Movies in School: A Handy FAQ

Movie Licensing USA is a company through which schools can purchase licenses to permit them to show copyrighted material in a public setting. Below is an excerpt of the FAQ. See the source article for the more information.

I thought schools were exempt from needing a license to legally use copyrighted movies.

Under the "Educational Exemption" copyrighted entertainment movies may be shown in a school without copyright permission only if all criteria are met:
- A teacher or instructor is present
- The showing takes place in a classroom setting with only the enrolled students attending
- The movie is used as an essential part of the core, required curriculum being taught. (The instructor should be able to show how the use of the motion picture contributes to the overall required course study and syllabus.)
 - The movie being used is a legitimate copy, not taped from a legitimate copy or taped from TV
For specific requirements, please reference The Copyright Act of 1976, Public Law No. 94-553, 90 stat 2541: Title 17; Section 110(i), or consult your copyright attorney.

Source: Movie Licensing USA

Surprise, Surprise: 'Pirates' Buy More

A recent article at TechDirt shows data that shows that people who pirate media are also those who buy more of it. See the source article below for the full story and watch the video featuring author Neil Gaiman's thoughts on piracy.

Source: TechDirt

Wired: The Problem With Patents

Recent lawsuits in the mobile technologies industry have caused many to look at the increasingly evident problems with the United States patent system. Steven Levy of Wired takes an in-depth look at the patent system and explains many of its biggest problems. See the source article below for the article.

Source: Wired

Patently Absurd: Microsoft Sued for Live Tiles

Microsoft is now being sued for its Live Tiles technology used in its Zune, Surface, Windows Phone, and Windows 8 offerings by a company called SurfCast. It is odd that this suit is coming up only now, however, as several of the allegedly infringing technologies have been in the market for several years.

The Patent in question is US Patent #6,724,403, described as follows: "A computerized method of presenting information from a variety of sources on a display device. Specifically the present invention describes a graphical user interface for organizing the simultaneous display of information from a multitude of information sources. In particular, the present invention comprises a graphical user interface which organizes content from a variety of information sources into a grid of tiles, each of which can refresh its content independently of the others. The grid functionality manages the refresh rates of the multiple information sources. The present invention is intended to operate in a platform independent manner."

Nilay Patel of The Verge questions whether this patent actually covers the allegedly infringing devices, but patent laws and filings are now so vague and so unable to keep-up with the pace of technology that only time will tell whether Microsoft will pay dearly for their advances in the computing industry.

What do you think about this lawsuit? Is Microsoft infringing? Is SurfCast just a patent troll? Leave your thoughts in the comments section down below.

Source: The Verge

The Tek: Six Strikes

Tek Syndicate has released their newest episode of The Tek in which they discuss the new Six Strikes intellectual property and copyright protection laws.

According to Tek Syndicate, strike penalties are based on the principle of guilty until proven innocent, and major Internet service providers will be required to report potential violations in a person-per-IP address basis.

Watch the video for their full breakdown of the new law.

Warning: there is a bit of language toward the end of the video.