EPrints sells out free software: more Apple crippleware prizes

Posted on 30 October 2007
Filed under FOSS, Open access
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EPrints, the important FOSS open archive project — widely used by open access repositories — is organizing a call for plugins. Unfortunately, EPrints has followed Mozilla’s lead and is awarding DRM-crippled, proprietary Apple products as prizes.

The EPrints package is even included in the GNU Project. I am very disappointed in this move; they should know better. Supporting Apple’s anti-competitive business practices that limit users’ freedoms is not in the public interest.

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Shield laws, diffuse interests, and collective action

Posted on 26 October 2007
Filed under Free speech, Journalism, Political science
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Particularly in the past few years, American journalists have been making noise about the need for a federal shield law. Currently, 33 states plus D.C. have laws to protect journalists from having to reveal privileged source information in court; the federal government has no such law. A handful of recent high-profile cases, such as that of Judith Miller, have called attention to the issue.

The House recently passed a bill, HR 2102, which would create a reporter’s privilege, and a companion bill in the Senate has been reported out of committee, S. 2035. However, the President has indicated he would veto the bill.

Before the House voted on the bill, Josh Wolf spotted some changes from earlier language. He notes:

When the bill was first introduced in May, it was not without its weaknesses, but it’s [sic] broad definition of who was covered under the bill and its limited exceptions made for a robust bill that I could easily support.

By August the bill had been amended to refine who would and wouldn’t qualify as a journalist. The new language stated that only those who who derive “financial gain or livelihood” from their journalistic activity would be covered. Journalism students would no longer be covered, nor would many bloggers. […]

Since then, two more amendments have been introduced that will further erode the bill. One introduced by Representative Boucher (VA) and Pence (IN) (sponsors of the original bill) adds that the journalist must depend on his craft for a “substantial portion of the person’s livelihood or for substantial financial gain” [emphasis by Josh].

I was struck by a comment on the article:

I noticed in the Washington Post article that the large newspaper conglomerates all support the bill with the amendment. Mmm?

My inner political scientist awoke. Here was James Q. Wilson’s theory on diffuse vs. concentrated benefits: the relatively few and concentrated commercial journalism operations were effectively defending their interest; the many and diffuse bloggers and students were not. And Mancur Olson’s logic of collective action: the relatively small, homogeneous, tight-knight community of large journalism organizations could effectively mobilize — it was even potentially a privileged group, where it would be rational for one actor to expend resources to pursue the good even if no others followed suit. The larger, more heterogeneous, more disconnected group of amateur journalists could not effectively mobilize.

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CopyNight Orlando: coming soon (maybe)

Posted on 25 October 2007
Filed under Copyright, Personal
1 comment

Now that I’ve relocated to Orlando, I’m looking for kindred spirits. I’m considering hosting a CopyNight meet-up, if there’s interest. If you’re in the area, fill out this form so we can get started. Pass it on!

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Why is Mozilla selling out free software?

Posted on 23 October 2007
Filed under FOSS
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Promote Firefox, win a Mac full of proprietary software. Wait, what?

You do realize that OS X doesn’t even come with Firefox pre-loaded, right?

And you do realize that other manufacturers offer laptops pre-loaded with Firefox and Linux, right?

So why in the world should the prize for promoting open source be closed?

Update: Mozilla is also giving away a Macbook for their Extend Firefox contest. For the avoidance of doubt: “Apple is not a sponsor of the Extend Firefox competition.”

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Upcoming presentation in Gainesville, Fla.: software as a service

Posted on 16 October 2007
Filed under FOSS, Linux, Personal
1 comment

On Wednesday, 16 17 October 2007, I am giving a presentation on “Software as a Service (or, Why I Hate Facebook)”. The presentation is at the GatorLUG meeting at 6 pm at Virtually Cuban (2409 SW 13th St.).

I’ll post the presentation here when I have a chance.

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Upcoming presentations in Tallahassee, Fla.

Posted on 15 October 2007
Filed under Open access, Personal, Students for Free Culture
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I’m giving a few presentations and appearances during a visit to Tallahassee:

I have a poster at Campus & Community Sustainability conference, 14-16 October. I’ll be by the poster during the poster session on Monday, 4:30 - 6 pm, in the ballroom of Oglesby Student Union. The presentation is Sustaining Scholarship: The Case for Open Access Academic Literature.
I’ll be hanging out with FSU Free Culture at The Warehouse (706 W. Gaines St.) on Monday, 9 - 10 pm.
I’m giving a talk to the Intellectual Property Law Society on open access. The presentation is Tuesday at 12:30 - 1:15 pm in room 241 of BK Roberts Hall.

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Presentation on Net neutrality at Florida Media Reform Conference

Posted on 8 October 2007
Filed under Net neutrality, Telecom
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On Saturday, 6 October, I gave a presentation on Net neutrality at the Florida Media Reform Conference.

The slides aren’t beautiful, but the presentation seemed to be effective. I’d thought a lot about how to present the topic. “Surely the attendees will have heard about Net neutrality before,” I figured, “but they may not know much about what it actually is.” A lot of the public framing of the issue, while effective at getting the public to pay attention, tended to miss the point. Much public discussion would center on who and how the telcos should be able to charge, rather than the (admittedly abstract but fundamental) effect of neutrality as a network design.

By now, everyone in the media reform community is aware of Net neutrality, and most support it, largely due to the issue’s framing and the alignment of groups in the debate. But most, in my estimation, skipped the understanding phase. Unfortunately, Net neutrality isn’t going away as a policy issue, so it’s time to plan for the long haul. It’s time for a deeper level of education, which will allow more people to speak cogently about the issue.

The first time I really got Net neutrality was reading Lessig’s The Future of Ideas, talking about the end-to-end principle. I tried to take a similar approach here.

The slides are available here. Update: Now posted. In addition, the conference was video recorded; if/when the video is posted online, I’ll link to it as well.

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