Clarity on Copyright: The Purpose of Copyright Law – It’s Not What You Think
August 16, 2010
In the digital age with the almost frictionless ability to reproduce audio, video and text the issue of copyright has entered the mainstream in a big way. No longer the rarified domain of intellectual property attorneys, copyright issues make the news with the regularity of the latest RIAA lawsuit over the unauthorized sharing of music files and the current sturm and drang over Wikileaks posting of the Afghan War Diary.
It seems people only remember the first half of Stewart Brand’s famous pronouncement in 1987, “Information wants to be free. Information also wants to be expensive . . .That tension will not go away.” In 1984 at the first Hackers Conference, Brand put it in a more nuanced way:
“On the one hand information wants to be expensive, because it’s so valuable. The right information in the right place just changes your life. On the other hand, information wants to be free, because the cost of getting it out is getting lower and lower all the time. So you have these two fighting against each other.”
Thanks to the good folks at TechDirt for linking to this excellent article by attorney and associate professor Lydia Pallas Lorn of Northwestern’s School of Law of Lewis & Clark College, The Purpose of Copyright Law.
Copyright and patent law derives from a clause in the US constitution and “the primary purpose of copyright is not, as many people believe, to protect authors against those who would steal the fruits of their labor,” according to the author. The purpose of copyright is “to promote the progress of knowledge and learning.”
Pallas Loren traces the origin of this concept from English common law and the early publishing industry to the Digital Millennium Copyright Act of 1998 and beyond. I believe this is essential reading for anyone who creates content today – from the lowly blog scribe all the way up to Lady Gaga. Understanding copyright is necessary and Lydia Pallas Loren lays it all out clearly and definitively, in my opinion.
I wish the web contained more writing of this quality and thoughtfulness and less gossip, opinions, trivia and noise about disposable celebrities and manufactured scandals. ” ‘Tis of no importance what bats and oxen think.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson.
![[del.icio.us]](http://images.del.icio.us/static/img/delicious.small.gif){kind=small}
Flash vs. HTML5 for video: Will the Designers Decide?
June 9, 2010
I agree with Steve Job’s position on Adobe’s Flash (see his Thoughts on Flash) primarily because of its resource hogging nature, long load times, vulnerability to malicious code explaoits and the fact that it causes my browser to hang or crash.
The other reason is because I believe that Content is King and I always skip the whiz-bang Flash intro’s to web sites whenever I have that option. If I want animation, I’ll go to Pixar and Disney.
H+Jobs clearly favors HTML5 and here’s a nice page of Demos and Examples.
But clearly there is room for debate here. Peter Wayner of InfoWorld makes the case for Flash gives 7 good reasons why developers will stick with it, despite the word from On High out of Cupertino.
He positions the discussion differently than most who have weighed in on this debate by identifying the user base as the most important element in the continued use of Flash on the web: “The real battle,” he writes, “is in the hearts and eyes of the artists who are paid to create incredibly beautiful objects in the span of just a few hours. The designers will make the final determination. As long as Flash and its cousins Flex and Shockwave remain the simplest tools for producing drop-dead gorgeous Websites, they’ll keep their place on the Internet.”
Tim Berners-Lee, Linked Open Data and a Bag of Potato Chips
May 28, 2010
Sir Tim Berners-Lee, who created the web while working at CERN, is someone we should listen to when he talks about the future development of the Internet.
What he’s hot on right now is something called Linked Open Data, something he believes will be the next evolutionary step for web development. He uses the information on a bag of potato chips to illustrate this concept:
The outside of the bag contains different sets of information, each using a different vocabulary and coming from a different source, Berners-Lee explained.
The front of the package displays the name of the brand and the company’s own marketing claim that the chips are crunchy. The back of the package has nutritional information, such as calories and vitamins, defined by terms generated by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA). Finally, there is a Universal Product Code (UPC) bar code on the bottom of the package, which is not understood by humans at all but rather is recognized by scanning machines globally as the moniker for the item.
In other words, this single package of information actually is a collection of data and attributes that have been developed by multiple parties, not just Utz.
For the rest of the article, go here at IT World.
6 Critical WordPress Plugins You Should Have Installed from Six Revisions
May 12, 2010
If you develop for the web you likely already know about 6 Revisions. Here’s their list of 6 essential WordPress plugins:
- WP SuperCache
- Akismet
- WP-SpamFree
- Google XML Sitemaps Generator
- All in One SEO (Search Engine Optimization)
- WP-PageNavi
To learn about their functionality and why you should install them NOW, go to the complete article here.
131 FREE Web 2.0 Photoshop Layer Styles from Dezinerfolio
May 10, 2010
Photoshop is an essential part of every web designers tool kit. And if you’re proficient in PS, you know that layer styles are akin to Paragraph and Character styles in InDesign and QuarkXPress: the fast way to apply consistent effects.
Now Deziner Folio has made it even easier for you (and what’s better than easy, right?). They’ve put together 131 free PS Layer Styles that install in a snap. You read that right: 131 FREE layer styles. Free and Easy. Two of my favorite things. Grab them here.
20 Resources for Website Templates from Smashing Downloads
April 26, 2010
Smashing Downloads offers these 20 sites for downloading a great variety of website templates, here. These are all free and can be adapted and changed to suit your needs, depending upon your knowledge of HTML and CSS.
For 13 collections of premium-quality WordPress themes selected by Smashing Downloads, go here.
20,800 FREE Online Training Videos from VTC
April 20, 2010
By now Lynda.com has established itself as one of the premiere online sites for video training and tutorials. But they are not alone in this space. VTC Online & CD Computer Software Tutorials offers training in everything from Animation & 3D to Game Design & Development to Networking & Security.
The great thing about VTC is that they have over 20,000 FREE tutorials for you to check out. So if you’re looking to brush up on your skills or want to explore some new software prior to purchase, this a great site to explore.
55 High Resolution Photoshop Brushes from Colorburned
April 14, 2010
I love getting new brushes, layer styles and actions for Photoshop. The good folks over at Colorburned offer a selection of 15 high resolution PS brushes for creating moldy paper effects, here. Then, in a burst of generosity they throw in 40 high resolution ‘streak of light’ effect brushes here.
Readability – Make Reading Content on the Web Better, Easier
March 30, 2010
The web is a great place for gathering information and doing research. I find though, that reading big chunks of content on screen leads quickly to eye fatigue. So often I’ll copy and paste the text of say, a New York Times article into a Word document and then print it out to read away from my computer. This isn’t a very ‘green’ way of consuming prose.
Now there’s another option: Readability from arc90 Labs. You just drag the icon from their web page on to the top of your web browser and it installs a bookmarklet. Then when you come across an article or post you want to read, just click on the Readability bookmark and it places your text on a white background with several configurable options.
You can change the style of presentation (newspaper, novel, eBook and more); the size of the text (extra small, small, medium, large, extra large) and the margins (extra narrow, narrow, medium, wide and extra wide).
Once you start using it you wonder how you ever did without it. And I think you’ll find that, like me, you’re printing out less and reading more — comfortably — online, on screen.
Neil Patel, a Technorati Top 100 Blooger: What I Learned Through 4 Site Redesigns
March 23, 2010
Neil Patel, founder of two Internet companies, Crazy Egg and KISSMetrics writes about what he’s learned through 4 redesigns of his site Quicksprout.
He’s intelligent and articulate and what he says has broad application for anyone presenting themselves or their business online. Read the Top Ten things he’s learned here.