Michael Power in fine form
Friday, January 27, 2006
WWM 2006 is Underway
Committee Chair Candace Jones has opened the meeting with our "newbie" session -- A presentation for those who have not been to WWM or Cyberspace in the past. We are pleased to see a large group of first timers to join the many old souls, and it's always great to see the fresh minds to join us.
Thursday, January 26, 2006
Conference Call for Transferrability of Electronic Assets
I hear through the grapevine that the WG on Transferrability of Electronic Assets is having a conference call capability for their meeting on Friday morning. Can someone post the call in number?
Press Release
Potter Anderson has sent out a press release to the local media in Delaware, notifying them of our impending meeting.
Universal Business Language
Prof. Jane Winn (University of Washington) and Jon Bosak (Sun Microsystems) will be presenting an update on the OASIS group's current efforts to develop the Universal Business Language. As explained on the OASIS site:
Jane and Jon have provided materials for your review prior to the presentation. Pick them up here and here.
This looks to be interesting, and quite appropriate for our group given how the founders of this very committee were deeply involved with the early efforts to put a legal framework around EDI.
Join us at 8 AM Saturday in the Atrium for this presentation.
UBL, the Universal Business Language, is the product of an international effort to define a royalty-free library of standard electronic XML business documents such as purchase orders and invoices. Developed in an open and accountable OASIS Technical Committee with participation from a variety of industry data standards organizations, UBL is designed to plug directly into existing business, legal, auditing, and records management practices, eliminating the re-keying of data in existing fax- and paper-based supply chains and providing an entry point into electronic commerce for small and medium-sized businesses.
Jane and Jon have provided materials for your review prior to the presentation. Pick them up here and here.
This looks to be interesting, and quite appropriate for our group given how the founders of this very committee were deeply involved with the early efforts to put a legal framework around EDI.
Join us at 8 AM Saturday in the Atrium for this presentation.
Wednesday, January 25, 2006
A Question for the Senator--Please
The proposed Analog Hole (I prefer the slang A-Hole) bill that is being considered in Congress is a real work of art. As Ed Felton reported in his Blog:
PLEASE, someone ask the Senator how Congress can pass a bill that enshrines a secret technology into the law and forces everyone to use it and to pay for the privilege? Regardless of how you feel about DRM technology and the current fight regarding the proper limits of IP protections, this question deserves to be asked.
If you want to review the bill, here's the link.
If you’ve been reading here lately, you know that I’m no fan of the Sensenbrenner/Conyers analog hole bill. The bill would require almost all analog video devices to implement two technologies called CGMS-A and VEIL. CGMS-A is reasonably well known, but the VEIL content protection technology is relatively new. I wanted to learn more about it.
So I emailed the company that sells VEIL and asked for a copy of the specification. I figured I would be able to get it. After all, the bill would make compliance with the VEIL spec mandatory — the spec would in effect be part of the law. Surely, I thought, they’re not proposing passing a secret law. Surely they’re not going to say that the citizenry isn’t allowed to know what’s in the law that Congress is considering. We’re talking about television here, not national security.
After some discussion, the company helpfully explained that I could get the spec, if I first signed their license agreement. The agreement requires me (a) to pay them $10,000, and (b) to promise not to talk to anybody about what is in the spec. In other words, I can know the contents of the bill Congress is debating, but only if I pay $10k to a private party, and only if I promise not to tell anybody what is in the bill or engage in public debate about it.
Worse yet, this license covers only half of the technology: the VEIL decoder, which detects VEIL signals. There is no way you or I can find out about the encoder technology that puts VEIL signals into video.
PLEASE, someone ask the Senator how Congress can pass a bill that enshrines a secret technology into the law and forces everyone to use it and to pay for the privilege? Regardless of how you feel about DRM technology and the current fight regarding the proper limits of IP protections, this question deserves to be asked.
If you want to review the bill, here's the link.
Consumer Law Working Group
A message from your chair, Prof. Don Clifford:
Everyone (whether formally affiliated with the working group or not!) is urged to consider the following:
1.) Make comments on www.Safeshopping.org , which we will consider at the winter working meeting. Comments are especially welcome from those who cannot come to the meeting—whether made before, during or afterwords. Send them to me along with your views of whether we should take up such a project at clif@email.unc.edu or come to the meeting and we can discuss them there!
2. Another topic on which we need broad input is whether to work up an ABA website on Identity Theft. We touch on the subject briefly in Safeshopping and have a link to the excellent FTC site and to the site for getting credit reports, www.annualcreditreport.com. There are a number of good websites, so the question is whether we should work up our own to add to the ABA series that is developing (including a site-in-progress on Safeselling). Please send me links to or information about any sites you have found particularly helpful. Among the major ones I have found are:
“OnGuardOnline.gov provides practical tips from the federal government and the technology industry to help you be on guard against Internet fraud, secure your computer, and protect your personal information.” http://onguardonline.gov/idtheft.html
FTC’s ID Theft Website. http://www.consumer.gov/idtheft/
A fairly new site funded and hosted by Microsoft which has this description:
“staysafe.org is an educational site intended to help consumers understand both the positive aspects of the Internet as well as how to manage a variety of safety and security issues that exist online. The guidance given on this site is focused on helping consumers understand those issues and how to take steps to prevent or repair their effects. That guidance may include both behavioral and product and technical solutions. Although this site is non-commercial, various products will be discussed in order to provide consumers with good decision making guidance. The content presented on this site may originate from corporations and non-profit, media and governmental organizations that focus entirely or in part on Internet safety education, consumer protection and consumer products. This site is funded and hosted by Microsoft Corporation and honoraria are paid for some content simply to enable its availability. If you have any questions please contact us.” http://staysafe.org/
There are also materials on such sites as Citibank, Visa and Equifax. There is also http://www.identitytheftassistance.org/home/index.cfm a site which is described as “a cooperative initiative of the financial services industry that provides a free victim assistance serevice for customers of member companies.”
I look forward to hearing from many of you and to the Wilmington meeting!
Don Clifford
clif @ email.unc.edu
Everyone (whether formally affiliated with the working group or not!) is urged to consider the following:
1.) Make comments on www.Safeshopping.org , which we will consider at the winter working meeting. Comments are especially welcome from those who cannot come to the meeting—whether made before, during or afterwords. Send them to me along with your views of whether we should take up such a project at clif@email.unc.edu or come to the meeting and we can discuss them there!
2. Another topic on which we need broad input is whether to work up an ABA website on Identity Theft. We touch on the subject briefly in Safeshopping and have a link to the excellent FTC site and to the site for getting credit reports, www.annualcreditreport.com. There are a number of good websites, so the question is whether we should work up our own to add to the ABA series that is developing (including a site-in-progress on Safeselling). Please send me links to or information about any sites you have found particularly helpful. Among the major ones I have found are:
“OnGuardOnline.gov provides practical tips from the federal government and the technology industry to help you be on guard against Internet fraud, secure your computer, and protect your personal information.” http://onguardonline.gov/idtheft.html
FTC’s ID Theft Website. http://www.consumer.gov/idtheft/
A fairly new site funded and hosted by Microsoft which has this description:
“staysafe.org is an educational site intended to help consumers understand both the positive aspects of the Internet as well as how to manage a variety of safety and security issues that exist online. The guidance given on this site is focused on helping consumers understand those issues and how to take steps to prevent or repair their effects. That guidance may include both behavioral and product and technical solutions. Although this site is non-commercial, various products will be discussed in order to provide consumers with good decision making guidance. The content presented on this site may originate from corporations and non-profit, media and governmental organizations that focus entirely or in part on Internet safety education, consumer protection and consumer products. This site is funded and hosted by Microsoft Corporation and honoraria are paid for some content simply to enable its availability. If you have any questions please contact us.” http://staysafe.org/
There are also materials on such sites as Citibank, Visa and Equifax. There is also http://www.identitytheftassistance.org/home/index.cfm a site which is described as “a cooperative initiative of the financial services industry that provides a free victim assistance serevice for customers of member companies.”
I look forward to hearing from many of you and to the Wilmington meeting!
Don Clifford
clif @ email.unc.edu
Contact Number at Meeting Site
For those who need a contact number for others to reach them at the meeting site, use the main number for Potter Anderson: (302) 984-6000.
Also, for those who are using conference phones for your individual meetings, we will distribute individual conference room direct-dial numbers on Friday morning.
Also, for those who are using conference phones for your individual meetings, we will distribute individual conference room direct-dial numbers on Friday morning.
Tuesday, January 24, 2006
Cyberspace Committee Members attend Wild Game
Three members of the Minnesota contingent--Matthias, Kate, and Michael--all happened to find themselves in the same suite at the Minnesota Wild hockey game on Tuesday night. Since none of us will be able to make it to the WWM, we thought we'd take a quick phone cam picture and tell you all to have a good time. The Wild won the game by the way.
Wilmington Activities and Venues
The good folks at Potter Anderson & Corroon helped to pull together thoughts on their fair city and things to do, including a restaurant guide. Grab a copy here!
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