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We have mentioned the battle within Sony between content and electronic device divisions as representative of the larger struggle going on between rights and usage. Now the perspicacious Farhad Manjoo looks at a similar continental divide within AOL Time Warner: But stuck in the middle of this fight is a …

Another look at the dilemma exemplified by Kazaa – licensed vs. unlicensed downloading, copyright holder’s willingness to license – coming to the now almost universal conclusion (excluding most corporate copyright holders, of course) that the key to the digital entertainment future is for record labels (and to a lesser extent, …

It’s as simple as this: companies would rather sue over a patent or copyright claim than duke it out in the chancy world of open competition. Congress, in its eagerness to please its corporate masters, has helped facilitate the mess. The public, long disinterested in the complex and dry niceties …

How far can perceived self-interest go in blinding one to impending peril? A very long way apparently: On the pedestrian-only streets of Munich’s historic downtown yesterday, couples walked arm in arm past elegant boutiques and narrow stores offering 100 different kinds of homemade chocolate truffle. Cathedral bells pealed through the …

States are hurting – revenues are down – they need the bucks, but is taxing Internet sales, still in their relative infancy, a way to recoup legitimate funds or a form of infanticide? The Internet’s image as a duty-free zone took a beating this week when several major online retailers …

Spain's graphic adaptation of William Lindsay Gresham's dark carny classic.

Chicago recording artist Emilie Autumn is making her new album available without restriction in “high quality MP3 format” – she is fearless indeed. Of course the 22 year-old violinist/”fantasy rocker” also believes in faeries. This from her press release: Traitor Records recording artist Emilie Autumn has released her long-awaited album, …

Video webcast of a debate on the merits of a federally mandated “broadcast flag” from the Cato Institute: Battle over the Broadcast Flag: The IP Wars and the HDTV Transition Featuring Fritz Attaway, Motion Picture Association of America; Jim Burger, Dow, Lohnes & Albertson; Mike Godwin, Public Knowledge; and Andy …

If you have been following the Verizon/RIAA case at all, you know it has something to do with an individual, branded a heinous pirate by the RIAA, “downloading” 600 songs – in a single day!! Sounds pretty egregious right? How greedy and rapacious to snurfle down 600 songs in a …

Randon House decided it was time for a new Godfather novel, so it held a contest. Martha Stewart won – kidding: Mark Winegardner is joining the Corleone family business: He’s been selected to write the next “Godfather” novel. Winegardner, a fiction writer whose previous subjects include baseball, Cleveland and organized …