Peter Black's Freedom to Differ

Blogging resumes soon

Watch this space ...

I am a Geek

A video from the Society for Geek Advancement:

#atNickHodge: "Australian Constitution. Yes, We have one"

Last night I was a guest on Nick Hodge's Ustream show, atNickHodge, where we discussed the Australian Constitution:

 

Podcast on Ice TV Pty Ltd v Nine Network Australia Pty Ltd

Yesterday evening I had a chat with Ben Grubb from Tech Wired Australia about the High Court's decision Ice TV Pty Ltd v Nine Network Australia Pty Ltd.  Ben has posted a podcast of that conversation you can download here.  And see my previous posts on the decision here and here.

What others are saying about Ice TV Pty Ltd v Nine Network Australia Pty Ltd

Yesterday the High Court of Australia handed down its decision in Ice TV Pty Ltd v Nine Network Australia Pty Ltd, bringing to an end legal proceedings that have been going on for the past three years.  (I first blogged about the case in October 2006 here.)  I had hoped to post a summary of the decision as well as some comments by this morning but unfortunately it now appears that I'm unlikely to get the time to write anything until the weekend.  However, a few other Australian blawgers have posted their thoughts on the decision:

• My QUT colleague Kylie Pappalardo has an excellent summary on her blog OctaviaNet here.
• Warwick Rothnie posted his initial thoughts at ipwars.com here before a posting a more detailed summary and analysis last night here.
• On Australian Regulatory Compliance Review David Jacobson highlights a particular interesting part of the judgment here.
• Joshua Gans comments briefly here.
• Law student Katherine Liew has also written up her reaction to the decision here.

I'll continue to update this list as more people post their thoughts on this decision ...

One aspect of the decision that hasn't really been commented on yet was the nature of the divide on the Court.  Although all six justices agreed that the appeal should be allowed, the court divided into two groups of three justices each.  One judgment was authored by French CJ, Crennan and Kiefel JJ, and the other was authored by Gummow, Hayne and Heydon JJ.  This seems to be part of ongoing trend that suggests that maybe there is a divide on the Court emerging between the more established justices (Gummow, Hayne and Heydon JJ) and the more recent appointees (French CJ, Crennan and Kiefel JJ).  In particular, I can't help but wonder if there is minor battle taking place behind the scenes of the High Court between the new Chief Justice and the longest serving member of the Court, Gummow J, for the intellectual leadership of the Court.  If my suspicisions are correct, it will be fascinating to see how it plays out.

Ice TV Pty Ltd v Nine Network Australia Pty Ltd

Update: link fixed.  Judgment also now available on AustLII here.

The High Court of Australian has handed down this morning its decision in Ice TV Pty Ltd v Nine Network Australia Pty Ltd.  I've been following this case since October 2006 (see my first post here) so it is interesting to note that Ice TV has ultimately been successful.  The judgment is not yet available on AustLII but I have posted a copy of the judgment for you to read here.  This is also what Ice TV has posted to their website:

IceTV wins High Court decision - freezes Nine!

April 22nd, 2009

The High Court of Australia has today ruled in favour of IceTV in what has been an epic three year legal battle with the Nine Network.

Six months after the appeal was heard by the High Court and 3 years since the case originally began the High Court has today in Canberra, allowed IceTV’s appeal from the decision of the Full Court of the Federal Court. A comment as to the High Court findings will follow shortly.

In an official statement made immediately following today’s judgment, IceTV’s Chairman and major investor, Mr. Colin O’Brien said the following;

“I would like to thank all our shareholders, our staff, our customers and our business partners. Without their support during the last three years IceTV would not have survived. IceTV now looks forward to a successful future bringing both Free-To-Air TV and content via various partners to viewers in a way that satisfies viewer demand, whilst embracing the future of digital Free-To-Air television in Australia.”

Since it’s incorporation in 2005 IceTV has had one aim: To give TV viewers the freedom to record and manage their TV shows as they choose. To record what they want, skip what they want and watch it at a time that suits them. No longer do viewers have to watch their chosen shows when the Networks tell them or to watch content they would rather skip through. IceTV gives them this choice.

This win today is also a win for our many subscribers who enjoy the benefits of simpler, smarter TV viewing.

IceTV’s General Manager, Mr. Matt Kossatz made the following comment after the High Court’s decision;

“Today’s decision is the news that we (IceTV), our staff and our loyal users have waited 3 long years and worked very hard for. With everything happening with digital television in Australia at the moment, the timing is ripe and almost worth the wait. We are seeing more and more content coming to both free-to-air TV and via the web and as an independent company (not a TV Network), we will always have the ability to put the interest’s of the consumer first in terms of features we offer”.

For more information, please read our following Press Release.

A copy of the High Court’s Judgment is expected to be made publicly available later this week. A copy of the High Court’s Summary of Findings will be made available via IceTV’s website as soon as possible.

Regards,
IceTV

I'll try to post a summary of the judgment later today.

So what is happening with this blog?

I've just realised that it has been almost two months since I posted anything to this little blog.  Unlike my previous blogging hiatus, this blogging break was not planned in any way, it just happened.  My absence from the blogosphere was not because there was nothing worth blogging about or nothing I wanted to say.  In fact there have actually been several issues and stories I have wanted to blog about over the last two months: Microsoft's Politics and Technology Forum in Canberra and Joe Trippi's visit to Brisbane; Senator Conroy's ongoing attempt to censor the internet in Australia; the Queensland State election; the High Court challenge to the Australian Government's stimulus package; the seeming convergence of Twitter and Facebook; Hilary: The Movie; and the role of the news media in the digital age ...

So why no updates?  Primarily because I have been very busy at work since the semester started in February.  The roll out of a core new constitutional law unit, that utilises a wide range of new communication technologies like podcasts and wikis, has consumed more of my time than I had anticipated when I designed the learning and technology methodology and considered the pedagogy.  However in addition to frequently being time poor, I have also been finding other forums to communicate my ideas and interests; mainly Twitter but also the traditional media.  The increasing amount of radio and print media interviews I have been doing has allowed me to express my views and passions to a wider audience than this humble little blog.

So what is happening with this blog?  The honest answer is I don't know.  I'm not going to shut it down just yet but I also don't know how viable it is moving forward.  In the second half of this year I plan to commence a PhD which means that I am only going to get busier and busier, presumably making it harder and harder to blog.  Ages ago I thought about opening it up as a group blog, but I can't really imagine anyone wanting to join this blog as part of a team of bloggers.  I might make it more of a portal to some of my other work and publications.  Or I might just keep it here as a space I can go to vent when nowhere else wants to hear what I have to say.  But I'll make that decision another day.

In the meantime, feel free to follow my mundane life on Twitter @PeterBlackQUT.

Podcast of The Tangled Web: Beyond an Internet Filter

On Tuesday night I had the pleasure of chairing a newmatilda.com public forum on the internet regulation debate in Australia:

newmatilda.com presents a series of public forums about the internet regulation debate in Australia.

The Federal Government's proposal to block internet sites with a mandatory filter has drawn overwhelming opposition from voices across politics and civil society. So what are the real questions for policy-makers?

These forums explore the ethical, social and political questions raised by government regulation of the internet. With the growing intersection between technology, politics and media, how do existing and proposed classification regimes measure up?

Is filtering inevitable? Or are there better ways to regulate the world wide web?

Chair:
Peter Black, QUT Faculty of Law

Speakers:
Senator Scott Ludlam, The Australian Greens
Irene Graham, libertus.net
Nic Suzor, Electronic Frontiers Australia

A podcast of the audio recording of this forum can be downloaded here:

iiNet copyright case update

In November I blogged that iiNet had been sued for copyright infringement by by Village Roadshow, Universal Pictures, Warner Bros, Paramount Pictures, Sony Pictures Entertainment, 20th Century Fox, Disney and the Seven Network (see here).  The case moved forward during the week with iiNet filing their defence on Thursday and a preliminary hearing taking place before Justice Cowdroy on Friday:

THE court showdown between internet service provider iiNet and movie studios has been set for October 5 in the Federal Court.

The Australian Federation Against Copyright Theft (AFACT), on behalf of seven leading film companies and their affiliates and licensees, sued iiNet last November on copyright infringements claims.

AFACT alleges that despite being warned on 18 occasions over a five month period, iiNet didn't stop its customers from illegally downloading and exchanging movies and TV programs.

It is seeking a ruling that iiNet infringed copyright by virtue of not taking reasonable steps to prevent its customers from allegedly dabbling in the illegal activity.

iiNet has said it would vigorously defend itself against the lawsuit.

Entertainment industry heavyweights party to the court action include Village Roadshow, Universal Pictures, Warner Bros Entertainment, Paramount Pictures, Sony Pictures Entertainment, Disney Enterprises, Seven Network and Twentieth Century Fox, owned by News Corp, which also owns The Australian.

In the Federal Court this morning, lawyers for iiNet and AFACT agreed that the trial would last around two weeks.

Justice Dennis Cowdroy also set the next directions hearing date on July 29, as well as a series of deadlines for affidavits to be filed.

Read more here (from Australian IT).  The Age has more details about iiNet's defence:

iiNet filed its defence yesterday, claiming that the Copyright Act and Safe Harbour provisions introduced with the US free trade agreement stipulated that ISPs were not liable for copyright infringement by customers.

...

In its defence, iiNet admitted that the movie studios held copyright to their libraries of films but was not yet ready to concede that its customers illegally downloaded them.

Regardless, it said that it would not derive commercial benefit from customers downloading films illegally and would in fact incur more costs due to the additional bandwidth used.

In court today, lawyers for the movie studios said they provided iiNet with evidence of its customers' copyright infringement yesterday. The studios hired online investigators DtecNet to intercept BitTorrent traffic and record all instances of iiNet users downloading copyrighted movies illegally.

In the face of this evidence, lawyers for the movie studios said they expected iiNet to admit that its customers had downloaded movies illegally. iiNet's lawyers said they were still reading the document but may be willing to concede that point.

Both sides agreed that the main issue in the hearing would be whether iiNet was liable for the actions of its users and whether it in effect "authorised" their copyright infringement by failing to disconnect them when notified of the infringements by the movie studios.

The Australian Federation Against Copyright Theft (AFACT) sent several letters to iiNet notifying the ISP of the infringements, however, in its defence iiNet said the notifications were "mere allegations of copyright infringement" and were forwarded to police.

"The allegations of copyright infringement in the AFACT notifications were not accompanied by sufficient information to demonstrate the veracity of the allegations," iiNet claims.

"iiNet was, and is, legally bound to continue to provide relevant iiNet Services to iiNet Subscribers under its contracts with those subscribers."

iiNet pointed out that it provided access to legal downloads of games, movies, music, radio, sports and TV content through its Freezone service. (www.iinet.net.au/freezone)

It said it "did not sanction, approve, or countenance" alleged copyright infringement by any iiNet user.

Read more here.  I was interviewed about the iiNet lawsuit for ABC's Radio National PM program on Friday.  You can listen to the report or read the transcript here.

Finally! A politician worth following on Twitter

Politico's Ben Smith explains why we should all be following US Senator Claire McCaskill on Twitter:

Many politicians are now on Twitter, but few are posting stream-of-consciousness updates from their BlackBerrys, and the telegraphic press releases that compose most official tweets can be a bit wearing.

So Sen. Claire McCaskill's feed, which she began, communications director Adrianne Marsh tells me, as a way to give constituents a running glimpse of the inaugural festivities ("Scalia in a really weird hat," read one entry), is pretty remarkable: obviously authentic, somewhat candid and much in the spirit of the new tech age.

"It gives me a little bit of heartburn, but it is what it is," said Marsh, who said McCaskill uses the program TinyTwitter on her personal Blackberry. "That's really the stream of consciousness way she takes in these events."

Read it here.  Senator McCaskill's use of Twitter is a much more interesting and revealing use of Twitter than that of any Australian politician I can think of.

"25 Things I Didn't Want to Know About You"

Time's Claire Suddath has understandably had enough of the latest ridiculous Facebook meme, "25 Things About Me":

A girl I knew in high school has memorized all of Janet Jackson's dance routines. A college acquaintance is afraid of train whistles. Five separate people harbor lifelong desires to visit New Zealand. How do I know these things? Because they won't stop writing about them on Facebook! (See the 50 best websites of 2008.)

Facebook's "25 Things About Me" meme seems harmless enough; people write 25 facts about themselves and post them on their Facebook pages, just as they do with videos, status updates and photos of last weekend's party. An estimated 5 million of these notes — that's 125 million facts — have appeared on the website within the past week. Assuming it takes someone 10 minutes to come up with their list, this recent bout of viral narcissism has sent roughly 800,000 hours of worktime productivity down the drain. (Read "Does Facebook Replace Face Time or Enhance It?")

But it's just so stupid. Most people aren't funny, they aren't insightful, and they share way too much. Facebook is a loose social network; a "friend" on Facebook might translate to someone you'd barely recognize in real life. I don't care that my college roommate's sister is anemic or that my stepcousin's boyfriend gets nervous around old people (apparently he's afraid they're going to die). (See the best social-networking applications.)

Below are 25 facts I wish people hadn't told me about themselves.

Read those facts here.  I thought of compiling my own list based on what my Facebook friends have disclosed through this meme, but I decided that would be cruel.  Claire Suddath's list will have toto.

Goodbye Twitter?

Facebook has announced that they are opening up their status API:

Facebook has made a number of updates to the Facebok platform one of which is the opening of status updates. In order to get Facebook statuses, you no longer need to use a session ID to access statuses. This is a huge update and one that I think is going to take Facebook to the next level. There are additional updates listed in the Facebook blog post:

Specifically, your applications can now directly access all of a user’s status, links, and notes via new methods and FQL calls. Your application will have access to any status, notes, or links from the active user or their friends that are currently visible to the active user. In addition, we’re opening new APIs for you to post links, create notes, or upload videos for the current user, and we’ve made setting a user’s status easier.

As mentioned, Facebook has made it easier to set a user’s status. Get ready for streaming Facebook status tools galore. Just over one month ago I suggested that opening up that status API would be the first step toward Facebook killing Twitter. Now we will see if this really has as large of an effect as I claimed it would.

Read more here (AllFacebook).  I really doubt that this will be beginning of the end for Twiiter.   There is a very loyal community of users on Twitter has who will not readily shed the tech cred that comes with using Twtter for the relatively mainstream Facebook.

Brisbane Twestival

This coming Thursday 12 February a series of Twestivals are being held over the world to raise money for charity: water and Brisbane is no exception:

Step right up! Come along to the number one charity event this year: Brisbane Twestival!

We're raising money for charity:water, who help the 1 in 6 people worldwide to gain access to clean safe drinking water.

To raise this money, the Brisbane Twitter community is holding an evening of arts and entertainment right in the heart of Brisbane. Your donation entitles you to witness some great performances from acts including DizzyGotheca, The Strange Attractors, Supergeneric and Collapsicon! Dancers Moniq and Lady Vee will be providing shows, and the night will bear witness to a super special performance from AS Theatre, presenting a scene from Dave Burton's award-winning new play Lazarus won't get out of bed.  Additionally there will be art displays, raffles, competitions and more.

Follow the latest announcements on the Brisbane Twestival blog or on Brisbane Twestival's twitter page. To contact someone, send an email to twestival -at- lexiphanic -dot- com, or speak to @lexiphanic or @NicoleJensen on Twitter.

We'd also like to thank our sponsors for their enthusiasm in contributing to and participating in this event:

• ourbrisbane.com
• MetroArts
• BandHost.com.au
  
• SomebodyThinkOfTheChildren.com
• Kelvin Grove Lolly Shop
• Auto Greasemonkey
• Telstra
• Verve Cafe
  

...and this is in addition to the great performers and people donating their time to help make the night a smooth-running success.

If you and/or your business are interested in contributing to this event in any way, please contact Greg by emailing twestival -at- lexiphanic -dot- com. We have a range of sponsorship opportunities in all shapes and sizes and every contribution helps!

The Brisbane Twestival has also been written up in The Courier Mail here and the Brisbane Times here.

If you are based in Brisbane, I'll look forward to seeing you there.

Joe Trippi at QUT: "Online campaigning in the US Presidential election"

As part of Joe Trippi's visit to Australia thanks to Microsoft Australia, he will be speaking at QUT on Thursday 5 March:

QUT Faculty of Law Free Public Lecture Series 2009
Presents
 
Mr Joe Trippi
Trippi & Associates (USA)
 
Online campaigning in the US Presidential election
 
Thursday 5 March 2009
 
The Gibson Room
Level 10, Z Block
QUT Gardens Point Campus
 
5.30 pm Refreshments
6.00 pm Lecture commences
7.00 pm Lecture concludes

The Speaker
Joe Trippi is the man who introduced the internet into US presidential campaigning and is widely-credited with having ‘re-invented campaigning’.

Much of the success of Barack Obama’s presidential campaign has been attributed to the innovative use of the internet to rally grassroots support.

As National Campaign Manager for Howard Dean’s presidential campaign in 2004, Joe pioneered the use of online technology to organise what became the largest grassroots movement in presidential politics.

As a campaign manager, Joe has run presidential, senate, gubernatorial and mayoral campaigns in the US. His innovations have brought fundamental change to the electoral system and have become the model for smart campaigning.

Joe Trippi has been profiled in GQ, Wired, Fast Company, The New Republic and The New York Times Magazine. He is a  political analyst for the 24-hour US cable news channel MSNBC and a former Harvard University fellow. He currently heads the Washington, DC political consultancy, Trippi & Associates.

Joe is the author of “The Revolution Will Not Be Televised: Democracy, the Internet and the Overthrow of Everything,” the story of how his revolutionary use of the Internet and an impassioned, contagious desire to overthrow politics as usual grew into a national grassroots movement and changed the face of politics, and indeed many aspects of American life, forever.

Joe Trippi’s visit is supported by Microsoft Australia.

Registration: Register by 27 February 2009 at qutlawpubliclectures@qut.edu.au

Registered attendees may claim 1 CPD point for the Queensland Bar Association and Queensland Law Society.

Second Annual Microsoft Politics & Technology Forum: Online Campaigning

On Thursday 26 February, Microsoft will be hosting their second annual Politics and Technology Forum.  The keynote speaker this year is Joe Trippi.  Once again it looks as though it will be an excellent event:

Join government, business leaders and political bloggers at the second annual Microsoft Politics & Technology Forum.

On this informative morning, Keynote Speaker Joe Trippi details the impact of new technologies on modern politics. Heralded by the US press as the man who “reinvented campaigning”, Joe has run Presidential, Senate, Gubernatorial and Mayoral campaigns. His innovations have brought fundamental change to the electoral system and have become the model for online campaigning.

There will also be a Q&A panel discussion, new technologies will be demonstrated, and some revealing insights and statistics around Australian digital behaviour will be shared.

We are delighted to welcome Lindsay Tanner MP, Minister for Finance and Deregulation, The Hon Malcolm Turnbull MP, Leader of the Opposition to this exciting event.

RSVP here. Note, however, that before you start booking flights to Canberra, Microsoft is organsing events in other capital cities where Joe Trippi will akso be speaking.  Stay tuned for details of those other events ...

Update: Microsoft's Australian Government Affairs Blog has more information on the event, including this invitation:

While our keynote and discussion will be invaluable to anyone interested in democracy and communication in the first half of this century I also wanted the forum to be an opportunity for a look at practical examples of new technology tools.

To that end I'd like to invite any developers, web 2.0 or social networking activists with ideas for, or examples of, on-line tools that can be used in political campaigning and who would like to demonstrate their ideas (as a proof of concept or developed application) to the attendees at the forum to contact me.

I'm not interested in how the tools were or are developed, what platform or language the tool was or would be developed with as long as the idea is original, is yours, and you are prepared to demonstrate the concept or tool to the audience. It would be preferable if the idea were capable of wide usage but that is a matter for you.

• Up to three ideas will be selected for demonstration.
• Financial support will be provided to get to Canberra.

Contact me:

If you have an idea or you have developed a tool that you think will support on-line campaigning and you want to demonstrate it to our federal political campaigners and bureaucrats send me an email - simone@microsoft.com

Proposals will need to be with me by 16 February and you will need to have the tool ready for demonstration on the 26th of February in Canberra.

Read more here.

Pirating the 2009 Oscars

Waxy has posted some amazing data on the availability of unauthorised copies of Oscar-nominated movies.  The data reveals that virtually all movies have been posted to file sharing networks and that the source for almost all of those movies are screener copies distributed by the studios and not the poor quality camcorded copies that the industry claims is the primary source of movie piracy.  Interestingly, the average time from the time screeners are received by Academy members to its leak online is just six days.

Read Waxy's post here.

Lose-lose: The New York Times and GateHouse Media settle their dispute over linking

The New York Times Company and GateHouse Media have settled the copyright infringement suit Gatehouse Media filed last month:

GateHouse had accused The Boston Globe and its website, Boston.com, both of which are owned by The New York Times, of violating copyright law by posting material without permission from WickedLocal.com, a GateHouse website covering small towns in Massachusetts.

GateHouse, which is based in Fairport, New York and operates hundreds of daily newspapers and local websites, was objecting to the publication on Boston.com of headlines and lead paragraphs of stories from WickedLocal.com.

The case was being closely watched by many in the media industry because of potential legal implications for the common practice of linking between news sites and the use of links to content on other sites by news aggregators.

The New York Times had argued after the lawsuit was filed last month that linking to other websites is widespread and that Boston.com provided a link back to the original stories on WickedLocal.com.

A trial had been scheduled to begin in a US District Court in Boston on Monday but an agreement was reached over the weekend.

Under the terms of the settlement, neither party admitted any wrongdoing and in the absence of a court ruling, the case failed to bring any legal clarity to the situation.

Under the settlement, GateHouse agreed to put in place technical safeguards that would prevent Boston.com from automatically "scraping" material from GateHouse sites and Boston.com agreed not to try to circumvent the barriers.

Boston.com would also discontinue its use of RSS feeds from GateHouse sites and take "reasonable commercial steps" to remove headlines and lead paragraphs of GateHouse stories from Boston.com by March 1.

But the agreement did allow both websites to continue providing links to one another -- so long as they did not do so through RSS feeds or "scraping."

Read more here (from Google News).  Download a copy of the settlement here.   Techdirt's Mike Masnick sums up why this settlement isn't good news for anyone:

It's bad for the NY Times, because in settling they've almost guaranteed that plenty of other companies will now come seeking similar "settlements." It's bad for GateHouse Media because in winning "the battle" they're losing the war. The NY Times/Boston Globe will no longer be sending them the traffic they were getting in the past. It's hard to describe the level of pure cluelessness that goes into actively turning away the kind of traffic a major media publication can provide. It's bad for readers of both sites, because it limits the usefulness of the content they get. And... most importantly, it's bad for everyone in failing to have a hard and fast precedent set that linking to such sites and including the headline and a snippet are clearly fair use. What a shame.

Read more here.

Top 250 Australian blogs

Over at Dipping into the Blogpond, Meg Tsiamis has posted a special Australia Day 2009 list of the 250 top Australian blogs.  This humble little blog, which was once in the top 100, is now sitting at 157 (that's what happens when your blogging becomes erratic, sporadic even).  If you're looking for some great Australian blogs to follow, this list is a good place to start.  You can see the list here.

Social media will apparently make you a better writer

Over the weekend I cam across two separate blog posts that made the somewhat counter intuitive argument that blogging and Twitter actually make you better writers.  In a guest post on Problogger, freelance writer Jenny Cromie outlined five ways blogging can improve your writing.  However, before she did so explained how she needed to change her attitude to blogging:

In my mind, blogging was just a socially acceptable way for bad, wannabe writers to go mainstream with their poorly written rants and diatribes about things that made no difference to anyone else but the writer, a handful of family members, and other poor captive souls who loved the bloggers enough to read all their bad prose. In fact, if someone mentioned that they had a blog, my mind would click into sleep mode like my MacBook does after 10 minutes of inactivity. I’d think: Oh, one of those self-indulgent wannabe writer types. Where’s the nearest exit?

In short, blogging just seemed like a waste of time and effort. And I guess I had a snobbish writer attitude too—the idea that real writers didn’t need to blog because their writing was good enough to get published through more legitimate, mainstream ways. In my mind, push-button publishing was for the wannabes, not the real McCoys.

Fast-forward a few years. Now, everyone who is someone seems to have a blog these days. And if you’re a freelancer and you don’t have a blog, people sometimes wonder how you can bill yourself as a professional writer. Blogs aren’t just popular among individuals anymore either. Big companies have blogs. Mothers with babies have blogs. Teenagers with pimples and braces have blogs. And I wouldn’t be surprised to find out if some dogs have blogs too.

So this past year, I finally succumbed to this thing called blogging. I decided that since I was billing myself as a serious writer and freelancer, I needed to join the blogosphere. I started writing my own blog about freelance writing. And then one thing led to another and I eventually became the editor of The Golden Pencil, a b5media blog about freelance writing and how to build a successful freelance business.

And after all that herself she discovered that blogging made her a better writer as it helped her:

1. discover her voice;
2. connect with readers;
3. get feedback;
4. get disciplined; and
5. write faster.

Read more here.

But it is not just blogging that can improve your writing.  Dave Winer explains how Twitter makes you a better writer:

Twitter forces you to write concisely, and that makes for crisper, more direct, easier to read copy.  

I was reminded of this when reading a piece written by Dan Santow at Edelman PR, who offers a list of phrases that can be replaced by single words without loss of meaning.  

I realized you never see these phrases in Twitter-talk because there's no space for flowery prose with only 140 characters to express an idea. 

Read it here.  I generally agree with both these posts.  There is no doubt in my mind that blogging and Twitter have made me both a faster and more precise writer.

Blawg Review #196

G'day and welcome back down under!  And most importantly, Happy Australia Day! 

This is the fourth time I have hosted Blawg Review from Australia (I previously hosted Blawg Review #85, Blawg Review #136 and Blawg Review #178.). For those who don't know, the Blawg Review is a weekly round-up of posts from around the blawgosphere, and today I am thrilled to have the opportunity to host Blawg Revew on Australia Day.

However, before we begin my whip around the blawgosphere, a little about me and my blog.  I am a lecturer at the Queensland University of Technology (QUT) in Brisbane, Australia, where I teach Intellectual Property, Australian Federal Constitutional Law and Legal Regulation of the Internet, and research within the Australian Research Council Centre of Excellence for Creative Industries and Innovation. Accordingly, my blog began as a forum to discuss the legal regulation of the internet and the media.  However, just as the collaborative and interdisciplinary nature of my work at QUT has seen my teaching and research interests expand beyond traditional black-letter legal scholarship, my blog is in many ways not a proper "blawg".  Most of my posts cover developments in new media - be they technological, social, political or legal - and you are just as likely to see me embed an interesting, popular or provocative viral video as you are to see me critique a significant legal case or piece of legislation.

Although I blog from time to time on developments all over the world, my blog is fundamentally Australian, which makes it particularly nice to be able to host Blawg Review on Australia Day and showcase some of the best Australian blawgs.

Australia Day is celebrated on 26 January each year, which commemorates the arrival of the First Fleet in 1788 and the proclamation of British sovereignty over the eastern seaboard of Australia.  Most Australians celebrate it - as I did today - by having a barbeque, playing some beach or park cricket, and listening to Triple J's Hottest 100 or the cricket on the radio.  Thanks to the cheeky "We love our Lamb" advertising campaign over the last few years it has also become a bit of a tradition to eat lamb on Australia Day, or else risk being labelled un-Australian.  Here is Sam Kekovich's Australia Day address for 2009:

However, even Australia Day is not without its controversy.  For many Australians, especially indigenous Australia, the day symbolises the adverse effects of British settlement on Australia's indigenous people, with some referring to it as Invasion Day.  This year the Australian of the Year Mick Dodson suggested that Australia may want to consider changing the date of Australia Day to a date that is more sensitive to the heritage and backgrounds of all Australians.  Andrew Bartlett has a good post at Crikey canvassing this suggestion.  However, Australian blawgers have covered a range of issues in the past week or so.

• Ben Lehman on Duncan Bucknell's IP Think Tank asks, has the fat lady finished singing at YouTube?. 
• Warwick Rothnie considers Elwood v Cotton On and asks is copying enough to infringe Down Under?.
• Pia Waugh looks at the ICT industry in Australia and argues that antiquated ideas won’t save Australia. 
• At Illegitimis Nil Carborundum, Bozwell looks at the blame game in negligence and criminal matters.
• Mirko Bagaric on Moral Dilemma has two lessons from the Middle East hostilities.
• Peter Timmins suggests that Australia's politicians could learn a lot of Barack Obama when it comes to openness and transparency.
• Brendan Scott has the third in a series of posts on acquiring closed source software.
• David Starkoff (sort of) ponders the existence of the universe.
• And finally David Jacobson on Australian Regulatory Compliance Review reflects on 30 years of change in legal practice.

However, as I was looking at the Australian blawgosphere this week I couldn't help but notice that it has slowed down a bit in recent times: Catherine Bond has announced she is taking a break from blogging at The House of Commons, a new job has seen Dale Clapperton has slow down at Defending Scoundrels, there is only the occasional post from the team at Lawfont, and Peter Faris QC closed his blog only yesterday. This year has also seen Jeremy Gans wind up his excellent Charter Blog, although he did leave with this call to legal academics:

Quitting the blog feels a little like giving up a baby. I can’t recommend blogging highly enough to any academic whose field includes regular contemporary developments. A commitment to regular, public and comprehensive commentary forces an engagement with the subject-matter that exceeds any other academic endeavour, even a PhD. And the informality of blogging is a perfect antidote to the jargon and circuitous nature of formal academic discourse, not to mention the obsequiousness and pomposity of the law.

i find it interesting that legal blogging in Australia is yet to gain the popularity and respectability that it has the United States, but I remain hopeful that this will continue to change over time.

It has been a pleasure to host Blawg Review #196 this week.  Blawg Review has information about next week's host, and instructions how to get your blawg posts reviewed in upcoming issues

Comparing government copyright on the web: from whitehouse.gov to pm.gov.au

One feature of US President Barack Obama's relaunched whitehouse.gov website was the inclusion in the copyright notice the provision that all third-party content on the site is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License:

Copyright Notice

Pursuant to federal law, government-produced materials appearing on this site are not copyright protected. The United States Government may receive and hold copyrights transferred to it by assignment, bequest, or otherwise.

Except where otherwise noted, third-party content on this site is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License. Visitors to this website agree to grant a non-exclusive, irrevocable, royalty-free license to the rest of the world for their submissions to Whitehouse.gov under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License.

Read it here.  Canadian copyright scholar Michael Geist compared the copyright notice on whitehouse.gov to the Prime Minister of Canada's copyright notice:

The material on this site is covered by the provisions of the Copyright Act, by Canadian laws, policies, regulations and international agreements. Such provisions serve to identify the information source and, in specific instances, to prohibit reproduction of materials without written permission.

Non-commercial Reproduction

Information on this site has been posted with the intent that it be readily available for personal and public non-commercial use and may be reproduced, in part or in whole and by any means, without charge or further permission from the Office of the Prime Minister. We ask only that:

• Users exercise due diligence in ensuring the accuracy of the materials reproduced;
• The Office of the Prime Minister be identified as the source department; and,
• The reproduction is not represented as an official version of the materials reproduced, nor as having been made, in affiliation with or with the endorsement of the Office of the Prime Minister.

Commercial Reproduction

Reproduction of multiple copies of materials on this site, in whole or in part, for the purposes of commercial redistribution is prohibited except with written permission from the Government of Canada's copyright administrator, Public Works and Government Services Canada (PWGSC). Through the permission granting process, PWGSC helps ensure individuals/organizations wishing to reproduce Government of Canada materials for commercial purposes have access to the most accurate, up-to-date versions. To obtain permission to reproduce materials on this site for commercial purposes, please contact:

Public Works and Government Services Canada
Publishing and Depository Services
350 Albert Street, 4^th Floor
Ottawa, Ontario
Canada
K1A 0S5 or
copyright.droitdauteur@pwgsc.gc.ca

Giest concluded that:

While this is better than some other Canadian government departments (who require permission for all uses), it is still not good enough.  First, Canada should drop crown copyright so that there is no copyright in government-produced materials.  Second, there is no need for a distinction between commercial and non-commercial - Canadians should be free to use the government-produced materials for either purpose without permission.  Third, third-party materials, which are Creative Commons licensed in the U.S., are subject to full restrictions in Canada.  Admittedly few people take the time to read these terms and conditions, yet they send a message about the openness, transparency, and a commitment to public engagement with government.  The White House has changed its approach and now the Prime Minister should do the same.

Read more here.  Geist's post made me curious as to what the position would be in other countries with a similar copyright and political system, so I looked at the respective websites for the Prime Minister of Britain and the Prime Minister of Australia.  This is the copyright notice for number10.gov.uk:

Material on this site is subject to Crown copyright protection unless otherwise indicated. The material may be downloaded to file or printer without requiring specific prior permission. Any other proposed use of the material is subject to the approval of Her Majesty’s Stationery Office (HMSO).

Applications should be made to:

HMSO
St Clements House
2 - 16 Colegate
Norwich
NR3 1BQ
United Kingdom

Tel: +44 (0) 1603 621000
Fax: +44 (0) 1603 723000

Read it here.  This policy is even more restrictive than the copyright notice on the Prime Minister of Canada's website.  First, it provides that all material on the website is subject to Crown copyright.  Second, this policy does not allow for reproduction for non-commercial use; rather it requires premission regardless of whether the use is for commercial or non-commercial purposes.  A further disappointing feature of this copyright notice is that applications for permission cannot be made online or on email.

Fortunately, the copyright statement on the website of the Prime Minister of Australia is not as restrictive:

The material on this website is copyright. You may download, display, print and reproduce (copy) this material in unaltered form only (retaining this notice) for your personal, non-commercial use or use within your organisation. Apart from any use as permitted under the Copyright Act 1968, all other rights are reserved. If you wish to republish any material on your own website or in a publication of any description, please see further guidance under Republishing Material from this Website below.

Requests and inquiries concerning reproduction and rights should be addressed to: 

Commonwealth Copyright Administration
Attorney General's Department
Robert Garran Offices
National Circuit
BARTON ACT 2600

or posted at http://www.ag.gov.au/cca.

Republishing Material from this Website

All the material on our website is subject to copyright. You must not:

• Unlawfully use any of the material from this site, or
• Pass off content from this site as your own. This includes copying sections or re-using parts of the site under this pretense.

If you wish to republish or quote any material from the Prime Minister's website in a publication of any description you must seek written permission from the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet which manages this website. Written enquires should be directed to:

Publishing Services Manager
Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet
PO Box 6500
CANBERRA ACT 2600
Australia

Read it here.  This notice is quite similar to the Canadian notice in that it allows personal, non-commerical use, but does not go anywhere near as far the new whitehouse.gov website.  Presuambly nations like Canada, Britan and Australia share Obama's ideal of transparency and accountability in government, yet these values are not yet reflected in their copyright policies. 

As a post on the Creative Commons website suggests, the rest of the world should follow the lead site by Obama and whitehouse.gov:

While the decision to use CC on Whitehouse.gov may appear uncontroversial in light of the fact that US federal works are not subject to copyright protection, very few other countries share this policy ... This is precisely where Creative Commons can help. Obama’s far sighted choice should serve as an example for other governments around the world: now is the time to start sharing.

Read it here.

Facebook thinks friends are worth more than 37 cents

I thought I should post an update to the story on the interesting marketing strategy employed by Burger King on Facebook that I blogged about two weeks ago(see here).  From TechCrunch:

Burger King, through their insanely creative advertising agency Crispin Porter + Bogusky (see their recent Burger King perfume launch), launches a Facebook application that encourages users to remove Facebook friends. Sacrifice ten of them and you got a free Whopper. 233,906 friends were removed by 82,771 people in less than a week.

Facebook is overjoyed, right? What a great example to show the Madison Avenue agencies on how a big brand can get real engagement from users. This is the future of advertising. Or it could have been, if Facebook hadn’t shut it down, citing privacy issues:

We encourage creativity from developers and brands using Facebook Platform, but we also must ensure that applications follow users’ expectations of privacy. This application facilitated activity that ran counter to user privacy by notifying people when a user removes a friend. We have reached out to the developer with suggested solutions. In the meantime, we are taking the necessary steps to assure the trust users have established on Facebook is maintained.

Did anyone talk to the sales department before pulling the trigger on this? All that happened is the user being dissed got a message telling them, which helps the application spread virally. Without that feature the app is far less powerful. There is no real privacy issue here, just a policy decision by Facebook that people shouldn’t be notified when you remove them as a friend.

Read more here.

A Thousand Words

Ted Chung's mesmerising short film, A Thousand Words, is deservedly beginning to go viral.  Jeffrey Wells describes it in this way:

... an elegant, concise and very affecting portrait of big-city loneliness and instant connections that flare up and are gone seconds later. The emotions are halting and delicate but true. Beautiful piano score.

And here it is:

A Thousand Words from Ted Chung on Vimeo.

White House exempts YouTube from privacy rules

CNET's Chris Soghoian has a fascinating post on an under-reported early decision of the Obama administration:

The new Web site for Obama's White House is already drawing attention from privacy activists and tech bloggers. While the initial focus has been on the site's policies relating to search engine robots, a far more interesting tidbit has so far escaped the public eye: the White House has quietly exempted YouTube from strict rules relating to the use of cookies on federal agency Web sites.

The new White House Web site privacy policy promises that the site will not use long-term tracking cookies, complying with a decade-old rule prohibiting such user tracking by federal agencies. However, the privacy policy then reveals that Obama's legal team has exempted YouTube from this rule (YouTube videos are embedded at various places around the White House Web site).

While the White House might not be tracking visitors, the Google-owned video sharing site is free to use persistent cookies to track the browsing behavior of millions of visitors to Obama's home in cyberspace.

No other company has been singled out and rewarded with such a waiver.

...

For the past 10 years, federal agencies have been prohibited from using tracking cookies on their Web sites, except in a few special cases. The Office of Management and Budget rule M-03-22 states that:

"Agencies are prohibited from using persistent cookies or any other means (e.g., web beacons) to track visitors' activity on the Internet except .... [when there is] a compelling need."

The question we must now focus on is this: Is the need for Obama to use embedded videos hosted by YouTube (and not, say, another company's video-streaming platform that does not force cookies upon its users) a use that can be reasonably described as compelling?

Presumably, this has been justified on the basis that YouTube forces cookies on the visitors of any Web site that embeds one of its videos. However, while Joe or Jane blogger has no bargaining power with YouTube/Google, the federal government certainly does.

In just the past couple weeks, YouTube has launched dedicated pages for both the House and Senate to show off their own videos, and the site also recently started allowing users to directly download copies of some videos. This latter feature has not yet been widely deployed across the site, and is seems to be limited to videos posted by Obama's team.

Given the famously close connections between Obama and Google, you'd think his tech team could negotiate for a cookie-less way to embed videos. At a technical level, this would be an easy enough change, even if it would deny Google the ability to collect even more information on millions of Americans.

Read more here.

"Writing in the Age of Distraction"

Cory Doctorow has a useful piece on writing in the age of distraction:

We know that our readers are distracted and sometimes even overwhelmed by the myriad distractions that lie one click away on the Internet, but of course writers face the same glorious problem: the delirious world of information and communication and community that lurks behind your screen, one alt-tab away from your word-processor.

The single worst piece of writing advice I ever got was to stay away from the Internet because it would only waste my time and wouldn't help my writing. This advice was wrong creatively, professionally, artistically, and personally, but I know where the writer who doled it out was coming from. Every now and again, when I see a new website, game, or service, I sense the tug of an attention black hole: a time-sink that is just waiting to fill my every discretionary moment with distraction. As a co-parenting new father who writes at least a book per year, half-a-dozen columns a month, ten or more blog posts a day, plus assorted novellas and stories and speeches, I know just how short time can be and how dangerous distraction is.

But the Internet has been very good to me. It's informed my creativity and aesthetics, it's benefited me professionally and personally, and for every moment it steals, it gives back a hundred delights. I'd no sooner give it up than I'd give up fiction or any other pleasurable vice.

I think I've managed to balance things out through a few simple techniques that I've been refining for years. I still sometimes feel frazzled and info-whelmed, but that's rare. Most of the time, I'm on top of my workload and my muse. Here's how I do it ...

Read his tips here (from Locus Online).