History: "The South"

In many traditional Southern countries awe and mystery surround the created object into which the creator projects spirit and soul. Also in contrast with the Western individual-based concept of intellectual property rights it is custom to recognize 'collective', 'communal' or 'folkloric' copyright. Folkloric copyright acknowledges rights to all kinds of knowledge, ideas and innovations produced in 'intellectual commons'. Such rights are not limited to the lifetime of an individual but rather exist in perpetuity with a specific group or an entire people.

Islamic Tradition

Already early Islamic jurists recognized a creator's right or copyright and offered protection against piracy. Traditional Islamic law treats infringement as a breach of ethics, not as a criminal act of theft. Punishment is carried out in the form of defamation of the infringer and the casting of shame on his tribe. Only in recent years many Islamic countries have adopted formal copyright statutes.

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1960s - 1970s: Expert Systems Gain Attendance

The concept of expert systems dates back to the 1960s but first gained prominence in the 1970s. Conclusive for this development were the insights of the Stanford University professor Edward Feigenbaum, who in 1977 demonstrated that the problem-solving capacity of a computer program rather is a result of the knowledge it posses, than of the applied programming techniques and formalisms.

Expert systems were designed to mimic the knowledge and reasoning capabilities of a human specialist in a given domain by using (top down) artificial intelligence techniques. Made possible by the large storage capacity of the computers at the time, expert systems had the potential to interpret statistics and formulate rules. An initial use of expert systems was to diagnose and treat human physical disorders, but as its applications in the market place were extensive over the course of the following years they were also employed in fields such as stock market forecast, taxation, chemistry, and geology.

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Economic rights

The economic rights (besides moral rights and in some cases also neighboring rights) granted to the owners of copyright usually include 1) copying or reproducing a work, 2) performing a work in public, 3) making a sound recording of a work, 4) making a motion picture of a work, 5) broadcasting a work, 6) translating a work and 7) adapting a work. Under certain national laws some of these rights are not exclusive rights of authorization but in specific cases, merely rights to remuneration.

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Kosov@

The "word" Kosov@ is a compromise between the Serb name KosovO and the Albanian KosovA. It is mostly used by international people who want to demonstrate a certain consciousness about the conflict including some sort of neutrality, believing that neither the one side nor the other (and maybe not even NATO) is totally right. Using the word Kosov@ is seen as a symbol of peace.

For more explanations (in German) see: http://www.zivildienst.at/kosov@.htm

http://www.zivildienst.at/kosov@.htm
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