by Kevin Coates | Sep 3, 2013 | News from around the Web
From Chillin’Competition: Déjà vu? Microsoft announces Skype’s integration in Windows ” On 15 August Microsoft announced on a blog post that Skype will come installed by default in Windows 8.1, and that it will be prominently displayed in its “Start” Menu (see Skype-right from (the) “Start”) The news appears to have surprised many, who have publicly wondered whether Microsoft is actively looking for antitrust trouble...
by Kevin Coates | Aug 29, 2013 | News from around the Web
From FOSS Patents: Follow-up on New Zealand: patent offices and judges don’t interpret patent law like geeks do “”
by Kevin Coates | Aug 29, 2013 | News from around the Web
From FOSS Patents: New Zealand Parliament adopts UK approach to software patents, allows broad swaths of them “”
by Kevin Coates | Aug 28, 2013 | News from around the Web
From Law360: Competition: E-Book Judge Threatens Apple With Outside Monitor “The judge who oversaw the Apple Inc. e-book price-fixing trial indicated Tuesday that she would likely appoint an external monitor to review its internal antitrust policy, saying the company showed a “blatant” disregard for the...
by Kevin Coates | Aug 23, 2013 | News from around the Web
From Law360: Competition: DOJ Reins In Injunction Bid In Apple E-Books Fight “The U.S. Department of Justice proposed Friday a narrower injunction against Apple Inc. for its alleged e-book price-fixing that slashes the length of the restrictions on the iPad maker but stood by its call for an external monitor and limits on Apple’s dealings in other types of...
by Kevin Coates | Aug 23, 2013 | News from around the Web
From Regulation Watch Feed: Bridging the transatlantic divide in privacy “ A clash of privacy cultures If there is one lesson to be learned from the recent NSA surveillance scandal, it is that no government can guarantee the rights of its citizens beyond national borders – and that the internet, for better or worse, knows no borders. Nothing illustrates this better than the contentious debate on privacy in Germany and in the United States. In the United States, the right to privacy is primarily understood as a right to physical privacy, thus the protection from unwarranted government searches and seizures. In Germany, on the other hand, it is also understood as a right to spiritual privacy, thus the right of citizens to develop into autonomous moral agents. More fundamentally, American and German attitudes towards privacy reflect different underlying constitutional assumptions: privacy as an aspect of liberty or as an aspect of dignity. (Whitman, 2004: 1161; Post, 2001) As data flows defy jurisdictional boundaries, however, policymakers across the Atlantic are faced with a conundrum: how can German and American privacy cultures be reconciled? Freedom is the most valued social good in the American constitution, while the German constitution is grounded on the idea of human dignity. Nevertheless these two potentially conflicting notions of freedom and dignity can be reconciled in the name of freedom of choice. Both the United States and German constitutions are intent on protecting citizens from undue government intrusion into their personal sphere, albeit for different historical and cultural reasons. Furthering the freedom of personal choice in order to enhance privacy could thus fulfill both the conditions...