Fighting for non-rival pudding

About half a decade ago, my fascination with (and anger about) issues arising from the growing push toward licensing access to library materials, rather than purchasing them outright, pushed me out of a traditional library career path and into one that would allow me to focus more deeply on explication of and advocacy for the [...]

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My Intro Lecture on IP

A few weeks ago, I gave two days’ worth of lectures on intellectual property to the undergraduate class I’m helping teach this quarter. They seemed to like it, and a few people have asked me to send this to them, so I figured I’d post it up here for other folks to peruse.
Note that [...]

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Ah, Synergy

I love coming across the doings of folks I have known when I’m least expecting it.  For example, I spent a summer working for the editor of this book — which, incidentally, looks really cool and has now been made available as a free PDF.

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I Like this Article

[Note: I wrote this post on February 5, but held it back until I'd made my decisions about where I would be next year. Now that such decisions have been made, here it is...]
I think The New Yorker is probably one of the few mainstream media outlets that actually takes the time to provide [...]

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Oh. So. Beautiful.

Ohsobeautiful.
Lastly, does our appetite for creative vitality require the violence and exasperation of another avant-garde, with its wearisome killing-the-father imperatives, or might we be better off ratifying the ecstasy of influence—and deepening our willingness to understand the commonality and timelessness of the methods and motifs available to artists?
…
Any text is woven entirely with citations, references, [...]

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Readings and Writings

Just read Siva Vaidhyanathan’s new piece — “Copyright Jungle” — in the Columbia Journalism Review, and…
I loved it.
Admittedly, perhaps 90% of the article’s content was not really news to me, or likely to anyone who follows such issues with any regularity. But I think that’s kind of the point. As Siva points out, [...]

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Toe-dipping

More evidence that Yahoo’s thinking DRM-free: a Jessica Simpson single released for sale as an unlocked MP3 (CNET).
$1.99 seems a bit pricey, though.
(Some might say especially so for Jessica Simpson…)

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I’d buy that.

Apparently, Yahoo’s thinking about offering non-DRM mp3’s through its music service. That would rule. And they’d more than likely have me as a customer.
Right now, I would love to be buying all my music online — I tend never look at a jewel case again after I rip the CD inside — but [...]

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Amazing.

I was overwhelmed with both despair and uncontrollable laughter upon reading Senator Stevens’ comments on Net Neutrality last week. “The Internet is not a truck”? Oh dear.
However, the number of creative ways people have found to riff on this bit of political idiocy has been quite amazing. The latest – a poppy [...]

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A Lament for the State of Radio Broadcasting in America

I dove headfirst into Last.fm a few weeks back, while procrastinating on writing my article. Since then, it has helped make my cubicle so much more bearable — I listen all day at work. Now that I’ve listened to a fair mass of music, it’s getting better at knowing what I like, and [...]

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