Well, this is getting interesting. Last week, we noted that Russian President Dmitry Medvedev, alone among the other G8 leaders, questioned today’s copyright laws, suggesting that they did not fit with the times, and pointed out that these century-old laws don’t seem to fit with today’s internet.

What the ‘free’ west can learn from ‘oppressive’ Russia!

via Russian President Proposes Creative Commons-Style Rules Baked Directly Into Copyright | Techdirt.

This page shows each ministry’s ICT projects, descriptions and budgets and how far they’re over or under budget.

ICT-dashboard | ICT-dashboard.

KPN: Where unlimited means limited!

I guess this is their strategy for people using whatsapp and skype services more often. It’s not a very good one, it’s like going back to the days where we paid a few cents per email… that business model didn’t last that long either.

KPN wil klanten extra laten betalen voor bepaalde mobiele internetdiensten. Daarmee lijkt de provider netneutraliteit aan de kant te willen zetten. Onder meer voor onbeperkt gebruik van voip en chat via 3g zal extra moeten worden betaald.KPNDe telecomprovider gaat bundels voor mobiele telefonie introduceren waarbij mensen tegen een meerprijs ‘extra faciliteiten’ kunnen gebruiken. Dat blijkt uit de woorden van KPN-topman Eelco Blok.Tegen Tweakers.net zei Blok dat gebruikers het onbeperkt gebruik van bepaalde diensten, bijvoorbeeld instant messaging en voip-diensten als Skype, moeten ‘afkopen’. Volgens Blok betekent dat niet meteen dat diensten worden geblokkeerd voor gebruikers die niet extra willen betalen. Dat strookt echter niet met zijn uitspraak dat onbeperkt gebruik moet worden betaald. Dat zou immers tot gevolg hebben dat mensen die niet extra betalen, de desbetreffende dienst niet onbeperkt kunnen gebruiken.

via KPN wil klanten extra laten betalen voor chat- en voip-diensten | Mobile | Tweakers.net Nieuws.

A new study by Forrester Research found that maintaining a Facebook presence is less effective at drumming up business than plain old email newsletters or search ads. Companies interviewed for the study “received little benefits from Facebook,” according to the Wall Street Journal. Another recent study found that even print ads were better at fostering consumer engagement with brands than a Facebook page. Hundreds of thousands of people may “like” a brand’s Facebook page, but they don’t actually like it

via Nobody Actually Likes Your Brand’s Stupid Facebook Page.

A study conducted by the Dutch calculators came up with the conclusion that open source didn’t save any money. Not so, says the MOD – they didn’t take into account things like the same costs incurred for 2500 users are now spent to service 6000 users, a savings of 66%!

Rekenkamer blundert bij berekening open source | Webwereld.

internet kassa, ecommerce, e-commerce, internet payment, credit card, creditkaart, shop

PSPcheck.nl.

Allthough you lose quite a few subscribers, you keep the subscribers who are interested in your messages and you increase conversions. You won’t be put on a spamlist (if you mail a subscribed list with an option to unsubscribe). It also outperforms using social media.

Extreme Email Experiment: How Much Is Too Much?.

Yup, the little kids have to fork over the money if they want to sing modern songs covered by copyright.

Kindergartens ordered to pay copyright for songs | Germany | Deutsche Welle | 28.12.2010.

American Express Identifies ‘A New Era of Pause and Purchase’ With Five Key Trends Driving Consumer Spending in 2011 and Beyond

Report Finds Locally-Sourced Goods, Digital Shopping and “Give-a-nomics” Are Among Top Trends Re-Shaping the American Consumer

More Than Half (54%) of Americans Said They Try to Support Their Local Economy

Over a Third (38%) of Americans Equate Being Good and Ethical to Quality of Life, Far Higher Than Being Rich (5%)

41% of Americans Cite Internet Accessibility as the Biggest Factor Affecting Spending Habits in Years to Come

via American Express Identifies ‘A New Era of Pause and Purchase’ With Five Key Trends Driving Consumer Spending in 2011 and Beyond.

The directive will fully harmonise the period within which payment is due at 30 days. Companies dealing with other companies will be able to set that period at 60 days in their contracts, but must pay bills within 30 days if no contractual period is set.

Contracts will not be able to extend that period beyond 60 days “unless otherwise expressly agreed in the contract and provided it is not grossly unfair to the creditor”, according to the new directive.

Organisations that break those rules will have to pay interest at 8 per cent above the European Central Bank’s reference rate. They will also have to pay fixed fees to companies to cover costs. This will be set at a minimum of €40 but can cover all reasonable costs.

via European Parliament: If you don’t pay, you will pay • The Register.

The Norwegian traders, Svend Egil Larsen and Peder Veiby, were handed suspended prison sentences and fines for market manipulation after outsmarting the trading system of Timber Hill, which is a unit of US-based Interactive Brokers.

The two men managed to work out how the computerised system would react to certain trading patterns. This allowed them to influence the price of low-volume stocks for their own gain.

via Norwegian traders convicted for outsmarting US stock broker algorithm – ComputerworldUK.com.

I agree – it’s like jailing someone for using Word to write a letter – if you know that’s the functionality, that’s what you’re going to exploit it for. Then Timber Hill shouldn’t have used something so predictable as a computer algorithm and certainly not without oversight. Just because there’s money in it, it’s a crime?!

New Zealand has had a look at how the US software patents work and the mess they’ve made of things, so they’ve written up a bill stating that software is unpatentable.

NZCS News – – NZ Computer Society.

This shows how from every $1000,- of revenue, the average music artist makes around $23,- out of which the record company then recoups ‘expenses’.

” In a traditional loan, you invest the money and pay back out of your proceeds. But a record label deal is nothing like that at all. They make you a “loan” and then take the first 63% of any dollar you make, get to automatically increase the size of the “loan” by simply adding in all sorts of crazy expenses (did the exec bring in pizza at the recording session? that gets added on), and then tries to get the loan repaid out of what meager pittance they’ve left for you.

Oh, and after all of that, the record label still owns the copyrights. That’s one of the most lopsided business deals ever.”

RIAA Accounting: Why Even Major Label Musicians Rarely Make Money From Album Sales | Techdirt.

Of course, Hollywood does this too but on a much larger scale.

Which is why we need copyright laws – to protect the big companies. Screw the artists!

Star Wars creator George Lucas is trying to stop a company from making a high-powered laser that bloggers around the world have dubbed “a real-life lightsaber”.

The laser is cool, but isn’t called a lightsaber by the producer. It’s bloggers that made teh comparison.

This goes to show how outdated copyright law is: the original star wars movies stem from the 70s and Lucas is still scraping the bottom of that barrel… let him work like the rest of us and come up with something new!

A lot of people are blaming Lucas and calling him a douchebag, but to be fair, it’s the law that’s allowing him to do this, so even though he’s stretching things, he may be within his rights. The system needs to change to make it clear that this kind of thing is ridiculous.

via George Lucas, Star Wars creator, tries to block ‘lightsaber’.

The Dutch government has released the current text of ACTA and invites comments on it.

Overheid.nl | Consultatie ACTA.

I’ve run through the text and this is my take:

2.3.2. Each Party shall further provide that its judicial authorities shall have the authority to order that materials and implements the predominant use of which has been in the manufacture or creation of [infringing] [pirated or counterfeit] goods be, without undue delay and without compensation of any sort, destroyed or disposed of outside the channels of commerce in such a manner as to minimize the risks of further infringements.

So they’re going to destroy computers and networks because they might be used to copy something again some time? Will they be burning notebooks, pens and pencils as well?

2.5.X. Each Party shall provide that its judicial authorities shall have the authority, at the request of the applicant, to issue an interlocutory injunction intended to prevent any imminent infringement of an intellectual property right … Each Party shall also provide that provisional measures may be issued, even before the commencement of proceedings on the merits,

so if a party decides they think someone may be about to copy them, they can get an injunction and go about destroying and / or confiscating material (as described in 2.3) without having to display any evidence! I can see newspapers magazines using this on one another quite happily. They limit this some in 2.5.3 but the wording: “to provide any reasonably available evidence” leaves much lattitude.

Liability

2.14.1
Willful copyright or related rights piracy on a commercial scale includes:
[(a) significant willful copyright or related rights infringements that have no direct or indirect motivation of financial gain; and

Which means you can’t make parodies, cartoons where the characters wear Ralph Loren shirts may be subject to criminal persecution, etc.

2.14.3 Each Party shall provide for criminal procedures and penalties to be applied [in accordance with its laws and regulations,] against any person who, without authorization of the holder of copyright [or related rights] [or the theatre manager] in a [motion picture or other audiovisual work], [cinematographic work] [knowingly] [uses an audiovisual recording device to transmit or make] [makes] a copy of [, or transmits to the public] the motion picture or other audiovisual work, or any part thereof, from a performance of the motion picture or other audiovisual work in a motion picture exhibition facility open to the public.

Which means – you can’t back up movies you bought, you can’t show them to your friends, you can’t watch it in a park and you can’t use any of the footage therein for any purpose whatsoever, eg. to edit your own home film and / or parody.

2.18.3
(b) condition the application of the provisions of subparagraph (a) on meeting the following requirements:
(i) an online service provider adopting and reasonably implementing a policy[58] to address the unauthorized storage or transmission of materials protected by copyright or related rights
(ii) an online service provider expeditiously removing or disabling access to material or [activity][alleged infringement], upon receipt [of legally sufficient notice of alleged infringement,][of an order from a competent authority] and in the absence of a legally sufficient response from the relevant subscriber of the online service provider indicating that the notice was the result of mistake or misidentification.

Which means an ISP has to become some sort of copyright enforcer And they have to start censoring the internet – that’s not their job! They provide access to internet!

But option 2 3a gets worse:
Each Party shall enable right holders, who have given effective notification to an online service provider of materials that they claim with valid reasons to be infringing their copyright or related rights, to expeditiously obtain from that provider information on the identity of the relevant subscriber.

So without legal due process, ISPs are expected to give out personal information on their customers to ‘rights holders’ who don’t have to prove they are, in fact, rights holders of anything.

4b the manufacture, importation, or circulation of a [technology], service, device, product, [component, or part thereof, that is: [marketed] or primarily designed or produced for the purpose of circumventing an effective technological measure; or that has only a limited commercially significant purpose or use other than circumventing an effective technological measure.]]

Which means you couldn’t invent the tape recorder, VHS, DVD recorder, photocopier maybe even the harddisk.

6 (a) to remove or alter any [electronic] right management information
(b) to distribute, import for distribution, broadcast, communicate, or make available to the public copies of works, [or other subject matters specified under Article 14 of the TRIPS Agreement] [performances, or phonograms], knowing that [electronic]rights management information has been removed or altered without authority.]

Again, you can’t use parts of anything for any reason and you’re not allowed to make edits. This would include the use of quotations in books, photocopies of pages in libraries,

3.3.5
[5. State parties shall endeavour to provide technical assistance in the following areas:
(a) Promoting the culture of intellectual property.

What? Why? I don’t think IP is a good culture to promote, it’s a call for stagnation. There are plenty of articles showing this, as well as articles showing that lacking IP, especially in the fashion industry, drives innovation.

Large problems:
ACTA leans heavily on the Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS), which itself leans on the 1971 Berne Convention for the protection of literary and artistic works – how can a 1971 document still be relevant in this digital world? Especially when ACTA for at least a third concerns software piracy. Not only the medium but also the way the inhabitants of the world percieve it (as opposed to large corporations) has changed. In order to guarantee your IP you need to spend vast amounts of money, thus favouring the large IP companies at the expense of the smaller IP companies.

Measuring the role of online in the consumer journey from research to purchase

The CCB is a free online research tool providing consumer insights across 27 countries and 36 product categories.

Using the tool, you can understand and interrogate how consumers across markets use the internet to buy and research different products

Consumer Commerce Barometer.

The Combined Online Information System COINS is a database of UK Government expenditure provided by government departments. The data is used to produce reports for Parliament and the public including: expenditure data in the Budget and Pre-Budget reports; Supply Estimates; Public Expenditure Statistical Analyses PESA; the monthly Public Sector Finance Releases. It is also used by the ONS for statistical purposes.

This is the raw data, so you can do with it what you like.

via Combined Online Information System | data.gov.uk.

England, the home of tidal energy generator projects, has a new one: a Swedish startup has models of a turbine attached to a kite wing and rudder tethered to the ocean floor.

‘Underwater kite’ aims to turn energy tide – CNN.com.

So these guys who were busted by the bankers in the credit crunch have found a way to fight back: sue the credit collection agencies on technicalities. They win a lot of settlements, get out of their debts and make some money!

Dallas News – Better Off Deadbeat: Craig Cunningham Has a Simple Solution for Getting Bill Collectors Off His Back. He Sues Them. – page 1.