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Submission Summary: 0 pending, 98 declined, 39 accepted (137 total, 28.47% accepted)

Submission + - SingularDTV: using Ethereum for DRM on a sci-fi TV show about the Singularity (rocknerd.co.uk)

Submitted by David Gerard
David Gerard writes: SingularDTV is an exciting new blockchain-based entertainment industry startup. Their plan is to adapt the DRM that made $121.54 for Imogen Heap, make their own completely premined altcoin and use that to somehow sell two million views of a sci-fi TV show about the Singularity. Using CODE, which is explicitly modeled on The DAO ... which spectacularly imploded days after its launch. There's a white paper, but here's an analysis of why these schemes are a terrible idea for musicians.

Submission + - Elsevier going after authors sharing their own papers (svpow.com) 2

Submitted by David Gerard
David Gerard writes: Elsevier, in final desperation mode, is going after authors sharing their own papers online. Academia.edu reported to several researchers that Elsevier "is currently upping the ante in its opposition to academics sharing their own papers online." This is the sound of a boycott biting. Repeat after me: "Elsevier delenda est."

Submission + - How amateurs destroyed the professional music business (rocknerd.co.uk)

Submitted by David Gerard
David Gerard writes: Here in the future, musicians and record companies complain they can't make a living any more. The problem isn’t piracy — it’s competition. There is too much music and too many musicians, and the amateurs are often good enough for the public. This is healthy for culture, not so much for aesthetics, and terrible for musicians.
Your Rights Online

Submission + - Internet Brands sues people for forking under CC by-sa (davidgerard.co.uk)

Submitted by
David Gerard
David Gerard writes: "Internet Brands bought Wikitravel.org in 2006, plastered it with ads and neglected it. After years, the Wikitravel community finally decided to fork under CC by-sa and move to Wikimedia. Internet Brands is now suing two of the unpaid volunteers for wanting to leave. The Wikimedia Foundation is seeking a declaratory judgement that you can actually fork a free-content project without permission. Internet Brands has a track record of scorched-earth litigation tactics."
Your Rights Online

Submission + - Stuxnet/Flame/Duqu uses GPL code: release it! (crysys.hu)

Submitted by
David Gerard
David Gerard writes: "It seems the authors of Stuxnet/Duqu/Flame used the LZO library, which is straight-up GPL. And so, someone has asked the US government to release the code under the GPL. (Other code uses various permissive licenses. As works of the US
federal government, the rest is of course public domain.) Perhaps the author could enlist the SFLC to send a copyright notice to the US government..."
Google

Submission + - Schmidt: G+ "identity service", not social network (google.com)

Submitted by
David Gerard
David Gerard writes: "Eric Schmidt has revealed that Google+ is an identity service, and the "social network" bit is just bait. Schmidt says "G+ is completely optional," not mentioning that Google has admitted that deleting a G+ account will seriously downgrade your other Google services. As others have noted, Somewhere, there are two kids in a garage building a company whose motto will be "Don't be Google"."
Wine

Submission + - Wine 1.2 released (winehq.org)

Submitted by
David Gerard
David Gerard writes: "Stuck with that one Windows app you can't get rid of? Rejoice — Wine 1.2 is officially released! Apart from running pretty much any Windows application on Unix better than 1.0 (from 2008), major new features include 64-bit support, bi-directional text and translation into thirty languages. And, of course, DirectX 9 is well-supported and DirectX 10 is getting better. Packages should hit the distros over the weekend, or you can get the source now."
Media

Submission + - Times UK paywall a miserable failure (newser.com)

Submitted by
David Gerard
David Gerard writes: "As part of his war against free, Rupert Murdoch put the Times and Sunday Times of London behind a paywall. Michael Wolff of Newser asks how that's working out for him. You can guess: miserable failure. "Not only is nobody subscribing to the website, but subscribers to the paper itselfâ€Â”who have free access to the siteâ€Â”are not going beyond the registration page. Itâ€Âs an empty world." Not that this wasn't entirely predictable."

Submission + - Programmers Need To Learn Statistics (zedshaw.com) 2

Submitted by
David Gerard
David Gerard writes: "Zed Shaw writes an impassioned plea to programmers: Programmers Need To Learn Statistics Or I Will Kill Them All. "I go insane when I hear programmers talking about statistics like they know shit when it’s clearly obvious they do not. I’ve been studying it for years and years and still don’t think I know anything. This article is my call for all programmers to finally learn enough about statistics to at least know they don’t know shit. I have no idea why, but their confidence in their lacking knowledge is only surpassed by their lack of confidence in their personal appearance.""

Submission + - "Three strikes" to go ahead in Britain (guardian.co.uk)

Submitted by
David Gerard
David Gerard writes: "Lord Peter Mandelson has carefully ignored the Gowers Report and the Carter Report, instead taking the advice of his good friend David Geffen and three strikes and you're out will become law in Britain. The Open Rights Group has, of course, hit the roof. Oh, and never mind MI5 and the police pointing out that widespread encryption will become normal, hampering their efforts to keep up with little things like impending terrorist atrocities. Still, worth it to stop a few Lily Allen tracks being shared, what?"
Patents

Submission + - Intellectual Ventures' patent protection racket (timothyblee.com)

Submitted by
David Gerard
David Gerard writes: "Nathan Myhrvold's Intellectual Ventures doesn't sue people over patents, because that would be patent trolling! No, instead they just threaten to sell the patent to a known litigous patent troll. So that's all right then. Timothy Lee details how using patents to crush profitable innovation works in practice, and concludes: 'In thinking about how to reform the patent system, a good yardstick would be to look for policy changes that would tend to put Myhrvold and his firm out of business.'"
Google

Submission + - Google trying to make <video> H.264 only? (whatwg.org)

Submitted by
David Gerard
David Gerard writes: "Google Chrome includes Ogg support for the <video> element. It also includes support for the hideously encumbered H.264 format. Nice as an extra, but ... they're also testing HTML5 YouTube only for H.264 — meaning the largest video provider on the Net will make H.264 the primary codec and relegate the equally good open format Ogg Theora firmly to the sidelines. Mike Shaver from Mozilla has fairly unambiguously asked Chris diBona from Google what the heck Google thinks it's doing. We all eagerly await the answer to the question: "WTF?""

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