Britain’s new Internet law — as bad as everyone’s been saying, and worse. Much, much worse.

Digital economy bill: A punishing future

The “Digital Economy Bill” expands government control over the internet

If you feel strongly that this bill should not be passed, I’d recommend you write to your MP to tell them.  There’s a great service called, www.writetothem.com which enables UK citizens to contact their MP, MEP’s and members of the House of Lords free of charge.

The main body of my letter is listed below – if you do contact your own MP it’s important that you use your own words.  I’ve never been certain that our government takes notice of the views of the common people, I think that this issue warrants at least trying to influence a positive change.

DIGITAL ECONOMY BILL

I would like ask for your support in opposition of the proposed Digital Economy Bill.

This proposed, draconian, legislation designed to alter the online-behaviour of UK citizens is unfocused, disproportionate and places the desires of large corporations above the needs of the UK population.

While supporters of the bill may suggest that the introduction of a fixed-scheme of powers to prosecute copyright evaders would be at odds with the fast-rate of change within the digital economy, the creation of a law which provides a vague set of powers, is at odds with liberty.

The recording industry’s lobby state they require this legislation to protect the industry against the effects of piracy and file-sharing. The unfortunate truth is that movement to a digital economy changed the parameters of their industry irreconcilably. If this unfortunate truth is accepted, the need to change must be firmly placed at the feet of those in charge of these media companies.

My personal view is that legislation should not be used to enforce a shift in culture, especially when corporations are the main driver in campaigning for this change. In my experience, education is the only effective method to create lasting change.

A Digital Economy Bill must look to the future and should protect, not criminalise, the citizens of Britain.

If we – the people of Britain – wish to create and sustain a burgeoning digital economy in Britain, we need to create an environment where free-discussion, innovation and continued civil liberties feature prominently.

I’m left wondering what this bill could have been. The move to a digital economy has the potential to create inequality. The bill could have focused on widening – not curtailing – access access to the internet.

• Access to the internet is currently unequally distributed between different sections of society. In the future digital economy, access to the Internet will be as important as the provision of basic household utilities. We should be looking towards countries like Estonia, France, Finland and Greece, who have legislated to make internet access a human right.
• While the 50p tax on land-line telephone users may help provide access to members of rural communities, physical access to the Internet is only one part of the problem. The issue of ‘net neutrality’ is vitally important. I’d like to know why safeguards haven’t been proposed to prevent Internet Service Providers from artificially limiting the type of traffic they transmit over their networks.
• As society becomes increasingly reliant on technology, the potential to monitor and control the activities of the population increases. Without wanting to appear alarmist, the possibility of living in an Orwellian dystopia is very real. I’d like to feel that our government is doing it’s very best to safeguard the civil liberties of the UK population.
• Access to impartial information, free from commercial influence, is vital to a healthy society. There is no mention of how publicly funded media – created via the BBC or Arts Council Grants for example – can be made available via the public domain.
• The types of company operating in the digital economy are far more varied than this bill suggests. By disregarding the full range of technology-led companies, the opportunity for sustained development and further growth are severely limited.

The new digital economy needs to create the right kind of environment to support entrepreneurial innovation, but it also needs to place safeguards – limiting the activities of companies operating in the digital domain.

I would hope that our Government’s primary duty is to act on behalf of the common majority.

Rather than create a set of proposals to ensure a bright future for the UK digital economy, this bill provides wide-ranging measures designed to crystallise the current status quo.

The civil liberties of the UK population are being eroded at a dangerous rate. Many of my friends, fellow Europeans from neighbouring countries, are shocked and appalled that such measures have been proposed.

The Digital Economy Bill does nothing to instil any kind of confidence that the government is able to face the challenges ahead, and I urge you to oppose this bill.

Thank you for your time.

So much of the hype that I read regarding crowdsourcing seems disingenuous.

The majority of the proponents are either those who take a fee from the initial prize fund (crowdSpring/99designs et al), or those who use crowdsourcing as a tool (CP&B, and other clients).

I’d imagine the most fierce supporters of crowdsourcing (as participants) are the very same people who would traditionally participate in the outsourcing of work. For this group, the $1000 offered by design firm CP&B to create a logo for motorcycle brand Brammo, may have been fair compensation – even if obtaining the fee involves entering into a lottery.

After reading about CP&B’s decision to use crowdSpring, my anger piqued my curiosity and I entered into one of these design ‘competitions’ myself.

After participating, I decided to exchange some emails with the contest organiser, and I discovered that he was a subcontractor who takes on web-jobs and uses the crowdsourcing agency to produce PSD images of each potential website which can then be given to other outsourcers who create an HTML website. He likes the crowdsourcing model because he has a number of different designs to choose from, and ultimately he doesn’t need to carry out the work himself.

Crowdsourcing creates a dynamic of factory owner v. factory workers. There’s no equality between participants.

I honestly don’t think that those participating are going to gain a better understanding of the processes involved in design. The idea that the contest organiser even knows what constitutes a good design isn’t even a given. The only known fact is that the organiser has some money.

The bottom line is that it’s unfair to expect anyone with any skill to work for free. In my mind, this is about good old fashioned wrong and right. One group of people is benefiting at the expense of another group of people – and your comment that participants experience “psychic reward” is laughable and offensive.

I do believe that crowdsourcing has a future – but only when a fair remuneration model has been developed. I think that the Amazon Mechanical Turk provided a more fully formed conceptual model in this respect.

The Future of Crowdsourcing

I believe that crowdsourcing in it’s best format involves creating efficiency by horizontally dividing a task between hundreds and thousands of people. Ideally all the participants involved are employed (i.e. paid), and the amount of work they complete is at least as engaging as it would be if the task was approached conventionally.

The benefits of this idealised view, involve speed / efficiency in completing the task and the luxury of a plurality of viewpoints.

Baring this in mind, in my opinion, there are a limited variety of tasks that are suitable for a crowdsourcing approach. I don’t think design is very suitable for crowdsourcing because it’s very difficult to divide a design task among multiple participants.  I don’t think that design can possibly excel when it’s carried out by committee.

Long term, I’d actually question whether these CS companies will survive. Currently I think they’re doing well because:

• We’re currently in an economic downturn – the number of people willing to participate and give crowdsourcing a go will surely have been buoyed by laid off workers.
• The concept is novel. Many people are willing to give something new a chance… but after a short while they’ll most probably ask themselves whether continued participation is worthwhile.

Even so, I don’t think the game’s totally over for companies like crowdSpring or 99designs.

I think that these companies are providing two types of service.

1. The first can be loosely defined defined as crowdsourcing. I say ‘loosely’, because they don’t divide the task of creating design – they multiply it.
2. The second type of service involves building relationships between designer and client; a task which is very similar to that of a traditional work agency.

I think they should focus on providing the second type of service – this is where they could make the most positive difference.

If we look at the way they operate at the moment, (cynically) I’d state that the current crop of crowdsourcing applications are only really acting as ‘enablers’. They provide a place for client and participant to meet – and the functionality they provide is very basic. Currently it would probably be fair to suggest that crowdsourcing web-applications are still most similar in functionality to a traditional bulletin board system.  Ideas (graphic files) can be submitted, and messages can be submitted publicly and privately. There’s little in the way of innovation.

If speaking optimistically, I’d state that these crowdsourcing applications provide a platform for collaboration. This statement holds a lot of potential, but if these companies can possibly survive, they need to try to offer innovative collaborative technologies. The problems they try to solve are both interesting and challenging – but unless they accept the fact that their current approach is full of holes, they stand no chance of becoming a positive force for change.

Joel Tenenbaum recently went head to head with four recording companies in the American courts, the result of which was an order to pay a sum of $675,000.  Joel Tenenbaum will try to appeal the verdict, but if it’s upheld he intends to file for bankruptcy .

In my opinion, while the jury’s decision to award $22,500 for each infringement is significantly lower than the sum the labels requested  ($4.5 million dollars), the judgement still seems overly severe.

Obviously, the world has changed since the time the music industry lay it’s roots. Previously there was a very real need for a companies which could promote, produce the tracks (onto real world media) and distribute the music to the fans – but now the role of recording companies seems very different. It seems to me that their primary purpose is to act as the guardians of intellectual property – and this is where I think the injustice resides.

The skill and effort required to write music is often awe inspiring, and there can’t be many art-forms which bring as much joy to as many people – but why is this effort seen as something which should be rewarded perpetually? Why is the finite amount of effort required to make music treated as a gold-mine or a cash-cow? Previously there were many costs associated with making and distributing a record, cassette tape or CD – but now, in the digital age, these costs are far closer to nil.

Concepts based around profiting from intellectual property are essentially flawed, because they refuse to acknowledge principles of scarcity – principles, upon which, our economies have previously been based. (We should all be able to appreciate what happens when these principles are ignored, thanks to the financial clusterfck we’re currently recovering from.)

To be able to price something, traditionally we ask how much of a resource is available. In the case of information (which by it’s very nature is a resource which can be copied infinitely) record companies are forced to either employ DRM (which is fundamentally flawed), or more recently (due to the failure of DRM solutions) to bully society into changing it’s behaviour, to protect this infinitely available resource.

Which brings us to the case of this guy being sued. I think the huge amounts of money involved are simply a sign of the fear and determination of these music corp. behemoths – they have to win at any cost, because if they loose one case – their game is up.

Some commentators have stated that Joel Tenenbaum deserves the penalty because he committed the crime – to these people I’d ask how much of a crime has been committed.  If a person truly believes that a wrong has been done, I’d imagine they’re either being disingenuous because they stand to profit from the slow drip of money being syphoned through the music industry or are just plain stupid.

In all honesty I think that once an artist has been recompensed handsomely for their efforts, the cash should stop – I think that should be it. There are many more ways to make a living from music than trying to sell music as IP.  The age of the music industry is over – and they should embrace change fully. While (in my opinion) profiting from IP can’t be sustained, creating an industry based upon selling services is realistic – they just need to adjust their models.

I can’t see how any other situation is fair – and it makes me angry that our societies’ notions of what’s acceptable are being dictated by the greed of huge corporations and their vast legions of lawyers.

I think could be a case of killing many birds with one stone. These are ideas I that I think might have led to the decision:

By setting data access as public by default, they are encouraging a culture shift towards more openness on the part of users. I remember when myspace first debuted, I thought the idea of having conversations about social arrangements etc. out loud was pretty undesirable .. but after a while, actually became more used to the idea. I.e users ideas of what’s acceptable change and moderate according to what other users are prepared to do.

I’m almost certain that a large majority of younger users wont bother changing their privacy settings. Privacy is a dead concept for people of a certain generation – and I don’t think it’s even something that they aspire to protect.

Once data is in the public domain, it can (arguably) be mined and used for commercial purposes. While other companies will be able to use this data, facebook will obviously be in control of their APIs for access. They’ll also have behavioural (click) data which is the thread that ties everything else together. I haven’t read their EULA in a while, maybe this isn’t possible at the moment -> but even so, it wouldn’t surprise me if this changed.

This is pure speculation, but no doubt facebook has been approached by government agencies from many countries – and has been asked to give access to user’s private data. This would present a set of scruples to most reasonable people. Perhaps setting data as open (public) by default, they’re able to appease some of those who might be putting pressure on them by setting the bar low.

Basically it seems that four major browsers manufacturers are happy to roll out new versions of their apps which implement the ‘@font-face’ method.

The font foundries themselves are not happy with this because it might make it easy for users to steal fonts. Microsoft won’t use it because the font foundries object – and they’ve been championing their own format (EOT) for sometime now. (The WEFT stuff you link to, is an early implementation of this). They submitted the idea as freebie to the W3C but I afaik it was turned down.

So right now, there are a load of people arguing about a possible solution (three main camps .. the open-source browsers, Microsoft, and some reps from some of the major font-foundries).

The battle seems to revolve around how to appease the font foundries. (e.g. the font companies don’t want people visiting websites and stealing fonts from their computer’s temp directory).

Lots of different methods have been suggested – most try to deal with the problem by either obfuscation or compression. So font-files would either be placed in some-kind of wrapper (e.g. EOT) or compressed using some kind of proprietary format (Monotype want their own format MXT to be used), or maybe changing the font-file’s meta-data in some obscure way which would make the font unusable in desktop applications.

I reckon the main problem is that the argument is philosophical as well as practical. Microsoft are closed-source and don’t like co-operating and giving away their code… the open-source guys are religiously opposed to Microsoft’s stance and it seems that some font-foundries ideally want to implement DRM for fonts which is as a daft as King Canute trying to turn back the tide.

While there are doubtlessly better ways to spend time, it’s been pretty interesting following these developments. I had no idea how these things were decided before I joined these w3.org mailing lists… now I can see just how tortuous the process is.

And right now it seems like they’re all very very pissed off.

As far as I can see, the concept of open-source technology provides a realistic approach to the problem of how companies and individuals can go about making money from intellectual property.

I think that the basic idea that you can repeatedly (and perpetually) make money from a one-time spend of labour, is at odds with the laws which our economy has traditionally been based upon.  So lets say, in a hypothetical situation, you get paid to produce a product (say, software or a font). Payment is a fair amount which reimburses you for time spent… and then the product is out there in the world.  An economic-ecosystem can then develop around an open-source product or technology according to market needs.

The net result of this is that we shift from charging for IP to a model which is based around offering services which make use of and extend open-sourced goods.

An this situation we no-longer need to try to enforce artificial scarcity (e.g. via DRM or scare tactics), because copying isn’t prohibited by open-source economics.

As far as I can see the main problem with open-source, is that large corporations can’t necessarily profit in the traditional way, because the need for middlemen is cut. I think the world changes for the better.. it’s not communism.  This is still capitalism – but the system avoids some of the gross divides created by IP-based / closed-source capitalism.

The notion that a person can profit from one idea, or period of labour, perpetually is simply not fair; even though it’s obviously very attractive. It’s strange how conditioning can make the blindingly logical seem wrong.