Spanish courts admits submission of complaint against Ley Sinde/Wert

Ley Sinde/Wert is a controversial intellectual property rights enforcement law passed in Spain last year. This blog has reported about it last year (in Swedish). Spanish internet user organisation Internautas has asked a court to look deeper into the issue of whether a state authority independent of the justice system is allowed to make administrative decisions about shut-downs of webpages. The court which received the claim has admitted the request, meaning that they will look in to the matter further. The European Parliament has previously expressed the blocking and filtering of internet connections without due judicial process is undesirable, and this office is hoping that the Spanish court will agree.

The savings on public funds for culture will not change in the Netherlands

The Dutch Minister of Culture maintains a line of saving on public subsidies for culture.

UK government wants open source software

from SME:s, nonetheless.

Strong market dominance in fibre-to-the-home connections in Spain

At the same time as it is revealed that Telefónica is the provider of 95% of all Spanish fibre-to-the-home-connections (Telefónica is the former state telecom monopolist and the third largest provider in the world, with many market shares also in Latin America) OFCOM (the British national regulatory agency for telecommunications) reveals intentions to make it easier for users to switch ISPs. Very large market shares in infrastructure dominated by a single, or even a couple, of disproportionally strong actors imposes a risk of market power abuse both in the wholesale and in the retail sector. For former state monopolies there is a relatively strong European framework for keeping back potential market abuses, for accidental monopolists less so. This office is always looking out for information about, especially, what national regulatory authorities are or are not doing to uphold healthy competition in the field of European access-to-infrastructure.

Environmentally friendly IT companies and flashdrives in the public sector

Greenpeace produces a list with information about how ecologically friendly the world's largest IT companies are. El País reports that measurements include environmental impact of production processes and energy consumption. The Register notes that many of the most prominent IT companies don't even appear on the list. This MEP notes that the issue of raw materials in hardware production is an issue (the global markets are very vulnerable to especially China choosing to invest in domestic windpower plants with their rare earth elements rather than in hardware exports for European consumers), as is the centralization of production facilities (as is shown by the disastrous effects of floods in the harddisc factories of Thailand). On the other hand, public institutions wanting to make a move for cleaner ICTs are now in a brilliant position to invest in flashdrives, rather than traditional harddrives, which will (if I'm not mistaken) be slightly more advantageous from an environmental perspective since the only really tricky element used in them would be silicon. Does anyone know more about potential environmental benefits of moving over to flashdrives?