Media News - Friday, August 15, 2008

Legal milestone for open source

Advocates of open source software have hailed a court ruling protecting its use even though it is given away free. The US federal appeals court move overturned a lower court decision involving free software used in model trains that a hobbyist put online. The court has now said conditions of an agreement called the Artistic Licence were enforceable under copyright law. "For non-lawgeeks, this won't seem important but this is huge," said Stanford Law Professor Larry Lessig. "In non-technical terms, the Court has held that free licences set conditions on the use of copyrighted work. When you violate the condition, the licence disappears, meaning you're simply a copyright infringer. "This is a very important victory." According to details outlined in the ruling, Robert Jacobsen had written and then released code under an Artistic Licence. This meant anyone using that free code had to attribute the author, highlight the original source of the files and explain how the code had been modified. Jacobsen, who manages open source software group Java Model Railroad Interface, accused commercial software developer Matthew Katzer and his company of ignoring the terms of the Artistic Licence when they took his code and used it to develop commercial software products for trains. The ruling has implications for the Creative Commons licence which offers ways for work to go into the public domain and still be protected. These licenses are widely used by academic organisations like MIT for distributing coursework, scientific groups, artists, movie makers and Wikipedia among others. (BBC)

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Russia accuses EUX.TV of ‘dirty propaganda’

The Russian embassy at the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation in Brussels has accused EUX.TV, the Europe channel, of "Russophobe" reporting that supports "dirty propaganda aims." Reacting via e-mail to an analysis article on the EUX.TV website, Alexey Zaytsev, press officer at the Russian Mission to NATO, said an article published on Tuesday shows the webtv channel's "interest in anti-Russian campaign very clear."vThe article involved, written by EUX.TV editor Raymond Frenken, was published under the headline "Russia's Contempt for Free Press Kills Dutch Journalist". It analysed media coverage of the war in Georgia in the light of the killing earlier that day of Dutch RTL Nieuws journalist Stan Storimans, who was reporting from the Georgian town of Gori. The article mentioned a number of examples of questionable reporting both on the Russia Today TV channel and on CNN to underline the need for independent reporting from inside a conflict zone. Dutch European Affairs Minister Frans Timmermans told EUX.TV in Brussels on Wednesday that the Dutch government is still waiting for details on the killing of Storimans. The Dutch Foreign Minister has asked the Russian embassy in The Hague for such an official explanation. EUX.TV, launched in Brussels two years ago, is an independent non-profit web platform that covers European politics through a website and a branded YouTube channel. (EUX TV)

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Telegraaf group to slash 425 jobs

The Telegraaf Media Group is to scrap 425 jobs in an effort to push up its profitability, reports ANP news service on Friday. The publisher, whose titles include the Telegraaf newspaper and gossip magazine Privé, wants to make cost savings of between €40 million and €50m. Jobs will go across the whole organisation and will include compulsory redundancies the company is reported as saying. TMG employs 3,500 staff. The company also wants to sell off unprofitable activities. TMG booked a net loss of €175.5m in the first half of this year compared with profit of €39.7m in the same 2007 period. Turnover fell marginally to €360m from €365m last year. Advertising revenues fell to €182m from €180m but TMG expects pressure on the advertising market to grow in the second half of the year while costs increase. (Dutch News)

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Gannett is cutting 1,000 newspaper jobs

Gannett Co. is eliminating 1,000 jobs, including 600 layoffs, across its newspaper operations, a company spokeswoman said Thursday. USA Today, the largest-circulation newspaper in the US, wasn't affected by the latest round of cutbacks, but had 45 job cuts of its own last November. The latest cuts will affect Gannett's other newspapers, which include 84 dailies such as The Arizona Republic and the Detroit Free Press as well as nearly 900 non-daily publications. The cost-cutting drive at the country's largest newspaper publisher is the latest effort by the industry to cope with declining revenues due to an economic slump and a continuing migration of advertising dollars online. News of the job cuts was reported Wednesday on a blog run by a former editor and reporter at Gannett, who obtained a company memo addressed to publishers. The publishers were asked to notify employees of the cuts by Friday. Other major newspaper publishers have also been slashing jobs, including McClatchy Co., which said in June it would eliminate 1,400 jobs, or about 10 percent of its work force. Gannett shares rose $2.05, or 10.6 percent, to $21.31 (14.30 EUR) in afternoon trading. (Chicago Sun-Times)

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Mixed results for Schidsted’s free dailies

Schibsted's free daily 20 Minutos in Spain has moved from making a profit in the first six months of 2007 (€1.8m) to a loss in the same period in 2008 (-€2.6m). Total profits in 2007 were €0.6m. Schibsted called the advertsing market in Spain 'challenging'. “Spain's macroeconomic developments are weak. The advertising market for print media is weaker, and this affects Schibsted Classified Media and 20 Minutes.” Readership in Spain, however, is developing very well, it is the best-read daily in the country. Earlier also Metro expressed their disappointment with the Spanish market. The position of 20 Minutes in France seems to be somewhat better, the paper made a profit of €1.3m - in 2007 it lost money in France. (Newspaper Innovation)

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Fight is on to halt government plans that would ban reporters from inquests

A growing campaign is underway to convince Prime Minister Gordon Brown to scrap plans to ban reporters and the public from inquests in the interests of national security. The Counter-Terrorism Bill includes powers for the Justice Secretary to remove juries from inquests and appoint a government “specially appointed coroner”. The bill would particularly affect military inquests, a rare source of unbiased and unfettered news about the armed forces, which are held at Brize Norton RAF base in Oxfordshire. The bill is set to be debated in the House of Lords after the parliamentary recess, and if passed campaigners warn it would undermine the ancient right to hold public inquests. (UK Press Gazette)

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