The Amabile Boys and Men’s Choirs Christmas concert is on Dec 19. The flyer is below for anyone interested in attending. These choirs are truly world class – having won national competitions, and performed internationally. My son is in the Young Men’s Choir.
Back in September, thousands of Internet users tapped their feet to the brilliant open letter on piracy, sent to Lily Allen by musician Dan Bull. As November draws to a close, Dan is back again, this time taking a swipe at everyone’s favorite twice-fired, unelected politician Lord Mandelson and his controversial Digital Economy Bill.
Swedish Communications Minister Åsa Torstensson visits Washington, DC next week with a meeting with the USTR on the agenda. According to a press release , the message on ACTA will be simple: open up the process to the public and do not adopt a three-strikes model.
Don Tapscott, who notes that he coined the phrase digital economy, argues that the UK Digital Economy bill is deeply flawed.
isoHunt, the Canadian-based Torrent search engine, has filed a follow-up statement of claim against the Canadian Recording Industry Association as it seeks a declaration that it is operating legally in Canada. The filing is well worth reading as it explains BitTorrent technology and argues that isoHunt is a P2P search engine that merely indexes torrent files found on other indexing sites (it describes itself as a Super-Indexer). Further, it notes the limits of its involvement in the copying process as well as its compliance with the DMCA notice-and-takedown system. isoHunt clearly tries to position itself as a specialized search engine that does not host infringing content. The filing is the second in the case. CRIA challenged isoHunt's earlier filing, arguing that a full trial was needed. The B.C. courts agreed and this marks the continuation of the case.
The CRIA response will be interesting since it faces a conflict between its rhetoric and its view of Canadian law. On the one hand, it has argued that the isoHunt case is indication that Canadian law is out-of-date, suggesting that it provides a clear sign that reform is needed. On the other, given that it initiated cease and desist letters, it is unlikely to simply say that isoHunt is correct and that it is operating legally. In other words, if it challenges isoHunt's claims, it acknowledges that it believes that Canadian law can be used to stop torrent search sites. If it doesn't make such an argument, it can continue to make the claim for reform, but it loses the case.
The European Union has filed its comments to the ACTA Internet chapter. While the existence of the document has been made public, the document itself has not.
The BBC reports that a UK law firm plans to file at least 15,000 legal demand letters earlier next year against people suspect of file sharing. The letters will threaten lawsuits but offer settlement terms of hundreds of pounds per person.
After nearly five years of loyal service, Mininova disabled access to over a million torrent files when it partly shut down its website. Starting today, only approved publishers are able to upload files to the site, but luckily there are plenty of alternatives and potential replacements BitTorrent users can flock to.
.. then OUT-Law asked me to comment on the implications of the Digital Economy Bill, especially for organisations and businesses that provide wi fi networks; and this made me think a bit more about how unworkable this whole scheme is.As I said to OUT-L…
A trade body representing advertisers has called on European countries not to implement new EU cookie laws in ways that would “disrupt” use of the internet.