I'm confused how the licensing of users' content is intended to work.
The site states that you own your content[1] but then on its manifesto page[2] states that all information is in the public domain. The license itself[3] is not particularly clear.
Putting information into the public domain does provide for maximum freedom in terms of how the information can be used, but that's because the copyright owner renounces their rights.
You're misunderstanding what that sentence means. In context:
3. Intellectual Property Ownership
The Software and any authorized copies that Customer makes are the intellectual property of and are owned by Adobe Systems Incorporated and its suppliers. The structure, organization, and source code of the Software are the valuable trade secrets and confidential information of Adobe Systems Incorporated and its suppliers. The Software is protected by law, including but not limited to the copyright laws of the United States and other countries, and by international treaty provisions. Except as expressly stated herein, this agreement does not grant Customer any intellectual property rights in the Software. All rights not expressly granted are reserved by Adobe and its suppliers.
The rights being referred to are rights that Adobe (and its suppliers) have in the software. Courts long ago decided that, absent specific wording to the contrary, implicit rights and obligations can be read into contracts. This type of specific wording tries to avoid that from happening.
I haven't read the rest of the document so I can't speak as to whether the EULA does indeed transfer/license your rights to Adobe, but if there is such a provision, this is not it.
The problem that I have is that it's not clear to me why you shouldn't look at it by comparing it to CD sales. The goal of Spotify isn't to capture all the pirates and leave the rest of the public paying for their music -- it's to replace other forms of music consumption.
In one sense you could compare Spotify to radio and say that it's no different to that. But it is different. On radio, I can't select any song I want to listen to. On radio, I have to listen to what's on a playlist someone else has created (often in a manner that avoids repeating a particular song). Radio doesn't replace the needs to buy a song in order to listen to it repeatedly. Spotify does. And if it's going to do that, I think it behooves them to pay more to artists (or to place some kind of restriction on the number of times a song can be played).
The last time I was discussing this (http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3047694) I was downvoted because I linked to the famous infographic which appears to demonstrate that Spotify might not earn artists much money. Supposedly, it's incorrect because it was based on data after Spotify had 'recently launched' (the data in the infographic was from 2010).
This tweet is from about 2 weeks ago. Can we now say it doesn't help artists?
(I'm an Australian lawyer and will use 'trade mark' as my preferred spelling.)
The headline of this link is misleading. An action doesn't 'violate a trade mark'. An action can infringe the rights that a trade mark owner has (the scope of those rights will be dependent on the location in which the right has been granted and where the action takes place). In common law countries, trade mark rights can refer to statutory rights (which are granted in accordance with a piece of legislation and typically require registration with a government office) and common law rights.
This document is Adobe's guidelines for use of its trade marks. Adobe is saying that, if you follow the guidelines in these documents, then you can be sure that you have not infringed any of Adobe's rights in its trade marks (or at least that Adobe won't sue you alleging that you have).
Whether a failure to follow these guidelines constitutes trade mark infringement is a separate matter. Generally speaking, a trade mark owner has the right to use a trade mark exclusively in the course of trade in respect of a class of products. What does it mean to use a trade mark in the course of trade? This means, for instance, using a particular word or phrase to identify your product. Consumers will then use your trade mark to identify your product in the course of trade (eg. 'Could I please buy a copy of Photoshop?'). An obvious rationale for trade mark rights is to protect consumers from unscrupulous merchants who might call their product Photoshop in order to take advantage of the goodwill Adobe has built up in its product.
However, not every use of a term is in the course of trade. It is not in the course of trade for me to write a Wikipedia article about Photoshop. I would argue it is also not in the course of trade to use photoshop as a verb to refer to the act of digital manipulating an image (such as by using the Photoshop product).
Why does Adobe want to prevent people from doing this? As others have pointed out, if a trade mark falls into common usage, a trade mark owner can lose the ability to register it as a trade mark (trade marks are usually registered for a period of time and must be renewed after that period) and so lose, at the very least, the statutory rights associated with that registration. This then enables competitors to use that term in their products. Good examples of trade marks that have fallen into common usage are elevator, xerox and hoover. Obviously Adobe spends a great deal of money developing and marketing the Photoshop brand. They do not want to see it become a generic term that competitors can use.
That said, usually both trade mark owners and their competitors have little interest in a term becoming generic. You don't see Microsoft going around saying that you should 'google' something. While a trade mark falling into common usage can be a bad thing from an intellectual property perspective, it can of course be a good thing from a marketing perspective. This is why the only people like to cause a trade mark to fall into common usage is the general public (and possibly journalists). So, people like Adobe pay lawyers to draft up these kind of documents to help make sure that doesn't happen.
While I practice law, I must give one of those annoying disclaimers that are part of the reason people hate us: I am not your lawyer and the above should not be treated as legal advice. If you are concerned as to whether you are infringing a trade mark, I recommend speaking to a lawyer in your local area.
I think that, while nerds are used to mentioning others via @, regular people are used to putting @ in email addresses. Frankly, I find this change frustrating (for the reason that " is not the opposite of -) but I don't believe regular people are going to have any more difficulty with +Adam than they did with @Adam.
Amazon is just about to start encouraging people to buy Android applications for the Amazon App Store that presumably wouldn't work on a webOS tablet. If Amazon are in the running, it can only be for the patent portfolio.
If Google were to clamp down on Android, why wouldn't Amazon just continue developing their Android fork? Seems like it would be a lot more effort to get webOS to where they need it to be.
So I got downvoted based on a comment that alleged the data in the graphic was wrong but provided no data to demonstrate that? The link later on the thread that does include some data shows that the songwriter (not artist) earns $0.00017 per listen.
Can someone explain how this makes the data in the infographic grossly wrong?
Sorry, why is radio a relevant comparison? When I listen to the radio, I listen to songs that are selected by the radio station. I don't get to play any song I want as often as I want. The correct comparison is not with radio but with an mp3 download. Radio didn't stop people needing to buy an album/single if they wanted to listen to a song. Spotify does.
(I also note that the amount referred to in this article is the amount given to songwriters. Not all musicians are songwriters.)
Again, Apple runs businesses (eg. Macs) that operate in some jurisdictions that their other businesses (eg. iTunes) do not. You don't need a structural separation to 'innovate', you need a structural separation to ease a sale of a business.
While they seem to be going to great pains to be genuine and upfront about what they're doing, why does Netflix need to create a separate company in order to innovate? Apple doesn't have a separate Mac and iPhone business and they seem to innovate just fine.
What really seems to be going on is that Netflix is getting ready to spin off its DVD business. That this seems so obvious makes the repeated apologies feel like an insult to our intelligence.