NewsScan Daily, 15 May 2000 ("Above The Fold")
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"ABOVE THE FOLD"
When is a Database More Than a Database?
Network Solutions to Offer "Pre-Owned" Names
Chinese Financial Site Punished for "Spreading Rumors"
World Wide Wrongdoing
Trademark-This Dot-Com
FEATURES
Flash Card
Honorary Subscriber: Joseph Campbell
WHEN IS A DATABASE MORE THAN A DATABASE?
Upstart Jurisline.com is being sued by legal publisher Lexis for copying
the
CDs containing court opinions and related documents that Lexis sells and
distributing the same information free on its Web site. For decades, the
database of legal material has been marketed by two companies -- Reed
Elsevier's Lexis and Thomson Corp.'s West Publishing -- which charge
premium
rates for access to a single document and reap millions of dollars a year
in
subscription fees from the nation's law firms. Jurisline.com, on the other
hand, distributes the information for free, making its revenue on
advertising. At issue in the court case is whether Lexis's license
agreement
prohibiting the purchaser from developing "a database, infobase or other
information resource" is legally enforceable, given that the materials in
question were written on the taxpayer's dime and can't be copyrighted. A
federal judge is expected to rule today in the case. (Wall Street Journal
15
May 2000)
http://interactive.wsj.com/articles/SB958348989291026253.htm
NETWORK SOLUTIONS TO OFFER "PRE-OWNED" NAMES
Network Solutions is expanding its Internet domain name registration
business to include "pre-owned" names ending in .com, .net and .org. Dozens
of Web sites have entered the resale market in the last few years, giving
cyberspeculators a venue for auctioning off names they've registered,
sometimes for millions of dollars. Network Solutions says it will offer its
new service for free during an introductory period, and later plans to fold
its resale business into its existing name search and registration process.
(Los Angeles Times 15 May 2000)
http://www.latimes.com/business/20000515.t000045842.html
CHINESE FINANCIAL SITE PUNISHED FOR "SPREADING RUMORS"
The China Finance Information Network, a local Web site, has come under
fire
from the country's Internet Information Management Bureau, which was
established in April to monitor Internet content. The site was fined
US$1,800 and suspended for 15 days for "spreading rumors" damaging to the
government's image. The transgression appears to be the publication in
March
of a Hong Kong newspaper article about corruption by a provincial official
in Hubei. Bureau chief Wang Qingchun was quoted in the Liberation Daily
saying that pending rules on Internet content could limit Chinese Web sites
to publication of news originating only from authorized reports in the
state
media. (Financial Times 15 May 2000)
http://www.ft.com/
WORLD WIDE WRONGDOING
With the "Love Bug" virus providing a recent reminder of the problem of
cybercrime and other kinds of mischief on the Internet, leaders from the
Group of Eight countries are meeting to see what can be done, and the
41-nation Council of Europe is working with the U.S., Canada, Japan and
South America to draft a treaty to standardize laws against Internet crime.
Jonathan Fornici of the Internet security consulting firm AtomicTangerine
says that governments need to write laws that make the punishment clear,
because the way things are now, people know security violations are
wrong --
"but what's the repercussion?" In the Love Bug case, investigators in the
Philippines delayed a raid for several days until prosecutors found a law
that might apply. (AP/San Jose Mercury News 14 May 2000)
http://www.sjmercury.com/svtech/news/breaking/merc/docs/011053.htm
TRADEMARK-THIS DOT-COM
A study of trademark applications submitted to the U.S. Patent & Trademark
Office shows that the number of applications between 1994 and 1999
increased
more than a thousand-fold, from just 307 in 1994 to 33,731 in 1999. In
addition, the number of trademark applications with the ".com" domain name
went from 4 in 1994 to 12,000 last year. A partner in the Philadelphia law
firm that conducted the study sees some confusion up ahead: "There are
similar trademarks pending with garden.com, pets.com and others of that
ilk.
The real question will be what happens when you have a generic.com and
someone else comes real close. What happens when you stick on an i, or an
e,
or make it a plural?" The government's trademark policies are posted on
www.uspto.gov. (New York Times 15 May 2000)
http://partners.nytimes.com/library/tech/00/05/biztech/articles/15pate.html
*****
FLASH CARD
"Life is all memory, except for the one present moment that goes by
you so quick you hardly catch it going." (Tennessee Williams)
Go to http://www.altalang.com/flashcard/default.asp?000515 to see
how
that reads in seven other languages.
HONORARY SUBSCRIBER: JOSEPH CAMPBELL
Today's Honorary Subscriber is the scholarly thinker and superb
storyteller, Joseph Campbell (1904-1987), who spent a lifetime educating us
about the fascinating mythologies depicted in a wide range of the world's
literatures.
A charismatic lecturer, Campbell enthralled his audiences with
depictions of the origin, function, and meaning of myth in various human
cultures. In his book "The Hero With a Thousand Faces" he demonstrated the
connection between age-old stories and the emotional concerns of modern
life, observing: "The latest incarnation of Oedipus, the continued romance
of Beauty and the Beast, stand this afternoon on the corner of 42nd Street
and Fifth Avenue, waiting for the traffic light to change."
Campbell's subsequent prolific writings included the four-volume
"Masks of God," "The Mythic Image," and the richly illustrated series "The
Historical Atlas of World Mythology." He attained the status of a virtual
guru through the series of television interviews by Bill Moyers titled,
"The
Power of Myth." Filmed in 1985-86, this series did not air until after his
death in 1987. Although some mythologists have criticized his scholarship,
others believe that as his influence grows, Joseph Campbell seems destined
to join Sigmund Freud and Carl Jung as one of the great disseminators of
the
psychological wisdom to be found in mythology.
See http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0060926171/newsscancom/ for "A
Joseph Campbell Companion: Reflections on the Art of Living." (We donate
all
revenue from our book recommendations to adult literacy action programs.)
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