It doesn't seem like it, but it's nearly two years since I started ORG, along with Ian Brown, Rufus Pollock, Cory Doctorow, and Danny O'Brien, at the OpenTech conference. In the following weeks, we got together with Stef Magdalinski, James Cronin, Louise Ferguson and Ben Laurie and William Heath to form the ORG Board. Later on we acquired Neil Gaiman as our patron, and gathered a group of digital rights experts together to form our Advisory Council.

At the beginning of this year, I moved from the Executive Director role to the Board when we recruited Becky Hogge to be our full-time ED, with able support from Michael Holloway.

We've campaigned on data retention, copyright term extension, DRM and evoting, just to name a few. We've had some spectacular successes, some great press, and have built strong relationships with a host of other rights organisations, journalists and MPs.

All in all, it's been a busy two years, but now the time has come to recruit some new blood to the Board and are looking for people to take up non-executive positions.

So what are we after? Well, your expertise. Not so much your knowledge of digital rights issues - although interest in that area is helpful, we have the Advisory Council to set policy - but your expertise in how to run an organisation like ORG. This is all about the stuff that keeps ORG working, keeps it successful - deciding strategy, guiding the Executive Director and staff, and helping the organisation meet our goals.

We meet once a month, and you'll be expected to take part in two low-volume mailing lists (Board and Advisory Council) and our internal wiki, as well as attend Advisory Council meetings once a quarter. You'll need to be able to dedicate 1-2 days a month to ORG. Although unpaid, your out-of-pocket expenses will be covered.

Again, it's worth stressing that this isn't about digital rights policy, so you don't have to be an expert, you just have to be interested in helping to protect our digital freedoms and liberties. We'd much rather see people who have experience in a business area such as finance, long-term business planning, or management. Maybe you've worked as an entrepreneur, in big business, or in an SME - NGO or non-profit experience isn't essential, but a good head for Board-level matters is!

Full job description is on the ORG site, and the closing date is 22 June. To apply, send covering letter and CV to michael [AT] openrightsgroup.org.

I don't know if posting videos is sort of cheating on my whole 'will blog daily' thing... but this one is so fab you really have to see it. (Thanks John!)






Lip Dub - Flagpole Sitta by Harvey Danger on Vimeo

Later... Whilst I was googling for Harvey Danger to see if it really is spelt 'sitta', I discovered that not only is the band still going, they've also got a new album out, Little by Little.... They've made it available for free download, either via bit torrent or direct from their site in both MP3 and Ogg Vorbis format, as well as selling really nice packages from their store which include sets of badges and stickers, as well as a second bonus CD.

I think this is a fabulous idea, and one that I'm really glad to see bands experimenting with. Indeed, I think Harvey Danger really have their heads screwed on right, as their explanation for why they are giving their music away for free chimes very much with the way I look at things.

Given our unusual history, and a long-held sense that the practice now being demonized by the music biz as “illegal” file sharing can be a friend to the independent musician, we have decided to embrace the indisputable fact of music in the 21st century, put our money where our mouth is, and make our record, Little By Little…, available for download via Bittorrent, and at our website. We’re not streaming, or offering 30-second song samples, or annoying you with digital rights management software; we’re putting up the whole record, for free, forever. Full stop. Please help yourself; if you like it, please share with friends.

Of course, the CD will also be for sale on the site, as well as in fine independent record stores across the country, in a deluxe package that includes a 30-minute bonus disc that serves as a companion piece to the record proper (retail price for the package is $11.99). [...]

However, it’s important that people understand the free download concept isn’t a frivolous act. It’s a key part of our promotional campaign, along with radio and press promotion, live shows, and videos. It’s a bet that the resources of the Internet can make possible a new way for musicians to find their audience – and forge a meaningful artistic career built on support from cooperative, not adversarial, relationships.

We realize that digital files are the primary means by which a huge segment of the population is exposed to new music; we also believe that plenty of music lovers in the world will buy a record once they’ve heard it – whether via radio or computer.

I've downloaded the album and I'm going to give it a good listening to. If I like it I'll buy it and, if I do, then that will be a sale they made explicitly because some people at some company called Connected Ventures did a mad lip-dub version of Flagpole Sitta and because Harvey Danger let me hear their music for free.

It's just over a week til the Open Rights Group's Support ORG (and Party!) event, at which there will be public domain DJs, free culture goodie bags and the chance to win some really cool schwag. Our special guest speaker is the wonderful Danny O'Brien, who is always fantastic value for money and well worth coming along to see. So, if that sounds like fun, come along - it's free! Well... it's sort of free - we just ask that you bring someone who might like to become a new ORG supporter.

If you can't make it, then you can still support ORG by buying a raffle ticket for just £2.50 (link to PayPal is at the bottom of that page). Prizes up for grabs include:

• a signed copy of Code 2.0 from Lawrence Lessig
• £150 in O’Reilly book vouchers
• a signed copy of the Gowers Review of Intellectual Property from Andrew Gowers
• a signed copy of Bruce Schneier's Beyond Fear
• a set of a dozen Beatpick compilations
• a signed author's galley of Cory Doctorow's next novel, Little Brother and the opportunity to be written into it
• ... and the pièce de résistance, as far as I am concerned - a 'very battered keyboard with a key missing and everything!', signed by our Patron, Neil Gaiman.

Many thanks to everyone who has donated! Buy your tickets on the night, or online via PayPal. At £2.50 each, they're a snip!



Oh... and also, please blog about this as widely as you can. ORG has a busy year ahead and we really need to spread the word - your blog post is as valuable a way of showing support for the work that ORG does as buying a raffle ticket or becoming a supporter.

From the ORG blog:

Should the term of copyright protection on sound recordings stay at 50 years or be extended?

This question has been hanging in the air for the last couple of years, with the music industry lobbying government for an extension on the grounds that the royalties they earn from old recordings are essential to bringing new acts to the stage and supporting ageing musicians. They believe that copyright term on sound recordings should be the same length as the copyright in the composition, which currently stands at life plus 70 years.

On the other hand, copyright reformers argue that term should remain the same in order to protect the public domain and to free the huge number of old recordings which are no longer commercially viable and therefore not being released by the record labels. They also argue that there is a greater economic benefit to allowing works to pass into the public domain after 50 years so that new works can be made from them and new businesses that specialise in niche markets can flourish.

This question of term extension, along with many others, is now being considered by Andrew Gowers in his Review of Intellectual Property which was commissioned by the Treasury and is due to report before the end of the year.

The Open Rights Group believes that term extension is such an important issue that it deserves focused and rigourous discussion, so we've invited people from number of backgrounds to give us their thoughts and opinions.

We would be delighted if you could join us - the event is free to all, but places are limited so book now!

Schedule:
6.00pm - Registration.
6.30pm - Keynote by Professor Jonathan Zittrain, Chair in Internet Governance and Regulation at Oxford University.
7.30pm - Panel Discussion, moderated by John Howkins, RSA & Adelphi Charter; guests include Caroline Wilson, University of Southampton, Faculty of Law; others TBC.
8.30pm - DJ set by The Chaps, playing a pre-1955 public domain set.
10.00pm - Close.

Date:
Monday 13 November 2006

Location:
Conway Hall
25 Red Lion Square
London, WC1
United Kingdom

Nearest tube:
Holborn

If you sign up, but find you are not able to come, please do let us know so we can release your seat to someone else.

Cory Doctorow, ORG Advisory Council member, famous novelist, copyright activist and one of the driving forces behind BoingBoing, has kindly donated a Razr mobile phone and a signed fist edition of his novel Eastern Standard Tribe, to the Open Rights Group for us to auction. We have duly put both together as one lot on eBay, with a starting price of just £5. (Rather fuzzy photo.)

Bargain!

Details for the Motorola Razr:

Flipphone
Condition: New
GSM/GPRS 850/900/1800/1900 Mzh
Unlocked
Camera with 4x zoom
Bundled Items: Battery, Wall Charger
Features: Bluetooth, Colour Screen, Email / Web, GPRS, MMS enabled, Polyphonic ringtones, Streaming video, Vibration

And the blurb for Eastern Standard Tribe:

Art is an up-and-coming interface designer, working on the management of data flow along the Massachusetts Turnpike. He's doing the best work of his career and can guarantee that the system will be, without question, the most counterintuitive, user-hostile piece of software ever pushed forth into the world

Why? Because Art is an industrial saboteur. he may live in London and work for an EU telecommunications megacorp, but Art's real home is the Eastern Standard Tribe.

The comm - instant wireless communication - puts everyone in touch with everyone else, twenty-four hours a day. but one thing hasn't changed: the need for sleep. The world is slowly splintering into Tribes held together by common time zones, less than families and more than nations. And Art is working oto humiliate the Greenwich Mean Tribe to the benefit of his own people.

The world of next week is overflowing with ubiquitous computing, where an idea scribbled onto one's comm can revolutionize an industry. But in a world without boundaries, nothing can be taken for granted - not happiness, not money, and, most certainly, not love.

Which might explain why Art finds himself stranded on teh roof of an insane asylum outside Boston, debating whether to push a pencil into his brain. Happiness or smarts? What's it going to be, Art?

If you want to check out Cory's book before you buy this signed hardback, then you can - he's made it available for download under a Creative Commons licence.

So, whilst you're checking out the full spec for the ultra-slim Razr and reading through Cory's download to make sure you're into time-shifting double-dealing hackers, why not bid? Just in case...

And if you don't want to bid, but want to support ORG, please blog the links!

Was the headline that I chose not to run with in today's Open Rights Group press release, despite the fact that's pretty much how I felt about it.

If you're a regular reader of either my or Neil's blog, you will of course already know that Neil's our Patron, but it's nice to finally fess up publicly about it. I'm pleased about it for a few reasons. Neil's very clued in when it comes to copyright, digital rights and authors' freedoms. He even won the Defender of Liberty Award* from the CBLDF in 97. It's wonderful to see someone whose creative processes are so very analogue - Neil writes his first drafts longhand with a nice pen and a Moleskine notebook - becoming so deeply immersed in the digital world.

It's also great because Neil and Cory Doctorow, who is on our Advisory Council, are the very people that the rights-grabbing publishing oligarchies claim that they are trying to 'protect' using that annoying DRM crap, plus they're the people that you are I are supposedly 'stealing' from every time we read their books more than once. I've always found Cory to be quite pleased to have his work downloaded, repurposed and redistributed (within the terms of his Creative Commons licence, of course). And I know for a fact, because he's said so on his blog, that Neil's very keen on people reading his works more than once, turning them into tattoos, and using them as inspiration for interpretative dance.

Plus, of course, and you know how much I love stating the blindingly obvious, I'm chuffed because I've been a huge fan of Neil's for a long time, and finally I have a good excuse to email him and ask for quotes. To wit:

"We're in a world in which digital rights, the world of the internet, and the exchange of information is getting more and more important and relevant to all our lives, wherever we are," said my new friend Neil. "I'm delighted that there's now a group of people committed to preserving and extending civil liberties in a digital world and to being sane and sensible as we careen into a digital future. I was honoured to be asked to be Patron of the Open Rights Group, and I look forward to working with them for years to come."

So, don't forget to sign up to support ORG, and especially don't forget that we have an evening of free drinks, nibbles and Cory Doctorow on Feb 7th.

* Hm... wonder if ORG should start a Defender of The Digital Realm awards...

The second Open Rights Group, featuring ubergeek Cory Doctorow, is set for the evening of Tuesday 7 Feb 2006.

Don't let Hollywood hijack your rights
Cory Doctorow

American entertainment companies say they're fighting piracy, but they're going at it by punishing the innocent to get at the guilty. A pan-European digital television restrictions proposal will turn the studios from companies that can control copying of movies into companies that can control the design of all digital TV devices, that get to define how big your family is allowed to be, that get to take away all the rights you get under copyright law and sell them back to you, one painful, expensive dribble at a time. It's not really a business plan: more like a urinary tract infection. Europe's coming Broadcast Flag will ban open source for digital TV, break the devices in your living room, and turn you into a truly captive audience. Get your torch and pitchfork, for this genuinely sucks -- and you shouldn't take it lying down!

This free event is open to digital rights campaigners, grassroots activists, the press and the general public, so please do send this information to anyone you think may be interested.

Refreshments and nibbles will be provided free of charge.

When: Tuesday 7 February 2006, 6pm–9pm
Where: 01Zero-One Hopkins Street (corner of Peter Street), Soho, London, W1F 0HS
Map: http://www.01zero-one.co.uk/map.htm

Note: 01Zero-One is sometimes a difficult venue to find if you've never been there before. On the corner of Hopkins and Peter Street, you'll see a featureless brick wall, with nothing but a black door in it. That anonymous black door is the one you want — just ring the buzzer and it'll be opened for you, if it's not propped open with a brick, that is.

Only 100 people can attend, so please book your place by signing up on the Open Rights Group wiki.

The Open Rights Group pledge finally matured on Christmas day, and now we're proud to announce that the supporters' database is up and running and you can officially now give us cash! We've had a surge of donations since the email went out to pledge signatories, so please do join the stampede and let us have your fiver a month.

We have two levels of support: normal is £5 per month, or £60 per year; and concession is £30 per year. You can pay by cheque, credit/debit cards via PayPal, or standing order - we'll even create your own personalised standing order form which you can either send to us or use to set up your standing order via your own online banking system.

The first 1000 people to give us actual cold hard cash will be given a special status, that of 'Founding 1000', which basically means that we will give you special treats as soon as we've figured out what those special treats are. In the meantime, you get a warm rosy glow of satisfaction (batteries not included).

If you can't donate, then please help us by spreading the word and blogging about ORG. We also have, for your delectation and delight, a wiki and a discussion list where you can join in the flame wars fun.

The impudence of the music and film industries never ceases to amaze me. First they make crap products no one wants to buy. Then they sue their own customers because they aren't buying said crap products. Then they follow that up with DRM that kills your computer. And now they are trying to hijack proposed data retention legislation originally tabled to fight 'terrorism and organised crime', saying that it's essential that all your telecomms and web browsing data be made available to them so that they can sue your arses off with it.

Yes, that's right. The music and film industries think that there are far, far more dangerous things in this world than terrorists and organised crime. Oh yes. You nasty little file sharers and DRM breakers are going to bring down civilisation and you must be stopped! Stopped, I say!

And, of course, there's some more new legislation, going by the acronym IPRED2 which makes this all much, much easier for the industry as it criminalises copyright infringement. So, with Data Retention forcing ISPs to store all the information they can about your web habits, and IPRED2 mandating that the police must work with rightsholders to investigate alleged infringement, the music industry can now get investigation and prosecution done at the taxpayer's expense, instead of having to pay out lots of money to go through that pesky civil system.

You weren't really using your civil liberties and human rights, were you?

Come 13th December, the European Parliament are voting on Data Retention. And if they get suckered into voting yes, we're all buggered. It's not often that European legislation truly does affect all 457 million Europeans, but this time round, they mean business. 457 million people's mobile phone usage, including who you call, where you were when you called, and how long your call lasted, will be logged. 457 million people's internet usage will be logged, including your VoIP call details, your email and the website you visit. And there won't be bugger all you can do about it.

So, don't delay, Email Your MEP today, and tell them that you don't like Data Retention, and you certainly don't like the way it's being pushed through the European Parliament so quickly, and could they please brush up on the meaning of the word 'democracy'. I urge you to be polite, be informed (that's easy - read the two links at the top of this post), and be brief, and I urge you to email your MEP now.

The emergence of new communications technologies has radically changed the civil rights landscape in our society. Privacy, intellectual property, and access to knowledge are just some of the areas where digital rights are being eroded by government and big business.

The Open Rights Group (ORG) would like to invite you to an evening of digital rights discussion, networking and wine at 01Zero-One Hopkins Street on Tuesday 29 November at 6pm to debate these issues.

This inaugural ORG event will begin with a short presentation by special guest speaker Jonathan Zittrain, Chair in Internet Governance and Regulation at Oxford University. Lloyd Davis from Perfect Path will then moderate an open discussion, asking: Which issues are a priority for you? And where would coalitions strengthen your hand? There'll also be plenty of time to meet and talk with fellow organisers and activists.

To reserve your place, please email events@openrightsgroup.org now. There are only 100 places available, so be quick!

This free event is open to digital rights campaigners, grassroots activists, the press and the general public, so please do forward this information to anyone you think may be interested.

Where: 01Zero-One Hopkins Street (corner of Peter Street), Soho, London, W1F 0HS
When: Tuesday 29 November, 6pm - 9pm
Guest Speaker: Jonathan Zittrain, Chair in Internet Governance and Regulation, Oxford University; Co-Founder, Berkman Center for Internet & Society
RSVP: events@openrightsgroup.org
Map: http://www.01zero-one.co.uk/map.htm

What is the Open Rights Group?
ORG is a new not-for-profit digital rights activist group, working to raise the profile of digital rights issues in the media and help other groups get their voices heard. For more information visit www.openrightsgroup.org or email Suw Charman, Executive Director, at suw@openrightsgroup.org.

This event is presented with the support of 01Zero-One's InSync Programme.

(I'm cross-posting this from the new Open Rights Group blog, which doesn't yet get the traffic CnV gets.)

Remix Reading, the group dedicated to promoting free culture and Creative Commons locally in the Reading area is expanding into four cities across the UK and establishing a new project, Remix Commons, to bring Creative Commoners together.

Says Tom Chance:

We've got most of the infrastructure ready; we have people in Brighton, Deptford (East London), Leeds, Milton Keynes and Reading working on ways to promote free culture and Creative Commons locally; we have a bunch of events lined up over the next few months, and we're in touch with lots of other local arts organisations and local government people. Soon we'll unleash the coolest free culture network yet, creating a national repository of free content (on the Remix Commons web site) and a network of local projects providing a local energy and presence. You'll also be able to see, for example, all the work produced by people in Reading, to cement that local presence on the web.

But... we need more techies! We're currently limping along with two people who barely have the time to maintain the current Remix Reading web site, let alone expand and support the network. People with PHP knowledge (especially Drupal), people who are good at maintaining a server, people who know how to run an icecast (webradio) server, people who are good in making HTML and CSS layouts, and so on, and so on. Just one or two extra technical hands with enthusiasm could make a huge impact. It should also be an interesting challenge as we expand and improve.

If you're interested in helping out, contact Tom at Remix Reading.
PS If you haven't already got your Open Rights Group link updated to the new URL - www.openrightsgroup.org - please do so soon!

Just posted an update on where we're at with ORG over on the temporary ORG blog, along with some information on Free Culture UK and Open Geodata. The most important thing, though, is that we really need to whip up some fuss about data retention:

Urgent Data Retention ACTION NEEDED BY THURSDAY 2005-09-22

You don't need us to tell you that the mandatory retention of data about every EU citizen's calls, mobile phone movements, and internet usage would be a bad thing (if you do, check http://www.edri.org/docs/lettertoUKpres.pdf for a joint letter from EDRi and Privacy International to the Council of Ministers on the problems with data retention).

But it's happening anyway: the EU Commission just published their proposal to do just that:
http://www.statewatch.org/news/2005/sep/com-data-retention-prop.pdf

And there's a live streaming press conference with Commissioner for Justice, Freedom and Security Franco Frattini on the 'retention of data and the radicalisation and recruitment of terrorists' today (Wednesday 21 Sept) at 12.15pm.
http://europa.eu.int/comm/ebs/schedule.cfm

One of the key EU institutions considering their position on this proposal is the ARTICLE 29 WORKING GROUP: that's all of the Information Commissioners (data protection registrars) in the EU, acting as one. Word has it that many of the Article 29 Working Group want to fight data retention.

But the UK Information Commissioner says he can't join the fight because he doesn't feel that he can publically stand against the UK government's recent paper "Liberty and Security: Striking the Right Balance".
http://www.edri.org/docs/UKpresidencypaper.pdf

Short summary: it has a CCTV picture of the London Bombers on the front page. Says civil liberties are nice and all but, woo, terrorism.

Longer summary (from the excellent Privacy International coverage):
http://www.privacyinternational.org/article.shtml?cmd%5B347%5D=x-347-346410

EDRi has produced a short analysis of the paper, which finds that none of the examples used by the UK government would justify their data retention proposals:
http://www.edri.org/node/view/679

The latest draft of the EU's data retention plans have already excised the Article 29 working group from overseeing what sort of data gets retained.

The group want to fight, but the UK commissioner is reticent.

You can get them fighting back. Tell your Info Commissioner to stand up for your rights.

IF YOU HAVE TWO MINUTES:
Visit http://www.dataretentionisnosolution.com and sign European Digital Rights (EDRi)'s Europe-wide petition. EDRi is working hard at the EU level to alert politicians to the issues with data retention; the petition helps it demonstrate the size of the constituency it represents and will help boost Article 29's confidence.

IF YOU HAVE TWENTY MINUTES:
The UK Information Commissioner doesn't answer to the government: he answers to Parliament, and from them, to you. His mission (should he choose to accept it) includes: "protecting your personal information".

For that he doesn't need the government's backing: he needs yours.

1. Write to your MP, and tell him or her that you want the UK Information Commissioner to speak in the EU on your behalf against data retention. Use http://www.writetothem.com/

2. When you're done, copy and paste your message to the Commissioner's office email at: mail@ico.gsi.gov.uk If you like, cc: us at suw.charman+ico@gmail.com.

(You may want to check http://www.openrightsgroup.org/ before you send that second mail. We want the information commissioner to know we support him, but don't want to spam him to death. If he complains, we'll put up a sign.)

3. Forward this mail. Feel free to cut out everything but this plea. But make sure you include the expiry date: THURSDAY 2005-09-22.

Here's some points you could mention in your letter to your MP:

* Ask your MP to tell the Information Commissioner to speak for you, not the British government. Your right to have your personal data protected will outlast the current incumbents and must be assured by the appropriate legislation.

* The Commissioner has previously commented on both the expense of and lack of need for data retention. Ask your MP to ask that he fully and thoroughly investigate any data retention plans before rolling them out across Europe. Try not to mention "45 minute claims": it makes MPs uncomfortable and sweaty.

* The "Liberty and Security" paper published by the government actually only asks for "internet logins and logouts". The EU proposal also demands the To: and From: of emails. Tell your MP that even if the Commissioner is beholden to the government's stance, he should agree to no more than the minimum amount of data requested.

Be polite; be pursuasive: we want him on our side.

But most of all, be prompt. The Article 29 Working Group meets Thursday and Friday of this week.

We'll let you know how you get on. Remember, 850 people have your back.

And if you haven't already, please do go and sign the Pledge - we have over 850 signatories now, so we're getting close. If you've already signed it, please convince just one of your friends to sign as well.

data retention, Open Rights Group, ORG

May I present to you, in all it's wondrous bloggy glory, the Open Rights Group! Yes, that's right, the organisation with no name is now the organisation called ORG. And no smart-alec comments about what we're going to call our first digital rights conference, thank you kindly.

You'd be surprised how much work there is to do now, just to get ORG to the point where we can actually start accepting donations and recruiting members. It's important that we get this going, though, so I shall once again kiss goodbye to my evenings weekends. Pity. I'd really been enjoying them.

The interview I did with Kevin Anderson for BBC Radio 5 Pods and Blogs show is now up online, for a limited time only. It will likely be replaced some time around Monday 29 Aug-ish, when the next show goes out at which point I'll post/podcast the MP3 of my 10 minute segment.

The nice thing about blogging this, though, is that I can correct a slip of my tongue. I said that 1.6 billion AOL customer records were stolen, but in fact it was 1.6 billion Acxiom customer records. I have no idea why Acxiom morphed into AOL in my head, but at least I can clarify that here.

UPDATE: My section is now online as an mp3.

digital rights, data retention, BBC Radio 5, Kevin Anderson, podcast

Have to pop over to BBC TV Centre tomorrow to record an interview about this digital rights group that I'm helping set up, and data retention. The interview will be aired overnight, during the Blog and Podcast Hour. When I get more details, I'll let you know, but I'm guessing it'll be easier to listen after the event via their streaming than to stay up all night wondering what time it's on.