shilltroll that well. Kudos.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  3. icon
    Spaceboy (profile), 25 Jun 2011 @ 3:07pm

    Re:

    lol and you can think for yourself? Your non-conformity is conformist. Welcome to the club.

    You are so filled with anger that you come here on a Saturday and post on a blog you hate. But at least you are true to your name.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  4. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 25 Jun 2011 @ 4:25pm

    Re: Re:

    I think your sarcasm meeter needs some adjustment.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  5. icon
    Spaceboy (profile), 25 Jun 2011 @ 4:47pm

    Re: Re: Re:

    My sarcasm meter is just fine. I detected no sarcasm in the original post...He came across as 100% serious.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  6. icon
    Chargone (profile), 25 Jun 2011 @ 4:49pm

    Re: Re: Re:

    that or he's playing along...
    though i'll admit that's less likely.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  7. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 25 Jun 2011 @ 5:06pm

    Re: Re: Re: Re:

    Quote:
    Forget the fact that you have a Ph.D. in physics and and I can barly(correction: barely) spell the word physics because nothing I've done even comes close. Forget the fact that Mike can create a successful blog and I can't


    Hmmm...I see that as a sign of sarcasm, it was just me?

    link to this | view in thread ]

  8. icon
    Gwiz (profile), 25 Jun 2011 @ 5:07pm

    Re:

    Here, let me just save the trolls the trouble

    And I will save them some trouble before the whole koolaid thing is brought up again and let them know that, since it's Summer, I took the liberty of freezing all the Techdirt koolaid onto sticks.

    Sort of a Intellectual Popsicle, you could say.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  9. identicon
    Nicedoggy, 25 Jun 2011 @ 5:08pm

    Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:

    The post above was me, I forgot to type the name sorry.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  10. icon
    ChurchHatesTucker (profile), 25 Jun 2011 @ 5:39pm

    The Dark Meldrew Award?

    "This week saw a "dark Meldrew event" when a woman was arrested by police for filming them from her own property. The antics of the TSA are often in the same vein and would probably win this award quite frequently if it was run every week."

    I'm in favor of this award.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  11. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 25 Jun 2011 @ 5:50pm

    Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:

    (my misspellings and poor grammar were intentional).

    link to this | view in thread ]

  12. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 25 Jun 2011 @ 5:52pm

    Re: Re:

    So does that mean you're giving away free Koolaid popsicles. Because if you are, being the freetard that I am, I'll have some.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  13. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 25 Jun 2011 @ 6:25pm

    Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:

    >(my misspellings and poor grammar were intentional).

    They all say that.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  14. icon
    Atkray (profile), 25 Jun 2011 @ 7:06pm

    "you can get it down to a small number of useful contributions by selecting only insightful comments"

    made my day right there.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  15. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 25 Jun 2011 @ 7:10pm

    Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:

    My Firefox comes with spell check, I have no reason to misspell anything.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  16. identicon
    Nicedoggy, 26 Jun 2011 @ 1:01am

    Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:

    The curse of the spell-checker?

    link to this | view in thread ]

  17. icon
    Dark Helmet (profile), 26 Jun 2011 @ 4:30am

    Re: The Dark Meldrew Award?

    I'm pretty sure this infringes on something for me, somehow. Trademark? Publicity rights maybe?

    Either way, I'm hiring Righthaven to go after you and any churches that don't hate you....

    link to this | view in thread ]

  18. identicon
    darryl, 26 Jun 2011 @ 5:24am

    Don't worry he's from the UK..

    This week's favorites post comes from Richard, who's from the UK, but will hopefully forgive my removing of the extraneous "u's" from the word "favorite."

    Hi, here is this guy, he is not from around here, so I will DUMB it down for you Americans.

    He is from the UK so we'll make sure we act suitabilly better than he is.

    I will change the spelling for you so you can understand his stainge foreign language.

    So allthough he is 'sub-human' compared to us "Americans" we'll let him have a say, but not before I correct he's screwed up english.


    you never know he might be an eater of black pudding and a master of "ekky thump", be a skinhead and walk around in his trade 'Doc Martins', or "bother boots". :D

    link to this | view in thread ]

  19. icon
    Jay (profile), 26 Jun 2011 @ 6:19am

    Re: Re: The Dark Meldrew Award?

    NEVERMORE!

    link to this | view in thread ]

  20. icon
    Jay (profile), 26 Jun 2011 @ 6:20am

    Re: Don't worry he's from the UK..

    "I will change the spelling for you so you can understand his [strange] foreign language."

    Irony...

    link to this | view in thread ]

  21. icon
    Old Fool (profile), 26 Jun 2011 @ 8:24am

    Re: Don't worry he's from the UK..

    Its the 'extraneous' description that gets me.

    They are MEANT to be there, it's called 'English'

    PS its not 'bother boots' its 'bovver boots'

    link to this | view in thread ]

  22. icon
    The eejit (profile), 26 Jun 2011 @ 10:07am

    Re: Re: Don't worry he's from the UK..

    Or Smeggin' Docs.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  23. icon
    Eugene (profile), 26 Jun 2011 @ 10:48am

    Re: Re: Re: Re:

    And that is why it's always important to check a commenter's username before replying. Because no matter how 100% serious he sounds, I don't think someone named "ShillTroll" actually means what he says ;)

    link to this | view in thread ]

  24. identicon
    kilometr, 26 Jun 2011 @ 4:32pm

    that or he's playing along...

    link to this | view in thread ]

  25. identicon
    darryl, 26 Jun 2011 @ 9:46pm

    Re: Re: Don't worry he's from the UK..

    lol your right "bovver boots"

    smeggin docs works for me too :D

    link to this | view in thread ]

  26. identicon
    Darryl, 26 Jun 2011 @ 10:08pm

    Re: Re: Don't worry he's from the UK..

    I would have said 'bovver' but I felt if they cannot understand the colourfull spelling I though "bovver" might be a bit beyond them, as to what I was talking about.

    Lets hope your mum does not have a moustache having naivety, and wearing pyjamas in a furore and an aluminium arse, followed by a bogeyman in an aeroplane.

    speciality being a scallyway, getting titbit's of colour, and flavour, with honour of my neighbour, but its a rumour and labour is humourous.



    oh wait,,

    What about

    SPACE SHUTTLE ENDEAVOUR

    (or the Australian Labor Party !)

    link to this | view in thread ]

  27. This comment has been flagged by the community. Click here to show it
    icon
    doublemyspeed (profile), 26 Jun 2011 @ 10:39pm

    NEVERMORE!

    link to this | view in thread ]

  28. icon
    Mike Masnick (profile), 26 Jun 2011 @ 11:21pm

    Re: Don't worry he's from the UK..

    Hi, here is this guy, he is not from around here, so I will DUMB it down for you Americans.

    He is from the UK so we'll make sure we act suitabilly better than he is.

    I will change the spelling for you so you can understand his stainge foreign language.


    And I thought you Aussies were supposed to have a sense of humor (humour).

    link to this | view in thread ]

  29. icon
    The eejit (profile), 26 Jun 2011 @ 11:54pm

    Re: Re: Don't worry he's from the UK..

    NAh, that's just the distinct lack of elbows and kness at play. They can't be humerus.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  30. icon
    Richard (profile), 27 Jun 2011 @ 3:35am

    Re: Re: Don't worry he's from the UK..

    Actually it was only Dr Johnson who put in those spellings - to emphasise the Latin roots of words - before him no-one really cared how words were spelled.

    I'm not bothered with Mike adjusting my spellings to match the standard ones used on the site - it does make sense for consistency when searching.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  31. identicon
    darryl, 27 Jun 2011 @ 8:57am

    Re: Re: Don't worry he's from the UK..

    That's right we know nothing about humour, but satire is another thing alltogether.

    It's like comparing Monty Python with Tim the toolman! orh orh orh orh!!!!

    link to this | view in thread ]

  32. icon
    Doddyboddy (profile), 27 Jun 2011 @ 10:00pm

    favourite ways of spelling

    This week's favorites post comes from Richard, who's from the UK, but will hopefully forgive my removing of the extraneous "u's" from the word "favorite."

    So, why not extraneos?

    link to this | view in thread ]


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