Open Access to Research Blog Entries

We’ve decided to get aggressive about social platforms here at PK. For a while, we’ve had a facebook group, and now we’ve started a Ning Public Knowledge group. Each offers something a little different. At facebook, you’ve got the large communities of people who are already invested in the platform. I’m hoping that they allow for group administrators to embed applications into group pages (until they do, we’ll keep manually inputting our content). That’s actually what I think the Ning group offers more of, is the ability to syndicate content.

Tomorrow the House is set to vote on an appropriations bill that would mandate that all National Institutes of Health (NIH)-funded researchers make their findings publicly available, for free, within 12 months of publishing their work in a private journal. Currently the NIH is responsible for some $28 billion in research grants annually - about 28% of all money spent on biomedical research in the United States. But while taxpayers cover all these expenses, none of the results from these research grants must be made available to the public. Instead the findings of these projects are published in private academic journals, subscriptions to which can thousands of dollars for a single title.

Congress Daily (subscription required) is reporting that FCC Chairman Martin will issue a draft of the 700 MHz rules this week. As can be expected from such a high profile matter, rumors are flying about what will and will not be in this “Chairman’s Draft.” One of my colleagues describes the release of the draft like being in the 7th inning of a 9-inning baseball game - if you are winning in the 7th inning, you feel pretty good about your chances. If you are not…then you know you have to pull out all the stops to be victorious. This might include bringing pressure to bear from members of Congress, calling on the netroots and blogosphere to weigh in, and ramping up pressure on the mainstream media to cover the issue.

The Public Knowledge blog is a great source for up-to-date information on key communications and copyright issues. But if you haven’t been reading it forever, well, it can be a little hard to jump in. Here, then, is a primer on some of the issues we’ve been working on, what’s new, and why you should care.

According to Michael Geist Canada is also planning a major spectrum auction for 2008. And, like here, the mainstream media have about zero interest in covering it. Not only do they have the spectrum auction discussed by Geist coming up, but they will then have their own spectrum auction for broadcast spectrum when they do their transition to digital television.

I hope folks in Canada are paying attention to our current spectrum auction fights down here. In the past, I’ve often felt that Canada has done a better job than we have of resisting the blandishments of industry when setting its various intellectual property, privacy, and telecom policies. I hope the CRTC (Canada’s version of the FCC) and, more importantly, Canadian civil society, watch our public debate and feel inspired to have a public debate about this themselves.

Previously, I’ve written about how the success of the MVNO (though not without its problems) demonstrates how an Open Access-like business model can work in a wireless context. The underlying carrier, such as Sprint or Verizon, can sell access to its network at wholesale rates to a company like Virgin Mobile, which then markets to consumers. This model can be and is a success both for the retailer and the wholesaler.

• YouTube will begin using filtering technology to block users from posting copyrighted content. This technology has long been demanded by studio executives and decried by public interest groups

• eBay has opened its three largest businesses - eBay, PayPal, and Skype - to third party developers. The open API’s will allow outside individuals and companies to build new shopping and buying applications, but because only a few developers will be given ‘preferred’ status, new programs may be slow in coming.

• Yahoo said that China should not punish people for expressing their political opinions on the Internet. This comes one day after a Chinese woman announced her intention to sue Yahoo for helping Chinese officials imprison her son.

• Former Engadget editor Pete Rojas is launching a new music blog that will give away songs for free. The site, RCRD LBL, will make money through advertisements on its blog.

• The FCC formally opened its review of the XM-Sirius merger to public comment. The Commission has aimed to complete the merger review within 180 days, though that date is not binding

• Apple may soon begin a $2.99 movie rental service. The DRM-protected downloads would survive for $30 days and could be copied to one other device, such as an iPod or iPhone.

• The Church of England is considering suing Sony for using Manchester Cathedral as a site in its new first-person-shooter video game. The Church is demanding that Sony apologize and that ‘Resistance: Fall of Man’ be pulled from shelves.

• Forbes has an article this week about the fight for Open Access

  “It’s now clear that the techies are learning, fast, how to take a fight to Washington. One of the companies pushing the idea—Frontline Wireless—already has former FCC Chairman Reed Hunt on staff, proving they know how to play this game. Now we’ll see if they have the stomach to win it.”

• The Chicago Tribune says that opening up the set top box market will raise consumers’ cable bills

  What seems more certain is that consumers’ monthly cable bills are likely to rise a few dollars after the new rule takes effect. That’s because the cable box born from the regulation costs more to produce, a cost likely to get passed down to TV watchers, analysts and cable operators say.

You can see why we disagree with this conclusion here, here, and here

The Senate Commerce Committee has scheduled a hearing on the 700 MHz Auction. “The 700 MHz Auction: Public Safety and Competition Issues,” will take place on Thursday June 14 at 10 a.m. in the Senate Russell Bldg (come early if you want a seat, or hire a professional.

We can expect the usual panoply of industry representatives and, with the Democrats back in charge, possibly a public advocate or two. But the real question remains whether the Senate (and their colleagues in the House) will listen to the more than 250,000 Americans who have already told the FCC they are tired of business as usual.

• FCC Commissioner Michael Copps has an op-ed article in Saturday’s New York Times about broadcasters’ public service requirements, recommending among other things that the license term be cut from eight years down to three:

  “Using the public airwaves is a privilege — a lucrative one — not a right, and I fear the F.C.C. has not done enough to stand up for the public interest. Our policies should reward broadcasters that honor their pledge to serve that interest and penalize those that don’t.”

• A Chicago man was arrested for allegedly uploading four episodes of the TV show ‘24’ before they aired in January. If convicted he faces up to three years in prison.

• Tim O’Reilly has a posted the results of an experiment in open access publishing. His company’s new book, Asterisk: The Future of Telephony, was offered for free online concurrent with a print release: “Our goal of course, is to help publishers understand whether free downloads help or hurt sales. The quick answer from this experiment is that we saw no definitive correlation, but there is little sign that the free downloads hurt sales.”