Mormon Church v. Sandra and Jerald Tanner
In a ruling of December 1999, a federal judge in Utah temporarily barred two critics of the Mormon Church from posting on their website the Internet addresses of other sites featuring pirated copies of a Mormon text. The Judge said that it was likely that Sandra and Jerald Tanner had engaged in contributory copyright infringement when they posted the addresses of three Web sites that they knew, or should have known, contained the copies.
Kaplan, Carl S.:
Universal Studios v. Movie-List
The website Movie-List, which features links to online, externally hosted movie trailers has been asked to completely refrain from linking to any of Universal Studio's servers containing the trailers as this would infringe copyright.
Cisneros, Oscar S.: Universal: Don't Link to Us. In:
More cases concerned with the issue of linking,
Ross, Alexandra: Copyright Law and the Internet:
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Steganography
Applied to electronic files, steganography refers to the process of hiding information in files that can not be easily detected by users. Steganography can be used by intellectual property owners in a variety of ways. One is to insert into the file a "digital watermark" which can be used to prove that an infringing file was the creation of the copyright holder and not the pirate. Other possibilities are to encode a unique serial number into each authorized copy or file, enabling the owner to trace infringing copies to a particular source, or to store
Agents
Agents are programs that can implement specified commands automatically. Copyright owners can use agents to search the public spaces of the Internet to find infringing copies. Although the technology is not yet very well developed full-text search engines allow similar uses.
Copyright Litigation
While not every infringement will be the subject of litigation, the threat of litigation helps keep large pirate operations in check. It helps copyright owners obtain relief for specific acts of infringement and publicly warns others of the dangers of infringement.
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Until the 19th century "early computers", probably better described as calculating machines, were basically mechanical devices and operated by hand. Early
Therefore
After working on the Difference Engine for ten years Babbage was inspired to build another machine, which he called Analytical Engine. Its invention was a major step towards the design of modern computers, as it was conceived the first general-purpose computer. Instrumental to the machine's design was his assistant, Augusta Ada King, Countess of Lovelace, the first female computer programmer.
The second major breakthrough in the design of computing machines in the 19th century may be attributed to the American inventor Herman Hollerith. He was concerned with finding a faster way to compute the U.S. census, which in 1880 had taken nearly seven years. Therefore Hollerith invented a method, which used cards to store data information which he fed into a machine that compiled the results automatically. The punch cards not only served as a storage method and helped reduce computational errors, but furthermore significantly increased speed.
Of extraordinary importance for the evolution of digital computers and
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Copyright is not only about protecting the rights of creators, but has also become a major branch of industry with significant contributions to the global economy. According to the
In an age where knowledge and information become more and more important and with the advancement of new technologies, transmission systems and distribution channels a further increase in the production of
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On the other hand are the data bunkers of the private sector, whose position is different. Although these are fast-growing engines of data collection with a much greater degree of dynamism, they may not have the same privileged position - although one has to differentiate among the general historical and social conditions into which a data bunker is embedded. For example, it can safely be assumed that the databases of a large credit card company or bank are more protected than the bureaucracies of small developing countries.
Private data bunkers include
- Banks
- Building societies
Credit bureaus
Credit card companies
Direct marketing companies
Insurance companies
Telecom service providers
Mail order stores
Online stores
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Personal data are collected, appropriated, processed and used for commercial purposes on a global scale. In order for such a global system to operate smoothly, there a server nodes at which the data streams converge. Among the foremost of these are the data bases of credit card companies, whose operation has long depended on global networking.
On top of credit card companies such as Visa, American Express, Master Card, and others. It would be erroneous to believe that the primary purpose of business of these companies is the provision of credit, and the facilitation of credit information for sale transactions. In fact, Information means much more than just credit information. In an advertisement of 1982, American Express described itself in these terms: ""Our product is information ...Information that charges airline tickets, hotel rooms, dining out, the newest fashions ...information that grows money funds buys and sells equities ...information that pays life insurance annuities ...information that schedules entertainment on cable television and electronically guards houses ...information that changes kroners into guilders and figures tax rates in Bermuda ..."
Information has become something like the gospel of the New Economy, a doctrine of salvation - the life blood of society, as Bill Gates expresses it. But behind information there are always data that need to be generated and collected. Because of the critical importance of data to the economy, their possession amounts to power and their loss can cause tremendous damage. The data industry therefore locates its data warehouses behind fortifications that bar physical or electronic access. Such structures are somewhat like a digital reconstruction of the medieval fortress
Large amounts of data are concentrated in fortress-like structures, in data bunkers. As the
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The more so-called security measures are taken the more control and the less freedom is granted. Whereas criminals are flexible in their computer work/digital existence, the average person cannot be. So it is her/him who gets punished with an increase of control.
Of course security can be in favor of the population as well - and this is the case if cryptography is legal so that everyone has access to it to protect his/her data. This one needs for e-commerce, secure payments and transmission of private data, mostly e-mails or access to websites where one needs a password. E-mails are nothing else than postcards, letters without envelopes. Without encryption they are easy to open, read and trace back, even without knowing the password. Rumors that Echelon works with a list of key-words, controlling any e-mail in the world and reacting to words of that list, led to actions like the Jam Eschelon Day, last time held on October 21st, 1999, to confuse the espionage system.
for more information on Jam Eschelon Day see:
But the respect for privacy stands for an essential values in democratic societies.
So, how can it be regarded a governmental risk?
At a conference:
"How many people here fear a greater risk
from government abuses of power
than from criminal activity?"
The majority raised their hands,
one participant shouted "What's the difference?"
(anonymous)
If governments really care for the people and want to fight against cybercriminality they should rather support the work on the latest technologies for encryption than to restrict their access. Or even better: they should not intervene at all - to make sure they do not build in any trapdoors. Though it is already too late for discussion like this one as the trapdoors are already part of most of the key-systems. Rumors about PGP and trapdoors do not help the confidence in cryptology.
for information about the risks of cryptography see:
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Within the EU's goal of establishing a European single market also
An overview of EU activities relating to intellectual property protection is available on the website of the European Commission (DG Internal Market):
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Generally copyright vests in the author of the work. Certain national laws provide for exceptions and, for example, regard the employer as the original owner of a copyright if the author was, when the work was created, an employee and employed for the purpose of creating that work. In the case of some types of creations, particularly audiovisual works, several national laws provide for different solutions to the question that should be the first holder of copyright in such works.
Many countries allow copyright to be assigned, which means that the owner of the copyright transfers it to another person or entity, which then becomes its holder. When the national law does not permit assignment it usually provides the possibility to license the work to someone else. Then the owner of the copyright remains the holder, but authorizes another person or entity to exercise all or some of his rights subject to possible limitations. Yet in any case the "
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The laws of almost all countries provide that protection is independent of any formalities. Copyright protection then starts as soon as the work is created.
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The glamour of the data body economy clouds economic practices which are much less than glamorous. Through the seizure of the data body, practices that in the real political arena were common in the feudal age and in the early industrial age are being reconstructed. The data body economy digitally reconstructs exploitative practices such as slavery and wage labour. However, culturally the data body is still a very new phenomenon: mostly, people think if it does not hurt, it cannot be my body. Exploitation of data bodies is painless and fast. Nevertheless, this can be expected to change once the awareness of the political nature of the data body becomes more widespread. As more and more people routinely move in digitised environments, it is to be expected that more critical questions will be asked and claims to autonomy, at present restricted to some artistic and civil society groups trying to get heard amidst the deafening noise of the commercial ICT propaganda, will be articulated on a more general level.
The more problematic aspect of this development may be something else: the practices of the data body economy, themselves a reconstruction of old techniques of seizure, have begun to re-colonise real political space. Simon Davis, Director of the London-based privacy campaigners
The constant adaptation process required from the modern individual has anonymised and structuralized punishment, which now appears in the guise of error messages and the privatisation of risk.
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Looking at the financial situation of think tanks, different funding patterns can be found. While financial contributions from foundations play an important role especially for conservative think tanks, also contributions from governments are made to certain institutions. Yet one of the most important funding sources are corporate donors and individual contributors. Although the extent to which - in most cases conservative - think tanks rely on corporate funding varies, from the US$ 158 million spent by the top 20 conservative think tanks, more than half of it was contributed by corporations or businessmen.
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The London-based Institute for Economic Affairs (AEI) from its beginning undertook an extensive publishing program to push forward its free-market ideology. Among its publications was one particular paper, which had a direct and immediate political impact. Published in 1960 "Resale Price Maintenance and Shoppers' Choice" by Basil Yamey argued for the abolition of Resale Price Maintenance, which by fixing prices in shops prevented large stores from necessarily under-cutting smaller shops. Yamey argued that a free market in shop prices would save the shoppers £180,000,000 a year, and prices would fall by five percent.
The publication of Yamey's paper was timed to coincide with a period of public debate on the subject to ensure maximum impact, and Yamey's suggestions were taken up by the incumbent Conservative Government. Although the Abolition of Resale Price Maintenance by
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Shortly after Microsoft was faced with federal antitrust charges, full-page newspaper ads supporting Microsoft's claim of innocence were run by the
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While most progressive think tanks acquire their funding through many different sources, for conservative think tanks financing by corporations prevails. Among the think tanks receiving a considerable amount of corporate money are the Cato Institute (U.S. conservative/libertarian), the Brookings Institution (U.S. centrist), the Heritage Foundation (U.S. conservative), the American Enterprise Institute (U.S. conservative) and the
Also, whereas the combined revenue base of such conservative multi-issue policy institutions as the Heritage Foundation, the American Enterprise Institute, Free Congress Research and Education Foundation, the Cato Institute, and
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In 1948 RAND was created at the urging of its original sponsor, the Air Force. After World War II, RAND focused especially on research in national security. Today RAND operates on a broad front, making its research available to public policy makers at all levels, private sector leaders in many industries, and the public at large. RANDs research and analysis aims to: provide practical guidance by making policy choices clear and by addressing barriers to policy implementation; develop solutions to complex problems by bringing researchers in all relevant academic specialities; dissemination of research findings. RAND has more than 500 employees.
Official Organizational Status: Independent Institute
Political Orientation: U.S. Center-right
Scope/Research Areas: RAND specializes in: Foreign relations and diplomacy, security and defense, economic issues, regional studies, science sand technology, labor and human resource development, social issues, education and health and welfare.
Funding Sources: 1998 Budget: US$ 113.5 million. National, local and state government (83 %) and private donations (17 %).
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Heritage was started to counter what it perceived as the liberal intellectual climate of Washington in the 1970s. The Heritage Foundations mission is to formulate and promote conservative public policies based on the principles of free enterprise, limited government, individual freedom, traditional American values, and a strong national defense. Heritage pursues this mission by performing research addressing key policy issues and effectively marketing these findings to its primary audiences: members of Congress, key congressional staff, policymakers in the executive branch, the nation's news media, and the academic and policy communities.
Official Organizational Status: Independent research and educational institute.
Political Orientation: U.S. Conservative
Scope/Research Areas: The Heritage Foundation's research areas include: economic issues, health and welfare, education, culture and religion, security and defense, foreign policy and international relations/institutions. Priority is given to issues, such as: Social Security reform, fundamental tax reform, livable cities, ballistic missile defense, education reform, domestic and economic policy and foreign and defense policy. Recent publications include: Feulner, Edwin J.: The March of Freedom. (1998). Holmes, K. et.al.: 1999 Index of Economic Freedom. (1998).
Funding Sources: 1998 Budget: US$ 26 million. Private donations (47 %), foundations (21 %), investment income (21 %), corporate donations (4 %). Among others US$ 1 million from the Korea Foundation - funded by South Korea's foreign ministry.
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the original, legible text
Japanese SONY KK, major Japanese manufacturer of consumer electronics products. Headquarters are in Tokyo. The company was incorporated in 1946 and spearheaded Japan's drive to become the world's dominant consumer electronics manufacturer in the late 20th century. The company was one of the first to recognize the potential of the consumer videotape market. In 1972 it formed an affiliate to market its Betamax colour videocassette system. In 1987-88 Sony purchased the CBS Records Group from CBS Inc., thus acquiring the world's largest record company. It followed that purchase with the purchase in 1989 of Columbia Pictures Entertainment Inc.
the study of breaking others' codes to transform a message back into a legible form without knowing the key from the beginning
an algorithm for bringing a legible message into an illegible form. There has to exist some sort of code book to encode/decode it.
the enciphered/encoded and primarily illegible text
to put a word or text into ciphers/codes
the word "cipher" comes from the Hebrew word "saphar", meaning "to number". Ciphers are mere substitutions. Each letter of the alphabet gets substituted; maybe by one letter or two or more.
an example:
PLAINTEXT a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z
CIPHERTEXT D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z A B C
The term mass production refers to the application of the principles of specialization,
Vladimir Putin is Russian President,
In this essay, Friedrich Kittler, one of the world's leading media theorists and media historicist, offers a concise and fascinating history of communication technologies in general terms from its beginnings up to now, provoking new insights by showing interesting interdependencies.
http://www.ctheory.com/ga1.14.html
This document, intended as a reliable electronic reference tool, provides a timeline for three types of developments and milestones: (1) advances in long distance person-to-person communication; (2) advances in storage, replication, cataloguing, finding, and retrieval of data; and (3) standardization of concepts and tools for long distance interaction.
The advancements may have a technical (hardware), conceptual (software), or an organizational aspect, or represent an important milestone in the history of a given invention, and are annotated as such in the timeline.
The period covered ranges from 30000 BC up to now.
http://www.ciolek.com/PAPERS/milestones.html
Those encompass the industries that create copyrighted works as their primary product. These industries include the motion picture industry (television, theatrical, and home video), the recording industry (records, tapes and CDs), the music publishing industry, the book, journal and newspaper publishing industry, and the computer software industry (including data processing, business applications and interactive entertainment software on all platforms), legitimate theater, advertising, and the radio, television and cable broadcasting industries.
A computer programming language is any of various languages for expressing a set of detailed instructions for a digital computer. Such a language consists of characters and rules for combining them into symbols and words.
CNN is a U.S.-TV-enterprise, probably the world's most famous one. Its name has become the symbol for the mass-media, but also the symbol of a power that can decide which news are important for the world and which are not worth talking about. Every message that is published on CNN goes around the world. The Gulf War has been the best example for this until now, when a CNN-reporter was the one person to do the countdown to a war. The moments when he stood on the roof of a hotel in Baghdad and green flashes surrounded him, went around the world.
GE is a major American corporation and one of the largest and most diversified corporations in the world. Its products include electrical and electronic equipment, plastics, aircraft engines, medical imaging equipment, and financial services. The company was incorporated in 1892, and in 1986 GE purchased the RCA Corporation including the RCA-owned television network, the National Broadcasting Company, Inc. In 1987, however, GE sold RCA's consumer electronics division to Thomson SA, a state-owned French firm, and purchased Thomson's medical technology division. In 1989 GE agreed to combine its European business interests in appliances, medical systems, electrical distribution, and power systems with the unrelated British corporation General Electric Company. Headquarters are in Fairfield, Conn., U.S.
MIRALab is a research laboratory attached to the University of Geneva. Its motto is "where research meets creativity". MIRAlab's objective is to model human functionalities, such as movement or facial expression, in a realistic way.
to put the ciphers/codes back into the plaintext