Access & infrastructure

The Information Society for None

Free the Mind has blogged about the report Cultural industries in the context of the Lisbon strategy [PDF] being discussed in the European Parliaments Committee on Culture and Education.

Article 9 in the report attempts to address online piracy and should be seen as a step in the right direction. The authors have reached the understanding that …criminalising consumers so as to combat digital piracy is not the right solution.

However the committee members did not agree with this and several of them have submitted proposals for changes [PDF]. The most serious is the proposal from Christopher Hilton-Hearris. His proposal will force Internet providers into action and to close the accounts of those caught violating others copyright:

This cooperation of Internet service providers should include the use of filtering technologies to prevent their networks being used to infringe intellectual property, the removal from the networks or the blocking of content that infringes intellectual property, and the enforcement of their contractual terms and conditions, which permit them to suspend or terminate their contracts with those subscribers who repeatedly or on a wide scale infringe intellectual property

He even proposes that the EU-Commission launch pro intellectual property campaigns to the general public and as a subject in schools. He is not alone in his suggestion to cut off Internet supply to those involved in copyright violations. The Committee on Industry, Research and Energy has recommended the Committee for Culture and Education to:

Calls on the internet service providers to cooperate in the fight against internet piracy and enforce their contractual terms and conditions or terminate contracts with subscribers who infringe intellectual property rights. Internet service providers should apply filtering measures to prevent copyright and stop existing infringements

Photo hear hear by massdistraction

This is an extremely simplistic and naive approach to the problem of copyright violation in digital environments.

Now that politicians are actively attempting to shut down connections the dream of creating an inclusive society based upon a technological infrastructure (for example Information Society for All) seems to be on its way out.

Why is banning people from the Internet a bad idea?

The Internet has been promoted and become our most basic communications infrastructure (obviously my focus here is Europe since this is where the proposal is being discussed).

1. The punishment does not fit the crime: We have changed the way Banks, Post Offices, ticket sales, hotel booking, insurance (etc, etc) work and banning someone from the Internet will be tantamount to branding a symbol of guilt onto the person. Not to mention the increased costs involved in time and money. Indeed why should copyright violation prevent me from online banking?

2. Group punishment: If an Internet connection is involved in copyright violation this does not mean that all those dependent upon that connection should be punished. The actual violator may be underage or the network may be open to others.

3. Privatizing the law: The ability to punish copyright violators should not be delegated to private bodies. Internet providers are not equipped to mete out legal punishments.

The proposals seen above are simplistic, naive and dangerous they show a fundamental lack of understanding not only of technology or its role in society but also a lack of understanding of the role of communication in a democratic society. The actions of the politicians proposing such measures show that they are not acting in the interests of the individuals they are there to serve.

Posted on by mklang

Steal This Film II

Copyright never was what it used to be and the struggle to define the purpose and limits over the protection of intellectual property (or indeed the idea of intellectual property) continues daily.

One example of the ongoing debate is an op-ed in the Swedish paper Expressen a group of Swedish politicians called for the legalization of file sharing. One of the politicians was a police officer. But this is more an example of the exception than the rule.

The real attempt to draw the lines that may limit copyright occur every day and are defined in the way in which we all collectively use our technology. The act of file sharing by an individual is, in of itself, an unimportant act. Taken collectively file sharing is a massive active form of resistance and a re-interpretation of the the general consciousness of justice, right, wrong & morality.

Another important position is taken by those who actively comment and interpret the acts of all those involved in the re-definition of copyright. An important contribution to this is the film Steal this Film II. It features scholars such as Yochai Benkler, Felix Stalder, Siva Vaidhyanathan, and Howard Rheingold and portrays file sharing and the copyright debate as a historical development in the urge to regulate the spread of information.

Over at the Industrial IT Group blog Jonny has written a very good analysis of the importance of the film. Watch the movie, read the analysis and get involved in the most interesting re-defition of law in our time. 


Posted on by mklang

3000 Open Access Journals

A press release from DOAJ in Lund:

Lund, Sweden – As of today the Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ, http://www.doaj.org) contains 3000 open access journals, i.e. quality controlled scientific and scholarly electronic journals that are freely available on the web.

We are very pleased to see that the usage of DOAJ is constantly increasing on all parameters. Every month visitors from more than 160 countries are using the service, hundreds of libraries all over the world have included the DOAJ titles in their catalogues and other services, and commercial aggregators are as well benefiting of the service.

The goal of the Directory of Open Access Journals is still to increase the visibility and accessibility of open access scholarly journals, and thereby promote their increased usage and impact. The directory aims to comprehensively cover all open access scholarly journals that use an appropriate quality control system. Journals in all languages and subject areas are welcome. To maintain the quality of the service we also have to remove titles from DOAJ if they no longer live up to the selection criteria. 96 titles have been removed so far during 2007.

Posted on by mklang

FSCONS and Skolelinux

The FSCONS conference was really good. I managed to speak to many interesting people and my presentation turned into a very good interactive discussion with the audience. The only thing that is wrong is that I am unable to attend the second day which is today. The reason for this is that my grandmother is 90. This is a birthday that cannot be missed so I am on the train to Stockholm.

As part of the FSCONS the Free Software Foundation Europe created and handed out the first Free Software Scandinavian Award. Since I was on the award committee I know first hand how interesting reviewing and discussing Free Software projects and initiatives can be. Here is the press release about the award which went to the excellent Norwegian project Skolelinux:

Free Software Foundation Europe is proud to announce that the Norwegian project Skolelinux is the winner of the first Free Software Scandinavian Award handed out at during the Free Software Conference Scandinavia 2007 in Göteborg friday 2007-12-07.

Skolelinux has under a long period of time worked hard to promote the use of Free Software as well as the use of free and open standards and file formats. By using low cost or spare hardware, schools and other public institutions can find a free and cheap IT solution made to meet their needs.

Skolelinux captures a big part of the free software spirit; sharing and reusing. By focusing on schools, Skolelinux makes sure students, tomorrow’s computer users, and decision makers, can grow up in a spirit of sharing, reusing and learning from family, friends and neighbours.

The goals of Skolelinux are to:

* Provide a complete software solution using free software tailored for the needs and use-cases in educational scenarios.

* Pre-configured for easy installation (standalone, as well as network-wide roll out).

* Easy to use, maintain, and administer.

* Supporting your native language.

* Classify and package all free software related to education.

* Write documentation to describe how to use the various software (in an educational context).

* International availability, currently being translated into more than 50 languages.

Skolelinux has combined important, and dedicated work contributions with technical knowledge and political skills.

The adoption of Skolelinux in so many countries around the globe shows that the use of Free Software and open standards has really been spreading in a very positiv way.

The next milestone is that we are now seeing the merge of different school systems based on Free Software. The largest example is the merge between Skolelinux and the very successful Spanish GNU/LinEx project which has at the moment more than 250.000 users and 80.000 work stations in use in schools in Extremadura. The one laptop for every two pupils project.

Both Skolelinux and the GNU/LinEx buildts on Debian GNU/Linux and can enjoy the many synergy effects.

By focusing on schools the Skolelinux project shows by example how Free Software can be used. The jury finds this strategy important for the continued use of free and open standards.

Short about Skolelinux:

GNU/Linux in Schools

Skolelinux is free, stable, future secured, sustainable, and is upgraded frequently

– no license problems
– easy and time saving administration
– security updates are made quickly available
– simple system updating
– good administration of the software packets
– older PC ‘s can be used as thin clients
– no dependence on commercial interests/vendor lock in

About the leadership:
———————
The Skolelinux project has “doer democracy” which means that the active persons decide! The merit lies in your contributions not in your title.

The free, open source code in the project is very valuable because the source code is available making it is easy to change and
customize. This is illustrated by the many languages that are being supported. In a digitalized world it is important for the survival of the cultures that even small national languages are being actively supported.

The collaboration platform:
—————————
The Skolelinux version 3.0r1 is now available. There has been a valuable collaboration between the following countries: Germany, Spain , France, Greece and Norway. Lately also with a Canadian School project.

For some years now there have been regular meetings between different free software school systems and projects. The reason being to share cool applications and avoid double work. A win-win situation for all.

Congratulations again to Skolelinux. We wish you continued growths and success.

The Scandinavian Free Software Award
————————————

The Scandinavian Free Software Award has been designed for Nordic citizens, projects or organizations that make an outstanding contribution to the Free Software movement. Free Software projects, efforts, achievements of all kinds – including work done by Nordic citizens which has had a large effect in other parts of the world are eligible to be nominated. It is the aim of FSCONS 2007 that this award becomes an annual event.

Jury 2007:

The jury is compiled by Nordic citizens only. This year the members are:

– Anne Østergaard (Gnome Foundation, Denmark)
– Henrik Sandklef (FSFE, Sweden)
– Jonas Öberg (FSFE, Sweden)
– Marcus Rejås (FSFE, Sweden)
– Mathias Klang (FSFE, Sweden)
– Petter Reinholdtsen (NUUG, Norway)

Here is the complete list of nominated projects.

Posted on by mklang

Filtering Swedish Parliament

The Swedish Parliament has installed a filter in order to stop access to child pornography (Swedish press release). The filter was not installed in order to stop activities which were occurring but rather to prevent their occurrence. Most probably the decision to install such a filter was done to prevent what could have become a public relations nightmare.

The filter will delete any child pornography images it detects and no logs are created. The decision to create no logs may be strange but with the Swedish freedom of information policy this is probably done again to prevent public relations messes from occurring? Oh correct my cynical soul (if I had such a thing) if I am wrong.

Therefore in order to prevent a problem that has not occurred the highest decision making body in Sweden has placed its free access to information into the hands of who? Most probably a private company. If I was a more paranoid person then I would say this was a bad decision. This means that Swedish members of parliament will be unable to find information freely and independently.

Naturally I am not supporting child pornography – don’t be obtuse. I am, however, against putting free access to information into the hands of a private body. This is self censorship. Done in order to avoid public relations disasters.

Of course the parliamentarians could complain but considering the political atmosphere surrounding this issue anyone complaining would probably be placing themselves in a questionable light. This has the makings of a classic paranoid witch-hunt.

Posted on by mklang

Trust no-one

The question of trust is a difficult one. The decision to trust must be made taking into consideration both now and by calculating future probabilities into the equation. Unfortunately the users of the users of Hushmail, a longtime provider of encrypted web-based email made the wrong decision.

The main selling point of Hushmail was it’s encryption which would guarantee privacy and security to the user.  Hushmail markets it’s service by saying that “not even a Hushmail employee with access to our servers can read your encrypted e-mail, since each message is uniquely encoded before it leaves your computer.”

Unfortunately such promises are rarely true. In an article in Wired:

A September court document (.pdf) from a federal prosecution of alleged steroid dealers reveals the Canadian company turned over 12 CDs worth of e-mails from three Hushmail accounts, following a court order obtained through a mutual assistance treaty between the U.S. and Canada. The charging document alleges that many Chinese wholesale steroid chemical providers, underground laboratories and steroid retailers do business over Hushmail.

I have no sympathy for the drug dealers but it is important to realize that relying on free services provided by companies will never ensure a reliable infratructure – when placed under stress the private company has an obligation to make a profit, not to protect non-paying users.

Posted on by mklang

Avoiding copyright extemism…

Lessig presented a very interesting talk entitled Three stories and an argument at TED recently. It’s well worth watching for both it’s content and delivery. The basic argument is familiar. Since digital technology and tools are becoming cheaper and easier to use the cost of producing and remixing copyrighted material is becoming very cheap. Add to this the cheap availability of an efficient communications platform (the Internet with its applications) large groups of people are moving from cultural consumers to becoming consumer/producers.

Professional creators in the past (musicians, authors, filmmakers etc) have always taken culture and remixed it. Taken different ideas and re-packaged them in order to create something new. Most of our ideas have not emerged in great leaps but in many small (inevitable?) steps. Today the technology is making this process more democratic in that the amateur is invading the realm of the professional – and, as Lessig puts it, this does not mean that the material produced is amateurish. It refers to amateur in the true sense of the word it is done out of love rather than money.

The major barrier to all this is copyright law. The problem with this is that the ability to take parts of our culture and remix them is an accepted form of communication among large groups of people and the institutional response has been criminalization. Copyright law has produced the presumption that remixing is illegal in particular in the digital realm. Since every use of culture in the digital realm entails a copy therefore every use should require permission.

This is an inefficient system that goes against the way in which people act. We are developing a system where people are aware that they are acting in violation to the law but they do not feel that this is wrong. Lessig warns about the growth of copyright extremism on both sides: One side builds new technologies to protect copies while the opponent cry out for the abolition of copyright.

Much of my time is spent advising university lecturers on the ways in which they can and cannot use new technologies in the classroom. The university of today is required to connect and compete with a generation of people who are connected and digitally sophisticated. In our attempts to connect and educate we provide students with laptops, wireless connectivity and digital material.

In all this copyright is creating a barrier to effective use of ICT in education. Lecturers and students attempting to benefit from online material are being driven to acting against the law. Copyright law limits the use of web2.0 technologies such as Blogs, YouTube and Flickr in the lecture halls, but the need to connect and educate is driving dedicated lecturers to circumvent, avoid, bend and break the law. This is not a good situation.

The problem is that the law has become inadequate for our needs. In order to ensure copyright control the legislator has forgotten to allow people to remix and to allow educators to use copyrighted material to a greater extent. This is not an argument for making mass copies of the latest Hollywood film – “pure” copyright “piracy” is, and should be, illegal.

But there is a need to allow access to culture beyond the passive consumer role. It also makes good business and democratic sense since it takes the edge away from the extremist positions, which threaten to push the discussions into chaos – as extremism, does. It is an argument to allow non commercial uses of copyrighted material without the fear of reprisals which exists today.

Posted on by mklang

YouTube & Crime

The media in Sweden is (understandably) full about reports of the school shootings in Finland.* This is to be expected. But what surprises me is the focus on the fact that the perpetrator had made a video and posted it on YouTube.

The focus of Swedish media on the YouTube connection shows a fundamental lack of understanding about the use of technology today. The surprise should not be that a young disturbed man planning a school massacre places a video on YouTube but we should be surprised if the young man had not done so. The YouTube suicide note must be as predictable as death & taxes.

Despite this, the media calls in “experts” and asks them to explain what kind of anti-social cesspit YouTube is. They ask about the responsibility of YouTube, they ask why the events predicted in the film could not be stopped. They want to know how to prevent children from accessing YouTube to watch movies such as these and whether or not the films online are creating copycats.

Basically people do not seem to understand the YouTube culture. Firstly it is not a sub-culture. YouTube is a massive collection of sub-cultures. Secondly, YouTube is the logical result of camera and communications technology. It collects everything from death to porn (and death with porn), from toddlers to seniors, from party to study. Basically every type of activity that can be recorded on film is to be found there.

And the audience has seen it all. Here are some examples of search results:

  • School violence 1770 videos
  • Going postal 193 videos
  • Weapons 126 000 videos
  • Death 584 000 videos

And the audience has seen it all before.

So even if the audience had seen a young troubled Finn posing with a gun, shooting in the forest and making threats against the society around him – what was the audience supposed to do? Nobody runs out of a movie theater to get a cop because a murder is about to be committed. We just sit back, munch our popcorn and wait for the ending to come.  The difference with YouTube is that the people watching can comment on the film and others can comment on the comments of others.

YouTube cannot be blamed for the site just as the audience cannot be blamed for not acting against the rantings of yet another gun-toting youth. The outrage should not be against the communications technology of the day but against the ability of disturbed people to be able to legally carry lethal weapons. For lets face it, if he had been armed with a knife, a hammer or a big stick – none of us would ever have heard of the Jokela high school in Tusby, Finland.

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*The school shooting in Finland was another tragedy of the type we have almost come to expect on a regular basis. Probably the most shocking thing for Scandinavians is that this is the kind of thing that happens “only in America”. There is obviously no basis for this belief it’s just something everyone “knows” and therefore the shock is greater when our established knowledge is irrefutably challenged. No matter where things like this happen they are tragedies and the world should mourn the loss of life and innocence.

Posted on by mklang

Books as marketing channels

A pet hate of mine is people who make notes in library books. I just cannot understand the arrogance of some people who are prepared to borrow a book and then mess it up. It’s not about cost it’s about a lack of interest in other peoples property and a lack of consideration for the next reader.

But now it’s not only the lenders doing it. The Guardian reports that public libraries in the UK will be using books as a direct marketing channel. The project will insert advertising into library books and provide libraries with much needed extra funding.

Up to 500,000 inserts a month are due to be handed out by libraries in Essex, Somerset, Bromley, Leeds and Southend.

The plan is being run by the direct marketing company Howse Jackson, whose business development director Mark Jackson said the company was “very proud” of what he described as “a brand new channel” for direct marketing.

Obviously Mark Jackson is more of a marketer than a reader. Guy Daines (director of policy at the Chartered Institute of Library and Information Professionals) was dismayed by the scheme.

(via Lex Ferenda)

Posted on by mklang