Hey everybody – thanks for waiting, and happy Canada Day. Everyone may remember the War of 1812 and the only invasion onto the continental US soil by another nation’s army (Canadians, as a British colony), but did you know we also fought between Maine and New Brunswick in the Aroostook War in 1838? It was a bloodless war, so I guess no harm, no foul – and I’d forgive Canada on behalf of Americans everywhere, but I’m not altogether certain if my family had moved to Massachusetts from Newfoundland yet, so it’s entirely possible it should be me asking forgiveness of my neighbors. Be it as it may, Canada runs deep in my blood and I hope you can take some time to hug-a-Canuck today.
I’m going to do a quick news brain dump for now, and get into some more quality writing a little later today. Here’s some of the stuff I missed while spending time with some of my favorite people up on Mount Desert Island (the land mass with an identity crisis):
- As a followup to what I wrote in early June, the House Subcommittee on the Courts, Internet, and Intellectual Property approved the Performance Rights Act on Thursday. The act requires radio stations to pay royalties on sound recordings as well as compositions, as does webcasting since 2007’s Copyright Board ruling. Reactions abound from the ruling from the two major parties involved, musicFIRST and the National Association of Broadcasters, and analysis from Coolfer and Ars Technica, where Nate Anderson does an excellent job laying out the issues and showing how the merits of the cases are obscured by strange lobbying and PR tactics.
- Alex Leavitt, a young man I met at Berkman@10, delved into ethnomusicology on Friday with an analysis of enka music mixed with hip-hop. Enka was a popular early-20th-century form of pop music, best known in the US for its frequent inclusion in Tarantino films. It’s an interesting case of East mixing with West, then mixing again, such as what you see in Ghanaian Highlife (and more recently, Hiplife) music. Both enka and Highlife are favorites of mine, and on this balmy humid Boston day Nigeria Special! is one of the only things keeping me cool.
- Public Knowledge signals the importance of today (aside from this being Canada Day and all) as the first day in which Copyright claimants can register online, with a reduced fee. PK is well-known for their backing of the current Orphan Works bill, which inverses my opinion of the aforementioned Performance Rights bill – whereas the latter represents an issue I typically oppose but can appreciate the compromise in the details, the current Orphan Works bill represents an issue I usually support (that is, letting unrepresented works pass into the public domain) that loses my support in the details. Be that as it may, Alex Curtis does a great job showing how an online copyright registry can be opened up with a little API love to help users navigate the records easier.
- Copyright guru William Patry put on his Constitutional scholar cap on Friday and drew some fascinating parallels between the DC Handgun decision and Constitutional interpretation of Article I, Section 8, Clause 8 – the sentence that gave us copyright. His point, and I heartily agree with him, is to cast serious doubt in the majority’s opinion of dismissing the first part of the Second Ammendment (”Because a well regulated Militia is necessary to the security of a free State,”) as a mere prefatory clause, and cutting to the second part (“the right of the people to keep and bear Arms shall not be infringed.”) as the actual “right.” It’s dense and referential reading, but shows quite cleanly that if we are to agree with Scalia that this first part was just fluff, it would be the first time we ever regarded any part of the Constitution as prefatory.
- Aquarium Drunkard gives us their take on a curious release from this year that seems to be slipping under the radar: Stax Does the Beatles. Included in their assessment is a curious anecdote: Did you know the Beatles were originally slated to record Revolver at Stax, but for security reasons the band opted to stay at Abbey Road in London?
- I recently reconnected with an old friend and performing buddy Brian Bergeron. He informed me of his blog, which is now added to the blogroll on right. Today’s post is a deeply personal and excellent read about how the slumping economy is impacting street performers like Brian, who you can see frequently up at Faneuil Hall. Brian also fed me a story that I’ll be writing about a little later as well. Stay tuned.
Read and enjoy, and thanks for sticking around.
