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April 2013

Heartbreak for Harlequin authors as judge tosses e-book case

Harlequin Romance has prevailed in a class action suit brought by three authors who accuse the book publisher of depriving writers who published books between 1990 and 2004 of their fair share of e-book revenue.

A New York federal judge threw out the authors claim that Harlequin had used a corporate sleight-of-hand to pay them 3-4% of e-book royalties instead of the 50% they believed they were due. The case, which turned on technical questions of law, is an example of the collisions that can arise as a result of book contracts signed in an age that pre-dated the current boom in e-books. In a four-page decision, the New York court declined to consider the authors’ arguments that “third party publishers” were alter-egos for Harlequin. Instead, the court relied on a narrow interpretation of contract law to dismiss the claim. The decision is very brief and contains an unusual footnote stating that the judge’s clerk, a second-year law student, had largely researched and drafted the opinion (clerks often help with such tasks but judges rarely acknowledge this).

Rural doctors slow to adopt electronic medical records

These days when you go to the doctor, many rely on an electronic health records system. With just a few clicks of a mouse, they can bring up your medical history, prescribe you medication, or chart your test results. The 2009 Recovery Act actually set aside $20 billion to help health care providers ditch the paper records and go electronic. The idea was to cut soaring health care costs in the U.S. But while physicians backed by large health care groups can afford the system, many rural physicians are struggling to make that transition. The federal government has set a deadline. If health care providers don’t implement an electronic health records system by 2015, they’ll get dinged with Medicare penalties.

The problem for many rural health clinics is they don’t have the money to make the switch. A study by the National Bureau of Economic Research last year suggests that costs rise sharply in the first year of adoption for health centers in less tech-savvy locations. And they can remain up to 4 percent higher for years.

Lawmakers to amend cybersecurity bill behind closed doors

Members of the media and the public will not be able to watch the House Intelligence Committee's markup next week of a controversial cybersecurity bill, the Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act (CISPA).

Lawmakers will be allowed to discuss what happened in the meeting afterward, and the committee plans to release information about what amendments were offered and how lawmakers voted. But the public will not be allowed in the room, and the meeting will not be streamed online. Susan Phalen, a spokeswoman for the committee, explained that the Intelligence Committee often restricts access to hearings and that it is possible that lawmakers will need to discuss classified information. "Sometimes they'll need to bounce into classified information and go closed for a period of time to talk about threat information," she said. "In order to keep the flow of the mark-up continuing forward, you can't stop in the middle of an open hearing, move everyone to another location for a portion of it, and then move back." She noted that the committee used the same procedure when it marked up CISPA last year.

Rural Telecoms Look to Leverage Genachowski Exit for USF Reform Time-Out

The Rural Independent Competitive Alliance and the Rural Broadband Alliance have called on Congress to legislate a "time out" in what they say are the Federal Communications Commission's flawed universal service reforms – and they are trying to leverage the exit of the current FCC chairman to make their case.

The FCC is phasing out legacy phone support as it phases in subsidies for broadband deployment, the new must-have communications vehicle. The groups have asked legislators for a bill that would mandate a 180-day moratorium on implementation of the FCC's subsidy distribution reforms until the FCC has sought and gotten input from state officials via the Federal-State Joint Board on Universal Service. They argue that with FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski exiting the commission -- he launched the reforms -- it is a good time to take a time out to make sure those reforms do not prove a disincentive for investment by rural carriers, some of which is based on legacy support that is being phased out.

FCC Adopts Survey of Urban Rates

In this Order, the Federal Communications Commission adopts the form and content for a survey of urban rates for fixed voice and fixed broadband residential services, which the Commission will use to implement universal service reforms adopted as part of the USF/ICC Transformation Order.

For the survey, the FCC will annually select a statistically valid sample of urban providers who will complete the survey. The information collected in this survey will be used to establish a rate floor that eligible telecommunications carriers (ETCs) receiving high-cost loop support (HCLS) or frozen high-cost support must meet to receive their full support amounts and to help ensure that universal service support recipients offering fixed voice and broadband services do so at reasonably comparable rates to those in urban areas. These measures are important components of the Commission’s overall effort in the USF/ICC Transformation Order to improve accountability for the use of universal service funding.

How Do You Create US Cyber Guidelines for Foreign Firms?

Fitting foreign companies critical to U.S. society into a domestic cybersecurity framework will be tricky, said a U.S. pharmaceutical executive helping to form the guidelines.

On April 3, government and industry leaders met for the first time to try hammering out voluntary security standards for private sector networks. A policy is due by November, under a Feb. 12 cyber executive order covering "critical infrastructure" American sectors that sustain economic and national security. "What happens if we have a non-U.S. company operating critical infrastructure," questioned Terry Rice, Merck chief information security officer, who also has experience consulting critical infrastructure defense contractors. There is no answer yet as to how the guidelines will apply to those organizations, he said.

With New Weather Channel Deal, Twitter Aims to Make It Rain for Brands

Aiming to attract more big-brand ad dollars, Twitter and the Weather Company have a new deal to create custom content around weather-related Twitter activity.

Twitter users will be able to see video clips of local forecasts, severe-weather coverage or user-generated content. But instead of requiring a link out to other websites, users can view the video within the Twitter stream, using the company’s “Cards” technology. It’s similar to Twitter’s partnership with ESPN last year, where Twitter users were able to watch instant replays of college football, tweeted out from the official ESPN account. In that case, Twitter sold ad space to Ford, who played a short promo clip for the Ford Fusion automobile before each sports replay.

The National Digital Public Library Is Launched!

The Digital Public Library of America (DPLA), to be launched on April 18, is a project to make the holdings of America’s research libraries, archives, and museums available to all Americans—and eventually to everyone in the world—online and free of charge.

How is that possible? In order to answer that question, I would like to describe the first steps and immediate future of the DPLA. But before going into detail, I think it important to stand back and take a broad view of how such an ambitious undertaking fits into the development of what we commonly call an information society. Speaking broadly, the DPLA represents the confluence of two currents that have shaped American civilization: utopianism and pragmatism. The utopian tendency marked the Republic at its birth, for the United States was produced by a revolution, and revolutions release utopian energy—that is, the conviction that the way things are is not the way they have to be. When things fall apart, violently and by collective action, they create the possibility of putting them back together in a new manner, according to higher principles.

CBO Scores Cybersecurity Enhancement Act

The Cybersecurity Enhancement Act of 2013 (HR 756) would reauthorize several National Science Foundation (NSF) programs that aim to enhance cybersecurity (the protection of computers and computer networks from unauthorized access). The bill also would require the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) to continue a cybersecurity awareness program and to develop standards for managing personal identifying information stored on computer systems. Finally, the bill would establish a task force to recommend actions to the Congress for improving research and development activities related to cybersecurity.

Based on information from NSF and NIST and assuming appropriation of the necessary amounts, CBO estimates that implementing H.R. 756 would cost $504 million over the 2014-2018 period and $52 million after 2018. Enacting the legislation would not affect direct spending or revenues; therefore, pay-as-you-go procedures do not apply. HR 756 would authorize appropriations for several NSF grant programs aimed at enhancing cybersecurity. The bill would authorize appropriations totaling $357 million over the 2014-2016 period to improve research on cybersecurity.

In addition, H.R. 756 would authorize the appropriation of:

  • $15 million for grants to establish centers of cybersecurity research;
  • $75 million for grants to universities to improve cybersecurity programs and increase the number of students in fields related to cybersecurity. This includes a program to offer scholarships to students who pursue higher education related to cybersecurity and commit to public service after graduating;
  • $12 million for grants to institutions that grant associate degrees to develop cybersecurity programs and establish centers of excellence; and
  • $96 million for grants to higher education institutions to establish cybersecurity traineeship programs for graduate students.

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