ARTS & FARCES internet

The US-based entertainment cartel is hell-bent on putting the internet genie back in its bottle, regardless of cost and consequences—intentional and unintentional. Its latest weapon of choice to subvert democratic process and openness is something called the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP). It sounds benign, but it’s anything but.

The US participation in the agreement is ostensibly coordinated through the executive office of the president’s Office of the United States Trade Representative (USTR), but make no mistake, the US trade representative Ron Kirk takes his marching orders from the entertainment cartel.

The TPP is a secret agreement between a handful of countries that includes provisions dealing with intellectual property, specifically online copyright enforcement and infringement anti-circumvention. Unfortunately, no one really knows what all is contained within the TPP’s sections dealing with intellectual property. A 10 February 2011 version of the US intellectual property chapter proposal (.pdf; 283KB) was leaked and the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) produced a useful analysis (.pdf; 381KB) of its provisions.

Because the Obama administration has classified the TPP as a treaty, it’s not subject to congressional scrutiny. In fact, the TPP parties have agreed to reveal the final treaty only four years after ratification. In 2009, the Obama administration issued a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request denial (.pdf; 444Kb) to Knowledge Ecology International, declaring the contents of the proposed international treaty a national security secret. The George W. Bush administration similarly rejected an equivalent FOIA request (.pdf; 108Kb) from the EFF.

Last week, a group of legal academics—mostly from the US but some international representatives—sent a letter to Kirk’s USTR office demanding transparency in the TPP negotiations including release of the text and expanded stakeholder participation. The USTR response was shocking in its inability to pass the smell test. Kirk claimed the “USTR has conducted the most, active outreach to all stakeholders relative to the TPP than in any FTA [free trade agreement] previously, including, the proposed disciplines on intellectual property.” Free trade agreements, like TPP, are considered treaties and negotiated privately without congressional oversight. By way of contrast, World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) and World Trade Organization (WTO) negotiations are vastly more transparent.

Steelcase—the furniture maker—asked 100 thinkers to describe a wish for the next 100 years. Christopher Mims, writing for the Technology Review, reports that MIT Media Lab director Joi Ito absolutely nailed it in 150 words.

“One hundred years from now, the role of science and technology will be about becoming part of nature rather than trying to control it.

“So much of science and technology has been about pursuing efficiency, scale and ‘exponential growth’ at the expense of our environment and our resources. We have rewarded those who invent technologies that control our triumph over nature in some way. This is clearly not sustainable.

“We must understand that we live in a complex system where everything is interrelated and interdependent and that everything we design impacts a larger system.

“My dream is that 100 years from now, we will be learning from nature, integrating with nature and using science and technology to bring nature into our lives to make human beings and our artifacts not only zero impact but a positive impact to the natural system that we live in.”

Now if the brain trust at the MIT Press would get off its dead ass and publish Howard Rheingold’s Net Smart: How to Thrive Online as a non-DRMed EPUB ebook (as well as the rest of the Rheingold back catalog it has seemed to corral) my faith in MIT would be at least partially restored.

Since the last ice age some 12,000 years ago we’ve been living in what’s referred to the Holocene and may be entering a new epoch called the Anthropocene. In this Anthropocene era, humanity is no longer shaped by the external world; instead the external world is shaped by humanity. Our shaping of the external world naturally affects the planet’s geological record.

Globaia focuses on creating maps and other visualizations of the impact we’re having on the Earth. Earlier this month, Globia released its most recent work, an animation illustrating our collective impact on the planet by clearly showing our transportation routes and power grids.

Globia’s video animation of human impact on the Earth for Welcome to the Anthropocene commissioned for the Planet Under Pressure conference.

We think of the Earth as a water-filled planet. But that’s not so. The US Geological Survey (USGS) has created a stunning and compelling visualization of how much water there is on the planet. Not just fresh water, but all water: Salt water from the oceans, ice caps, ground water, atmospheric water (water vapor), and even water contained in plants and animals (including humans).

Earth’s total water, visualized (from USGS).

It’s a disturbing image because the dot of water stretches only about 332,500,000 cubic miles (with a diameter of only about 860 miles)—“from about Salt Lake City, Utah to Topeka, Kansas.”

In an effort to increase awareness in Germany about the disparity between people on organ transplant waiting lists and organ donors, Ogilvy & Mather Berlin created The Waiting Time Experiment. The short video shows dialysis patient Michael Stapf—who’s been waiting for a kidney for seven years—dialyzing in a concourse at the Frankfurt airport.

It’s quite disturbing to see the healthcare worker, probably a doctor because this is Germany after all, place Stapf’s dialysis needles without gloves.