Siteseeing: Bits and Pieces

There are a few tech-related stories I’ve been wanting to share but have put on the back-burner lately.

Louis CK takes matters into his own hands

What Louis CK knows that most media companies don’t — Tech News and Analysis.

This is the opening salvo for which I’ve been waiting. The war on traditional media distribution has begun, and content creators finally have someone to prop up as an example of success. By the time this post is released, Louis CK has made over $500,000 on his stand up act. It must be noted that he offered it to consumers for $5 in a DRM-free digital format. He has claimed over $200,000 of that for himself. The rest goes to the website, production, etc. The whole venture was a gamble that paid off.

Ultraviolet concerns

UltraViolet was mentioned here well over a year ago before it seemingly became a non-entity. In all honesty, I thought the idea had been dropped due to all sorts of concerns that should have been raised by consumer groups. Color me surprised to find that the service has launched with the releases of The Green Lantern and Horrible Bosses to home media. An additional surprise is that they launched the service with two movies that were generally dismissed by critics and failed to find a strong audience. I’m sure this bodes well for the service.

To clarify, I was being completely sarcastic.

The Public Domain

It is not uncommon these days to be curious about copyright laws and how they became the creature they are today. Not a month goes by without the mention of another lawsuit about someone breaking copyright law, either by copious downloading of material on the internet or by direct reference in something recorded and published. Copyright appears to be this limiting force that somehow costs people thousands of dollars. Honestly, that is all I really knew of copyrights – aside from the obvious “I own the rights to the work, so profits for original sales should go to me.”

Then I discovered James Boyle’s The Public Domain, which he has fittingly offered up for free download. The book is not the complete history of copyright law that I sought. Instead it was an overall easy read about the idea of copyright as well as its evolution to what it is today. It is also a commentary on what it should be.