Blogs

Which? has welcomed the news that the solicitors’ watchdog will pursue its complaint about a London law firm, Davenport Lyons, which accused hundreds of innocent consumers of illegal file sharing. The internet users accused of illegal sharing received letters from the law firm demanding payment of around £500 compensation for copyrightⁱ infringement.

Three out of four (73%) of UK consumers don’t know what they are allowed to copy or record. Fewer than one in five (17%) consumers know that it is illegal to copy a CD or DVD they have bought on to a computer for their own use, and even fewer (15%) think that it is illegal to copy them to an iPod.  Nearly four in ten (38%) of those using either an iPod or MP3 player admit to copying CDs onto their player.

Innocent consumers are receiving legal letters accusing them of illegally sharing porn and music files, according to Which? Computing. London law firm ACS Law has already contacted thousands of people who it claims have been illegally sharing copyrightⁱ material on everything from video games to German techno music. The letters offer the recipients the chance to ‘settle’ the claim by paying a compensation fee of around £500. Over 150 consumers have turned to Which? for help as a result. Matt Bath, Technology Editor at Which?

The Confederación de Consumidores y Usuarios (CECU)'s latest submission to the Spanish Parliamentary Commission on Intellectual Property asked for alternative copyrightⁱ systems to replace the current unfair copyright levies.

 In the course of a year, an average family will spend up to €100 more thanks to a new government Decree fixing copyrightⁱ levies.

 For want of being less outspoken in its criticism of the Committee on Copyright Levies, UFC-Que Choisir paid the price: representatives of artists, distributors, manufacturers, importers and even less critical consumer organisations were invited, but not UFC-Que Choisir.

The FIFA Soccer World Cup (trademarked) is just around the corner, and South Africans from all walks of life are gearing up for the event.  Already government schools have taken shorter summer holidays over the festive period because the mid-year holiday (our winter vacation) will be extended to accommodate Cup events.  South African consumers have been overwhelmed by a deluge of advertisements portraying ecstatic vuvuzela-blowing fans.  Traffic congestion, from ro

The context:

Even if some challengers have taken a significant share of the browser market (primarily Firefox), Microsoft still has a huge advantage. This advantage is due to the bundling of computers and OS.

Indeed as most computers are sold with Windows (close to 100% in France) IE is included by default. To strengthen this power Microsoft implements IE-specific code to be sure that a website optimized for its browser doesn’t work perfectly with other browsers.

US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton spoke in Washington today about the Obama administration's  commitment to promoting online rights and freedoms, including freedom of expression and access to knowledge - and, as a necessary precondition, access to the Internet itself.  In her speech she said:

3D Trade-Human Rights-Equitable Economy, a Geneva-based NGO, and IBON Foundation submitted a paper entitled The Philippines: Impact of copyrightⁱ rules on access to education to the Pre-Sessional Working Group of the Committee on the Rights of the Child last June 2009.