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"the profit-margins in publishing don't allow for hiring fact-checkers"

Lies! For those that didn't read TFA, Random House is owned by Bertelsmann AG. In 2005, the Random House division posted (EBIT) Earnings Before Interest and Taxes of 48 million Euros on revenues of 818 million Euros. So about USD$58 million in profit. http://www.bertelsmann.de/bertelsmann_corp/wms41// customers/bmcorp/pdf/Interim_Report_2005_.pdf

Indeed true! Almost forgot about that.

So I guess it is time to cancel Bertelmann club memberships as well and stop buying Bertelmann printed media as well.

Martin

Links:
    http://www.derclub.de/
    http://www.bertelsmann.de/

Note:
    Bertelmann is a german company hence the .de links - but still feel free to tell them how you feel about the DRM issue - shure somebody there can read english.

BBC News Online covers the same story here and reminds us that Napster's assets are now owned by media giant Bertlesmenn.

I guess you don't mean BMG but Bertelsmann (BMG = Bertelsmann Music group) which is the I belive 3rd biggest media company in the world.
BTW Bertelsmann is IIRC not a publicly traded company. It's owned by 68,8 Prercent by the Bertelsmann foundation.The rest of the stock is owned by the family Mohn and an other foundation.

I guess you don't mean BMG but Bertelsmann (BMG = Bertelsmann Music group) which is the I belive 3rd biggest media company in the world.
BTW Bertelsmann is IIRC not a publicly traded company. It's owned by 68,8 Prercent by the Bertelsmann foundation.The rest of the stock is owned by the family Mohn and an other foundation.

I suppose we can all stop buying Random House books and those of us who live in Germany can raise a stink about it directly, but what can people in other countries do? Example: if you live in England or some other european nation it might help to call your representitives and tell them that you do not want a unified censorship system because you don't want Germany/France/etc. to have control over your speach.

Also, how much of this will be non-legislative cowaperation from the other companies at the conferance? And what can we do to fight that? It would be nice to see something of a list of companies that were there next to there compeditors who were not.. then I could just call up said company and tell them I'm switching to there compeditor because they support censorship.

Also, what kind of protocoll modifications are we looking at here.. Linux/Apache may own the server world (as in NT no longer sold at all) before this is implemented.. could we make support for the protocoll modificatios a highly non-standard and difficult to install patch? Would it be prudent to adjust the Licenses of these programs to restrict censorship support? (Linus/Apache Team save us!)

Can will hurt Bertelsmann (boycott Random House?). How can I make shure I don't buy anyhting that comes thourgh them? Would someone like to set up a FAQ or site on how to avoid givng them any money. Could we watch them very closly and gradually make the net anti-Bertelsmann? I notices a link to there holdings here.

Finally, we should keep in mind that this will hurt everyone execpt the few companies that are large enough to censor themselves.. and we should be selling Bertelsmann hate in whatever way people will be most receptive. Example: If you live near a smaller publisher you can perhaps get them to call elected officials (who don't want to put the constituants out of work) and complain.

Jeff

I noticed the first post asked what can we do about this.. and I saw a few responces.. but nothing specific enough. Here are my specific versions of what can we do about this:

What can we do to stop the legislation associated to this? I am an American and don't vote for the people who are imposing this law, but if there are phone calls to make or letters to write I would be happy to help. Who do I harass?

How much of this will be non-legislative cowaperation from the other companies at the conferance? And what can we do to fight that?
Linux/Apache may own the server world (as in NT gone) before this is implemented.. could we make support for the protocoll modificatios a highly non-standard, difficult to install patch? (Linus/Apache Team save us! )

Can will hurt Bertelsmann (boycotts?). How can I make shure I don't buy anyhting that comes thourgh them? Would someone like to set up a FAQ or site on how to avoid givng them any money. Could we watch them very closly and gradually make the net anti-Bertelsmann? I notices a link to there holdings here.

Analysis?

Jeff

Hey, for whoever's interested in voicing an e-pinion, here's some interesting email addresses:

internetcontent@bertelsmann.de

info@incore.org

I imagine the addresses make it pretty obvious which address goes where, but we should probably just cc: both anyhow.

THATS RIGHT!!

BMG (Bertelsmann Music Group) owns Windham Hill Group which in turn supplies us with Yanni. The entire rating system is a secret ploy to support their evil elevator music empire. (insert maniacal laughing here).

More disturbingly (and seriously) though, take a look at exactly who this company is via their descriptive (but less complete) Company Profile or their 97/98 annual report. They have a major (~50%) stake in everything from barnesandnoble.com to AOL and CompuServe in Western Europe (the scoundrels even own The Science Fiction Book Club). I'm guessing that this ownership of almost every type of media outlet will give them some significant sway in their bid to play thought police and may be why they can make everyone jump.

THATS RIGHT!!

BMG (Bertelsmann Music Group) owns Windham Hill Group which in turn supplies us with Yanni. The entire rating system is a secret ploy to support their evil elevator music empire. (insert maniacal laughing here).

More disturbingly (and seriously) though, take a look at exactly who this company is via their descriptive (but less complete) Company Profile or their 97/98 annual report. They have a major (~50%) stake in everything from barnesandnoble.com to AOL and CompuServe in Western Europe (the scoundrels even own The Science Fiction Book Club). I'm guessing that this ownership of almost every type of media outlet will give them some significant sway in their bid to play thought police and may be why they can make everyone jump.

Here are a few thoughts on this conference...

A couple of points to be noticed:

1. This entire thing has been organized by a private "foundation". That probably means we are safe from ultra-stupid and clueless laws and regulations, since the proceedings of this conference will not have the same weight as if it was, say, organized by the EU Parliament of Strasbourg. So far, this is one good point.

2. On the other hand... the foundation in question is the *Bertelsmann* Foundation. For those of you who are not in Europe, Bertelsmann is one of the largest publisher in Germany (and also in Europe, and in the world). Think Rupert Murdoch with a German accent, and you have a pretty good idea of what Bertelsmann is. Now, this a certified Very Bad Thing (tm), since German publishers are notoriously conservative and stuck-up. And, AFAIK,
Bertelsmann is no exception to the rule, unfortunately.

That does not mean German people (in general) are
conservative and stuck-up -- just that their press is. (If you are German, don't flame me, I have very good German friends that I respect and care about -- thank you very much).

3. Another Very, Very, Very BAD Thing (tm) is the roster of "experts" that are on board. We have a *huge* bunch of politicos, law "experts" (read: clueless lawyers) and, worse than this, "law-enforcement experts" -- with a huge contingent of German people. Again, I don't want to appear critical of Germany, but we have to remember it was Bavarian police officers who prosecuted CompuServe for "porn" and also tried to block German users from the XS4LL Dutch web site and access provider because of some leftist/anarchist web site there.

Oh, and we also have a representative from... Microsoft Corporation Europe (Shock! Horror! The Number of the Beast!!) =)

On the plus side, we also have one (count them, people, "one" !) representative from the ACLU. and Esther Dyson, which, I suspect, is more interested in pushing ICANN than really defending free speech. Ouch. Click here for a complete list of experts.

In summary, we have a probably conservative foundation, putting a panel of "experts", made up of "law-enforcement officers" (policemen, to remain polite). That panel of expert is going to convene in a city and a state of Germany known for its heavy-handed tactics against the 'net and its conservative Catholicism. Draw your own conclusions (DYOC).

That does not smell good people. Not by a long shot. I'll keep an eye on this.

Just my US$ 0.02...