Berkman Buzz: Week of August 31, 2009
BERKMAN BUZZ: A look at the past week's online Berkman conversations
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What's being discussed...take your pick or browse below.
* Harry Lewis presents Lewis Hyde's (and his own) objections to the Google Book settlement.
* Stuart Shieber works over the arguments around academic freedom and open access funds.
* Dan Gillmor is thinking about ways to preserve digital materials like blogs.
* Ethan Zuckerman looks into the newshole; does it look back?
* The CMLP reads through the opinion overturning the conviction of Lori Drew.
* Weekly Global Voices: "East Timor: The land was freed, but who owns it?"
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The full buzz.
"As an author I am also a reader, a user of libraries, and a beneficiary of the public domain. I say this because I believe that the settlement in question amounts to a major intervention in our national cultural policy, one that will affect the U.S. knowledge ecology for generations to come. It therefore should not be adjudicated upon the assumption that we authors (and our publishers) are rights holders only. We are cultural citizens as well; our copyrights matter to us, but so do larger questions of how literature and knowledge circulate among us."
Lewis Hyde, from Harry Lewis' blog post Objections to the Google Book Settlement
"Academic freedom means that faculty can study what they want, and publish the results where they want. It doesn’t mean that the university must cover all costs for doing so, nor does it mean the university cannot cover some costs and not others in ways that redound to what the university sees as the benefit of its constituencies."
From Stuart Shieber's blog post More on academic freedom and OA funds
"A common belief holds that once something gets onto the Internet, it’s there indefinitely. This is true, no doubt, for some things. Does anyone believe the Paris Hilton sex video will ever not be out there? Not everything does last, however, including some creative works that matter a great deal. Many of the works we should want to keep around disappear all the time, for a variety of reasons."
From Dan Gillmor's blog post Archiving the News: Auto-Preserving Blogs
"When a story occupies 28% of the newshole, but only 20% list it as the story they’re following most closely, it suggests that news media is pushing a story. Conversely, when reader interest vastly outpaces coverage, it suggests strong interest in a topic that the media might be downplaying (or simply not overhyping.) The top ten stories where interest greatly outpaces coverage include stories that might directly impact readers (three stories on sharp stock market drops, a story on a peanut recall, swine flu, unemployment) and celebrity stories like Michael Jackson’s death, the “octomom” story and the NCAA basketball tournament."
From Ethan Zuckerman's blog post When coverage outpaces interest – can statistics show us when the press is trying to lead readers to a story?
"Judge Wu ruled that accepting the government's theory -- and the jury's finding -- that Drew violated the CFAA merely by intentionally violating MySpace's terms of use would render the statute unconstitutionally vague. As a result, he granted Drew's motion for a judgment of acquittal, ending the government's case against her. The judge previously announced in July that he planned on reversing the conviction."
From Sam Bayard's blog post for the Citizen Media Law Project, Judge Issues Opinion Overturning Lori Drew's Conviction
"When Indonesia left East Timor, with one of the most devastating scorched earth campaigns of modern times in September 1999, it also left the country with land conflicts accumulated over two colonial occupations."
From Janet Gunter's blog post for Global Voices, East Timor: The land was freed, but who owns it?