Tag Archives: TPP

June 3, 2016 · 23:09

The Wrong Question

Another day, another wave of news. To be more precise, more and more ‘news’ regarding the upcoming Brexit event. The vote that will impact Europe, the vote that will drive America nuts with fear and the question that is less and less about actual reasoning, especially as France is now moving towards a referendum too.

You see, the title Cameron says Brexit would be ‘economic self-harm’ might be correct, it might be to the point and it could certainly be a truth in itself. My issue is that my Conservatives are no longer thinking things through. Perhaps there are issues that they cannot address and as such the Brexit wave will grow and grow. You see, the Guardian might be all up and proud with the illusion of informing the public, but in that regard they are falling short.

So the title ‘Today’s briefing: what we learned from Cameron’s TV grilling‘ is equally disturbing, but does it give us actual information that the people in the UK can use to form an opinion which party (Brexit or Bremain) is the right one?

I feel that the answer to that question is ‘No!’, in addition the Scottish equation is pushing the matter even further out of balance. You see, the ‘grilling’ of David Cameron gave us the following quotes: “I think if we’ve learnt anything over the last six years, if you don’t have a strong economy you can’t have the health service that you want, you can’t have the schools that you need, you can’t have the public services you want, and this would be an act of economic self-harm of the United Kingdom doing it to ourselves” and the closing remark that is equally disturbing is “I’ll tell you what it would be like, we would be outside the room. The European Union doesn’t stop existing just because we’ve left.”

The latter one is no longer a given. Now that Frexit is gaining traction, Brexit becomes almost a given requirement. I do not think that this is a fair path, but when we see that Brexit is avoided and Frexit becomes a reality, the tables will turn on the UK in the nastiest of ways, as France will drive Italy out of the EU as well. Unless there is a clear call to action for the players in the UK, the start of non-Brexit, could push a Yea-Frexit voice, for the mere reason that France has pushed into a corner and Italy could act after that walking away from it all. If any of these nations Germany, Italy, France or the UK walks away, the remaining three will fall out of synch with the abilities to continue. For the UK Frexit would be a disaster as it would have to arrange special deals regarding the Euro tunnel, whatever gets shipped through there would have a nasty surcharge, in that regard, the UK would have to increase its bonds with the Netherlands a lot more tightly than it currently is to prevent export items to hit top prices plus.

Even if all rules remain open in an EU without France (which would be likely), a Le Pen government in Frexit mode would have large impacts on shipping anywhere via France, that part is almost a given and time is still money too. You see all this link to the Wrong Question, partially we see this when we look at ‘UK should stop ‘sitting back’ in EU, says Jeroen Dijsselbloem‘, you see, Jeroen Dijsselbloem is one party that has been sitting back for too long in a much larger way. The parties might hide behind the TTIP as the reason, but that joke should have been scrapped long ago. Together with the TPP, the US is becoming a business usurper. They might call it ‘legal’, but it is still the US now trying to push what they laughingly regard as ‘rights’ into a framework on unaccountability, beyond what we already regard as acceptable. That is the mere consequence of a former superpower that is as I see it now bankrupt. The Financial Times (at http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/ed4cfe7e-16a4-11e6-b197-a4af20d5575e.html#axzz4AVKPmPMk) goes one step further. They state “TTIP also puts private profit above public interest, penalising polities that change policy preferences to the disadvantage of business. Indemnifying business against political risk through off-the-record investor-state dispute settlement arbitration is especially worrying. Secret negotiations and special court processes — more Guantánamo than Gray’s Inn — invite the expectation of abuse“, which is pretty much what the US has achieved with the Trans Pacific Partnership. A political system that is now all about the exploitation of those they should be protecting, the people, especially the non-wealthy ones in the US!

So here we are not really admiring the words of Jeroen Dijsselbloem, whilst we get the quote “He was speaking on the same day that the head of the European Central Bank, Mario Draghi, warned that Brexit posed “a downside risk” to the global economy“, the one person who is actually one of the larger problems in the entire Brexit situation. You see, the question that needed to be asked clearly and needed to be addressed is: ‘How can the EU be allowed to continue, whilst the political players are spending the funds of the next three generations that follow us?‘ That is the real question. Trillions are being spend without a clear plan, without clear sense making reason absent from the equation.

That is scaring the people towards Brexit and the two people addressing it are not outspoken on any of it. In here we now introduce the two silent players, Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne and the Governor of the Bank of England Mark Carney. The unresolved issues of massive governmental overspending, is one of the reasons why being part of the EU will no longer matter, would be undesirable and would be a good thing to get rid of.

We can agree that Jeroen Dijsselbloem should get credit for “Dijsselbloem, a fiscal hawk, who has led the Euro group since 2013, sharply criticised the European commission for not championing the EU’s fiscal rules“, yet his office has not been championing changes in taxation law (or not loudly enough). That part is at the heart of it all, because overspending and failing laws of taxation makes the EU a broke and impoverished individual.

You see, part of the stupidity (as I see it) comes from “Juncker, sensitive to elections in Spain later this month and in France next year, has said fiscal rules should not be applied blindly“, yes they should! You see, whomever has lost the ability to properly budget should be removed from the game. This issue with keeping Francois Hollande in ‘his’ presidential seat is part of this mess. He is not hungry for winning, he is happy to just get by and whilst he fills his pockets (in legal ways of course), the French situation will not ever improve, which is why he is truly scare of Marine Le Pen and the rest is scared because Marine is willing to let it all collapse so she can build a real France for the French and that is scaring a lot of people, especially in the large financial sectors that run through Natixis, the IMF and Wall Street, two of them equally scared of what Brexit will bring. Yet in all this, just like with Greece, certain people are all about Status Quo and that has now angered the UK people, they have had enough and with the two British coin Big Wigs that issues are not addressed, giving additional fears to the referendum voters. All being pushed emotionally, whilst rational would have resolved it (unless controlling EU spending is not an option). We know that Mark Carney is an excellent orator, he has the ability to economically talk the crowd into getting 49 runs in one over, smashing the record of Steve Dublin, for a Canadian that would be a massive achievement and Mark better pull this off fast, because the Brexit group is still growing and when they grow a critical mass, there will be no longer an option to convert them to a reasonable solution (whether Brexit or Bremain) that would truly be about the solution that is best for the UK and the British people. That option will go out of the window.

So this is where we find ourselves. We are all staring at the Wrong Question and the actual question cannot be answered and the evidence of hardware is removed from our vision, whilst the presented software can no longer be seen as reliable. You see, the people are seeing more and more how the American agreements called the TTIP and the TPP are about American solutions to not be an acceptable option any longer. This plays out nicely for China and perhaps Russia, but overall the Americans with their arrogance and non-accountability did this to themselves, so how can our lives become acceptable and liveable? That remains an issue, yet for the UK, not to be part of many of these players might not be the special coat they are hoping we would buy.

So here we are looking at the Wrong Question and no decent answer in sight, that is the part not dealt with and it seems that this issue will not be dealt with any day soon. The mere consequence of a lame Duck in Washington and a ‘fearless’ group lacking vision in Europe, united in (again as I Personally see it) personal gain against all odds. This is exactly why UKIP remains in ascendance. The one part that requires regulation isn’t getting any, because unless the EU’s debt grows to the level where Japan and USA are, those two are in a tough spot at the end of the way to dusty death with no alternatives. In all this the final element is seen as Crete rescued hundreds of refugees coming to Greece via Libya only an hour ago. That is the first of several escalations that Europe will have to deal with (at http://www.news.com.au/world/breaking-news/greece-rescues-hundreds-off-crete/news-story/987b32889f6327496a179d4ec95f2aa8), the issue here is not just that these Syrians came from Libya, the question becomes how they got to Libya in the first place. We know that Libya had Syrian refugees as early as 2014, but are those the ones crossing? More important, how can we verify that they were actually Syrians? With Crete entering the high tourist season, will these refugees have an impact on tourism? If so, that would be extremely unfortunate for Crete who is still recovering from years of lessened tourism, not as bad as some other places, but still in a recovering situation, will the almost 30% Dutch downturn turn even worse with the hundreds of refugees arriving on Crete?

There is no way to tell, but these new growing groups of arrivals gives additional ‘worry’ to those in favour of Brexit and their numbers are still growing, the implied pressure that the UK will feel over the next 60 days as people are trying to get into the UK will only grow fears, which drives an implied drive towards Brexit. Here I am cautiously stating ‘implied’, because we have no way of telling how many want to be on route past Greece towards Germany, the Netherlands and the UK. Add to this the fact that the EU remains active in irresponsible spending, debts that the next 4 generations need to work off, and that part is another driving force for Brexit.

There is now too much noise all over the papers, too many facts are intertwined and nobody trusts any of the players involved on either side of the Brexit/Bremain equation. From my side, as stated before Mark Carney did a good job, a really good job to bring clarity to the House of Lords and as such to the British population, it swayed me back to a neutral stance away from a definite Brexit. Now Mark Carney (as well as George Osborne) need to focus on the question too many people are not asking, whilst everyone is staring at the wrong Question. ‘How do we stop the irresponsible spending by Mario Draghi et al?‘

That part is gaining momentum when we consider the Irish Times (at http://www.irishtimes.com/business/euro-zone-recovery-may-slow-down-says-mario-draghi-1.2670722), the issue ‘Euro zone recovery may slow down, says Mario Draghi‘ comes AFTER he has spent a sizeable slice of the planned 1.74 trillion euros. Now we see how the recovery is slowing down? So when we get the quote “Mr Draghi said his central bank was “willing, able and ready” to act again, should those measures leave inflation short of the target“, the people should worry as Mario Draghi has spent well in excess of the total GDP of most EU nations. This gives the clear danger that the debt will stay in place for another generation. So until someone muzzles that man and crazy glues his EU wallet shut, explain to me how anyone wants to remain in an EU where too many politicians are spending the coins of other people, with no clear repayment in sight? That whilst several larger nations (like France) is growing the national debt in excess of the allowed 3% and no one is getting fined, because no one has any of these levels of cash left.

So as we might remember Shakespeare’s quote, we should consider the newly revised edition: ‘this was the noblest Roman of them all, yet it no longer matters as they have become extinct!‘

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May 22, 2016 · 20:46

Tuesday Evening Quarterback

Well, good afternoon to today’s match, playing on infield, with a home advantage is Australia’s very own Honourable BS, leader of the Labor party. In the outfield is his ego.

Let the game begin! So, when you read the article ‘Labor promises to keep medication cheaper at cost of $3.6bn over 10 years’ (at http://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2016/may/22/election-2016-labor-promises-medication-cheaper-cost-over-10-years), we see an emotionally charged article that is about…. Yes, what is it about?

The by-line reads: “Bill Shorten pledges to axe 2014 budget cut to pharmaceutical benefits scheme, which has been booked as saving $1.3bn but is blocked by the Senate“, so we seem to get all huffy and puffy regarding pharmaceutical schemes and we seem to be all about stopping big Business, but the Senate will not hear about it. Yet, is that actually true?

You see, the quote “Patients will pay less for taxpayer-subsidised medication if federal Labor wins the election, but the move will cost $3.6bn over a decade” gives us some of the goods, it boils down to the next government spending another 3.6 billion. You see the Government is in debt, in debt for almost 750 billion and that move will add to that debt. We got into that debt as Labor decided to all these nice and seemingly mighty things and then left a massive invoice with the liberals. Perhaps we should take a look at the spin doctoring Bill Shorten did in February 2014 (at http://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-02-10/shorten-says-car-manufacturing-shutdown-was-not-inevitable/5250834). Or consider in equal measure the fact that we see Julia Gillard smiling in a car in the Adelaide plant, whilst the people read on how GM Holden received well over 2 billion in subsidies. The response by GM Holden executive Matt Hobbs is “the subsidies underwrite tens of billions of dollars in local investment“, this sounds interesting as the timeline is off. The Hobbs statement came in April 2013 (at http://www.abc.net.au/news/2013-04-02/holden-reveals-billions-in-subsidies/4604558), now consider the January 2015 news (at http://www.news.com.au/technology/innovation/motoring/holden-shutdown-general-motors-international-boss-stefan-jacoby-says-australia-is-better-without-car-manufacturing/news-story/af4de2d0090baa6c2a0ce24aa0e28729), 20 months later. So how was 2 billion pushed back into Australia? It gets even worse when we consider Toyota. You see, the Honourable BS is forgetting the timeline. Billions in subsidies under labor and miraculously 3 weeks after the elections the parties pull out. I remember watching Bill Shorten, boasting and stating whilst there was a really silent Kim Carr in the background. If we were to investigate the total amount of subsidies here and how much came back, will that equation be a positive one for the Australian people? Me thinks not!

This now equates to the current game being played. You see, even though the guilt of all issues should be shared (between Liberals and Labor, as both parties were around with them subsidies), the issue is that whilst Labor was in ‘attendance’ of government, they did nothing, absolutely nothing to secure cheaper medication. The first step was to stop the TPP, that paper (a document to some, a farce to others) is giving too much power to pharmaceuticals and is a first stopper for the evolution and continuation of generic medication. That part is not in view. At least that small island South East of here (New Zealand) had several people pushing back asking the hard questions. In that regard team Gillard-Rudd did too little and they did not think beyond their governing time here in parliament. If Bill Shorten really wanted cheaper medication the TPP would not be here and we would be trying to hold serious talks with India and UK to unite in a healthcare solution with the aim to provide for affordable medication.

That has not been the case and Bill Shorten knows this, making the article even more of a farce than it already was. This all aligns when we see the article (at http://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2016/may/19/labor-to-end-freeze-on-medicare-rebates-with-122bn-funding-pledge) and we consider the quote “It is Labor’s biggest announcement of the election so far, and will cost $2.4bn over the next four years, and $12.2bn over the decade“, you see, I am siding with the medical side as much as possible. I believe that doctors, especially junior doctors have a raw deal, but making promises with funds you do not have is why we got into the mess we are in in the first place. It is essential for voters to realise that Labor does not have these funds and when it blows back we will be in even deeper waters. So as we realise that the Shorten-sighted approach to governing is giving away 6 billion (over 10 years) on these two elements alone, the clear dangers are that labor is soon to make the Australian people the bitch of the banks, as they want the interest owed. This is why Labor is too dangerous to be allowed to govern.

You see, when we look at the budgets and balances, Labor has no solution at all, they will blow the total debt, possibly even surpassing a trillion dollars. Now to get back to the other side in all this and that is seen when we look at the Medical Journal of Australia (at https://www.mja.com.au/journal/2015/202/6/costs-australian-taxpayers-pharmaceutical-monopolies-and-proposals-extend-them), an article from 2015. ‘Costs to Australian taxpayers of pharmaceutical monopolies and proposals to extend them in the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement‘,

The following summary points matter:

– Intellectual property (IP) protections proposed by the United States for the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement (TPPA) have sparked widespread alarm about the potential negative impact on access to affordable medicines.
– Three of the greatest concerns for Australia in the recent draft include provisions that would further entrench secondary patenting and evergreening.
– Pharmaceutical monopoly protections already cost Australian taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars each year (2013).
– Provisions still being considered for the TPPA would further entrench and extend costly monopolies, with serious implications for the budget bottom line and the sustainability of the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme.

So not only were these elements known for some time, previous labor did almost nothing to stop this from becoming a reality (the liberals are in this, as I see it, equally guilty).

So Bill Shorten is even worse than a Monday morning quarterback. After the match is done, after the results are in, he is trying to talk you into a new match, leaving you with more debt and an even smaller piece of life to work with, all whilst being pushed into servitude to those holding the Australian debt markers.

The part that I do not get is that Bill should know better, when we get another politician hiding behind forecasters stating that next year will be better, then those politicians need to be held criminally liable if that upturn does not happen. It is time for politicians to be held accountable to the massive overspending as I see it. I reckon it is the only option left to prevent us to leave the next three generations with debts that we were unable to pay off, especially when they hide behind healthcare claims that were never realistic to begin with.

That’s just my view on the situation!

Before you decide to vote labor, ask your MP how Labor expects to pay for the total of 12 billion in changes over the next 10 years, which makes it 1.2 billion a year. Consider that total taxation collected in 2015 was $445B, you think that this would be enough, but now also consider that the total debt is 168% of the collected taxation, other services will still need to be paid, so if the debt goes down by $20B (which would be an amazing achievement), it will still take a little over 20 years to pay for our debt. Now consider, should labor be squandering this level of tax money, knowing that it will only make our lives harder down the track?

I am merely asking, because in my humble opinion, when a clear answer is not given, when the answer becomes, ‘It is really complex, even for me, but we have a solution ready!‘; at that time, do not walk away from that politician, you should run away! By the way, as a Liberal, running away from the coalition when they cannot answer these questions is equally essential. We need to focus on making Australia great. Also realise that neither side have successfully made any strong improvements regarding taxation loopholes. So, it might be very valid to read that ‘Politicians ‘double-dipping’ on property claims aren’t breaking rules – Cormann‘, yet in that regard, when tax loopholes are not set and at the same time, these politicians are spending money on ‘solutions’ that will not work and in even greater measure will land Australia in deeper debt down the line, those politicians are the ones you need to take distance from and fast, so as I personally see this, Bill Shorten should have known better!

 

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April 27, 2016 · 18:19

Lessening the consumer?

After yesterday’s Ignoranus Totalicus it seemed to take another look at this level of ‘brilliance’ (read: active attempt to use sarcasm). And it did not take much time to find it. You see, whenever greed is at the foundations of things, less bright decisions will be made. And that issue was already the case at several places in that industry. Now, it is off course important to make distinction here. The makers do not seem to have this need, other than the righteous desire for the funds of their product. Yet, there is more than one side to the issue at play (isn’t there always?) One of the issues is facilitation. Here we see, as I see it, the consumer betrayal Sony is now starting to give us, which is only now starting to take shape. I initially wrote about this in ‘Pricing a Sony game!‘ in November 2013 (at https://lawlordtobe.com/2013/11/20/pricing-a-sony-game/) this issue was raised, but in another shape. You see Don Mattrick made this speech on how the Xbox One would be mandatory. It drove the public on mass away from that system into the hands of the PlayStation 4. Now we see that Sony is slowly breaking that promise. In the first case (Fallout 4) there was a possible issue as Microsoft has never made the online ‘need’ a secret, which is why people have been flocking towards Sony so strong. Now we see quite a different scene and it is soon to get worse. For me it is the issue of a different matter, it is the part that now stops me from playing fallout 4. You see, a small accident broke my router, so when I initially started the game, whilst in the end of Automatron it told me that the DLC could not be found. Only after I got back online would the game load correctly with DLC and all. Now we get the second part, the fantastic achievement Ratchet & Clank, which came with a weapon called the bouncer (DLC code) was suddenly gone when playing offline. When I got back online, it was still gone and I had to purchase it again and got it at level 1 (purchasing it offline was not an option.

I personally do not believe it is a bug, or an oversight. It is merely another way to ‘force’ people to work online. You see, I have had a few issues with article 7 of the Sony service agreement in those days. The fact that games could no longer be pre-owned, which was my only issue. Even as I personally believe that people should be able to exchange their old games with other ones (just like books, records and movies). I do not have that sentiment when we look at DLC’s. They are separate additions to the game and as such often sold for a mere few dollars. So as the game goes, so do the DLC’s. I have no issues with that. Yet, the need to be online so that the DLC works is another matter. That has never been a requirement in previous systems. I see this move a mere attempt to keep a flair of innocence whilst now Sony and Microsoft are using other ways to force people to be online. They were already, in a feigned way, trying to keep people online by denying gamers their achievements, now the DLC’s seem to be become part of the additional pressure to keep people online. Online data is to be regarded as the profiling data mine of the future, and both Microsoft and Sony want their share of that coffer. So far the only two are Bethesda with their new DLC’s on Sony PS4. On the Xbox One Bethesda had already changed their way as it would not proceed the game without online logging in from the moment Windows 10 became part of the Xbox One, now this need has been added to the PS4. In addition, Ratchet and Clank has added them to the downloaded weapon (I have only one). It seems that the online push is going through. The rights of gamers now starting to be diminished, forced online against their choice (those who prefer to play offline), this issue had been in play for a while and the press had been very interested in ignoring this issue in the past, especially as the changes given came two weeks before the release of the PS4, like any decent prostitute, the press at large would hold off as much as possible for the need of advertisement and circulation. I wonder how the press feels after 3 years, now that it is less about advertisement?

It is hard to state how I feel about this. I am online often enough, but when you cannot continue a game because of a broken router and two weeks away from a pay check tends to make most gamers a little irritated. That is the part most of us know. The other group of gamers, the ones Americans (and Japanese) tend to ignore are the rural gamers, those with less online options, no great connections and those relying on wireless broadband, depending on 5 pounds per gigabyte, those gamers are soon to be left in the cold. Short-sightedness of a small group of people who look at the 90% of their flock and casually forget about the potential 3 million people forced to higher expenses. This is not a local group, there are several groups all over the Commonwealth, all requiring some connectivity to keep on gaming.

A nasty dilemma for those faced with it, a minor inconvenience for those greedy for data revenue. It is irritating how easy those deciding voices seem to ignore the need of the few. Sony has now illustrated itself to be no longer about being ‘for the players’, they are now the players who will exploit at the expense of the gamers, a simple path that was delayed for a mere three years. Now, it is back on track. Yet the interesting part is not just the choice Sony made, it is equally interesting that Japan today reported (at http://www.japantoday.com/category/politics/view/clinton-pivots-from-obamas-asia-policy-with-tpp-opposition). Here we see thee quote “The TPP has been the main economic plank of President Barack Obama’s seven-year effort to intensify engagement with a fast-growing region and counter China’s rising clout with nations that count it as their principal trading partner“, which seems to prove that being the lame quack quack in the White House comes at a price, one that could now cost him a 7 year plan as it falls away completely. The fact that both sides of the American Isle regard the TPP as a disaster can’t be a good thing, apart from the fact that people all over the world had issues with it. There is more to the TPP, partially it does affect the digital world as well. The digital world (read: gaming as a mere fraction here), would be under massive duress due to the TPP, that is still an issue, but it seems to me that it now realises that the bulk of gaming might no longer be coming from the US. The shift of indie gamers is growing strong and even though this is extremely likely not the cause of action by Hillary Clinton (read: most likely financial and pharmaceutical industries), we might see a flitter of hope for gamers as they could profit from the events playing at present and as such, it is not entirely impossible that Microsoft and Sony will have to do a 180 on their current path of forced connectivity.

The last part is a mere speculation on my side, but not a farfetched one. I reckon that the DRM part of the TPP gave path to the ideas Microsoft had initially. The parts we hear now is not a given, one article is not a guarantee for any about face. Yet, the fact that both sides in the US were never happy with the TPP is an initial good sign. If we consider the DRM, than there are sides. Yes, I agree with the quote “deprive the public domain of decades of creative works“, yet in that same part I personally feel that when Bethesda makes digital content, it has every right to sell this material. I would never oppose this, yet if this requires mandatory online presence than the systems are either massively flawed (which is not likely the issue), or just a new path for Sony to walk and Microsoft will be walking the same path.

In the end, consider what you want, take the path you want, just consider that corporations will find a way to the profit they consider they are entitled to, games are just one medium. Which is exactly what seems to be happening in the world of Facebook at present. You see, Facebook doesn’t need to rely on connectivity, when you are on Facebook, you are online. Facebook shows us the next iteration of limited special deals, or perhaps we need to call it ‘intentional discrimination’.

You see, when we see certain special offers and we get the text: “Couldn’t Complete Purchase: We didn’t receive all the information we needed from this app to complete your purchase. You haven’t been charged for this purchase, so please try again. If you keep seeing this error, contact the app developer”, we are given the impression that it was a mere error. Yet, the truth is a lot harsher than you imagine. You see, when the ‘normal’ purchase works without issues, it is no longer about a mere error. The special deal is about collecting information. A special deal that gives you a trinket for the mere option of collecting identity and credit card details. The issue is that the special deal does not give clear indication of this, it does not state “in exchange for your credit card details we will give you an extra trinket”, so why does the offer not show this? Perhaps I am just assuming that and it shows that my assumption is wrong. That would be fair enough, we are all wrong at times, which is why I await initial feedback from Facebook and when that response comes, I will update this story.

 

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October 14, 2015 · 00:20

A lesson learned late

We all have this, we stump our heads into a wall, some in ignorance, some through stubbornness, ideologically and the last group through determination. I am one of these four. As I bring the bad news first, I need to talk about myself. I got an extension on a test which might not be a massive one in points, but I am in a state where every point counts! Hoping to save up to 15 points on a test 44 pages long. My little big horn is a ‘Memorandum of Detailed Opinion‘. I still have 30 hours of work actual to go and I had to restart as I was turning my ‘Other Applicable Revocation Issues’ into a mesh of Titanic distraught and the deep dark feeling when you are at the top of a truly high building (like the Hancock building) and you see the street 100 flights down, that one step through the glass looks suddenly so appealing, such dread! I feel a little better, especially as I started fresh again, things are slowly adding up, connections are now coming to life. the smallest issue I had initially was a part in section 40 of the Patents Act 1990 ‘disclose the best method known to the applicant of performing the invention‘, this and a personal believe that my professor was intertwining ‘best method’ with the mathematical approach to describing Cantonese had an impact too. Yet those feelings were all between my own ears. You see, this is the first subject ever in history, where I got confronted with the limitation of my thinking. This has never happened before! We all face the music that we do not get something, but in most cases someone explains, someone aides or you find a supporting document that helps you. We all have that. No, I mean that feeling you get when your life depends on the next conversation and the one part you were not told is that everyone speaks Aramaic, that level of non-comprehension!

Yet, I also feel stronger today, because the light suddenly came on and I am starting to put it together. I took longer than I expected and if I had not been confronted with bad news last week that stress would not have stopped me from completing my assignment. Getting told you need to find another apartment tends to do that to a person whilst his exam just started. So as I finished my notes for tonight, prepping to get loads done tomorrow, I had to write this. You see, this intersects with something I read yesterday on my mobile, I believe.

That part was about Xbox boss Phil Spencer. Microsoft has always been about ideology and ignorance, so to call this part ideological ignorance is not too big a leap. Spencer stated that he was not interested in beating Sony, he was interested in gaining customers, as many as possible. In my view, his predecessors ‘messed’ it all up. I reckon not intentionally. In my view Microsoft was convinced that the TPP would have been in effect now and the steps initially made towards the XB1 would have been massively exploitative, with the law allowing them to destroy certain markets (the preowned game market for one). This all took a step back towards a streaming enterprise that did not quite make it off the floor. The 2013 promise of a 300,000 servers for gamers in one cloud. The quote is in light of the backwards compatibility claim a little hilarious: “Microsoft’s Don Mattrick stated “If you’re backwards compatible, you’re really backwards”” (at https://lawlordtobe.com/2013/05/24/spin-dryers-by-microsoft/). Even then I claimed how stupid the 500 GB thought was. Sony made the same mistake, but with the Sony version a person can update when he/she is ready, the XB1 does not allow for that. In that same article I chewed on some of the presented facts: “Their on-line system is now getting grown from the initial 15,000 servers now that Xbox 360 uses, to 300,000 servers from the moment the next Xbox is launched. It is a 2,000% growth in data collection and over 200,000% storage capacity. If foundations of business are set to return-on-investment, then ask yourself why a gaming system requires that level of growth“, a question that was never answered, but with the TPP, the streaming and the data requirements, it was about the gamer, it was how he/she could best be exploited. That was the view that my mind saw and so far I have been proven correct in almost every way. The next quote supports all this “In all honesty Microsoft Marketing did state that there will be pre-owned possibilities, yet they have not officially stated how this EXACTLY will play out, so we await clarity by Microsoft“, consider that part, if the TPP would have been in effect that part would have costed gamers dearly, so in all this, we can speculate that Don Mattrick was no more than the bearer of bad news and his career took a massive tumble. Now we get Phil Spencer and how this is about gamers. A 2 year stretch that now demands a 145 degree course adjustment. The weird thing is that if the decision makers realised their audience in the era of Xbox and Xbox 360, they should have known what gamers wanted, and adjusting that with their own view of exploitation is a misplaced view to say the least.

So as I see myself ignorant and determined, I also see Microsoft as ideologically ignorant. Ideological in their pursuit of maximising profit any way they can and ignorant to consider that gamers would take this lying down. Microsoft now set at less than 40% of what Sony has, losing the market share the 360 had grown, how stupid is that? The big issue is still that Mettrick and Spencer leave the feeling of being no more than puppets on a string, jumping to the needs of the decision makers behind the screens of Microsoft. Their strings to be cut at a moment’s notice. It is the second failing compared to Sony. Yet, in all this I must admit that Sony is likely to work in similar ways, but in a much better setting as their focus has been the gamer for 4 iterations of their console. That does account for something.

I feel that I learned my lesson late, hopefully not too late and the next two weeks will be about work 24%, study 48% and the rest is about trying to get sleep, food and an apartment. I feel strengthened as my eyes open towards the issues I could not solve for almost 10 days. I also feel better as Microsoft seems oblivious towards the gain they lost whilst they should have known better, in that respect Gamespot (who was source to most of the Microsoft information) should also have known better and as they seem to hide behind the PS4 vs XB1 console war, they have done too little regarding the investigation on the business decisions that did hurt a contending console and forced it towards a gloomier place. We can all admit that backwards compatibility will gain them momentum, yet in the end it will be about good games and yes, Microsoft has done a decent job, but with the lost field, decent will not hack it.

So I end this article with a personal message to Phil Spencer. Phil, I am not blaming you (which would be unfair), I am not having a go at you (which would be too easy), yet I will do your job for you this one instance. There is a game coming, it is nowhere near ready at present, but it is getting there. It is for PC and it has the option of becoming every bit as addictive as Minecraft currently is. So another masterpiece by an indie developer! The game is called Heat Signature as it shows massive promise. This game could propel the XB1 even further. The quirkiness and the connected options for multiplayer could be next thing people desire. The single player part is showing real promise. So instead of waiting and having to shell out another 2 billion for a game Microsoft didn’t create, so how about getting in front of a repetitive timeline for a change?

Heat Signature (heatsig.com) is able to be uniquely placed next to Elite Dangerous, Eve Online, Star Citizen and No Mans Sky. It can exist next to all of them and will be as entertaining to all those who play the other mentioned titles. I suggest that you keep your eye on @HeatSig (Twitter address) and feel free not heeding my word (I have only been wrong 4 times in the last 30 years when it comes to gaming), so I am due another failure. Yet the stats go hugely my way and as such I predict that Heat Signature, a Tom Francis production which was, as I remember it a Johnny Chiodini discovery evolve into a true contender for being the next big thing (as an indie developer title).

In all this, am I too ideological when it comes to gaming? That is a fair question and I must ask this from myself if I want to remain connected to a field I have been involved in since 1983. I believe so and games like Fallout 4 show my view to be a good one. In equal part Elite Dangerous shows that true passion for a game can last decades (something Blizzard also proved with the Diablo series) and in all this Ubisoft squandered it and Microsoft rejected their view only to get bitten on their sitting area really hard. The future belongs to the believers, because faith has always been the most pure and natural driving force. It got me my law degree it got me to the final stage of my MIP and it can get anyone to their place of achievement. Greed is never an achievement! Will Microsoft learn from their mistakes? That remains dubious because the puppeteers behind the screens remain an unknown. I do believe that illuminating them could shed light on the problem and truly propel the world of gamers forward as the onslaught of counterproductive acts end up getting terminated with extreme prejudice. EA has 7 months left to learn their lesson and not fall into the traps with Mass Effect Andromeda, traps that Ubisoft seems to be unable to avoid. Still, if they are unable to do that, John Oliver will be able to have a little fun here too.

 

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October 5, 2015 · 11:25

How to cure economic sickness

The Guardian is bringing me grim news today. As a British conservative and as an Australian Liberal the news presented does not look good, it is slightly beyond critical. It also reminds me of a small gag I heard in the Netherlands 3 decades ago. The one-liner was: “Due to a death, this cemetery will remain closed for the next few days” (source Fons Jansen), yes it seems like a laughing matter, but the Grimness behind it is less amusing and more dread based than we realise. The news ‘Ministers ‘are hiding details of £2bn NHS cash crisis’‘ (at http://www.theguardian.com/society/2015/oct/03/ministers-hiding-details-nhs-cash-crisis) is at the centre of all this. As a conservative my response (with all due respect) to Prime Minister David Cameron is ‘Sir, are you barking mad?‘ I will direct this at the Prime Minister because he is ‘our’ leader, the man in charge. If there is even the slightest hint that he was not aware than a massive reshuffle will be needed within the next 48 hours.

You see, I have forever opposed hiding bad news. Managing bad news will always bite the parties involved in the end. When the implied deficit amounts to 0.5% of all collected taxations in 2014, we have a massive problem which must be addressed and it needs to be addressed sooner rather than later. You see, no matter how trivial this 0.5% might seem. The coffers are down well over a trillion pounds, which requires 100% of all collected taxations for three years to address. Now that act is not realistic, but that show you the massive damage the United Kingdom faces. Economies are slowing down, partially due to Asia, partially due to acts that America is about to do and as such the American economy will soon take another tumble. As I see it, Thanksgiving and Christmas might hide the events, but the end of January through March, especially when the US Department of Defence will make 40,000 people redundant, that economy will shift over the following 4 months. In all this, the UK can no longer afford to hide bad news of this nature. The Commonwealth in general needs to realise that as the US seems to enable greed based corporations, we as members of the Commonwealth will have to stick together. This is no longer about national pride and ego. Our collective politicians are more likely to walk away with opportunities that will guarantee the well-being of their families for more than two generations, whilst in all this the people will end up getting saddled with a debt that will stop them from moving forward in any decent future for decades to come. None of us agreed to such imbalance.

The quote “Heidi Alexander, the shadow health secretary, said on Saturday: “This appears to be a cynical attempt to suppress bad news ahead of the Tory party conference. It makes a mockery of Tory claims to be committed to transparency in the NHS, and leaves Jeremy Hunt with very serious questions to answer. These figures must now be published in full as a matter of urgency”” gives weight to this. Part of me is also very cautious on her statement, let’s not forget that it was Labour that squandered 11 billion from the NHS and they have not been forthcoming at all, so let’s realise that this still remains an issue of the Pot calling the Kettle black.

The next part is set over two quotes. The first is “Professor Chris Ham, chief executive of the King’s Fund think tank, recently said that the NHS’s fast-ballooning deficit was leading to “panic” at the health department and “denial” at the Treasury. The service’s overspend was so large that it needed an emergency injection of £1bn in the comprehensive spending review to keep functioning, added Ham“, the second quote is “Without extra funding, he argued, the NHS would end up unable to cope, “most likely during the winter when many hospitals run out of money … With NHS hospitals unable to go bankrupt…, the Treasury will be forced to intervene or accept a rapid decline in performance.”“. The issue is in more than one part. In the first we must question how the NHS ended up short by 2 billion. We have heard all the wild accusations in the papers, but what news there has any reliability? No matter how little of it is true, Jeremy Hunt has an official problem, because if he has kept facts away from the public than he has no right being in his position, if he is falling on his sword for the party, we have an even larger issue. Because the conservative members feel that they should be told the facts, good or bad. We cannot fix when things remain hidden. We within the Commonwealth will become puppets to those operating the machines. It is a fake freedom which does do no one any good.

Yet the NHS has issues on several levels. One level was discussed in my blog article called ‘In Greed we trust‘ (at https://lawlordtobe.com/2015/09/22/in-greed-we-trust/). Here we looked at Turing Pharmaceuticals AG and the little caper they pulled on Daraprim. They weren’t the only ones. The Financial Post (at http://business.financialpost.com/investing/global-investor/valeant-pharmaceuticals-international-inc-shares-plummet-as-525-hike-in-drug-price-draws-fire) gave us “Valeant Pharmaceuticals International Inc. shares fell as much as 20 per cent after Democrats in the U.S. House asked to subpoena the company for documents relating to drug price increases, the latest move by politicians seeking to curb price hikes on acquired drugs“. When we see places like Turing Pharmaceuticals ‘hiding’ behind places like PrWeb and PrNewsWire, you better believe you are facing marketing from the bottom of the barrel. Yet in all this serious demands from the government looking into these companies who bought up niche medications and driving up prices by hundreds of percentage points is a matter this government (as well as the previous one) did not have to content with and as such the NHS will receive even more pressure. This is exactly why I have pushed for close to two years towards a stronger Commonwealth coalition. India with its Generic pharmaceuticals that will become one of the pillars of salvation for the NHS. This needs to happen now, before the Australian government (as well as the previous one) does something irreversibly stupid like signing the TPP. We must recognise here that it was not Australian Labor or the Australian Liberals asking the questions that had to be asked, it was New Zealand that put up a fight against the TPP issues. So have we been watching a media event by Martin Shkreli and Turing Pharmaceuticals?

Because we all need to realise clearly that once the TPP is signed, the signing government will have placed a knife on the throats of nearly 21.7% of the population of Australia, whilst that group will be left with no medical alternative!

That part reflects on the NHS!

When we consider some information from the ABPI (at http://www.abpi.org.uk/our-work/library/industry/Documents/OHE%20ABPI%20Medicines%20Bill%20Forecast.pdf), we must also acknowledge that they, the Association of the British Pharmaceutical Industry, represents commercial enterprises, a branch not to favoured, or flavoured towards generic medication. They are given, as I personally see it (read: speculate) the inside track from ‘friends’ on how far they must lower the price to remain seated. It is a form of let’s say branded exploitation that can no longer be afforded. Now, we must be clear that there is nothing illegal on branded exploitation, but we have to acknowledge that the NHS can no longer afford to play that game (a 2 billion deficit is ample proof of that).

Within the ABPI we see plenty of information, now consider this one quote from one of their presentations: “Loss of exclusivity of some major brands is projected to yield £3.4bn cumulative savings to the NHS between 2012 and 2015 with £5.4bn cumulative lost revenue to industry“. Do you think this is about the savings to the NHS, or the revenue lost to industry? If you think that this is about ‘savings to the NHS‘ than you, the respectful reader, will be slightly too naive than is good for you! I cannot fault the ABPI, because it is doing what it needs to do, represent its industry, we all forgot that they are not living in a symbiotic relationship with the government as they provide THEIR solutions to the NHS. The people the ABPI is representing, is a commercial group. They want to get the most out of whatever they can. Culling their needs by having stronger ties with Generic brands, even Indian ones is essential. They might cry about their low prices, but the reality is different. These players claiming the high costs are hoping you forget about news from 2001 (and many other years) where we saw “The UK government is introducing tax incentives aimed at persuading British-based pharmaceutical companies to boost their research into diseases affecting the world’s poor, such as AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria“, so they get the tax breaks for research, they have the inside tracks on ‘maximising’ product pricing solutions, yet overall they still complain. Which in light when we consider the ABPI document showing a 15% growth in spending on medication to be another issue. This is was a projection over 4 years (up to 2015), yet the facts remain, the NHS needs another solution and we agree that generic medication will not be as strong, however a medication that needs to be taken 10% longer might be preferable to medication that is 30% more expensive. Clarity is what matters here and for the implied accusation that Jeremy Hunt was keeping people in the dark should be offensive to all of us. There is one more side to all this, which is shown in that same presentation. The Office of Health Economics (OHE) is stating with their key message 6 that: “By 2015, new branded medicines launched between 2012 and 2015 will account for less than 2% of the total medicines bill. This underlies the issue in the UK of slow uptake of innovative new medicines“. From an analyst side I want to offer this thought to you. the quote ‘new branded medicines’ implies not that they are new medication, but new versions of existing medications, which means that rebranded and possibly marketed solutions is now implied to be below 2%, yet whatever deal is in place, it could also imply that this 2% is also a group that for now cannot be replaced by generic mediation. This is a speculation on my side, yet these kinds of presentations are never about ‘informing’ the people, it is about awareness on which questions to ask and what solutions to push for. Both tend to be expensive exercises for any NHS.

Yet medication is only one side, it is the one side we can clearly fight for with the possible reward of direct savings, but other sides need to be considered too. This we see in the comment article in the Guardian called ‘This junior doctor contract puts patients in danger‘ (at http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/oct/04/junior-doctor-contract-patients-danger). Can anyone explain to me how the stupidity of “The contract that the Department of Health is threatening to impose on junior doctors once again raises the prospect of 90-hour weeks being written into rotas“? I went to University with some of these upcoming doctors, the pressure on them is just beyond harsh. How can a 90-hour contract be allowed? apart from that being a step just one hair fraction away from being regarded as slave labour, the pressures on these people will result in a certain harm to them self, an implied certain harm to their patients and a long term harm to the NHS as a whole. Because this will fall over within 2 years after which there will be no doctors left, there will be nearly no nurses left and the UK gets to rely on the medical care we can import from Siberia and Africa, how would that end well?

As a final year student in Intellectual Property law I call upon my peers to aid the NHS, give aid to them by creating strong patents for Generic medication, for patents that  lessen the stranglehold on prolonged exclusive medication. In 2008 in the Financial Times, Yusuf Hamied, stated: “I am not against patents, but India cannot afford them. I am against monopolies”, he is correct! In addition, now 7 years later the UK and many other nations cannot afford them either. That part has been ignored on many governmental levels all over the Commonwealth. The response the article gives: “he is a “pirate”, an opportunist who has exploited others’ intellectual property to swell his own profits. In the process, they say, he is undermining investment in future medicines, including the next generation of HIV therapies“, this fake response is flame baked with emotion, the reference to ‘the next generation of HIV therapies‘ does that. You see they had a patent, they had exclusivity for 20 years, but the people in that house became lazy and greedy and now they do not want to give it up. They try to revamp the drug to the tiniest part (they will call it an innovative new drug) and then they reshape it with a patent for 20 more years of exclusivity. They are now learning that this is not always successful. As a Patent Attorney (if I make it to the end) I would want to work on the patents of Generic medications, lowering the barricades to NHS on a global level, which is one of the reasons I oppose the TPP. Governments (including the UK) have squandered the position they had by prolonging a solution that never worked and voila, here we have the trillion pound deficit!

OK, I admit it is not a completely accurate statement and as such the issues are more complex, but we must fight the wars we can win and the NHS war could be won, however if Mr not so bright, I am hiding the numbers Jeremy Hunt MP is indeed hiding the numbers, any NHS solution will come too late, which puts 68 million in peril.

I feel that I am on the right track. Some will question my view towards Generic Medication Patents. When I consider my duties as stated in the Code of Conduct for Patent and Trade Marks Attorneys 2013, I see section 11 that a registered attorney must act as a patent attorney or a trade marks attorney in the following:

  • In accordance with the law; and
  • In the best interests of the registered attorney’s client; and
  • In the public interest; and
  • In the interests of the registered attorney’s profession as a whole.

The first two would carry for certain, the latter two are the debate. I believe that Generic Medication and protecting these is in the public interest on a global scale, I never believed that ‘reworking’ a patent, unless it is truly a new substance was in the public interest. You see exclusivity is a right given to the actual innovator, not giving in perpetuity, which only propagates exploitation, the last part is that the profession as a whole relies not on the cash of the rich client. It relies on driving true innovation, when we start repackaging the same solution with a new delivery method (which costs less than $15 dollars to make), the price hike from $20 to $175 is not just a tough pill to swallow it is a dangerous escalation in our greying population. The fact that Patent Laws as well as Patent Regulations have not been properly updated (even though this example is specifically for the US, not the UK) should give warning to other parts that needs to be overhauled.

This all hits back to the NHS. The Independent showed a few sides which reflects mighty badly on Jeremy Hunt. You see the quote: “it was his intention that no one should lose out financially” might sound nice and perhaps the change to a schedule where doctors work 7 days a week might not be an avoidable part, yet in all this the 90 hour a week part is still one of the deadliest issues. That person might not feel a financial ‘pinch’, but I guarantee you that these hours will drive most doctors bonkers within 2 years. How can the NHS survive when by 2018 23% of the medical GP’s are in a sanatorium? Did Mr Hunt add that risk to his spreadsheet?

So how will this end? Well, for Jeremy Hun MP not all that good I reckon (speculation on my side), but we have to wait to see all the facts to place judgment on this. In all this, as I see it, I started with the title: ‘How to cure economic sickness‘.

The answer in my case is by changing direction, by changing it massively. There is now more than half a decade of data and Business Intelligence that the US only considers the US and there they falter and fail as they refuse to deal with Greed. They hide behind more and more emotional stories (especially when there are school shootings), even there the US legislative branch is failing its people. The Commonwealth cannot afford these steps. We the Commonwealth must unite as never before. We the people of the Commonwealth must also realise that to make this work we must be willing to make large changes if needed. I always lived a global live, so if I am required to move to the UK, Canada or perhaps even India, than I will! In this day and age, holding onto your one little hill (especially those with tertiary educations) we must consider a global (read a complete Commonwealth field). The UK must start to realise this too, because they have squandered too much funds on solutions that never worked. Australia is moving into that direction as well as Canada, they just move in that direction more politely than the other players.

And finally my message to David Cameron. David, your Conservative party can be the solution, we all can be part of that solution, yet in all this we must know how bad things are and the playbook you currently use needs to change, the US can no longer be seen as a potential ‘solution’, they burned that bridge by themselves. Our Commonwealth can grow towards the empire it was, we have the skills, we have the innovators, we have the drive and (most of us) the loyalty to the crown, yet in all this, not enough drive towards a Commonwealth Union has been made. The SNP is partially evidence of that. They now realise that their oil revenue is not making it work, they need to realise that together we are stronger. Yes, perhaps that will be as an independent Scotland, but then it should still be a Commonwealth Nation, we must propel on all sides to show both the US and China that the UK is the 5th largest economy, yet as a United Commonwealth we can surpass China and become the second largest economy! The next 12 years will be about the innovators that propel ideas in many fields. We will see a growth in Trade Marks, in Patents and in Business solutions and all this will be resulting in new avenues of growth, yet as a single nation the UK can no longer compete to the extent it needs to. The costs are too high, the NHS is the first and clearest piece of evidence.

So economic sickness can be cured, it needs the right medication and this can be administered by acquiring the right medication, the current providers have shown that they are not up to the task!

I leave it to the honourable David Cameron to set the right course!

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July 29, 2015 · 10:14

Freedoms removed by Amazon

One of the most outrageous articles of the year hit me this morning, via the Guardian off course! The piece in question is ‘Amazon proposes drones-only airspace to facilitate high-speed delivery’ (at http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2015/jul/28/amazon-autonomous-drones-only-airspace-package-delivery). In the first, since when does a company decide on traffic rules? Can anyone explain that to me? In the second, since when is a company allowed to set FAA rules (or in general rules of flight regarding safety of airspace)? In the third, how in the name of all blazing hell does a company decides on how amateurs, hobbyists and innovators do their work?

Well, it seems that Amazon has stepped up to the plate to ‘suggest’ a few changes. Let’s face it, Amazon is a place of nothing, a mere grocery store for parchment products. In the UK they paid £11.9 million in taxation and the year before that £4.2 million, so why should we give them even the slightest consideration? The Australian Amazon site is limited to kindle stuff, so they pay even less there. You know, they are big in Luxembourg, so there is every possibility that they can pursue their drone packaging strikes in that country. But to give any consideration outside of Luxembourg and the US is a little too strong, so the quote “Amazon is proposing that a pristine slice of airspace above the world’s cities and suburbs should be set aside for the deployment of high-speed aerial drones capable of flying robotically with virtually no human interference” should not be taken too seriously.

We cannot fault Amazon for having vision, but it comes at a cost. You see “It envisages that within the next 10 years hundreds of thousands of small drones – not all of them Amazon’s or devoted to delivery – will be tearing across the skies every day largely under their own automated control” shows us that there would be a massive drop in the need for delivery people, which is not good for job security. Now, in opposition, these things happen, when people started to correspond through their computers, the people did not think it would grow beyond the realm if Geeks and Nerds, now, the bulk of the population has not touched parchments, quills and ink for a long time. Less postman were needed and on a global scale dogs were in mourning for nearly a decade.

Now we get the part that Amazon thinks is visionary “The company’s aeronautics experts propose that a 200ft slab of air – located between 200ft and 400ft from the ground – should be segregated and reserved for state-of-the-art drones equipped with sophisticated communications and sensing equipment and flying at high speeds of 60 knots or more. A further 100ft of airspace – between 400ft and 500ft – would be declared a no-fly zone to act as a buffer between the drones and current conventional aircraft such as passenger and cargo planes, thus mitigating fears about the impact on manned flight or dangers posed to people on the ground“.

I wonder how these aeronautics experts got their degree, perhaps it was added to the side of the pot of vegemite in an effort to market the product to Americans? Perhaps their degree was the wrapper for Troyer Roll Butter (if you know the product, the joke makes sense, Google it!). You see, the sky is filled with these weird things, that need to be all over the place, they are called helicopters, the police uses them, the press uses them and oh, yes, the emergency rescue services uses them all over the world, also in city areas. So this ideas hold a few operational holes even before it is seriously considered.

There is an additional concern. We do not deny that drones will be the big thing in the next decade, which also means that indie developers and visionaries will emerge, so is the quote “segregated and reserved for state-of-the-art drones equipped with sophisticated communications and sensing equipment” anything else than an attempt to crush market growth and keep it in hand for a few established brands? How will that ever be any good for innovation? Furthermore, the image gives way that hobbyists, rural hobbyists will be pushed from their rural live to little spots, just like the Native American Indians were. In my view, if you want to be top dog, you’ll just have to create a superior product that can anticipate these events. By the way, helicopters come in all these areas, including in the no fly zone, so this idea is saturated with bad insights from even before day zero. Not a good start me thinks!

So in reference to the position papers where the call states “It calls for a “paradigm shift” that will allow hundreds of thousands of small unmanned aircraft to fly under their own technological steam without the current involvement of humans through air traffic control“, that part could only work if there is one player, once there are more, if becomes a technological jungle of miscommunications and lost handshakes due to iterative updates, flaws and glitches. So how about letting drones work above the freeways and major lanes? It would not hinder anyone, hobbyists and innovators continue and unless a helicopter absolutely must land on a highway (likely medical emergency) they can continue without any hiccups.

Wow, I just solved the ‘lack’ of free airspace in 7.2 minutes. How clever am I?

Then we see “Amazon sets out five capabilities that drones must meet if they are to be allowed to fly inside the new 200ft high-speed corridor“. well let’s just agree that this is not up to Amazon to begin with, the fact that they precede this with “to realise that futuristic vision safely“, implying that they are working on a solution only they will offer, laws must abide with… In my view it is not up to them, many nations know that drones will be the new slave labour force (read: unpaid population that will drive others away from a job), which is a little out there (the way I framed it), but the reality is that this market will massively evolve over the next 2 decades and we have to give space to innovators and visionaries, not limit their scope to the need of “sophisticated GPS tracking that allows them to pinpoint their location in real-time and in relation to all other drones around them“, which is basically stating that drones must be a product made by DJI, Raytheon or Northrop Grumman to be allowed in this airspace. Amazon does NOT get to make THAT call!

the additional quotes “Online flight planning that allows them to predict and communicate their flight path” and “Communications equipment that allow them to “talk” and collaborate with other drones in the zone to ensure they avoid each other” give additional notice to forcing us into a one player path. That is not what innovation is about. First the TPP is pushing innovation to the mercy of big business, now Amazon add more limitations here? That is not a playing field that the world signed up for.

So as we see that hobbyists and indie developers (and visionaries) are slowly pushed into reservations like the Native American Indians by the quote “Under Amazon’s proposals, by contrast, hobbyists would only be allowed to fly within the new 200ft-400ft corridor if their vehicles were equipped with the latest hyper-sophisticated gadgetry for autonomous flight. Otherwise, they would have their activities confined to geographically demarcated airfields in relatively unpopulated areas that would be set aside specifically for the purpose” we have to wonder what Amazon has up his sleeve. Because either the US government is so bankrupt that it will agree to anything to not collapse before the results of the next elections, or is Amazon just waving in the air to be noticed?

The quote by Brendan Schulman, drone lawyer and senior executive and DJI gives us additional issues regarding the Amazon statement “by far the greatest use of unmanned aerial vehicles today was by amateurs. That’s currently by far the most common use of the technology, so before you disrupt their experience you want to think carefully about what slice of airspace would really be needed by these new technologies“. I would say ‘Amen!’ to that, because the issue that the article danced around (perhaps intentionally) is that Amazon needs to adhere to established safety protocols, we do not change protocols because of Amazon. I can agree that down the track changes will have to be made, but that time is not now and especially as the paper ignored several basic avionics issues.

Which now gets me to the paper where in a mere flash something stood out to me. Consider the quote “Amazon believes the current model of airspace management will not meet future sUAS demands, particularly highly-automated, low-altitude commercial operations. A paradigm shift in airspace management and operations is necessary to safely accommodate the one-operator-to-many-vehicle model required by large-scale commercial fleets“, in that apart from a massive dose of arrogance, we see “the one-operator-to-many-vehicle model required by large-scale commercial fleets“. So it is already on the premise for big business where one controller manages 100-200 drones. The shift of a workforce that only requires payment in cc’s of fuel.

In my view, the air is for now still empty, it will change, that much is certain, but it will be the people that decide on how far this goes, it is not Amazon to make that move. I am not entirely certain that Amazon should be the lead at all, but that is perhaps a discussion for another day.

What is in the last part an issue is the small part privacy activists were given. They are all up in arms regarding police and spook drones. Which is massively farfetched as these people have already given away their liberty through Facebook and other social means, so these two parties receive via e-mail all you did, including the amounts of times you ogled the ass of the neighbours wife (and teenage daughter). We seem to forget the massive danger that follows, it is not Amazon with its non-human package delivery system. It is the fact that in any innovation, organised crime follows pretty quickly, because they know that it takes the government up to 5 years to catch up, so in the first 5 years they can strike it rich. Drug deliveries, via cheap drones to penthouses. The paying clientele gets balcony to balcony delivery via a $499 drone and there is no link between the parties. Crime is already making a nice killing here, so the proper focus is not here and when it gets to be in the right place it is already too late.

So Amazon should not be setting the pass for removed freedom, it should set pace to create the right atmosphere, an attempt that they failed miserably from my point of view.

My opinion in this matter is strengthened through a previous article regarding Amazon which was published on March 30th (at http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2015/mar/30/amazon-tests-drones-secret-site-canada-us-faa). The title ‘Amazon tests delivery drones at secret Canada site after US frustration‘ already implies the ludicrous part in all this. A ‘secret Canada site‘. Why? Because a spotter could take a pic? Because of industrial espionage? Actually, that last one is not THAT far-fetched. So let’s leave it for now.

In the article we get two parts that show my view the first is “Into that aerial slice the company plans to pour highly autonomous drones of less than 55lbs, flying through corridors 10 miles or longer at 50mph and carrying payloads of up to 5lbs“, which represents as stated in the article for 86% of all the packages, now that is fair enough, if you want to address 80% of what is done now, yu see a choice that is just common sense. Now part two “The Company wants to offer its customers the ability to have packages dropped on their doorstep by flying robots within 30 minutes of ordering goods online“. Initially that pat makes sense too. Yet combined, we get ordered articles are delivered within a range of 18 miles. Here we account for loss of time for picking up, after which the drone gets 30 minutes, so 18 miles is pretty much the limit, so this is a metropolitan solution, this is less about ‘global change’, but more the need to address the high impact profit places like New York, Vancouver, San Francisco, Honolulu, Seattle, New Orleans, San Jose, Chicago and Los Angeles and a few other congested places. The ‘global’ part was just nice to give it marketing. They need to address congestion and dromes will make sense. Yet the visionary part is that they are trying to address it on a global scale, because if this is accepted, Amazon would be sole player in places like London, Paris, Amsterdam, The Hague, Munich, Berlin, Rome and Sydney for that matter too. That seems to be the reality and it is not a bad idea to have, but in that adjusted view, Amazon does not get to set policy, especially as Europe might develop its own drone solutions. Binding options for developers through ‘sophisticated GPS tracking‘ is what I would call ‘the big No No’.

Brendan Schulman, aka the drone lawyer shows us the merits of my thoughts “Amazon’s Canadian airstrip-in-exile should be a “serious wake-up call to politicians and regulators”. “America has led the world in aviation development,” he said, “but for the first time in history we are at risk of losing out”“.

There is the part, where I made the reference to the TPP. These presentations are all about big business carving their patch making sure no one else can inhabit it. The plane industry is polarised, but drones are another matter, drones can invigorate visionary workers and dreamers, because a drone is not an expensive tool, you can buy them in a game shop and the next kid getting one could be the one who revolutionises that field because he/she thought ‘what if I want to do this, could I alter my app….?’ that is all it takes to create a billion dollar corporation.

The FAA has (according to Amazon) taken much too long to make up its mind, it also stated “it does not believe that drones can be flown safely under their own autonomous control, and is insisting that humans must keep them within eyesight at all times“, which makes it non-profitable for Amazon. For now the FAA is right, but there is no given certainty that this is still a truth in 5 years. The mobile industry, Wi-Fi and sensor market is evolving at an alarming rate, my $699 mobile phone now has the same technological options a $15K digital film camera had 10 years ago, only the lens is the physical difference in quality, so that market will evolve, possibly beyond my comprehension before I die.

I feel certain that the FAA realises this, but they report to others and those people see that drones will be the new orgasmic high for organised crime. Common Law in the US and in the Commonwealth is flawed enough for all players to realise that this opens up massive undeclarable profits for these players. With the one to many option, whatever small chance of successful prosecution of a drug dealer any Districts Attorney had in the past, flies straight out of the window via drone. Here we see how the law has not caught up again.

Should it stop drone development? No! But there are a few sides that need addressing, which cannot be done today, but soon it will be the only blockade remaining. What happens when that day comes?

 

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July 16, 2015 · 23:10

You keep what you kill

The business section of the Guardian had an interesting article yesterday. It comes from David Pegg and it is about targeting customers. In the article we see a prominent picture of Robert Redford (at http://www.theguardian.com/business/2015/jul/15/sky-broadband-customers-targeted-allegedly-pirating-robert-redford-film). So what is at play here?

Here we see ‘US firm TCYK, apparently named after film The Company You Keep, made Sky hand over details of customers accused of downloading movie‘, which comes with the opening quote “Dozens of UK broadband customers have received letters from a US firm accusing them of pirating a little-known Robert Redford film and inviting them to pay a financial settlement on pain of further legal action“. You see TCYK got a court order against Sky Broadband, which must now hand over customer details of those TCYK accuses of using torrent sites to download and distribute the films.

These people now get the offer of paying a hefty fine or end up in a legal battle.

So, how does that work in Australia? Well, here we depend on the Copyright Act 1968, where we see in section 36(1) “Subject to this Act, the copyright in a literary, dramatic, musical or artistic work is infringed by a person who, not being the owner of the copyright, and without the licence of the owner of the copyright, does in Australia, or authorizes the doing in Australia of, any act comprised in the copyright“, which means you made the movie, you are licensed to handle the movie, or you own the copyright, if you are none of these three, you become the infringer.

Now we get to the nitty gritty of the act (sections 43A and 43B) when we consider ‘temporary reproductions‘, which starts of nicely in section 43A(1) with “The copyright in a work, or an adaptation of a work, is not infringed by making a temporary reproduction of the work or adaptation as part of the technical process of making or receiving a communication“, with the crown part ‘temporary reproduction of the work or adaptation as part of the technical process’, which takes Sky Broadband out of the loop in all this, because Sky just sends packages from point A to Point B and as such, they do not keep any parts of that they communicate, they only keep the logs of what is communicated.

In subsection 2 of section 43A we see “Subsection (1) does not apply in relation to the making of a temporary reproduction of a work, or an adaptation of a work, as part of the technical process of making a communication if the making of the communication is an infringement of copyright“, which might put Sky in the hotspot, yet Sky is at this point an innocent disseminator of information (you know that anti-censoring part people all love), so Sky must prove that by handing over the records. This now counters the (what I would regard as fake indignation) from Michael Coyle, a solicitor advocate at Lawdit Solicitors, who stated regarding the act of Sky Broadband “They should be fighting tooth and nail not to have this information released”, to which I would state “Yes, because we should always protect the people engaging in illegal acts!” more important is the part that comes next “TCYK says that it hired a “forensic computer analyst” to identify IP addresses of computers that were making the film available online” so it seems that those watching the movie are not high on the list, it is about the distributors, those who made the movie available online. So there are two parts. The first part ‘temporary reproductions’, is a part we are still looking at, yet ‘distribution’, which we will also look at.

As Sky is protecting itself by showing themselves to be innocent disseminators, we need to see the logs, part of that is to give evidence that you (or they) are working on a temporary reproduction.

Temporary what?

OK, let’s take YouTube, when you watch a movie, a trailer, a TV Show, you are looking at a temporary reproduction. The movie is streamed into the memory of your computer and once the link is severed at ANY GIVEN MOMENT, the movie cannot be watched and it cannot be re-watched’ it must be pushed into the memory of your computer again. This is different from Torrent systems where a file, temporary or not is actually saved to your computer. This is the confusing part, whether it is a temporary file (what the people refer to as temporary) is actually ‘just a file’ that file remains on your computer, just like many other ‘temporary’ files.

I know, it is still confusing! Let me elaborate, when windows or a windows application needs to handle data, it created a file that changes all the time, we refer to them as temporary files. The UNIX reference is much better, they are called ‘scratch files’. So if you download a PDF, it will create a file, and that file will capture all the packages and add them together. That is done until the file is complete, when the download is completed the file gets written becoming the permanent file. This is the normal way for operating systems to work. The issue is that something is written (read: saved) onto your local destination, when this is done, it is by sheer definition no longer a temporary file. this is the part that is taken care of in Section 43A, now as long as there is no way to make the ‘temporary file’ work via an application of any kind, you can also rely on section 43B of the act where we see in subsection 1 “Subject to subsection (2), the copyright in a work is not infringed by the making of a temporary reproduction of the work if the reproduction is incidentally made as a necessary part of a technical process of using a copy of the work“. This now shows my explanation of temporary reproduction, where we refer to ‘incidentally made as a necessary part of a technical process‘, which could make that part a no go area, was it not for the first part where we saw ‘Subject to subsection (2)’, which is now the issue as this does not apply as per section 43B (2)(a) relying on both (i) which states “if the reproduction is made from an infringing copy of the work“, and the irritating use of the ‘or’ statement for (ii) “a copy of the work where the copy is made in another country and would be an infringing copy of the work if the person who made the copy had done so in Australia“, which takes care of any ‘border’ issues.

So, here we are with an infringed work, so what about the words of Michael Coyle?

Well, for this we need to look at Part V remedies and offenses, specifically ‘Division 2AA Limitation on remedies available against carriage service providers‘, which now puts poor poor old Sky Broadband in the limelight! It is a bit of a puzzle, but in short it amounts to “A carriage service provider must satisfy the relevant conditions set out in Subdivision D before the limitations on remedies apply” (a bit paraphrased), this is set in section 116AH, where we see that the carriage service must provide the following two elements for ALL category transgressions

  1. “The carriage service provider must adopt and reasonably implement a policy that provides for termination, in appropriate circumstances, of the accounts of repeat infringers“
  2. “If there is a relevant industry code in force—the carriage service provider must comply with the relevant provisions of that code relating to accommodating and not interfering with standard technical measures used to protect and identify copyright material“

This is only the first of several elements that address the part that the Guardian stated “TCYK says that it hired a “forensic computer analyst” to identify IP addresses of computers that were making the film available online“, that part is also needed for Sky Broadband to prove that limitations ‘a’ and ‘b’ were adhered to. For this we need to take a look to a case (mentioned below) where we see at [697] “The question whether a person has supplied the means with which copyright has been infringed raises its own difficult issues. The primary judge concluded that the BitTorrent system was the means by which the appellants’ copyright was infringed. But I cannot see why the means with which the primary infringers committed acts of infringement must be so narrowly defined. The primary infringers used computers which were no less essential to their infringing activities than was the BitTorrent system. The same is true of the internet connections with which they made the appellants’ films available online”

More important, at [505] we see “It follows that customers, by entry into the CRA, consented to iiNet disclosing and using information, including personal information as defined, for the purpose of iiNet administering and managing the services provided pursuant to the CRA. Part of that administration and management includes compliance with the CRA. In circumstances where iiNet has received evidence of breaches of its CRA (for example, cl 4.2(a) and (e)) the customer has necessarily consented to iiNet using information it possesses, including personal information, to determine whether to take action under cl 14.2 of the CRA“, which all comes from the case Roadshow Films Pty Limited v iiNet Limited [2011] FCAFC 23, which means that Sky Broadband is going through the motions iiNet in Australia went through 4 years ago. This is important, because the customer relationship agreement is a legal scope that the customer agrees to, which allows for disclosure and more important, now looking at the ‘limitation on remedy’ or bluntly put ‘the massive amount of money TCYK will demand of Sky Broadband if they cannot satisfy conditions’ is where we see actions from Sky Broadband to disclose information.

In addition we need to see the satisfied part “Any transmission of copyright material in carrying out this activity must be initiated by or at the direction of a person other than the carriage service provider“, that part is given by the logs as the viewer did the ‘click here to watch full movie‘, basically that means that the user initiated the act. In addition, there is “The carriage service provider must not make substantive modifications to copyright material transmitted. This does not apply to modifications made as part of a technical process“, showing that whatever solution was used, Sky broadband passed through the information as part of what it is supposed to do as an ISP.

In the end, this will be a messy battle and there is one part that holds less water. It is the statement “Nicolas Chartier, the president of Voltage Pictures, told the Hollywood Reporter this year that he had issued 20,000 lawsuits against individuals accused of pirating the Hurt Locker in order to “make a statement”. “The day after we announced 20,000 lawsuits, the internet downloads of Hurt Locker went down about 40%”“, I am not sure if that will be the end this time, Hollywood has been clasping down in several ways. We see the 10 movies that make a billion, but the hundreds of others that aren’t slicing the cake are not in there, as such Hollywood is now lashing out all over Terra ‘non US’ and we see that it will hit Australia too, even more direct when the TPP becomes fact, at that point having a computer with logs pointing to it with irrefutable evidence might literally cost you your house. There is one side in the TPP that remains undiscussed, especially, as I personally see it behind the closed doors of the TPP negotiations. In all this America relies on fair use, in all this they are eager to criminalise that what is not criminal within the US, it makes for another case.

If we accept the following “Some historians prefer ‘slave’ because the term is familiar and shorter and it accurately reflects the inhumanity of slavery, with ‘person’ implying a degree of autonomy that slavery did not allow for“.

Now we convert that sentence into “Some politicians prefer ‘user’ because the term is familiar and shorter and it accurately reflects the chargeability of usage, with ‘US consumer’ implying a degree of freedom that users are not allowed to have” This is as I see it exactly the core and the broken foundation of the TPP, there is no fair use and there is no accountability on the other side, by all means the TPP ignores the constitutions of more than one nation. This was raised by Alan Morrison in The Atlantic on June 23rd 2015 (at http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2015/06/tpp-isds-constitution/396389/). The quote in question is “It is January 2017. The mayor of San Francisco signs a bill that will raise the minimum wage of all workers from $8 to $16 an hour effective July 1st. His lawyers assure him that neither federal nor California minimum wage laws forbid that and that it is fine under the U.S. Constitution. Then, a month later, a Vietnamese company that owns 15 restaurants in San Francisco files a lawsuit saying that the pay increase violates the “investor protection” provisions of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) agreement recently approved by Congress“, this is a situation that could be a reality.

You see, this relates to the case at hand in more than one way. In my view, TCYK has every right to protect its side, the movie it made and the revenue coming from that, so I am not against prosecuting copyright infringement at all. Yet, in all this the shift that TPP will allow for is a situation where ‘investor protection’ will bring a case which will be heard by three private arbitrators; the United States government is the sole defendant in that given scenario. More important, it will be a case brought by “investor-based expectations”, I think we can clearly see the link when we consider “Village Roadshow’s revenue and profits are below expectations, which was down 1.9% to $469.5 million for the six months to December. Net profit was lower by 26.2% to $13.34 million“, so in this case Village Roadshow blamed the weather, yet Village roadshow has blamed piracy on many occasions, so the moment we see a court case based on ‘investor-based expectations’, we should all become weary of this becoming an option the regain revenue from a mismanaged product (which is far-fetched but not out of the question).

So why these jumps?

  1. It might be a movie piracy case in the UK, but the result will hit Australia sooner rather than later and vice versa.
  2. Infringement is a growing ‘market’ and as such, especially in dire times, the industry at large wants to recoup parts of their losses due to infringement, yet will it truly hunt down the real perpetrators?
  3. Too many people rely on their ignorance and ‘they did not know’. This defence is now slowly but surely coming to an end, it is more and more an accepted rule that if you did not buy the article, or pay for it, how come you watched it?
  4. The TPP will change EVERYTHING! This closed door agreement is all about ‘indulging’ big business whilst big business is not playing the game fairly to begin with. In its core it can be seen as a discriminatory violation of ‘fair use’ and ‘constitutional values’.

In all this I jumped at Village Roadshow more than once. Personally I think that Graham Burke has been playing a lose rant game too often, whilst trying not to step on the toes of Telstra and Optus, but that might just be me! In addition, I have additional issues with Federal Attorney-General George Brandis regarding past events. This all links to an article last April in the Sydney Morning Herald (at http://www.smh.com.au/business/village-roadshow-wants-to-work-with-isps-instead-of-suing-movie-pirates-20150416-1mj8cd.html), where we see the quotes “The document centres on a “three strikes” system. An illegal downloader will get three warning notices before a Telco will help copyright holders identify them for potential legal action“, which sounds fine, yet in that part, if at any time the IP address was hijacked, there will not be any evidence absolving the accused person, so the one in court could be the victim in all this. In my view, this is a warped solution to the court case Village Roadshow lost against iiNet, meaning that other avenues need to be taken, which now reflects back to the UK case of Sky Broadband, which could hit Australian legislation. The next quote is “Federal Attorney-General George Brandis and Communications Minister Malcolm Turnbull set a 120-day deadline last December for internet service providers and entertainment companies to create a binding code“, which is indeed central but not in the way reported on. You see, Telstra and Optus are all about bandwidth, the more you use, the better the invoice from their point of view. This is part of the move we see all over the internet in the last article I wrote regarding the short-sightedness of Graham Burke, in the article ‘The real issue is here!‘ (at https://lawlordtobe.com/2014/06/17/the-real-issue-here/), which also reflected on the article ‘FACT on Piracy?‘ (at https://lawlordtobe.com/2014/01/03/fact-on-piracy/) from January 3rd 2014. These articles connect through ISP’s like Telstra and Optus who have been rescaling their bandwidth plans. The consequence of losing out on 4 billion a year. Now Telstra offers 50GB for $75 a month, smaller plans no longer exist, they have been pushing for new broadband boundaries so that their revenue is less impacted, so the impact of $40 and $80 a month is now decreased to an optional loss of $20 and $40 a month. It was (as I personally saw it) always about time and retrenching. It has been forever about big business! By the way, it is not just Telstra, others like iiNet have done the same thing, offering a new margin, reset to the width that has never been offered before. It is about rescaling the broadband plans, which results in resetting expectations and preparing for new data usage adherence.

You keep what you kill fits perfectly, it comes from the Riddick movies, which is basically the credo of a survivor, in this day and I agree, in this economy it is about lasting the longest and as such, they keep what they kill, which are the copyright infringers and their technologies. I do not oppose it, as I feel that owners of copyright are entitled to protect their assets. Yet, when we read Graham Burke we see “He said Australian film producers were trying to educate the public rather than sue them“, which might seem true enough, but behind that, I suspect, is the fear that if the Australian Copyright Act 1968 adds the ‘Fair Use’ principle, his education boat will sink on the spot, moreover, whatever US pressure we get from the TPP, gets drowned by Fair Use, because if it is good enough for Americans, it should be good enough for non-Americans too.

Last in all this is Matthew Deaner, executive director of Screen Producers Australia, who made a fair statement in the SMH article “They’re trying to say, ‘this is the right way to go about this stuff, this has a consequence to us’,” Mr Deaner said“, which we can get behind, yet the colourful rants by both Graham Burke and Sony executives on the utter non-realistic loss of billions is a consequence as well. By not properly and realistically setting the view, whilst, as I personally saw it, Sony executives were hiding behind excuses regarding missed targets that were never realistic to begin, which soured the milk of reality and reasonability.

Will this affect Australia?

Roadshow Films Pty Ltd v iiNet Ltd [2012] HCA 16 was settled in the High Court of Australia, yet the essential changes to copyright, the impact of the Trans Pacific Partnership (once signed) will also impact the future. The lack of a ‘fair use’ clause is as I see it an essential first step to protect those not engaged in active copyright infringement as well as allowing for innocuous acts not to be struck down in favour of big business in a draconian way. In all this, US corporations have relied on unfair advantages, whilst overcharging people all over the non-US in a massive way is just beyond belief.

Even now, example, ‘Ex Machina’ is in the US $17, in the UK $20 (both Amazon), which is already a 20% offset, a title which cannot be bought in Australia. The US has segmented commerce to maximise profits, whilst not giving fair options to consumers. The fact that they still enforce multiple region codes to limit fair consumer rights is also not addressed. This is in part what drives piracy. If Mr Burke is so about educating, how about Mr Burke educating the other side of the equation? With video games where price difference can go up to 100% in difference between the US and Australia, a consumer grievance that Federal Attorney-General George Brandis never bothered to properly address. When we consider the issue of price fixing we see “Price fixing occurs when competitors agree on pricing rather than competing against each other. In relation to price fixing, the Competition and Consumer Act refers to the ‘fixing, controlling or maintaining’ of prices“, in this we see a loaded gun of different proportions. You see, Agreements between related companies are also exempt from price fixing, yet, when this difference is set at 100%, whilst the firms place technological restrictions (region codes) on products, as well as denying fair competition, largely pushed by American corporations, where is the fairness in any trade agreement?

If a trade agreement is about removing trade barrier, in that regard, the region codes should be regarded as detrimental to trade, but the TPP is not about equality, it is about giving the power to big business and limiting the rights of consumers, which is why partially because of created limitations movies and videogames are not equally and honestly made available. So as we look at what some can buy more expensive and others cannot buy at all, Mr Burke should in part refrain from stating that ‘one leg is education’ the other is regarding ‘products being available at the same time as other countries’, it would make him instantly paraplegic. Unfairness is what drives infringement. This was shown in the 80’s in Europe in a very direct way as games, movies and music were so unbalanced that a $450 ferry ride to London (from Rotterdam) could pay itself back during one VHS shopping spree (not to mention the price difference in games).

That same principle applies here, so if this is truly about stopping infringement than the first step would have been consumer equality. Yet this is about the US maximising its profits, counteracting whatever ‘free’ trade is supposed to do, so copyright infringement is not going away any day soon, it will soon create new situations, all because those involved seem to be about abolishing what constitutes a fair user, which is why the TPP should never come into effect.

You keep what you kill

The question is, who gets killed in the end, because as more true illumination is given, the bigger the question mark we see on what propels infringement. If there is one real upside to all this, it will be evolution, it will not take long for someone to change the premise of the game and design a new peer to peer cloud solution that resets the legal playing field.

Strife has always been the number one innovator in both war and technology, that part has not and will not change.

 

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June 15, 2015 · 23:38

In continuation

Perhaps you noticed it, perhaps not. The last article was left a little unfinished. I had to do this because we are faced with two separate parts and I needed to isolate a few things, leaving you with the idea that this was it, alas (or fortunately) it is not!

In the past we saw that software required to pass “a manner of manufacture”, the linked issue of physicality, which is one I do believe in. It is for that reason I still consider the article by Ben McIniery ‘Physicality in Australian Patent Law‘ (at Deakin law review) to be the article that everyone in IP should read. It is an absolute must in the field. The article opened my eyes to a few parts of IP. On page 465 He goes into National Research Development Corporation v Commissioner of Patents (1959) 102 CLR 252, where we see “the High Court explained that the patentable subject matter inquiry is a broad test that recognises all new and useful innovation as patent eligible, irrespective of whether it involves a physical embodiment or a transformation of physical matter“.

This is where we are now. The gaming industry is only one side of it, the mobile data and mobile device market is the big one. No matter how much you see how mobile markets are worth hundred, two, three or even four hundred billion. As I see it, the mobile device market has now passed the 1 trillion dollar mark. As the people involved are looking at ‘their’ corners, the overall interaction market, including apps, data and hardware has exceeded a trillion dollars. So why does this now matter?

This is at the core of it all. The new games are only one side, the other side connected to all this is the value of data. There was a reason that Microsoft paid 2.2 billion for a videogame. The massive connection here is not just the data, it is the collection technology that you can link to it that matters.

Software was taken to satisfy the requirement for patentable subject matter; that is, it was “a manner of manufacture”. As articulated in the watershed NRDC decision, it is a mistake to ask if an invention (in the present context, software) is a kind of manufacture because it tends to limit one’s thinking by reference to the idea of making tangible goods by hand or by machine. Rather, the correct emphasis is that the application of a manner of manufacture results in an artificially created state of affairs, and that a manner of manufacture has an industrial, commercial or trading character in that it belongs to a useful art, as distinct from a fine art, and consequently its value to the country is in a field of economic endeavour. Software would appear to satisfy that requirement. Apple found that out the hard way, when it ‘learned’ that Smartflash owned the patent (at http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/02/25/us-ip-apple-verdict-idUSKBN0LT0E720150225), the bandage for that pain has been set at half a billion dollars. Here we see the link to both gaming and mobile devices.

The hottest ticket in the gaming industry is not just the game, it is the one who gets the race horse right on cross platform workings. So, a person on an Xbox One meets a person on a PlayStation 4 and they both fight it out ‘Doom’ style, who is the baddest, deadliest and most determined player on his console? That is currently not an option to the extent it should be. If you think it is easy, than think again, Bethesda with its Elder Scrolls online has not been able to bring that baby to life (Neither has Diablo 3 for that matter, who has a lot more experience in this field).

The jackpot value goes up even more when we consider the Android and IOS devices. Cross platform is the one ticket (read: patent) that once solved will hold the trump card to instant super wealth. Leave it to greed to properly motivate innovation, but that is usually the case.

So as we see the E3 to the largest extent about gaming. I am looking at it from the additional view of Intellectual property. If you have read yesterday’s article called ‘As the heart thumps‘ (at https://lawlordtobe.com/2015/06/15/as-the-heart-thumps/), you might wonder if there is a reason behind my focus on the navigational view of Elite: Dangerous. Now consider the design patents that Microsoft holds and consider the Elite HUD in a car window as a heads up display. It is the next step. You see, several players (read: car manufacturers) have been looking at implementing something like this, but the costs were scary. Now consider Corning’s Gorilla Glass technology solutions, not just to be a stronger screen, but a screen ‘film’ solution on the inside of the glass linked to a device that feeds the screen, whoever holds the quality design patent here will make a killing. The ‘technology’ that we saw in games for HUD, is technically already possible, now it only needs one clear implementation with the right patent and that person is sitting on the platinum patent. That same train is linked to interactive data transfer and consolidation cross platforms. Not what you think already exists (like feeds to every device), no, I am talking about true bi-directional interaction of the mobile world. We are getting closer, but we are not there yet.

In gaming terms, we are talking interactive intelligence versus scripted moments. The bulk of all games still rely on scripted moments. When you walk into a door, a new house, or meeting that ‘special’ character in the game. Games are full of that, no it is the intelligent design, regardless of moment, character or location that decides the interaction. That will be the upcoming frontier. Yes, you might think that this is about gaming, which is partially true. Yet that part is one step away from intuitive marketing; to reach any person regardless of device, location or state of travel, the holy grails of Direct Marketing and the Business Intelligence field is pursuing. You see, when we travel we tend to be decently idle. That is the moment marketing could hit us square in the face, possible resulting in us pressing the ‘buy’ button. That is as I say the platinum patent that allows for almost instant wealth beyond measure. Most of the technologies exist in generic form, whoever delivers the focus narrow enough to get set into patent will be holding onto the Chalice of Avarice.

In all this, the IP market remains in development, in addition, these events with added complication of what the TPP will offer large corporations is centre as to why I had an issue with the TPP. It gives unbalanced strength to large corporations, whilst diminishing the efforts of small innovators and it is the latter part that is most likely to come up with the golden idea, which was always my issue against the TPP.

So, when you take another look at what the E3 offers in gaming, consider how much bigger the net is that could catch options in other parts and other business segments.

 

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June 5, 2015 · 20:58

In reference to the router

Is this a case of Mythopoeia? Am I the JRR Tolkien of bloggers (I wish) and writer of facts by a non-journalist? It might be. You see, this is all about a mythological theme that is constant as war is, because war never changes! Its concept and construct is as old as the first ‘soldier’ who combined a flint and a stick and started to spear people. In this mindset it is all about the other person, an archaic approach to the issue that does not lie beneath, it’s in front of the person not seeing what is right in front of him/her.

It is also the first evidence that we consider the concept ‘old soldier never die, they simply fade away’ to be no longer a genuine consideration. In this day and age, the old soldier gets his/her references deleted from the database of considerations. We remain with nothing more than an old person that cannot connect or interact, the router won’t let him/her!

This is how it begins, this is about certain events that just occurred, but I will specify this momentarily, you see, it goes back to an issue that Sony remembers rather well they got hacked. It was a long and hard task to get into that place Login=BigBossKazuoHirai; Password=WhereDreamsComeTrue;

Soon thereafter no more firewall, no more routers, just the bliss of cloud servers and data, so much data! The people behind it were clever, and soon it was gone and the blame fell to the one nation that does not even have the bandwidth to get 10% past anything. Yes, North Korea got blamed and got fingered and in all that the FBI and other spokespeople gave the notion that it was North Korea. The people who understand the world of data know better, it was the only player less then least likely to get it done, the knowhow and the infrastructure just isn’t there. I did have a theory on how it was done and I published that on February 8th 2015 (at https://lawlordtobe.com/2015/02/08/the-next-cyber-wave/) in the article called ‘The next cyber wave’. It is only a theory, but it is a lot more reliable and likely than a North Korean incursion because of a movie no one cares about.

The FBI has plenty of achievements (FIFA being the latest one), but within the FBI there is a weakness, not a failing, but a weakness. Because the US has such a niche setup for NSA, CIA and other Intel officers, their offices are for the most still archaic when it come to the digital era. They go to all the events, spend millions on courses and keep up to date, but for the most, these people are following a wave that is one generation old, they follow, they do not lead. The entire Edward Snowden issue is clear evidence. I remain to regard him a joke, not a hacker, so far he is just placed on a pedestal by the press, who have created something unreal and whatever they do not to change it, it will only cut themselves. That is the fall-back of creating an artificial hero who isn’t one.

Yet, this is not about Snowden, he is only an element. Now we get to the concept of paleo-philosophy and how it hits government structures behind IT. This all started yesterday (at http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2015/jun/04/us-government-massive-data-breach-employee-records-security-clearances), where we see ‘OPM hack: China blamed for massive breach of US government data’. Now first of all, if one power can do this, than it is China! France, UK and a few others can do it too, but let’s just assume it is not an ally! Here is where the entire paleo-philosophy comes into play. You see, even though war remained constant, the players changed and for the most, it is no longer about governments. This is all about corporations. Even the movies are catching on, there is no true side to Russia or China as the enemy. Yes, their students might do it to impress their superiors/professors, but that would just be there defining moment. Ethan Hunt is not hunting a nation, it is now hunting conglomerates, large players who remain and require to be zero percent taxable. Those are the actual ream enemies for the UK, the US and China. You see, I am not stating it was not China, I am only questioning the reasoning and other acts. You see, I tried to get an answer from State Secretary John Kerry at +1-202-647-9572, who does not seem to be answering the phone, neither is his right hand man, Jonathan J. Finer at +1-7234 202-647-8633. This is not a secret, the State Department has the PDF with office numbers, locations and phone numbers in an open PDF and you can Google the little sucker! In the age where loads of stuff is open the right person can combine tonnes of data in a moment’s notice.

So can the larger players! The quote in the beginning is the kicker “the impact of a massive data breach involving the agency that handles security clearances and US government employee records“, you see loads of this information is already with intelligence parts and counter parts. I reckon Beijing and Moscow had updated the records within the hour that the next record keeper moved into the office. Yet, now in 2015, as the engine starts up for the presidential elections of 2016, that data is important to plenty of non-governments, that part is not seen anywhere is it?

Then we get “A US law enforcement source told the Reuters news agency on Thursday night that a ‘foreign entity or government’ was believed to be behind the attack“, which is fair enough, so how was the jump made to China? You see, only 5 weeks ago, the Financial Review gave us “US Treasury pressures Tony Abbott to drop ‘Google tax’” (at http://www.afr.com/news/policy/tax/us-treasury-pressures-tony-abbott-to-drop-google-tax-20150428-1mu2sg). So as the Obama administration ‘vowed’ to crackdown on Tax avoidance, they are really not the player who wants to do anything to upset those luscious donators of pieces of currency paper (loads of currency paper), so a mere 6 months later the US, is trying to undo what they promised, whilst still trying to push the TPP papers through the throats of consumers everywhere, what an interesting web we weave!

You see, for the large corporation that list of who has access to papers, and his/her situation is worth gold today, for the Chinese a lot less so. Yet, I am not writing China off as a possible culprit! Let’s face it, they are not North Korea, which means that they do not need to power their router with a Philips 7424 Generator! So at this point, I would tend to agree with Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Hong Lei who branded the accusations “irresponsible and unscientific” at a news briefing on Friday.

Now we get to the quote that is central to the entire paleo-philosophy matters: “DHS is continuing to monitor federal networks for any suspicious activity and is working aggressively with the affected agencies to conduct investigative analysis to assess the extent of this alleged intrusion”, first of all, I am not having a go at the DHS. I have done so in the past with good reason, but this is not that case. I think that in many areas government in not just falling behind, it started to fall behind in 2005 and has been falling behind ever since. Not just them though, organised large corporations like Sony, CVS Health, Valero Energy and Express Scripts Holding are only a few of the corporations that do not even realise the predicament they are in. The Deep Web is not just a place or a community, some of the players there have been organising and have been sharing and evolving that what they know. A massive pool of information, because Data is money, governments know it, corporation know it and THE HACKERS know it too. For them it is all relative easy, they have been living and walking the cloud data with the greatest of ease they can conflict data points and flood certain shared data hosts, only to achieve to get behind the corridor and remain invisible whilst the data is available at their leisure. In that environment the intelligence community is still trying to catch up with the basics (compared to where the hackers are). You see, whilst people in corporations and government are all about politics, those hackers were bout mayhem and anarchy, now they are figuring out that these skills get them a wealthy and luxurious lifestyle and they like the idea of not having a degree whilst owning most of Malibu Drive, a 21st century Point Break, where the funds allow them to party all the time. Corporations got them into that thinking mode. So were the culprits ‘merely’ hackers or was it a foreign government? That is the question I am unable to answer with facts, but to point at China being likely is event less assuring. Consider who gains power with that data? This much data can be up for sale, it can be utilised. In the premise of both, China is not unlikely, but what is ‘more likely than not’ is also a matter, even though that question is less easily answered and without evidence (I have none) any answer should not be regarded as reliable!

Now we get to the quote “Embassy spokesman Zhu Haiquan said China had made great efforts to combat cyberattacks and that tracking such events conducted across borders was difficult” it is correct, it matters and it is to the point. In addition, we must accept that trackers can also be set on the wrong path, it is not easy, but it can be done, both the hackers and China have skills there, as do the NSA and GCHQ. Yet, in all that, with the Sony hack still fresh in memory, who did it, which is the interesting question, but WHY is more interesting. We tend to focus on clearances here, but what else was there? What if the OPM has health details? What is the value of health risk analyses of 4 million people? At $10 a month that is a quick and easy half a billion isn’t it?

You see, the final part is seen here: “DHS is continuing to monitor federal networks for any suspicious activity and is working aggressively with the affected agencies to conduct investigative analysis to assess the extent of this alleged intrusion”, This is to be expected, but the intruders know this too, so how did they get past it all again? That is the issue, I gave in my earlier blog one possible solution, but that could only be done through the inside person, to be clear of that, someone did a similar thing in the cloud, or in the stream of data, in a way that it does not show. Perhaps a mere pressure of data in a shared cloud point is all it took to get past the security. How many data packages are lost? what intel is gained from there, perhaps it is just a pure replication of packages job, there is no proper way to monitor data in transit, not in cloudy conditions, so as we see that more data is ‘breached’ we all must wonder what the data holders, both government and non-government are not ready for. It is the data of you and me that gets ‘sold’ who does it get sold to?

So as we see an article of a data hack and a photo of routers and wiring, which looks geeky and techy, was this in reference to the router? Or perhaps it is in reference to a reality many in charge are not ready to face any day soon, and in light of the upcoming US elections of 2016, some of these politicians definitely do not want to face it before 2017. Like the Google Tax, let the next person fix it!

A preferred political approach that will allow them to lose exclusivity of your data real fast!

 

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May 25, 2015 · 00:03

Dark side of the moon

The Guardian ended up with an interesting article on Friday. The title ‘Malware is not only about viruses – companies preinstall it all the time‘ (at http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2015/may/22/malware-viruses-companies-preinstall), it is a good article and Richard Stallman is a great man, but there are parts in this article that I have an issue with. Mind you, the man is not telling stories or lying, but he is showing one side of the coin. He is also reinforcing other sides to the software industry that are a definite issue.

The first part is a part I am completely in agreement with “In 1983, the software field had become dominated by proprietary (i.e. non-free) programs, and users were forbidden to change or redistribute them“, a side which I do not oppose. In addition there is “But proprietary developers in the 1980s still had some ethical standards: they sincerely tried to make programs serve their users, even while denying users control over how they would be served“, I have a partial issue with the last bit ‘denying users control over how they would be served‘. I disagree for two reasons.

The first is based on resources. In those days, an IBM PC was a massive behemoth, it had 256Kb memory and if you were really really rich, you also had a 10Mb hard drive. So, yes, the expensive personal computer had less resources then the cheapest $39 Non-smart Nokia phone. Go figure! By the way, that 10Mb hard drive was priced at $1499 in those days. So, user control was an issue, because resources did not allow for them, but soon thereafter, the 512Kb PC was released and there was so much we could do then! No sarcasm here, it was true! In those days I learned and mastered Lotus Symphony an excellent program! This was also a time when we started to get some choices in control, control remained limited, but some control was gained.

Next we see the first part that is an issue, even though he makes a nice point on End User License Agreements. I would like to add the Terms of service as a clear point here, but overall there is a part that is too coloured. The quote “So many cases of proprietary malware have been reported, that we must consider any proprietary program suspect and dangerous. In the 21st century, proprietary software is computing for suckers“.

I cannot completely disagree that Microsoft soured the market by a lot, it has done so in several directions, yet Corporate Earth is at times too stupid to consider growing a brain, which is also part of the problem. It is an element that is shown all over the place. The Netherlands, Sweden, UK, France, Germany, Denmark and even Australia (I worked in all those countries). Instead of sitting down and considering a switch to LINUX with open office, the IT and other elements are just too lazy and too under resourced to push for a change, so the users are no longer people, they are for the most mere meek sheep following the ‘corporate standard‘, which means that they too use windows and Office.

Another direction is the hardware world. Windows comes preinstalled, more important, Windows and Microsoft have been a driving force, forcing people to buy stronger and more expensive computers. Even though many users have not needed any need for more powerful and stronger hardware, Windows forced them to upgrade again and again. Anyone not into gaming and using their computer merely for office activities and browsing mail on the internet should not have needed to upgrade their computer for the better part of 10 years, but that is not the reality, go to any computer shop for windows hardware and we see how the ‘old’ ASUS, ACER, Lenovo, HP or Toshiba no longer hacks it. Which is actually weird, because if you reinstall your old laptop with LINUX and Apache Open Office there is a high chance that you will work in 90% of the time just as fast as with that new $2000 laptop on Windows 7. Setback? You have to install and configure it yourself. Upside? LINUX and Open Office are both free software, no costs and no fees!

Is it not interesting how companies are not jumping on that free horse? Why is that you think? In addition, with all the needs for government costs to go down, why are they not more pro-active to push for a shift towards LINUX? Is it security? This is also odd, because with the massive amount of non-stop security patches, Windows is not that secure to begin with.

So where do I disagree? Well the first clear quote is “Some are designed to shackle users, such as Digital Rights Management (DRM)“, I believe that if a firm makes software, it has every right to prevent illegal use, for a long time, how many people do you know that have a LEGAL version of Adobe? Even when the stars are in your favour. In many Universities, Adobe offers the entire master collection (all their software) for $400, which is an amazing deal! I got my legal versions of both Windows 7 and Microsoft Office Ultimate for an additional $199. Why not buy it? No many just find a download place and get the software for free, in addition you can get the codes. It goes even further that I stumbled on a place in Germany some years ago where they were offering the OEM stickers for PC complete with license key for 20 Mark. I could not tell the difference from the original sticker in the software box I had bought. Do you think that DRM would have been such a push if people just bought their software? I will take it one step further, I feel certain that if every person was charged $275 a year, we all would have the complete Adobe, Windows and Office programs free to download, with no need to illegally copy anything.

But there is still that other side. You see, I still believe that Microsoft and hardware providers have been forcing a technological armistice race upon the consumers, which now adds up to us all wasting resources on iterative junk we should not need. So even though I do not completely agree with Richard Stallman here, he does have a point.

Now we get to an issue that I actually faced without knowing it “Even Android contains malware in a non-free component: a back door for remote forcible installation or deinstallation of any app“, you see, I thought I was bonkers (which I actually are) but for some reason one of my apps had suddenly be removed and not by me. It was not something I needed. I had just downloaded it from Google play out of curiosity, but suddenly it was gone! In addition, on more than one occasion it just decided to update my apps, without my permission. When you have bandwidth issues, seeing a force upgrade which could cost you is not that nice a moment.

Yet, for the most, I remain a loyal fan towards Android, even though at times programs use background resources for reasons unknown, or are they unknown?

We get the next part from the quote “Even humble flashlight apps for phones were found to be reporting data to companies. A recent study found that QR code scanner apps also snoop“, there is a lot more at http://www.facstaff.bucknell.edu/ejsmith/scan.this.or.scan.me.2015.pdf; now we have ourselves a massive issue, although the paper shows that there is a prompt for GPS and the sending of GPS, none of them has the situation where they do not prompt for GPS and still send it. Eric Smith and Dr Nina A. Kollars who wrote the paper give us another consideration on page 8. There we see “Moreover, contemporary privacy norms are increasingly threatened as what initially appears to be signals of consumer preference slide further into determining bigger-picture life patterns and behavior. The term most commonly used to address this creeping phenomenon is the literature on consumer panopticism“, which now refers to ‘Gandy, Oscar H. The Panoptic Sort: A Political Economy of Personal Information‘. Before getting the book (which is worth the purchase), you might want to take a look at a paper by Adam Arvidsson, from the Department of Film and Media Studies, University of Copenhagen, Denmark (at http://www.surveillance-and-society.org/articles1(4)/prehistory.pdf), you see, my partial issue with the article by Richard Stallman becomes slowly visible now. He is right in his view and his vision as he sees this, but you the user did this to yourself! You think that Facebook is ‘free’, that these apps are there merely for amusement (some actually are), their goal is income! Some work the Freemium game market, where games like ‘Book of Heroes‘ gives you a free game, but if you want to grow faster and better in the game, you will have to invest. For the most, these games will rely on the investment from $10-$25 to truly open up, which is, if you consider the amount of hours played still great value. Freemium games also come with that ‘try before you buy’ approach, as you can play the game, but to enjoy it, to get more moves and more joy a few dollars will be essential. The other part that relies on ‘captured data’ did they inform you? If not, there is an issue, but the app programmer will get his pound of flesh, either by cash of by data!

Yet the other side is also true, you see, as Richard mentions and as Adam Arvidsson report on, there are places like Red Sheriff, that rely on hidden script, which is more advanced/intrusive as it keeps track of ALL your online movements. You get this script as a ‘present’ when you visit one of its affiliated sites. Did you the internet user sign up for that? When we see the reference on who pushes this. We see “since most major commercial sites use Redsheriff“, which means that nearly all will somehow be tracked. I for one do not really care that much, but I never signed up for any of it, so should we see this as an invasion to our privacy?

This is where we see that freeware is almost never free.

Yet Richard also alerts us to another state of freedom, or lack thereof! In the quote “If the car itself does not report everywhere you drive, an insurance company may charge you extra to go without a separate tracker“. Can anyone explain to me why it is ANY business of the insurer where we are?

In the end, Richard states three parts, which are fair enough, but overall the issue is missed. The issues reported are:

“Individually, by rejecting proprietary software and web services that snoop or track“, here I do not completely agree! I used Adobe as an example for a reason, there is simply no viable alternative, it only became worse when Macromedia bought Adobe (I know it is the other way round, but I will remain a faithful Macromedia fan until the day I die!), there is in addition, no tracking done by Adobe, other than keeping track whether you have a valid license, which I never opposed.

“Collectively, by organising to develop free/libre replacement systems and web services that don’t track who uses them“, which I whole heartedly agree with, I am even willing to devote time to this worthy cause (not sure how I could ever size up to the hundreds of Richard Stallman’s, but I am willing to give it a go!

And last there is “Democratically, by legislation to criminalise various sorts of malware practices. This presupposes democracy, and democracy requires defeating treaties such as the TPP and TTIP that give companies the power to suppress democracy“, this is the big one. The political branches all over Europe and the Commonwealth have sold us short and have not done anything to properly enforce the rights to privacy. In addition, Google and Apple remains in a state of non-clarity on what data these apps capture and what they convey. In that regard Facebook is equally guilty. Facebook goes further that it does not even proper police those who claim to give a free app, only to no longer work, but when you went to the install the data is as I see it already captured by the app provider, which gives wonder to where that data went.

In regards to suppressing democracy, which is perhaps partially overstated, there is an issue with the TPP that seems to empower large corporations and nullify the protection to smaller innovators and even governments as the TTP wants to enforce “where foreign firms can ‘sue’ states and obtain taxpayer compensation for ‘expected future profits’”, how long until we get an invoice for overinflated ego’s? Especially from those people in the entertainment industry claiming the loss of so many billions in an era when the bulk of the population can hardly pay their rent!

I regard Graham Burke of Village Roadshow to be one of the greater jokes this era has brought forth. Consider who he is supposed to ‘protect’, he goes on regarding “‘crazies’ whose hidden agenda is the ‘theft of movies’“, which is not that far-fetched a statement, because movies will be downloaded and not bought, it happens, yet not to the degree Graham Burke claims it is! So we get him soon enough to claim billions from losses due to the massive download of ‘the LEGO movie’ perhaps? Yet in the public forum on copyright infringement, we did not hear him utter a word on bandwidth, perhaps the response from Telstra’s Jane Van Beelen would likely have been a little too uncomfortable Mr Burke?

You see, in my view it is less about the democracy as Richard Stallman sees it. The legal protection seems to be massively delayed as bandwidth is income, and when piracy is truly stopped bandwidth will simmer down. If we accept the word of Village Roadshow with global revenue of 13 billion since 1997. Yet, I wrote about movie piracy in ‘The real issue here!‘ on June 17th 2014 (at https://lawlordtobe.com/2014/06/17/the-real-issue-here/), in the calculation, which I kept very conservative, Telstra could lose up to 320 million a month in revenue, due to diminished bandwidth, which gets us 4 billion a year. Consider that Village Roadshow is global, which means that Australian revenue is a mere fraction of that, how soon until they see that Village roadshow might only get 5-10 million a year more, against the 320 million a month loss for Telstra? So Mr. Burke is not regarded as a serious party as I see it (yet he is not an invalid party), Telstra would have too much to lose, not to mention the loss Optus and iiNet could face. However, if the TPP changes that with ‘expected future profits’, whilst there is absolutely no quality data to prove that the loss is nothing more than there ego’s talking.

There is the crunch that politicians are too afraid to touch!

Yet, in light of many factors, legal protection (including protection for Village Roadshow) is essential, yet the large corporations seem to hold the game to the need of their bottom dollar, which is the dollar, not democracy or decent rights. If it were decent rights than telecom companies would properly monitor abuse of digital rights, because the movie is for Village Roadshow to sell, or to stream for a fee via Netflix. I do not deny this at all, I just oppose the outlandish income some of them claim that they ‘lost’!

So on the dark side of the moon we see that (actually we do not see any of that) things are not right. I do not completely adhere to the idealist view that Richard Stallman validly has (we are all entitled to our views), but he touches on several parts that definitely need change and until we see a governmental push away from Microsoft solutions, we will see that the government will spend loads of money on never-ending updates to hardware and software. We all agree that such a change is not easily made, but in light of the cost of living, the fact that nearly no one makes that change is equally worrisome.

When we stare up to the sky we always see the same side of the moon, the dark side is wild, and is covered with impact craters, impacts we never see. It is a lot more reminiscent of the chaotic wild life of malware, a side that is constantly lacking the exposure it should have, mainly because it affects the bottom dollar.

 

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