Apr 19
Cancer researchers are using Amazon’s Elastic Compute Cloud to run extremely complicated experiments. They only had 3 hours, but in that time they tested 21 million synthetic compounds that could eventually be used in drugs. The total cost was about $15,000.
Full Article at Ars Technica
Apr 18
The normally silent Teller, from the famous magical comedy duo and hosts of Showtime’s “Bullshit!” Penn & Teller, is speaking up in a copyright case over one of his magic tricks, known as “Shadows.”
Apparently another magician saw Teller’s trick in Las Vegas and developed his own version. He sells the secret of the trick for $3000, along with instructions and a DVD. To promote the product, he posted a video of himself performing the trick to YouTube. When Teller found out, he used YouTube DMCA policy to file a takedown request. When Teller requested that the magician stop using his routine entirely, the magician refused. Teller offered to buy him out, but when they couldn’t agree on a price, Teller decided to take him to court.
To me, this brings up an interesting question. If a magic trick is a sequence of actions that make up a performance, how is that any different than a song, a comedy routine, a dance, etc.? How does copyright apply in this case?
Shadows:
Full Article at Ars Technica
Apr 13
The Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA) was proposed to create a new governing body, outside of the World Trade Organization, United Nations, and World Intellectual Property Organization, to go after copyright infringement around the world. It’s been criticized as being a thinly-veiled attack on civil rights and privacy on the Internet.
Despite the controversy, it’s been signed by Australia, Canada, Japan, Morocco, New Zealand, Singapore, South Korea, the United States and the European Union. The European Parliament is set to vote on ACTA, possibly to stop it dead in its tracks, and it appears it’s losing support by the truckload. David Martin, a British Member of the European Parliament, who has been guiding ACTA through the European Parliament, has no come out in opposition. He is quoted as saying:
Today’s conference has confirmed my suspicion that ACTA raises more fears than hopes. What it delivers in terms of important intellectual property rights is diminished by potential threats to civil liberties and internet freedom. When the European Parliament rejects ACTA, the Commission must work to find other ways to defend European intellectual property in the global marketplace.
Coming from the guy who has been driving the ACTA bus, this is a huge development in the ACTA case and could result in total loss of support for ACTA.