Media

Has everyone forgotten that copyright exists primarily to encourage the public good that can come from intellectual property? That helping to compensate the content creator is a means for getting good ideas out there, not an end unto itself?

The Wall Street Journal reports today that a coalition of "Internet, media and technology companies" is set to announce... a set of guidelines they have agreed on aimed at protecting copyrights online."

Jeff Atwood is taking YouTube to task for its wink-wink, nudge-nudge approach to uploading copyrighted video clips.

It's a valid point, and I especially like his quip that "by YouTube's own rules, YouTube cannot exist." But YouTube's copyright tips also qualify as a "big copyright lie" in another sense: they seriously downplay the importance of fair use.

John McCain's daughter Meghan has launched her own (sorta) campaign blog: McCainBlogette.com, a "fresh perspective on what is sometimes perceived as a stale and boring process."

Meghan and her two co-bloggers plan to post from Dad's campaign bus about "musings and pop culture on the campaign trail." I'm all for pop culture, so this is already better than the Rommney brothers' groupblog. Beyond that, though, I'm mainly just scratching my head.

Aug. 29, 2007, in the Lufkin Daily News:
City attorney, bin Laden at high noon in city park?
Lufkin lawyer, who swore after 9/11 to wear necktie until 'maniac' was found, dares him to prove he's alive

Sept. 8, 2007, in the Washington Post:
In a New Video, Bin Laden Predicts U.S. Failure in Iraq

On ars technica yesterday, Nate Anderson wrote about the Computer & Communications Industry Association's "Defend Fair Use" initiative.

It's a nice run-down of the effort by Oracle, Microsoft, Google, Yahoo, Sun, Red Hat, and others to rein in the overly broad copyright notices that accompany sports broadcasts, DVDs and a wide range of other "big media." Toward the end, however, Anderson notes:

National Journal's Technology Daily has published an impressive package of articles on the role tech policy is playing (or isn't, as the case may be) in the 2008 race for the White House.

Good stuff. And unlike the vast majority of insider coverage produced by Tech Daily and the other publications of National Journal Group, these articles are posted outside the subscibers-only wall -- no four-figure annual subscriptions required.

If memory serves, that quote is from former White House Spokesman Mike McCurry -- it's probably my favorite example of the off-the-record attitude that pervades Washington DC.

That "maintain deniability" mantra doesn't apply to today's web, obviously. From the blogs to Facebook to now Twitter and Pownce, it seems like there's now nothing that won't be posted for posterity.

The explosion of interest in Twitter, Facebook, Pownce, et al is exciting for anyone hoping to get their message out, but it also poses some obvious problems:

1. Multiple channels mean multiple places to post (and check). Blogging is a dangerous time suck as it is.
2. Even if you automate the cross-posting -- and God help me if I ever go so far as to do this -- that means the same posts are showing up on your blog AND Twitter AND Facebook AND [insert your preferred Web2.0 services here]...

Jeff Jarvis, posting at both PresVid and his own BuzzMachine, has some interesting thoughts on the CNN-YouTube presidential debates. My favorite quote:

...the YouTube debates are a crack in the wall of control of elections, politics, and media. Bring your chisels.

On Friday, VentureBeat's Dan Kaplan wrote about PoliticalTrends.info -- a site that mines web data "to track political buzz in the blogosphere." It got me thinking about a rather unfortunate reality -- at least from the perspective of political junkies and would-be web moguls: Like newly launched restaurants, nearly all big-time political web ventures are doomed to fail.