The Online Computer Library Center (OCLC) is a nonprofit, made up of member libraries that basically tries to help facilitate access to information among libraries. That seems like a good thing. One of its offerings is WorldCat — basically a big online catalog of library collections, so that it's easy for anyone to find books that are available at other libraries. This, obviously, seems quite useful, and many libraries agree and are a part of WorldCat. However, a month ago, OCLC announced new policies for WorldCat that effectively allowed OCLC to claim ownership over the records that any library put in its system — and, upon doing so, limiting what libraries could do with that data (such as, say, giving it to competing cataloging services).

Do not start over. The Bush administration took a major step toward improving federal cybersecurity with its Comprehensive National Cybersecurity Initiative. Although CNCI is not comprehensive and unnecessary secrecy reduced its effect, we believe it is a good place to start.

We recommend that the United States buy only secure products and services; standards and guidelines for secure products should be developed in partnership with industry."

We will make a new Ogg Theora (with Vorbis audio) opensource/free-based video derivative. This derivative will play natively in Firefox 3.1 release (v3.1 is due around the end of 2008).

Created in 1961 ... The radio station was there at the birth of Jamaica's music business when all kinds of music burst forth on the Caribbean island. Artists would go out and make just one vinyl record only for radio, a one-off cut ... [by January of this year] 80% of the collection had been taken, but the true scale of the loss was difficult to calculate as no accurate records were kept. Nearly one year on not a single record has been recovered, but officials are hoping an appeal to music fans will help replace the collection built up over the years by the JBC.

On November 12, 2008, a group of artists and activists unveiled a brilliant spoof of the New York Times, widely distributed to readers in New York and Los Angeles. This "July 4, 2009" version of the Times — which the real New York Times described as a "Grade-A caper" — boldly announced the end of the Iraq War, the nationalization of major oil conglomerates, the elimination of tuition at public universities, and the indictment of soon-to-be-former president Bush on charges of high treason. The poignant send-up, also available in an online version at www.nytimes-se.com, is a perfect example of parody in the 21st century.

De Beers responded not by confronting the authors (whose parody is protected by the First Amendment) but instead by threatening their Swiss-based domain name registrar, Joker.com. De Beers has demanded that Joker.com disable the spoof website's domain name or face liability for trademark infringement.

"The health situation is extraordinary, so we have to take extraordinary action," said an MP, Weynand Watari.

John Howson, associate director of the International HIV/Aids Alliance, said: "The majority of new infections come from people who don't know they are HIV positive. It is not going to be effective and you are treating people as criminals. It will increase stigma and promote a feeling of complacency."

EU culture ministers yesterday (20 November) rejected French proposals to curb online piracy through compulsory measures against free downloading ... [and instead pushed] for "a fair balance between the various fundamental rights" while fighting online piracy, first listing "the right to personal data protection," then "the freedom of information" and only lastly "the protection of intellectual property".

[This] indicates that the culture ministers and their advisers are beginning to understand the dynamics of the Net, that throttling its use through crude instruments like the "three strikes and you're out" is exactly the wrong thing to do ...