I’m on Rocketboom

Posted on 8 September 2008
Filed under Creative Commons, DRM, Personal
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…after a fashion. They use a photo of me around the one minute mark in today’s video, during a discussion of DRM. The photo’s from the DRM protests at the Students for Free Culture conference in Boston last year. I’m photogenic enough to be Generic Protester, then.

I forget who took the photo, either Karen or Fred. Either way, it was CC-licensed. I don’t know whether they attributed; anyway, it’s fair use. (Thanks to Hendrik for the tip.)

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Photo used in Music 2.0 book

Posted on 29 February 2008
Filed under Creative Commons, DRM, Florida, Gainesville, Music, Personal, Students for Free Culture
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This photo I took, of Florida Free Culture’s protest on Defective By Design’s “Day Against DRM” in October 2006, has been used in the book Music 2.0 by Gerd Leonhard. (It’s a photo of the 34th Street Wall in Gainesville, Fla.) He used the photo under the terms of its Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike license. I received a courtesy copy from the author in the mail today. The book is available for purchase or free download from its Web site.

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FSF to libraries: boycott DRM

Posted on 7 February 2008
Filed under Copyright, DRM, FOSS, Libraries
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Sometimes, different interests of mine will intersect in fascinating ways. Here’s one: the Free Software Foundation’s DefectiveByDesign.org campaign is asking libraries to boycott DRM, digital restrictions on content the library purchases or subscribes to. Specifically, DbD is targeting the Boston Public Library for its use of OverDrive’s Digital Library Reserve platform.

I would expect libraries to be receptive to the message of eliminating DRM — DRM is diametrically opposed to libraries’ missions of access and preservation, and is an awful abuse of copyright law against the public interest. But it’s hard to argue that libraries should forgo access altogether to DRM-crippled content if they can’t negotiate out of it or acquire the content from another source. (Exhibit A: The Boston library’s response.) With that said, there’s plenty of room for library pushback against DRM, which could further signal vendors that there’s no market for it. We’ll see how this turns out.

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