Conditions, constraints and contracts: on the use of annotations for policy modeling.

Organisational policies express constraints on generation and processing of resources. However, application domains rely on transformation processes, which are in principle orthogonal to policy specifications and domain rules and policies may evolve in a non-synchronised way. In previous papers, we have proposed annotations as a flexible way to model aspects of some policy, and showed how they could be used to impose constraints on domain configurations, how to derive application conditions on transformations, and how to annotate complex patterns. We extend the approach by: allowing domain model elements to be annotated with collections of elements, which can be collectively applied to individual resources or collections thereof; proposing an original construction to solve the problem of annotations remaining orphan , when annotated resources are consumed; introducing a notion of contract, by which a policy imposes additional pre-conditions and post-conditions on rules for deriving new resources. We discuss a concrete case study of linguistic resources, annotated with information on the licenses under which they can be used. The annotation framework allows forms of reasoning such as identifying conflicts among licenses, enforcing the presence of licenses, or ruling out some modifications of a licence configuration

World Music on a U.S. Stage: A Berne/TRIPs and Economic Analysis of the Fairness in Music Licensing Act

This article analyzes the dispute settlement proceedings pending before the World Trade Organization (WTO) concerning the Fairness in Music License Act of 1998, a new provision of the US Copyright Act that exempts many bars, restaurants, and retail stores from paying license fees for performing broadcast music in their establishments. In May 1999, the European Community challenged the Act, and its predecessor homestyle exemption, as a violation of the Agreement on Trade Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPs) and the Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works (Berne). The FMLA dispute is the first time in history that US copyright laws will be judged by an international tribunal. The case is an embarrassing one for the United States, which has recently pursued a policy of aggressively encouraging other nations to provide strong legal protections for copyrighted works. Although officials within the Clinton Administration warned legislators that the Fairness in Music Licensing Act might be incompatible with the Berne and TRIPs treaties, Congress enacted the statute over their objections. Thus, in the first year of the new century, Congress may be faced with an unprecedented choice: modify the Copyright Act to satisfy the demands of international trade jurists or face retaliatory trade sanctions by the EC. In addition to analyzing the legal arguments available to the US and the EC under the Berne and TRIPs treaties, this article also seeks to explain why Congress deliberately chose to ignore past US intellectual property policy. Using insights from law and economics and from a study of the history of laws and licensing practices governing secondary uses of broadcast music, the article demonstrates how an increasingly broad free use exemption developed for businesses playing radio and television music. It then draws on these economic and historical insights to develop legislative reform proposals that are both compatible with United States\u27 treaty obligations and that encourage performance rights organizations and associations of copyright users to reach an efficient private agreement to resolve the WTO dispute

Formulating an open source business model requires community segmentation and targeted marketing

From a commercial open source company's point of view, open source is ideally the ultimate in “grass roots" marketing where people learn by word-of-mouth about the project and where they volunteer their time and effort, resulting in a vibrant community that benefits the company in many ways. This enables an open source company to enjoy major advantages that do not normally accrue to proprietary software companies e.g. they do not need to spend resources on traditional marketing activities and furthermore, having this community support can help ensure the longevity of the project and company. While this ideal may apply to a handful of open source projects, where they achieve a large critical mass of a community which lends itself to a natural form of monetization, for the vast majority of open source companies, it is not the case of “build it and they will come”. Instead, most open source companies need to understand who comprises their community so they can formulate a viable business model. In particular, they need to understand that communities are comprised of heterogeneous types of people, each of which have their own interests, motivation, needs and ability to be monetized. Open source companies need to identify the subgroups in their community, decide which ones to deliberately focus on, and choose the best way to leverage them. This is indispensable for determining how best to monetize the interest in their software, ideally without ruffling the community spirit that differentiates their software from proprietary offerings. And this is where “old fashioned” marketing can help. This means understanding your user base and what makes them tick, determining their needs, and formulating products and services that people are willing to pay for. The sooner an open source company understands that it needs to practice traditional marketing techniques such as segmentation and target marketing, the faster they will hit on the business model formula that enables their company to succeed. These techniques need to be adapted for the open source world, which requires the blending of traditional marketing techniques and community relations. The risk of treating one's community in an undifferentiated manner and applying a generic, formulaic business model is that a company will fail to generate significant revenue as well as alienate a community that could abandon them. As a community is perhaps the most distinctive asset of an open source company, losing its community is tantamount to death. If the community is not properly nurtured and leveraged, an open source company's potential will not be realized. This paper aims at describing, through case study research, a generic approach for how commercial open source companies can segment their community to aid in their formulation of a business model and marketing plans to reach their potential. It is for anyone who works in an open source company or project who is trying to determine a viable business model. The paper is structured in three parts: the first part outlines the research question and methodology. The second part proposes a way that an open source company can segment its community. The final part analyzes the Funambol experience, describing how the company segmented its community and created open source programs to nurture and leverage it.

Towards Licenses Compatibility and Composition in the Web of Data

International audienceWe propose a general framework to attach the licensing terms to the data where the compatibility of the licensing terms concerning the data affected by a query is verified, and, if compatible, the licenses are combined into a composite license. The framework returns the composite license as licensing term about the data resulting from the query

Transaction Streams: Definition and Implications for Trust in Internet-Based Electronic Commerce.

In this paper we analyze how transactions related to the exchange of goods and services are being performed on the Internet. The adoption of electronic markets in an industry has a disintermediation potential because it can create a direct link between the producer and the consumer (without the need for the intermediation role of distributors). Electronic markets lower the search cost, allowing customers to choose among more providers (which ultimately reduces both the costs for the customer and the profits for the producer). In this paper we contend that electronic markets on the Internet have the opposite effect, resulting in our increase in the number of intermediators. We introduce transaction streams, which model how transactions are being conducted and help explain the types of new intermediators that are appearing on the Internet. We also describe mechanisms by which companies are exploring ways of extending transaction streams. To illustrate the model and validate our findings, we analyze transaction streams in the insurance industry and review associated concepts such as trust and brands.transactions; electronic markets;

Rural non-farm development in China and India

The dynamic rural nonfarm sector in China has been a major contributor to the country's remarkable growth, while in India the growth in output and employment in this sector has been rather stagnant. The paper argues that the observed patterns in the rural nonfarm development are the results of institutional differences between the two countries, especially in their political systems, ownership structure, and credit institutions. A review of the strengths and weaknesses of the rural nonfarm economy in China and India highlights the potentials and challenges of growth in the sector.Industrial policy ,Policy research ,Non-farm development ,

Past, present and future of information and knowledge sharing in the construction industry: Towards semantic service-based e-construction

The paper reviews product data technology initiatives in the construction sector and provides a synthesis of related ICT industry needs. A comparison between (a) the data centric characteristics of Product Data Technology (PDT) and (b) ontology with a focus on semantics, is given, highlighting the pros and cons of each approach. The paper advocates the migration from data-centric application integration to ontology-based business process support, and proposes inter-enterprise collaboration architectures and frameworks based on semantic services, underpinned by ontology-based knowledge structures. The paper discusses the main reasons behind the low industry take up of product data technology, and proposes a preliminary roadmap for the wide industry diffusion of the proposed approach. In this respect, the paper stresses the value of adopting alliance-based modes of operation

Country risk and the international flows of technology: evidence from the chemical industry

We empirically investigate the relationship between country risk and the international flows of technology. Using a comprehensive database on investments in chemical plants during the period 1981- 1991, we show that higher levels of country risk are associated with fewer technology transfers to recipient economies. This holds true both for wholly owned operations and for more market-based transactions. The analysis also suggests that technology transfers with smaller resource commitment tend to be preferred in country with higher levels of risk. Hence, higher country risk not only does it reduce the amount of wholly owned investment, it also contributes to shift from this type of technology transfer to more market-mediated means, such as licensing. After controlling for several country characteristics, we do not find intellectual property rights protection playing a significant role in fostering technology transfers or conditioning the transfer mode

ImageJ2: ImageJ for the next generation of scientific image data

ImageJ is an image analysis program extensively used in the biological sciences and beyond. Due to its ease of use, recordable macro language, and extensible plug-in architecture, ImageJ enjoys contributions from non-programmers, amateur programmers, and professional developers alike. Enabling such a diversity of contributors has resulted in a large community that spans the biological and physical sciences. However, a rapidly growing user base, diverging plugin suites, and technical limitations have revealed a clear need for a concerted software engineering effort to support emerging imaging paradigms, to ensure the software's ability to handle the requirements of modern science. Due to these new and emerging challenges in scientific imaging, ImageJ is at a critical development crossroads. We present ImageJ2, a total redesign of ImageJ offering a host of new functionality. It separates concerns, fully decoupling the data model from the user interface. It emphasizes integration with external applications to maximize interoperability. Its robust new plugin framework allows everything from image formats, to scripting languages, to visualization to be extended by the community. The redesigned data model supports arbitrarily large, N-dimensional datasets, which are increasingly common in modern image acquisition. Despite the scope of these changes, backwards compatibility is maintained such that this new functionality can be seamlessly integrated with the classic ImageJ interface, allowing users and developers to migrate to these new methods at their own pace. ImageJ2 provides a framework engineered for flexibility, intended to support these requirements as well as accommodate future needs