FurdLog

But, of what, exactly? Demand for patents falling as crisis bites: WIPO (pdf)

“The best inventions are patented internationally and not just nationally and so enterprises focus in time of economic difficulty on promoting their best inventions and are less inclined to patent across the whole of the output of their research and development,” Gurry said.

Oh, wait - they’re dead: Disney Faces Copyright Claims Over Marvel Superheroes (pdf)

And not much of a consensus: FCC Vote Expected to Advance New Â?Net Neutrality Rules (pdf)

The Federal Communications Commissions proposal of new rules to prevent companies such as AT&T, Verizon and Comcast from deliberately blocking or slowing certain Web traffic is expected to advance with three votes out of the five-member agency, according to sources.

Another constituency heard from in the run-up to the 111th Congress’ hearings on S.379/H.R.848 in the effort, once again, to BROADEN copyright protections: Film, TV music composers urge copyright law change (pdf)

Maureen Dowd finished up with Hilary Clinton; now she’s on to Googleⁱ, with this trenchant presentation that misses the point while disseminating all sorts of hogwash: Dinosaur at the Gate (pdf)

Google is in a battle royal over whether it has the right to profit so profligately from newspaper content at a time when journalism is in such jeopardy.

While I am confident that a breach of contract has been committed, it’s not clear yet that it’s even a crime. And “piracy?” Amazing how we manipulate language these days: Piracy Puts Film Online a Month Before Theater Opening (pdf)

Leading to the movie industry’s “Napster moment?” That’s the contention of this article: Digital Pirates Winning Battle With Studios (pdf)

A bizarre one: India’s Novel Use of Brain Scans in Courts Is Debated

Now, well before any consensus on the technology’s readiness, India has become the first country to convict someone of a crime relying on evidence from this controversial machine: a brain scanner that produces images of the human mind in action and is said to reveal signs that a suspect remembers details of the crime in question.

So, a new test of the “inducement” theory of secondary copyright infringement? After all, the fact that Wordscraper doesn’t make it impossible for users to mimic the classic Scrabble board may be enough — especially if there’s a provable “intent:” On Facebook, an 11-Letter Synonym for Scrabulous Turns Out to Be Wordscraper

Op-Ed Columnist - Paul Krugman - Bits, Bands and Books, Paying for Creativity in a Digital World (pdf)