Copyright for wrongs.

This is my first piece on Copyright; this is more of an introduction to what my take is on the history of it. The subject itself is too deep to simply present all the facts and all the information, but ultimately I hope to present a reasoned opinion on it as I write more on the subject.

First and foremost I wish to make it clear that these are my own simple thoughts on the issues of copyright theft. I do not condone piracy nor do I condone a lifetime of servitude to all who are slaves to a contract between an owner of copyright and a provider of works to the copyright owner.

In the beginning.

Music was something you had to go to. It couldn’t be bought, it couldn’t be switched on or off, you had to go to the hall when the orchestra visited and pay the price for admission. Some hung outside quietly catching snippets of the performance.

Recorded music changed all. With the invention of the gramophone it became possible to place a recording of the music on a storage medium, that storage medium being a humble Wax disc not too dissimilar from a vinyl LP. Few possessed the technology to do this and those few started a business of recording performances pressing them to wax discs and selling them to the public so that they too could enjoy a musical experience even if they could not afford the price of a ticket to the concert.

An Idea refined.

In order to create an incentive to musicians a slice of the sales of music was offered, it was not much but that was negotiable to an extent (though that extent was still around %2-4). The greater the sale of the music, the more likely that artist was to produce more work. The extra funds earned from the sale of music by the recorded sound companies was re-invested in technology and finding new talent in order to increase sales and deliver more of what people wanted to hear.

The business model wasn’t the only thing that was refined, technology was refined too. Recording quality had improved dramatically, professional quality Mic’s and magnetic tape brought multi-track recording to the play. The early benefits can be heard on great music from artists like Ray Charles (Night and Day). The concept of home tape recording brought with it the ability for the home listener to compile his/her own recordings or make a mix tape that they could pass to a friend. The humble audio cassette became the first anti-piracy target of the music industry.

But with thanks to bands like Metallica, bootleg recordings of concerts were encouraged in order to help the band’s sound permeate the masses.

The industry progressed from wax to harder wearing Vinyl and the quality of the sound improved dramatically as a result.

When Harry met Sally….

Digital technology finally reached a point where it was possible to represent real music as binary code, etched into a fine sliver of metals coated in plastic, the compact disc revolutionized the distribution, and storage of music and came with a subsequent price hike. There is a debate as to whether CD’s are a ‘rip-off’ that’s a separate issue. An almost unholy marriage of the analogue (sound) to a digital medium

This marriage of digital technology and sound recordings is ultimately what has lead to an enormous decline in the profitability of the music industry. Initially it was thought that CD copying technology would be too expensive for anyone to own but those of us in technology knew that the potential data storage capability of the CD would be exploited cheaply soon enough it was only a matter of time.

The birth of CD piracy.

At first the CD writing machines were industrial machines that cost a huge sum of money to purchase and run. But the humble PC changed that. With increasing improvements in computer technology it became possible to mimic a lot of that process in software, resulting in the production of small compact CD writers that you could slot into your computer at home.

People now had the power to copy CD’s at will and many early adopters exploited that. Once it became possible to copy CD’s it was only a matter of time before the data itself could be lifted and stored.

Imaging – Separating the intangible from the physical.

Copying software became more advanced, and it became possible to store the draw data of a CD as a file on a computer that you could simply burn to another CD at will. It wasn’t long before it was realised that the next step was to lift the data of the disc verbatim and store it as an uncompressed Wave file on a computer’s hard disc. This took quite a large amount of storage (650mb-700mb) for a full 74-80 minutes of music.

MPEG Encoding Technology.

A number of new devices started to appear on the market promising a digital revolution that ended up not going anywhere. The Commodore CDTV was born and it had a capability to playback movies that were stored on CD. The race to develop a system of compression that could enable this to happen resulted in the production of the MPEG Codec. The first stab at taking a movie and its associated data and compressing it so that it could fit on a couple of CD’s.

Different levels of compression were used to deliver the finished product but the one that the music industry is interested in the most is a codec known as MPEG Layer 3 or more commonly MP3. Using this technology it became possible to turn a 60mb wave file into a compact 3-4mb with a little discernible quality loss. MP3 created a digital revolution for content distribution that culminated with the founding of Napster.

Napster

Regarded as the first and greatest music file sharing service; Napster would scan your computer for MP3’s and make them freely available for download to anyone else who used Napster. Napster re-defined the role of technology and media distribution. It challenged the old way of doing business by eliminating business from the equation.

The greatest issue created by Napster was simply one of money. Napster could deliver all the content available anywhere on anyone’s computer to anyone’s computer, with (in its hey-day) over 2 petabytes of data available on the network. The real problem this presented to business is simply that no money was changing hands so technically was it piracy?

The availability of music on this kind of scale was unheard of, you could get that old song by Pink Floyd faster than you could find it in a store and not even pay for it. Just type in the name and there it was.

The Music industry did whatever it could to bring Napster down without really understanding the technology behind it. In the process it ostracised many fans and instigated a swathe of lawsuits in an attempt to protect its property.

Interestingly enough Metallica lead the charge against Napster and instead of suing the individual who was distributing their music, they sued the organisation that the files were sourced from.

A dying era.

They say ‘No one missed the door to door ice sales guy when the fridge was invented.’ That may be the case, but that guys family probably missed the income.

Today I’m Listening to:

Play Dead by Bjork & David Arnold

Phorms PR blitz, more like a fart in a bathtub.

Phorm, the company that sells ISP’s a targeted ad spying system, have been very havily embroiled in a PR offensive that quite frankly doesn’t seem to be going anywhere.

All Phorm no substance.

Phorm’s PR companies are trying to present the system being offered in terms of service and value; the issue that they are facing is that they are fighting against technology people who actually understand how the system is put together and see beyond the simple oh it’ll just give you ‘more relevant ads.’

But the New York times sums the Phorm ’service’ up very nicely

New York Times, 20th March 2008

“As you browse, we’re able to categorize all of your Internet actions,” said Virasb Vahidi, the chief operating officer of Phorm. “We actually can see the entire Internet.”

Ironic

Ever get the feeling that the PR machine isn’t working quite as smoothly as it perhaps should? 

I find it amusing that the biggest issue Phorm faces is controlling its public image in light of what is out there on the wider internet. It’s ironic that a firm built on the principal of profiling Internet communications is having an Internet communications crisis of its own.

Phorm’s share price has tanked, the FIPR believe that it’s methodology may be illegal, and now ISP’s who were once going to be partners are facing lawsuit’s as a result of their complicity. There is only one office in the UK that has the power to stop Phorm or let them have their way with our Internet connections. the office of Richard Thomas the Information Commissioner. But its not quite that simple.

His office is in the process of piecing together a reprot that will address the legality of Phorm’s proposed system, the results of which are expected in a couple of weeks.

Relationships

But the damage is done, the public’s relationship with their ISP has been damaged by this, the reputations of those ISP’s are also damaged. Phorm’s involvement will cost millions in lost customers, millions in future sales, and that is just the beginning. The PR blitz Phorm is engaged in will not help those ISP’s who are already losing customers as a result.

Final Opinion

Phorm is a double edged sword, a poison apple almost. The companies and organisations that use it will be viewed as de-valuing their customer base and also as miss-treating the privacy and security of their customers. Those same customers will leave those ISP’s as they already are doing so, and are doing so before the service is even live. Phorm went down this path without having the full legality of their proposal supported by the ICO. Their investors are deserting the company as I would envisage rats from a sinking ship.  BT is under threat of legal action as it initiated a trial secretly during the Summer of 2007 without informing customers what they were doing or why.

If the ICO’s opinion does not rule in Phorm’s favour then there will be a public reckoning. If it does then public opinion will be damaged along with the reputation of the ICO and the companies that use the technology.

In the meantime the message is clear if you are an ISP anywhere in the world.

PHORM = BAD NEWS FOR YOUR BUSINESS.

 

Today Phorm is staring down:

Barrel of a Gun by Depeche Mode

The Gospel of K0rs0 part 3

 Not content with creating the universe and basic physi…. Uhm sucky forces god has turned his attention to the creation of planets but he doesn’t call them that yet cos he hasn’t finished inventing them (and the patent office wont be around for at least a few billio… Uhm thousand years)

So I’ve got this gas here and this dust, I’ll smash it all together and see what happens, but since this is a project, it needs a project name. The name can’t be too descriptive because I cant file with the patent office yet, I know! I’ll call it Codename Bum, no one who will exist would guess that.

How long should I spend, well the concept of a day is a bit pointless in interstellar space, given that I haven’t even started making other things yet including days, but despite that fact I’ll take six days. And just as there was no point for the concept of a day there was also no point for the project bum Gant chart……..

Project Bum Day 1

I need some tools to move all this crap to one spot. So what I’ll do is spend today inventing some tools that I can use to move stuff around. I need something that can scoop stuff up and deposit it somewhere else in a sort of shoving motion. Shoving…. Shov… a Shovel! Great a slightly smaller version for tricky corners could be handy sort of cut-down shovel. A dowel… no. Trowel!

Gas is a bit tricky but I’ve discovered that if you squeeze it enough it can become a sort of liquid, hmm, how do I move that liquid…. Perhaps something that’s hollow on the inside but with no ends, I can suck the liquid up and blow it out where I need it. But I cant call it the sucky thing I’ve already got that and don’t need confusion. Its not exactly a container and is cylindrical a tub… TUBE!

I’ve used my shovel, trowel and tube to get the gas and dust into one spot but its sort of just sitting there. I might leave it and come back tomorrow for a second look.

Project Bum Day 2

Not much different today, damn this is taking a while. Well that’s it the time for action is at hand. God then squashed the gas and dust together in his hands and then rolled it out flat. Nice thought god. I’ll leave it to dry and come back tomorrow.

Project Bum Day 3

What The….. Its turned into a sphere, honestly you sweat and slave and turn your back for 5 minutes and suddenly it’s a bloody sphere. Well we’ll see about that.. What I need is something big and heavy with handles. Like my tube on its side only where the ends are I’ll put the handles in. It will roll the thing flat. A Rolling Pin! God took the rolling pin and rolled Bum flat once more. That’ll show it.

Project Bum Day 4

….. …….. F…… F…… S…….. It’s a bloody sphere again. This time I’ll roll it flat and I’ll bloody watch it.

Project Bum Day 4 (and a little bit)

“Oh!” Proclaimed god as he watched Bum tear apart at the edges and collapse in on itself. It’s the same shape as those star thingies I made earlier I guess they are circular for a reason… Aahhh yes the sucky force that’s relative to the mass of everything. If there was no time it would stay flat, dammit.

I guess I’d better leave it and come back tomorrow when all this has settled down.

Project Bum Day 5

Well it’s a sphere again. But it looks a bit barren, sort of rocky with no atmosphere. I wonder thought god. What if I were, uhm you know. Well let’s find out, god turned around pulled up his robes and defecated in the general direction of Bum. The gas cloud settled around the planet forming an atmosphere, but god squeezed a little too hard and lo the appropriately named ‘Moon’ was created as well.

God looked at Bum and Moon and thought to himself ‘damn I really gotta go………

Stay tuned for Part 4 when god finishes project bum on day 6 and then changes the name for the launch party on day 7; and also realises that living things need food to generate energy in order to live but forgot that consumed food has to be ‘deposited’ to relieve the internal pressure.

Today God is listening to:

Epic by Faith No More

Why PHORM Can PHUCK OPH!

Hello all, once again I have been gone from my blog for more time than seems healthy. but I have been a bit busy with stuff as always.

Today I’ve decided to try and help raise awareness of a service called Webwise created by a group of assholes called Phorm.

What is this Phorm stuph then?

Phorm is a company built on top of 121 Media, the very same company that installed extrememly difficult to remove spyware products on your home PC that would bombard your system with pop-up adverts. 121 Media not content with having its malware identified as Spyware by every major anti-virus company on earth decided that it could do more.

Phorm was born and what they do is sell advertising products to ISP’s. Their system works by capturing every single web page request made by EVERY SINGLE Customer at an ISP. Building up an advertising profile that is then used to process mangle the web pages you visit and return those pages with targetted ads based on data gleaned by tracking your web usage.

Let me be clear on this from a technical stand-point the phorm system relies on all outbound traffic being relayed to it on layer 7, each page viewed is captured and processed and fed back to you the user with lovely targetted ads.

But it gets better, they tell you that you can opt-out, basically all this means is that they allegedly stop filling the pages with their targeted adverts, they still perform the data capture. What does this mean for you, the customer? Well basically it means that a third party system, has complete unfettered, un-restricted access to see every single site you have visited, every page you visited on that site everything you posted to that site and they can read everything that you viewed and did. Think about that when you read your webmail, or your on-line bank account details (SSL encrypted or not, SSL proxying is a reality), when you are visiting blogs, when you make a donation to a political party, book a holiday or when your kids are visiting their favourite sites.

What is your guarantee that they dont do this? Well you have to accept their word on it. Is this an acceptable approach to personal security on the internet?

There is no simple way of getting around Phorm’s advertising blitzing technology blocking the web services phorm provides will cut you off from the internet as every data packet has to travel through their system. and Opting out does not stop the data capture process.

Those of you living in the UK should be aware that BT, TalkTalk, Virgin Media and Carphone Warehouse, are offering this ’service’. The private communications data of 10 million citizens is being pimped to phorm. Those of you who live in the US should be aware that Phorm are in discussions with your ISP’s too.

Phor more inpormation on phorm please visit the protest site http://www.badphorm.co.uk

Some additional information – Update.

With thanks to Barry Tork who drew my attention to http://www.politicalpenguin.org.uk you can check out details on Phorm’s patent on-line at the Politcal Penguin blog by following this link http://www.politicalpenguin.org.uk/blog/p,295/  . Political Penguin also have some excellent articles related to the Phorm system.

Cheers Barry and thanks for the info relating to Phorm’s dirty information campaign being conducted by its PR company ‘Citigate Dewe Rogerson.‘

 Tonight I’m listening to

Labyrinth by The Cure