Friday, June 30, 2006

Design Differences

The word design has many connotations in the English language. It can be a noun, or a verb, but more importantly, it can refer to both artistic works, technical works, and the creation of either.

The differences in the title allude to the differences in protections afforded to artistic works, and technical works. An artistic work falls under copyright, whilst a technical work goes on to become a patent – or more often doesn't. It is this in particular that is the point.

If I draw a picture, it's automatically copyrighted. This writing, since its held on a US server, is considered to have been published in the US, and is automatically copyrighted. What's more its copyright term is until I die, plus 70 years. So, even if I get hit by a truck tomorrow, it's copyrighted until 2076. It has taken no great effort to write this. I had a basic idea, my associate does some assistance with the research, and I write it. He edits it for clarity, and then its published. No great creative effort is needed. I haven't slaved over a tablet for three or five weeks, writing this. Get a patentable device completed this quick, from first concept to public release, and you're some sort of super-designer.

Both I, and my associate are engineers. If I design a device, its not patented automatically. I have to register it. What's more a patent only lasts for 20 years, and is territorial. In other words, if I want my patent in the US, and the UK, I'd have to apply for a patent in both countries

Why are there these differences? A good technical invention is hard to do (although some might claim the same of good artistic works) and involves a lot of work. Of course, the biggest difference between the two is the restrictions on what is patentable. The UK patent office lists them as
1. Has to be new – never been made public before the patent is filed for
2. Be an inventive step – not an obvious adaption of something existing which anyone can see
3. Be capable of existence – if its some sort of perpetual motion machine, its likely to be deined.

There are also more exclusions, but you can read them on the site. All in all, what qualifies for a patent is a narrow field a small percentage of technical output. In some 10 years as an engineer, I've assisted in developing one patent, I've assisted in hundreds, of copyrighted works.

Both copyright and patent were designed for the same thing to reward work in the artistic and scientific/technological/mechanical fields, by allowing the materials creators to profit from their work. The difference is, Patents are for 20 years, copyright can be 50 in the UK, up to 95 or even (considering I personally aim to live another 60 years) 130 years in the US. Then there are all the protections for copyright now. Patents have none of this. If one group infringes another groups intellectual property, in the form of a patent, one group files a civil lawsuit against the other. If it were a copyright infringement, the litigant can similarly file a civil suit, or get the FBI (if in the US) to arrest and seize material. Copyrights have methods now to, it is claimed, protect them from being infringed. Do patents carry these methods? Your computer carries patents in its hardware. Can you take a look at that hardware design – sure you can. Can you then take that, and use it to build your own patent? Well, if it involves an innovative step, and is separately developed, its fine.

DRM, is a new thing in copyright, that has a lot of fans with the copyright crowd. Lets apply it to a patent, lets say a nice new plasma TV. Imagine if you were restricted in the number of people that could watch it at a time, or told that over its lifetime, or until the patent runs out, you can only have the TV in a total of 3 rooms. And of course, you're not allowed to sell or otherwise give away your TV now you've 'purchased' it. It sounds absurd, but these are commonplace restrictions for music. Of course, trying to get around any of these would be a breach of the 'license' you bought the TV under, would be against the law.

The differences do not stop there, however, enforcement is probably the biggest difference between the two. In internal conflicts between the two, in the US, for instance, copyright infringement would often take the form of lawyers initially, or if its major, federal law enforcement; meanwhile patent infringement is just a civil lawsuit regardless – palm and Xerox in their $22.5M fight for instance. In international matters, we have seen in recent statements the US position on it – forcing national economic sanctions against nations for a site, or having quiet words with another nation's government. When it comes to patents, though, There is no government interaction, No wild and lurid statements, or accusations, press releases filled with wild speculation and rhetoric. A New Zealander is challenging the validity of the 1-click patent Amazon.com holds (or at least that's his aim, its not certain it'll even be looked into). Meanwhile, Intergraph, a US company that specialises in surveillance and security systems for military and civilian agencies, is suing NEC, Toshiba, and Fujitsu. Odds are that there will be no government involvement there either, certainly no intimidation or governmental suggestions of arrests.

Why this difference? Why are people so interested in copyright, and the patent left as the poor relation? Patentable material is harder to create than copyrighted material. Patents advance our culture and civilisation, copyrights merely minutely enhance culture. When it comes to world change, was it the jet engine, or “Sgt. Peppers Lonely Hearts Club Band that changed the way of life? Microchips or music? The VCR, or the content of the videos played on them?

The reason is clear, copyrighted material is easy to make. The idea then, is to maximise the revenues derived from the works, before they're passed into the public domain. Of course, the public domain is Bad for content producers monetarily – as Ian Anderson of Jethro Tull put it , songs in the public domain “becomes instantly devalued”. For the good of all, however, their value is greatly magnified.

As is stated extensively, patents and copyrights are for creators to be able to profit from their creativity, be it artistic or technological, and thus increase creativity. If patents were to last as long as copyrights, cars would still be a new thing, and they'd cost a million or so, air travel would be as common as space travel is now. Clearly not a good thing. If copyright lasted as long as patents, would there be any difference? Well, there would be greater creative artistic works. When you can receive payment from your works for 50-95 years, where is the impetus to create? Additionally there would be more material to base new works on. Samples, lyrics, melodies, film clips musical scores, cheaply.

It appears, as with many other things, the money aspect has wiped out the reasoning in the first place – creative stimulation. How anyone can see that as anything but bad is a mystery, since it only requires the application of a little common sense.

Ben jones

Thursday, June 29, 2006

UK copyright lobby discredits MPAA study pt 2

First, if you haven't read part 1, I would advise you to.

There have been a number of enquiries come in, as to what the conversation has said, and more than once, there has been the allegation that the story is not true. Its been a busy week, but here at last, the emails.



From: B Jones
Sent: 20 May 2006 00:15
To: info@jdapr.co.uk
Subject: request for clarification of data on piracyisacrime.com


Dear sir/madam

I am sending this email to ask for a clarification of some of the data on your site, specifically its with reference to the second paragraph on the page http://www.piracyisacrime.com/bigissue/

My problem is that the figures given vary (between 7-13%, depending on exchange rate) with the figures published by the MPAA in their Lek study (http://mpaa.org/press_releases/2006_05_03leksumm.pdf - page 4). the ITFIPA figures for lost VAT only matches the MPAA figure if the US/UK exchange rate is $1.62=£1 - a rate that has certainly not been seen in the past 12 months.

Thus the question is, how can two organisations with much the same membership, express figures purporting the same thing, yet have such a radical difference in values. how were such values calculated, and how were they checked to be sure they were either accurate or representative.

Yours,

Ben jones
cc: MPAA




On Tue, 23 May 2006 12:58:00 +0100 , "Stefanie Riese-McCartney" wrote:
In reply to your query on the MPA/LEK study findings, please see the attached. 

This information is so old now (research done in 2004) that I’m afraid it’s lost its currency, which is why we haven’t used it.  The apparent anomalies between our locally produced consumer research and the MPA study are due to the fact that the methodologies employed were completely different. The figure quoted in the MPA research is not a consumer spending loss figure and it is not a loss figure to the industry worldwide -  it is only the revenue loss suffered by the MPA member companies.  So it is a different calculation from the industry loss figures we are talking about locally.

I hope this clarifies things.

Kind regards
Stefanie

Stefanie Riese-McCartney
JDA PR

(On the behalf of the Industry Trust for IP Awareness)



From: B Jones
Sent: 24 May 2006 00:02
To: Stefanie Riese-McCartney
Subject: RE: request for clarification o data on piracyisacrime.com


Dear Ms Riese McCartney
I'm afraid I have to send you another email. Your response did not answer my points, perhaps down to a miscommunication. In my question (kept below) I asked about 'lost VAT' of £108.5Million, on a page copyrighted at 2006. Therefore, I can only assume its a recent figure, after all, if its an old figure with no currency, why is it still on the site, let alone updated. Indeed the only timeframe reference on the page . Additionally, the figure I had put it in comparison to was not "a loss figure to the industry worldwide" as you so succinctly put it, but then, neither is it "the revenue loss suffered by the MPA member companies". in fact, the figure to which I referred you (again, on the lower half of page 4) there is a table showing "Tax Loss Estimates (USD$M)" and listing the UK at '176', or roughly £99.1million. Your VAT estimate is £9.4million over.

The other thing that puzzles me is your statement that the methodologies employed were completely different, which explains the disparities in figures. So, which method is the more accurate and correct? Incidentally, what was the method used to determine your figure. Thank you for your time

Ben jones



On Thu, 1 Jun 2006 09:28:02 +0100 , "Stefanie Riese-McCartney"   wrote:
Dear Ben

Sorry for the delayed response but I have been out of the office until today.

To further clarify our answer to your enquiry regarding the amount of 'lost VAT', the figure of £108.5 million was taken from IPSOS research commissioned by the British Video Association, carried out in November 2005 - the most recent research available. It is based on 17.5% of the cannibalised DVD sales the study identified due to all copyright theft in over 12 months. Differences between this figure and the MPA's can be explained by the time elapsed between studies and the different methodology used. The IPSOS research was done using face-to-face interviews with 2,000 members of the public in GB of 15 years+. 

In carrying out research to determine losses caused by crime, no study will be 100% accurate but we have to use the best information available. The figure is used on the piracy is a crime website to make the point that piracy is making a huge impact on many levels, not just losses to copyright owners.  Although it's certainly important to be accurate, we have a common aim with the MPA and other organisations to raise awareness of the harm done by piracy.  We are using a transparent and up-to-date model to generate evidence to prove our point.

MPA members comprise the Hollywood majors.  The members of the Industry Trust for IP Awareness include UK distributors such as representatives of British TV companies, specialists in non-film entertainment and also the key video manufacturers and retailers in this country.

If you have any other information that is pertinent, statistically viable and up to date, please do let us know as we welcome any information that contributes to our insight into this vexing issue.

I hope this helps but please let me know if there's anything else you would like clarified.

Best regards

Stefanie

Stefanie Riese-McCartney
JDA PR
(On the behalf of the Industry Trust for IP Awareness)


Additionally, I have now re-sent requests to the MPAA and the BVA (whose study is referred to) to get their comments on it. We shall see if they reply.

Ben jones

Wednesday, June 28, 2006

Journalism, or press release 2 - the reply

10 days ago, I wrote a letter to the Washington Post, in response to an article they'd written. (you can read it here) I said I didn't expect it to do much good, nor did I expect a reply. I did, however, get one.

As it states right at the top here, N2N is all about BOTH sides of the argument, so I feel duty-bound to post the reply from Frank Ahrens

Greetings, all:

Allow me to apologize for the mass reply, but this story generated a lot of
discussion, to put it mildly, and I wanted to get back to everyone who
wrote, even those who accused me of not knowing my asshole from my elbow
(which, by the way, is one of my favorite phrases).

The story was meant to shine a light on the U.S. government's increasing
involvement with U.S. entertainment industries and their joint efforts to
influence foreign governments to strengthen copyright laws--to the
satisfaction of U.S. companies--and crack down on what the U.S. government
and industries see as piracy.

It was not an endorsement or condemnation of the practice. It was not meant
to debate copyright law and whether rightsholders have their rights for too
long. That's a fine debate that reasonable people of both sides can
disagree on and perhaps a story for another day.

Early in the story, I incorrectly referred to Allofmp3.com as a
file-sharing sight. That was my oversight on final edit--I of course
realize it operates like iTunes--and I'm sorry I did not catch it. I
realize that factual errors can undermine a thesis but I hope you will not
devalue the story--which is about the activities of the U.S. government and
entertainment industry--because of this mistake.

As for The Pirate Bay, perhaps the Swedish authorities conducted a
ham-fisted raid and perhaps the dissemination vs. receiving of copyrighted
material debate is ongoing in Sweden. But in characterizing TPB, I relied
on the opinion of the Swedish minister of trade and economic affairs, who
called it illegal, and the opinion of the U.S. Supreme Court, which ruled
last year that the administrators of file-sharing networks may be held
responsible for ciminal activities of their users, which is clearly guiding
the Swedish authorities. As for the BitTorrent argument, saying that the
network does not carry copyrighted works but seeds to where those
copyrighted works reside strikes me as saying it's not illegal if you chop
up the Mona Lisa into 100 pieces and then tell people where those pieces
are.

Finally, the Swedish police believed TPB was illegal enough to raid. If the
Swedish law of last year is overturned, then that's newsworthy to me down
the road.

As for Allofmp3.com, not only does the RIAA and MPAA but the MPA
(international) and IFPI (international) believe that even though it may
claim it is licensed by Russian authorities, that license and its guiding
authority are shams in the Wild West bazaar of Russian commerce. I tend to
agree.

As for the potential losses suffered by the music and movie industries
overseas, those are of course estimates but not without some empirical
evidence. I pressed both bodies on their calculations, which they compute
but surveying the market to find out what percentage of counterfeit
material is being sold and estimating the corresponding market value, i.e.,
what the music and movie companies would have made from those sales if they
were not pirated goods. A report from the Russian government earlier this
year, for instance, estimated that 70 percent of all CDs and DVDs sold in
Russia are counterfeit.

This is a large, growing and complex problem. I am not infallible but make
every attempt to make my stories as factually correct as possible, to get,
as a former colleague once said, "The best available version of the truth."
The ongoing conversation with readers through the Web greatly helps my
reporting and makes it smarter, as there are tons of readers who know more
about most topics than I do.

So I hope to keep up the dialogue and please allow me to encourage everyone
to keep it civil. Just as you say a mistake in one of my stories can cause
you to devalue the entire story, if someone starts off an e-mail to me by
calling me a name, or several, then I'm likely going to skip the rest of
your e-mail, possibly missing valuable information.

Thanks.

Best,


Frank Ahrens
Media and entertainment industry reporter
The Washington Post
Phone: 202.334.5158
Fax: 202.496.3815

Friday, June 23, 2006

UK copyright lobby discredits MPAA study

The MPAA's recent LEK study into intellectual property theft has been dismissed by the UK's Industry Trust for Intellectual Property Awareness (ITfIPA) as inaccurate and out of date.

The dismissal came after discrepancies between that report, and figures the ITfIPA itself publicises were highlighted. Stefanie Riese-McCartney, spokesperson for the trust, said of the Lex study “This information is so old now (research done in 2004) that I’m afraid it’s lost its currency”. She then went on to say that a British Video Association study from November 2005 was more accurate as it was more recent. The study consisted of “face-to-face interviews with 2,000 members of the public in GB of 15 years+”. The MPAA were contacted, but did not respond.

Apparently, though, there is some confusion as to what the actual public line should be, since at two points Miss Riese-McCartney defended the differences in values (£108.5M for the BVA study, $175M/£98.5M for the MPAA study) as “due to the fact that the methodologies employed were completely different.” Although how they can use two different methods to measure the same thing, have a 10% difference, and still believe either to be accurate beggars belief. Unless, then, there has been a schism in the nature of reality, one, or possibly both, figures are wrong. Fortunately, the ITfIPA does also give a 3rd reason in the same set of statements.

“The figure is used on the piracy is a crime website to make the point that piracy is making a huge impact on many levels, not just losses to copyright owners.  Although it's certainly important to be accurate, we have a common aim with the MPA and other organisations to raise awareness of the harm done by piracy.” - in short, whilst accuracy is nice, getting our point across is nicer.

However, this is not the first time the ITfIPA has revealed information that has broken with the broadly established copyright agency gameplan. In December 2005, the ITfIPA let slip that they considered public domain material copyrighted.

Ben jones

**UPDATE** - 29/06/06
Now read part 2

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