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The BBC has a thoughtful piece on the pending expiry of copyright in sound recordings of a number of major pieces of music.

[T]he message from the industry is one of impending gloom. They are warning that they face one of the biggest challenges to their survival since popular music exploded in the 1960s. In 2013, copyright in the sound recording of the Beatles’ first album expires, as it will for recordings from Elvis Presley, Cliff Richard and other performers of the same period.

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Macworld has a short news update reporting that Apple’s iTunes store now sells 3m songs per day, and is approaching the 1 billionth sale mark.

An interesting counterpoint to a story in the same publication 27 months previously, which linked to a blog post by Dave Fester, general manager of Microsoft’s Windows Digital Media Division.

My favourite excerpt from that post is:

iTunes captured some early media interest with their store on the Mac, but I think the Windows platform will be a significant challenge for them. Unless Apple decides to make radical changes to their service model, a Windows-based version of iTunes will still remain a closed system, where iPod owners cannot access content from other services. Additionally, users of iTunes are limited to music from Apple’s Music Store. As I mentioned earlier, this is a drawback for Windows users, who expect choice in music services, choice in devices, and choice in music from a wide-variety of music services to burn to a CD or put on a portable device. Lastly, if you use Apple’s music store along with iTunes, you don’t have the ability of using the over 40 different Windows Media-compatible portable music devices. When I’m paying for music, I want to know that I have choices today and in the future.

As Homer would say, “mmm, retrospection”.

In case you didn’t know already, in October 2005 Stanford University launched a partnership with Apple called “Stanford on iTunes“, which allows the public to download podcasts of Stanford lectures, events, and music free of charge. There are already over 400 programs available, including: Steve Jobs’ 2005 commencement address; various podcasts on technology; academic lectures on literature, philosophy, and music; and news of Stanford. Stanford on iTunes is also being used by Stanford academics to deliver content to their students. There does not seem to be any law-related content yet, but I’ll be looking out for it.

As with any content from iTunes, it’s not necessary to own an iPod to listen — you can also listen via another kind of mp3 player or your computer. The Stanford podcasts are available via an add-on to iTunes itself (meaning that it’s necessary to launch Stanford on iTunes via http://itunes.stanford.edu to download any content). It’s all pretty impressive, and I look forward to listening to some of the podcasts. I only hope that other universities will follow Stanford’s example.

Another Internet company has been accused of cozying up to the Chinese government. The other week, it was Google, which has decided to filter its Google.cn search results, according to categories set by the Chinese government. This time, it seems that Yahoo! may have cooperated with the Chinese government in its arrest of a political dissident (and this may not have been the first time). (more…)

ZDNet had a recent article about RIM winning a patent case in the UK. The action was unrelated to the NTP/RIM litigation, and appears to have been an action by RIM to have an InPro patent revoked, provoking InPro to countersue for infringement. (more…)

Following on my post the other day about courts ordering the release of “private” data about net usage, an interesting case in point is a decision of the Dutch Supreme Court in late November, which ordered Lycos to reveal the identity of a user of one of its websites who had anonymously posted slanderous (or potentially slanderous) allegations against a postage stamp dealer. (more…)

Rothnie very usefully notes that the Cth has released its draft legislative agenda for the Autumn sittings. On the IP front, it includes a few pieces that I had predicted back when I was crystal ball-gazing in January, plus some other stuff of general interest.

It’s worth noting that none of the IP legislation is marked for introduction and passage in the Autumn sittings (ie, none are ‘starred bills’ on this list). Though, these things can always change… Comments on the particular Bills foreshadowed over the fold. (more…)

US copyright expert William Patry (Former copyright counsel to the U.S. House of Representatives, Committee on the Judiciary; Policy Planning Advisor to the Register of Copyrights) has commented on the US Copyright Office’s orphan works proposal, which I commented on briefly last week. Prof. Patry has also written, with Justice Posner, on orphan works (get the article here). Worth noting this paragraph from Patry’s commentary:

The New York Times has a story on the use of data held by internet companies in court. I don’t think it’s actually all that new a story; it’s more of a ‘lawyers are finally starting to catch up with the net’ story, in the same way you would have had a story about lawyers coming to terms with fax technology 20 years ago. (more…)

The question in Conor Medsystems Inc v The University of British Columbia (No.2) [2006] FCA 32 (Finkelstein J) was this:

1. if you have two joint patentees
2. one of those joint patentees is a University which claims title through two people claiming to be inventors,
3. but it turns out that those people were not in fact inventors,
4. is the patent liable to revocation, on the grounds that it was not granted to the actual inventors or those claiming under them – even though the other patentee is not affected by the problem?

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A new voice in Australian blogs: Joshua Gans, a colleague of mine in Melbourne, has started a blog, apparently due to Andrew Leigh’s inspiring influence. Gans’ research focuses on areas of applied game theory: specifically in the nature of technological competition and also in various aspects of the regulation of market power. He writes/comments/consults on competition, innovation – that kind of thing. Definitely worth watching.

There’s a story in the Australian Financial Review today (sorry, not available online) which notes some comments by the Attorney-General appearing to favour harmony on copyright exceptions, and noting that it seems ‘intrinsically unfair’ if material that would be able to be used under fair use in the US is not so freely useable here in Australia.

Has anyone noticed the recent anti-smoking advertisements showing on television – you know, the ones that talk about how no matter what colour the pack, and no matter whether called ‘mild’, or ‘light’, or ‘low tar’, cigarettes are still toxic? Probably you have – they’ve been around quite a lot lately.

So here’s the question: how many people, do you think, realise that this is corrective advertising, required as a result of some undertakings given to the ACCC by some of the leading cigarette manufacturers in Australia? And why isn’t that part of the advertisement? (more…)

I commented the other day about the Blackberry patent dispute between RIM, makers of the Blackberry device, and NTP. My comments were basically on the court processes, but there are ongoing issues happening in the Patent Office. The new development? I’ll just quote TechDirt:

…the OECD has just held a major conference on the Future of the Digital Economy. Michael Geist, who attended, has a summary of the ‘big themes: the battle over DRM, and network neutrality.