Unity Behind Diversity

Engagement Video

Blaise Alleyne — Sat, 31 Jul 2010 00:24:23 +0000

This is a really rough edit, but a really special moment: some video of the proposal 16 months ago.

T-minus 17.5 hours until marriage…

Engagement Photos

Blaise Alleyne — Wed, 28 Jul 2010 18:00:10 +0000

I’m getting married in three days, thought I’d share the engagement photos that my aunt took for us.

Lawsuit Averted As WordPress and Thesis Settle Differences Over Themes And The GPL

Blaise Alleyne — Tue, 27 Jul 2010 14:00:18 +0000

This post originally appeared on Techdirt.

Free (libre) and open source software is one of the best examples of an alternative to restrictive copyright, but even within these communities there can be heated debates about licensing. The WordPress community just witnessed such a debate between the founder of WordPress, Matt Mullenweg, and the developer of a popular premium WordPress theme, Chris Pearson, over whether or not themes are subject to the GPL (WordPress’ license). The GPL applies to derivative works of a program—requiring that they, too, must be licensed freely—but Pearson maintained quite publicly that he wasn’t subject to it and could use a proprietary license for his theme. This caused tension between him and Mullenweg, until last week, when Pearson gave in and switched to a split GPL license.

Without getting too bogged down in the legal details and community politics, the dispute is of interest for a couple reasons. Although some open source developers believe the GPL is too restrictive, copyright enforcement is approached in a very different way by free software projects than proprietary software companies or the entertainment industry. Mullenweg had sought a legal opinion from the Software Freedom Law Center over a year ago, and they agreed that the PHP part of a WordPress theme (which interfaces directly with WordPress code) is subject to the GPL, while JavaScript and CSS are not. Pearson disagreed, relying on some pretty novel legal arguments, but those were countered by others in the community. Mullenweg began to put more social and business pressure on Pearson, offering to pay for people to move away from Thesis to premium WordPress themes fully available under the GPL, and speaking publicly about how he felt Thesis was hurting the community by violating the license. Things became pretty heated, and the two squared off in a joint interview, failing to reach any visible consensus. It seemed like a lawsuit from Mullenweg would be the only way to resolve things—something he’d been trying to avoid at all costs—but a week later, the legal conflict was averted as Pearson switched to a split GPL license (i.e. PHP is GPL, as required; proprietary license for the rest). It was messy, but very different from the sue-first-ask-questions-later approach of so many copyright holders, and a lot less messy than a lawsuit could have been. The business and social pressure caused some tension in the short-term, for sure, but ultimately led to a resolution without nearly as much pain or division as a lawsuit within the community might have caused.

This kind of disagreement also highlights the fact that free software licenses (like the GPL) and the free culture licenses they’ve inspired (like some of those offered by Creative Commons) are ultimately hacks on a restrictive copyright system; they’re merely tactics to reverse the negative effects of overly restrictive copyright, but not at all the ideal scenario. For example, we’ve seen concerns over how Creative Commons licenses act as a contractual layer on top of copyright, and non-commercial restrictions can also be a source of tension. Sometimes these disputes help a community to better develop its position on copyright and licensing, but other times, they’re a sign that these licenses are still just a hack on a less than ideal system.

It’ll be interesting to see how Thesis fares in the long-run with a split licensing approach compared to other premium themes that are 100% GPL. Regardless, it’s nice to have a more or less happy ending where the community was able to resolve things without getting the courts involved.

Read the comments on Techdirt.

Dave Borins at the Mariposa Folk Festival this summer

Blaise Alleyne — Mon, 21 Jun 2010 18:49:31 +0000

I’ve been playing violin with Dave Borins for two years now, and it’s been a blast. This April, we played an audition in Orillia, and secured ourselves a spot in the Mariposa Folk Festival this summer. Now that some of the audition videos are available online, I thought I’d share ours in anticipation of our upcoming showcase.

(We’ve got some other good videos on YouTube too.)

Details on the July 11th showcase are available on the the events calendar I’ve been hacking together recently, and the full Mariposa schedule has details on the other folk goodness happening throughout that weekend.

New Canadian Copyright Bill C-32: The Good, The Bad, The Ugly, And What To Do About It

Blaise Alleyne — Thu, 03 Jun 2010 00:28:37 +0000

As expected, the Canadian government tabled a new copyright bill today. Despite the consultation last summer, rumour has it that Canadian Heritage Minister James Moore and Industry Minister Tony Clement—the two cabinet ministers responsible for copyright (who seemed to understand the new opportunities technology presents)—couldn’t come to an agreement, and the Prime Minister’s Office sided with Moore’s more hard-line approach. Yet, it appears Clement’s influence was not lost. The proposed legislation, Bill C-32, actually contains many good provisions… but strict digital lock restrictions threaten to undo them all.

Fair Dealing—There’s An Exception For That

The current Canadian concept of fair dealing is more limited that the American doctrine of fair use. The Supreme Court has repeatedly ruled that it should be interpreted broadly, but present law restricts fair dealing to just five categories—research, private study, criticism, news reporting, and review. NDP Member of Parliament Charlie Angus had tabled a private member’s bill to introduce flexible fair dealing back in March, but with Moore’s vision winning out over Clement’s, Bill C-32 rejects flexible fair dealing.

But, it does contain a host of new exceptions for parody and satire, education, time shifting, formating shifting, and backup copies. There’s even a new “Non-Commercial User-generated Content” exception (29.21), which would legalize mashups and remixes under certain circumstances.

While the litany of exceptions fails to introduce real flexibility into the law for new innovations, Michael Geist—leading critic of the last, failed copyright bill—still describes this as “a pretty good compromise.” There are those who strongly oppose the uncertainty that comes with flexibility, so maybe the “there’s an exception for that” approach is the best we can hope for right now.

Though not perfect, it’s still a positive development, and definitely an improvement on the past.

Other Good Compromises

Geist notes two other good compromises. As with the last two copyright bills, C-32 would implement a notice-and-notice system for Internet Service Providers to handle copyright infringement allegations, rather than the guilty-until-proven-innocent American notice-and-takedown system, or the insanely disproportionate three-accusations-and-you’re-kicked-off-the-internet approach. Also, a change to the statutory damages provision would finally distinguish between large scale counterfeiting and non-commercial infringement, limiting the latter between $100-$5000 instead of the current $20,000 maximum. While $5000 per infringement is still pretty ridiculous, cutting the maximum down by 75% for non-commercial infringement would be a positive development.

The Downright Terrible: Digital Lock Provisions Undo The Exceptions

The huge loophole in this bill is the approach to anti-circumvention provisions, which would make it illegal to break a digital lock even if what you are doing is otherwise non-infringing. It’s important to understand how this massively undermines any good which might come from additional fair dealing exceptions: if there’s a digital lock, the exceptions are meaningless. Bill C-32′s rigid digital lock provisions undo the exceptions.

Want to make a backup copy? There’s an exception for that… unless there’s a digital lock!
Want to transfer songs to your iPod? There’s an exception for that… unless there’s a digital lock!
Want to make use of copyrighted content in the classroom? There’s an exception for that… unless there’s a digital lock!
Want to remix Louis Armstrong with death metal? There’s an exception for that… unless there’s a digital lock!

This has to change. More importantly, it doesn’t have to be this way. Submissions to last summer’s consultation were overwhelmingly opposed to this approach. Other countries have met their international obligations with anti-circumvention provisions that are actually linked to copyright infringement (e.g. New Zealand‘s passed law, India‘s proposed law). With a flexible anti-circumvention provision, the exceptions would apply to digital locks too.

Why should companies be able to rewrite copyright law and trump exceptions simply because they slap a digital lock onto something? If there’s a backup exception, there should be a backup exception. If there’s allowance for parody and satire, no digital lock should be able to take that away. And what’s the use of a format shifting exception if digital locks will force you to repurchase your content to stay legal anyways?

Canada needs to have a flexible anti-circumvention approach that is actually linked to infringement, or none of the compromises in this bill even matter.

Other Nasty Things

There’s an inducement clause (27 (2.3)) which would make it illegal to provide a service online “that a person knows or should have known is designed primarily to enable acts of copyright infringement.” Would the Internet-equivalent of a VCR pass that test? What about BitTorrent? Both technologies can be used to enable acts of copyright infringement, but they also have legitimate uses. How the “primary use” is determined could have significant implications here.

The time shifting provision (29.23) warrants further review, as it contains a variety of conditions under which you can record a program for later viewing. For example, the bill would require that you “keep the recording no longer than is reasonably necessary in order to listen to or view the program at a more convenient time”—seemingly, a requirement to get rid of recordings once you’ve listened to/watched them.

Also, library provisions allowing for distribution are subject to digital locks, and contain a requirement for copies to be destroyed within five days.

There are lots of details like this in this bill that require further study, and most likely revision.

The Strategy: Let’s Make Some Noise

The Conservatives are seeking support on this bill from the Liberals. Liberal Industry critic, MP Marc Garneau, is keen to work with the government to introduce a new law, and is open to the possibility of summer hearings to get it passed. But Clement told the CBC, “I’m not coming down from the mountain with this chiselled in stone… we could seek some consensus and there could be some positive amendments to this bill.”

When I met with my MP, Liberal Joe Volpe, over Bill C-61 in the summer of 2008, his main question to me was whether to scrap the bill or to fix it. Critically, We must let our MPs know—especially the Liberals—which compromises are acceptable, and which undermine the entire copyright bargain. Flexible fair dealing would have been better than a litany of exceptions, but that compromise could work. However, allowing digital locks to undo those exceptions is simply unacceptable.

Conclusion

Politics is the art of the possible, a complex art of balance between ideals and interests. This bill isn’t perfect, but there is a push from both sides of the floor to get it passed. There are a lot of good compromises, but whether or not the bad provisions get fixed could have huge implications on Canadian culture, technology and business in the years to come. Make your voice heard.

Acoustic Assaultcast: Free Culture

Blaise Alleyne — Tue, 11 May 2010 13:16:25 +0000

Back in March, I was invited by my friend Roman Verzub to the first episode of The Acoustic Assaultcast to talk about music and free culture.

HOWTO: Sync Notes Between Tomboy and Conboy With Unison

Blaise Alleyne — Thu, 06 May 2010 22:52:19 +0000

Disclaimer: this is a hack from someone who doesn’t know Tomboy well. It seems to work for me, but YMMV. And I have backups.

I wanted a way to sync Tomboy on my Ubuntu desktop with Conboy on my Nokia N900, but Conboy only syncs to Ubuntu One—a proprietary web service. Snowy synchronization support is supposed to be on the way, but Snowy itself is still under heavy development, so this might be a great option in the near future, but not today.

A comment on maemo.org made me think that rsync over ssh was a possibility, and a quick rsync showed this to work (as far as I can tell). The trick is being able to sync changes back and forth; rsync can’t handle updates to both the source and destination—it’s unidirectional.

Hence, Unison—a bidirectional synchronization utility. In case it’s useful to anyone else, this is how I’ve setup Unison to sync notes between Tomboy and Conboy.

Step 0: Some things you should know

First, I want to be clear that this is a temporary hack while I wait for proper synchronization support through Conboy with Snowy.

Prerequisites: I already have OpenSSH running on my server, and I have key-based ssh access configured from both my laptop and N900. Unison syncs remotely over SSH.

What this does: It allows me to synchronize notes and changes to notes from my N900 to my laptop, and potentially to any number of other computers.

What this doesn’t do: Unison has support for handling conflicts, but it’s not the least bit Tomboy-aware. A proper Tomboy sync might give you the option of renaming a note that has been changed in more than one place, but with Unison, you’ll be looking at diffs and merges of cryptically named XML files. So, I don’t recommend relying on Unison to sort out conflicts. I plan to sync often, backup often, and avoid conflicts as much as possible. This is for advanced users.

Tomboy Concerns: I’m using Tomboy, but actually quite uncomfortable with the risk, since it depends on Mono. I’ve considered switching to Gnote, but haven’t yet because I’m concerned about losing data/synchronization compatibility. But, this solution might work for Gnote too, and I may well s/Tomboy/Gnote/g in the near future.

Step 1: Desktop

1A: Install Unison

Unison is cross-platform and available for a variety of operating systems

I have Ubuntu on both my laptop and server right now, and I’m syncing through that server (instead of directly to my N900, which would be another option).

In Ubuntu, you can install unison with the command:
sudo apt-get install unison

Or, if you want a GUI:
sudo apt-get install unison-gtk

1B: Create a Unison profile for Tomboy

I created a file called ~/.unison/notes.prf with the following text:
# Unison preferences file root = /home/balleyne/.local/share/tomboy/ root = ssh://alleyne.to/.local/share/tomboy/

I decided to sync my notes with the Tomboy directory on my server, which is also a workstation.

Now, I can synchronize the notes on my laptop with my server by running the command:
unison notes

1C: Enable NoteDirectoryWatcher Add-in for Tomboy

Tomboy doesn’t automatically look for changes to notes on the file system unless you enable the NoteDirectoryWatcher Add-in: Edit > Preferences > Add-Ins > Tools > Note Directory Watcher > Enable. This way, Tomboy will accept any changes you get from the Unison sync.

Step 2: Mobile

2A: Installing Unison in Maemo 5

To compile Unison, you need the OCaml compiler. To compile OCaml, you need the gcc compiler. I began the process of compiling compilers, but then realized that there were some unison .debs available already:

These were compiled for an older version of Maemo, but the command line version seems to be working fine for me in Maemo 5. Note, that if you use the GUI, it’s standard GTK, not a Maemo port, so you might need the stylus to use it.

To install, I ran the following commands:
$ sudo gainroot # wget http://www.bundyo.org/maemo/unison/unison_2.27.57-2_armel.deb # dpkg -i unison_2.27.57-2_armel.deb

2B: Create a Unison profile for Conboy

Similar to step 1B, I created a file at ~/.unison/notes.prf:
# Unison preferences file root = /home/user/.conboy root = ssh://alleyne.to/.local/share/tomboy

Now, I can sync my mobile computer with the server by running the command:
unison notes

And there was much rejoicing.

Conclusion

With Unison configured, I now have a basic, low-level sync between Tomboy and Conboy. I’m getting into the habit of syncing every time I change anything, to avoid conflicts. This should tie me over until a Conboy Snowy sync is available.

WIND Mobile Launches Reasonable Data Plans In Canada

Blaise Alleyne — Wed, 05 May 2010 21:27:04 +0000

WIND Mobile’s pricing plans brought a breath of fresh air to the Canadian wireless landscape last December, but customers have been asking for less expensive data. WIND offered a great $35/month unlimited data add-on, but nothing below that for general purpose data.

Well, today, WIND announced new data add-ons. Just like their voice plans (and unlike what I was used to with Rogers), WIND’s data add-ons are brilliantly simple and easy to understand.

Here’s my take:

Add-On	Social	Charged	Infinite
Cost	$10/month (+ overage)	$20/month (+ overage)	$35/month. Period.
Data Included	50 MB/month	500 MB/month	*unlimited*
Overage rate	20¢/MB $10 / 50 MB	4¢/MB $20 / 500 MB	n / a
Monthly break-even	100 MB x 20¢/MB = $20	875 MB x 4¢/MB = $35	n / a
My Thoughts	Makes sense if you only use mobile data occasionally, or for mostly text. e.g. My mom, who uses mobile data mostly for email, and occasionally to browse the web	Makes sense if you browse the web regularly, and stream/download audio or video sometimes. e.g. My fiancée, an average web user (email, social networking sites, chat, photos, maps, the occasional audio/video stream)	Makes sense if you stream/download audio or video a lot, or if you want to tether your mobile device with your laptop. e.g. A geek like me, especially if I’m tethering, though I might even consider downgrading to Charged.

The monthly break-even point is not necessarily the long-term break-even point. Even if you go over the monthly break-even point occasionally, a smaller plan might be less expensive on average over time.

Pay Before to cap spending. If you’re concerned about overage charges, you can go Pay Before and only put in as much money as you’re willing to spend each month. Unlike other carriers, WIND offers Pay Before customers access to the same plans and add-ons.

Although these rates only apply in Home Zones, WIND is expanding it’s Home Zones daily, with the ambition of building a national 3G network. Right now, the Home Zones are Toronto, Calgary, Vancouver, Ottawa and Edmonton.

No More Getting Ripped Off

Coming from a family that’s been ripped off by Rogers for way too long, this is a breath of fresh air. Working through a Rogers bill involves a labyrinth of plans (fixed versus flex rate, Pay-As-You-Go versus regular wireless), vague details, ridiculous contracts, outrageous early cancellation fees, and sales reps who don’t understand half of it. The game is to do a detailed analysis of your usage and their offerings (including the fine print and hidden costs), and try to match them up as best you can. Otherwise, Rogers will happily take as much of your money as it can. Bell and Telus are hardly different.

I’m thankful for a wireless company that is trying to earn money by making things easy to understand, rather than profiting from confusion.

SOLUTION: Firefox Fails When Upgrading to Ubuntu 10.04 After Using Mozilla PPA

Blaise Alleyne — Sat, 01 May 2010 17:48:04 +0000

This is a quick fix for a problem I had when upgrading to Ubuntu 10.04, after having used the Mozilla PPA.

The Firefox upgrade failed during the distribution upgrade process (from 9.10 to 10.04). I was told to run `dpkg -a –configure`, and the same error occurred again (it’s in bold).

$ sudo dpkg -a --configure Setting up firefox (3.6.3+nobinonly-0ubuntu4) ... update-alternatives: error: alternative path /usr/bin/firefox doesn't exist. dpkg: error processing firefox (--configure): subprocess installed post-installation script returned error exit status 2 dpkg: dependency problems prevent configuration of firefox-3.5: firefox-3.5 depends on firefox; however: Package firefox is not configured yet. dpkg: error processing firefox-3.5 (--configure): dependency problems - leaving unconfigured dpkg: dependency problems prevent configuration of firefox-3.0: firefox-3.0 depends on firefox; however: Package firefox is not configured yet. dpkg: error processing firefox-3.0 (--configure): dependency problems - leaving unconfigured dpkg: dependency problems prevent configuration of firefox-gnome-support: firefox-gnome-support depends on firefox (= 3.6.3+nobinonly-0ubuntu4); however: Package firefox is not configured yet. dpkg: error processing firefox-gnome-support (--configure): dependency problems - leaving unconfigured dpkg: dependency problems prevent configuration of firefox-3.5-gnome-support: firefox-3.5-gnome-support depends on firefox-gnome-support; however: Package firefox-gnome-support is not configured yet. dpkg: error processing firefox-3.5-gnome-support (--configure): dependency problems - leaving unconfigured Errors were encountered while processing: firefox firefox-3.5 firefox-3.0 firefox-gnome-support firefox-3.5-gnome-support

A quick web search brought up a bug report, and I was able to figure out this fix with the help of

$ sudo rm /usr/bin/firefox $ sudo ln -s /usr/lib/firefox-3.6.3/firefox /usr/bin/firefox $ sudo dpkg -a –configure

The symlink for /usr/bin/firefox had been pointing to /usr/bin/firefox-3.5, which no longer existed, so the commands above (1) remove the dead-end link; (2) add the proper link (YMMV depending on which version of Firefox you are upgrading to); (3) resume the upgrade process.

Hope that helps!

The future of electronic publishing and reading

Blaise Alleyne — Wed, 14 Apr 2010 22:32:22 +0000

Last Wednesday, I had the opportunity to sit on a panel for an event put on by the Society of Internet Professionals: The Future of E-Publishing and E-Reading. The following is a rough approximation of my presentation.

Digital technology has a disruptive effect on traditional content industries in many ways, but this is especially true when it comes to copyright and the law. We’re at the beginning of a struggle between traditional and new media in the space of electronic publishing, and much like the past decade has been for the record industry and newspapers, the transition from analog to digital isn’t going to be easy.

Patents

First, there’s an unfortunately predictable area of legal conflict for any emerging technology: patents. Winners innovate, losers litigate. We see it again and again, with the most heated battles taking place right now in the mobile computing space between companies like Apple, Nokia and HTC. To mention just a couple of patent lawsuits related to e-books:

In March 2009, Apple was sued by a Swiss communications company, MONEC, for distributing digital book reading applications through the iPhone App Store. MONEC believes that Apple violated a 2002 patent, which describes a “light-weight” electronic device with a “touch-screen” LCD-display having the “dimensions such that [...] approximately one page of a book can be illustrated at normal size, this display being integrated in a flat, frame-like housing.”
That same month, the Discovery Channel sued Amazon claiming that the Kindle violated a patent held by its CEO for technology that “provides for secure distribution of electronic text and graphics to subscribers and secure storage.” When asked whether Discovery would build an e-book reader, the company’s spokeswoman said, “we are only focused on the Kindle at this time.” So, they aren’t interested in making anything, just in suing people who make things.

Even though these broad reaching patents are patently obvious to anyone who understands technology, the lawsuits happen time and time again because they’re profitable. As more companies get involved in the e-reader market, expect more patent lawsuits, just as Apple, Nokia, and HTC have started suing each other over smartphone patents. Because of problems in the patent system, this is the price that innovative technology companies pay to step through a patent thicket and get involved in the market.

Copyright

Copyright law, however, has many more implications for all parties involved when it comes to electronic publishing. The issue is fundamentally about freedom, and the economics of digital goods, as copyright law gets used and abused as a crutch and a hammer.

Economics of Abundance

The problem stems from a misunderstanding of scarcity. As we move from atoms to bits, we also move from scarcity to abundance. Traditional business models are built on scarcity—selling copies, for example. Windowing systems are used to milk money from hardcovers before the paperbacks are released. Basic economics tells us that, in a competitive market, price gets set at the marginal cost of reproduction, at the cost of producing one more copy. When books become digital, the marginal cost of reproduction is essentially zero. And there are no hardcover and softcover e-books. Publishers are terrified by what Napster did to the record industry, worried that consumers won’t want to pay for books, so they’re trying to keep content locked down and with high prices, to keep the audience passive and consuming—and copyright law is often the tool for the job.

Anti-features

How many people are familiar with the Amazon Kindle Big Brother mishap? In its best impersonation of big brother and the most ironic tech event of 2009, Amazon deleted all of the copies of 1984 and Animal Farm from every single Kindle last July because the publisher changed its mind about offering an electronic edition. Just like that, people who legitimately purchased (well, more like “rented”), those books lost them in an instant.

Amazon backtracked on the deletion, restored the books and promised it would never happen again, but why do devices like the Kindle have such a kill switch to begin with? As Andrew Moshirnia from the Citizen Law and Media Project later explained,

Amazon used its power to delete entire volumes, a tactic with all the subtlety of carpet bombing. But this technology could be used like a sniper rifle, replacing small portions of an offending work and leaving the reader none the wiser.

When you buy a physical book, the retailer or publishing doesn’t have the right to enter your home and confiscate it, or rip out a page. Yet, that’s the functionality that’s being built right in to these e-readers.

This is an example of an anti-feature—a “feature” that no user would ever request or desire.

The reason these digital locks are appearing is that many publishers and authors don’t feel that they can protect their copyright interests without them. And, the technology companies often don’t mind the monopoly they wind up with when consumers can’t easily move their content from their device to a competitor’s, as they become the new gatekeepers (e.g. Apple and iTunes), but at other times they’re under intense pressure from publishers and authors to limit the functionality of their devices.

For example, in February 2009, Paul Aitken, as executive director of the Authors’ Guild, made an extraordinary statement when he discovered that the Kindle had an experimental text-to-speech feature. He insisted that it was illegal, claiming,

They don’t have the right to read a book out loud. That’s an audio right, which is derivative under copyright law.

Notice that no one, at least no one I’m aware of, would claim that, if you purchase a dead-tree book, you need the publisher’s permission to read it out loud. I don’t believe the Author’s Guild is knocking down on people’s doors for reading to their kid at night. But, the second that process is automated as part of electronic reader, they claim it’s a violation of copyright. Amazon caved, and allowed rights holders the ability to disable the text-to-speech feature, something that would have been useful to many, and even essential for some (such as the blind).

The real concern is audiobook sales. If text-to-speech technology can read a book for you, why would you need an audiobook? This is an instance where authors threatened to use copyright law to shut down a new technology, the sort of feature that would help to transform the book and create it anew in electronic form. The new potential was stifled because it might affect the old sales model.

Mike Masnick of Floor64 describes it as being “like the ‘horseless carriage’ or ‘talking pictures,’ rather than focusing on what the new technology allows, the focus is on bringing the old offerings onto a new platform and assuming it’ll be just like the old…”

Here’s an example of a copyright license for an eBook on the Secrets of Digital Photography (admittedly from 6 years ago, but the same fear is present today). It’s presentation in a FAQ format:

Q: Can I sell it?

A: Yes you can, as long as you do four things (five if you sell it in a public forum such as eBay) then you can sell the eBook original with its package intact when you have outgrown it or no longer need it. Here is the list of things you MUST do, otherwise you have not lived up to the law:

(Only if selling it on a public sales site such as, but not limited to, eBay.) Inform the publisher that the sale will be appearing on days x through y. That will alert them of your legal sale and prevent you from looking like a software pirate. You’ll get no hassle from them if you simply let them know what’s going on.
eBay has had a policy for years of not allowing CDR materials to be sold through their site unless the seller is the original copyright holder. Both eBay and we know that software pirates are plentiful and eBay knows that they cannot legally be a willing party to software piracy. Now eBay allows resale of original material if the seller has permission from the copyright holder to do so.

Permission costs nothing. Ask first.

Remove every shred of eBook software and files from all of your computers. All of them.

Destroy every hard copy print-out you have made from any and all of the files.

Trash all of your iNovaFX Photoshop actions.

Destroy all traces of the original serial number that you may have kept as a record for upgrades and sidegrade purchases at a discount, and inform the recipient that upgrade privileges do NOT transfer with the transaction. Upgrade and sidegrade privileges only are granted to the original first recipient of each eBook.

And my favourite part was the post-amble:

Copyright in the digital age is evolving. Perhaps some future system can be developed without onerous conditions that would allow you to sell it and not have to live up to today’s conditions.

But for now, our eBooks are the legal equivalent of an object. You can buy a book, then sell it when you’re finished with it. But if you were to run off a copy of it–just for reference, mind–then you could NOT sell the original without destroying your copy. Nor could you sell that copy to a friend.

We endeavor to only expect the same equivalent procedures from buyers of our eBooks. We want you to buy it and enjoy it and learn from it and use its included software and example files to your great benefit.

But we are merciless with people who steal it.

Of course, that isn’t you, so this whole discussion is academic.

There is a fear of the potential for digital books that causes rights holders to treat them like physical objects, to use copyright to impose these restrictions, to impose artificial scarcity. It’s an all stick no carrot approach, and copyright law is the stick.

Anti-circumvention

And rights holders have been pushing for more and more draconian copyright laws. The Digital Millenium Copyright Act, a 1998 update to copyright law in the States, contains many troubling expansions to the law, but one of the most troubling has to do with anti-circumvention provisions. The DMCA makes it illegal to circumvent a digital lock, even if what you are doing would otherwise not be considered copyright infringement.

For example, to watch a DVD that you’ve lawfully purchased is not copyright infringement. But, it would be copyright infringement for me to use my laptop to watch a DVD in the US, because DVDs contain digital locks, and with the GNU/Linux operating system I use, my DVD software has to break those digital locks in order to show me my movie. Watching a DVD you own would not normally be copyright infringement, but if you have to break a digital lock to see it, it becomes infringement.

These troubling anti-circumvention provisions essentially allow rights holders to rewrite copyright law with a digital lock. It’s this sort of thing that caused law professor Lawrence Lessig to proclaim that “code is law.” With electronic books that have digital locks, things that might normally be considered fair use—like copying and pasting a couple paragraphs, or transferring an electronic book from one device to another—can become infringement if the action requires breaking a digital lock.

There are no anti-circumvention provisions in Canadian copyright law, but anti-circumvention has been an issue in the last two (failed) copyright bills, and in the copyright consultation conducted by the government last summer. Anti-circumvention provisions are required in order to ratify the WIPO treaties, but there’s flexibility—anti-circumvention could be linked to copyright infringement, so that circumventing a digital lock for something that would be considered fair dealing would not be considered infringement.

The government expects to table a new copyright bill this Spring, and anti-circumvention will certainly be one of the contentious issues. Whether or not it allows rights holders to invent new rights, with a broad ban on circumvention, or whether it protects fair dealing will remain to be seen.

Fair dealing

Fair dealing is another contentious issue. Uses that are considered fair dealing under the copyright act do not require permission from the rights holder. Canadian currently has a limited fair dealing provision that only applies to research, private study, criticism, review, and news reporting. A recent proposal to expand that into a more flexible concept was met with criticism from the Writers’ Union of Canada, which claimed that more flexible fair dealing would “legalize theft.” These debates have been a heated part of Canadian copyright reform.

The Potential for Electronic Reading—When is the future coming?

When faced with a fear that old sources of income will disappear with new technology, people are understandably concerned, but they too often turn to copyright law to prop up old business models and avoid the necessity of exploring new ones. The real tragedy is that the potential of electronic readers is not being met. Consumers are confronted with anti-features—readers that can’t copy/paste, that allow books to be deleted against their will, that prevent an easy transfer from device to device—and rights holders focus on trying to replicate the physical world in the digital.

I don’t think we’ll see the future of electronic publishing anytime soon. So far, we’ve only seen attempts to recreate the scarcity and limitations of the physical word—and then some. With physical books, you can buy them, keep them, mash them up, share, photocopy, as opposed to device-specific rentals, bogged down by digital locks and people who think you need their permission to read a book out loud.

The really exciting things about electronic books are the things you can’t do with paper books. Like, having a text-to-speech feature. Or sharing things you’re reading with others. Or commenting on it. Is there an electronic reader out there yet that can host a conversation thread inside of a book? Because of copyright-related fears, the focus has been on using readers as a sort of broadcast, consumption medium. They’re called “readers.” I personally don’t have any desire for a dedicated electronic device, just for reading a particular kind of text. I read Plato and Aristotle, and Aquinas and JPII, but I also read blogs and news articles and other forms of content online. Why would I want a single device for “books?”

Content comes out of its container when it goes digital, but efforts so far have centred on using copyright law to try and build containers, through locks and legislation. To let text come out of its container would unlock the real opportunities that the technology allows. A paper copy of Brittanica has to be linear; Wikipedia isn’t—it’s hyperlinked. Blog posts are as much about the conversation as they are about the initial “content,” but how many electronic books are being designed with conversation in mind?

Until we get beyond this tendency to impose artificial scarcity and digital locks on electronic books and media, we won’t see the full potential of electronic publishing.