Unix Group Takes UK Standards Body To Court Over OOXML
Halfway through the two-month window of opportunity during which OOXML’s ISO standardization can be derailed by a formal objection from a national standards body, the UK Unix Users Group is trying to force the British Standards Institution to do just that. According to the Unix Users Group, the BSI used a flawed decision-making process when they chose to approve OOXML in the ISO vote. ‘The UKUUG is also folding in many other complaints about Office Open XML (OOXML), such as unresolved patent issues and a lack of completion in the specification’s documentation, and is calling for the High Court of Justice to force a judicial review of the BSI’s decision.’ This is not the first time a country’s ISO vote has been challenged.
Creative Sued for Base-10 Capacities On HDD MP3 Players
A class-action settlement from Creative Labs over the capacity of their HDD MP3 players. Evidently they calculated drive capacity in base-10 (1,000,000,000 bytes per GB) instead of base-2 (1,073,741,824 bytes per GB). The representative plaintiff is entitled to $5,000, and everyone else who bought one of the HDD MP3 players in the past several years gets a 50% discount on a new 1GB player[PDF]. They can also opt for a 20% discount on anything ordered from Creative’s online store. Creative has made available all of the necessary legal forms. Seagate lost a similar lawsuit late last year.
Massive Increase in RIAA Copyright Notices
According to Wired, universities in the US are experiencing a “20-fold increase” in the number of takedown notices from the RIAA in the last ten days.
Indiana University reports 80 notices a day, but they say their traffic hasn’t increased significantly over the same time period.
It will be interesting to see if the affected schools join the legal battle against the RIAA, or cave under the increased pressure.
University of California at Berkeley’s chief information officer Shel Waggener confirmed he’d heard of the spikes and suggested there was a political purpose driving them.
Public universities are in a unique position since the industry puts pressure on us through state legislatures to try to impose what are widely considered to be draconian content monitoring measures and turn us into tech police forces in support of a specific industry.
Waggener said.
The RIAA is also backing legislation in states such as Illinois and Tennessee that would require schools that get a certain number of notices to begin installing deep packet monitoring equipment on their internet and intranets, according to Luker.
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