Group items tagged

"This paper investigates the conditions of the manufacture of low-cost technology in China with the examples of 'pirated' VCD players, 'no-name' DVD players, and Shenzhen's development as a techno-urban city. It emphasizes the significance of the cultural logic of original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) and argues that the various transformations and deflections that are derived from ubiquitous OEM experiences have gone beyond the original model of an authorized OEM, experiences that are to some extent embodied in the transgression of brand name and patent hegemonies, which are mainly controlled by high technology companies. OEMs have been associated with China's current imperative and uninhibited development of low-cost technology capitalism. 'Made in China' signifies the production of any product, legal or illegal, for transnational high technology giants or domestic technology manufacturers. Learning to 'become an OEM' in China has partly resulted in excessive technological mimesis that may be part of an unauthorized, underground economy that is based on low-cost technology. Based on the Shenzhen experience, part of this study will show industrial production-oriented OEM cultures in which illegal operations and counterfeit trade are incorporated, even in city projects that are shared by municipal governments and Chinese technological companies, and undergo spatial restructuring in the development of the economy, consumerism, and urbanism. "

"The common Western narrative of China is of a country whose businesses unfairly compete by stealing intellectual property from others and making money off of copycat technology. While undoubtedly a large amount of IP theft does happen in China, its hard to believe that anyone can look at China and not see innovation everywhere. I've noticed that this question of innovation in China comes up often among Western observers of China. Why? Do we feel that the playing field is unfair? Are we in the U.S. desperately looking for signs of an enduring competitive advantage even as we've shipped our entire manufacturing base overseas? I'm not sure, but the topic sure comes up a lot. Yes, China can innovate, but what kind of innovation? Jacob Hsu (Symbio) remarked that in Silicon Valley, investors and entrepreneurs are looking for "business model" innovation, which I interpreted to mean a new product that creates new markets. He characterized Chinese innovation as mostly incremental "technology" innovation in the past, but that increasing we were seeing highly innovative companies emerge, such as Tencent. He also highlighted the phenomenon of "shanzhai" as an example of innovation on a much smaller scale. The "shanzhai" consumer electronics economy in China is rapidly creating next generation connected devices out of laptop and mobile phone components, and that in most cases the minimum scale required to produce these units can be as small as a few hundred units to make money. Conventional wisdom equates intellectual property protection with innovation. But the "shanzhai" phenomenon challenges this idea. Could the lack of intellectual property protection create opportunities to remix, modify and mashup existing technology that creates an "innovation capability" for China's entrepreneurs even as the lack of IP protection prevents them from fully capitalizing on their successes (because the next guy will just rip them off)? In this

Sony has been sued for patent infringement for its Blu-Ray technology once again, this time by California intellectual property company Orinda IP USA.In May 2007, a company called Target Technology sued Sony, alleging that Blu-ray infringed on patents discussing the reflective materials used on optical discs. The suit from Orinda, filed on August 20, involves the method of reproducing data on "disk-shaped media," namely Blu-ray discs.

"The six classes of works are: (1) Motion pictures on DVDs that are lawfully made and acquired and that are protected by the Content Scrambling System when circumvention is accomplished solely in order to accomplish the incorporation of short portions of motion pictures into new works for the purpose of criticism or comment, and where the person engaging in circumvention believes and has reasonable grounds for believing that circumvention is necessary to fulfill the purpose of the use in the following instances: (i) Educational uses by college and university professors and by college and university film and media studies students; (ii) Documentary filmmaking; (iii) Noncommercial videos (2) Computer programs that enable wireless telephone handsets to execute software applications, where circumvention is accomplished for the sole purpose of enabling interoperability of such applications, when they have been lawfully obtained, with computer programs on the telephone handset. (3) Computer programs, in the form of firmware or software, that enable used wireless telephone handsets to connect to a wireless telecommunications network, when circumvention is initiated by the owner of the copy of the computer program solely in order to connect to a wireless telecommunications network and access to the network is authorized by the operator of the network. (4) Video games accessible on personal computers and protected by technological protection measures that control access to lawfully obtained works, when circumvention is accomplished solely for the purpose of good faith testing for, investigating, or correcting security flaws or vulnerabilities, if: (i) The information derived from the security testing is used primarily to promote the security of the owner or operator of a computer, computer system, or computer network; and (ii) The information derived from the security testing is used or maintained in a manner that does not facilitate copyright infringement or a violation

"Tracking the products, trends and reach of China's local to global technology & culture."

The Long Tail was a response to an essay by Clay Shirky, a prominent technology writer who also teaches at New York University. Shirky's argument dampened much of the nascent utopianism about blogs, pointing out that the readership of early blogs followed what economists call a Pareto curve, or "power curve": a small number of sites (the "head") attracted a huge number of readers, but most (the "tail") had few or none. This jarred with the utopian notion of the internet as a new kind of democracy. Why bother to participate if our fates were decided for us by a few block votes? So Anderson turned the notion upside down. The blockbuster was over, he proclaimed, and, like a man possessed, he began to see long tails everywhere. It was the Guardian that lauded this logic by comparing Anderson to Copernicus. The implicit message was that the little people would win. Many people were so keen to believe that Web 2.0 would make the world fairer that they rejected any evidence to the contrary. It was only last year, with an exhaustive study of online music sales by the economist Will Page and an experienced digital retailer, Andrew Bud, that a more useful picture of digital markets begin to emerge. Page and Bud found that most of the songs available for purchase had never been downloaded, and that the concentration of hits was more pronounced than ever before. On the file-sharing networks, the same pattern emerged. So, carrying a huge retail inventory, though cheaper than before, was of little or no value. Now, with Free, Anderson has turned to the criticism that the internet destroyed the value of movies, newspapers and music. Firms could, and now should, cross-subsidise this unprofitable activity, he argues. But cross-subsidies aren't new: they have been the subject of decades of observation by economists. Nor are they a panacea. Alan Patrick, co-founder of the Broadsight media and technology consultancy, points out that despite falling marginal costs, th

There are two common assumptions about the relationship between age and technical competency that rear their heads whenever the internet is discussed. The first assumption is that young people have a natural affinity for technology and both understand and use it in ways that older people cannot. The second is that anyone over the age of 60 is not only technically incompetent but also uninterested in the internet, using it only under protest. Both of these assumptions are flawed, yet have worked their way firmly into the public consciousness. Because they seem like 'common sense', these concepts are spread by policy makers, the media and technology companies alike. But if civil society associations take them at face value, they risk forming strategies and policies that are as flawed as the assumptions they are based on.

Asha Achuthan has an interesting series of posts over at the CIS website, a work in progress that she writes will: * lay down the historical and geo-political contexts for the use of technology in India * engage with existing concepts like context, postcoloniality, organicity, and exclusion that have come into use with the critical responses to technology in India * offer a conceptual vocabulary that explains the tools being used to engage with the question, and * suggest strategies for testing of the hypotheses being set forward in the paper, as well as parallel modes of generating 'critical debate' on them.

"How to make money from online content, even after it gets loose on third-party websites." We don't know yet seems to be the conclusion. But content creators are already changing their attitudes toward the piracy they discover. Matt Robinson, Attributor's vice president of business development and partnerships and a speaker at South by Southwest Interactive, noted that, two years ago, most of Attributor's customers used the technology to serve takedown notices. Today, he said, most are using it to gather statistics on where their content is appearing.

Smita Srinivas is Assistant Professor in the Urban Planning program at Columbia University, Director of the Technological Change Lab (TCLab), and a Faculty Associate of the South Asian Institute (SAI), Columbia University. Current and past projects include primary research in India and Finland, and comparative and collaborative work in the USA, Brazil, South Africa, and elsewhere. She advises students for their M.S. and PhD. dissertations on diverse settings: Yemen, Kenya, S. Korea, Mexico, Spain, Germany, USA, Uganda, India, and others.

"Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) has not issued any orders/guidelines in respect of ban of mobiles manufactured in China and operating in the country for want of valid International Mobile Equipment Identity (IMEI) number. However, Department of Telecom (DOT) has issued instructions to Telecom Service Providers that calls from mobile handsets with any IMEI number which is not available in the latest updated IMEI database of Global System for Mobile Association (GSMA) alongwith without IMEI or all zeroes IMEI are not processed and rejected with effect from 24 Hrs. of 30th November 2009. This information was given by the Minister of State for Communications & Information Technology, Shri Sachin Pilot in written reply to a question in Rajya Sabha today. "

"Wine, private jets, insurance policies, premium coffee and high-speed Internet service, even technology consulting, are just a few examples of the market niches that have been hit by lower prices in recent years because of widespread imitation and competition. That may be good news for consumers, but not for the small businesses that invested time and resources to create products and build markets. To survive and thrive, a small business has to learn to constantly innovate in every area, from back-shop operations to products to distribution, says management consultant Oren Harari. His book "Break From the Pack: How to Compete in a Copycat Economy," to be published in September by Wharton Publishing/Prentice Hall, is packed with advice for small businesses."

"First of all, keep in mind that it's not only stickers-or, for that matter, PCs and dishwashers and insurance policies and designer coffee-that become commodities. Every organization faces the challenge. IBM is discovering that even its traditional discrete consulting services are slowly becoming commoditized, a term IBM itself uses. Companies like Wipro-based in Bangalore, India-are replicating some of IBM's consultative offerings at much lower prices, which is why, to IBM's chagrin, companies like Louis Vuitton and Target are turning to Wipro for basic information technology and data-management expertise."

The Information Technology (Amendment) Act, 2008 was passed by both the Houses of Parliament on 23.12.08. The Act was notified after the assent of the Hon'ble President on 5.2.2009. The Depertment has prepared following draft rules under the IT(Amendment) Act., 2009 : 1. Section 52 - Salary, allowances and other terms and conditions of service of Chairperson and Members. 2. Section 54 - Procedure for investigation of misbehaviour or incapacity of Chairperson and Members. 3. Section 69 - Directions for Interception, Monitoring and Decryption of Information 4. Section 69A - Blocking for public access of any information generated, transmitted, received, stored or hosted in a computer resource 5. Section 69B - Monitoring and Collecting Traffic Data or information 6. Section 70B(1) - Appoint an agency of the Government to be called the Indian Computer Emergency Response Team 7. Section 70B(5) - The manner in which the functions and duties of agency shall be performed. Your comments/feedback may be forwarded to Dr. Gulshan Rai at grai@mit.gov.in

The Centre for Internet and Society filed an RTI application to Visvesvaraya Technological University asking it to provide details about its curriculum design, and its tie-ups with various software vendors. (The Microsoft DreamSparkProgram is an initiative by Microsoft where all the students of the VTU would be allowed to download free versions of Microsoft original software and portraying an act of benignity from Microsoft for the student community. Microsoft through this program (with the real intention of suppressing any development of intellectual self reliance of the students), was able to make a deal with the VTU.)

But the settlement would also create a class that includes millions of people who will never come forward. For the majority of books -- considered "orphan" works -- no one will claim ownership. The author may have died; the publisher might have gone out of business or doesn't respond to inquiries; the original contract has disappeared. Google would get an explicit, perpetual license to scan and sell access to these in-copyright but out-of-print orphans, which make up an estimated 50 to 70 percent of books published after 1923. No other provider of digital books would enjoy the same legal protection. The settlement also creates a Book Rights Registry that, in conjunction with Google, would set prices for all commercial terms associated with digital books. Broad access is the greatest promise of our digital age. Giving control over such access to one company, no matter how clever or popular, is a danger to principles we hold dear: free speech, open access to knowledge and universal education. Throughout history, those principles have been realized in libraries, publishers and legal systems. There are alternatives. Separate from the Google effort, hundreds of libraries, publishers and technology firms are already digitizing books, with the goal of creating an open, freely accessible system for people to discover, borrow, purchase and read millions of titles. It's not that expensive. For the cost of 60 miles of highway, we can have a 10 million-book digital library available to a generation that is growing up reading on-screen. Our job is to put the best works of humankind within reach of that generation. Through a simple Web search, a student researching the life of John F. Kennedy should be able to find books from many libraries, and many booksellers -- and not be limited to one private library whose titles are available for a fee, controlled by a corporation that can dictate what we are allowed to read.

In a new tack against piracy, Microsoft Corp. will make a series of investments in the Chinese city of Hangzhou, which has promised to clamp down on illegitimate software. Microsoft will build two new technology centers and make other investments in the wealthy city on China's east coast, with the aim to establish a model city where intellectual-property rights have greater protections than elsewhere in China. In October, Microsoft started sending out software updates that turned users' computer wallpapers black if they had a pirated Windows operating system, a move that sparked anger among some Chinese users.

"As the world economy increasingly centers on "memes, genes, and bits," new technologies permit new production models that threaten entrenched interests. As a consequence, we face a looming political battle that could reshape the information society. There are three main barriers to democratic participation in setting the rules of the information economy that bias the playing field in favor of entrenched interests and old models. The first is that the harms of bad A2K policy often take a long time to manifest themselves, making it difficult to instill a sense of urgency in the body politic and among policy elites. The current experience of "information overload" obscures increasing regulation of the use of knowledge. The second is that information policy issues tend to be highly technical and esoteric to the uninitiated, and difficult even for the initiated to analyze effectively. The third is that the promises of a world where knowledge is free as the air we breathe seems ephemeral in the face of the concrete harms claimed by those who would fence off the information commons."