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We live in a very competitive age. From resources to jobs — and jobs to money — everyone is competing for it in one way or another. Once we grasp a career, most of the money we earn is dependent on what kind of education we gathered throughout our academic career (that piece of paper, i.e: degree, diploma, certificate etc).

Not everyone gets to afford or attain all levels of education or knowledge – so the question arises – is there a possibility for such individuals, or the society in general, to obtain similar information at ease — and for free?

Thanks to technology and multiple levels of investment from academic institutions — the answer is yes, and… no.

The good news is: you can now learn all content taught in a (for example) Liberal Arts Degree online; for free – but, by learning the content yourself. Detailed lessons, powerpoint presentations, assignments, syllabus, book references, and tests are posted on participating university’s website – you can download them as one pre-packaged course and learn it yourself. Some universities are better than others with video demonstrations – but this approach is more of a ‘free viewership of an archived class’ – available to everyone.

The bad news is: you can’t really “earn” an official degree/diploma/certificate by learning these courses yourself. You can learn the content and probably can do a better job than the prof who designed the course, but you can’t really get that ‘paper’ without paying the university. The main point of this approach is to have content available – so that at least information is accessible by all; meanwhile, regulation and recognition of the content will be the university’s responsibility. Universities will provide official paperwork to those who successfully go through their exclusive system — that’s how they get paid.

If your company doesn’t care about a piece of paper and appreciates application of knowledge through exposure of information – you might as well get down to studying these courses. The courses span from engineering to biology and other desired fields.

Check out this link for a list of online websites offering free education (Some highlights: MIT, iTunes, Khan Academy, etc.)

Curiosity leads to another question — should one even bother attaining free education content provided with assignment and tests – prepared by professionals?
– I say, what’s stopping you? Information is knowledge – knowledge is power, and power is change — and change is always good. Go for it, I know I am.

Source#1: Gizmodo

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Don’t be scared by the picture above; let’s talk about what some of us might and might not know about, The Canadian Copyright Law (Modernization Act: Bill C-11).

Most of the developed countries use several forms of legislation to protect people and their creative works. One such ruling comes in a form of a copyright law. A ‘federal statute’ (governmental paper-based or written authority) known as “Copyright Act of Canada” is the governing body that protects copyright laws within Canada [WikiPedia]. There have been several ‘revisions’ of the copyright law which came in the form of bills. Bill C-11 is the latest revision which updates or ‘modernizes’ the current set of laws to protect consumers and copyright holders simultaneously.

All provisions about the the copyright law can be read here [WikiPedia].

What does it mean for DOWNLOADING and YOU (after the bill has passed)?

What’s the main point of all this?
- to stop people from downloading through torrents and ‘seeding’ files. Commercial liabilities are being added for people who sell illegal copies of these downloads in stores, or privately.

Can I download anything I want?
- Yeah, but it all comes down to how you are downloading and what you are doing with it. There are several ways to download or share files these days: torrents, file-sharing websites, newsfeeds, WaRez, VPN (proxy) etc. Torrents can be easily tracked and monitored unless you protect yourself through multiple VPN (proxy) variants [in many instances, even they are traceable]. If you download a copyrighted file, you are required to delete it within a specific amount of time, and not share it for commercial purposes (i.e: sell or re-distribute without owner’s consent). If its a file that had a ‘digital lock’ on it, then its copyright holder is protected. Breaking this ‘digital lock’ is now considered ILLEGAL – the one who started the distribution and broke the lock will be held liable along with those who ‘seeded’ even bits or pieces of the file (happens via torrents).

So, who is specifically liable (responsible) and who isn’t?
- Person(s) doing illegal distribution of the copyrighted material, and commercializing on those assets — will be held liable. It could be an individual(s) or a company(s). Your Internet Service Provider (ISP), Search Engine (like Google, bing, etc), or cloud-computing storage websites (RapidShare, Google Drive, SkyDrive, Dropbox) will not be held liable for influencing infringement of content, however, they are liable to correspond with court orders to give out information on IP addresses/accounts – that would help the process of litigation on the people involved with illegal distribution.

What will happen if I’m accused of torrenting and downloading/sharing a copyrighted file?
- This is a step by step process.

• A copyright holder would send notification to the ISP or search engine in a prescribed format identifying an electronic location to which a claimed infringement relates.
• The ISP would forward this notification to the subscriber (person at the electronic location, aka you).
• The ISP or search engine must store the subscriber’s IP information for 6 months, or a year if a court action results from the infringement.
• The ISP may be liable to statutory damages of $5,000 to $10,000 if it fails to comply with these provisions.
  [Source: UBC]

We still don’t know the length of these proceedings, who else could be involved, what are the consumer rights or how consumers can get help. What we do know is what ‘criteria’ would be used to determine that a person is at fault — each situation will be evaluated on a case by case scenario, and will go through the ’6 step criteria’:
the purpose of the dealing; the nature of the dealing; the amount of the dealing; alternatives to the dealing; the nature of the work; and, the effect of the dealing on the work.

What are the penalties or monetary damages?
- “Statutory damages for copyright infringements with non-commercial purposes have been reduced from the current $500 to $20,000 per work infringed, to $100 to $5,000 for all infringements in a single proceeding for all works (not for each work infringed). The current range continues to apply to cases of infringement for commercial purposes only.”
[Source: UBC]

Is there any good news for consumers?
- Not a lot, but here are some rights given to consumers as of this act:

• You could splice (cut/copy) scenes from copyrighted videos and movie trailers to create a fan-made trailer, research, critique, review, or video and distribute it on the Internet
  … that is also subject to certain conditions:
  e.g. the source and author HAS to be identified, legality of the original work or the copy used, absence of a substantial adverse effect on the exploitation of the original work.
• You could copy a song purchased from iTunes from your computer to your iPod.
  … that is also subject to certain conditions:
  e.g: you cannot reproduce a copy for private use on CD-Rs and Mini-Discs. It has to stay within one “audio medium” to another; meaning a device that plays music (computer) to another device that plays music (iPod). CD or Mini-discs are ‘received’ as inputs by media players. (wow, unbelievable lol)
• You can record a show on your PVR to watch at a later time.
  … is also subject to exceptions:
  e.g: You cannot record on-demand service, or to works protected by digital locks.
• You can take a photograph and be deemed as its author. Prior to this ruling, company (or person) who “commissioned” the rule was deemed as an author.
  [Source: UBC & Mondaq]

Any other stakeholders?
- The focus has been primarily on education institutions, copyright holders, and specific rights provided to consumers – all details can be read through the sources below. But the information laid out above is pretty much what you need to know.

A bit of my rant now. In one way some of these rulings are completely absurd which totally harm the way things are shared online. But in realistic terms, I don’t think companies will go after perpetrators who are involved in petty sharing amongst friends etc. It’s only when things go out of hand (creating illegal sharing networks, selling pirated copies and monetizing on those factors) – that’s the only time when these people will be subject to court visits. But it should make you wonder “WHY” people start pirating in the first place? Maybe ‘consumable media’ is a bit too expensive and needs to be re-thought out? NO one focuses on that, all they want to focus on is their deep pockets and the rights they can enforce on normal consumers like us.

Source: CDMN
Source: Wikipedia
Source: PARL (actual bill)
Source: HuffingtonPost
Source: UBC
Source: Mondaq

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Engineers and researchers in UK are about to turn another crazy sci-fi idea into reality. Bionic Bees.

Scientists have always fancied the idea of Artificial Intelligence, but many have either failed to create one or just found it too difficult to program one – since sophisticated animals were used as test subjects to be replicated.

These folks used a different approach: use simpler ‘beings’ like insects, who carry a lot less set of instructions within them.

The idea is to upload a bee’s brain into a robot. With limited amount of instructions, they are aiming their robots to work on ‘instinct’ rather than programmed algorithms. The core components of the brain consists of uploading algorithms designed around sense of sight and smell, which would be required to act like a normal insect and be accepted by the environment.

Afterwards, researchers want to use these mini robots for time-critical missions (like searches, rescues, etc) as well as one day eventually replacing conventional bees (which might be close to extinction? not sure about that one).

The project is called “Green Brain” – funded by IBM and U.K.’s Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council — for approximately $1.6 MILLION USD. We can expect to see buzzing bees by 2015.

Anyway, the point is to gain an upper hand on A.I research by creating models presented by these soon-to-be ‘natural robots’. If you think about it deeply (and ofcourse believe in such things), maybe all life on this planet was also developed this way by the ‘Creator of all things’ – slowly but surely — in small steps.

Source: CNET