Author: James Love
Microsoft: What can go wrong
MICROSOFT CORPORATION, FORM 10-Q For the Quarter Ended March 31, 2009
Item 1A. Risk Factors
Our operations and financial results are subject to various risks and uncertainties, including those described below, that could adversely affect our business, financial condition, results of operations, cash flows, and the trading price of our common stock.
KEI comments to WHO EWG
Tweets from Fordham/Cambridge event, Wed, April 15
These were my tweets yesterday from the Fordham/Cambridge IPR event:
# Fordham event in Cambridge, UK. Michael Keplinger from WIPO said treaty for reading disabled “would take years and not solve the problem”
# At Fordham/Cambridge IP event, Luc Devigne of DG Trade says ACTA membership will be “enlarged,” become standard for developing countries.
Novartis games the FDA Priority Review Voucher
On April 8, 2009, the FDA announced it had awarded Novartis a one-time priority review voucher (PRV) to use towards a future new drug application, for Coartem, a malaria drug. While the PRV was designed as an incentive to develop new drugs, Coartem was developed and put on the market outside the United States years before the PRV legislation was proposed. Continue Reading
Abraham Lloyd on the Kindle2/Authors Guild demo in NYC
I am in Montreal right now, and missed the Right Rights Coalition demonstration at the Authors Guild. Manon, Judit and Malini from our office are in NYC at the demonstration, and said it was incredibly moving. Several people at the protest sent reports by tweeter. The most complete was probably Abraham Lloyd. This was his account, with the Tweets organized from his first to last.
Some ideas for the Authors Guild
The Authors Guild is claiming text to speech functions in software programs and e-book readers violate their copyrights, and should be turned off unless they are paid more for the extra functionality. Obviously the geniuses among the Authors Guild are on to something. There are many similar areas of functionality to be exploited by the Authors Guild. Here are some thoughts on how the Guild might squeeze more money from readers, if they want to expand upon their new anti-consumer business strategy:
KEI Statement on Authors Guild attack on Kindle 2 synthetic speech functions
The Authors Guild is pressuring Amazon to modify the Kindle 2 so that the synthetic speech function can only be used with the express authorization of the owner of the copyright of a work. A coalition of organizations that represent or work with persons with reading disabilities is organizing a protest to persuade the Guild to change its position. KEI supports the protest, and makes this statement on the Kindle 2 issue:
The 1991 Improvement of Information Access Act
At the COMMUNIA workshop at the London School of Economics, I mentioned a legislative proposal from 1991 that was designed to open up and improve the management of government databases, promote open standards and interoperability, limit prices, and to give the public regular opportunities to engage agencies on policies. Here is a copy of the bill, from the 102nd Congress. In reading the bill, remember it was introduced in 1991, the same year the first web site was built at CERN, and three years before the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) was created.
The 41 proposed COMMUNIA recommendations for Accessing, Using, Reusing Public Sector Content and Data
In London’s, at the 5th COMMUNIA workshop held at the London School of Economics, speakers here are asked to suggest recommendations on the topic of “Accessing, Using, Reusing Public Sector Content and Data.” Here are the 41* that have been proposed in advance, including 9 from KEI.
5th COMMUNIA Workshop:
Accessing, Using, Reusing Public Sector Content and Data
26-27th March 2009, London School of Economics
Policy Recommendations