[Commons-Law] relay

Via: Pranesh Prakash

On Mon, Aug 31, 2009 at 10:04, Prashant
Iyengar wrote:
> Jagath doesn’t see any threat from piracy. “There is a separate
> readership for original and pirated books. Our clients are people who
> value the intellectual rights of the author. Piracy rarely eats into
> our sales.”

Now that's an opinion of a bookseller that did not find any
representation amongst "industry" voices at the recently-concluded CII
meeting on counterfeiting and piracy. It seems so commonsensical too.

Via: Prashant Iyengar

http://www.indianexpress.com/story-print/509166
Nitya Kaushik Posted online: Monday , Aug 31, 2009 at 0159 hrs
Mumbai : Expelled BJP leader Jaswant Singh’s controversial book on M A
Jinnah is selling not only in its original form at legitimate
bookstores, but also in pirated prints on the pavements.

Jinnah India-Partition Independence costs Rs 695 if you want an
original from Rupa Publishers. The cost of a pirated version varies,
as low as Rs 150 for those who can bargain and as high as Rs 250 for
those who cannot.

At Bandra station, outside the ticket booking office on the west side,
a street stall owner says he has not stopped selling copies for a
week. “Every morning, I get around eight to 10 copies; by 5 pm, they
are all sold out,” he says.

This vendor starts off by asking for Rs 250. “It costs Rs 700 in a big
store,” he says, but later agrees to sell for Rs 180. By 3 pm on
Sunday, he has just two copies left. He refuses to say where the stock
comes from.

At Colaba, Fountain and Churchgate, at railway stations and signals,
bargains are being sealed between Rs 150 and Rs 250. A buyer at Fort
says, “The cover and the pages are of poor quality and the print is
smudged at places, but it’s Ok for a quick read.”

At Churchgate, near Gaylords Restaurant, a vendor quotes a “fixed
price” of Rs 150. “The book is out of stock now but you can place an
order and I will get it in a day or two,” he says. He says he has been
ordering copies on alternate days and they sell out in four or five
hours. “The book is controversial and so in demand,” he says.

On Friday, when Newsline stopped at a stall peddling pirated books on
Colaba Causeway, the copies were available at Rs 200. When this
reporter bargained, the owner said, “This week we have too much
demand, but maybe in a few weeks, I can give it for Rs 100.”

Among legitimate stalls, Strand Bookstall in Fort has sold about 500
copies since August 17, said T Jagath, assistant manager. “We are
bringing in stock every second day. Immediately after the expulsion,
we sold about 200 copies. After that we have been consistently selling
100 to 200 copies everyday.”

Jagath doesn’t see any threat from piracy. “There is a separate
readership for original and pirated books. Our clients are people who
value the intellectual rights of the author. Piracy rarely eats into
our sales.”

Via: Prashant Iyengar

http://www.thehindu.com/2009/08/26/stories/2009082662961200.htm Back

National

Ban a boon for Jaswant’s book publisher

Anita Joshua

NEW DELHI: On Monday, exactly a week after the former Union Minister,
Jaswant Singh’s book Jinnah: India-Partition-Independence was
released, publisher R. K. Mehra was signing the 10th print run of the
674-page tome.

Anticipating a controversy — but not such a windfall — Rupa & Co. went
in for a large first print run. This was sold out in the first two
days. With Mr. Singh’s expulsion from the Bharatiya Janata Party on
the third day of the release of the book and the Gujarat government
banning it that very evening, it is selling beyond expectations.

Mr. Mehra has been ordering a fresh print run daily — on some days
like Monday, even more than one — and hopes that the sales will touch
the 50,000-mark by the end of next month.

“I’m very happy with the ban; it has helped sales,” Mr. Mehra told The
Hindu, while voicing the hope that better sense would prevail upon the
Gujarat government. “I hope the Gujarat government will reconsider its
decision. The notice that has come to us does not even specify what is
objectionable. All it says is that ‘we have come to know’ of the book
and its contents could be misleading and may affect tranquillity of
State.”

Constitutional expert A.G. Noorani said the Gujarat notification was
“a sitting duck awaiting the whiff of a judicial shotgun. As it
stands, the order is absurd. It is clear they haven’t read the book,
and the grounds mentioned do not relate to Section 95 of the Criminal
Procedure Code. According to this provision, State Governments must
declare the grounds on which a book is banned.”

Stating that the Supreme Court could take suo motu notice of State
Govts abusing the power to proscribe books, Mr. Noorani felt that any
citizen could approach it as banning a book challenged a fundamental
right.

Meanwhile, Mr. Mehra was not alone in admitting that controversy and
localised bans could be a blessing in disguise. Conceding the fact,
Ravi Singh, Editor-in-Chief of Penguin India, was quick to add that no
publisher could accept even a localised ban, however much it helped
sales. “Gujarat may be an average-sized market, but even if there is
one person who wants to read the book, he/she has the right to do so.”

Though India has seen a growing incidence of censorship — both state
and social — Mr. Singh maintains that this has not affected editorial
decisions. “Obviously, we do not publish anything that is
irresponsible.” Penguin last year ran into trouble with its book Rani
by Jaishree Mishra, when the UP government banned it for suggesting a
romance between Rani Lakshmibai and a British officer.

© Copyright 2000 - 2009 The Hindu

Via: Aarthi Sridhar

GALLERYSKE and Annie Paul welcome you to a talk on ‘Kingston Logic vs. The History Brush’.

The subject of the talk emanated from the theme of the Third Guangzhou Triennial -Farewell to Post-Colonialism


at Guangzhou, China 2008. The theme led Paul to wonder whether it would be possible to think of

Jamaican/Caribbean art and music in terms of post-West knowledge production.



In this presentation Paul will attempt to question whether there exists Kingston Logic in places such as Jamaica,


which are so profoundly and inextricably inflected by the West. This presentation will take a stab at tracing the

contours of what the speaker sees as important alternative ‘artmaking’, which though Western does add


something crucial to the pot of postcolonial art.





Speaker profile:



Annie Paul works at the University of the West Indies, Mona, Jamaica, where she heads the Publications Section


of the Sir Arthur Lewis Institute of Social and Economic Studies (SALISES). She is a founding editor of the journal

Small Axe (Duke University Press) and the recipient of a grant from the Prince Claus Fund (Netherlands) in support


of her book project, Suitable Subjects: Visual Art and Popular Culture in Postcolonial Jamaica. She has also been

a contributor to the prestigious Documenta11 curated by Okwui Enwezor; the AICA 2000 International


Congress & Symposium at the Tate Gallery of Modern Art, London; Meridien Masterpieces, BBC World Service;

Dialogos Iberoamericanos (Valencia, Spain), the Guangzhou Triennale and in forums sponsored by Iniva


(Institute of International Visual Art, London). Paul is author of the blog ‘Active Voice’ and

her website is: http://www.anniepaul.com/.

Date and Time: Thursday, 27 August 2009, 5:30 pm

Venue: GALLERYSKE, The Presidency 82, St. Marks Road Bangalore - 560001
Phone: +91 80 65951972 / 41120873



Please R.S.V.P with Aarthi Sridhar at +919740194008 or aarthi@galleryske.com




GALLERYSKE
THE PRESIDENCY 82
ST.MARK'S ROAD
BANGALORE 560001
INDIA


T +91 80 65951972 / 41120873
F +91 80 22238312
www.galleryske.com
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Via: Pranesh Prakash

Via: Daya Shanker

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Via: Pranesh Prakash

Via: Monica Narula

Avant-garde artist Ai Weiwei, one of China's foremost public
intellectuals, was recently detained and beaten by police when he
attempted to testify at the show trial of dissident Tan Zuoren in
Chengdu. Harassment and threats are connected, in part, to his "Names
Project," a performative intervention which aims to compile, publish,
disseminate, and memorialize the names of the thousands of children
who were crushed to death en mass in their "crumbling tofu
construction" schools (the rotten fruits of official corruption and
kickbacks) during the May 12, 2008 Wenchuan Earthquake, while
neighboring government buildings stood intact. The State has strong-
armed bereaved parents into silence, refused to investigate government
corruption, and barred the victims' names from public release. Ai
Weiwei's vocal defiance has led to his censorship, intimidation,
threats and now arrest and beating.

Having spent the first 2 decades of his life with his father, the
revolutionary poet Ai Qing, in a cadre labor reform camp for errant
intellectuals, Ai Weiwei understands that no one in China, no matter
how "high profile" is ever "safe. Thus, he has chosen to push the
State as far as he can in an attempt to reclaim the public sphere for
critical discourse, and champion the cause of free speech and genuine
citizen and human rights in China. As such, he has willingly put
himself in a great deal of danger. His recent statement merits
reposting. I hope that you will pass this on and share it with others
who believe in the need to nurture and support critical public
intellectuals, especially in places like China, where there are so few
such clarion and courageous voices.

"Watch out! Have you prepared yourself?" -- Ai Weiwei: "I am ready.
Or, perhaps I should say that there is nothing to prepare, no way to
prepare myself. A person--this is all of me--is something that can be
received by others. I offer up all of myself. When the time comes when
it is necessary, I will not hesitate, I won't be ambiguous about it.
If there is anything that I am reluctant to leave behind it is the
wondrous miracle that life has brought me. And that miracles are that
every one of us is the same, that people are equal in this game, as
well as the fantasies that come along with playing it, and our
freedom. I regard every kind of intimidation, from any kind of
'authority or power' [sic - the character is for quanli as in
'rights', but from the context this appears to be a typo, perhaps?],
as a threat to human dignity, rationality and reason--a threat to the
very possibility of opposition. I will learn to face and confront this."


Monica Narula
Raqs Media Collective
Sarai-CSDS
www.raqsmediacollective.net
www.sarai.net

Via: Pranesh Prakash

Via: Pranesh Prakash