Criminal Minded? : Mixtape DJs, The Piracy Paradox, and Lessons for the Recording Industry

For at least the past three years, leading American fashion designers have lobbied for passage of copyright-like protection for the design aspects of their apparel creations. For at least as long, the recorded music industry has been engaged in an aggressive campaign to enforce its copyrights in recorded music against a number of technology-enabled and/or culturally sympathetic alleged infringers, including twelve year-olds and grandmothers. Although the record labels already have protection under the copyright law while the fashion houses seek it, they have at least one thing in common: some portion of the piracy that they seek to eradicate is more valuable to them than they publicly let on. In their recent article The Piracy Paradox: Innovation and Intellectual Property in Fashion Design, Kal Raustiala and Chris Sprigman explore the low-IP equilibrium of the fashion design industry, as well as the unexpected value created by a low-protection regime. One might ask whether there is anything wrong with chilling an unlawful activity such as large-scale copyright infringement. The article argues that there is something wrong with such a result, but that the owners of the copyright in the recordings either fail to appreciate the problem or fail to account for the problem in executing their enforcement strategy. Hip-hop mixtape DJs are engaged in productive infringement – infringing activity or improper appropriation that adds value to the infringed asset, rather than leading to losses for the copyright owner. Dealing with such infringement requires an approach different from typical recording industry tactics. This article argues that, in order to preserve and enhance the value of their own assets, the record labels should practice strategic forbearance

We Can Work It Out: Co-op Compulsory Licensing as the Way Forward in Improving Access to Anti-Retroviral Drugs

This Article explores the social and developmental underpinnings of the access problem and describes the legal framework that provides the backdrop for the Waiver\u27s licensing scheme. Part III examines the various lenses, humanitarian, economic, and political, through which the underutilization problem may be viewed and explained. Part IV sets out the structural heart of the Waiver scheme\u27s deficiencies: the notion of the “compulsory” license itself. Part V posits a co-op scheme of licensing that aligns the concerns, goals, and incentives of IP owners, importers, exporters, and consumers. Finally, the Article relates the proposed scheme to more general trends in thinking regarding the deployment of intellectual property assets

Light Curves and Period Changes of Type II Cepheids in the Globular Clusters M3 and M5

Light curves in the B, V, and I_c passbands have been obtained for the type II Cepheids V154 in M3 and V42 and V84 in M5. Alternating cycle behavior, similar to that seen among RV Tauri variables, is confirmed for V84. Old and new observations, spanning more than a century, show that V154 has increased in period while V42 has decreased in period. V84, on the other hand, has shown large, erratic changes in period that do not appear to reflect the long term evolution of V84 through the HR diagram.Comment: 28 pages, 12 figure

The Privacy Gambit: Toward a Game Theoretic Approach to International Data Protection

This article briefly explores several scenarios in which economic actors compete and cooperate in order to capture the value in personal information. The focus then shifts to one particular scenario: the ongoing interaction between the United States and the European Union in attempting to construct data protection regimes that serve the philosophies and citizens of each jurisdiction as well as provide a strategic economic advantage. A game theoretic model is presented to explain the course of dealings between the two actors, including both unilateral and bilateral actions. Part I ends with an exploration of opportunities for seizing competitive advantage, and for fostering cooperative mutual advantage, through government action. Several likely equilibrium states are posited, and a single ultimate equilibrium is predicted. Part I explores the literature on commodification and negotiability of information in order to explain the contextual nature of modern privacy and, further, introduces a number of the contexts and actors among which information interactions take place. Then, Part II focuses on a single context and a single pair of actors, the United States and European Union. This part describes their divergent philosophies regarding data protection, the conflicting legislative results that have flowed from those philosophies and the attempts at solving the privacy conflict between these two actors via negotiation. Part III expresses the U.S.-E.U. privacy conflict as an extensive form game, explains the history of interaction between the actors in terms of such game and assesses the current negotiated solution. Finally, the article concludes with a consideration of the traditional game theoretic underpinnings of the alternative outcomes and assesses the likely stability of the equilibrium achieved

Association between ABO Blood Type and Cervical Dysplasia/Carcinoma in Jamaican Women

Cervical cancer is one of the leading causes of death from cancer among women worldwide and is the most common female cancer in developing countries. In Jamaica, at 27.5 per 100, 000 it is second only to breast cancer as a cause of cancer death in women. Several studies have suggested an association between blood type A and cervical dysplasia/cancer. The aim of this study was to determine whether presence of cervical dysplasia/cancer is associated with blood type A in Jamaican women. Blood was collected from 319 women, 234 cases (abnormal Pap smears) and 85 controls (normal Pap smears). Blood type was determined by the determination of isoagglutinins (anti-A and anti-B). The frequency of types A, B, AB and O in the controls and cases was similar to the Jamaican population. There was a slightly association between blood group O and cervical dysplasia/ carcinoma in Jamaican women when compared with others blood groups. Cervical dysplasia/ carcinoma was strongly associated to the number of sexual partners, number of biological fathers, number of children and the use of hormonal contraceptive

Seroprevalence of Anti-HIV Antibodies in Women with Abnormal Pap Smears in Jamaica

The Human Papilloma Virus (HPV) and Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) are both sexually transmitted infections, which have impacted the prevalence of cervical dysplasia and cancer in women. Infections with one of these viruses can facilitate infection with the other. In Jamaica cervical cancer is seen in 27.5 per 100, 000 women making it the second leading cause of cancer death in this population only to breast cancer as a cause of death in women with cancer. Our study investigates the seroprevalence of anti-HIV antibodies in women with abnormal pap smears in Jamaica to determine the influence of HIV on cervical dysplasia. Only patients with positive confirmatory tests were classified as HIV positive. Enzyme-Linked Immunosorbent Assay (ELISA) was used for screening while the Western blot was used for confirmation. Sero-prevalence of anti-HIV antibodies in women with abnormal pap smears was 0.85%. The preliminary results of HIV seroprevalence in women with abnormal pap smears may be low in Jamaica because of the success of the HIV/AIDS programme. A larger study can be done in the future and be representative of the Jamaica population, since the present study has as a limitation a smaller number of controls in comparison to cases. The findings reported do not support the hypothesis that HPV infection facilitates HIV infection in the studied population. It is the first study of its class reported in the Caribbean. It has been postulated that HPV infections may account for the cervical dysplasia despite the low prevalence of HIV association in the women with abnormal pap smears and that persistent HPV and to a lesser extent the HIV is responsible for the prevalence of abnormal pap smears in Jamaica. A limitation of the study was that the control group was smaller than that expected for 3 million’s population but a larger study can be done in the future