Showing posts with label lawcast. Show all posts
Showing posts with label lawcast. Show all posts

Wednesday, September 21, 2016

Lawcast Hiatus until at least Summer 2017

Marvin and Garfield wrestling

I've long wanted to bring back the Lawcast. I thought leaving Sportazine might mean I had the time to bring the Lawcast back, but it has become clear that is not the case. There are a lot of reasons, but ultimately, I just don't have time, so why spend time listing a bunch of reasons?

Summer of 2017 seems optimistic. I am unlikely to have time to find an intern, but that would be the hope. The most likely scenario would be that Ryan comes back, but I don't want to talk to him seriously about that until after he is done with this semester.

If not summer of 2017, then each summer seems like a new opportunity to get another rising 2L. Also, maybe in a couple of years we will move closer to my place of employment, and that will free up more time. I'm commuting about two hours presently (an hour each way). I'd like to bring the Lawcast back, but something drastic will need to happen for that to happen.

In the mean time, we do still talk about legal issues from time-to-time on the main show.

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Wednesday, June 1, 2016

Introducing Ryan Masters


File:Magnetic-tape-acetate-vs-polyester-backing.jpg
Magnetic audio reel-to-reel tapes, from Wikipedia

I had some time on the plane this weekend, so I wrote a little introduction for the summer blocSonic/Music Manumit intern, Ryan Masters. It will be brief, but it frees up Ryan to work on what he wants.

Ryan is a rising 2nd year law student at the University of New Hampshire (where I went to law school). He is specifically interested in record labels.

The first year of law school is basically all core classes. For our purposes, it's just important to know that he hasn't had a lot of intellectual property training. He'll be learning this summer, just like most of you reading this. It's entirely possible the majority of you will find his writing more interesting than mine, since mine will often be more detail-oriented.

It's also important to note that the laws are different in different countries. While blocSonic/Music Manumit and Ryan are all interested in international law, familiarity necessitates that we focus on US law. If someone would like to write for us from an international perspective, we'd love to add to the team.

How much Ryan ends up writing and recording for the Lawcast is still to be determined. I'm sure you'll see it on the homepage.

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Tuesday, August 25, 2015

16. Lawcast: Performance Rights Organizations (PROs) and Collection Societies

In this episode, Thomas and Doug focus on the US-based music rights organizations, ASCAP, BMI, SESAC, and SoundExchange.

Expected Audience: Musicians trying to monetize in the USA

Audio
mp3 audio | ogg audio | stream | torrent


This month's drinks:
Doug - Celestial Seasoning's Honey Vanilla Chamomile
Thomas - Simply Enjoy Hawaiian Blend Coffee

Friday, August 7, 2015

15. Lawcast: Band Agreements

This image licensed as CC BY-SA. Click for details.

Expected Audience: Musicians in a band or novice attorneys working with bands

mp3 audio | ogg audio | stream | torrent 

Once we finally get past the announcements and coffee talk, Thomas has four major points for musicians to make sure they get in their band agreement. We go into detail on those points. We also go over some additional minor points.

Thursday, June 18, 2015

14. Lawcast Reboot Episode One: Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license

http://www.teqsa.gov.au/sites/default/files/cc_by_logo.jpg
Creative Commons Attribution Symbol

As always, this show is not legal advice and does not constitute an attorney-client relationship.

Audio
mp3 audio | ogg audio | stream | torrent | unedited video
Once again we don't have the player because we uploaded the video before realizing that mean no audio player. That will be resolved next month!

Thomas and Doug go through the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license line-by-line, pointing out anything they think is important. Given the length of the document, this show runs about twice as long as normal.

Thursday, June 4, 2015

13. Lawcast Reboot Episode Zero: Where We Are Headed

This is not legal advice. Leave audio feedback at (512) 686-6329.

Expected Audience: Anyone that wants to learn about the show reboot

Original and License

mp3 audio | ogg audio | torrent | stream | unedited video

First off, things are a bit funky with all of the imported shows into the main feed (this is the first one). They all show up as "Tom Ray" as the author. Aside from the design work for the site, Mr. Ray is not involved in the Lawcast. There are now two Tom's though! Thomas Giannini is the Tom on the Lawcast!

Also, there's no embedded player because I uploaded the audio as a file on the video entry. If I figure out how to get the player for audio, I'll delete these lines and put it here!


Tuesday, April 7, 2015

Lawcast is coming back, but lots of changes.

This image is in the public domain.

I really should have posted this on Easter, but whether you look at the past or the future it won't line up with three days. The Lawcast was dead and is about to be killed off. However, it is coming back stronger than ever. Actually, the comeback may come before the death.

"What the hell are you talking about, Doug?"

Two things - obviously.

First, I'm talking about moving everything to the main page. We will handle all of the different feeds by tag. I will tag everything pertaining to law as "law," assuming that's what Tom does when he does the import. There is no time frame on this, but it is happening.

Second, the Lawcast is coming back with a new co-host. I don't know how regularly we will do the show, but it is happening. I'm going to look at his studio on Thursday (it's Tuesday as I write this).

Thursday, December 4, 2014

Please Support Snowdrift.coop for the Future of the Commons

I don't think I can say it better than Aaron, so just watch.



Note: the main video above is also available in fully-free format at Archive.org.

Monday, September 15, 2014

Introduction to Aaron Wolf and Snowdift.coop

This is not legal advice. Leave audio feedback at (512) 686-6329.

Expected Audience: Those interested in financially supporting free culture and having their free culture works financially supported.


mp3 audio | ogg audio | torrent (CC BY)

Ever since Nick and I decided to start what would become Netizen Empowerment Federation in January 2012, I have been thinking a lot about financial sustainability. It's the main reason I decided to broaden the scope of the Lawcast.

I think snowdrift.coop has a lot of promise for financial sustainability, but it isn't ready yet. I've spent some time today preparing to get people together to discuss what can be done now - or if waiting really is the best option. I decided that having a discussion where the focus was "get us from now to snowdrift.coop" did not make a lot of sense if people weren't familiar with snowdrift.coop.

Snowdrift.coop has an overwhelming amount of documentation and even if it was a little less overwhelming, some people wouldn't read it. That's why I have decided to provide subscribers with the audio to this interview.

Unfortunately, the audio is still a bit overwhelming at over two hours. Perhaps Aaron has the time to make it to our panel. Perhaps Aaron and I can do a shorter interview. I'll see what I can do.

For now, as said by Aaron:
"The show is a bit over two hours long and covers topics including: copyright, music business, economics, participatory vs performance-based music, philosophy of art, barbershop harmony, software freedom, and more. Overall, it's a good casual summary of my whole personal story of my life and career and how I came to my current understanding and feelings on these topics."



Here are the links (with just a bit of commentary) from the original post.


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Friday, September 12, 2014

Ongoing Lawcast Hiatus, but Broader Focus

This is not legal advice. Leave audio feedback at (512) 686-6329.

I. Ongoing Hiatus

I don't think this needs a lot. The reasons for the hiatus were briefly documented here before and there's been even more on my personal blog.

I will add two things.

First, I will confirm that there is no schedule for returning. I will develop a plan after October 8. I'm in a bit of a holding pattern until then. I am unsure of how long after Oct 8 it will take me. That will depend on what I find out on Oct 8.

Second, I will note that I have a new Patreon listing. I suppose I should add a tier where I end the hiatus. That will be my next step after publishing this!

The hiatus from blogs and audio shows doesn't mean I haven't been thinking about things...

II. Broader Focus

I have already mentioned this in public, but not on the blog. Recent discussions about projectEqualize prompted me to make sure it was on the blog. The Lawcast is going to become a location for academic-type discussions around music, including panel discussions about the future of Creative Commons music.

As of the moment, I am calling this "Law & Policy" but I'm thinking music education, music technology, and basically, the type of stuff that doesn't really fit in the weekly Music Manumit show. Also, it will give me the opportunity to bring people into Music Manumit that can't work on the normal Music Manumit schedule. For example, Jason of Lame Drivers has a Friday night conflict.

Basically, since the Lawcast is only me now (although I'm happy to have this change), there's no reason for it not to have more of my voice. The end of Brian's involvement was the trademark show, so I guess it makes sense that the next post after that would be an announcement of this sort.

III. Panel

If I were ready to end the hiatus, this is where I'd announce a panel discussion on what the community wants out of projectEqualize. I really would like to do that, but I don't have time to put something like that together right now. Based on the loose timetable Mike recently gave, it seems reasonable to think I can pull together a panel before projectEqualize is complete. At this point, all I can say, is watch this space.

Get in Touch
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My Last.fm: DouglasAWh.
Libre.fm: douglasawh.
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Friday, May 2, 2014

Trademark Basics 1: Intro to Trademarks

This is not legal advice. Leave audio feedback at (512) 686-6329. This show was edited using GNU/Linux.

Expected Audience: Law Students and those interested in trademark basics

File:Coca-Cola logo.svg
Click For Image Usage Details

mp3 audio | ogg audio | torrent

This is a joint work by Doug and Brian. Brian is on voice. Doug edited and typed. Technically speaking, I'm still on hiatus, though I do have a back catalog of shows that need editing. I may very well get those out the door in the next few days.

I'm not entirely sure what took me so long to get this out. Maybe archive.org was down when I tried to upload it back in January?

Originally, this was supposed to be a series. It still might be. The other planned articles in the trademark basics series were going to be What is a Trademark?, Ownership and Use, Loss of Trademark Rights, Infringement, False Designation of Origin, Advertising, Dilution and Remedies. I was also planning to cover Tax and Trademarks/Goodwill, Trademarks and Ethnic Music, and Access to Gray Market Goods at some point. If I get donations or even requests, I may end up completing the series. Donation information is both on the right and at the bottom of this article.

And for those of you that are deaf, and I know there is at least one likely to see this, in the future the series may be text. I've got to figure out financials before I think about continuing the series. However, as with everything, feedback will speed up the process!

Until next time!

Get in Touch

Music Manumit Last.fm group
My Last.fm username: DouglasAWh.
Libre.fm username: douglasawh.
GNU Social: daw
I'm on too many social networks to list them all!

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Not Quite an Episode

This is a rerun of the Music Manumit Podcast on July 7th, 2010. This was supposed to go out before Nick and I did the interview with Pete, but it didn't. Better late than never. And just in case you're curious, I'm still technically on hiatus.

RasterWeb!
Pete aka raster's logo

mp3 audio | ogg audio | torrent

From Music Manumit Podcast:We talk with Pete Prodoehl, who's been involved in many disciplines of the creative arts, from music to photography, as well as videography, writing, drawing, and general computer hackery. Pete has been involved in open source software, and many other open initiatives such as BarCamp, Bucketworks, Web414, and MilwaukeeDevHouse. Check out Pete's music here. And the his photography here.

Pete tells us the story of how the media used one of his works, and the outcome of his pursuit to make them follow the CC license.

Thursday, April 10, 2014

Free Culture Baltimore and Baltimore/Maryland 2600

Expected Audience: Baltimorians, Marylanders and those from the surrounding area.

File:BaltimoreC12.png
Image licensed under CC BY-SA


I'm still on hiatus, but this is related enough to my work at Hopkins that I should take the time to do it. This is only vaguely related to the law, but I'll be bringing my legal knowledge to both projects, so I feel like it is worth a share here.

I. Free Culture Baltimore is an organization I am starting to bring my local community of free culture thinkers together. The intent is to become a local chapter of the Free Culture Foundation. My last day in my current position at Hopkins is April 24th, and it has been clear for some time that there is not a go-to person here (other than me) for free culture issues. It is not that there aren't people at Hopkins that couldn't figure it out. In fact, the JHU School of Public Health decided to release some course materials under a CC BY-NC-SA before I was here. [I personally disagree with the -NC part of that decision, but they are following the example set by MIT and this is not really the place for a general post about OCW (though I'm happy to do a longer post if people are interested). If you want to look at some data about OCW, I encourage you to look at and contribute to the spreadsheet I have started.]

As with all of my projects, I try to be realistic and not take on too much. Considering my current list of projects (NEF, MEFSportazine, Music Manumit, OSP), I don't realistically see Free Culture Baltimore as becoming anything more than a mailing list. I certainly hope I'm wrong about that, but I will need strong participation from others. Part of my hesitance on predicting more for the organization is that I could find out in October that I am leaving Baltimore in July 2015. If I don't leave then, I almost certainly will in July 2016. I'm sure my move will be discussed on the show once I know where I are headed. I'll immediately start looking for free culture opportunities in the next city, and while their is a list of cities, I don't think it makes much sense to speculate right now (although, again, if people are interested, I'm happy to share).

I do want to take a moment to think big about Free Culture Baltimore, because very few people are going to be excited about a mailing list. I think almost everything I'd like to do is a local implementation of things I'd like to do with NEF, but since not everyone reading this will be familiar with NEF, it is worth mentioning some explicit goals:

1. Get more people using federated social media, such as mediagoblin, which is currently running a funding campaign.
2. Get more people using free software generally.
3. Help creators understand both in- and out-licensing.
4. Help creators with crowd-funding campaigns.
5. Help creators with live exhibitions, shows, talks or however one might present material in physical space.

To be a little more specific, it'd be great if we could get local institutions like the Peabody Conservatory and MICA to release more material under a Creative Commons license. Which institutions end up doing what, if anything, really depends on who ends up joining the organization. I'm new to the area, so my local connections are limited.

II. Maryland 2600, which appears to have also gone by the name 2600 Group Baltimore, seems to no longer exist. Their twitter and LiveJournal are no longer maintained and both the .org and .net websites no longer exists. Strictly speaking, this isn't a music project, but I'd really like to find some answers and I know a lot of our audience are tech people. Specifically, I'd like to know if the meetings still take place, because they are still listed in the quarterly meeting list. I tried to go last Friday, but I couldn't find any group at the Barnes & Noble that looked like a 2600 group. Of course, since I've never been to a meeting, I didn't really know what I sought. In case you're wondering what 2600 is, you should check out the global 2600 website.




Last.fm username: DouglasAWh.
Libre.fm username: douglasawh
stativerse: daw

I'm on too many social networks to list them all!

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Sunday, January 19, 2014

Lawcast Hiatus

I am currently looking for post-graduation employment. Writing various cover letters and such is going to take up much of the time I previously spent on Music Manumit Lawcast.

If something important comes up, I'll be sure to share it here, but until then, I am on hiatus.

This will NOT change the non-Lawcast Music Manumit output in any way.

-----------------
Last.fm username: DouglasAWh.
Libre.fm username: douglasawh
stativerse: daw

I'm on too many social networks to list them all!


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Friday, November 15, 2013

Other Legal Podcasts To Check Out

I was going to make this list for a professor at my law school and I decided, why not share it with the world?

Here are the law podcasts I currently listen to. If you want to know about the sports podcasts or tech podcasts I listen to, I made lists for those this past summer (they have changed a bit, but not a ton).

General


More policy than law, but close enough for this list, I think.



Whether you're a conservative or not, you have to understand that these shows have a conservative bias. That means if you're representing a client, you'll have to think through if what they are saying is actually the law or what conservatives want to be the law. The Federalist Society also has event podcasts, a faculty division podcast and a SCOTUS podcast. If I had time, I'd listen to those too, but I don't have time. In fact, there are a LOT of legal podcasts out there, but I just don't have time to listen to them all!

IP


Actually, I just added this, so I don't have anything to say about it.



Finnegan is one of the largest IP law firms in the world.



This is half law podcast and half commercial for their clients. I've obviously got it in my feeds, but if you're only an occasional podcast listener, I'd suggest finding other feeds.



They probably don't want to be associated with "Intellectual Property," but the whole idea that IP isn't, well, property, seems to be based on some natural law definition of property. Humans invented property and we can make property rights out of whatever we want. Of course, I will have multiple graduate degrees once I finish law school, so maybe the whole philosophical idea of property sits better with me than the general public. From a political perspective, maybe disassociating IP from real property makes sense, but it still seems odd to me. Real property is not without limits. There are easements. There are rules against restricting alienation. If land were some easy thing with no "fair use" or "exhaustion" rights, then we wouldn't need to spend a whole semester on it in law school. There'd be a clinic for learning how to file deeds or something, and that would be it. Obviously, I'm on a soap box, so let me get off of it and say that this is a great show. It's less legal focused now that Karen is no longer at the SFLC and is at the GNOME Foundation, but it's still great and there's still a lot of great legal content.



There's probably not a lot I can say about the podcast without talking about the organization, so I'll just say check them out. They are a great organization.


This is part of TWiT. It probably needs no introduction.



Unfortunately, this is no longer active, but I've still got a ton of content to go through in my feed, so it makes the list for now.

Sports Law (it's true that this has little to do with Music Manumit, but might as well keep them all in one place)


Strictly speaking, this is not a sports law podcast. However, they do delve into sports law issues on occasion. It's worth keeping in your feed if you're interested in policy issues in the beautiful game.
SportsLaw10



This is great if you're interested in international governance. It's not so great if you're interested in US law.



It doesn't come out often enough for me to have a lot to say about them, but I have listened to every episode and I still have it in my feed, so that should tell you something.

Last.fm username: DouglasAWh.
Libre.fm username: douglasawh
stativerse: daw

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Thursday, October 24, 2013

The Rest of this Semester, Next Semester, and Beyond

This is not legal advice. Leave audio feedback at (512) 686-6329.

Expected Audience: Longtime Followers of the Blog

Well, it's the same title I gave over at Sportazine, but it's not the same content. Presumably, no one cares about TINT or Sports Law here.

The Rest of the Semester
There's about a month and a half left in the semester. I doubt Brian is going to get his trademark podcasts out. Unless I republish or rearrange my upcoming Sports Law and IP post from Sportazine, I doubt I'll be getting up anything else this semester. My courses are Patent Practice, Sports Law, Administrative Procedure, Technology Licensing, Writing for Practice and an Independent Study getting NEF up and running. Now, maybe there's something about copyright licensing from Tech Licensing or maybe there's something somewhere else, but there's nothing obvious. The Copyright Office is part of the Library of Congress, so it's not an executive agency. It's not really worth getting into, but basically I don't know that there's a lot. Now, the PTO handles trademarks and maybe there's something there, but at the end of the day, I probably just don't have time. Aside from classes and the NEF sites, I'm also working on a compilation with blocSonic and Living Libre, which will be out in December.


Next Semester
This is the main reason for me writing. The announcement is that I’ll be living in Baltimore and externing at Johns Hopkins University next semester in their Tech Transfer department. 
I don’t know what that means yet for the Lawcast. I don’t know what I’ll be at liberty to say due to attorney-client privilege, but I’ll bring as much to you as I can. I do know they are interested in having me do some copyright work, so there might be something I can bring to the blog. For now, don't expect anything next semester.

Beyond
At this point, there's not much to say about beyond. For OSP and Sportazine, I can assume that once I get a job, output will be much like things were before going to law school. However, the Lawcast did not exist until midway through 1L year, so there's no precedent. Of course, I now have other people contributing to OSP and Sportazine, which was not the case before law school. There's still no one else really contributing to the Lawcast, though certainly Nick and Brian have in the past. My hope is that I get someone to write regularly on the Lawcast. If you think that person could be you, please let me know!


Get in Touch


Last.fm username: DouglasAWh.
Libre.fm username: douglasawh
stativerse: daw

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Monday, August 19, 2013

12. What's Jazz Got To Do With It?

File:CascadeLivery.jpg

This is not legal advice. Leave audio feedback at (512) 686-6329. This show was recorded and edited using GNU/Linux.

Expected Audience: People interested in Jazz and the Law




mp3 audio | ogg audio | torrent

This week on the Lawcast we have something a little bit different. If you want to hear more from Robert, check out The Jazzcast After Party or you can check out when Tom and I had him on the main Music Manumit show. Thanks, as always on the Jazzcast, to Ryno for twiddling the knobs!

The reason it took so long to get this out is that I had to go back and put in some of the tracks because one of the channels dropped out late in the show. I didn't go back and fix the audio when Robert and I were talking because I thought it would take too long, but I didn't think it was fair to the musicians for you not to hear both of their channels, in case they had anything recorded in stereo.

I regret not getting this out sooner, because I think this might be the format of the future. We'll see if I am even able to do the Lawcast next summer. Brian and I discussed a bit about the future of the Lawcast on the last episode, but I go into a bit more detail in the most recent OpenSourcePlayground.org article.





Introduce Robert


Eternal Jazz Project
Song: Meander
Album: Gratis Jazz
BY NC SA

Swedish group
cool jazz inspired
electronica and jazz


Magnatune member “since the beginning”

Janne Nummela
Song: "Icthys I"
By NC SA


Imperial Tiger Orchestra


Janne Nummela
Song: "Mom's Song II"
Album: Kosmoskalevala
By NC SA



Contract law and unconscionability.
Arbitration vs. class action
“almost impossible to meet standard“

Class actions are not a panacea?


Talk about the first jazz track.
1st Million Selling Jazz record!


Dixieland Jass Band
"Livery Stable Blues"
PD

So, we’re both sorta right!
Doug pics two as well!

  1. "Grigioscuro" by Oprachina (jazz) - CC-BY-NC-SA - Website
  2. "African Skies" by Joel Holmes (Jazz) - CC-BY-SA - Website




Here's a followup email Robert sent me
Hi Doug:

Thanks for having me on the jazzcast. I appreciate it.

I woke up this morning eager to sort out all my confusions on the pre-1972 issues.

Here is what I learned:

1. as you discussed on the podcast, pre-1972 federal law did not protect sound recordings. The 1972 Act began that protection as to recordings from mid-February 1972. The 1976 act continued and incorporated the protection. Though the 1976 act provided for pre-emption of state law in some areas as to published works, state law is not pre-empted as to pre 1972 sound recordings until 2067.

2. state copyright law still applies to pre-1972 acts. Though the Copyright Office recommended passage of a savings statute,
I did not locate that one has passed, and believe I erred when I inferred that from a quick reading of the Copyright Office materials.

3. The field of state law copyright protection heated up when the New York state Court of Appeals held that the DMCA safe harbor does not apply to state copyright claims in pre-1972 matters, in a suit denying that key affirmative defense to 
Grooveshark. http://www.citizen.org/documents/NYAppDIvOpin.pdf

So it looks like I muddied up the podcast because 

a. then and now, it looks like  federal copyright protection in pre-Feb-1972 sound recordings is limited to the elements (lyrics, music, etc.) and not the recording itself and that state law copyright applies and
b. though the Copyright Office recommended a fix, no fix yet applies, and
c. state law in most states does provide (patchwork) protection for these works and
d. the DMCA's protection for broadcasters may not apply to infringement of these works under state law

Sorry to get it wrong on the show!

best, Bob