Monthly Archives: August 2010

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What If You Could Click A Button And A Sponsor Would Pay A Site Money (Without It Being Clickfraud)?

I recently wrote about Flattr and how it’s a different take on micropayments that seems more interesting to me (though I’m still not convinced it’ll get big enough to make a difference). In that post, I also noted a competitor, Kachingle. Apparently, another company is about to enter the space, named Twixa, but it has a slight twist on the concept. Rather than asking users of a site to click a button to pay with their own money, the “ThankThis” offering from Twixa gets a sponsor to pay the money. Basically, any time you clicked the “Thank This” button (which looks similar to the Flattr button), rather than some of your money going to the site, a sponsor’s money goes to the site. Of course, it also puts up a simple ad, which is how the sponsor finds this worthwhile. In some ways it’s almost a direct play on the fact that some sites ask people to click on their ads to get cost-per-click cash from advertisers — even though that’s often frowned upon as a form of “click fraud.” In this case, however, it’s encouraged with the participation of sponsors. I’m still not convinced that enough people would really click to make a difference, but it is quite interesting to see how this space is evolving.

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Using groovyc To Compile Groovy Scripts

For most Groovy scripts I use, I simply run the script from its Groovy source code as-is and allow the compilation to take place implicitly.  However, it can be helpful at times to use groovyc to compile Groovy code into .class files and then exec… Continue reading

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Judge Rejects Gov’t Request For Cell Tower Data, Noting Recent 4th Amendment Rulings

We recently wrote about a somewhat surprising ruling by the appeals court in the DC circuit saying that long-term use of a GPS to track someone without a warrant violated the 4th Amendment. What was surprising about this is that, while state courts had ruled similarly, the federal courts had almost universally ruled that such tracking was legal. While that case will almost certainly be appealed and seems to have a decent likelihood of ending up before the Supreme Court, it’s apparently already impacting some rulings elsewhere. Chris Soghoian notes that a federal magistrate judge recently rejected the governments’ request for historical cell site data from Sprint, because the government failed to show probable cause (as required under the 4th Amendment):

What’s notable is that the judge admits to having approved similar requests in the past, but refuses to do so this time, as a result of that recent ruling, and noting that the reasoning highlighted that technology is changing the way many view things concerning privacy and surveillance:


The decision in Maynard is just one of several rulings in recent years reflecting a growing
recognition, at least in some courts, that technology has progressed to the point where a person
who wishes to partake in the social, cultural, and political affairs of our society has no realistic
choice but to expose to others, if not to the public as a whole, a broad range of conduct and
communications that would previously have been deemed unquestionably private….

As a result of such decisions, I believe that magistrate judges presented with ex parte
requests for authority to deploy various forms of warrantless location-tracking must carefully re-
examine the constitutionality of such investigative techniques, and that it is no longer enough to
dismiss the need for such analysis by relying on cases such as Knotts or, as discussed below,
Smith v. Maryland…. For the reasons discussed below, I now conclude that the Fourth Amendment
prohibits as an unreasonable search and seizure the order the government now seeks in the absence of a showing of “probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation[.]”

Nice to see some judges recognizing this, though it remains to be seen how many others will agree… and how the Supreme Court reacts to all of this.

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Companies Reach ‘Deal’ On Net Neutrality… But What Does That Mean?

A few weeks back, we noted that a bunch of tech and broadband companies were back to “negotiating” around net neutrality, leading us to highlight Adam Smith’s famous quote that “people of the same trade” seldom meet together except to create “a conspiracy against the public, or in some contrivance to raise prices.” Now comes the news that those involved — including Verizon, AT&T, Skype, Microsoft, NCTA and “others” have “reached an agreement,” which might be “stricter” than the Googrizon “framework,” but which probably doesn’t really apply to wireless networks.

I’m still at a loss as to how this actually matters. The companies can agree to whatever they want, and none of it makes a difference if Congress acts (or the courts say that the FCC is allowed to act). I guess the idea is to think that an “industry agreement” will stave off legislation, which perhaps might work for some time, but still reeks of collusion without consumer input or review.

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Video experiment shows off HTML5 on Chrome

Alongside Arcade Fire song “We Used To Wait,” lots of pop-up windows and videos incorporating real street scenes from Google Street View are among the highlights of this crafty Chrome demo.

Originally posted at Digital Noise: Music and Tech

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Thinking About Possibilities: Arcade Fire Tries To Build The House You Grew Up In Into Latest Music Video

Brandon was the first of a few of you to send over the news of how the band Arcade Fire’s latest “music video” is actually an experiment in more interactive HTML 5 experiences. The idea is that you’re supposed to put in the address of where you grew up, and the “video” (which actually involves a bunch of different windows, rather than a single “video” window) builds the street you grew up on into the video itself via Google maps satellite view and Google Street View. Honestly, the implementation is just so-so (didn’t actually work for where I grew up, so I tried where I live now — which is on a hill — which looks funny since the guy in the video is running on totally flat ground). Still, the overall experience is neat in at least getting people to think about the possibilities for both HTML 5, as well as adding much more customization into content. It also might finally get people to realize that videos don’t need to just sit in a single box… While I doubt many musicians are going to do the same thing, hopefully it does inspire others to start thinking (literally) out of the video box, and about more interesting opportunities.

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US Commerce Secretary Sides With RIAA: Warns ISPs To Become Entertainment Industry Cops

It’s no secret that US Commerce Secretary Gary Locke is quite confused over intellectual property issues. There has yet to be a case where he’s actually questioned a highly biased or debunked industry study on the issue, and he seems to enjoy celebrating with the entertainment industry, even as the government has debunked the studies he relies on. But it’s really sad that he doesn’t even seem to consider the other side at all. His latest move is to side with the RIAA and effectively warn ISPs that they need to become copyright cops for the entertainment industry establishment.

As you go through the text of his speech at Belmont College in Nashville (where I once spoke as well), it’s really quite stunning how either uninformed Locke is or how purposely misleading he is. Neither speaks well for him:


Congressman Jim Cooper has made intellectual property protection a top priority of his as a co-sponsor of the pending Performance Rights Act. He is an outstanding senior member of congress who is committed to ensuring that the voices of Nashville are heard in Washington.

Except that the Performance Rights Act is not really about “intellectual property,” at all. It’s about the RIAA trying to squeeze more cash out of radio stations, despite the fact that in an open market, they know damn well that they get so much value out of radio that they constantly feel the need to pay radio stations under the table for the promotion. In other words, the Performance Rights tax is really an attempt to get radio stations to pay the record labels for the right to promote the music the RIAA wants to promote. It’s a huge wealth transfer, and Locke should be ashamed of supporting such a policy that does little to actually help musicians, but plenty to help the middlemen.


Governor Bredesen has been at the forefront of protecting individual property as well in Tennessee. In November 2008, he signed into law a Campus Piracy Bill that requires public and private colleges and universities in the state to ensure that computers connected to their campus network are not being used for illegal file-sharing.

Only problem? An analysis of this law showed that it would actually cost Tennessee taxpayers over $10 million with absolutely no evidence that it would help musicians at all. Gary Locke is apparently all in favor of faith-based legislating on copyright law. That’s scary.


Worldwide and certainly in the United States, consumers are spending less on recorded music in all formats. Recorded music revenues are down by almost half over the last decade.

Note that Locke conveniently ignores the fact that if you look beyond recorded music, overall spending on music and music related products has gone way up and (more importantly), much more of that money goes directly to artists, rather than to the middlemen. After talking about the Nashville floods — which were indeed quite devastating — Locke seems to compare them to file sharing:


But there are other problems that we have within our power to solve. And one of them is the rampant piracy of music, and of intellectual property, that are the lifeblood of this region’s economy.

And I think it’s important to lay down a marker about how the Obama administration views this issue. As Vice President Biden has said on more than one occasion, “Piracy is flat, unadulterated theft,” and it should be dealt with accordingly.

Is it worth reminding people that Biden once was famous for his plagiarism of a law review article while he was in law school? Or is that just a cheap shot. Biden begged off that “mistake” by saying it wasn’t “malevolent,” so it should be forgiven. And yet, oddly, he doesn’t seem to take that same stance towards people sharing the music they love.


This isn’t just an issue of right and wrong. This is a fundamental issue of America’s economic competitiveness.

Which is why you would think that Locke would actually be interested in all of the research showing that there’s greater economic benefit with weaker copyright laws. Wouldn’t you? Odd that he is not.


As the president has said before, America’s “single greatest asset is the innovation and ingenuity and creativity of the American people. It is central to our prosperity and it will only become more so in this century.”

Indeed. But no one should confuse copyright law with innovation, ingenuity and creativity. The two are not the same and, the research has shown, not even correlated.


Our founding fathers understood this as well as anyone, which is why they put in place a set of rules and laws to reward and protect the ideas and inventions of the artists, engineers and scientists who create them.

With clear limitations and statements of concern that such laws might be abused. Locke ignores that copyright law today looks nothing like it did when the founding fathers put it in the Constitution — and that the concerns they raised have been totally ignored.


But this copyright and patent framework needs to evolve to meet the evolving challenges of the 21st century.

Hey, one thing we agree on… though I’m guessing that his form of “change” looks nothing like what it should actually be.


Recently, I’ve had a chance to read letters from award-winning writers and artists whose livelihoods have been destroyed by music piracy. One letter that stuck out for me was a guy who said the songwriting royalties he had depended on to “be a golden parachute to fund his retirement had turned out to be a lead balloon.”

Well, there’s your problem. Copyright was never supposed to be about welfare or a pension. Copyright has always been about providing the incentive to create in order to more freely share works with the world and — eventually — to increase the public domain. That Locke appears to think that copyright is supposed to be a musician’s pension and welfare program is especially troubling. It suggests he doesn’t even know what copyright law is.


To take just one area that I know is important to this group, in our government-wide strategy, we endorsed and affirmatively encouraged the private sector — including content owners and Internet service providers — to work collaboratively to combat intellectual property infringement online.

Especially to combat repeat infringement.

And there it is. Dear ISPs: become copyright cops. Even though the RIAA admits that it’s impossible for them to combat such infringement, we feel that you should magically know how to do so, even though you have no way to know what is infringing and what is not.

None of this is surprising, of course, but it’s too bad that no one calls Locke out when he makes such statements.

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Say It Ain’t So, Woz: Steve Wozniak Says Patent Trolls Are Okay

Via Joe Mullin, we learn the rather unfortunate news that, when asked about Paul Allen’s decision to sue lots of big tech companies over questionable patents, Wozniak comes out in favor of “patent trolls” and patent holders suing companies who actually innovate. For someone so beloved by the tech community, these statements seem really unfortunate. He starts out by repeating the myth that patents somehow help out the small guy (ignoring that we’re talking about Paul Allen, one of the richest guys on the planet):


I think this lawsuit represents the idea that hey, patents, individual inventors, they don’t have the funds to go up against big companies. So he’s sorta representing some original investors. And I’m not at all against the idea of patent trolls.

The interviewer, from Bloomberg TV, pushes back pretty quickly, pointing out that Paul Allen is not the inventor and there’s no indication that the inventors on these patents would actually get any of the money should Allen succeed. Woz’s response is again disappointing, saying that Allen “represents inventors.” Nearly everything that Woz talks about comes off as really uninformed about the patent world today. For example, the interviewer notes that dealing with patents has become a “cost of doing business” and Woz seems to think that’s a good thing:


Every tech company is very aware that patents are really the heart of our innovation and invention system and (a) that you have to have your own patent position and you gotta be aware that there might be others. And, yes, you might be infringing. It’s very awkward, because some patents are so general. It’s hard to say how they’ll be interpreted. There’s a lot of ambiguity in the system.

So, wait, patents are the heart of the system, but there’s a ton of ambiguity. Can someone ship Woz a copy of Bessen and Meurer’s Patent Failure quickly, so he can learn about the stacks upon stacks of research that have shown that “ambiguity in the system” now costs society a hell of a lot more than any innovation created by it?

Of course, back in Wozniak’s autobiography, he talked about how much of a success Apple was without relying patents at the very beginning. Too bad he’s now forgotten that.

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Say It Ain’t So, Woz: Steve Wozniak Says Patent Trolls Are Okay

Via Joe Mullin, we learn the rather unfortunate news that, when asked about Paul Allen’s decision to sue lots of big tech companies over questionable patents, Wozniak comes out in favor of “patent trolls” and patent holders suing companies who actually innovate. For someone so beloved by the tech community, these statements seem really unfortunate. He starts out by repeating the myth that patents somehow help out the small guy (ignoring that we’re talking about Paul Allen, one of the richest guys on the planet):


I think this lawsuit represents the idea that hey, patents, individual inventors, they don’t have the funds to go up against big companies. So he’s sorta representing some original investors. And I’m not at all against the idea of patent trolls.

The interviewer, from Bloomberg TV, pushes back pretty quickly, pointing out that Paul Allen is not the inventor and there’s no indication that the inventors on these patents would actually get any of the money should Allen succeed. Woz’s response is again disappointing, saying that Allen “represents inventors.” Nearly everything that Woz talks about comes off as really uninformed about the patent world today. For example, the interviewer notes that dealing with patents has become a “cost of doing business” and Woz seems to think that’s a good thing:


Every tech company is very aware that patents are really the heart of our innovation and invention system and (a) that you have to have your own patent position and you gotta be aware that there might be others. And, yes, you might be infringing. It’s very awkward, because some patents are so general. It’s hard to say how they’ll be interpreted. There’s a lot of ambiguity in the system.

So, wait, patents are the heart of the system, but there’s a ton of ambiguity. Can someone ship Woz a copy of Bessen and Meurer’s Patent Failure quickly, so he can learn about the stacks upon stacks of research that have shown that “ambiguity in the system” now costs society a hell of a lot more than any innovation created by it?

Of course, back in Wozniak’s autobiography, he talked about how much of a success Apple was without relying patents at the very beginning. Too bad he’s now forgotten that.

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Samsung tries to woo TV app developers

The consumer electronics giant uses its first developer conference in the United States to recruit app makers for its Web-connected TVs. Should we really hold the Apple comparisons?

Originally posted at Circuit Breaker

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