Episode 0012, 08/24/2007
Title: Cabbies vs. GPS, Speaking of Privacy…, A DRM-Free World,
Welcome to Course Technology's CourseCast of the Week, Episode 12, recorded August 24th, 2007.
This is Ken Baldauf bringing you this week's technology news and information targeted at college students.
This CourseCast is brought to you by Course Technology. Check out www.course.com for innovative textbooks and creative electronic learning solutions for higher education.
Story 1 - NY City Cab Drivers vs. GPS
New York City cabbies are set to go on strike over GPS. Not that they have anything against the Global Positioning System, and its ability to help you find your way around; they just don't like it being install in their cabs. The city's Taxi & Limousine Commission is installing GPS systems in 13,000 cabs. The systems will track each cab's location and assist with dispatching the nearest cab to a customer. The drivers fear that the system will be used to track drivers, even when they are off duty and invade their privacy. This is a somewhat common scenario in today's digital world. The promise of convenience and efficiency provided by digital technologies sometimes comes at a cost of some individual liberties. The drivers are planning a "fight for dignity" strike for September 5 and 6.
Source: N.Y. taxi drivers set strike date to protest GPS systems (Computerworld)
Story 2 - Speaking of Privacy…
The American Civil Liberties Union has released a report entitled "Under the Watchful Eye." The report cautions that video surveillance in California threatens the privacy of the citizens. The report states that 37 cities in California use video surveillance, 18 have significant surveillance, and 10 are considering expansive programs. Even with all those cameras watching the streets, the report states that the cameras have had "next to zero impact on fighting crime." To make the situation even worse, California laws make it possible for anyone to access video surveillance tapes. Of course this problem isn't constrained to California. Most cities in developed countries are utilizing security cameras in public places. There has been a significant boost in the number of those cameras recently due to efforts to step up defenses against terrorism.
Also under the heading of privacy issues in the news. Jobs service Monster.com has had information about 159 million job seekers stolen from its servers this week. The theft of personal information from businesses has been a growing concern as we conduct more business online, and corporate databases bulge with information about customers. The Privacy Rights Clearinghouse, which tracks major privacy breaches, reports that 159 million people have been affected by data breaches over the last three years.
Sources: Video surveillance raises privacy concerns in California (ars technica), Monster says data loss involved 1.3 million names (Reuters), 159 million people affected by data breaches in under three years (ars technica)
Story 3 - A DRM-Free World?
iTunes and EMI Records made a big splash when they started providing DRM-free music to consumers over the Internet. You'll recall that DRM stands for Digital Rights Management, and is a technology embedded in online music that limits the user’s ability to copy the music and share it with others. DRM-free music is music which can be purchased online that does not utilize DRM technology. Since iTunes and EMI Records began providing tunes without DRM, other companies have followed suite. This week, the world's largest music retailer, Wal-mart, announced that it will be providing DRM-free music from EMI and Universal. With this latest announcement, it appears that we may be moving towards a DRM-free world, where songs can be purchased and copied legally. Does this mean that it's now legal to purchase music online and make copies for your friends? The answer in most cases is no. Most songs are still protected by copyright, and individuals are required to pay the price to own the song. Will you get caught and prosecuted if you share DRM-free songs? The answer is maybe. It has been discovered that many of the songs being distributed as DRM-free have tracking technology that allows the distributor to find out if the song has been illegally copied. In the case of iTunes, the music file stores information about the person that originally purchased the song. So keep in mind that DRM-free music makes it more convenient to copy and listen to music on multiple devices, but it doesn't make it legal or safe to share copyrighted music with others.
Sources: Wal-mart, the largest music retailer, has gone DRM-free - providing tunes from EMI and Universal without digital rights management embedded. (ars technica), Microsoft deal may lead to free but "watermarked" music (ars technica), Apple hides account info in DRM-free music, too (ars technica)
New Briefs
That's it for this week's CourseCast. Links to this week's stories and many more news and information resources are provided at the CourseCast Web site at coursecasts.course.com. Until next time have a great week and be sure to take advantage of the Power -- of Technology!