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1 <?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
2 <rss version='2.0' xmlns:lj='http://www.livejournal.org/rss/lj/1.0/'>
3 <channel>
4 <title>Petter Reinholdtsen - Entries tagged standard</title>
5 <description>Entries tagged standard</description>
6 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/</link>
7
8
9 <item>
10 <title>Regjeringen, FAD og DIFI går inn for å fjerne ODF som obligatorisk standard i det offentlige</title>
11 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Regjeringen__FAD_og_DIFI_g_r_inn_for___fjerne_ODF_som_obligatorisk_standard_i_det_offentlige.html</link>
12 <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Regjeringen__FAD_og_DIFI_g_r_inn_for___fjerne_ODF_som_obligatorisk_standard_i_det_offentlige.html</guid>
13 <pubDate>Mon, 18 Mar 2013 21:10:00 +0100</pubDate>
14 <description>&lt;p&gt;I
15 &lt;a href=&quot;http://standard.difi.no/hoyring/forslag-om-endring-av-forskrift-om-it-standarder-i-offentlig-forvaltning&quot;&gt;siste
16 høring&lt;/a&gt; om
17 &lt;a href=&quot;http://standard.difi.no/forvaltningsstandarder&quot;&gt;referansekatalogen
18 for IT-standarder i offentlig sektor&lt;/a&gt;, med høringsfrist 2012-09-30
19 (DIFI-sak 2012/498), ble det foreslått å fjerne ODF som obligatorisk
20 standard når en publiserte dokumenter som skulle kunne redigeres
21 videre av mottaker. NUUG og andre protesterte på forslaget, som er et
22 langt steg tilbake når det gjelder å sikre like rettigheter for alle
23 når en kommuniserer med det offentlige. For noen dager siden ble jeg
24 oppmerksom på at Direktoratet for forvaltning og IKT (DIFI) og
25 Fornyings-,administrasjons- og kirkedepartementet (FAD) har
26 konkludert, og oversendt forslag til regjeringen i saken. FADs
27 dokument
28 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.oep.no/search/result.html?period=none&amp;descType=both&amp;caseNumber=2012%2F2168&amp;senderType=both&amp;documentType=all&amp;list2=94&amp;searchType=advanced&amp;Search=S%C3%B8k+i+journaler&quot;&gt;2012/2168&lt;/a&gt;-8,
29 «Utkast til endring av standardiseringsforskriften» datert 2013-02-06
30 har følgende triste oppsummering fra høringen i saken:&lt;/p&gt;
31
32 &lt;p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt;
33 Det kom noen innvendinger på forslaget om å fjerne ODF som
34 obligatorisk standard for redigerbare dokumenter. Innvendingene har
35 ikke blitt ilagt avgjørende vekt.
36 &lt;/blockquote&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
37
38 &lt;p&gt;Ved å fjerne ODF som obligatorisk format ved publisering av
39 redigerbare dokumenter setter en Norge tiår tilbake. Det som vil skje
40 er at offentlige etater går tilbake til kun å publisere dokumenter på
41 et av de mange formatene til Microsoft Office, og alle som ikke
42 aksepterer bruksvilkårene til Microsoft eller ikke har råd til å bruke
43 penger på å få tilgang til Microsoft Office må igjen basere seg på
44 verktøy fra utviklerne som er avhengig av å reversutvikle disse
45 formatene. I og med at ISO-spesifikasjonen for OOXML ikke komplett og
46 korrekt spesifiserer formatene til MS Office (men er nyttige å titte i
47 når en reversutvikler), er en tilbake til en situasjon der en ikke har
48 en fri og åpen standard å forholde seg til men i stedet må springe
49 etter Microsoft. Alle andre leverandører enn Microsoft vil dermed ha
50 en seriøs ulempe. Det er som å fjerne krav om bruk av meter som
51 måleenhet, og heretter aksepterer alle måleenheter som like gyldige,
52 når en vet at den mest brukte enheten vil være armlengden til Steve
53 Ballmer slik Microsoft måler den.&lt;/p&gt;
54
55 &lt;p&gt;Jeg er ikke sikker på om forslaget er vedtatt av regjeringen ennå.
56 Kristian Bergem nevnte på et møte forrige tirsdag at han trodde det
57 var vedtatt i statsråd 8. mars, men jeg har ikke klart å finne en
58 skriftlig kilde på regjeringen.no som bekrefter dette. Kanskje det
59 ennå ikke er for sent...&lt;/p&gt;
60
61 &lt;p&gt;Jeg ba i forrige uke om innsyn i dokument 6, 7 og 8 i FAD-saken, og
62 har i dag fått innsyn i dokument 7 og 8. Ble nektet innsyn i
63 dokumentet med tittelen «Oppsummering av høring om endringer i
64 forskrift om IT-standarder i offentlig forvaltning» med hjemmel i
65 off. lovens §15.1, så det er vanskelig å vite hvordan argumentene fra
66 høringen ble mottatt og forstått av saksbehandleren hos DIFI. Lurer
67 på hvordan jeg kan klage på at jeg ikke fikk se oppsummeringen. Fikk
68 tre PDFer tilsendt fra FAD,
69 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.nuug.no/pub/offentliginnsyn/from-FAD/20130115%20Notat%20FAD%20-%20EHF.pdf%20(L)(889185).pdf&quot;&gt;Endring av underversjon i EHF&lt;/a&gt;,
70 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.nuug.no/pub/offentliginnsyn/from-FAD/Bakgrunnsnotat%20knyttet%20til%20versjon%20av%20EHF%20standarden%20i%20Forskrift%20om%20IT-standarder%20i%20offentlig%20sektor.pdf&quot;&gt;Bakgrunnsnotat knyttet til versjon av EHF standarden i Forskrift om IT-standarder i offentlig sektor&lt;/a&gt; og
71 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.nuug.no/pub/offentliginnsyn/from-FAD/Utkast%20Kongelig%20resolusjon.docx%20(L)(898064).pdf&quot;&gt;Utkast til endring av standardiseringsforskriften&lt;/a&gt;, hvis du vil ta en titt.&lt;/p&gt;
72 </description>
73 </item>
74
75 <item>
76 <title>&quot;Electronic&quot; paper invoices - using vCard in a QR code</title>
77 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/_Electronic__paper_invoices___using_vCard_in_a_QR_code.html</link>
78 <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/_Electronic__paper_invoices___using_vCard_in_a_QR_code.html</guid>
79 <pubDate>Tue, 12 Feb 2013 10:30:00 +0100</pubDate>
80 <description>&lt;p&gt;Here in Norway, electronic invoices are spreading, and the
81 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.anskaffelser.no/e-handel/faktura&quot;&gt;solution promoted
82 by the Norwegian government&lt;/a&gt; require that invoices are sent through
83 one of the approved facilitators, and it is not possible to send
84 electronic invoices without an agreement with one of these
85 facilitators. This seem like a needless limitation to be able to
86 transfer invoice information between buyers and sellers. My preferred
87 solution would be to just transfer the invoice information directly
88 between seller and buyer, for example using SMTP, or some HTTP based
89 protocol like REST or SOAP. But this might also be overkill, as the
90 &quot;electronic&quot; information can be transferred using paper invoices too,
91 using a simple bar code. My bar code encoding of choice would be QR
92 codes, as this encoding can be read by any smart phone out there. The
93 content of the code could be anything, but I would go with
94 &lt;a href=&quot;http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VCard&quot;&gt;the vCard format&lt;/a&gt;, as
95 it too is supported by a lot of computer equipment these days.&lt;/p&gt;
96
97 &lt;p&gt;The vCard format support extentions, and the invoice specific
98 information can be included using such extentions. For example an
99 invoice from SLX Debian Labs (picked because we
100 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.linuxiskolen.no/slxdebianlabs/donations.html&quot;&gt;ask
101 for donations to the Debian Edu project&lt;/a&gt; and thus have bank account
102 information publicly available) for NOK 1000.00 could have these extra
103 fields:&lt;/p&gt;
104
105 &lt;p&gt;&lt;pre&gt;
106 X-INVOICE-NUMBER:1
107 X-INVOICE-AMOUNT:NOK1000.00
108 X-INVOICE-KID:123412341234
109 X-INVOICE-MSG:Donation to Debian Edu
110 X-BANK-ACCOUNT-NUMBER:16040884339
111 X-BANK-IBAN-NUMBER:NO8516040884339
112 X-BANK-SWIFT-NUMBER:DNBANOKKXXX
113 &lt;/pre&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
114
115 &lt;p&gt;The X-BANK-ACCOUNT-NUMBER field was proposed in a stackoverflow
116 answer regarding
117 &lt;a href=&quot;http://stackoverflow.com/questions/10045664/storing-bank-account-in-vcard-file&quot;&gt;how
118 to put bank account information into a vCard&lt;/a&gt;. For payments in
119 Norway, either X-INVOICE-KID (payment ID) or X-INVOICE-MSG could be
120 used to pass on information to the seller when paying the invoice.&lt;/p&gt;
121
122 &lt;p&gt;The complete vCard could look like this:&lt;/p&gt;
123
124 &lt;p&gt;&lt;pre&gt;
125 BEGIN:VCARD
126 VERSION:2.1
127 ORG:SLX Debian Labs Foundation
128 ADR;WORK:;;Gunnar Schjelderups vei 29D;OSLO;;0485;Norway
129 URL;WORK:http://www.linuxiskolen.no/slxdebianlabs/
130 EMAIL;PREF;INTERNET:sdl-styret@rt.nuug.no
131 REV:20130212T095000Z
132 X-INVOICE-NUMBER:1
133 X-INVOICE-AMOUNT:NOK1000.00
134 X-INVOICE-MSG:Donation to Debian Edu
135 X-BANK-ACCOUNT-NUMBER:16040884339
136 X-BANK-IBAN-NUMBER:NO8516040884339
137 X-BANK-SWIFT-NUMBER:DNBANOKKXXX
138 END:VCARD
139 &lt;/pre&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
140
141 &lt;p&gt;The resulting QR code created using
142 &lt;a href=&quot;http://fukuchi.org/works/qrencode/&quot;&gt;qrencode&lt;/a&gt; would look
143 like this, and should be readable (and thus checkable) by any smart
144 phone, or for example the &lt;a href=&quot;http://zbar.sourceforge.net/&quot;&gt;zbar
145 bar code reader&lt;/a&gt; and feed right into the approval and accounting
146 system.&lt;/p&gt;
147
148 &lt;p&gt;&lt;img src=&quot;http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-02-12-qr-invoice.png&quot;&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
149
150 &lt;p&gt;The extension fields will most likely not show up in any normal
151 vCard reader, so those parts would have to go directly into a system
152 handling invoices. I am a bit unsure how vCards without name parts
153 are handled, but a simple test indicate that this work just fine.&lt;/p&gt;
154
155 &lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Update 2013-02-12 11:30&lt;/strong&gt;: Added KID to the proposal
156 based on feedback from Sturle Sunde.&lt;/p&gt;
157 </description>
158 </item>
159
160 <item>
161 <title>12 years of outages - summarised by Stuart Kendrick</title>
162 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/12_years_of_outages___summarised_by_Stuart_Kendrick.html</link>
163 <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/12_years_of_outages___summarised_by_Stuart_Kendrick.html</guid>
164 <pubDate>Fri, 26 Oct 2012 14:20:00 +0200</pubDate>
165 <description>&lt;p&gt;I work at the &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.uio.no/&quot;&gt;University of Oslo&lt;/a&gt;
166 looking after the computers, mostly on the unix side, but in general
167 all over the place. I am also a member (and currently leader) of
168 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.nuug.no/&quot;&gt;the NUUG association&lt;/a&gt;, which in turn
169 make me a member of &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.usenix.org/&quot;&gt;USENIX&lt;/a&gt;. NUUG
170 is an member organisation for us in Norway interested in free
171 software, open standards and unix like operating systems, and USENIX
172 is a US based member organisation with similar targets. And thanks to
173 these memberships, I get all issues of the great USENIX magazine
174 &lt;a href=&quot;https://www.usenix.org/publications/login&quot;&gt;;login:&lt;/a&gt; in the
175 mail several times a year. The magazine is great, and I read most of
176 it every time.&lt;/p&gt;
177
178 &lt;p&gt;In the last issue of the USENIX magazine ;login:, there is an
179 article by &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.skendric.com/&quot;&gt;Stuart Kendrick&lt;/a&gt; from
180 Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center titled
181 &quot;&lt;a href=&quot;https://www.usenix.org/publications/login/october-2012-volume-37-number-5/what-takes-us-down&quot;&gt;What
182 Takes Us Down&lt;/a&gt;&quot; (longer version also
183 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.skendric.com/problem/incident-analysis/2012-06-30/What-Takes-Us-Down.pdf&quot;&gt;available
184 from his own site&lt;/a&gt;), where he report what he found when he
185 processed the outage reports (both planned and unplanned) from the
186 last twelve years and classified them according to cause, time of day,
187 etc etc. The article is a good read to get some empirical data on
188 what kind of problems affect a data centre, but what really inspired
189 me was the kind of reporting they had put in place since 2000.&lt;p&gt;
190
191 &lt;p&gt;The centre set up a mailing list, and started to send fairly
192 standardised messages to this list when a outage was planned or when
193 it already occurred, to announce the plan and get feedback on the
194 assumtions on scope and user impact. Here is the two example from the
195 article: First the unplanned outage:
196
197 &lt;blockquote&gt;&lt;pre&gt;
198 Subject: Exchange 2003 Cluster Issues
199 Severity: Critical (Unplanned)
200 Start: Monday, May 7, 2012, 11:58
201 End: Monday, May 7, 2012, 12:38
202 Duration: 40 minutes
203 Scope: Exchange 2003
204 Description: The HTTPS service on the Exchange cluster crashed, triggering
205 a cluster failover.
206
207 User Impact: During this period, all Exchange users were unable to
208 access e-mail. Zimbra users were unaffected.
209 Technician: [xxx]
210 &lt;/pre&gt;&lt;/blockquote&gt;
211
212 Next the planned outage:
213
214 &lt;blockquote&gt;&lt;pre&gt;
215 Subject: H Building Switch Upgrades
216 Severity: Major (Planned)
217 Start: Saturday, June 16, 2012, 06:00
218 End: Saturday, June 16, 2012, 16:00
219 Duration: 10 hours
220 Scope: H2 Transport
221 Description: Currently, Catalyst 4006s provide 10/100 Ethernet to end-
222 stations. We will replace these with newer Catalyst
223 4510s.
224 User Impact: All users on H2 will be isolated from the network during
225 this work. Afterward, they will have gigabit
226 connectivity.
227 Technician: [xxx]
228 &lt;/pre&gt;&lt;/blockquote&gt;
229
230 &lt;p&gt;He notes in his article that the date formats and other fields have
231 been a bit too free form to make it easy to automatically process them
232 into a database for further analysis, and I would have used ISO 8601
233 dates myself to make it easier to process (in other words I would ask
234 people to write &#39;2012-06-16 06:00 +0000&#39; instead of the start time
235 format listed above). There are also other issues with the format
236 that could be improved, read the article for the details.&lt;/p&gt;
237
238 &lt;p&gt;I find the idea of standardising outage messages seem to be such a
239 good idea that I would like to get it implemented here at the
240 university too. We do register
241 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.uio.no/tjenester/it/aktuelt/planlagte-tjenesteavbrudd/&quot;&gt;planned
242 changes and outages in a calendar&lt;/a&gt;, and report the to a mailing
243 list, but we do not do so in a structured format and there is not a
244 report to the same location for unplanned outages. Perhaps something
245 for other sites to consider too?&lt;/p&gt;
246 </description>
247 </item>
248
249 <item>
250 <title>NUUGs høringsuttalelse til DIFIs forslag om å kaste ut ODF fra statens standardkatalog</title>
251 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/NUUGs_h_ringsuttalelse_til_DIFIs_forslag_om___kaste_ut_ODF_fra_statens_standardkatalog.html</link>
252 <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/NUUGs_h_ringsuttalelse_til_DIFIs_forslag_om___kaste_ut_ODF_fra_statens_standardkatalog.html</guid>
253 <pubDate>Mon, 1 Oct 2012 08:20:00 +0200</pubDate>
254 <description>&lt;p&gt;Som jeg
255 &lt;a href=&quot;http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/DIFI_foresl_r___kaste_ut_ODF_og_ta_inn_OOXML_fra_statens_standardkatalog.html&quot;&gt;skrev
256 i juni&lt;/a&gt; har DIFI foreslått å fjerne krav om å bruke ODF til
257 utveksling av redigerbare dokumenter med det offentlige, og
258 derigjennom tvinge innbyggerne til å forholde seg til formatene til MS
259 Office når en kommuniserer med det offentlige.&lt;/p&gt;
260
261 &lt;p&gt;I går kveld fikk vi i &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.nuug.no/&quot;&gt;NUUG&lt;/a&gt;
262 fullført vår høringsuttalelse og sendt den inn til DIFI. Du finner
263 &lt;a href=&quot;http://wiki.nuug.no/uttalelser/201209-forskrift-standardkatalog&quot;&gt;uttalelsen
264 på wikien&lt;/a&gt;. Ta en titt. Fristen for å sende inn uttalelse var i
265 går søndag, men en får kanskje sitt innspill med hvis en sender i
266 dag.&lt;/p&gt;
267 </description>
268 </item>
269
270 <item>
271 <title>Free software forced Microsoft to open Office (and don&#39;t forget Officeshots)</title>
272 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Free_software_forced_Microsoft_to_open_Office__and_don_t_forget_Officeshots_.html</link>
273 <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Free_software_forced_Microsoft_to_open_Office__and_don_t_forget_Officeshots_.html</guid>
274 <pubDate>Thu, 23 Aug 2012 14:20:00 +0200</pubDate>
275 <description>&lt;p&gt;I came across a great comment from Simon Phipps today, about how
276 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.infoworld.com/d/open-source-software/how-microsoft-was-forced-open-office-200233&quot;&gt;Microsoft
277 have been forced to open Office&lt;/a&gt;, and it made me remember and
278 revisit the great site
279 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.officeshots.org/&quot;&gt;officeshots&lt;/a&gt; which allow you
280 to check out how different programs present the ODF file format. I
281 recommend both to those of my readers interested in ODF. :)&lt;/p&gt;
282 </description>
283 </item>
284
285 <item>
286 <title>OOXML og standardisering</title>
287 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/OOXML_og_standardisering.html</link>
288 <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/OOXML_og_standardisering.html</guid>
289 <pubDate>Wed, 25 Jul 2012 21:10:00 +0200</pubDate>
290 <description>&lt;p&gt;DIFI har
291 &lt;a href=&quot;http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/DIFI_foresl_r___kaste_ut_ODF_og_ta_inn_OOXML_fra_statens_standardkatalog.html&quot;&gt;en
292 høring gående&lt;/a&gt; om ny versjon av statens standardkatalog, med frist
293 2012-09-30, der det foreslås å fjerne ODF fra katalogen og ta inn ISO
294 OOXML. I den anledning minnes jeg
295 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.regjeringen.no/upload/FAD/Vedlegg/IKT-politikk/Refkat_v2.pdf&quot;&gt;notatet
296 FAD skrev&lt;/a&gt; da versjon 2 av standardkatalogen var under
297 utarbeidelse, da FAD og DIFI fortsatt forsto poenget med og verdien av
298 frie og åpne standarder.&lt;/p&gt;
299
300 &lt;p&gt;Det er mange som tror at OOXML er ett spesifikt format, men det
301 brukes ofte som fellesbetegnelse for både formatet spesifisert av
302 ECMA, ISO, og formatet produsert av Microsoft Office (aka docx), som
303 dessverre ikke er det samme formatet. Fra en av de som implementerte
304 støtte for docx-formatet i KDE fikk jeg høre at ISO-spesifikasjonen
305 var en nyttig referanse, men at det var mange avvik som gjorde at en
306 ikke kunne gå ut ifra at Microsoft Office produserte dokumenter i
307 henhold til ISO-spesifikasjonen.&lt;/p&gt;
308
309 &lt;p&gt;ISOs OOXML-spesifikasjon har (eller hadde, usikker på om
310 kommentaren er oppdatert) i følge
311 &lt;a href=&quot;http://surguy.net/articles/ooxml-validation-and-technical-review.xml&quot;&gt;Inigo
312 Surguy&lt;/a&gt; feil i mer enn 10% av eksemplene, noe som i tillegg gjør
313 det vanskelig å bruke spesifikasjonen til å implementere støtte for
314 ISO OOXML. Jeg har ingen erfaring med å validere OOXML-dokumenter
315 selv, men ser at
316 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=5124&quot;&gt;Microsoft
317 har laget en validator&lt;/a&gt; som jeg ikke kan teste da den kun er
318 tilgjengelig på MS Windows. Finner også en annen kalt
319 &lt;a href=&quot;http://code.google.com/p/officeotron/&quot;&gt;Office-O-Tron&lt;/A&gt; som
320 er oppdatert i fjor. Lurer på om de validerer at dokumenter er i
321 formatet til Microsoft office, eller om de validerer at de er i
322 henhold til formatene spesifisert av ECMA og ISO. Det hadde også vært
323 interessant å se om docx-dokumentene publisert av det offentlige er
324 gyldige ISO OOXML-dokumenter.&lt;/p&gt;
325 </description>
326 </item>
327
328 <item>
329 <title>Mer oppfølging fra MPEG-LA om avtale med dem for å kringkaste og publisere H.264-video</title>
330 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Mer_oppf_lging_fra_MPEG_LA_om_avtale_med_dem_for___kringkaste_og_publisere_H_264_video.html</link>
331 <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Mer_oppf_lging_fra_MPEG_LA_om_avtale_med_dem_for___kringkaste_og_publisere_H_264_video.html</guid>
332 <pubDate>Thu, 5 Jul 2012 23:50:00 +0200</pubDate>
333 <description>&lt;p&gt;I føljetongen om H.264
334 &lt;a href=&quot;http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/MPEG_LA_mener_NRK_m__ha_avtale_med_dem_for___kringkaste_og_publisere_H_264_video.html&quot;&gt;forlot
335 jeg leserne i undring&lt;/a&gt; om hvor pakken fra MPEG-LA tok veien, og om
336 hvilke selskaper i Norge som har avtale med MPEG-LA. Da Ryan hos
337 MPEG-LA dro på ferie sendte jeg min melding videre til hans kollega,
338 og dagen etter fikk jeg følgende svar derfra:&lt;/p&gt;
339
340 &lt;p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt;
341 &lt;p&gt;Date: Fri, 29 Jun 2012 18:32:34 +0000
342 &lt;br&gt;From: Sidney Wolf &amp;lt;SWolf (at) mpegla.com&amp;gt;
343 &lt;br&gt;To: Petter Reinholdtsen &amp;lt;pere (at) hungry.com&amp;gt;
344 &lt;br&gt;Cc: Ryan Rodriguez &amp;lt;RRodriguez (at) mpegla.com&amp;gt;
345 &lt;br&gt;Subject: RE: Do NRK have a license agreement with MPEG-LA?&lt;/p&gt;
346
347 &lt;p&gt;Dear Mr. Reinholdtsen,&lt;/p&gt;
348
349 &lt;p&gt;Thank you for your message. As you know, Ryan is currently our of the
350 office, so it will be my pleasure to assist you.&lt;/p&gt;
351
352 &lt;p&gt;Per your request, attached please find an electronic copy of the
353 AVC Patent Portfolio License. Please note that the electronic copy of
354 the License is provided as a convenience and for informational
355 purposes only. When concluding the Licenses, only the hard copies
356 provided by MPEG LA may be used.&lt;/p&gt;
357
358 &lt;p&gt;To your question, MPEG LA lists our Licensees on our website
359 according to each program. The lists are in alphabetical order, so it
360 is very easy to search.&lt;/p&gt;
361
362 &lt;p&gt;I hope that this was helpful. If we can be of additional
363 assistance, please let me know.&lt;/p&gt;
364
365 &lt;p&gt;Kind regards,&lt;/p&gt;
366
367 &lt;p&gt;Sidney A. Wolf
368 &lt;br&gt;Manager, Global Licensing
369 &lt;br&gt;MPEG LA&lt;/p&gt;
370 &lt;/blockquote&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
371
372 &lt;p&gt;Selv om et epostvedlegg er nyttig for mottakeren, så håpet jeg å få
373 et dokument jeg kunne dele med alle leserne av bloggen min, og ikke et
374 som må deles på individuell basis. Opphavsretten krever godkjenning
375 fra rettighetsinnehaver før en kan gjøre slikt, så dermed fulgte jeg
376 opp med et spørsmål om dette var greit.&lt;/p&gt;
377
378 &lt;p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt;
379 &lt;p&gt;Date: Wed, 4 Jul 2012 20:25:06 +0200
380 &lt;br&gt;From: Petter Reinholdtsen &amp;lt;pere (at) hungry.com&amp;gt;
381 &lt;br&gt;To: Sidney Wolf &amp;lt;SWolf (at) mpegla.com&amp;gt;
382 &lt;br&gt;Cc: Ryan Rodriguez &amp;lt;RRodriguez (at) mpegla.com&amp;gt;
383 &lt;br&gt;Subject: Re: Do NRK have a license agreement with MPEG-LA?&lt;/p&gt;
384
385 &lt;p&gt;Thank you for your reply.&lt;/p&gt;
386
387 &lt;p&gt;[Sidney Wolf]
388 &lt;br&gt;&amp;gt; Per your request, attached please find an electronic copy of the AVC
389 &lt;br&gt;&amp;gt; Patent Portfolio License. Please note that the electronic copy of
390 &lt;br&gt;&amp;gt; the License is provided as a convenience and for informational
391 &lt;br&gt;&amp;gt; purposes only. When concluding the Licenses, only the hard copies
392 &lt;br&gt;&amp;gt; provided by MPEG LA may be used.&lt;/p&gt;
393
394 &lt;p&gt;This is useful for me to learn, but the reason I asked for the
395 Internet address of the licensing document was to ensure I could
396 publish a link to it when I discuss the topic of H.264 licensing here
397 in Norway, and allow others to verify my observations. I can not do
398 the same with an email attachment. Thus I would like to ask you if it
399 is OK with MPEG LA that I publish this document on the Internet for
400 others to read?&lt;/p&gt;
401
402 &lt;p&gt;&amp;gt; To your question, MPEG LA lists our Licensees on our website
403 &lt;br&gt;&amp;gt; according to each program. The lists are in alphabetical order, so
404 &lt;br&gt;&amp;gt; it is very easy to search.&lt;/p&gt;
405
406 &lt;p&gt;I am afraid this do not help me locate Norwegian companies in the
407 list of Licensees. I do not know the name of all companies and
408 organisations in Norway, and thus do not know how to locate the
409 Norwegian ones on that list.&lt;/p&gt;
410
411 &lt;p&gt;&amp;gt; I hope that this was helpful. If we can be of additional assistance,
412 &lt;br&gt;&amp;gt; please let me know.&lt;/p&gt;
413
414 &lt;p&gt;Absoutely helpful to learn more about how MPEG LA handle licensing.&lt;/p&gt;
415
416 &lt;p&gt;--
417 &lt;br&gt;Happy hacking
418 &lt;br&gt;Petter Reinholdtsen&lt;/p&gt;
419 &lt;/blockquote&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
420
421 &lt;p&gt;Jeg håpet også at det skulle være mulig å få vite hvilke av de
422 mange hundre som har avtale med MPEG-LA om bruk av H.264 som holdt til
423 i Norge. Begge mine håp falt i grus med svaret fra MPEG-LA.
424
425 &lt;p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt;
426 &lt;p&gt;Date: Thu, 5 Jul 2012 17:42:39 +0000
427 &lt;br&gt;From: Sidney Wolf &amp;lt;SWolf (at) mpegla.com&amp;gt;
428 &lt;br&gt;To: &#39;Petter Reinholdtsen&#39; &amp;lt;pere (at) hungry.com&amp;gt;
429 &lt;br&gt;Cc: Ryan Rodriguez &amp;lt;RRodriguez (at) mpegla.com&amp;gt;
430 &lt;br&gt;Subject: RE: Do NRK have a license agreement with MPEG-LA?&lt;/p&gt;
431
432 &lt;p&gt;Dear Mr. Reinholdtsen,&lt;/p&gt;
433
434 &lt;p&gt;Thank you for your reply.&lt;/p&gt;
435
436 &lt;p&gt;We appreciate the additional explanation you have provided and for
437 asking our permission to publish the electronic copy of the License in
438 advance of doing so. Typically, MPEG LA prefers to distribute the
439 electronic copies of our Licenses to interested parties. Therefore,
440 please feel free to send interested parties to the AVC portion of our
441 website, http://www.mpegla.com/main/programs/AVC/Pages/Intro.aspx for
442 their further reference.&lt;/p&gt;
443
444 &lt;p&gt;As previously mentioned, MPEG LA maintains a list of Licensees in good
445 standing on our website according to each program. Due to the large
446 volume of Licensees, it would be administratively impractical to
447 provide this level of detail to interested parties. Therefore, I am
448 afraid we are not in a position to assist you with your request.&lt;/p&gt;
449
450 &lt;p&gt;Kind regards,&lt;/p&gt;
451
452 &lt;p&gt;Sidney A. Wolf
453 &lt;br&gt;Manager, Global Licensing
454 &lt;br&gt;MPEG LA&lt;/p&gt;
455 &lt;/blockquote&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
456
457 &lt;p&gt;Men takket være epostvedlegget kunne jeg søke på Google etter
458 setningen &quot;WHEREAS, a video standard commonly referred to as AVC has
459 been defined and is referred to in this Agreement as the “AVC
460 Standard” (as more fully defined herein below)&quot; som finnes i avtalen,
461 og lokalisere en kopi fra 2007 av
462 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1342960/000119312509050004/dex1024.htm&quot;&gt;lisensavtalen
463 mellom MPEG-LA og DivX, Inc.&lt;/a&gt;, slik at mine lesere kan se hvordan
464 avtalen så ut da. Jeg har ikke sammenlignet tekstene for å se om noe
465 har endret seg siden den tid, men satser på at teksten er representativ.&lt;/p&gt;
466
467 &lt;p&gt;Jeg aner fortsatt ikke hvor FedEx tok veien med pakken fra
468 MPEG-LA.&lt;/p&gt;
469
470 &lt;p&gt;Update 2012-07-06: Jeg er visst ikke den første som forsøker å få
471 klarhet i problemstillinger rundt H.264, og kom nettopp over en veldig
472 interessant bloggpost fra 2010 hos LibreVideo med tittelen
473 &quot;&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.librevideo.org/blog/2010/06/14/mpeg-la-answers-some-questions-about-avch-264-licensing/&quot;&gt;MPEG-LA
474 answers some questions about AVC/H.264 licensing&lt;/a&gt;. Anbefales!&lt;/p&gt;
475 </description>
476 </item>
477
478 <item>
479 <title>DIFI foreslår å kaste ut ODF og ta inn OOXML fra statens standardkatalog</title>
480 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/DIFI_foresl_r___kaste_ut_ODF_og_ta_inn_OOXML_fra_statens_standardkatalog.html</link>
481 <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/DIFI_foresl_r___kaste_ut_ODF_og_ta_inn_OOXML_fra_statens_standardkatalog.html</guid>
482 <pubDate>Fri, 29 Jun 2012 18:00:00 +0200</pubDate>
483 <description>&lt;p&gt;DIFI har nettopp annonsert høring om revisjon av
484 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.standard.difi.no/forvaltningsstandarder&quot;&gt;standardkatalogen&lt;/a&gt;,
485 og endelig har Microsoft fått viljen sin. Se
486 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.standard.difi.no/hoyring/forslag-om-endring-av-forskrift-om-it-standarder-i-offentlig-forvaltning&quot;&gt;høringssiden&lt;/a&gt;
487 for hele teksten.&lt;/p&gt;
488
489 &lt;p&gt;Her er forslaget i sin helhet:&lt;/p&gt;
490
491 &lt;p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt;
492 &lt;p&gt;3.2 Revisjon av krav til redigerbare dokumenter&lt;/p&gt;
493
494 &lt;p&gt;I første versjon av referansekatalogen i 2007 ble det satt krav om
495 Open Document Format (ODF), versjon 1.1 (OASIS, 1.2.2007) for
496 redigerbare dokumenter. Kravet var obligatorisk for stat og sterkt
497 anbefalt for kommunal sektor. I 2009 ble kravet gjort obligatorisk for
498 hele offentlig sektor i
499 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.lovdata.no/for/sf/fa/xa-20090925-1222.html&quot;&gt;forskrift
500 om IT-standarder i forvaltningen&lt;/a&gt;. Anvendelsesområdet for kravet
501 har vært begrenset til publisering av dokumenter som skal bearbeides
502 videre (§ 4 nr. 1 andre ledd). I 2011 ble anvendelsesområdet utvidet
503 til å omfatte utveksling av dokumenter beregnet for redigering som
504 vedlegg til e-post (§4 nr. 2).&lt;/p&gt;
505
506 &lt;p&gt;Office Open XML ISO/IEC 29500:2011 (OOXML) er et dokumentformat
507 opprinnelig utviklet av Microsoft med tilsvarende anvendelsesområde
508 som ODF. Formatet er blant annet tatt i bruk i nyere versjoner av
509 kontorstøtteprogamvaren MS Office. Difi har foretatt en
510 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.standard.difi.no/filearchive/revisjonsvurdering-standarder-for-redigerbare-dokumenter-v1-0.pdf&quot;&gt;revisjonsvurdering&lt;/a&gt;
511 av krav som stilles til redigerbare dokumenter i Forskrift om
512 IT-standarder i forvaltningen, og anbefaler at kravet til ODF
513 fjernes. Dette innebærer at det ikke stilles krav til dokumentformater
514 for redigerbare dokumenter ved publisering på offentlige virksomheters
515 nettsider og for redigerbare vedlegg til e-post som sendes fra
516 offentlige virksomheter til innbyggere og næringsliv. Offentlige
517 virksomheter vil dermed stå fritt til å publisere eller sende
518 redigerbare dokumenter i det format som ivaretar brukernes behov
519 best.&lt;/p&gt;
520
521 &lt;p&gt;Forslaget innebærer at krav til ODF utgår § 4 nr. 1 tredje ledd og
522 § 4 nr. 2 første ledd&lt;/p&gt;
523
524 &lt;P&gt;Imidlertid bør det stilles strengere krav til hvilke formater
525 offentlige virksomheter plikter å motta redigerbare dokumenter. Vi
526 mener at det ikke bør skilles mellom mottak av redigerbare dokumenter
527 som sendes i ODF eller OOXML3, som begge er åpne standarder. Dette
528 medfører at innbyggere og næringsliv skal kunne basere sitt valg av
529 programvare på egne behov og ikke på de valg offentlige virksomheter
530 tar. Kravet vil omfatte hele offentlig sektor, herunder
531 utdanningssektoren, hvor det kanskje er størst bruk av ODF. Kravet er
532 foreslått som ny § 4 nr.2 andre ledd&lt;/p&gt;
533 &lt;/blockquote&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
534
535 &lt;P&gt;De satser vel på at det hele blir glemt over sommeren, og at de
536 fleste har glemt Standard Norge og ISOs fallitt fra da OOXML ble
537 jukset igjennom som ISO-standard. Jeg håper mine lesere sender inn
538 høringsuttalelser til høringen.&lt;/p&gt;
539
540 &lt;p&gt;Anbefaler alle å friske opp sine argumenter ved å lese
541 &lt;a href=&quot;http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_reply_from_Edgar_Villanueva_to_Microsoft_in_Peru.html&quot;&gt;svaret
542 fra senator Edgar Villanueva til Microsoft i Peru&lt;/a&gt;. Det er en
543 klassisk tekst som er like gyldig i dag som da det ble skrevet.&lt;/p&gt;
544
545 </description>
546 </item>
547
548 <item>
549 <title>Departementenes servicesenter har ingen avtale om bruk av H.264 med MPEG-LA</title>
550 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Departementenes_servicesenter_har_ingen_avtale_om_bruk_av_H_264_med_MPEG_LA.html</link>
551 <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Departementenes_servicesenter_har_ingen_avtale_om_bruk_av_H_264_med_MPEG_LA.html</guid>
552 <pubDate>Fri, 29 Jun 2012 09:40:00 +0200</pubDate>
553 <description>&lt;p&gt;Da fikk jeg nettopp svar fra
554 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.dss.dep.no/&quot;&gt;Departementenes servicesenter&lt;/a&gt;
555 (DSS) på
556 &lt;a href=&quot;http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Trenger_en_avtale_med_MPEG_LA_for___publisere_og_kringkaste_H_264_video_.html&quot;&gt;mitt
557 spørsmål om avtale rundt bruk av H.264&lt;/a&gt;. De har ingen avtale med
558 MPEG LA eller dets representanter. Her er svaret.
559
560 &lt;p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt;
561
562 &lt;p&gt;Date: Fri, 29 Jun 2012 07:04:42 +0000
563 &lt;br&gt;From: Nielsen Mette Haga &amp;lt;Mette-Haga.Nielsen (at) dss.dep.no&amp;gt;
564 &lt;br&gt;To: Petter Reinholdtsen &amp;lt;petter.reinholdtsen (at) ...&amp;gt;
565 &lt;br&gt;CC: Postmottak &amp;lt;Postmottak (at) dss.dep.no&amp;gt;
566 &lt;br&gt;Subject: SV: Innsynsbegjæring om MPEG/H.264-relaterte avtaler&lt;/p&gt;
567
568 &lt;p&gt;DSS har ikke inngått noen egen lisensavtale med MPEG-LA eller noen som
569 representerer MPEG-LA i Norge. Videoløsningen på regjeringen.no er
570 levert av Smartcom:tv. Lisensforholdet rundt H.264 er ikke omtalt i
571 vår avtale med Smartcom.&lt;/p&gt;
572
573 &lt;p&gt;Vennlig hilsen&lt;/p&gt;
574
575 &lt;p&gt;Mette Haga Nielsen
576 &lt;br&gt;Fung. seksjonssjef&lt;/p&gt;
577
578 &lt;p&gt;Departementenes servicesenter&lt;/p&gt;
579
580 &lt;p&gt;Informasjonsforvaltning
581
582 &lt;p&gt;Mobil 93 09 83 51
583 &lt;br&gt;E-post mette-haga.nielsen (at) dss.dep.no&lt;/p&gt;
584 &lt;/blockquote&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
585
586 &lt;p&gt;Hvis den norske regjeringen representert ved DSS ikke har slik
587 avtale, så kan en kanskje konkludere med at det ikke trengs? Jeg er
588 ikke trygg på at det er god juridisk grunn å stå på, men det er i det
589 minste interessant å vite at hverken NRK eller DSS har funnet det
590 nødvendig å ha avtale om bruk av H.264.&lt;/p&gt;
591
592 &lt;p&gt;Det forklarer ikke hvordan de kan ignorere bruksvilkårene knyttet
593 til bruk av opphavsrettsbeskyttet materiale de bruker til
594 videoproduksjon, med mindre slike vilkår kan ignoreres av selskaper og
595 privatpersoner i Norge. Har de lov til å bryte vilkårene, eller har
596 de brutt dem og så langt sluppet unna med det? Jeg aner ikke.&lt;/p&gt;
597 </description>
598 </item>
599
600 <item>
601 <title>MPEG-LA mener NRK må ha avtale med dem for å kringkaste og publisere H.264-video</title>
602 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/MPEG_LA_mener_NRK_m__ha_avtale_med_dem_for___kringkaste_og_publisere_H_264_video.html</link>
603 <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/MPEG_LA_mener_NRK_m__ha_avtale_med_dem_for___kringkaste_og_publisere_H_264_video.html</guid>
604 <pubDate>Thu, 28 Jun 2012 20:00:00 +0200</pubDate>
605 <description>&lt;p&gt;Etter at NRK
606 &lt;a href=&quot;http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/NRK_nekter___finne_og_utlevere_eventuell_avtale_med_MPEG_LA.html&quot;&gt;nektet
607 å spore opp eventuell avtale med MPEG-LA&lt;/a&gt; eller andre om bruk av
608 MPEG/H.264-video etter at jeg &lt;a
609 href=&quot;http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Trenger_en_avtale_med_MPEG_LA_for___publisere_og_kringkaste_H_264_video_.html&quot;&gt;ba
610 om innsyn i slike avtaler&lt;/a&gt;, tenkte jeg at i stedet for å forsøke å
611 få NRK til å finne en slik avtale, så burde det være like enkelt å
612 spørre MPEG-LA om de hadde avtale med NRK. Spørsmålet ble sendt før
613 jeg fikk tips fra Kieran Kunhya om hvor listen over lisensinnehavere
614 &quot;in Good Standing&quot; befant seg. MPEG-LA svarte meg i dag, og kan
615 fortelle at NRK ikke har noen avtale med dem, så da er i det minste det
616 slått fast. Ikke overraskende mener MPEG-LA at det trengs en avtale
617 med MPEG-LA for å streame H.264, men deres rammer er jo
618 rettstilstanden i USA og ikke Norge. Jeg tar dermed den delen av
619 svaret med en klype salt. Jeg er dermed fortsatt ikke klok på om det
620 trengs en avtale, og hvis det trengs en avtale her i Norge, heller
621 ikke sikker på om NRK har en avtale med noen andre enn MPEG-LA som
622 gjør at de ikke trenger avtale direkte med MPEG-LA. Jeg håper NRKs
623 jurister har vurdert dette, og at det er mulig å få tilgang til
624 vurderingen uansett om de trenger en avtale eller ikke.&lt;/p&gt;
625
626 &lt;p&gt;Her er epostutvekslingen med MPEG-LA så langt. Håper ikke
627 utvekslingen fører til NRK plutselig får en litt uventet pakke fra
628 MPEG-LA.&lt;/p&gt;
629
630 &lt;p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt;
631 &lt;p&gt;Date: Mon, 25 Jun 2012 15:29:37 +0200
632 &lt;br&gt;From: Petter Reinholdtsen &amp;lt;pere (at) hungry.com&amp;gt;
633 &lt;br&gt;To: licensing-web (at) mpegla.com
634 &lt;br&gt;Subject: Do NRK have a license agreement with MPEG-LA?&lt;/p&gt;
635
636 &lt;p&gt;Hi. I have a small question for you, that I hope it is OK that I
637 ask.&lt;/p&gt;
638
639 &lt;p&gt;Is there any license agreements between MPEG-LA and NRK, &amp;lt;URL:
640 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.nrk.no/&quot;&gt;http://www.nrk.no/&lt;/a&gt; &amp;gt;, the
641 Norwegian national broadcasting cooperation? I am not sure if they
642 need one, and am just curious if such agreeement exist.&lt;/p&gt;
643
644 &lt;p&gt;The postal address is&lt;/p&gt;
645
646 &lt;p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt;
647 NRK
648 &lt;br&gt;Postbox 8500, Majorstuen
649 &lt;br&gt;0340 Oslo
650 &lt;br&gt;Norway
651 &lt;/blockquote&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
652
653 &lt;p&gt;if it make it easier for you to locate such agreement.&lt;/p&gt;
654
655 &lt;p&gt;Can you tell me how many entities in Norway have an agreement with
656 MPEG-LA, and the name of these entities?&lt;/p&gt;
657
658 &lt;p&gt;--
659 &lt;br&gt;Happy hacking
660 &lt;br&gt;Petter Reinholdtsen
661 &lt;/blockquote&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
662
663 &lt;p&gt;I dag, to dager senere, fikk jeg følgende svar:&lt;/p&gt;
664
665 &lt;p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt;
666 &lt;p&gt;Date: Thu, 28 Jun 2012 14:11:17 +0000
667 &lt;br&gt;From: Ryan Rodriguez &amp;lt;RRodriguez (at) mpegla.com&gt;
668 &lt;br&gt;To: Petter Reinholdtsen &amp;lt;pere (at) hungry.com&gt;
669 &lt;br&gt;CC: MD Administration &amp;lt;MDAdministration (at) mpegla.com&gt;
670 &lt;br&gt;Subject: RE: Do NRK have a license agreement with MPEG-LA?&lt;/p&gt;
671
672 &lt;p&gt;Dear Mr. Reinholdtsen,&lt;/p&gt;
673
674 &lt;p&gt;Thank you for your message and for your interest in MPEG LA. We
675 appreciate hearing from you and I will be happy to assist you.&lt;/p&gt;
676
677 &lt;p&gt;To begin, I will assume that you are referring to AVC/H.264
678 technology in your message below, as this technology is commonly used
679 in the transmission of video content. In that case, please allow me
680 to briefly summarize the coverage provided by our AVC Patent Portfolio
681 License.&lt;/p&gt;
682
683 &lt;P&gt;Our AVC License provides coverage for end products and video
684 services that make use of AVC/H.264 technology. Accordingly, the
685 party offering such end products and video to End Users concludes the
686 AVC License and is responsible for paying the applicable royalties
687 associated with the end products/video they offer.&lt;/p&gt;
688
689 &lt;p&gt;While the Norwegian Broadcast Corporation (NRK) is not currently a
690 Licensee to MPEG LA&#39;s AVC License (or any other Portfolio License
691 offered by MPEG LA), if NRK offers AVC Video to End Users for
692 remuneration (for example, Title-by-Title, Subscription, Free
693 Television, or Internet Broadcast AVC Video), then NRK will need to
694 conclude the AVC License and may be responsible for paying applicable
695 royalties associated with the AVC Video it distributes.&lt;/p&gt;
696
697 &lt;p&gt;Today I will send you a FedEx package containing a copy of our AVC
698 License for your review. You should receive the License document
699 within the next few days.&lt;/p&gt;
700
701 &lt;p&gt;Meanwhile, MPEG LA currently has several Norwegian Licensees that
702 can be found under the &quot;Licensees&quot; header within the respective
703 portion of our website. For example, you may find our list of
704 Licensees in Good Standing to our AVC License in the AVC portion of
705 our website,
706 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.mpegla.com/main/programs/AVC/Pages/Licensees.aspx&quot;&gt;http://www.mpegla.com/main/programs/AVC/Pages/Licensees.aspx&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
707
708 &lt;p&gt;I hope the above information is helpful. If you have additional
709 questions or need further assistance with the AVC License, please feel
710 free to contact me directly. I look forward to hearing from you again
711 soon.&lt;/p&gt;
712
713 &lt;p&gt;Best regards,&lt;/p&gt;
714
715 &lt;p&gt;Ryan&lt;/p&gt;
716
717 &lt;p&gt;Ryan M. Rodriguez
718 &lt;br&gt;Licensing Associate
719 &lt;br&gt;MPEG LA
720 &lt;br&gt;5425 Wisconsin Avenue
721 &lt;br&gt;Suite 801
722 &lt;br&gt;Chevy Chase, MD 20815
723 &lt;br&gt;U.S.A.
724 &lt;br&gt;Phone: +1 (301) 986-6660 x211
725 &lt;br&gt;Fax: +1 (301) 986-8575
726 &lt;br&gt;Email: rrodriguez (at) mpegla.com&lt;/p&gt;
727
728 &lt;/blockquote&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
729
730 &lt;p&gt;Meldingen om utsendt FedEx-pakke var så merkelig at jeg
731 øyeblikkelig sendte svar tilbake og spurte hva i alle dager han mente,
732 da han jo ikke hadde fått noen postadresse som nådde meg.&lt;/p&gt;
733
734 &lt;p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt;
735
736 &lt;p&gt;Date: Thu, 28 Jun 2012 16:36:15 +0200
737 &lt;br&gt;From: Petter Reinholdtsen &amp;lt;pere (at) hungry.com&amp;gt;
738 &lt;br&gt;To: Ryan Rodriguez &amp;lt;RRodriguez (at) mpegla.com&amp;gt;
739 &lt;br&gt;Cc: MD Administration &amp;lt;MDAdministration (at) mpegla.com&amp;gt;
740 &lt;br&gt;Subject: Re: Do NRK have a license agreement with MPEG-LA?&lt;/p&gt;
741
742 &lt;p&gt;[Ryan Rodriguez]
743 &lt;br&gt;&amp;gt; Dear Mr. Reinholdtsen,&lt;/p&gt;
744
745 &lt;p&gt;Thank you for your quick reply.&lt;/p&gt;
746
747 &lt;p&gt;&amp;gt; Today I will send you a FedEx package containing a copy of our AVC
748 &lt;br&gt;&amp;gt; License for your review. You should receive the License document
749 &lt;br&gt;&amp;gt; within the next few days.&lt;/p&gt;
750
751 &lt;p&gt;The part about sending a FedEx package confused me, though. I did not
752 &lt;br&gt;give you my address, nor am I associated with NRK in any way, so I hope
753 &lt;br&gt;you did not try to send me a package using the address of NRK. If you
754 &lt;br&gt;would send me the Internet address of to the document, it would be more
755 &lt;br&gt;useful to me to be able to download it as an electronic document.&lt;/p&gt;
756
757 &lt;p&gt;&amp;gt; Meanwhile, MPEG LA currently has several Norwegian Licensees that can
758 &lt;br&gt;&amp;gt; be found under the &quot;Licensees&quot; header within the respective portion
759 &lt;br&gt;&amp;gt; of our website. For example, you may find our list of Licensees in
760 &lt;br&gt;&amp;gt; Good Standing to our AVC License in the AVC portion of our website,
761 &lt;br&gt;&amp;gt; http://www.mpegla.com/main/programs/AVC/Pages/Licensees.aspx&lt;/p&gt;
762
763 &lt;p&gt;How can I recognize the Norwegian licensees?&lt;/p&gt;
764
765 &lt;p&gt;--
766 &lt;br&gt;Happy hacking
767 &lt;br&gt;Petter Reinholdtsen&lt;/p&gt;
768 &lt;/blockquote&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
769
770 &lt;p&gt;Selv om jeg svarte kun noen minutter etter at jeg fikk eposten fra
771 MPEG-LA, fikk jeg eposten under som automatisk var beskjed på min
772 siste epost. Får håpe noen likevel følger opp &quot;FedEx-pakken&quot;. For å
773 øke sjansen for at noen revurderer utsending av pakke uten mottaker,
774 videresendte jeg min epost til swolf (at) mpegla.com, så får vi se.
775 Har ikke hørt noe mer 3 timer senere, så jeg mistenker at ingen leste
776 min epost tidsnok.&lt;/p&gt;
777
778 &lt;p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt;
779
780 &lt;p&gt;Date: Thu, 28 Jun 2012 14:36:20 +0000
781 &lt;br&gt;From: Ryan Rodriguez &amp;lt;RRodriguez (at) mpegla.com&amp;gt;
782 &lt;br&gt;To: Petter Reinholdtsen &amp;lt;pere (at) hungry.com&amp;gt;
783 &lt;br&gt;Subject: Automatic reply: Do NRK have a license agreement with MPEG-LA?&lt;/p&gt;
784
785 &lt;p&gt;Thank you for your message.&lt;/p&gt;
786
787 &lt;p&gt;I will be out of the office until Thursday, July 5 and will respond
788 to all messages upon my return. If this is a matter that requires
789 immediate attention, please contact Sidney Wolf (swolf (at)
790 mpegla.com)&lt;/p&gt;
791
792 &lt;p&gt;Best regards,&lt;/p&gt;
793
794 &lt;p&gt;Ryan&lt;/p&gt;
795
796 &lt;p&gt;Ryan M. Rodriguez
797 &lt;br&gt;Licensing Associate
798 &lt;br&gt;MPEG LA&lt;/p&gt;
799
800 &lt;/blockquote&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
801
802 &lt;p&gt;Litt klokere, men fortsatt ikke klok på mitt opprinnelige spørsmål,
803 som er om en trenger avtale med MPEG-LA for å publisere eller
804 kringkaste H.264-video i Norge.&lt;/p&gt;
805 </description>
806 </item>
807
808 <item>
809 <title>NRK nekter å finne og utlevere eventuell avtale med MPEG-LA</title>
810 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/NRK_nekter___finne_og_utlevere_eventuell_avtale_med_MPEG_LA.html</link>
811 <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/NRK_nekter___finne_og_utlevere_eventuell_avtale_med_MPEG_LA.html</guid>
812 <pubDate>Mon, 25 Jun 2012 15:10:00 +0200</pubDate>
813 <description>&lt;p&gt;Jeg fikk nettopp svar fra NRK på
814 &lt;a href=&quot;http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Trenger_en_avtale_med_MPEG_LA_for___publisere_og_kringkaste_H_264_video_.html&quot;&gt;min
815 forespørsel om kopi av avtale&lt;/a&gt; med MPEG-LA eller andre om bruk av
816 MPEG og/eller H.264. Svaret har fått saksreferanse 2011/371 (mon tro
817 hva slags sak fra 2011 dette er?) hos NRK og lyder som følger:&lt;/p&gt;
818
819 &lt;p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt;
820
821 &lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Svar på innsynsbegjæring i MPEG / H.264-relaterte
822 avtaler&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
823
824 &lt;p&gt;Viser til innsynsbegjæring av 19. juni 2012. Kravet om innsyn
825 gjelder avtale som gjør at NRK «ikke er begrenset av de generelle
826 bruksvilkårene som gjelder for utstyr som bruker MPEG og/eller
827 H.264».&lt;/p&gt;
828
829 &lt;p&gt;I henhold til offentleglova § 28 annet ledd må innsynskravet gjelde
830 en bestemt sak eller i rimelig utstrekning saker av en bestemt
831 sak. Det er på det rene at det aktuelle innsynskravet ikke gjelder en
832 bestemt sak. Spørsmålet som reiser seg er om identifiseringsgraden er
833 tilstrekkelig. I Justisdepartementets «Rettleiar til offentleglova»
834 står følgende:&lt;/p&gt;
835
836 &lt;p&gt;«Kravet om at innsynskravet må gjelde ei bestemt sak er til hinder
837 for at eit innsynskrav kan gjelde alle saker av ein bestemt art, utan
838 at den enkelte saka blir identifisert. Ein kan med andre ord i
839 utgangspunktet ikkje krevje innsyn i til dømes alle saker om
840 utsleppsløyve hos Statens forureiningstilsyn frå dei siste tre åra,
841 med mindre ein identifiserer kvar enkelt sak, til dømes med tilvising
842 til dato, partar eller liknande.»&lt;/p&gt;
843
844 &lt;p&gt;Vedrørende denne begrensningen har Justisdepartementet uttalt
845 følgende (Lovavdelingens uttalelser JDLOV-2010-3295):&lt;/p&gt;
846
847 &lt;p&gt;&lt;em&gt;«Bakgrunnen for avgrensinga av kva innsynskravet kan gjelde,
848 er fyrst og fremst at meir generelle innsynskrav, utan noka form for
849 identifikasjon av kva ein eigentleg ynskjer, ville vere svært
850 vanskelege å handsame for forvaltninga.»&lt;/em&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
851
852 &lt;p&gt;I samme sak uttaler Lovavdelingen følgende:&lt;/p&gt;
853
854 &lt;p&gt;&lt;em&gt;«Det følgjer vidare av offentleglova § 28 andre ledd at det `i
855 rimeleg utstrekning&#39; kan krevjast innsyn i `saker av ein bestemt
856 art&#39;. Vilkåret om at eit innsynskrav berre `i rimeleg utstrekning&#39; kan
857 gjelde saker av ein bestemt art, er i hovudsak knytt til kor
858 arbeidskrevjande det vil vere å finne fram til dei aktuelle
859 dokumenta. I tillegg reknar vi med at vilkåret kan gje grunnlag for å
860 nekte innsyn i tilfelle der innsynskravet er så omfattande (gjeld så
861 mange dokument) at arbeidsmengda som ville gått med til å handsame
862 det, er større enn det ein `i rimeleg utstrekning&#39; kan krevje (sjølv
863 om det nok skal mykje til).»&lt;/em&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
864
865 &lt;p&gt;NRK har ikke noen egen sammenstilling over avtaler innenfor
866 bestemte områder som omtales i innsynsbegjæringen. De måtte søkes på
867 vanlig måte. I tillegg finnes ikke noen automatisert måte å finne
868 avtaler som «ikke er begrenset av de generelle bruksvilkårene som
869 gjelder for utstyr som bruker MPEG og/eller H.264». En slik
870 gjennomgang av avtaler måtte gjøres manuelt av en person med
871 spesialistkunnskap. Dette vil kreve at NRK avsetter omfattende
872 ressurser for å finne frem relevante avtaler og for deretter å vurdere
873 om de dekkes av det innsynsbegjæringen omfattes.&lt;/p&gt;
874
875 &lt;p&gt;På bakgrunn av dette nekter NRK innsyn, med den begrunnelsen at
876 innsynskravet er så omfattende at arbeidsmengden for å håndtere kravet
877 vil være langt større enn det som i rimelig utstrekning kan kreves i
878 henhold til offentleglova § 28 annet ledd.&lt;/p&gt;
879
880 &lt;p&gt;Avslag på deres innsynsbegjæring kan påklages til Kultur- og
881 kirkedepartementet innen tre uker fra det tidspunkt avslaget kommer
882 frem til mottakeren, i henhold til reglene i offentleglova § 32,
883 jf. forvaltningsloven kapittel VI. Klagen skal stiles til Kultur- og
884 kirkedepartementet, og sendes til NRK.&lt;/p&gt;
885
886 &lt;p&gt;NRK er imidlertid etter Offentleglova forpliktet å gi ut journaler,
887 slik at en eventuell søknad om innsyn kan tydeligere identifisere
888 hvilke dokumenter som det ønskes innsyn i. NRKs offentlige journaler
889 for inneværende og forrige måned ligger ute på
890 NRK.no/innsyn. Journaler som går lengre tilbake i tid, kan sendes ut
891 på forespørsel til innsyn (at) nrk.no.&lt;/p&gt;
892
893 &lt;p&gt;Med hilsen
894 &lt;br&gt;Dokumentarkivet i NRK
895 &lt;br&gt;v/ Elin Brandsrud
896 &lt;br&gt;Tel. direkte: 23 04 29 29
897 &lt;br&gt;Post: RBM3, Postboks 8500 Majorstuen, 0340 Oslo
898 &lt;br&gt;innsyn (at) nrk.no&lt;/p&gt;
899
900 &lt;/blockquote&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
901
902 &lt;p&gt;Svaret kom
903 &lt;a href=&quot;http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2012-06-25-video-mpegla-nrk.pdf&quot;&gt;i
904 PDF-form som vedlegg på epost&lt;/a&gt;. Jeg er litt usikker på hvordan jeg
905 best går videre for å bli klok, men jeg har jo i hvert fall tre uker
906 på å vurdere om jeg skal klage. Enten må nok forespørselen
907 reformuleres eller så må jeg vel klage. Synes jo det er merkelig at
908 NRK ikke har bedre kontroll med hvilke avtaler de har inngått. Det
909 burde jo være noen i ledelsen som vet om de har signert en avtale med
910 MPEG-LA eller ikke...&lt;/p&gt;
911
912 &lt;p&gt;Oppdatering 2012-06-25 20:20: Et google-søk på &quot;2011/371 nrk&quot;
913 sendte meg til postjournalen for
914 &lt;a href=&quot;http://nrk.no/contentfile/file/1.8212365!offentligjournal19062012.pdf&quot;&gt;2012-06-19&lt;/a&gt;
915 og
916 &lt;a href=&quot;http://nrk.no/contentfile/file/1.8214156!offentligjournal20062012.pdf&quot;&gt;2012-06-20&lt;/a&gt;
917 hos NRK som viser mine forespørsler og viser at sakens tittel hos NRK
918 er &quot;Graphic Systems Regions MA 2378/10E&quot;. Videre søk etter &quot;Graphic
919 Systems Regions&quot; viser at dette er saken til et anbud om
920 &quot;&lt;a href=&quot;http://no.mercell.com/m/mts/Tender/27179412.aspx&quot;&gt;a graphics
921 system for 12 or 13 sites broadcasting regional news&lt;/a&gt;&quot; hos Mercell
922 Sourcing Service, også omtalt på
923 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.publictenders.net/tender/595705&quot;&gt;Public
924 Tenders&lt;/a&gt; og
925 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.doffin.no/search/show/search_view.aspx?ID=JAN155521&quot;&gt;Doffin&lt;/a&gt;.
926 Jeg er dog usikker på hvordan dette er relatert til min
927 forespørsel.&lt;/p&gt;
928
929 &lt;p&gt;Oppdatering 2012-06-25 22:40: Ble tipset av Kieran Kunhya, fra
930 miljøet rundt
931 &lt;a href=&quot;http://code.google.com/p/open-broadcast-encoder/&quot;&gt;Open
932 Broadcast Encoder&lt;/a&gt;, at listen over de som har lisensavtale med
933 MPEG-LA er
934 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.mpeg-la.com/main/programs/AVC/Pages/Licensees.aspx&quot;&gt;tilgjengelig
935 på web&lt;/a&gt;. Veldig fint å oppdage hvor den finnes, da jeg må ha lett
936 etter feil ting da jeg forsøke å finne den. Der står ikke NRK, men
937 flere andre &quot;Broadcasting Company&quot;-oppføringer. Lurer på om det betyr
938 at NRK ikke trenger avtale, eller noe helt annet?&lt;/p&gt;
939 </description>
940 </item>
941
942 <item>
943 <title>Trenger en avtale med MPEG-LA for å publisere og kringkaste H.264-video?</title>
944 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Trenger_en_avtale_med_MPEG_LA_for___publisere_og_kringkaste_H_264_video_.html</link>
945 <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Trenger_en_avtale_med_MPEG_LA_for___publisere_og_kringkaste_H_264_video_.html</guid>
946 <pubDate>Thu, 21 Jun 2012 13:40:00 +0200</pubDate>
947 <description>&lt;p&gt;Trengs det avtale med MPEG-LA for å ha lovlig rett til å
948 distribuere og kringkaste video i MPEG4 eller med videokodingen H.264?
949 &lt;a href=&quot;http://webmink.com/essays/h-264/&quot;&gt;H.264 og MPEG4 er jo ikke en
950 fri og åpen standard&lt;/a&gt; i henhold til
951 &lt;a href=&quot;http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Fri_og__pen_standard__slik_Digistan_ser_det.html&quot;&gt;definisjonen
952 til Digistan&lt;/a&gt;, så i enkelte land er det ingen tvil om at du må ha
953 en slik avtale, men jeg må innrømme at jeg ikke vet om det også
954 gjelder Norge. Det ser uansett ut til å være en juridisk interessant
955 problemstilling. Men jeg tenkte her om dagen som så, at hvis det er
956 nødvendig, så har store aktører som
957 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.nrk.no/&quot;&gt;NRK&lt;/a&gt; og
958 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.regjeringen.no/&quot;&gt;regjeringen&lt;/a&gt; skaffet seg en
959 slik avtale. Jeg har derfor sendt forespørsel til begge (for
960 regjeringen sin del er det Departementenes Servicesenter som gjør
961 jobben), og bedt om kopi av eventuelle avtaler de har om bruk av MPEG
962 og/eller H.264 med MPEG-LA eller andre aktører som opererer på vegne
963 av MPEG-LA. Her er kopi av eposten jeg har sendt til
964 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.dss.dep.no/&quot;&gt;Departementenes Servicesenter&lt;/a&gt;.
965 Forespørselen til NRK er veldig lik.&lt;/p&gt;
966
967 &lt;p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt;
968
969 &lt;p&gt;Date: Tue, 19 Jun 2012 15:18:33 +0200
970 &lt;br&gt;From: Petter Reinholdtsen
971 &lt;br&gt;To: postmottak@dss.dep.no
972 &lt;br&gt;Subject: Innsynsbegjæring om MPEG/H.264-relaterte avtaler
973
974 &lt;p&gt;Hei. Jeg ber herved om innsyn og kopi av dokumenter i DSS relatert
975 til avtaler rundt bruk av videoformatene MPEG og H.264. Jeg er
976 spesielt interessert i å vite om DSS har lisensavtale med MPEG-LA
977 eller noen som representerer MPEG-LA i Norge.&lt;/p&gt;
978
979 &lt;p&gt;MPEG og H.264 er videoformater som brukes både til kringkasting
980 (f.eks. i bakkenett og kabel-TV) og videopublisering på web, deriblant
981 via Adobe Flash. MPEG-LA, &amp;lt;URL:
982 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.mpeg-la.com/&quot;&gt;http://www.mpeg-la.com/&lt;/a&gt; &amp;gt;, er
983 en organisasjon som har fått oppgaven, av de kjente rettighetshavere
984 av immaterielle rettigheter knyttet til MPEG og H.264, å selge
985 bruksrett for MPEG og H.264.&lt;/p&gt;
986
987 &lt;p&gt;Via regjeringen.no kringkastes med MPEG og H.264-baserte
988 videoformater, og dette ser ut til å være organisert av DSS. Jeg
989 antar dermed at DSS har avtale med en eller annen aktør om dette.&lt;/p&gt;
990
991 &lt;p&gt;F.eks. har Adobe Premiere Pro har følgende klausul i følge &amp;lt;URL:
992 &lt;a href=&quot;http://news.cnet.com/8301-30685_3-20000101-264.html&quot;&gt;http://news.cnet.com/8301-30685_3-20000101-264.html&lt;/a&gt;
993 &amp;gt;:&lt;/p&gt;
994
995 &lt;p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt;
996
997 &lt;p&gt;6.17. AVC DISTRIBUTION. The following notice applies to software
998 containing AVC import and export functionality: THIS PRODUCT IS
999 LICENSED UNDER THE AVC PATENT PORTFOLIO LICENSE FOR THE PERSONAL AND
1000 NON-COMMERCIAL USE OF A CONSUMER TO (a) ENCODE VIDEO IN COMPLIANCE
1001 WITH THE AVC STANDARD (&quot;AVC VIDEO&quot;) AND/OR (b) DECODE AVC VIDEO THAT
1002 WAS ENCODED BY A CONSUMER ENGAGED IN A PERSONAL AND NON-COMMERCIAL
1003 ACTIVITY AND/OR AVC VIDEO THAT WAS OBTAINED FROM A VIDEO PROVIDER
1004 LICENSED TO PROVIDE AVC VIDEO. NO LICENSE IS GRANTED OR SHALL BE
1005 IMPLIED FOR ANY OTHER USE. ADDITIONAL INFORMATION MAY BE OBTAINED
1006 FROM MPEG LA L.L.C. SEE
1007 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.mpegla.com&quot;&gt;http://www.mpegla.com&lt;/a&gt;.&lt;/p&gt;
1008
1009 &lt;/blockquote&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
1010
1011 &lt;p&gt;Her er det kun &quot;non-commercial&quot; og &quot;personal and non-commercial&quot;
1012 aktivitet som er tillatt uten ekstra avtale med MPEG-LA.&lt;/p&gt;
1013
1014 &lt;p&gt;Et annet tilsvarende eksempel er Apple Final Cut Pro, som har
1015 følgende klausul i følge &amp;lt;URL:
1016 &lt;a href=&quot;http://images.apple.com/legal/sla/docs/finalcutstudio2.pdf&quot;&gt;http://images.apple.com/legal/sla/docs/finalcutstudio2.pdf&lt;/a&gt;
1017 &amp;gt;:&lt;/p&gt;
1018
1019 &lt;p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt;
1020
1021 &lt;p&gt;15. Merknad om H.264/AVC. Hvis Apple-programvaren inneholder
1022 funksjonalitet for AVC-koding og/eller AVC-dekoding, krever
1023 kommersiell bruk ekstra lisensiering og følgende gjelder:
1024 AVC-FUNKSJONALITETEN I DETTE PRODUKTET KAN KUN ANVENDES AV
1025 FORBRUKERE OG KUN FOR PERSONLIG OG IKKE- KOMMERSIELL BRUK TIL (i)
1026 KODING AV VIDEO I OVERENSSTEMMELSE MED AVC-STANDARDEN (&quot;AVC-VIDEO&quot;)
1027 OG/ELLER (ii) DEKODING AV AVC-VIDEO SOM ER KODET AV EN FORBRUKER TIL
1028 PERSONLIG OG IKKE-KOMMERSIELL BRUK OG/ELLER DEKODING AV AVC-VIDEO
1029 FRA EN VIDEOLEVERANDØR SOM HAR LISENS TIL Å TILBY
1030 AVC-VIDEO. INFORMASJON OM ANNEN BRUK OG LISENSIERING KAN INNHENTES
1031 FRA MPEG LA L.L.C. SE HTTP://WWW.MPEGLA.COM.&lt;/p&gt;
1032 &lt;/blockquote&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
1033
1034 &lt;p&gt;Tilsvarende gjelder for andre programvarepakker, kamera, etc som
1035 bruker MPEG og H.264, at en må ha en avtale med MPEG-LA for å ha lov
1036 til å bruke programmet/utstyret hvis en skal lage noe annet enn
1037 private filmer og i ikke-kommersiell virksomhet.&lt;/p&gt;
1038
1039 &lt;p&gt;Jeg er altså interessert i kopi av avtaler DSS har som gjør at en
1040 ikke er begrenset av de generelle bruksvilkårene som gjelder for
1041 utstyr som bruker MPEG og/eller H.264.&lt;/p&gt;
1042 &lt;/blockquote&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
1043
1044 &lt;p&gt;Nå venter jeg spent på svaret. Jeg planlegger å blogge om svaret
1045 her.&lt;/p&gt;
1046 </description>
1047 </item>
1048
1049 <item>
1050 <title>The cost of ODF and OOXML</title>
1051 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_cost_of_ODF_and_OOXML.html</link>
1052 <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_cost_of_ODF_and_OOXML.html</guid>
1053 <pubDate>Sat, 26 May 2012 18:00:00 +0200</pubDate>
1054 <description>&lt;p&gt;I just come across a blog post from Glyn Moody reporting the
1055 claimed cost from Microsoft on requiring ODF to be used by the UK
1056 government. I just sent him an email to let him know that his
1057 assumption are most likely wrong. Sharing it here in case some of my
1058 blog readers have seem the same numbers float around in the UK.&lt;/p&gt;
1059
1060 &lt;p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt; &lt;p&gt;Hi. I just noted your
1061 &lt;a href=&quot;http://blogs.computerworlduk.com/open-enterprise/2012/04/does-microsoft-office-lock-in-cost-the-uk-government-500-million/index.htm&quot;&gt;http://blogs.computerworlduk.com/open-enterprise/2012/04/does-microsoft-office-lock-in-cost-the-uk-government-500-million/index.htm&lt;/a&gt;
1062 comment:&lt;/p&gt;
1063
1064 &lt;p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt;&quot;They&#39;re all in Danish, not unreasonably, but even
1065 with the help of Google Translate I can&#39;t find any figures about the
1066 savings of &quot;moving to a flexible two standard&quot; as claimed by the
1067 Microsoft email. But I assume it is backed up somewhere, so let&#39;s take
1068 it, and the £500 million figure for the UK, on trust.&quot;
1069 &lt;/blockquote&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
1070
1071 &lt;p&gt;I can tell you that the Danish reports are inflated. I believe it is
1072 the same reports that were used in the Norwegian debate around 2007,
1073 and Gisle Hannemyr (a well known IT commentator in Norway) had a look
1074 at the content. In short, the reason it is claimed that using ODF
1075 will be so costly, is based on the assumption that this mean every
1076 existing document need to be converted from one of the MS Office
1077 formats to ODF, transferred to the receiver, and converted back from
1078 ODF to one of the MS Office formats, and that the conversion will cost
1079 10 minutes of work time for both the sender and the receiver. In
1080 reality the sender would have a tool capable of saving to ODF, and the
1081 receiver would have a tool capable of reading it, and the time spent
1082 would at most be a few seconds for saving and loading, not 20 minutes
1083 of wasted effort.&lt;/p&gt;
1084
1085 &lt;p&gt;Microsoft claimed all these costs were saved by allowing people to
1086 transfer the original files from MS Office instead of spending 10
1087 minutes converting to ODF. :)&lt;/p&gt;
1088
1089 &lt;p&gt;See
1090 &lt;a href=&quot;http://hannemyr.com/no/ms12_vl02.php&quot;&gt;http://hannemyr.com/no/ms12_vl02.php&lt;/a&gt;
1091 and
1092 &lt;a href=&quot;http://hannemyr.com/no/ms12.php&quot;&gt;http://hannemyr.com/no/ms12.php&lt;/a&gt;
1093 for background information. Norwegian only, sorry. :)&lt;/p&gt;
1094 &lt;/blockquote&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
1095 </description>
1096 </item>
1097
1098 <item>
1099 <title>OpenOffice.org fungerer da fint for blinde?</title>
1100 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/OpenOffice_org_fungerer_da_fint_for_blinde_.html</link>
1101 <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/OpenOffice_org_fungerer_da_fint_for_blinde_.html</guid>
1102 <pubDate>Mon, 21 May 2012 23:20:00 +0200</pubDate>
1103 <description>&lt;p&gt;De siste dagene har høringsuttalelsene om DIFIs forslag til
1104 standardkatalog v3.1 blitt
1105 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.standard.difi.no/hoyring/hoyring-om-nye-anbefalte-it-standarder?tab=comments&quot;&gt;publisert
1106 på DIFIs nettside&lt;/a&gt;, og jeg kunne der glede meg over at
1107 &lt;a href=&quot;http://wiki.nuug.no/uttalelser/201204-standardkatalog-v3.1&quot;&gt;NUUGs&lt;/a&gt;
1108 uttalelse er kommet med. En uttalelse som overrasker og forvirrer meg
1109 er
1110 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.standard.difi.no/filearchive/norges-blindeforbund.pdf&quot;&gt;den
1111 fra Norges Blindeforbund&lt;/a&gt;, som 5 år etter at Klaus Knopper sammen
1112 med sin blinde kone blant annet
1113 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.nuug.no/aktiviteter/20071211-accessibility/&quot;&gt;demonstrerte
1114 høyttalende OpenOffice.org på nynorsk for blinde&lt;/a&gt; på et NUUG-møte.&lt;/p&gt;
1115
1116 &lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;https://www.blindeforbundet.no/&quot;&gt;Norges Blindeforbund&lt;/a&gt;
1117 skriver følgende, som for meg virker å være formulert på sviktende
1118 grunnlag:&lt;/p&gt;
1119
1120 &lt;p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt;
1121 &lt;p&gt;Bruk av fri programvare
1122
1123 &lt;p&gt;I FRIPROGSENTERET, RAPPORT 2009-02: Universell utforming
1124 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.kunnskapsbazaren.no/filer/Friprogsenteret-Rapport-Universell_utforming.pdf&quot;&gt;http://www.kunnskapsbazaren.no/filer/Friprogsenteret-Rapport-Universell_utforming.pdf&lt;/a&gt;
1125 sies det &quot;Det finnes i dag ikke mange fri programvare-rammeverk eller
1126 generelle løsninger som støtter tilgjengelighet eller som er
1127 universelt utformet.&quot;&lt;/p&gt;
1128
1129 &lt;p&gt;Til tross for at det gjennom prinsippene i fri programvare åpnes
1130 for større frihet til selv å påvirke programvareløsninger i retning av
1131 universell utforming viser praksis at virkeligheten er en annen.
1132 Mange av de mest alminnelige frie programvarepakkene mangler delvis
1133 eller fullstendig tilgjengelighet for mennesker med nedsatt
1134 syn. Eksempler på dette er OpenOffice og LibreOffice m.fl.&lt;/p&gt;
1135
1136 &lt;p&gt;En annen utfordring ved bruk av fri programvare kan være manglende
1137 kundestøtte og muligheter til opplæring i bruk av løsningen. Svaksynte
1138 og blinde har et høyere behov for denne typen støtte enn andre brukere
1139 ettersom mange av dem har behov for tilleggsprogramvare som skal
1140 fungere sammen med den opprinnelige programvaren, og ettersom man ikke
1141 har de samme muligheter for overblikk over grensesnittet som en seende
1142 bruker. I tillegg til dette kommer de mer tilgjengelighetstekniske
1143 utfordringene som ofte må løses i samarbeid med
1144 programvareleverandør/produsent.&lt;/p&gt;
1145
1146 &lt;p&gt;Fri programvare er ikke på samme måte underlagt lovgivning gjennom
1147 for eksempel diskriminerings og tilgjengelighetsloven ettersom det
1148 ikke alltid finnes en produsent/tilbyder av tjenesten eller produktet.&lt;/p&gt;
1149
1150 &lt;p&gt;Norges Blindeforbund krever at universell utforming og
1151 brukskvalitet tas med som viktige hensyn i utredninger som ligger til
1152 grunn for valg av standarder som primært leder brukeren mot fri
1153 programvare. Et eksempel på dette er bruk av dokumentformatet ODF som
1154 leder brukeren i retning av OpenOffice, som er helt eller delvis
1155 utilgjengelig for svaksynte og blinde – noe avhengig av plattform og
1156 hjelpemiddelprogramvare.&lt;/p&gt;
1157
1158 &lt;/blockquote&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
1159
1160 &lt;p&gt;Jeg håper noen involvert i OpenOffice.org og/eller LibreOffice tar
1161 kontakt med Norges Blindeforbund og oppklarer det som for meg virker å
1162 være en misforståelse, i og med at OpenOffice.org så vidt jeg vet
1163 fungerer fint også for blinde.&lt;/p&gt;
1164
1165 &lt;p&gt;Jeg ble minnet på problemstillingen da jeg leste Slashdot-saken om
1166 &quot;&lt;a href=&quot;http://linux.slashdot.org/story/12/05/21/1417221/the-state-of-linux-accessibility&quot;&gt;The
1167 State of Linux Accessibility&lt;/a&gt;&quot;, som også hevder at Linux fungerer
1168 utmerket for blinde.&lt;/p&gt;
1169 </description>
1170 </item>
1171
1172 <item>
1173 <title>NUUGs leverer høringsuttalelse om v3.1 av statens referansekatalog</title>
1174 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/NUUGs_leverer_h_ringsuttalelse_om_v3_1_av_statens_referansekatalog.html</link>
1175 <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/NUUGs_leverer_h_ringsuttalelse_om_v3_1_av_statens_referansekatalog.html</guid>
1176 <pubDate>Fri, 27 Apr 2012 15:30:00 +0200</pubDate>
1177 <description>&lt;p&gt;NUUG-styremedlem Hans-Petter Fjeld
1178 &lt;a href=&quot;https://plus.google.com/u/0/110394259537201279374/posts/AGzRmAuFdW1&quot;&gt;meldte
1179 nettopp&lt;/a&gt; at han har sendt inn &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.nuug.no/&quot;&gt;NUUG&lt;/a&gt;s
1180 høringsuttalelse angående Difi sin standardkatalog v3.1. Jeg er veldig
1181 glad for at så mange bidro og sikret at vår stemme blir hørt i denne
1182 høringen. Anbefaler alle å lese våre
1183 &lt;a href=&quot;http://wiki.nuug.no/uttalelser/201204-standardkatalog-v3.1&quot;&gt;to
1184 sider med innspill&lt;/a&gt;.&lt;/p&gt;
1185 </description>
1186 </item>
1187
1188 <item>
1189 <title>HTC One X - Your video? What do you mean?</title>
1190 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/HTC_One_X___Your_video___What_do_you_mean_.html</link>
1191 <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/HTC_One_X___Your_video___What_do_you_mean_.html</guid>
1192 <pubDate>Thu, 26 Apr 2012 13:20:00 +0200</pubDate>
1193 <description>&lt;p&gt;In &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.idg.no/computerworld/article243690.ece&quot;&gt;an
1194 article today&lt;/a&gt; published by Computerworld Norway, the photographer
1195 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.urke.com/eirik/&quot;&gt;Eirik Helland Urke&lt;/a&gt; reports
1196 that the video editor application included with
1197 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.htc.com/www/smartphones/htc-one-x/#specs&quot;&gt;HTC One
1198 X&lt;/a&gt; have some quite surprising terms of use. The article is mostly
1199 based on the twitter message from mister Urke, stating:
1200
1201 &lt;p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt;
1202 &quot;&lt;a href=&quot;http://twitter.com/urke/status/194062269724897280&quot;&gt;Drøy
1203 brukeravtale: HTC kan bruke MINE redigerte videoer kommersielt. Selv
1204 kan jeg KUN bruke dem privat.&lt;/a&gt;&quot;
1205 &lt;/blockquote&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
1206
1207 &lt;p&gt;I quickly translated it to this English message:&lt;/p&gt;
1208
1209 &lt;p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt;
1210 &quot;Arrogant user agreement: HTC can use MY edited videos
1211 commercially. Although I can ONLY use them privately.&quot;
1212 &lt;/blockquote&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
1213
1214 &lt;p&gt;I&#39;ve been unable to find the text of the license term myself, but
1215 suspect it is a variation of the MPEG-LA terms I
1216 &lt;a href=&quot;http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Terms_of_use_for_video_produced_by_a_Canon_IXUS_130_digital_camera.html&quot;&gt;discovered
1217 with my Canon IXUS 130&lt;/a&gt;. The HTC One X specification specifies that
1218 the recording format of the phone is .amr for audio and .mp3 for
1219 video. AMR is
1220 &lt;a href=&quot;http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adaptive_Multi-Rate_audio_codec#Licensing_and_patent_issues&quot;&gt;Adaptive
1221 Multi-Rate audio codec&lt;/a&gt; with patents which according to the
1222 Wikipedia article require an license agreement with
1223 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.voiceage.com/&quot;&gt;VoiceAge&lt;/a&gt;. MP4 is
1224 &lt;a href=&quot;http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H.264/MPEG-4_AVC#Patent_licensing&quot;&gt;MPEG4 with
1225 H.264&lt;/a&gt;, which according to Wikipedia require a licence agreement
1226 with &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.mpegla.com/&quot;&gt;MPEG-LA&lt;/a&gt;.&lt;/p&gt;
1227
1228 &lt;p&gt;I know why I prefer
1229 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.digistan.org/open-standard:definition&quot;&gt;free and open
1230 standards&lt;/a&gt; also for video.&lt;/p&gt;
1231 </description>
1232 </item>
1233
1234 <item>
1235 <title>RAND terms - non-reasonable and discriminatory</title>
1236 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/RAND_terms___non_reasonable_and_discriminatory.html</link>
1237 <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/RAND_terms___non_reasonable_and_discriminatory.html</guid>
1238 <pubDate>Thu, 19 Apr 2012 22:20:00 +0200</pubDate>
1239 <description>&lt;p&gt;Here in Norway, the
1240 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.regjeringen.no/nb/dep/fad.html?id=339&quot;&gt; Ministry of
1241 Government Administration, Reform and Church Affairs&lt;/a&gt; is behind
1242 a &lt;a href=&quot;http://standard.difi.no/forvaltningsstandarder&quot;&gt;directory of
1243 standards&lt;/a&gt; that are recommended or mandatory for use by the
1244 government. When the directory was created, the people behind it made
1245 an effort to ensure that everyone would be able to implement the
1246 standards and compete on equal terms to supply software and solutions
1247 to the government. Free software and non-free software could compete
1248 on the same level.&lt;/p&gt;
1249
1250 &lt;p&gt;But recently, some standards with RAND
1251 (&lt;a href=&quot;http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reasonable_and_non-discriminatory_licensing&quot;&gt;Reasonable
1252 And Non-Discriminatory&lt;/a&gt;) terms have made their way into the
1253 directory. And while this might not sound too bad, the fact is that
1254 standard specifications with RAND terms often block free software from
1255 implementing them. The reasonable part of RAND mean that the cost per
1256 user/unit is low,and the non-discriminatory part mean that everyone
1257 willing to pay will get a license. Both sound great in theory. In
1258 practice, to get such license one need to be able to count users, and
1259 be able to pay a small amount of money per unit or user. By
1260 definition, users of free software do not need to register their use.
1261 So counting users or units is not possible for free software projects.
1262 And given that people will use the software without handing any money
1263 to the author, it is not really economically possible for a free
1264 software author to pay a small amount of money to license the rights
1265 to implement a standard when the income available is zero. The result
1266 in these situations is that free software are locked out from
1267 implementing standards with RAND terms.&lt;/p&gt;
1268
1269 &lt;p&gt;Because of this, when I see someone claiming the terms of a
1270 standard is reasonable and non-discriminatory, all I can think of is
1271 how this really is non-reasonable and discriminatory. Because free
1272 software developers are working in a global market, it does not really
1273 help to know that software patents are not supposed to be enforceable
1274 in Norway. The patent regimes in other countries affect us even here.
1275 I really hope the people behind the standard directory will pay more
1276 attention to these issues in the future.&lt;/p&gt;
1277
1278 &lt;p&gt;You can find more on the issues with RAND, FRAND and RAND-Z terms
1279 from Simon Phipps
1280 (&lt;a href=&quot;http://blogs.computerworlduk.com/simon-says/2010/11/rand-not-so-reasonable/&quot;&gt;RAND:
1281 Not So Reasonable?&lt;/a&gt;).&lt;/p&gt;
1282
1283 &lt;p&gt;Update 2012-04-21: Just came across a
1284 &lt;a href=&quot;http://blogs.computerworlduk.com/open-enterprise/2012/04/of-microsoft-netscape-patents-and-open-standards/index.htm&quot;&gt;blog
1285 post from Glyn Moody&lt;/a&gt; over at Computer World UK warning about the
1286 same issue, and urging people to speak out to the UK government. I
1287 can only urge Norwegian users to do the same for
1288 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.standard.difi.no/hoyring/hoyring-om-nye-anbefalte-it-standarder&quot;&gt;the
1289 hearing taking place at the moment&lt;/a&gt; (respond before 2012-04-27).
1290 It proposes to require video conferencing standards including
1291 specifications with RAND terms.&lt;/p&gt;
1292 </description>
1293 </item>
1294
1295 <item>
1296 <title>The video format most supported in web browsers?</title>
1297 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_video_format_most_supported_in_web_browsers_.html</link>
1298 <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_video_format_most_supported_in_web_browsers_.html</guid>
1299 <pubDate>Sun, 16 Jan 2011 00:20:00 +0100</pubDate>
1300 <description>&lt;p&gt;The video format struggle on the web continues, and the three
1301 contenders seem to be Ogg Theora, H.264 and WebM. Most video sites
1302 seem to use H.264, while others use Ogg Theora. Interestingly enough,
1303 the comments I see give me the feeling that a lot of people believe
1304 H.264 is the most supported video format in browsers, but according to
1305 the Wikipedia article on
1306 &lt;a href=&quot;http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HTML5_video&quot;&gt;HTML5 video&lt;/a&gt;,
1307 this is not true. Check out the nice table of supprted formats in
1308 different browsers there. The format supported by most browsers is
1309 Ogg Theora, supported by released versions of Mozilla Firefox, Google
1310 Chrome, Chromium, Opera, Konqueror, Epiphany, Origyn Web Browser and
1311 BOLT browser, while not supported by Internet Explorer nor Safari.
1312 The runner up is WebM supported by released versions of Google Chrome
1313 Chromium Opera and Origyn Web Browser, and test versions of Mozilla
1314 Firefox. H.264 is supported by released versions of Safari, Origyn
1315 Web Browser and BOLT browser, and the test version of Internet
1316 Explorer. Those wanting Ogg Theora support in Internet Explorer and
1317 Safari can install plugins to get it.&lt;/p&gt;
1318
1319 &lt;p&gt;To me, the simple conclusion from this is that to reach most users
1320 without any extra software installed, one uses Ogg Theora with the
1321 HTML5 video tag. Of course to reach all those without a browser
1322 handling HTML5, one need fallback mechanisms. In
1323 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.nuug.no/&quot;&gt;NUUG&lt;/a&gt;, we provide first fallback to a
1324 plugin capable of playing MPEG1 video, and those without such support
1325 we have a second fallback to the Cortado java applet playing Ogg
1326 Theora. This seem to work quite well, as can be seen in an &lt;a
1327 href=&quot;http://www.nuug.no/aktiviteter/20110111-semantic-web/&quot;&gt;example
1328 from last week&lt;/a&gt;.&lt;/p&gt;
1329
1330 &lt;p&gt;The reason Ogg Theora is the most supported format, and H.264 is
1331 the least supported is simple. Implementing and using H.264
1332 require royalty payment to MPEG-LA, and the terms of use from MPEG-LA
1333 are incompatible with free software licensing. If you believed H.264
1334 was without royalties and license terms, check out
1335 &quot;&lt;a href=&quot;http://webmink.com/essays/h-264/&quot;&gt;H.264 – Not The Kind Of
1336 Free That Matters&lt;/a&gt;&quot; by Simon Phipps.&lt;/p&gt;
1337
1338 &lt;p&gt;A incomplete list of sites providing video in Ogg Theora is
1339 available from
1340 &lt;a href=&quot;http://wiki.xiph.org/index.php/List_of_Theora_videos&quot;&gt;the
1341 Xiph.org wiki&lt;/a&gt;, if you want to have a look. I&#39;m not aware of a
1342 similar list for WebM nor H.264.&lt;/p&gt;
1343
1344 &lt;p&gt;Update 2011-01-16 09:40: A question from Tollef on IRC made me
1345 realise that I failed to make it clear enough this text is about the
1346 &amp;lt;video&amp;gt; tag support in browsers and not the video support
1347 provided by external plugins like the Flash plugins.&lt;/p&gt;
1348 </description>
1349 </item>
1350
1351 <item>
1352 <title>Chrome plan to drop H.264 support for HTML5 &amp;lt;video&amp;gt;</title>
1353 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Chrome_plan_to_drop_H_264_support_for_HTML5__lt_video_gt_.html</link>
1354 <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Chrome_plan_to_drop_H_264_support_for_HTML5__lt_video_gt_.html</guid>
1355 <pubDate>Wed, 12 Jan 2011 22:10:00 +0100</pubDate>
1356 <description>&lt;p&gt;Today I discovered
1357 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.digi.no/860070/google-dropper-h264-stotten-i-chrome&quot;&gt;via
1358 digi.no&lt;/a&gt; that the Chrome developers, in a surprising announcement,
1359 &lt;a href=&quot;http://blog.chromium.org/2011/01/html-video-codec-support-in-chrome.html&quot;&gt;yesterday
1360 announced&lt;/a&gt; plans to drop H.264 support for HTML5 &amp;lt;video&amp;gt; in
1361 the browser. The argument used is that H.264 is not a &quot;completely
1362 open&quot; codec technology. If you believe H.264 was free for everyone
1363 to use, I recommend having a look at the essay
1364 &quot;&lt;a href=&quot;http://webmink.com/essays/h-264/&quot;&gt;H.264 – Not The Kind Of
1365 Free That Matters&lt;/a&gt;&quot;. It is not free of cost for creators of video
1366 tools, nor those of us that want to publish on the Internet, and the
1367 terms provided by MPEG-LA excludes free software projects from
1368 licensing the patents needed for H.264. Some background information
1369 on the Google announcement is available from
1370 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.osnews.com/story/24243/Google_To_Drop_H264_Support_from_Chrome&quot;&gt;OSnews&lt;/a&gt;.
1371 A good read. :)&lt;/p&gt;
1372
1373 &lt;p&gt;Personally, I believe it is great that Google is taking a stand to
1374 promote equal terms for everyone when it comes to video publishing on
1375 the Internet. This can only be done by publishing using free and open
1376 standards, which is only possible if the web browsers provide support
1377 for these free and open standards. At the moment there seem to be two
1378 camps in the web browser world when it come to video support. Some
1379 browsers support H.264, and others support
1380 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.theora.org/&quot;&gt;Ogg Theora&lt;/a&gt; and
1381 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.webmproject.org/&quot;&gt;WebM&lt;/a&gt;
1382 (&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.diracvideo.org/&quot;&gt;Dirac&lt;/a&gt; is not really an option
1383 yet), forcing those of us that want to publish video on the Internet
1384 and which can not accept the terms of use presented by MPEG-LA for
1385 H.264 to not reach all potential viewers.
1386 Wikipedia keep &lt;a href=&quot;http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HTML5_video&quot;&gt;an
1387 updated summary&lt;/a&gt; of the current browser support.&lt;/p&gt;
1388
1389 &lt;p&gt;Not surprising, several people would prefer Google to keep
1390 promoting H.264, and John Gruber
1391 &lt;a href=&quot;http://daringfireball.net/2011/01/simple_questions&quot;&gt;presents
1392 the mind set&lt;/a&gt; of these people quite well. His rhetorical questions
1393 provoked a reply from Thom Holwerda with another set of questions
1394 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.osnews.com/story/24245/10_Questions_for_John_Gruber_Regarding_H_264_WebM&quot;&gt;presenting
1395 the issues with H.264&lt;/a&gt;. Both are worth a read.&lt;/p&gt;
1396
1397 &lt;p&gt;Some argue that if Google is dropping H.264 because it isn&#39;t free,
1398 they should also drop support for the Adobe Flash plugin. This
1399 argument was covered by Simon Phipps in
1400 &lt;a href=&quot;http://blogs.computerworlduk.com/simon-says/2011/01/google-and-h264---far-from-hypocritical/index.htm&quot;&gt;todays
1401 blog post&lt;/a&gt;, which I find to put the issue in context. To me it
1402 make perfect sense to drop native H.264 support for HTML5 in the
1403 browser while still allowing plugins.&lt;/p&gt;
1404
1405 &lt;p&gt;I suspect the reason this announcement make so many people protest,
1406 is that all the users and promoters of H.264 suddenly get an uneasy
1407 feeling that they might be backing the wrong horse. A lot of TV
1408 broadcasters have been moving to H.264 the last few years, and a lot
1409 of money has been invested in hardware based on the belief that they
1410 could use the same video format for both broadcasting and web
1411 publishing. Suddenly this belief is shaken.&lt;/p&gt;
1412
1413 &lt;p&gt;An interesting question is why Google is doing this. While the
1414 presented argument might be true enough, I believe Google would only
1415 present the argument if the change make sense from a business
1416 perspective. One reason might be that they are currently negotiating
1417 with MPEG-LA over royalties or usage terms, and giving MPEG-LA the
1418 feeling that dropping H.264 completely from Chroome, Youtube and
1419 Google Video would improve the negotiation position of Google.
1420 Another reason might be that Google want to save money by not having
1421 to pay the video tax to MPEG-LA at all, and thus want to move to a
1422 video format not requiring royalties at all. A third reason might be
1423 that the Chrome development team simply want to avoid the
1424 Chrome/Chromium split to get more help with the development of Chrome.
1425 I guess time will tell.&lt;/p&gt;
1426
1427 &lt;p&gt;Update 2011-01-15: The Google Chrome team provided
1428 &lt;a href=&quot;http://blog.chromium.org/2011/01/more-about-chrome-html-video-codec.html&quot;&gt;more
1429 background and information on the move&lt;/a&gt; it a blog post yesterday.&lt;/p&gt;
1430 </description>
1431 </item>
1432
1433 <item>
1434 <title>What standards are Free and Open as defined by Digistan?</title>
1435 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/What_standards_are_Free_and_Open_as_defined_by_Digistan_.html</link>
1436 <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/What_standards_are_Free_and_Open_as_defined_by_Digistan_.html</guid>
1437 <pubDate>Thu, 30 Dec 2010 23:15:00 +0100</pubDate>
1438 <description>&lt;p&gt;After trying to
1439 &lt;a href=&quot;http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Is_Ogg_Theora_a_free_and_open_standard_.html&quot;&gt;compare
1440 Ogg Theora&lt;/a&gt; to
1441 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.digistan.org/open-standard:definition&quot;&gt;the Digistan
1442 definition&lt;/a&gt; of a free and open standard, I concluded that this need
1443 to be done for more standards and started on a framework for doing
1444 this. As a start, I want to get the status for all the standards in
1445 the Norwegian reference directory, which include UTF-8, HTML, PDF, ODF,
1446 JPEG, PNG, SVG and others. But to be able to complete this in a
1447 reasonable time frame, I will need help.&lt;/p&gt;
1448
1449 &lt;p&gt;If you want to help out with this work, please visit
1450 &lt;a href=&quot;http://wiki.nuug.no/grupper/standard/digistan-analyse&quot;&gt;the
1451 wiki pages I have set up for this&lt;/a&gt;, and let me know that you want
1452 to help out. The IRC channel #nuug on irc.freenode.net is a good
1453 place to coordinate this for now, as it is the IRC channel for the
1454 NUUG association where I have created the framework (I am the leader
1455 of the Norwegian Unix User Group).&lt;/p&gt;
1456
1457 &lt;p&gt;The framework is still forming, and a lot is left to do. Do not be
1458 scared by the sketchy form of the current pages. :)&lt;/p&gt;
1459 </description>
1460 </item>
1461
1462 <item>
1463 <title>The many definitions of a open standard</title>
1464 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_many_definitions_of_a_open_standard.html</link>
1465 <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_many_definitions_of_a_open_standard.html</guid>
1466 <pubDate>Mon, 27 Dec 2010 14:45:00 +0100</pubDate>
1467 <description>&lt;p&gt;One of the reasons I like the Digistan definition of
1468 &quot;&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.digistan.org/open-standard:definition&quot;&gt;Free and
1469 Open Standard&lt;/a&gt;&quot; is that this is a new term, and thus the meaning of
1470 the term has been decided by Digistan. The term &quot;Open Standard&quot; has
1471 become so misunderstood that it is no longer very useful when talking
1472 about standards. One end up discussing which definition is the best
1473 one and with such frame the only one gaining are the proponents of
1474 de-facto standards and proprietary solutions.&lt;/p&gt;
1475
1476 &lt;p&gt;But to give us an idea about the diversity of definitions of open
1477 standards, here are a few that I know about. This list is not
1478 complete, but can be a starting point for those that want to do a
1479 complete survey. More definitions are available on the
1480 &lt;a href=&quot;http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_standard&quot;&gt;wikipedia
1481 page&lt;/a&gt;.&lt;/p&gt;
1482
1483 &lt;p&gt;First off is my favourite, the definition from the European
1484 Interoperability Framework version 1.0. Really sad to notice that BSA
1485 and others has succeeded in getting it removed from version 2.0 of the
1486 framework by stacking the committee drafting the new version with
1487 their own people. Anyway, the definition is still available and it
1488 include the key properties needed to make sure everyone can use a
1489 specification on equal terms.&lt;/p&gt;
1490
1491 &lt;blockquote&gt;
1492
1493 &lt;p&gt;The following are the minimal characteristics that a specification
1494 and its attendant documents must have in order to be considered an
1495 open standard:&lt;/p&gt;
1496
1497 &lt;ul&gt;
1498
1499 &lt;li&gt;The standard is adopted and will be maintained by a not-for-profit
1500 organisation, and its ongoing development occurs on the basis of an
1501 open decision-making procedure available to all interested parties
1502 (consensus or majority decision etc.).&lt;/li&gt;
1503
1504 &lt;li&gt;The standard has been published and the standard specification
1505 document is available either freely or at a nominal charge. It must be
1506 permissible to all to copy, distribute and use it for no fee or at a
1507 nominal fee.&lt;/li&gt;
1508
1509 &lt;li&gt;The intellectual property - i.e. patents possibly present - of
1510 (parts of) the standard is made irrevocably available on a royalty-
1511 free basis.&lt;/li&gt;
1512
1513 &lt;li&gt;There are no constraints on the re-use of the standard.&lt;/li&gt;
1514
1515 &lt;/ul&gt;
1516 &lt;/blockquote&gt;
1517
1518 &lt;p&gt;Another one originates from my friends over at
1519 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.dkuug.dk/&quot;&gt;DKUUG&lt;/a&gt;, who coined and gathered
1520 support for &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.aaben-standard.dk/&quot;&gt;this
1521 definition&lt;/a&gt; in 2004. It even made it into the Danish parlament as
1522 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.ft.dk/dokumenter/tingdok.aspx?/samling/20051/beslutningsforslag/B103/som_fremsat.htm&quot;&gt;their
1523 definition of a open standard&lt;/a&gt;. Another from a different part of
1524 the Danish government is available from the wikipedia page.&lt;/p&gt;
1525
1526 &lt;blockquote&gt;
1527
1528 &lt;p&gt;En åben standard opfylder følgende krav:&lt;/p&gt;
1529
1530 &lt;ol&gt;
1531
1532 &lt;li&gt;Veldokumenteret med den fuldstændige specifikation offentligt
1533 tilgængelig.&lt;/li&gt;
1534
1535 &lt;li&gt;Frit implementerbar uden økonomiske, politiske eller juridiske
1536 begrænsninger på implementation og anvendelse.&lt;/li&gt;
1537
1538 &lt;li&gt;Standardiseret og vedligeholdt i et åbent forum (en såkaldt
1539 &quot;standardiseringsorganisation&quot;) via en åben proces.&lt;/li&gt;
1540
1541 &lt;/ol&gt;
1542
1543 &lt;/blockquote&gt;
1544
1545 &lt;p&gt;Then there is &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.fsfe.org/projects/os/def.html&quot;&gt;the
1546 definition&lt;/a&gt; from Free Software Foundation Europe.&lt;/p&gt;
1547
1548 &lt;blockquote&gt;
1549
1550 &lt;p&gt;An Open Standard refers to a format or protocol that is&lt;/p&gt;
1551
1552 &lt;ol&gt;
1553
1554 &lt;li&gt;subject to full public assessment and use without constraints in a
1555 manner equally available to all parties;&lt;/li&gt;
1556
1557 &lt;li&gt;without any components or extensions that have dependencies on
1558 formats or protocols that do not meet the definition of an Open
1559 Standard themselves;&lt;/li&gt;
1560
1561 &lt;li&gt;free from legal or technical clauses that limit its utilisation by
1562 any party or in any business model;&lt;/li&gt;
1563
1564 &lt;li&gt;managed and further developed independently of any single vendor
1565 in a process open to the equal participation of competitors and third
1566 parties;&lt;/li&gt;
1567
1568 &lt;li&gt;available in multiple complete implementations by competing
1569 vendors, or as a complete implementation equally available to all
1570 parties.&lt;/li&gt;
1571
1572 &lt;/ol&gt;
1573
1574 &lt;/blockquote&gt;
1575
1576 &lt;p&gt;A long time ago, SUN Microsystems, now bought by Oracle, created
1577 its
1578 &lt;a href=&quot;http://blogs.sun.com/dennisding/resource/Open%20Standard%20Definition.pdf&quot;&gt;Open
1579 Standards Checklist&lt;/a&gt; with a fairly detailed description.&lt;/p&gt;
1580
1581 &lt;blockquote&gt;
1582 &lt;p&gt;Creation and Management of an Open Standard
1583
1584 &lt;ul&gt;
1585
1586 &lt;li&gt;Its development and management process must be collaborative and
1587 democratic:
1588
1589 &lt;ul&gt;
1590
1591 &lt;li&gt;Participation must be accessible to all those who wish to
1592 participate and can meet fair and reasonable criteria
1593 imposed by the organization under which it is developed
1594 and managed.&lt;/li&gt;
1595
1596 &lt;li&gt;The processes must be documented and, through a known
1597 method, can be changed through input from all
1598 participants.&lt;/li&gt;
1599
1600 &lt;li&gt;The process must be based on formal and binding commitments for
1601 the disclosure and licensing of intellectual property rights.&lt;/li&gt;
1602
1603 &lt;li&gt;Development and management should strive for consensus,
1604 and an appeals process must be clearly outlined.&lt;/li&gt;
1605
1606 &lt;li&gt;The standard specification must be open to extensive
1607 public review at least once in its life-cycle, with
1608 comments duly discussed and acted upon, if required.&lt;/li&gt;
1609
1610 &lt;/ul&gt;
1611
1612 &lt;/li&gt;
1613
1614 &lt;/ul&gt;
1615
1616 &lt;p&gt;Use and Licensing of an Open Standard&lt;/p&gt;
1617 &lt;ul&gt;
1618
1619 &lt;li&gt;The standard must describe an interface, not an implementation,
1620 and the industry must be capable of creating multiple, competing
1621 implementations to the interface described in the standard without
1622 undue or restrictive constraints. Interfaces include APIs,
1623 protocols, schemas, data formats and their encoding.&lt;/li&gt;
1624
1625 &lt;li&gt; The standard must not contain any proprietary &quot;hooks&quot; that create
1626 a technical or economic barriers&lt;/li&gt;
1627
1628 &lt;li&gt;Faithful implementations of the standard must
1629 interoperate. Interoperability means the ability of a computer
1630 program to communicate and exchange information with other computer
1631 programs and mutually to use the information which has been
1632 exchanged. This includes the ability to use, convert, or exchange
1633 file formats, protocols, schemas, interface information or
1634 conventions, so as to permit the computer program to work with other
1635 computer programs and users in all the ways in which they are
1636 intended to function.&lt;/li&gt;
1637
1638 &lt;li&gt;It must be permissible for anyone to copy, distribute and read the
1639 standard for a nominal fee, or even no fee. If there is a fee, it
1640 must be low enough to not preclude widespread use.&lt;/li&gt;
1641
1642 &lt;li&gt;It must be possible for anyone to obtain free (no royalties or
1643 fees; also known as &quot;royalty free&quot;), worldwide, non-exclusive and
1644 perpetual licenses to all essential patent claims to make, use and
1645 sell products based on the standard. The only exceptions are
1646 terminations per the reciprocity and defensive suspension terms
1647 outlined below. Essential patent claims include pending, unpublished
1648 patents, published patents, and patent applications. The license is
1649 only for the exact scope of the standard in question.
1650
1651 &lt;ul&gt;
1652
1653 &lt;li&gt; May be conditioned only on reciprocal licenses to any of
1654 licensees&#39; patent claims essential to practice that standard
1655 (also known as a reciprocity clause)&lt;/li&gt;
1656
1657 &lt;li&gt; May be terminated as to any licensee who sues the licensor
1658 or any other licensee for infringement of patent claims
1659 essential to practice that standard (also known as a
1660 &quot;defensive suspension&quot; clause)&lt;/li&gt;
1661
1662 &lt;li&gt; The same licensing terms are available to every potential
1663 licensor&lt;/li&gt;
1664
1665 &lt;/ul&gt;
1666 &lt;/li&gt;
1667
1668 &lt;li&gt;The licensing terms of an open standards must not preclude
1669 implementations of that standard under open source licensing terms
1670 or restricted licensing terms&lt;/li&gt;
1671
1672 &lt;/ul&gt;
1673
1674 &lt;/blockquote&gt;
1675
1676 &lt;p&gt;It is said that one of the nice things about standards is that
1677 there are so many of them. As you can see, the same holds true for
1678 open standard definitions. Most of the definitions have a lot in
1679 common, and it is not really controversial what properties a open
1680 standard should have, but the diversity of definitions have made it
1681 possible for those that want to avoid a level marked field and real
1682 competition to downplay the significance of open standards. I hope we
1683 can turn this tide by focusing on the advantages of Free and Open
1684 Standards.&lt;/p&gt;
1685 </description>
1686 </item>
1687
1688 <item>
1689 <title>Is Ogg Theora a free and open standard?</title>
1690 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Is_Ogg_Theora_a_free_and_open_standard_.html</link>
1691 <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Is_Ogg_Theora_a_free_and_open_standard_.html</guid>
1692 <pubDate>Sat, 25 Dec 2010 20:25:00 +0100</pubDate>
1693 <description>&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.digistan.org/open-standard:definition&quot;&gt;The
1694 Digistan definition&lt;/a&gt; of a free and open standard reads like this:&lt;/p&gt;
1695
1696 &lt;blockquote&gt;
1697
1698 &lt;p&gt;The Digital Standards Organization defines free and open standard
1699 as follows:&lt;/p&gt;
1700
1701 &lt;ol&gt;
1702
1703 &lt;li&gt;A free and open standard is immune to vendor capture at all stages
1704 in its life-cycle. Immunity from vendor capture makes it possible to
1705 freely use, improve upon, trust, and extend a standard over time.&lt;/li&gt;
1706
1707 &lt;li&gt;The standard is adopted and will be maintained by a not-for-profit
1708 organisation, and its ongoing development occurs on the basis of an
1709 open decision-making procedure available to all interested
1710 parties.&lt;/li&gt;
1711
1712 &lt;li&gt;The standard has been published and the standard specification
1713 document is available freely. It must be permissible to all to copy,
1714 distribute, and use it freely.&lt;/li&gt;
1715
1716 &lt;li&gt;The patents possibly present on (parts of) the standard are made
1717 irrevocably available on a royalty-free basis.&lt;/li&gt;
1718
1719 &lt;li&gt;There are no constraints on the re-use of the standard.&lt;/li&gt;
1720
1721 &lt;/ol&gt;
1722
1723 &lt;p&gt;The economic outcome of a free and open standard, which can be
1724 measured, is that it enables perfect competition between suppliers of
1725 products based on the standard.&lt;/p&gt;
1726 &lt;/blockquote&gt;
1727
1728 &lt;p&gt;For a while now I have tried to figure out of Ogg Theora is a free
1729 and open standard according to this definition. Here is a short
1730 writeup of what I have been able to gather so far. I brought up the
1731 topic on the Xiph advocacy mailing list
1732 &lt;a href=&quot;http://lists.xiph.org/pipermail/advocacy/2009-July/001632.html&quot;&gt;in
1733 July 2009&lt;/a&gt;, for those that want to see some background information.
1734 According to Ivo Emanuel Gonçalves and Monty Montgomery on that list
1735 the Ogg Theora specification fulfils the Digistan definition.&lt;/p&gt;
1736
1737 &lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Free from vendor capture?&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
1738
1739 &lt;p&gt;As far as I can see, there is no single vendor that can control the
1740 Ogg Theora specification. It can be argued that the
1741 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.xiph.org/&quot;&gt;Xiph foundation&lt;/A&gt; is such vendor, but
1742 given that it is a non-profit foundation with the expressed goal
1743 making free and open protocols and standards available, it is not
1744 obvious that this is a real risk. One issue with the Xiph
1745 foundation is that its inner working (as in board member list, or who
1746 control the foundation) are not easily available on the web. I&#39;ve
1747 been unable to find out who is in the foundation board, and have not
1748 seen any accounting information documenting how money is handled nor
1749 where is is spent in the foundation. It is thus not obvious for an
1750 external observer who control The Xiph foundation, and for all I know
1751 it is possible for a single vendor to take control over the
1752 specification. But it seem unlikely.&lt;/p&gt;
1753
1754 &lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Maintained by open not-for-profit organisation?&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
1755
1756 &lt;p&gt;Assuming that the Xiph foundation is the organisation its web pages
1757 claim it to be, this point is fulfilled. If Xiph foundation is
1758 controlled by a single vendor, it isn&#39;t, but I have not found any
1759 documentation indicating this.&lt;/p&gt;
1760
1761 &lt;p&gt;According to
1762 &lt;a href=&quot;http://media.hiof.no/diverse/fad/rapport_4.pdf&quot;&gt;a report&lt;/a&gt;
1763 prepared by Audun Vaaler og Børre Ludvigsen for the Norwegian
1764 government, the Xiph foundation is a non-commercial organisation and
1765 the development process is open, transparent and non-Discrimatory.
1766 Until proven otherwise, I believe it make most sense to believe the
1767 report is correct.&lt;/p&gt;
1768
1769 &lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Specification freely available?&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
1770
1771 &lt;p&gt;The specification for the &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.xiph.org/ogg/doc/&quot;&gt;Ogg
1772 container format&lt;/a&gt; and both the
1773 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.xiph.org/vorbis/doc/&quot;&gt;Vorbis&lt;/a&gt; and
1774 &lt;a href=&quot;http://theora.org/doc/&quot;&gt;Theora&lt;/a&gt; codeces are available on
1775 the web. This are the terms in the Vorbis and Theora specification:
1776
1777 &lt;blockquote&gt;
1778
1779 Anyone may freely use and distribute the Ogg and [Vorbis/Theora]
1780 specifications, whether in private, public, or corporate
1781 capacity. However, the Xiph.Org Foundation and the Ogg project reserve
1782 the right to set the Ogg [Vorbis/Theora] specification and certify
1783 specification compliance.
1784
1785 &lt;/blockquote&gt;
1786
1787 &lt;p&gt;The Ogg container format is specified in IETF
1788 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.xiph.org/ogg/doc/rfc3533.txt&quot;&gt;RFC 3533&lt;/a&gt;, and
1789 this is the term:&lt;p&gt;
1790
1791 &lt;blockquote&gt;
1792
1793 &lt;p&gt;This document and translations of it may be copied and furnished to
1794 others, and derivative works that comment on or otherwise explain it
1795 or assist in its implementation may be prepared, copied, published and
1796 distributed, in whole or in part, without restriction of any kind,
1797 provided that the above copyright notice and this paragraph are
1798 included on all such copies and derivative works. However, this
1799 document itself may not be modified in any way, such as by removing
1800 the copyright notice or references to the Internet Society or other
1801 Internet organizations, except as needed for the purpose of developing
1802 Internet standards in which case the procedures for copyrights defined
1803 in the Internet Standards process must be followed, or as required to
1804 translate it into languages other than English.&lt;/p&gt;
1805
1806 &lt;p&gt;The limited permissions granted above are perpetual and will not be
1807 revoked by the Internet Society or its successors or assigns.&lt;/p&gt;
1808 &lt;/blockquote&gt;
1809
1810 &lt;p&gt;All these terms seem to allow unlimited distribution and use, an
1811 this term seem to be fulfilled. There might be a problem with the
1812 missing permission to distribute modified versions of the text, and
1813 thus reuse it in other specifications. Not quite sure if that is a
1814 requirement for the Digistan definition.&lt;/p&gt;
1815
1816 &lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Royalty-free?&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
1817
1818 &lt;p&gt;There are no known patent claims requiring royalties for the Ogg
1819 Theora format.
1820 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.streamingmedia.com/Articles/ReadArticle.aspx?ArticleID=65782&quot;&gt;MPEG-LA&lt;/a&gt;
1821 and
1822 &lt;a href=&quot;http://yro.slashdot.org/story/10/04/30/237238/Steve-Jobs-Hints-At-Theora-Lawsuit&quot;&gt;Steve
1823 Jobs&lt;/a&gt; in Apple claim to know about some patent claims (submarine
1824 patents) against the Theora format, but no-one else seem to believe
1825 them. Both Opera Software and the Mozilla Foundation have looked into
1826 this and decided to implement Ogg Theora support in their browsers
1827 without paying any royalties. For now the claims from MPEG-LA and
1828 Steve Jobs seem more like FUD to scare people to use the H.264 codec
1829 than any real problem with Ogg Theora.&lt;/p&gt;
1830
1831 &lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;No constraints on re-use?&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
1832
1833 &lt;p&gt;I am not aware of any constraints on re-use.&lt;/p&gt;
1834
1835 &lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Conclusion&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
1836
1837 &lt;p&gt;3 of 5 requirements seem obviously fulfilled, and the remaining 2
1838 depend on the governing structure of the Xiph foundation. Given the
1839 background report used by the Norwegian government, I believe it is
1840 safe to assume the last two requirements are fulfilled too, but it
1841 would be nice if the Xiph foundation web site made it easier to verify
1842 this.&lt;/p&gt;
1843
1844 &lt;p&gt;It would be nice to see other analysis of other specifications to
1845 see if they are free and open standards.&lt;/p&gt;
1846 </description>
1847 </item>
1848
1849 <item>
1850 <title>The reply from Edgar Villanueva to Microsoft in Peru</title>
1851 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_reply_from_Edgar_Villanueva_to_Microsoft_in_Peru.html</link>
1852 <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_reply_from_Edgar_Villanueva_to_Microsoft_in_Peru.html</guid>
1853 <pubDate>Sat, 25 Dec 2010 10:50:00 +0100</pubDate>
1854 <description>&lt;p&gt;A few days ago
1855 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.idg.no/computerworld/article189879.ece&quot;&gt;an
1856 article&lt;/a&gt; in the Norwegian Computerworld magazine about how version
1857 2.0 of
1858 &lt;a href=&quot;http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Interoperability_Framework&quot;&gt;European
1859 Interoperability Framework&lt;/a&gt; has been successfully lobbied by the
1860 proprietary software industry to remove the focus on free software.
1861 Nothing very surprising there, given
1862 &lt;a href=&quot;http://news.slashdot.org/story/10/03/29/2115235/Open-Source-Open-Standards-Under-Attack-In-Europe&quot;&gt;earlier
1863 reports&lt;/a&gt; on how Microsoft and others have stacked the committees in
1864 this work. But I find this very sad. The definition of
1865 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.nuug.no/dokumenter/standard-presse-def-200506.txt&quot;&gt;an
1866 open standard from version 1&lt;/a&gt; was very good, and something I
1867 believe should be used also in the future, alongside
1868 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.digistan.org/open-standard:definition&quot;&gt;the
1869 definition from Digistan&lt;/A&gt;. Version 2 have removed the open
1870 standard definition from its content.&lt;/p&gt;
1871
1872 &lt;p&gt;Anyway, the news reminded me of the great reply sent by Dr. Edgar
1873 Villanueva, congressman in Peru at the time, to Microsoft as a reply
1874 to Microsofts attack on his proposal regarding the use of free software
1875 in the public sector in Peru. As the text was not available from a
1876 few of the URLs where it used to be available, I copy it here from
1877 &lt;a href=&quot;http://gnuwin.epfl.ch/articles/en/reponseperou/villanueva_to_ms.html&quot;&gt;my
1878 source&lt;/a&gt; to ensure it is available also in the future. Some
1879 background information about that story is available in
1880 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.linuxjournal.com/article/6099&quot;&gt;an article&lt;/a&gt; from
1881 Linux Journal in 2002.&lt;/p&gt;
1882
1883 &lt;blockquote&gt;
1884 &lt;p&gt;Lima, 8th of April, 2002&lt;br&gt;
1885 To: Señor JUAN ALBERTO GONZÁLEZ&lt;br&gt;
1886 General Manager of Microsoft Perú&lt;/p&gt;
1887
1888 &lt;p&gt;Dear Sir:&lt;/p&gt;
1889
1890 &lt;p&gt;First of all, I thank you for your letter of March 25, 2002 in which you state the official position of Microsoft relative to Bill Number 1609, Free Software in Public Administration, which is indubitably inspired by the desire for Peru to find a suitable place in the global technological context. In the same spirit, and convinced that we will find the best solutions through an exchange of clear and open ideas, I will take this opportunity to reply to the commentaries included in your letter.&lt;/p&gt;
1891
1892 &lt;p&gt;While acknowledging that opinions such as yours constitute a significant contribution, it would have been even more worthwhile for me if, rather than formulating objections of a general nature (which we will analyze in detail later) you had gathered solid arguments for the advantages that proprietary software could bring to the Peruvian State, and to its citizens in general, since this would have allowed a more enlightening exchange in respect of each of our positions.&lt;/p&gt;
1893
1894 &lt;p&gt;With the aim of creating an orderly debate, we will assume that what you call &quot;open source software&quot; is what the Bill defines as &quot;free software&quot;, since there exists software for which the source code is distributed together with the program, but which does not fall within the definition established by the Bill; and that what you call &quot;commercial software&quot; is what the Bill defines as &quot;proprietary&quot; or &quot;unfree&quot;, given that there exists free software which is sold in the market for a price like any other good or service.&lt;/p&gt;
1895
1896 &lt;p&gt;It is also necessary to make it clear that the aim of the Bill we are discussing is not directly related to the amount of direct savings that can by made by using free software in state institutions. That is in any case a marginal aggregate value, but in no way is it the chief focus of the Bill. The basic principles which inspire the Bill are linked to the basic guarantees of a state of law, such as:&lt;/p&gt;
1897
1898 &lt;p&gt;
1899 &lt;ul&gt;
1900 &lt;li&gt;Free access to public information by the citizen. &lt;/li&gt;
1901 &lt;li&gt;Permanence of public data. &lt;/li&gt;
1902 &lt;li&gt;Security of the State and citizens.&lt;/li&gt;
1903 &lt;/ul&gt;
1904 &lt;/p&gt;
1905
1906 &lt;p&gt;To guarantee the free access of citizens to public information, it is indispensable that the encoding of data is not tied to a single provider. The use of standard and open formats gives a guarantee of this free access, if necessary through the creation of compatible free software.&lt;/p&gt;
1907
1908 &lt;p&gt;To guarantee the permanence of public data, it is necessary that the usability and maintenance of the software does not depend on the goodwill of the suppliers, or on the monopoly conditions imposed by them. For this reason the State needs systems the development of which can be guaranteed due to the availability of the source code.&lt;/p&gt;
1909
1910 &lt;p&gt;To guarantee national security or the security of the State, it is indispensable to be able to rely on systems without elements which allow control from a distance or the undesired transmission of information to third parties. Systems with source code freely accessible to the public are required to allow their inspection by the State itself, by the citizens, and by a large number of independent experts throughout the world. Our proposal brings further security, since the knowledge of the source code will eliminate the growing number of programs with *spy code*. &lt;/p&gt;
1911
1912 &lt;p&gt;In the same way, our proposal strengthens the security of the citizens, both in their role as legitimate owners of information managed by the state, and in their role as consumers. In this second case, by allowing the growth of a widespread availability of free software not containing *spy code* able to put at risk privacy and individual freedoms.&lt;/p&gt;
1913
1914 &lt;p&gt;In this sense, the Bill is limited to establishing the conditions under which the state bodies will obtain software in the future, that is, in a way compatible with these basic principles.&lt;/p&gt;
1915
1916
1917 &lt;p&gt;From reading the Bill it will be clear that once passed:&lt;br&gt;
1918 &lt;li&gt;the law does not forbid the production of proprietary software&lt;/li&gt;
1919 &lt;li&gt;the law does not forbid the sale of proprietary software&lt;/li&gt;
1920 &lt;li&gt;the law does not specify which concrete software to use&lt;/li&gt;
1921 &lt;li&gt;the law does not dictate the supplier from whom software will be bought&lt;/li&gt;
1922 &lt;li&gt;the law does not limit the terms under which a software product can be licensed.&lt;/li&gt;
1923
1924 &lt;/p&gt;
1925
1926 &lt;p&gt;What the Bill does express clearly, is that, for software to be acceptable for the state it is not enough that it is technically capable of fulfilling a task, but that further the contractual conditions must satisfy a series of requirements regarding the license, without which the State cannot guarantee the citizen adequate processing of his data, watching over its integrity, confidentiality, and accessibility throughout time, as these are very critical aspects for its normal functioning.&lt;/p&gt;
1927
1928 &lt;p&gt;We agree, Mr. Gonzalez, that information and communication technology have a significant impact on the quality of life of the citizens (whether it be positive or negative). We surely also agree that the basic values I have pointed out above are fundamental in a democratic state like Peru. So we are very interested to know of any other way of guaranteeing these principles, other than through the use of free software in the terms defined by the Bill.&lt;/p&gt;
1929
1930 &lt;p&gt;As for the observations you have made, we will now go on to analyze them in detail:&lt;/p&gt;
1931
1932 &lt;p&gt;Firstly, you point out that: &quot;1. The bill makes it compulsory for all public bodies to use only free software, that is to say open source software, which breaches the principles of equality before the law, that of non-discrimination and the right of free private enterprise, freedom of industry and of contract, protected by the constitution.&quot;&lt;/p&gt;
1933
1934 &lt;p&gt;This understanding is in error. The Bill in no way affects the rights you list; it limits itself entirely to establishing conditions for the use of software on the part of state institutions, without in any way meddling in private sector transactions. It is a well established principle that the State does not enjoy the wide spectrum of contractual freedom of the private sector, as it is limited in its actions precisely by the requirement for transparency of public acts; and in this sense, the preservation of the greater common interest must prevail when legislating on the matter.&lt;/p&gt;
1935
1936 &lt;p&gt;The Bill protects equality under the law, since no natural or legal person is excluded from the right of offering these goods to the State under the conditions defined in the Bill and without more limitations than those established by the Law of State Contracts and Purchasing (T.U.O. by Supreme Decree No. 012-2001-PCM).&lt;/p&gt;
1937
1938 &lt;p&gt;The Bill does not introduce any discrimination whatever, since it only establishes *how* the goods have to be provided (which is a state power) and not *who* has to provide them (which would effectively be discriminatory, if restrictions based on national origin, race religion, ideology, sexual preference etc. were imposed). On the contrary, the Bill is decidedly antidiscriminatory. This is so because by defining with no room for doubt the conditions for the provision of software, it prevents state bodies from using software which has a license including discriminatory conditions.&lt;/p&gt;
1939
1940 &lt;p&gt;It should be obvious from the preceding two paragraphs that the Bill does not harm free private enterprise, since the latter can always choose under what conditions it will produce software; some of these will be acceptable to the State, and others will not be since they contradict the guarantee of the basic principles listed above. This free initiative is of course compatible with the freedom of industry and freedom of contract (in the limited form in which the State can exercise the latter). Any private subject can produce software under the conditions which the State requires, or can refrain from doing so. Nobody is forced to adopt a model of production, but if they wish to provide software to the State, they must provide the mechanisms which guarantee the basic principles, and which are those described in the Bill.&lt;/p&gt;
1941
1942 &lt;p&gt;By way of an example: nothing in the text of the Bill would prevent your company offering the State bodies an office &quot;suite&quot;, under the conditions defined in the Bill and setting the price that you consider satisfactory. If you did not, it would not be due to restrictions imposed by the law, but to business decisions relative to the method of commercializing your products, decisions with which the State is not involved.&lt;/p&gt;
1943
1944 &lt;p&gt;To continue; you note that:&quot; 2. The bill, by making the use of open source software compulsory, would establish discriminatory and non competitive practices in the contracting and purchasing by public bodies...&quot;&lt;/p&gt;
1945
1946 &lt;p&gt;This statement is just a reiteration of the previous one, and so the response can be found above. However, let us concern ourselves for a moment with your comment regarding &quot;non-competitive ... practices.&quot;&lt;/p&gt;
1947
1948 &lt;p&gt;Of course, in defining any kind of purchase, the buyer sets conditions which relate to the proposed use of the good or service. From the start, this excludes certain manufacturers from the possibility of competing, but does not exclude them &quot;a priori&quot;, but rather based on a series of principles determined by the autonomous will of the purchaser, and so the process takes place in conformance with the law. And in the Bill it is established that *no one* is excluded from competing as far as he guarantees the fulfillment of the basic principles.&lt;/p&gt;
1949
1950 &lt;p&gt;Furthermore, the Bill *stimulates* competition, since it tends to generate a supply of software with better conditions of usability, and to better existing work, in a model of continuous improvement.&lt;/p&gt;
1951
1952 &lt;p&gt;On the other hand, the central aspect of competivity is the chance to provide better choices to the consumer. Now, it is impossible to ignore the fact that marketing does not play a neutral role when the product is offered on the market (since accepting the opposite would lead one to suppose that firms&#39; expenses in marketing lack any sense), and that therefore a significant expense under this heading can influence the decisions of the purchaser. This influence of marketing is in large measure reduced by the bill that we are backing, since the choice within the framework proposed is based on the *technical merits* of the product and not on the effort put into commercialization by the producer; in this sense, competitiveness is increased, since the smallest software producer can compete on equal terms with the most powerful corporations.&lt;/p&gt;
1953
1954 &lt;p&gt;It is necessary to stress that there is no position more anti-competitive than that of the big software producers, which frequently abuse their dominant position, since in innumerable cases they propose as a solution to problems raised by users: &quot;update your software to the new version&quot; (at the user&#39;s expense, naturally); furthermore, it is common to find arbitrary cessation of technical help for products, which, in the provider&#39;s judgment alone, are &quot;old&quot;; and so, to receive any kind of technical assistance, the user finds himself forced to migrate to new versions (with non-trivial costs, especially as changes in hardware platform are often involved). And as the whole infrastructure is based on proprietary data formats, the user stays &quot;trapped&quot; in the need to continue using products from the same supplier, or to make the huge effort to change to another environment (probably also proprietary).&lt;/p&gt;
1955
1956 &lt;p&gt;You add: &quot;3. So, by compelling the State to favor a business model based entirely on open source, the bill would only discourage the local and international manufacturing companies, which are the ones which really undertake important expenditures, create a significant number of direct and indirect jobs, as well as contributing to the GNP, as opposed to a model of open source software which tends to have an ever weaker economic impact, since it mainly creates jobs in the service sector.&quot;&lt;/p&gt;
1957
1958 &lt;p&gt;I do not agree with your statement. Partly because of what you yourself point out in paragraph 6 of your letter, regarding the relative weight of services in the context of software use. This contradiction alone would invalidate your position. The service model, adopted by a large number of companies in the software industry, is much larger in economic terms, and with a tendency to increase, than the licensing of programs.&lt;/p&gt;
1959
1960 &lt;p&gt;On the other hand, the private sector of the economy has the widest possible freedom to choose the economic model which best suits its interests, even if this freedom of choice is often obscured subliminally by the disproportionate expenditure on marketing by the producers of proprietary software.&lt;/p&gt;
1961
1962 &lt;p&gt;In addition, a reading of your opinion would lead to the conclusion that the State market is crucial and essential for the proprietary software industry, to such a point that the choice made by the State in this bill would completely eliminate the market for these firms. If that is true, we can deduce that the State must be subsidizing the proprietary software industry. In the unlikely event that this were true, the State would have the right to apply the subsidies in the area it considered of greatest social value; it is undeniable, in this improbable hypothesis, that if the State decided to subsidize software, it would have to do so choosing the free over the proprietary, considering its social effect and the rational use of taxpayers money.&lt;/p&gt;
1963
1964 &lt;p&gt;In respect of the jobs generated by proprietary software in countries like ours, these mainly concern technical tasks of little aggregate value; at the local level, the technicians who provide support for proprietary software produced by transnational companies do not have the possibility of fixing bugs, not necessarily for lack of technical capability or of talent, but because they do not have access to the source code to fix it. With free software one creates more technically qualified employment and a framework of free competence where success is only tied to the ability to offer good technical support and quality of service, one stimulates the market, and one increases the shared fund of knowledge, opening up alternatives to generate services of greater total value and a higher quality level, to the benefit of all involved: producers, service organizations, and consumers.&lt;/p&gt;
1965
1966 &lt;p&gt;It is a common phenomenon in developing countries that local software industries obtain the majority of their takings in the service sector, or in the creation of &quot;ad hoc&quot; software. Therefore, any negative impact that the application of the Bill might have in this sector will be more than compensated by a growth in demand for services (as long as these are carried out to high quality standards). If the transnational software companies decide not to compete under these new rules of the game, it is likely that they will undergo some decrease in takings in terms of payment for licenses; however, considering that these firms continue to allege that much of the software used by the State has been illegally copied, one can see that the impact will not be very serious. Certainly, in any case their fortune will be determined by market laws, changes in which cannot be avoided; many firms traditionally associated with proprietary software have already set out on the road (supported by copious expense) of providing services associated with free software, which shows that the models are not mutually exclusive.&lt;/p&gt;
1967
1968 &lt;p&gt;With this bill the State is deciding that it needs to preserve certain fundamental values. And it is deciding this based on its sovereign power, without affecting any of the constitutional guarantees. If these values could be guaranteed without having to choose a particular economic model, the effects of the law would be even more beneficial. In any case, it should be clear that the State does not choose an economic model; if it happens that there only exists one economic model capable of providing software which provides the basic guarantee of these principles, this is because of historical circumstances, not because of an arbitrary choice of a given model.&lt;/p&gt;
1969
1970 &lt;p&gt;Your letter continues: &quot;4. The bill imposes the use of open source software without considering the dangers that this can bring from the point of view of security, guarantee, and possible violation of the intellectual property rights of third parties.&quot;&lt;/p&gt;
1971
1972 &lt;p&gt;Alluding in an abstract way to &quot;the dangers this can bring&quot;, without specifically mentioning a single one of these supposed dangers, shows at the least some lack of knowledge of the topic. So, allow me to enlighten you on these points.&lt;/p&gt;
1973
1974 &lt;p&gt;On security:&lt;/p&gt;
1975
1976 &lt;p&gt;National security has already been mentioned in general terms in the initial discussion of the basic principles of the bill. In more specific terms, relative to the security of the software itself, it is well known that all software (whether proprietary or free) contains errors or &quot;bugs&quot; (in programmers&#39; slang). But it is also well known that the bugs in free software are fewer, and are fixed much more quickly, than in proprietary software. It is not in vain that numerous public bodies responsible for the IT security of state systems in developed countries require the use of free software for the same conditions of security and efficiency.&lt;/p&gt;
1977
1978 &lt;p&gt;What is impossible to prove is that proprietary software is more secure than free, without the public and open inspection of the scientific community and users in general. This demonstration is impossible because the model of proprietary software itself prevents this analysis, so that any guarantee of security is based only on promises of good intentions (biased, by any reckoning) made by the producer itself, or its contractors.&lt;/p&gt;
1979
1980 &lt;p&gt;It should be remembered that in many cases, the licensing conditions include Non-Disclosure clauses which prevent the user from publicly revealing security flaws found in the licensed proprietary product.&lt;/p&gt;
1981
1982 &lt;p&gt;In respect of the guarantee:&lt;/p&gt;
1983
1984 &lt;p&gt;As you know perfectly well, or could find out by reading the &quot;End User License Agreement&quot; of the products you license, in the great majority of cases the guarantees are limited to replacement of the storage medium in case of defects, but in no case is compensation given for direct or indirect damages, loss of profits, etc... If as a result of a security bug in one of your products, not fixed in time by yourselves, an attacker managed to compromise crucial State systems, what guarantees, reparations and compensation would your company make in accordance with your licensing conditions? The guarantees of proprietary software, inasmuch as programs are delivered ``AS IS&#39;&#39;, that is, in the state in which they are, with no additional responsibility of the provider in respect of function, in no way differ from those normal with free software.&lt;/p&gt;
1985
1986 &lt;p&gt;On Intellectual Property:&lt;/p&gt;
1987
1988 &lt;p&gt;Questions of intellectual property fall outside the scope of this bill, since they are covered by specific other laws. The model of free software in no way implies ignorance of these laws, and in fact the great majority of free software is covered by copyright. In reality, the inclusion of this question in your observations shows your confusion in respect of the legal framework in which free software is developed. The inclusion of the intellectual property of others in works claimed as one&#39;s own is not a practice that has been noted in the free software community; whereas, unfortunately, it has been in the area of proprietary software. As an example, the condemnation by the Commercial Court of Nanterre, France, on 27th September 2001 of Microsoft Corp. to a penalty of 3 million francs in damages and interest, for violation of intellectual property (piracy, to use the unfortunate term that your firm commonly uses in its publicity).&lt;/p&gt;
1989
1990 &lt;p&gt;You go on to say that: &quot;The bill uses the concept of open source software incorrectly, since it does not necessarily imply that the software is free or of zero cost, and so arrives at mistaken conclusions regarding State savings, with no cost-benefit analysis to validate its position.&quot;&lt;/p&gt;
1991
1992 &lt;p&gt;This observation is wrong; in principle, freedom and lack of cost are orthogonal concepts: there is software which is proprietary and charged for (for example, MS Office), software which is proprietary and free of charge (MS Internet Explorer), software which is free and charged for (Red Hat, SuSE etc GNU/Linux distributions), software which is free and not charged for (Apache, Open Office, Mozilla), and even software which can be licensed in a range of combinations (MySQL).&lt;/p&gt;
1993
1994 &lt;p&gt;Certainly free software is not necessarily free of charge. And the text of the bill does not state that it has to be so, as you will have noted after reading it. The definitions included in the Bill state clearly *what* should be considered free software, at no point referring to freedom from charges. Although the possibility of savings in payments for proprietary software licenses are mentioned, the foundations of the bill clearly refer to the fundamental guarantees to be preserved and to the stimulus to local technological development. Given that a democratic State must support these principles, it has no other choice than to use software with publicly available source code, and to exchange information only in standard formats.&lt;/p&gt;
1995
1996 &lt;p&gt;If the State does not use software with these characteristics, it will be weakening basic republican principles. Luckily, free software also implies lower total costs; however, even given the hypothesis (easily disproved) that it was more expensive than proprietary software, the simple existence of an effective free software tool for a particular IT function would oblige the State to use it; not by command of this Bill, but because of the basic principles we enumerated at the start, and which arise from the very essence of the lawful democratic State.&lt;/p&gt;
1997
1998 &lt;p&gt;You continue: &quot;6. It is wrong to think that Open Source Software is free of charge. Research by the Gartner Group (an important investigator of the technological market recognized at world level) has shown that the cost of purchase of software (operating system and applications) is only 8% of the total cost which firms and institutions take on for a rational and truly beneficial use of the technology. The other 92% consists of: installation costs, enabling, support, maintenance, administration, and down-time.&quot;&lt;/p&gt;
1999
2000 &lt;p&gt;This argument repeats that already given in paragraph 5 and partly contradicts paragraph 3. For the sake of brevity we refer to the comments on those paragraphs. However, allow me to point out that your conclusion is logically false: even if according to Gartner Group the cost of software is on average only 8% of the total cost of use, this does not in any way deny the existence of software which is free of charge, that is, with a licensing cost of zero.&lt;/p&gt;
2001
2002 &lt;p&gt;In addition, in this paragraph you correctly point out that the service components and losses due to down-time make up the largest part of the total cost of software use, which, as you will note, contradicts your statement regarding the small value of services suggested in paragraph 3. Now the use of free software contributes significantly to reduce the remaining life-cycle costs. This reduction in the costs of installation, support etc. can be noted in several areas: in the first place, the competitive service model of free software, support and maintenance for which can be freely contracted out to a range of suppliers competing on the grounds of quality and low cost. This is true for installation, enabling, and support, and in large part for maintenance. In the second place, due to the reproductive characteristics of the model, maintenance carried out for an application is easily replicable, without incurring large costs (that is, without paying more than once for the same thing) since modifications, if one wishes, can be incorporated in the common fund of knowledge. Thirdly, the huge costs caused by non-functioning software (&quot;blue screens of death&quot;, malicious code such as virus, worms, and trojans, exceptions, general protection faults and other well-known problems) are reduced considerably by using more stable software; and it is well known that one of the most notable virtues of free software is its stability.&lt;/p&gt;
2003
2004 &lt;p&gt;You further state that: &quot;7. One of the arguments behind the bill is the supposed freedom from costs of open-source software, compared with the costs of commercial software, without taking into account the fact that there exist types of volume licensing which can be highly advantageous for the State, as has happened in other countries.&quot;&lt;/p&gt;
2005
2006 &lt;p&gt;I have already pointed out that what is in question is not the cost of the software but the principles of freedom of information, accessibility, and security. These arguments have been covered extensively in the preceding paragraphs to which I would refer you.&lt;/p&gt;
2007
2008 &lt;p&gt;On the other hand, there certainly exist types of volume licensing (although unfortunately proprietary software does not satisfy the basic principles). But as you correctly pointed out in the immediately preceding paragraph of your letter, they only manage to reduce the impact of a component which makes up no more than 8% of the total.&lt;/p&gt;
2009
2010 &lt;p&gt;You continue: &quot;8. In addition, the alternative adopted by the bill (I) is clearly more expensive, due to the high costs of software migration, and (II) puts at risk compatibility and interoperability of the IT platforms within the State, and between the State and the private sector, given the hundreds of versions of open source software on the market.&quot;&lt;/p&gt;
2011
2012 &lt;p&gt;Let us analyze your statement in two parts. Your first argument, that migration implies high costs, is in reality an argument in favor of the Bill. Because the more time goes by, the more difficult migration to another technology will become; and at the same time, the security risks associated with proprietary software will continue to increase. In this way, the use of proprietary systems and formats will make the State ever more dependent on specific suppliers. Once a policy of using free software has been established (which certainly, does imply some cost) then on the contrary migration from one system to another becomes very simple, since all data is stored in open formats. On the other hand, migration to an open software context implies no more costs than migration between two different proprietary software contexts, which invalidates your argument completely.&lt;/p&gt;
2013
2014 &lt;p&gt;The second argument refers to &quot;problems in interoperability of the IT platforms within the State, and between the State and the private sector&quot; This statement implies a certain lack of knowledge of the way in which free software is built, which does not maximize the dependence of the user on a particular platform, as normally happens in the realm of proprietary software. Even when there are multiple free software distributions, and numerous programs which can be used for the same function, interoperability is guaranteed as much by the use of standard formats, as required by the bill, as by the possibility of creating interoperable software given the availability of the source code.&lt;/p&gt;
2015
2016 &lt;p&gt;You then say that: &quot;9. The majority of open source code does not offer adequate levels of service nor the guarantee from recognized manufacturers of high productivity on the part of the users, which has led various public organizations to retract their decision to go with an open source software solution and to use commercial software in its place.&quot;&lt;/p&gt;
2017
2018 &lt;p&gt;This observation is without foundation. In respect of the guarantee, your argument was rebutted in the response to paragraph 4. In respect of support services, it is possible to use free software without them (just as also happens with proprietary software), but anyone who does need them can obtain support separately, whether from local firms or from international corporations, again just as in the case of proprietary software.&lt;/p&gt;
2019
2020 &lt;p&gt;On the other hand, it would contribute greatly to our analysis if you could inform us about free software projects *established* in public bodies which have already been abandoned in favor of proprietary software. We know of a good number of cases where the opposite has taken place, but not know of any where what you describe has taken place.&lt;/p&gt;
2021
2022 &lt;p&gt;You continue by observing that: &quot;10. The bill discourages the creativity of the Peruvian software industry, which invoices 40 million US$/year, exports 4 million US$ (10th in ranking among non-traditional exports, more than handicrafts) and is a source of highly qualified employment. With a law that encourages the use of open source, software programmers lose their intellectual property rights and their main source of payment.&quot;&lt;/p&gt;
2023
2024 &lt;p&gt;It is clear enough that nobody is forced to commercialize their code as free software. The only thing to take into account is that if it is not free software, it cannot be sold to the public sector. This is not in any case the main market for the national software industry. We covered some questions referring to the influence of the Bill on the generation of employment which would be both highly technically qualified and in better conditions for competition above, so it seems unnecessary to insist on this point.&lt;/p&gt;
2025
2026 &lt;p&gt;What follows in your statement is incorrect. On the one hand, no author of free software loses his intellectual property rights, unless he expressly wishes to place his work in the public domain. The free software movement has always been very respectful of intellectual property, and has generated widespread public recognition of its authors. Names like those of Richard Stallman, Linus Torvalds, Guido van Rossum, Larry Wall, Miguel de Icaza, Andrew Tridgell, Theo de Raadt, Andrea Arcangeli, Bruce Perens, Darren Reed, Alan Cox, Eric Raymond, and many others, are recognized world-wide for their contributions to the development of software that is used today by millions of people throughout the world. On the other hand, to say that the rewards for authors rights make up the main source of payment of Peruvian programmers is in any case a guess, in particular since there is no proof to this effect, nor a demonstration of how the use of free software by the State would influence these payments.&lt;/p&gt;
2027
2028 &lt;p&gt;You go on to say that: &quot;11. Open source software, since it can be distributed without charge, does not allow the generation of income for its developers through exports. In this way, the multiplier effect of the sale of software to other countries is weakened, and so in turn is the growth of the industry, while Government rules ought on the contrary to stimulate local industry.&quot;&lt;/p&gt;
2029
2030 &lt;p&gt;This statement shows once again complete ignorance of the mechanisms of and market for free software. It tries to claim that the market of sale of non- exclusive rights for use (sale of licenses) is the only possible one for the software industry, when you yourself pointed out several paragraphs above that it is not even the most important one. The incentives that the bill offers for the growth of a supply of better qualified professionals, together with the increase in experience that working on a large scale with free software within the State will bring for Peruvian technicians, will place them in a highly competitive position to offer their services abroad.&lt;/p&gt;
2031
2032 &lt;p&gt;You then state that: &quot;12. In the Forum, the use of open source software in education was discussed, without mentioning the complete collapse of this initiative in a country like Mexico, where precisely the State employees who founded the project now state that open source software did not make it possible to offer a learning experience to pupils in the schools, did not take into account the capability at a national level to give adequate support to the platform, and that the software did not and does not allow for the levels of platform integration that now exist in schools.&quot;&lt;/p&gt;
2033
2034 &lt;p&gt;In fact Mexico has gone into reverse with the Red Escolar (Schools Network) project. This is due precisely to the fact that the driving forces behind the Mexican project used license costs as their main argument, instead of the other reasons specified in our project, which are far more essential. Because of this conceptual mistake, and as a result of the lack of effective support from the SEP (Secretary of State for Public Education), the assumption was made that to implant free software in schools it would be enough to drop their software budget and send them a CD ROM with Gnu/Linux instead. Of course this failed, and it couldn&#39;t have been otherwise, just as school laboratories fail when they use proprietary software and have no budget for implementation and maintenance. That&#39;s exactly why our bill is not limited to making the use of free software mandatory, but recognizes the need to create a viable migration plan, in which the State undertakes the technical transition in an orderly way in order to then enjoy the advantages of free software.&lt;/p&gt;
2035
2036 &lt;p&gt;You end with a rhetorical question: &quot;13. If open source software satisfies all the requirements of State bodies, why do you need a law to adopt it? Shouldn&#39;t it be the market which decides freely which products give most benefits or value?&quot;&lt;/p&gt;
2037
2038 &lt;p&gt;We agree that in the private sector of the economy, it must be the market that decides which products to use, and no state interference is permissible there. However, in the case of the public sector, the reasoning is not the same: as we have already established, the state archives, handles, and transmits information which does not belong to it, but which is entrusted to it by citizens, who have no alternative under the rule of law. As a counterpart to this legal requirement, the State must take extreme measures to safeguard the integrity, confidentiality, and accessibility of this information. The use of proprietary software raises serious doubts as to whether these requirements can be fulfilled, lacks conclusive evidence in this respect, and so is not suitable for use in the public sector.&lt;/p&gt;
2039
2040 &lt;p&gt;The need for a law is based, firstly, on the realization of the fundamental principles listed above in the specific area of software; secondly, on the fact that the State is not an ideal homogeneous entity, but made up of multiple bodies with varying degrees of autonomy in decision making. Given that it is inappropriate to use proprietary software, the fact of establishing these rules in law will prevent the personal discretion of any state employee from putting at risk the information which belongs to citizens. And above all, because it constitutes an up-to-date reaffirmation in relation to the means of management and communication of information used today, it is based on the republican principle of openness to the public.&lt;/p&gt;
2041
2042 &lt;p&gt;In conformance with this universally accepted principle, the citizen has the right to know all information held by the State and not covered by well- founded declarations of secrecy based on law. Now, software deals with information and is itself information. Information in a special form, capable of being interpreted by a machine in order to execute actions, but crucial information all the same because the citizen has a legitimate right to know, for example, how his vote is computed or his taxes calculated. And for that he must have free access to the source code and be able to prove to his satisfaction the programs used for electoral computations or calculation of his taxes.&lt;/p&gt;
2043
2044 &lt;p&gt;I wish you the greatest respect, and would like to repeat that my office will always be open for you to expound your point of view to whatever level of detail you consider suitable.&lt;/p&gt;
2045
2046 &lt;p&gt;Cordially,&lt;br&gt;
2047 DR. EDGAR DAVID VILLANUEVA NUÑEZ&lt;br&gt;
2048 Congressman of the Republic of Perú.&lt;/p&gt;
2049 &lt;/blockquote&gt;
2050 </description>
2051 </item>
2052
2053 <item>
2054 <title>Officeshots still going strong</title>
2055 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Officeshots_still_going_strong.html</link>
2056 <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Officeshots_still_going_strong.html</guid>
2057 <pubDate>Sat, 25 Dec 2010 09:40:00 +0100</pubDate>
2058 <description>&lt;p&gt;Half a year ago I
2059 &lt;a href=&quot;http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Officeshots_taking_shape.html&quot;&gt;wrote
2060 a bit&lt;/a&gt; about &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.officeshots.org/&quot;&gt;OfficeShots&lt;/a&gt;,
2061 a web service to allow anyone to test how ODF documents are handled by
2062 the different programs reading and writing the ODF format.&lt;/p&gt;
2063
2064 &lt;p&gt;I just had a look at the service, and it seem to be going strong.
2065 Very interesting to see the results reported in the gallery, how
2066 different Office implementations handle different ODF features. Sad
2067 to see that KOffice was not doing it very well, and happy to see that
2068 LibreOffice has been tested already (but sadly not listed as a option
2069 for OfficeShots users yet). I am glad to see that the ODF community
2070 got such a great test tool available.&lt;/p&gt;
2071 </description>
2072 </item>
2073
2074 <item>
2075 <title>Best å ikke fortelle noen at streaming er nedlasting...</title>
2076 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Best___ikke_fortelle_noen_at_streaming_er_nedlasting___.html</link>
2077 <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Best___ikke_fortelle_noen_at_streaming_er_nedlasting___.html</guid>
2078 <pubDate>Sat, 30 Oct 2010 11:20:00 +0200</pubDate>
2079 <description>&lt;p&gt;I dag la jeg inn en kommentar på en sak hos NRKBeta
2080 &lt;a href=&quot;http://nrkbeta.no/2010/10/27/bakom-blindpassasjer-del-1/&quot;&gt;om
2081 hvordan TV-serien Blindpassasjer ble laget&lt;/a&gt; i forbindelse med at
2082 filmene NRK la ut ikke var tilgjengelig i et
2083 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.digistan.org/open-standard:definition&quot;&gt;fritt og
2084 åpent format&lt;/a&gt;. Dette var det jeg skrev publiserte der 07:39.&lt;/p&gt;
2085
2086 &lt;p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt;
2087 &lt;p&gt;&quot;Vi fikk en kommentar rundt måten streamet innhold er beskyttet fra
2088 nedlasting. Mange av oss som kan mer enn gjennomsnittet om systemer
2089 som dette, vet at det stort sett er mulig å lure ut ting med den
2090 nødvendige forkunnskapen.&quot;&lt;/p&gt;
2091
2092 &lt;p&gt;Haha. Å streame innhold er det samme som å laste ned innhold, så å
2093 beskytte en stream mot nedlasting er ikke mulig. Å skrive noe slikt
2094 er å forlede leseren.&lt;/p&gt;
2095
2096 &lt;p&gt;Med den bakgrunn blir forklaringen om at noen rettighetshavere kun
2097 vil tillate streaming men ikke nedlasting meningsløs.&lt;/p&gt;
2098
2099 &lt;p&gt;Anbefaler forresten å lese
2100 &lt;a href=&quot;http://blogs.computerworlduk.com/simon-says/2010/10/drm-is-toxic-to-culture/index.htm&quot;&gt;http://blogs.computerworlduk.com/simon-says/2010/10/drm-is-toxic-to-culture/index.htm&lt;/a&gt;
2101 om hva som ville være konsekvensen hvis digitale avspillingssperrer
2102 (DRM) fungerte. Det gjør de naturligvis ikke teknisk - det er jo
2103 derfor de må ha totalitære juridiske beskyttelsesmekanismer på plass,
2104 men det er skremmende hva samfunnet tillater og NRK er med på å bygge
2105 opp under.&lt;/p&gt;
2106 &lt;/blockquote&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
2107
2108 &lt;p&gt;Ca. 20 minutter senere får jeg følgende epost fra Anders Hofseth i
2109 NRKBeta:&lt;/p&gt;
2110
2111 &lt;p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt;
2112 &lt;p&gt;From: Anders Hofseth &amp;lt;XXX@gmail.com&gt;
2113 &lt;br&gt;To: &quot;pere@hungry.com&quot; &amp;lt;pere@hungry.com&gt;
2114 &lt;br&gt;Cc: Eirik Solheim &amp;lt;XXX@gmail.com&gt;, Jon Ståle Carlsen &amp;lt;XXX@gmail.com&gt;, Henrik Lied &amp;lt;XXX@gmail.com&gt;
2115 &lt;br&gt;Subject: Re: [NRKbeta] Kommentar: &quot;Bakom Blindpassasjer: del 1&quot;
2116 &lt;br&gt;Date: Sat, 30 Oct 2010 07:58:44 +0200&lt;/p&gt;
2117
2118 &lt;p&gt;Hei Petter.
2119 &lt;br&gt;Det du forsøker dra igang er egentlig en interessant diskusjon,
2120 men om vi skal kjøre den i kommentarfeltet her, vil vi kunne bli bedt
2121 om å fjerne blindpassasjer fra nett- tv og det vil heller ikke bli
2122 særlig lett å klarere ut noe annet arkivmateriale på lang tid.&lt;/p&gt;
2123
2124 &lt;p&gt;Dette er en situasjon NRKbeta ikke ønsker, så kommentaren er
2125 fjernet og den delen av diskusjonen er avsluttet på nrkbeta, vi antar
2126 konsekvensene vi beskriver ikke er noe du ønsker heller...&lt;/p&gt;
2127
2128 &lt;p&gt;Med hilsen,
2129 &lt;br&gt;-anders&lt;/p&gt;
2130
2131 &lt;p&gt;Ring meg om noe er uklart: 95XXXXXXX&lt;/p&gt;
2132 &lt;/blockquote&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
2133
2134 &lt;p&gt;Ble så fascinert over denne holdningen, at jeg forfattet og sendte
2135 over følgende svar. I og med at debatten er fjernet fra NRK Betas
2136 kommentarfelt, så velger jeg å publisere her på bloggen min i stedet.
2137 Har fjernet epostadresser og telefonnummer til de involverte, for å
2138 unngå at de tiltrekker seg uønskede direkte kontaktforsøk.&lt;/p&gt;
2139
2140 &lt;p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt;
2141 &lt;p&gt;From: Petter Reinholdtsen &amp;lt;pere@hungry.com&gt;
2142 &lt;br&gt;To: Anders Hofseth &amp;lt;XXX@gmail.com&gt;
2143 &lt;br&gt;Cc: Eirik Solheim &amp;lt;XXX@gmail.com&gt;,
2144 &lt;br&gt; Jon Ståle Carlsen &amp;lt;XXX@gmail.com&gt;,
2145 &lt;br&gt; Henrik Lied &amp;lt;XXX@gmail.com&gt;
2146 &lt;br&gt;Subject: Re: [NRKbeta] Kommentar: &quot;Bakom Blindpassasjer: del 1&quot;
2147 &lt;br&gt;Date: Sat, 30 Oct 2010 08:24:34 +0200&lt;/p&gt;
2148
2149 &lt;p&gt;[Anders Hofseth]
2150 &lt;br&gt;&gt; Hei Petter.&lt;/p&gt;
2151
2152 &lt;p&gt;Hei.&lt;/p&gt;
2153
2154 &lt;p&gt;&gt; Det du forsøker dra igang er egentlig en interessant diskusjon, men
2155 &lt;br&gt;&gt; om vi skal kjøre den i kommentarfeltet her, vil vi kunne bli bedt om
2156 &lt;br&gt;&gt; å fjerne blindpassasjer fra nett- tv og det vil heller ikke bli
2157 &lt;br&gt;&gt; særlig lett å klarere ut noe annet arkivmateriale på lang tid.&lt;/p&gt;
2158
2159 &lt;p&gt;Godt å se at du er enig i at dette er en interessant diskusjon. Den
2160 vil nok fortsette en stund til. :)&lt;/p&gt;
2161
2162 &lt;p&gt;Må innrømme at jeg synes det er merkelig å lese at dere i NRK med
2163 vitende og vilje ønsker å forlede rettighetshaverne for å kunne
2164 fortsette å legge ut arkivmateriale.&lt;/p&gt;
2165
2166 &lt;p&gt;Kommentarer og diskusjoner i bloggene til NRK Beta påvirker jo ikke
2167 faktum, som er at streaming er det samme som nedlasting, og at innhold
2168 som er lagt ut på nett kan lagres lokalt for avspilling når en ønsker
2169 det.&lt;/p&gt;
2170
2171 &lt;p&gt;Det du sier er jo at klarering av arkivmateriale for publisering på
2172 web krever at en holder faktum skjult fra debattfeltet på NRKBeta.
2173 Det er ikke et argument som holder vann. :)&lt;/p&gt;
2174
2175 &lt;p&gt;&gt; Dette er en situasjon NRKbeta ikke ønsker, så kommentaren er fjernet
2176 &lt;br&gt;&gt; og den delen av diskusjonen er avsluttet på nrkbeta, vi antar
2177 &lt;br&gt;&gt; konsekvensene vi beskriver ikke er noe du ønsker heller...&lt;/p&gt;
2178
2179 &lt;p&gt;Personlig ønsker jeg at NRK skal slutte å stikke hodet i sanden og
2180 heller være åpne på hvordan virkeligheten fungerer, samt ta opp kampen
2181 mot de som vil låse kulturen inne. Jeg synes det er en skam at NRK
2182 godtar å forlede publikum. Ville heller at NRK krever at innhold som
2183 skal sendes skal være uten bruksbegresninger og kan publiseres i
2184 formater som heller ikke har bruksbegresninger (bruksbegresningene til
2185 H.264 burde få varselbjellene i NRK til å ringe).&lt;/p&gt;
2186
2187 &lt;p&gt;At NRK er med på DRM-tåkeleggingen og at det kommer feilaktive
2188 påstander om at &quot;streaming beskytter mot nedlasting&quot; som bare er egnet
2189 til å bygge opp om en myte som er skadelig for samfunnet som helhet.&lt;/p&gt;
2190
2191 &lt;p&gt;Anbefaler &amp;lt;URL:&lt;a href=&quot;http://webmink.com/2010/09/03/h-264-and-foss/&quot;&gt;http://webmink.com/2010/09/03/h-264-and-foss/&lt;/a&gt;&gt; og en
2192 titt på
2193 &amp;lt;URL: &lt;a href=&quot;http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Terms_of_use_for_video_produced_by_a_Canon_IXUS_130_digital_camera.html&quot;&gt;http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Terms_of_use_for_video_produced_by_a_Canon_IXUS_130_digital_camera.html&lt;/a&gt; &gt;.
2194 for å se hva slags bruksbegresninger H.264 innebærer.&lt;/p&gt;
2195
2196 &lt;p&gt;Hvis dette innebærer at NRK må være åpne med at arkivmaterialet ikke
2197 kan brukes før rettighetshaverene også innser at de er med på å skade
2198 samfunnets kultur og kollektive hukommelse, så får en i hvert fall
2199 synliggjort konsekvensene og antagelig mer flammer på en debatt som er
2200 langt på overtid.&lt;/p&gt;
2201
2202 &lt;p&gt;&gt; Ring meg om noe er uklart: XXX&lt;/p&gt;
2203
2204 &lt;p&gt;Intet uklart, men ikke imponert over måten dere håndterer debatten på.
2205 Hadde du i stedet kommet med et tilsvar i kommentarfeltet der en
2206 gjorde det klart at blindpassasjer-blogpostingen ikke var riktig sted
2207 for videre diskusjon hadde dere i mine øyne kommet fra det med
2208 ryggraden på plass.&lt;/p&gt;
2209
2210 &lt;p&gt;PS: Interessant å se at NRK-ansatte ikke bruker NRK-epostadresser.&lt;/p&gt;
2211
2212 &lt;p&gt;Som en liten avslutning, her er noen litt morsomme innslag om temaet.
2213 &amp;lt;URL: &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.archive.org/details/CopyingIsNotTheft&quot;&gt;http://www.archive.org/details/CopyingIsNotTheft&lt;/a&gt; &gt; og
2214 &amp;lt;URL: &lt;a href=&quot;http://patentabsurdity.com/&quot;&gt;http://patentabsurdity.com/&lt;/a&gt; &gt; hadde vært noe å kringkaste på
2215 NRK1. :)&lt;/p&gt;
2216
2217 &lt;p&gt;Vennlig hilsen,
2218 &lt;br&gt;--
2219 &lt;br&gt;Petter Reinholdtsen&lt;/p&gt;
2220 </description>
2221 </item>
2222
2223 <item>
2224 <title>Standardkrav inn i anbudstekster?</title>
2225 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Standardkrav_inn_i_anbudstekster_.html</link>
2226 <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Standardkrav_inn_i_anbudstekster_.html</guid>
2227 <pubDate>Sun, 17 Oct 2010 19:30:00 +0200</pubDate>
2228 <description>&lt;p&gt;Hvis det å følge standarder skal ha noen effekt overfor
2229 leverandører, så må slike krav og ønsker komme inn i anbudstekster når
2230 systemer kjøpes inn. Har ikke sett noen slike formuleringer i anbud
2231 så langt, men har tenkt litt på hva som bør inn. Her er noen ideer og
2232 forslag. Min drøm er at en kan sette krav til slik støtte i
2233 anbudstekster, men så langt er det nok mer sannsynlig at en må nøye
2234 seg med å skrive at det er en fordel om slik støtte er tilstede i
2235 leveranser.&lt;/p&gt;
2236
2237 &lt;p&gt;Som systemadministrator på Universitetet er det typisk to områder
2238 som er problematiske for meg. Det ene er admin-grensesnittene på
2239 tjenermaskiner, som vi ønsker å bruke via ssh. Det andre er nettsider
2240 som vi ønsker å bruke via en nettleser. For begge deler er det viktig
2241 at protokollene og formatene som brukes følger standarder våre verktøy
2242 støtter.&lt;/p&gt;
2243
2244 &lt;p&gt;De fleste har nå støtte for SSH som overføringsprotkoll for
2245 admin-grensesnittet, men det er ikke tilstrekkelig for å kunne stille
2246 inn f.eks BIOS og RAID-kontroller via ssh-forbindelsen. Det er flere
2247 aktuelle protokoller for fremvisning av BIOS-oppsett og
2248 oppstartmeldinger, og min anbefaling ville være å kreve
2249 VT100-kompatibel protokoll, for å sikre at flest mulig
2250 terminalemulatorer kan forstå hva som kommer fra admin-grensesnittet
2251 via ssh. Andre aktuelle alternativer er ANSI-terminalemulering og
2252 VT220. Kanskje en formulering ala dette i anbudsutlysninger vil
2253 fungere:&lt;/p&gt;
2254
2255 &lt;p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt;
2256 BIOS og oppstartmeldinger i administrasjonsgrensesnittet til maskinen
2257 bør/skal være tilgjengelig via SSH-protokollen som definert av IETF
2258 (RFC 4251 mfl.) og følge terminalfremvisningprotokollen VT100 (ref?)
2259 når en kobler seg til oppstart via ssh.
2260 &lt;/blockquote&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
2261
2262 &lt;p&gt;Har ikke lykkes med å finne en god referanse for
2263 VT100-spesifikasjonen.&lt;/p&gt;
2264
2265 &lt;p&gt;Når det gjelder nettsider, så er det det HTML, CSS og
2266 JavaScript-spesifikasjonen til W3C som gjelder.&lt;/p&gt;
2267
2268 &lt;p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt;
2269 Alle systemets nettsider bør/skal være i henhold til statens
2270 standardkatalogs krav om nettsider og følge HTML-standarden som
2271 definert av W3C, og validere uten feil hos W3Cs HTML-validator
2272 (http://validator.w3.org). Hvis det brukes CSS så bør/skal denne
2273 validere uten feil hos W3Cs CSS-validator
2274 (http://jigsaw.w3.org/css-validator/). Eventuelle JavaScript skal
2275 være i henhold til EcmaScript-standarden. I tillegg til å følge de
2276 overnevnte standardene skal websidene fungere i nettleserne (fyll inn
2277 relevant liste for organisasjonen) Firefox 3.5, Internet Explorer 8,
2278 Opera 9, etc.
2279 &lt;/blockquote&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
2280
2281 &lt;p&gt;Vil et slikt avsnitt være konkret nok til å få leverandørene til å
2282 lage nettsider som følger standardene og fungerer i flere
2283 nettlesere?&lt;/p&gt;
2284
2285 &lt;p&gt;Tar svært gjerne imot innspill på dette temaet til aktive (at)
2286 nuug.no, og er spesielt interessert i hva andre skriver i sine anbud
2287 for å oppmuntre leverandører til å følge standardene. Kanskje NUUG
2288 burde lage et dokument med forslag til standardformuleringer å ta med
2289 i anbudsutlysninger?&lt;/p&gt;
2290
2291 &lt;p&gt;Oppdatering 2010-12-03: I følge Wikipedias oppføring om
2292 &lt;a href=&quot;http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ANSI_escape_code&quot;&gt;ANSI escape
2293 code&lt;/a&gt;, så bruker VT100-terminaler ECMA-48-spesifikasjonen som
2294 basis for sin oppførsel. Det kan dermed være et alternativ når en
2295 skal spesifisere hvordan seriell-konsoll skal fungere.&lt;/p&gt;
2296 </description>
2297 </item>
2298
2299 <item>
2300 <title>Terms of use for video produced by a Canon IXUS 130 digital camera</title>
2301 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Terms_of_use_for_video_produced_by_a_Canon_IXUS_130_digital_camera.html</link>
2302 <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Terms_of_use_for_video_produced_by_a_Canon_IXUS_130_digital_camera.html</guid>
2303 <pubDate>Thu, 9 Sep 2010 23:55:00 +0200</pubDate>
2304 <description>&lt;p&gt;A few days ago I had the mixed pleasure of bying a new digital
2305 camera, a Canon IXUS 130. It was instructive and very disturbing to
2306 be able to verify that also this camera producer have the nerve to
2307 specify how I can or can not use the videos produced with the camera.
2308 Even thought I was aware of the issue, the options with new cameras
2309 are limited and I ended up bying the camera anyway. What is the
2310 problem, you might ask? It is software patents, MPEG-4, H.264 and the
2311 MPEG-LA that is the problem, and our right to record our experiences
2312 without asking for permissions that is at risk.
2313
2314 &lt;p&gt;On page 27 of the Danish instruction manual, this section is
2315 written:&lt;/p&gt;
2316
2317 &lt;blockquote&gt;
2318 &lt;p&gt;This product is licensed under AT&amp;T patents for the MPEG-4 standard
2319 and may be used for encoding MPEG-4 compliant video and/or decoding
2320 MPEG-4 compliant video that was encoded only (1) for a personal and
2321 non-commercial purpose or (2) by a video provider licensed under the
2322 AT&amp;T patents to provide MPEG-4 compliant video.&lt;/p&gt;
2323
2324 &lt;p&gt;No license is granted or implied for any other use for MPEG-4
2325 standard.&lt;/p&gt;
2326 &lt;/blockquote&gt;
2327
2328 &lt;p&gt;In short, the camera producer have chosen to use technology
2329 (MPEG-4/H.264) that is only provided if I used it for personal and
2330 non-commercial purposes, or ask for permission from the organisations
2331 holding the knowledge monopoly (patent) for technology used.&lt;/p&gt;
2332
2333 &lt;p&gt;This issue has been brewing for a while, and I recommend you to
2334 read
2335 &quot;&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.osnews.com/story/23236/Why_Our_Civilization_s_Video_Art_and_Culture_is_Threatened_by_the_MPEG-LA&quot;&gt;Why
2336 Our Civilization&#39;s Video Art and Culture is Threatened by the
2337 MPEG-LA&lt;/a&gt;&quot; by Eugenia Loli-Queru and
2338 &quot;&lt;a href=&quot;http://webmink.com/2010/09/03/h-264-and-foss/&quot;&gt;H.264 Is Not
2339 The Sort Of Free That Matters&lt;/a&gt;&quot; by Simon Phipps to learn more about
2340 the issue. The solution is to support the
2341 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.digistan.org/open-standard:definition&quot;&gt;free and
2342 open standards&lt;/a&gt; for video, like &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.theora.org/&quot;&gt;Ogg
2343 Theora&lt;/a&gt;, and avoid MPEG-4 and H.264 if you can.&lt;/p&gt;
2344 </description>
2345 </item>
2346
2347 <item>
2348 <title>Officeshots taking shape</title>
2349 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Officeshots_taking_shape.html</link>
2350 <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Officeshots_taking_shape.html</guid>
2351 <pubDate>Sun, 13 Jun 2010 11:40:00 +0200</pubDate>
2352 <description>&lt;p&gt;For those of us caring about document exchange and
2353 interoperability, &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.officeshots.org/&quot;&gt;OfficeShots&lt;/a&gt;
2354 is a great service. It is to ODF documents what
2355 &lt;a href=&quot;http://browsershots.org/&quot;&gt;BrowserShots&lt;/a&gt; is for web
2356 pages.&lt;/p&gt;
2357
2358 &lt;p&gt;A while back, I was contacted by Knut Yrvin at the part of Nokia
2359 that used to be Trolltech, who wanted to help the OfficeShots project
2360 and wondered if the University of Oslo where I work would be
2361 interested in supporting the project. I helped him to navigate his
2362 request to the right people at work, and his request was answered with
2363 a spot in the machine room with power and network connected, and Knut
2364 arranged funding for a machine to fill the spot. The machine is
2365 administrated by the OfficeShots people, so I do not have daily
2366 contact with its progress, and thus from time to time check back to
2367 see how the project is doing.&lt;/p&gt;
2368
2369 &lt;p&gt;Today I had a look, and was happy to see that the Dell box in our
2370 machine room now is the host for several virtual machines running as
2371 OfficeShots factories, and the project is able to render ODF documents
2372 in 17 different document processing implementation on Linux and
2373 Windows. This is great.&lt;/p&gt;
2374 </description>
2375 </item>
2376
2377 <item>
2378 <title>A manual for standards wars...</title>
2379 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/A_manual_for_standards_wars___.html</link>
2380 <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/A_manual_for_standards_wars___.html</guid>
2381 <pubDate>Sun, 6 Jun 2010 14:15:00 +0200</pubDate>
2382 <description>&lt;p&gt;Via the
2383 &lt;a href=&quot;http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/robweir/antic-atom/~3/QzU4RgoAGMg/weekly-links-10.html&quot;&gt;blog
2384 of Rob Weir&lt;/a&gt; I came across the very interesting essay named
2385 &lt;a href=&quot;http://faculty.haas.berkeley.edu/shapiro/wars.pdf&quot;&gt;The Art of
2386 Standards Wars&lt;/a&gt; (PDF 25 pages). I recommend it for everyone
2387 following the standards wars of today.&lt;/p&gt;
2388 </description>
2389 </item>
2390
2391 <item>
2392 <title>Danmark går for ODF?</title>
2393 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Danmark_g_r_for_ODF_.html</link>
2394 <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Danmark_g_r_for_ODF_.html</guid>
2395 <pubDate>Fri, 29 Jan 2010 12:00:00 +0100</pubDate>
2396 <description>&lt;p&gt;Ble nettopp gjort oppmerksom på en
2397 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.version2.dk/artikel/13690-breaking-odf-vinder-dokumentformat-krigen &quot;&gt;nyhet fra Version2&lt;/a&gt;
2398 fra Danmark, der det hevdes at Folketinget har vedtatt at ODF skal
2399 brukes som dokumentutvekslingsformat i Staten.&lt;/p&gt;
2400
2401 &lt;p&gt;Hyggelig lesning, spesielt hvis det viser seg at de av vedtatt
2402 kravlisten for hva som skal aksepteres som referert i kommentarfeltet
2403 til artikkelen og
2404 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.version2.dk/artikel/13693-er-ooxml-doemt-ude-her-er-kravene-til-en-offentlig-dokumentstandard&quot;&gt;en
2405 annen artikkel&lt;/a&gt; i samme nett-avis. Liker spesielt godt denne:&lt;/p&gt;
2406
2407 &lt;p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt; Det skal demonstreres, at standarden i sin helhed kan
2408 implementeres af alle direkte i sin helhed på flere
2409 platforme.&lt;/blockquote&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
2410
2411 &lt;p&gt;Noe slikt burde være et krav også i Norge.&lt;/p&gt;
2412 </description>
2413 </item>
2414
2415 <item>
2416 <title>Relative popularity of document formats (MS Office vs. ODF)</title>
2417 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Relative_popularity_of_document_formats__MS_Office_vs__ODF_.html</link>
2418 <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Relative_popularity_of_document_formats__MS_Office_vs__ODF_.html</guid>
2419 <pubDate>Wed, 12 Aug 2009 15:50:00 +0200</pubDate>
2420 <description>&lt;p&gt;Just for fun, I did a search right now on Google for a few file ODF
2421 and MS Office based formats (not to be mistaken for ISO or ECMA
2422 OOXML), to get an idea of their relative usage. I searched using
2423 &#39;filetype:odt&#39; and equvalent terms, and got these results:&lt;/P&gt;
2424
2425 &lt;table&gt;
2426 &lt;tr&gt;&lt;th&gt;Type&lt;/th&gt;&lt;th&gt;ODF&lt;/th&gt;&lt;th&gt;MS Office&lt;/th&gt;&lt;/tr&gt;
2427 &lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;Tekst&lt;/td&gt; &lt;td&gt;odt:282000&lt;/td&gt; &lt;td&gt;docx:308000&lt;/td&gt;&lt;/tr&gt;
2428 &lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;Presentasjon&lt;/td&gt; &lt;td&gt;odp:75600&lt;/td&gt; &lt;td&gt;pptx:183000&lt;/td&gt;&lt;/tr&gt;
2429 &lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;Regneark&lt;/td&gt; &lt;td&gt;ods:26500 &lt;/td&gt; &lt;td&gt;xlsx:145000&lt;/td&gt;&lt;/tr&gt;
2430 &lt;/table&gt;
2431
2432 &lt;p&gt;Next, I added a &#39;site:no&#39; limit to get the numbers for Norway, and
2433 got these numbers:&lt;/p&gt;
2434
2435 &lt;table&gt;
2436 &lt;tr&gt;&lt;th&gt;Type&lt;/th&gt;&lt;th&gt;ODF&lt;/th&gt;&lt;th&gt;MS Office&lt;/th&gt;&lt;/tr&gt;
2437 &lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;Tekst&lt;/td&gt; &lt;td&gt;odt:2480 &lt;/td&gt; &lt;td&gt;docx:4460&lt;/td&gt;&lt;/tr&gt;
2438 &lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;Presentasjon&lt;/td&gt; &lt;td&gt;odp:299 &lt;/td&gt; &lt;td&gt;pptx:741&lt;/td&gt;&lt;/tr&gt;
2439 &lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;Regneark&lt;/td&gt; &lt;td&gt;ods:187 &lt;/td&gt; &lt;td&gt;xlsx:372&lt;/td&gt;&lt;/tr&gt;
2440 &lt;/table&gt;
2441
2442 &lt;p&gt;I wonder how these numbers change over time.&lt;/p&gt;
2443
2444 &lt;p&gt;I am aware of Google returning different results and numbers based
2445 on where the search is done, so I guess these numbers will differ if
2446 they are conduced in another country. Because of this, I did the same
2447 search from a machine in California, USA, a few minutes after the
2448 search done from a machine here in Norway.&lt;/p&gt;
2449
2450
2451 &lt;table&gt;
2452 &lt;tr&gt;&lt;th&gt;Type&lt;/th&gt;&lt;th&gt;ODF&lt;/th&gt;&lt;th&gt;MS Office&lt;/th&gt;&lt;/tr&gt;
2453 &lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;Tekst&lt;/td&gt; &lt;td&gt;odt:129000&lt;/td&gt; &lt;td&gt;docx:308000&lt;/td&gt;&lt;/tr&gt;
2454 &lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;Presentasjon&lt;/td&gt; &lt;td&gt;odp:44200&lt;/td&gt; &lt;td&gt;pptx:93900&lt;/td&gt;&lt;/tr&gt;
2455 &lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;Regneark&lt;/td&gt; &lt;td&gt;ods:26500 &lt;/td&gt; &lt;td&gt;xlsx:82400&lt;/td&gt;&lt;/tr&gt;
2456 &lt;/table&gt;
2457
2458 &lt;p&gt;And with &#39;site:no&#39;:
2459
2460 &lt;table&gt;
2461 &lt;tr&gt;&lt;th&gt;Type&lt;/th&gt;&lt;th&gt;ODF&lt;/th&gt;&lt;th&gt;MS Office&lt;/th&gt;&lt;/tr&gt;
2462 &lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;Tekst&lt;/td&gt; &lt;td&gt;odt:2480&lt;/td&gt; &lt;td&gt;docx:3410&lt;/td&gt;&lt;/tr&gt;
2463 &lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;Presentasjon&lt;/td&gt; &lt;td&gt;odp:175&lt;/td&gt; &lt;td&gt;pptx:604&lt;/td&gt;&lt;/tr&gt;
2464 &lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;Regneark&lt;/td&gt; &lt;td&gt;ods:186 &lt;/td&gt; &lt;td&gt;xlsx:296&lt;/td&gt;&lt;/tr&gt;
2465 &lt;/table&gt;
2466
2467 &lt;p&gt;Interesting difference, not sure what to conclude from these
2468 numbers.&lt;/p&gt;
2469 </description>
2470 </item>
2471
2472 <item>
2473 <title>ISO still hope to fix OOXML</title>
2474 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/ISO_still_hope_to_fix_OOXML.html</link>
2475 <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/ISO_still_hope_to_fix_OOXML.html</guid>
2476 <pubDate>Sat, 8 Aug 2009 14:00:00 +0200</pubDate>
2477 <description>&lt;p&gt;According to &lt;a
2478 href=&quot;http://twerner.blogspot.com/2009/08/defects-of-office-open-xml.html&quot;&gt;a
2479 blog post from Torsten Werner&lt;/a&gt;, the current defect report for ISO
2480 29500 (ISO OOXML) is 809 pages. His interesting point is that the
2481 defect report is 71 pages more than the full ODF 1.1 specification.
2482 Personally I find it more interesting that ISO still believe ISO OOXML
2483 can be fixed in ISO. Personally, I believe it is broken beyon repair,
2484 and I completely lack any trust in ISO for being able to get anywhere
2485 close to solving the problems. I was part of the Norwegian committee
2486 involved in the OOXML fast track process, and was not impressed with
2487 Standard Norway and ISO in how they handled it.&lt;/p&gt;
2488
2489 &lt;p&gt;These days I focus on ODF instead, which seem like a specification
2490 with the future ahead of it. We are working in NUUG to organise a ODF
2491 seminar this autumn.&lt;/p&gt;
2492 </description>
2493 </item>
2494
2495 <item>
2496 <title>Regjerningens oppsummering av høringen om standardkatalogen versjon 2</title>
2497 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Regjerningens_oppsummering_av_h_ringen_om_standardkatalogen_versjon_2.html</link>
2498 <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Regjerningens_oppsummering_av_h_ringen_om_standardkatalogen_versjon_2.html</guid>
2499 <pubDate>Thu, 9 Jul 2009 14:40:00 +0200</pubDate>
2500 <description>&lt;p&gt;For å forstå mer om hvorfor standardkatalogens versjon 2 ble som
2501 den ble, har jeg bedt om kopi fra FAD av dokumentene som ble lagt frem
2502 for regjeringen da de tok sin avgjørelse. De er nå lagt ut på NUUGs
2503 wiki, direkte tilgjengelig via &quot;&lt;a
2504 href=&quot;http://wiki.nuug.no/uttalelser/200901-standardkatalog-v2?action=AttachFile&amp;do=get&amp;target=kongelig-resolusjon.pdf&quot;&gt;Referansekatalogen
2505 v2.0 - Oppsummering av høring&lt;/a&gt;&quot; og &quot;&lt;a
2506 href=&quot;http://wiki.nuug.no/uttalelser/200901-standardkatalog-v2?action=AttachFile&amp;do=get&amp;target=kongelig-resolusjon-katalogutkast.pdf&quot;&gt;Referansekatalog
2507 for IT-standarder i offentlig sektor Versjon 2.0, dd.mm.åååå -
2508 UTKAST&lt;/a&gt;&quot;.&lt;/p&gt;
2509
2510 &lt;p&gt;Det er tre ting jeg merker meg i oppsummeringen fra
2511 høringsuttalelsen da jeg skummet igjennom den. Det første er at
2512 forståelsen av hvordan programvarepatenter påvirker fri
2513 programvareutvikling også i Norge når en argumenterer med at
2514 royalty-betaling ikke er et relevant problem i Norge. Det andre er at
2515 FAD ikke har en prinsipiell forståelse av verdien av en enkelt
2516 standard innenfor hvert område. Det siste er at påstander i
2517 høringsuttalelsene ikke blir etterprøvd (f.eks. påstanden fra
2518 Microsoft om hvordan Ogg blir standardisert og påstanden fra
2519 politidirektoratet om patentproblemer i Theora).&lt;/p&gt;
2520 </description>
2521 </item>
2522
2523 <item>
2524 <title>Regjerningen forlater prinsippet om ingen royalty-betaling i standardkatalogen versjon 2</title>
2525 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Regjerningen_forlater_prinsippet_om_ingen_royalty_betaling_i_standardkatalogen_versjon_2.html</link>
2526 <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Regjerningen_forlater_prinsippet_om_ingen_royalty_betaling_i_standardkatalogen_versjon_2.html</guid>
2527 <pubDate>Mon, 6 Jul 2009 21:00:00 +0200</pubDate>
2528 <description>&lt;p&gt;Jeg ble glad da regjeringen
2529 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.digi.no/817635/her-er-statens-nye-it-standarder&quot;&gt;annonserte&lt;/a&gt;
2530 versjon 2 av
2531 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.regjeringen.no/upload/FAD/Vedlegg/IKT-politikk/Referansekatalogen_versjon2.pdf&quot;&gt;statens
2532 referansekatalog over standarder&lt;/a&gt;, men trist da jeg leste hva som
2533 faktisk var vedtatt etter
2534 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.regjeringen.no/nb/dep/fad/dok/horinger/horingsdokumenter/2009/horing---referansekatalog-versjon-2.html&quot;&gt;høringen&lt;/a&gt;.
2535 De fleste av de valgte åpne standardene er gode og vil bidra til at
2536 alle kan delta på like vilkår i å lage løsninger for staten, men
2537 noen av dem blokkerer for de som ikke har anledning til å benytte
2538 spesifikasjoner som krever betaling for bruk (såkalt
2539 royalty-betaling). Det gjelder spesifikt for H.264 for video og MP3
2540 for lyd. Så lenge bruk av disse var valgfritt mens Ogg Theora og Ogg
2541 Vorbis var påkrevd, kunne alle som ønsket å spille av video og lyd
2542 fra statens websider gjøre dette uten å måtte bruke programmer der
2543 betaling for bruk var nødvendig. Når det nå er gjort valgfritt for
2544 de statlige etatene å bruke enten H.264 eller Theora (og MP3 eler
2545 Vorbis), så vil en bli tvunget til å forholde seg til
2546 royalty-belastede standarder for å få tilgang til videoen og
2547 lyden.&lt;/p&gt;
2548
2549 &lt;p&gt;Det gjør meg veldig trist at regjeringen har forlatt prinsippet om
2550 at alle standarder som ble valgt til å være påkrevd i katalogen skulle
2551 være uten royalty-betaling. Jeg håper det ikke betyr at en har mistet
2552 all forståelse for hvilke prinsipper som må følges for å oppnå
2553 likeverdig konkurranse mellom aktørene i IT-bransjen. NUUG advarte
2554 mot dette i
2555 &lt;a href=&quot;http://wiki.nuug.no/uttalelser/200901-standardkatalog-v2&quot;&gt;sin
2556 høringsuttalelse&lt;/a&gt;, men ser ut til å ha blitt ignorert.&lt;/p&gt;
2557
2558 &lt;p&gt;Oppdatering 2012-06-29: Kom over &lt;ahref=&quot;
2559 http://www.regjeringen.no/upload/FAD/Vedlegg/IKT-politikk/Refkat_v2.pdf&quot;&gt;en
2560 rapport til FAD&lt;/a&gt; fra da versjon 1 av katalogen ble vedtatt, og der
2561 er det tydelig at problemstillingen var kjent og forstått.&lt;/p&gt;
2562 </description>
2563 </item>
2564
2565 <item>
2566 <title>Microsofts misvisende argumentasjon rundt multimediaformater</title>
2567 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Microsofts_misvisende_argumentasjon_rundt_multimediaformater.html</link>
2568 <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Microsofts_misvisende_argumentasjon_rundt_multimediaformater.html</guid>
2569 <pubDate>Fri, 26 Jun 2009 13:30:00 +0200</pubDate>
2570 <description>&lt;p&gt;I
2571 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.regjeringen.no/upload/FAD/Vedlegg/Hoeringer/Refkat_V2/MicrosoftNorge.pdf&quot;&gt;Microsoft
2572 sin høringsuttalelse&lt;/a&gt; til
2573 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.regjeringen.no/nb/dep/fad/dok/horinger/horingsdokumenter/2009/horing---referansekatalog-versjon-2.html?id=549422&quot;&gt;forslag
2574 til versjon 2 av statens referansekatalog over standarder&lt;/a&gt;, lirer
2575 de av seg følgende FUD-perle:&lt;/p&gt;
2576
2577 &lt;p&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt;&quot;Vorbis, OGG, Theora og FLAC er alle tekniske
2578 spesifikasjoner overordnet styrt av xiph.org, som er en
2579 ikke-kommersiell organisasjon. Etablerte og anerkjente
2580 standardiseringsorganisasjoner, som Oasis, W3C og Ecma, har en godt
2581 innarbeidet vedlikeholds- og forvaltningsprosess av en standard.
2582 Det er derimot helt opp til hver enkelt organisasjon å bestemme
2583 hvordan tekniske spesifikasjoner videreutvikles og endres, og disse
2584 spesifikasjonene bør derfor ikke defineres som åpne
2585 standarder.&quot;&lt;/blockquote&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
2586
2587 &lt;p&gt;De vokter seg vel for å nevne den anerkjente
2588 standardiseringsorganisasjonen IETF, som er organisasjonen bak HTTP,
2589 IP og det meste av protokoller på Internet, og RFC-standardene som
2590 IETF står bak. Ogg er spesifisert i
2591 &lt;a href=&quot;http://ietf.org/rfc/rfc3533.txt&quot;&gt;RFC 3533&lt;/a&gt;, og er uten
2592 tvil å anse som en åpen standard. Vorbis er
2593 &lt;a href=&quot;http://ietf.org/rfc/rfc5215.txt&quot;&gt;RFC 5215&lt;/a&gt;. Theora er
2594
2595 under standardisering via IETF, med
2596 &lt;a href=&quot;http://svn.xiph.org/trunk/theora/doc/draft-ietf-avt-rtp-theora-00.txt&quot;&gt;siste
2597 utkast publisert 2006-07-21&lt;/a&gt; (riktignok er dermed teksten ikke
2598 skrevet i stein ennå, men det blir neppe endringer som ikke er
2599 bakoverkompatibel). De kan være inne på noe når det gjelder FLAC da
2600 jeg ikke finner tegn til at &lt;a
2601 href=&quot;http://flac.sourceforge.net/format.html&quot;&gt;spesifikasjonen
2602 tilgjengelig på web&lt;/a&gt; er på tur via noen
2603 standardiseringsorganisasjon, men i og med at folkene bak Ogg, Theora
2604 og Vorbis også har involvert seg i Flac siden 2003, så ser jeg ikke
2605 bort fra at også den organiseres via IETF. Jeg kjenner personlig lite
2606 til FLAC.&lt;/p&gt;
2607
2608 &lt;p&gt;Uredelig argumentasjon bør en holde seg for god til å komme med,
2609 spesielt når det er så enkelt i dagens Internet-hverdag å gå
2610 misvisende påstander etter i sømmene.&lt;/p&gt;
2611 </description>
2612 </item>
2613
2614 <item>
2615 <title>Standarder fungerer best når en samler seg rundt dem</title>
2616 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Standarder_fungerer_best_n_r_en_samler_seg_rundt_dem.html</link>
2617 <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Standarder_fungerer_best_n_r_en_samler_seg_rundt_dem.html</guid>
2618 <pubDate>Tue, 19 May 2009 11:30:00 +0200</pubDate>
2619 <description>&lt;p&gt;En standard er noe man samler seg rundt, ut fra ideen om at en får
2620 fordeler når mange står sammen. Jo flere som står sammen, jo
2621 bedre. Når en vet dette, blir det litt merkelig å lese noen av
2622 uttalelsene som er kommet inn til
2623 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.regjeringen.no/nb/dep/fad/dok/horinger/horingsdokumenter/2009/horing---referansekatalog-versjon-2/horingsuttalelser.html?id=549423&quot;&gt;høringen
2624 om versjon 2 av statens referansekatalog over standarder&lt;/a&gt;. Blant
2625 annet Abelia, NHO og Microsoft tror det er lurt med flere standarder
2626 innenfor samme område. Det blir som å si at det er fint om Norge
2627 standardiserte både på A4- og Letter-størrelser på arkene, ulik
2628 sporvidde på jernbaneskinnene, meter og fot som lengemål, eller
2629 høyre- og venstrekjøring - slik at en kan konkurrere på hvilken
2630 standard som er best. De fleste forstår heldigvis at dette ikke
2631 bidrar positivt.&lt;/p&gt;
2632 </description>
2633 </item>
2634
2635 <item>
2636 <title>Hvorfor jeg ikke bruker eFaktura</title>
2637 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Hvorfor_jeg_ikke_bruker_eFaktura.html</link>
2638 <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Hvorfor_jeg_ikke_bruker_eFaktura.html</guid>
2639 <pubDate>Thu, 23 Apr 2009 23:00:00 +0200</pubDate>
2640 <description>&lt;p&gt;Telenors annonsering om å kreve 35 kroner i gebyr fra alle som
2641 ønsker papirfaktura har satt sinnene i kok, og pressedekningen så
2642 langt snakker om at eldre og folk som ikke behersker data vil få en
2643 urimelig ekstrakostnad. Jeg tror ikke jeg passer inn i noen av de
2644 kategoriene, men velger å holde meg unna eFaktura - som er det
2645 Telenor ønsker å få folk over på - pga. systemets egenskaper.&lt;/p&gt;
2646
2647 &lt;p&gt;Slik jeg har sett eFaktura til forbrukere så langt, så sender
2648 selger en elektronisk beskjed til kundens bank, som legger ut
2649 informasjon om fakturaen i nettbanken for godkjenning. Personlig
2650 ville jeg sett det som mer naturlig at det gikk en elektronisk beskjed
2651 fra selger til kunde, dvs meg, og at jeg så kunne bruke den videre
2652 mot banken eller andre hvis jeg ønsket dette. Mine innkjøp og
2653 regninger er jo en sak mellom meg og mine leverandører, ikke en sak
2654 mellom min bank og mine leverandører. Kun hvis jeg ønsker å betale
2655 fakturaen skal banken involveres. En faktura bør jo inn i
2656 regnskapet, og jeg ønsker mulighet til å legge det inn der. Når
2657 fakturaen sendes til banken i stedet for meg, blir det vanskeligere.
2658 Hele eFaktura-modellen virker på meg som en umyndiggjøring av meg
2659 som kunde.&lt;/p&gt;
2660
2661 &lt;p&gt;I tillegg har jeg ikke vært i stand til å finne
2662 eFaktura-formatets spesifikasjon, og det ser ut til at utsending av
2663 slike krever dyre avtaler med bankene for å få lov til å sende ut
2664 eFaktura til kunder. Jeg ser vel helst at fakturering på
2665 elektroniske formater kan gjøres f.eks. via epost eller HTTP uten å
2666 måtte betale mellommenn for retten til å lever ut en faktura, og
2667 liker rett og slett ikke dagens faktureringsmodeller.&lt;/p&gt;
2668 </description>
2669 </item>
2670
2671 <item>
2672 <title>Standardize on protocols and formats, not vendors and applications</title>
2673 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Standardize_on_protocols_and_formats__not_vendors_and_applications.html</link>
2674 <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Standardize_on_protocols_and_formats__not_vendors_and_applications.html</guid>
2675 <pubDate>Mon, 30 Mar 2009 11:50:00 +0200</pubDate>
2676 <description>&lt;p&gt;Where I work at the University of Oslo, one decision stand out as a
2677 very good one to form a long lived computer infrastructure. It is the
2678 simple one, lost by many in todays computer industry: Standardize on
2679 open network protocols and open exchange/storage formats, not applications.
2680 Applications come and go, while protocols and files tend to stay, and
2681 thus one want to make it easy to change application and vendor, while
2682 avoiding conversion costs and locking users to a specific platform or
2683 application.&lt;/p&gt;
2684
2685 &lt;p&gt;This approach make it possible to replace the client applications
2686 independently of the server applications. One can even allow users to
2687 use several different applications as long as they handle the selected
2688 protocol and format. In the normal case, only one client application
2689 is recommended and users only get help if they choose to use this
2690 application, but those that want to deviate from the easy path are not
2691 blocked from doing so.&lt;/p&gt;
2692
2693 &lt;p&gt;It also allow us to replace the server side without forcing the
2694 users to replace their applications, and thus allow us to select the
2695 best server implementation at any moment, when scale and resouce
2696 requirements change.&lt;/p&gt;
2697
2698 &lt;p&gt;I strongly recommend standardizing - on open network protocols and
2699 open formats, but I would never recommend standardizing on a single
2700 application that do not use open network protocol or open formats.&lt;/p&gt;
2701 </description>
2702 </item>
2703
2704 <item>
2705 <title>Hva er egentlig en åpen standard?</title>
2706 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Hva_er_egentlig_en__pen_standard_.html</link>
2707 <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Hva_er_egentlig_en__pen_standard_.html</guid>
2708 <pubDate>Sat, 28 Mar 2009 10:50:00 +0100</pubDate>
2709 <description>&lt;p&gt;Jeg møter alle slags interessante mennesker på min vei, og et møte
2710 jeg lærte mye av var å treffe på en svært kompetent IT-fyr som
2711 benektet ting jeg anser som åpenbart og selvfølgelig når det gjelder
2712 standarder. Det var interessant, da det fikk meg til å tenke litt
2713 nøyere på hvilke mekanismer som ligger til grunn for at noe oppfattes
2714 som en standard. Det hele startet med arbeid rundt integrering av NSS
2715 LDAP mot Active Directory, og problemer som oppstår pga. at Active
2716 Directory ikke følger LDAP-spesifikasjonen som dokumentert i RFCer fra
2717 IETF (konkret, AD returnerer kun et subset av attributter hvis det er
2718 mer enn 1500 atributter av en gitt type i et LDAP-objekt, og en må be
2719 om resten i bolker av 1500). Jeg hevdet måten dette ble gjort på brøt
2720 med LDAP-spesifikasjonen, og henviste til hvor i LDAP-spesifikasjonen
2721 fra IETF det sto at oppførselen til AD ikke fulgte
2722 LDAP-spesifikasjonen. AD-spesialisten overrasket meg da ved å
2723 fortelle at IETF var ikke de som definerte LDAP-spesifikasjonen, og at
2724 Active Directory ikke brøt den virkelige LDAP-spesifikasjonen som han
2725 mente lå til grunn. Jeg ble spesielt overrasket over denne
2726 tilnærmingen til problemstillingen, da til og med Microsoft så vidt
2727 jeg kan se anerkjenner IETF som organisasjonen som definerer
2728 LDAP-spesifikasjonen. Jeg fikk aldri spurt hvem han mente sto bak den
2729 egentlige LDAP-spesifikasjonen, da det var irrelevant for problemet vi
2730 måtte løse (få Linux og AD til å fungere sammen). Dette møtet
2731 fortalte meg uansett at det ikke er gitt at alle aktører er enige om
2732 hva en standard er, og hva som er kilden til en gitt standard. Det er
2733 vanskelig å enes om felles standarder før en først enes om hvem som
2734 bestemmer hva en gitt standard innebærer.&lt;/p&gt;
2735
2736 &lt;p&gt;Hva er så en standard? I sin abstrakte form er det noe å samles
2737 om. På engelsk er en av betydningene fane brukt i krig, du vet, den
2738 type fane en samlet seg rundt på kamplassen i riddertiden. En
2739 standard definerer altså et felleskap, noen som har noe felles. Det
2740 er naturligvis mange måter å utgjøre et felleskap på. En kan
2741 f.eks. enes om å gjøre alt slik som Ole gjør det, og dermed si at Oles
2742 oppførsel er standard. Hver gang Ole endrer oppførsel endrer også
2743 standarden seg uten noe mer organisering og prosedyre. En variant av
2744 dette er å gjøre slik som Ole har gjort det i stedet for slik Ole til
2745 enhver til gjør noe. Dette er ofte litt enklere å forholde seg til,
2746 da en slipper å sjekke med Ole hver gang for å vite hvordan ting skal
2747 gjøres nå, men hvis det Ole gjorde noe dumt den gang en bestemte seg
2748 for å følge Ole, så er det vanskeligere å få endret oppførsel for å
2749 unngå dette dumme.&lt;/p&gt;
2750
2751 &lt;p&gt;En kan også ta det et skritt videre, og istedet for å basere seg på
2752 enkeltpersoners oppførsel sette seg ned og bli enige om hvordan en
2753 skal gjøre ting, dvs. lage et felleskap basert på konsensus. Dette
2754 tar naturligvis litt mer tid (en må diskutere ting i forkant før en
2755 kan sette igang), men det kan bidra til at den oppførselen en
2756 planlegger å benytte seg av er mer gjennomtenkt. Det ender også
2757 typisk opp med en beskrivelse av ønsket oppførsel som flere kan forstå
2758 - da flere har vært involvert i å utarbeide beskrivelsen.&lt;/p&gt;
2759
2760 &lt;p&gt;Dette er dessverre ikke alt som trengs for å forstå hva en åpen
2761 standard er for noe. Der alle kan se på hvordan folk oppfører seg, og
2762 dermed har valget om de vil oppføre seg likt eller ikke, så er det
2763 endel juridiske faktorer som gjør det hele mer komplisert -
2764 opphavsretten og patentlovgivningen for å være helt konkret. For å gi
2765 et eksempel. Hvis noen blir enige om å alltid plystre en bestemt
2766 melodi når de møtes, for å identifisere hverandre, så kan
2767 opphavsretten brukes til å styre hvem som får lov til å gjøre dette.
2768 De har standardisert hvordan de kjenner igjen alle som følger denne
2769 standarden, men ikke alle har nødvendigvis lov til å følge den.
2770 Musikk er opphavsrettsbeskyttet, og fremføring av musikk i
2771 offentligheten er opphavsmannens enerett (dvs. et monopol). Det vil i
2772 sin ytterste konsekvens si at alle som skal plystre en
2773 opphavsrettsbeskyttet melodi i det offentlige rom må ha godkjenning
2774 fra opphavsmannen. Har en ikke dette, så bryter en loven og kan
2775 straffes. Det er dermed mulig for opphavsmannen å kontrollere hvem
2776 som får lov til å benytte seg av denne standarden. En annen variant
2777 er hvis en standard er dokumentert, så er dokumentet som definerer
2778 standarden (spesifikasjonen) beskyttet av opphavsretten, og det er
2779 dermed mulig for rettighetsinnehaver å begrense tilgang til
2780 spesifikasjonen, og slik styre hvem som kan ta i bruk standarden på
2781 den måten.&lt;/p&gt;
2782
2783 &lt;p&gt;Der opphavsretten innvilger et monopol på kunstneriske uttrykk med
2784 verkshøyde, innvilger patentlovgivningen monopol på ideer. Hvis en
2785 slik patentert idé (fortrinnsvis uttrykt i en teknisk innretning, men
2786 det er kompliserende faktorer som gjør at det ikke er et krav) trengs
2787 for å ta i bruk en standard, så vil den som innehar patent kunne styre
2788 hvem som får ta i bruk standarden. Det er dermed ikke gitt at alle
2789 kan delta i et standard-felleskap, og hvis de kan delta, så er det
2790 ikke sikkert at det er på like vilkår. F.eks. kan rettighetsinnehaver
2791 sette vilkår som gjør at noen faller utenfor, det være seg av
2792 finansielle, avtalemessige eller prinsipielle årsaker. Vanlige slike
2793 vilkår er &quot;må betale litt for hver kunde/bruker&quot; som utelukker de som
2794 gir bort en løsning gratis og &quot;må gi fra seg retten til å håndheve
2795 sine egne patentrettigheter ovenfor rettighetshaver&quot; som utelukker
2796 alle som ønsker å beholde den muligheten.&lt;/p&gt;
2797
2798 &lt;p&gt;En åpen standard innebærer for meg at alle kan få innsikt i en
2799 komplett beskrivelse av oppførsel som standarden skal dekke, og at
2800 ingen kan nektes å benytte seg av standarden. Noen mener at det
2801 holder at alle med tilstrekkelig finansiering kan få tilgang til
2802 spesifikasjonen og at en kun har finansielle krav til bruk.
2803 Pga. denne konflikten har et nytt begrep spredt seg de siste årene,
2804 nemlig fri og åpen standard, der en har gjort det klart at alle må ha
2805 komplett og lik tilgang til spesifikasjoner og retten til å gjøre bruk
2806 av en standard for at en standard skal kunne kalles fri og åpen.&lt;/p&gt;
2807 </description>
2808 </item>
2809
2810 <item>
2811 <title>Fri og åpen standard, slik Digistan ser det</title>
2812 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Fri_og__pen_standard__slik_Digistan_ser_det.html</link>
2813 <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Fri_og__pen_standard__slik_Digistan_ser_det.html</guid>
2814 <pubDate>Sat, 31 Jan 2009 23:10:00 +0100</pubDate>
2815 <description>&lt;p&gt;Det er mange ulike definisjoner om hva en åpen standard er for noe,
2816 og NUUG hadde &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.nuug.no/dokumenter/standard-presse-def-200506.txt&quot;&gt;en
2817 pressemelding om dette sommeren 2005&lt;/a&gt;. Der ble definisjonen til
2818 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.aaben-standard.dk/&quot;&gt;DKUUG&lt;/a&gt;,
2819 &lt;a href=&quot;http://europa.eu.int/idabc/servlets/Doc?id=19529&quot;&gt;EU-kommissionens
2820 European Interoperability Framework ( side 9)&lt;/a&gt; og
2821 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.teknologiradet.no/files/7polert_copy.htm&quot;&gt;teknologirådet&lt;/a&gt; omtalt.&lt;/p&gt;
2822
2823 &lt;p&gt;Siden den gang har regjeringens standardiseringsråd dukket opp, og de
2824 ser ut til å har tatt utgangspunkt i EU-kommisjonens definisjon i
2825 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.regjeringen.no/nb/dep/fad/kampanjer/standardiseringsradet/arbeidsmetodikk.html?id=476407&quot;&gt;sin
2826 arbeidsmetodikk&lt;/a&gt;. Personlig synes jeg det er en god ide, da
2827 kravene som stilles der gjør at alle markedsaktører får like vilkår,
2828 noe som kommer kundene til gode ved hjelp av økt konkurranse.&lt;/p&gt;
2829
2830 &lt;p&gt;I sommer kom det en ny definisjon på banen.
2831 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.digistan.org/&quot;&gt;Digistan&lt;/a&gt; lanserte
2832 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.digistan.org/open-standard:definition&quot;&gt;en
2833 definisjon på en fri og åpen standard&lt;/a&gt;. Jeg liker måten de bryter
2834 ut av diskusjonen om hva som kreves for å kalle noe en åpen standard
2835 ved å legge på et ord og poengtere at en standard som er både åpen og
2836 fri har noen spesielle krav. Her er den definisjonen etter rask
2837 oversettelse fra engelsk til norsk av meg:&lt;/p&gt;
2838
2839 &lt;blockquote&gt;
2840 &lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Definisjonen av en fri og åpen standard&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
2841
2842 &lt;p&gt;Den digitale standardorganisasjonen definierer fri og åpen standard
2843 som følger:&lt;/p&gt;
2844 &lt;ul&gt;
2845 &lt;li&gt;En fri og åpen standard er immun for leverandørinnlåsing i alle
2846 stadier av dens livssyklus. Immuniteten fra leverandørinnlåsing gjør
2847 det mulig å fritt bruke, forbedre, stole på og utvide en standard over
2848 tid.&lt;/li&gt;
2849 &lt;li&gt;Standarden er adoptert og vil bli vedlikeholdt av en ikke-kommersiell
2850 organisasjon, og dens pågående utvikling gjøres med en åpen
2851 beslutningsprosedyre som er tilgjengelig for alle som er interessert i
2852 å delta.&lt;/li&gt;
2853 &lt;li&gt;Standarden er publisert og spesifikasjonsdokumentet er fritt
2854 tilgjengelig. Det må være tillatt for alle å kopiere, distribuere og
2855 bruke den uten begresninger.&lt;/li&gt;
2856 &lt;li&gt;Patentene som muligens gjelder (deler av) standarden er gjort
2857 ugjenkallelig tilgjengelig uten krav om betaling.&lt;/li&gt;
2858 &lt;li&gt;Det er ingen begresninger i gjenbruk av standarden.&lt;/li&gt;
2859 &lt;/ul&gt;
2860 &lt;p&gt;Det økonomiske resultatet av en fri og åpen standard, som kan
2861 måles, er at det muliggjør perfekt konkurranse mellom leverandører av
2862 produkter basert på standarden.&lt;/p&gt;
2863 &lt;/blockquote&gt;
2864
2865 &lt;p&gt;(Tar gjerne imot forbedringer av oversettelsen.)&lt;/p&gt;
2866 </description>
2867 </item>
2868
2869 <item>
2870 <title>ODF-bruk i staten, ikke helt på plass</title>
2871 <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/ODF_bruk_i_staten__ikke_helt_p__plass.html</link>
2872 <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/ODF_bruk_i_staten__ikke_helt_p__plass.html</guid>
2873 <pubDate>Thu, 22 Jan 2009 23:00:00 +0100</pubDate>
2874 <description>&lt;p&gt;I går publiserte
2875 &lt;a href=&quot;http://universitas.no/nyhet/52776/&quot;&gt;Universitas&lt;/a&gt;,
2876 &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.dagensit.no/trender/article1588462.ece&quot;&gt;Dagens-IT&lt;/a&gt;
2877 og &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.idg.no/computerworld/article118622.ece&quot;&gt;Computerworld
2878 Norge&lt;/a&gt; en sak om at de ansatte ved Universitetet i Oslo ikke følger
2879 regjeringens pålegg om å publisere i HTML, PDF eller ODF. Det er bra
2880 at det kommer litt fokus på dette, og jeg håper noen journalister tar
2881 en titt på de andre statlige instansene også.&lt;/p&gt;
2882
2883 &lt;p&gt;Skulle ønske det var en enkel måte å sjekke om ODF-dokumenter er i
2884 henholdt til ODF-spesifikasjonen, og en måte å teste om programmer som
2885 hevder å støtte ODF forstår alle delene av ODF-spesifikasjonen.
2886 Kjenner kun til ufullstendige løsninger for slikt.&lt;/p&gt;
2887 </description>
2888 </item>
2889
2890 </channel>
2891 </rss>