Microsoft has made a step (ish, sorta) to providing interoperability documentation available, and supporting standards. Whilst MS finally getting its backside into gear (its only taken them 4 years to start to adhere to the EC's ruling) is good, many many people have noted they've said this before, and the EC in particular remains sceptical (he Commission notes that today's announcement follows at least four similar statements by Microsoft in the past on the importance of interoperability).
I'd be happy if MS actually released useful documentation. I'd be even more happy if they follow through with adhering to standards; not MS defined de facto standards, but ISO standards. W3C standards. The ones everyone else in the computing field have agreed to and use.

Whilst this possibly good news happened, possibly bad news occurred here. Our government is suggesting that legislation be brought in to force ISPs to cooperate with the MAFIAA, err, sorry, "creative content industry".
Argh.
The music/film industries' current model is broken. The government should in no way, shape or form be supporting it. This bleating about "lost sales due to piracy! WAAGHH!" is bullshit.

For example, Joe Public spent, in the past, £100 a month on movies and CDs. Joe Public now has a Wii. He enjoys playing Wii games with his kids, and so buys more games. He still only has £100 a month to spend on entertainment, so he'll have to cut back on the CDs and DVDs. Net result? The movie/music industries see lower sales.

Do they just not see that? People enjoy games more. They therefore spend more money on games, not buying as many CD/DVDs as before. Thats simple economics.

People have also woken up to the fact that most of the "content" the industries put out isn't worth it any more. The money either goes to the wrong people (the middleman rather than the creative person) or its so bad and bland it just simply isn't worth the cost any more.

I look forward to the first disconnection. I also look forward to the ensuing legal battle for the wide variety of offences caused by the ISP/BPI/HMG.

The Government white paper on disconnecting P2P users from the Net. One news outlet correctly described the proposal; toilet paper.

Why do non-technical people try to make technical decisions without first consulting the technical people? Then complain loudly its all the technical people's fault (the government haven't got to this bit yet)

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/7246403.stm

The 2 major points in this; its illegal for ISPs to monitor what traffic is going to a user without a warrant, and there are many many legal uses of P2P (BBC iPlayer , linux distros, Napster).

Its similar to asking the Highways Agency to stop bad drivers from using the roads. Why would they do that? They just build and maintain the roads, its up to the law and police to catch the wrongdoers.

Herein lies the problem. It shouldn't be the ISP's job to monitor P2P and enforce summary judgement on a user; what if someone else used their wireless?
What about places that provide internet access, like, I dunno, libraries? Schools? Universities? Cafes? You going to disconnect all of them?
Is the ban in place on a house? Person? Given the current amount of data going "missing", I wouldn't trust the government with holding a blacklist of users.
If the ban is on a house, how long for? A student area has a really high turnover of tenants, and a really high need for the Net.

Finally, would ISPs cut off their customers? £15 a month, 12 months a year is £180. Cut off even 10,000 users and the ISPs have lost £1.8million. £1.8million. Thats assuming that everyone they cut off is using the basic tariff only; no higher ones at all.

So, are the Government going to refund this money to the ISPs? I know, how about the BPI paying them, you know the people who would really want this white paper to be passed into law.

The Government should have turned around to the BPI and said, basically, get lost. It isn't our job to help you prop up an outdated business model; you already have the tools (copyright law) to sue offenders.

The BPI, IFPI and RIAA should;

1) Not rip off the artist with < 10% royalties,
2) Not rip off the customer with stupid prices

instead of lobbying for a draconian and effectively unimplementable "solution". You're not making any friends in the british public, BPI et al. We can spot bollocks when we see it.

EDIT From el reg; http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/02/15/tiscali_bpi_agreement/