Others may not but I do…

“Two and a half years ago, EFF sued AT&T on behalf of its customers, seeking to hold the telecom giant responsible for its craven complicity in the White House’s illegal warrantless wiretapping program.

Since then, the phone companies and their allies in Washington have spent tens of millions of dollars lobbying Congress to grant them retroactive immunity. They ran ridiculous fear-mongering attack ads against any politician who dared to oppose them. President Bush threatened to veto any bill that allowed EFF’s lawsuit to continue.”

Our rights as Americans are being wiped off the slate by this administration and the Telecoms because of - MONEY and the smoke screen of FEAR!

Help EFF Continue the Fight Against Warrantless Wiretapping

“We need your help to take the fight to the next level. We’re going to challenge Congress’s unconstitutional grant of immunity in our case against AT&T. We’re going to fight for a congressional repeal of immunity in the next Congress. And we’re going to file a new lawsuit against the government, challenging its warrantless surveillance practices, past, present and future.”

I’d like to remind you that Internet Marketing is not immune to this type of eavesdropping. Think about that…

The Electronic Frontier Foundation cares about our rights. Click through and make your own determination. To make a direct contribution you can go here.

Reported by The Electronic Frontier Foundation;

A Free Speech Double Whammy: Flawed Anti-Phishing Bill Would Dilute Trademark Fair Use and Anonymity Protections

“Congress is contemplating a so-called “Anti-Phishing Consumer Protection Act” (APCPA) that takes an odd view of consumer protection. In the name of stopping phishing schemes, Senator Olympia Snowe has introduced S. 2661, a bill that would expand trademark law, limit consumer access to information about competitive products, and eviscerate key protections for anonymous speech.”

Sounds worthy enough at first glance but - “Co-sponsors are Senators Bill Nelson and Ted Stevens (yes, THAT Ted Stevens).” More on that in a moment…

Read more

Which is exactly why I’m going to pass it on…

The Electronic Frontier Foundation, specifically Corynne McSherry and Eric Goldman, posted this today;

ABA IP Section Quietly Considering Anti-Consumer Proposals to Regulate Keyword Advertising

Think quickly! Don’t look down and then tell me what you think it is…

Anti-Consumer proposals to regulate keyword advertising? Who would do such a thing? Why - our own American Bar Association, who else? Corynne tells us;

“these efforts — not to mention the committee’s attempts to prevent public scrutiny of those efforts — are deeply misguided and could help undermine the very purpose of trademarks: to improve consumer access to accurate information about goods and services.”

Then they both tell us;

“The tussle over keyword advertising has spilled over into numerous arenas, including the courts, the legislatures (such as Utah’s ill-conceived attempt to ban keyword advertising), the private trademark policies of the search engines and the law review literature. Given the magnitude of the issue—and the billions of dollars associated with keyword advertising—it’s not surprising that new battlefields are cropping up all over the place. But the latest skirmish has an unexpected venue—the closed-door deliberations of the American Bar Association.”

Now, actually, we have no further to go than “billions of dollars associated with keyword advertising” plus “battlefields,” to come to a thorough understanding of what this is all about. But… add to it what Corynne and Eric say at the end and my understanding is total and complete;

“First, why is the ABA IP Section attempting to intervene in this contentious area of the law in the first place? These resolutions are political in nature and reflect a deep trademark owner-favorable bias that does not necessarily reflect the views of American lawyers generally or IP lawyers specifically. It’s hard to see how these biased and divisive statements are an appropriate use of the ABA’s resources or authority.”

Political, end of basic story.

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EFF Wins Fast-Track Release of Telecom Lobbying Records

Judge Cancels Friday Hearing, Orders Government to Comply by December 10

“San Francisco - Late Tuesday, the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) won the speedy release of telecom lobbying records from the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI).

The agency was ordered to comply with a new December 10 deadline — in time for the documents to play a role in the congressional debate over granting amnesty for telecommunications companies taking part in illegal electronic surveillance. The ruling by U.S. District Judge Susan Illston vacates a hearing on the matter previously scheduled for Friday.”

In an almost identical “parallel universe” this is how big corporate lobbying money works - from The New York Times;

F.C.C. Chief Seeks Votes to Tighten Cable Rules

“WASHINGTON, Nov. 25 — The head of the Federal Communications Commission is struggling to find enough support from a majority of the agency’s commissioners to regulate cable television companies more tightly.

The five-member commission is set to vote on Tuesday on a report, proposed by Kevin J. Martin, the agency’s chairman, that would give the commission expanded powers over the cable industry after making a formal finding that it had grown too big.

After news reports this month that Mr. Martin supported the finding — along with the commission’s two Democrats — the cable industry heavily lobbied the commission and allies in Congress to kill the proposal. Those efforts may be paying off.”

Doesn’t everybody paying attention to this know beyond any doubt that the telcos’ money can buy enough influence in all the “right” places (allies in Congress?) to insure their “victory.” And isn’t it about time also that this country, this nation of free people, exert their influence over this nature of corrupt greed? (I.E. - that ally could be your Congressman! Do something about it!)

Under the sub-title “Six Concrete Guidelines Aim to Balance Free Speech Rights and Copyright” the EFF (Electronic Frontier Foundation) and “a coalition of leading public interest groups issued a “Fair Use Principles” document that sets out six concrete guidelines designed to minimize the collateral damage that copyright enforcement efforts may inflict on video creators who are “remixing” copyrighted material into new video creations.”

This is an important step because it is designed “to protect creative videos that remix material from movies, TV and popular music,” said EFF Senior Intellectual Property Attorney Fred von Lohmann.

So, if you effectively quote a movie by excerpting part of that movie and using it in yours that would be considered “fair use” and not a copyright infringement.

The Six Principles;

1. A Wide Berth for Transformative, Creative Uses: Copyright owners are within their rights to pursue nontransformative verbatim copying of their copyrighted materials online.

2. Filters Must Incorporate Protections for Fair Use. Broken down further into three parts;

a) Three Strikes Before Blocking: The use of “filtering” technology should not be used to automatically remove, prevent the uploading of, or block access to content unless the filtering mechanism is able to verify that the content has previously been removed pursuant to an undisputed DMCA takedown notice or that there are “three strikes” against it;

1. the video track matches the video track of a copyrighted work submitted by a content owner;

2. the audio track matches the audio track of that same copyrighted work; and

3. nearly the entirety (e.g, 90% or more) of the challenged content is comprised of a single copyrighted work (i.e., a “ratio test”).

b) Humans Trump Machines: Human creators should be afforded the opportunity to dispute the conclusions of automated filters.

c) Minimization: In applying automated filtering procedures, service providers should take steps to minimize the impact on other expressive activities related to the blocked content.

3. DMCA Notices Required for Removals: Service providers should require compliant DMCA takedown notices from content owners before removing content in any manner that does not afford users the ability to contest and override the removal.

4. Notice to Users upon DMCA Takedown: Upon issuance of any DMCA takedown notice by a content owner, the service provider should provide prompt notice to the user who posted the allegedly infringing material.

5. Informal “Dolphin Hotline”: Every system makes mistakes, and when fair use “dolphins” are caught in a net intended for infringing “tuna,” an escape mechanism must be available to them.

6. Mandatory Reinstatement upon Counter-notice or Retraction: Service providers should establish and follow the formal “counternotice-and-putback” process contemplated by the DMCA.