impact
Brussels lights way ahead for Euro book digi library
Anything Google can do, we can do slower The European Union has promised a rapid reaction to the threat posed to Europe’s cultural heritage by Google Books, deploying the twin weapons of a “stakeholder dialogue” and an impact assessment.…
Continue reading »NBC sued for $2M? Fontastic.
NBC has been sued by typographic design firm Font Bureau for allegedly infringing its fonts in marketing material used to promote NBC shows. So says the Wall Street Journal . “NBC Universal is one of the more hard core supporters of stronger copyright law, with regular statements from execs that border on ridiculous,” says TechDirt , citing general counsel Rick Cotton (right) as an example.
Continue reading »Current emissions may mean 4°C temperature hike before 2100
This week, a climatology meeting is taking place at Oxford University that has a rather provocative title: 4 degrees & beyond . Most of the public policy discussions so far have focused on limiting the impact of climate change to somewhere in the neighborhood of 2°C, while many of the IPCC’s projections have focused on the impact of doubling the preindustrial levels of atmospheric carbon dioxide, which they place at a bit above that figure. However, as the UN’s climate conference in Copenhagen draws near, it’s become increasingly clear that there is little appetite for placing any hard targets on emissions, which raises the specter that some of the IPCC’s high-end scenarios may come to pass.
Continue reading »Quantifying success of science stimulus spend is challenging
The US economic stimulus package was intended to both shore up short-term employment figures and lay the groundwork for future economic growth through infrastructure and technology improvements. Science agencies were among the beneficiaries, with the National Institutes of Health getting $10.4 billion dollars, the National Science Foundation another $2 billion, and various other agencies like the Department of Energy picking up additional funding for research efforts. Obviously, the scientific community was pretty excited about the money but, since it was allocated, it’s beginning to realize that it will eventually be asked to account for how well the spending worked.
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