Here comes Open Web Next project 2.0!

es, software and/or hardware that have been discovered but not disclosed to CivicAuthority; (c) other problems. Therefore, after the UVST has been thoroughly tested in real life scenarios, we will advise its use for e-government, e-democracy and private social and political communication, but we would not support it’s use for remote voting for government elections and political primaries, for the above mentioned reasons and other reasons.

PROPOSAL DETAILS AND WORKPACKAGES

WP 1 – €200K – System Requirements

Analysis and definition of the system requirements for the construction OWN Basic and Premium as defined in Project Description section above.

Analysis and definition of the requirements of prospective end-users and content partners of the platforms. End-user requirements will be analyzed and collected about different types of end-users target demographics, and analyzed with content partners of the project, in order to define the system requirements prior to the development of the platform in the Basic and Own Premiums.

WP 2 – €1800K – OWN Basic

(See above Project Description for the basic info. Only details follow below.)

Design and development of the fruition and monetization sections of Own Basic platform, with its services: store management; monetization via ads or pay; payment systems; in-app purchase; advertising systems; procedures for filtering and verification of the submitted content app for safety and stability parameters and other parameters; API and data access policies, and other application; systems and catalogs discovery applications. Technologies used will mainly be free/open-source, open Web, HTML5, or hybrid web / native but Web-intensive. Will develop:

A Web app store for FirefoxOS
Web apps and/or native app stores for primary mobile or TV platforms, and for partnering platforms (Firefox for Android, Ubuntu Phone, Opera TV Store, ChromeOS, Chrome Web Store, etc.).,
Native multipurpose Apps for primary mobile platforms, with capacity for App Launcher (native or web), of notifications, etc.. (As in the case of Facebook Home).
Native apps or web apps for direct (or indirect via Internet or Web) wireless interaction With TV content on TV devices certified[19] Gold by DGTVI MHP standard and/or HTML5.
Other forms of dissemination and marketing anywhere anytime of the platform and its contents.

WP 3 – €1400K – OWN Premium

(See above Project Description for the basic info. Only details follow below.)

It offers a similar service and experience to Telefonica Dual Persona Service[20] but with much-higher, user-verifiable and expert-verified levels of security, authentication and privacy. Levels of service should be sufficient to enable a UVST service provider to reasonably “sale” privacy, in a financially sustainable way, with a money-back guaranteed policy of up to several thousands of dollars per user, for the coverage of damages due to the provisioning of the UVST services.

It aims to develop a set of software, hardware, procedures and organizational processesthat enable any willing service provider, to offer to ordinary non-technical citizens and businesses, access to (at least) basic internet-based mobile and mobile-2-TV end-to-end communication, media consumption and monetization service, that is affordable (~150$/year), very user-friendly, and with actual levels of end-to-end privacy, security and authentication of content, and partially communications metadata, that are: beyond state-of-the-art; fully constitutional and legal; and intrinsically and completely top-expert-verified and user-verifiable.

UVST aims to intrinsically (i.e. inherently) ensure that the actual end-to-end software, hardware and procedures running “at any given time” match that whose security, privacy and authentication levels has been very extensively assessed (paid or volunteers) by top-experts, hackers and crackers, and what’s allowed by applicable (non-secret) local laws and constitution.

The main components of UVST are: a very-cheap and thin touch device attacheable via custom case to any smartphone (CivicPods) or embedded [or integrated] in custom-modified smartphones (CivicPhones); bare-bone dedicated or compatible TV-connected devices with HD video and full HTML5 rendering capabilities (CivicDongle/Box); that are assembled in dedicated custom-built street-facing labs (CivicLabs), that also host a dedicated server room (CivicRooms); that are managed, distributed and commercialized by any willing service provider (CivicProviders), whose service is regularly certified by a to-be-established dedicated certification organization/Committee (CivicAuthority) of leading global digital civil rights organizations, also responsible for the updating of the certification specifications.

We will achieve beyond state-of-the-art mobile privacy and security by enhancing the highest-standards time-proven standard-grade end-to-end mobile & server-room security hardware, software and procedures, through paradigms of “security through transparency”, open innovation, expensive security bug bounties, continuous world-expert review and, in particular, through innovative monitoring procedures and technologies inspired by best-practice paper-based ballot-box democratic election procedures. For instance, any physical access to the server room (CivicRoom), where all service servers are located and all new devices are flashed, is physically conditional on the presence of at least 5 citizens or users randomly-selected and/or with conflicting interests. The latter idea – that was first presented in this2007 blog post I wrote and constituted the core project of theTelematics Freedom Foundation (that i founded) – has recently been solidly validated by the”2-man rule” for access to NSA server rooms that constitutes one of the 2 key improvements that the NSA Director has committed to implement in the wake of Datagate[21]. Onion routing functionality is provided to protect the privacy of non-voice communications metadata, and it is directly or indirectly provided through the dedicated devices and/or server room.

UVST is conceived for large-scale consumer or business mobile usage scenarios whereas the service provider falls under intercept legislation through warrant and logs maintenance applicable to telecom operators.

A CivicPod is a multi-function ipod-like tamper-proof touch-screen electronic device, ? the size of a average smartphone, 3mm-thin, with encryption hardware, that wirelessly connects to any mobile device, to one of more dedicated or compatible TV-connected devices which users can (1) engage in ultra-secure text and audio communications through a dedicated [or ordinary] bluetooth earpiece; and (2) display, remote-control and interact on TV, in a highly-ergonomic or immersive manner, with any Web and free-to-air digital TV content, and dedicated content. It is typically used while firmly lodged at all times into a hard external smartphone case, custom-built for most smartphone models, even when detached from smartphone, to increase form factor, reduces heat and weight. While at home, it is used with 2 hands, with 1 hand on the sofa arm-chair, or docked on a TV-frame or a Desk-keyboard docking stations.

A CivicPhone is an ordinary (Firefox and/or UbuntuPhone, and possibly[22] Android) commercial smartphone that is modified by a partnering manufacturer to host a CivicPod inside its built-in case rather that in an external additional case. It’s available in 2 Types: (Type A) embedded by a partnering manufacturer inside the internal phone case that has been slightly modified (together with its structural frame) to house a CivicPod as a fully indipendent devices facing outwards from the back of the phone; (Type B) as in Type B, but sharing the phone screen and with a physical swtich for OS switching. Interaction between the Smartphone and the “embedded CivicPod” happen the same way as for ordinary CivicPod.

The CivicDongle/Box is a bare-bone dedicated or compatible TV-connected device with HD video and full HTML5 rendering capabilities. It is a pen-drive-shaped device (or a very small set-to-box) that connects physically to HDMI and/or USB ports of most TVs, and wirelessly (Wireless HDMI, Miracast, Wifi Direct, BT 3.0, or other dedicated) connects to a CivicPod or a CivicPhone, and to mainstream commercial mobile devices via native web browser apps. It contains basic DVT-B(2) decoder and dedicated decryption and decoding[23] hardware.

The CivicLab is the assembling laboratory, sales office and administrative office of CivicProvider. They are the places in which CivicPods are assembled and tested in public view and delivered to end users, and all the encryption and decryption keys associated to each CivicPod are generated, and where the CivicRoom is located. The production processes of certain hardware components of CiviPad and CivicPhone will be subject to similar procedures and those governing the CivicLab (and likely located in the country providing the services).

The CivicRoom is a small server room inside the CivicLab, that hosts the servers providing UVSTservices, the latest version of the CivicPod/Phone firmware and approved applications, and the keys that are necessary for law officers to decrypt communications among UVST end users. The keys are not accessible to CivicLab personnel. In order to guarantee against unauthorised, unlawfull and/or uncostitutional access, any physical access to the server room (CivicRoom) will be physically conditional to the presence of at least 5 citizens (or users) randomly-selected and/or with conflicting interests, in ways similar to the security management of ballot boxes during well-run paper-based governmental elections

OWN Premium beyond state-of-the-art end-to-end security architecture, and exemplification descriptions of the end-user devices – such as the CivicPod, CivicPhone ad CivicDongle- are detailed in USER VERIFIABLE SOCIAL TELEMATICS – Project Summary (12 pages, in live mobile-friendly version with ongoing partner comments, or in PDF format without comments).

WP 4 – €900K – OWN Ecosystem: Meta-formats, techno-formats, Pilots

(See above Project Description for the basic info. Only details follow below.)

The crossmedia content developed will be mostly living room centric, and may include of video content or video channels, live or non-live, but it must have an indispensable and crucial interactive component.

Each content partner will carry outdevelopment of new content, or adaptation of existing proprietary content which will be usable, to some extent, on the 3 primary mobile Internet platforms/TV (Apple Store, Google Play, Samsung TV), but will be optimized for OWN Premium and/or OWN Premium Platforms. Adaptation will not amount to more than 50% of total work.

Each partner will be responsible for its own content, but interaction and extensive contamination will be actively promoted among content partners and content consultants, that are leading experts in their respective fields, such as: TV social engagement (Andrea Materia), transmedia storytelling (Max Giovagnoli), immersivity and augmented reality (Domenico Zungri), second-screen apps (Meway), TV production mainstream cross-media (Fremantle Media*, Wildside and Large TV cross media producers**), live performance/theater (UCLA Remap), and top-end corporate events (Fidogroup), and VJ performances (LPM / flyer). Ultimate goal will be to catalyze the energy of high-innovation media sectors the production, both short and medium term perspective, to create innovative cross media content for the living room with high-potential for monetization and/or large consumer/user base.

For a 50% of total work, content will be optimized for fruition in the form of open web apps, web apps and mobile/TV websites; and for another 50% of total work, content will be optimized for one or more of the technical features of OWN Premium and its multi-function devices CivicDevices.

Areas of application will be primarily by viewers / users from home, but also by viewers / users outside the home, as spectators on the set, and sample viewers from home.

The public premiere of the non-video component of all content developed, or derived from meta-content developed, will appear exclusively on the OWN platform for at least 6 months. The video component of developed content, instead, may be premiered simultaneously on OWN and a digital television channel of choice of the partner; except in the case in which this channel is one of the top 10 by audience in Italy ro other EU country and that is shown in a primetime TV slot, in which case it can be made exclusive for up to 36-month for that channel network.

Partners will develop formats of interactive and participatory live performances that take advantage of one or more of OWN Premium devices, such as CivicPods and/or CivicDongles for interaction and participation during, before and/or after the event. User scenario may include: audience on-stage, from home or on-the-go for a television program, theatrical performance, corporate event or other performance. Some examples:

(From home) Participation in live TV events in second screen mode, but where the “second screen” can be superimposed on the “first screen” (TV), i.e. with interaction, comments and other info superimposed on a broadcast or IP video stream.
(From home, in the studio or mobile) Active participation in decision-making or advisory with the highest levels of privacy, security and authentication, with possibility ‘of anonymity’, pseudonymity and other configurations; television programs such as web series (talk show (comments, comments anonimo, vote, …), reality (choose the winner, etc.), political (real time survey), news.
(From home) Participation with immersive Kinect-like interactions, by individual or family, by lodging the CivicPod device in the docking station of the TV frame, which enable the activation exploit the double camera for body tracking and other sensors.

Each content partner will devote at least 25% of its assets to the development and adaptation of content to be released with open license, with a license Creative Commons Share-alike,possibly with a delayed release of 6 months after the first public use (eg. before television), for Pilot, and 12 months after the end of the project, the Concept.

At least 50% of the work will be dedicated development of at least 5 Concept (proof of concept, paper format, techno-format), rather than content series Pilot (advanced prototypes, or web-centric or broadcast-centric video series).

WP 5 – €1100K – Content Development Kits & Community

(See above Project Description for the basic info. Only details follow below.)

Development of custom plugins and extension modules for content development platform (globally established and/or emerging, best if free/open-source) and experimentation of models of community development and incubation, which are instrumental to the development and adaptation of content for both platforms Own Basic and Premium, and for the primary mobile platforms.

Development tools and community activities will be centered on cross-platform HTML5-based content, especially video-intensive.

Development and testing of models, technologies and organizational practices for incubation and acceleration of partners for content development and remixing, constituted by internal teams, freelancers, spinoff or micro-enterprises.

It will follow economic paradigms of open innovation and inspired also to community development of software and hardware free / open-source software.

Development of dedicated software technologies and processes for audiovisual, cross-media and immersive production studios aimed at real-time performance, which is world-class by the following standards: support for cross-media and immersive content components, modularity and centralization of equipment, environmental sustainability and energy consumption reduction, reduction of production time and other costs.

WP 6 – € 500K – Pilot testing and validation of the solution (SS)

Approximately 100 sets of equipment will be provided free of charge developers OWN Premium, for technical tests of functionality, security, usability, and user experience. Approximately 150 will be stocked later in samples of users primarily consumer, business and government but also for feedback on the user experience and to test the user acceptance

WP 7 – €300K – Governance (during and after), Dissemination and Exploitation of research results

GOVERNANCE DURING DEVELOPMENT

Current Governance of the OWN project in this preliminary phase is exclusively by the Open Media Cluster.

OWN R&D Governance Board is the body that – starting from the date of approval of a first grant proposal for the realization of the project – will have total decision making power over the R&D phase of the project, and all R&D activities resulting from the approval of grant requests, including the appointment of the Exec.Dir. (currently Rufo Guerreschi[24]) and proposal and prj management consult companies (currently Theorema). It will be constituted by well-paid advisors of world-class expertise and independence. It will be comprised, for a majority, of individuals or no-profit institutions expert in state-of-the-art IT privacy and security mostly from a citizen and business perspectives; and, for a minority, by experts with world-class expertise in the economics of living room linear and interactive entertainment from the point of view of the content rights owners. It will be composed of 11 to 21 members. All members will obviously retain their full right to make public their dissent over decisions taken by the majority.

GOVERNANCE AFTER DEVELOPMENT

Although most of the technologies of the platform will be released under free/open-source licenses, and all those affecting its authentication, privacy and security will be at least released under a “copylefted shared-source license”, by the time the first Beta Testing of the OWN platform has begun, the governance of the resulting platform and all related IPs will be transfered to 2 governance bodies:

OWN Governance Board will be managed by 3 main Italian actors: (1) actual Italian content partners, in proportion to their direct and indirect monetization via the platform (Confindustria Cultura*, Associazione Produttori Televisivi** and OWN R&D content partners); (2) actual users of the platform (initially Altroconsumo* and/or others**), and (3) a committee of experts of digital freedom (Hermes Center for Transparency and Human Digital Rights, others), state security (Research Center for Cyber ??Intelligence) and monetization of digital contents (eg. Leonardo Chiariglione, others). Governance will be open to new partners for each category with full rights. The members of the initial proposed governance mentioned above which have not yet accepted (i.e. with * or **), have received, and will receive repeatedly from the start of the project, an offer of options for their paid (5K euros) participation in the governance, exercisable until 30 days by end of the grant financed R&D project. In case of non-acceptance, or subsequent waiver, such option will be divided among other parties representative of the same category.
OWN Privacy Governance Board (also identified elsewhere, as UVST CivicAuthority), will be appointed by OWN R&D Governance Board. It will manage the IP and trademarks, relative to the security, privacy and authentication aspects; will have veto rights on OWN platform governance decisions that affect in any substantial way the levels of security, privacy and authentication; will manage and update the certification specifications and process for User Verified Social Telematics and OWN Premium services compliant services. It will be a global dedicated body made mostly of leading individual and institutional IT security experts digital civil rights organizations – but with also consumer, authors and content rights holders associations. It is run by proceeds from certification revenue and from % of revenue generated by CivicProviders. We’ll propose membership in order to: Privacy International, EFF, EPIC, CDT, Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International, Altroconsumo, and more. Such board would be re-elected by and accountable directly to an informed sample of ordinary citizens throughdeliberative polling(™) or similar procedures.

ECONOMIC EXPLOITATION

Planned Exploitation Activities include:

Economic Analysis and strategic positioning of the economics of the project for each partner, in light of the expected changes over the next 18-30 months in the relevant markets, technologies, industry standards, technology strategies of leading players, as well as national and Community legislation in this field, in particular with respect to the freedom of the Web and the contrast dominant positions.
The Business Plan will include the identification of the market potential of the innovations developed. Economic scenarios will be analyzed and centered on a variety of business models, in the context of expected regulatory contexts. Ad-supported business models that combine both very high levels of privacy and very high levels of user profiling (also user-driven) will be analyzed.
Models of open innovation will be applied to increase the critical mass of innovation: the majority of technology, will be released with use free/open-source license (and / or “delay open source”, released 3-9 months after the first release), but at least with a shared source license to enable security review for the Own Premium. Such model is intended to promote knowledge transfer activities and stimulate a wide array of derivative innovations – between the partners, partners spinoff, as well as local leading broadcasters, mobile operators, micro innovators – to market variations of the original innovations to take advantage of unforeseen applications and market opportunities. Any patent will be contributed to Open Invention Network and/or similar organizations. More innovative licensing schemes will be evaluated to stimulate copyleft-like open innovation dynamics for UVST-compliant code[25]. Linear media and HTML5-centered innovations will be considered content and not technology.

DISSEMINATION

Planned dissemination activities include:

Organization of seminars, conferences, meetings with key stakeholders in the sector
Sending newsletter
Publication of the main results

WP 8 – €300K – Proposal Coordination

Project proposal coordination involves the management and coordination of all activities of the project by the partner. General on-site/remote partner meetings shall be held at least quarterly during the project.

OTHER GRANT OPPORTUNITIES

EU HORIZON 2020

EU 2014 upcoming grant called “Technologies for creative industries, social media and convergence.”. Mor einfo in this 2 pager PDF.

CONTACTS

Dr. Rufo Guerreschi,

CEO at Open Media Park (i.e. Tecnoconsult International Srl),

Exec. Dir. at Open Media Cluster

rg@openmediacluster.com

Mobile +39.335.7545620

Fax +39.06.60513110

[1] https://docs.google.com/document/d/1KFmOHkcEGgQfcCaX9ce8LUTpsbWvP0iTbHZzowdqQ1k/edit?usp=sharing

[2] It is possible, though not quite likely, that Google may refuse, as a anti-competitive measure, to give authorization to the smartphone manufacturer to embed Google Play in devices that offer dual persona services based on UVST.

[3]Similar to what is done by Amazon with its new support for Web app and mobile Web sites, but with promotion of optimization for Kindle and full HTML5 apps support for its store: www.techcrunch.com/2013/08/07/amazon-appstore-now-open-to-web-apps-with-one-click-in-app-purchases-in-tow

[4] It is possible, though not quite likely, that Google may refuse, as a anti-competitive measure, to give authorization to the smartphone manufacturer to embed Google Play in devices that offer dual persona services based on UVST.

[5] Uncompetitive practices by main mobile app Stores, unresolved by proper national or EU legislation, may limit such functionality.

[6] Find here, in Italian, a 30 lines detailing of our high chances of approval of the grant request.

[7] It is possible, though not quite likely, that Google may refuse, as a anti-competitive measure, to give authorization to the smartphone manufacturer to embed Google Play in devices that offer dual persona services based on UVST.

[8] http://www.forbes.com/sites/tomgroenfeldt/2013/07/04/gov-spying-boosts-swiss-data-center-revenues/

[9] Which would still leave out many vulnerabilities related to verification of the hardware, the OS updates, authentication of users. Furthermore, such solution, if widely adopted would be banned with some reason as they would not be possibile subject to court ordered wiretapping, and therefore could heavily be abused by criminals and terrorist for which there were probable cause of crimes externally acquired.

[10] Here is news of hardware backdoors in ZTE phones: http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2012/05/zte-backdoor/

[11] Blackberry gave keys to the Indian Government. What guarantees user against even detection of abuses whereby keys, even in bulk (!) are given to other individuals or institutions by rogue employees, contractors or hackers? Similar questions may be raised for Samsung Know, VMware Horizon Mobile, or even General Dynamics solutions. Solutions like Redphone, ZPhone and Silent Circle rely on the safety of the Mobile OS and the Mobile device hardware, that are known not to be trustable.

[12]My recent blog post: FBI/NSA wants to have access to end-points: UVST could ensure it can BUT with a warrant

[13] For example keyword sniffing systems, such Echelon, or more sophisticated database analysis tools like NSA ThinThread and later incarnations

[14] Here in this Wired article more on the efficiency of deliberative processes based on informed random sampled citizens

[15] From Lawrence Lessig June 12th 2013 blog post: “An FBI agent listening to a telephone call is always tempted to wander or misuse. S/he is human, and bad is in our blood. A computer sniffing for signals of crime only wanders as far as the code allows. And so the key is how and whether we regulate how far the code can wander—and do so both in law and in code.”

[16] https://freedom-to-tinker.com/blog/felten/calea-ii-risks-of-wiretap-modifications-to-endpoints/

[17] From Huffington Post June 17th: “The survey found that 45 percent of respondents approve of the president, while 54 percent disapprove. In mid-May, the numbers were essentially reversed — 53 percent approved and 45 percent disapproved. Americans under 30 flipped by 17 points against Obama,according to the poll. Half of the respondents said they do not feel that he is honest and trustworthy — a nine-point drop from last month.”

[18] Open Web Next e UVST: privacy e sicurezza sono davvero un zero-sum-game?
[18]FBI/NSA wants to have access to end-points: UVST could ensure it can BUT with a warrant

[18]

[19] http://www.dgtvi.it/bollino.php

[20] http://www.vmware.com/company/news/releases/vmw-telefonica-2-28-12.html

[21]In fact, full “2-man rule” will still need add many more techs and procedure to make as unlikely as possible conspirations by the 2 admins or other abuse to the rule, as we detailed in our server room access procedures.

[22] It is possible, though not quite likely, that Google may refuse, as a anti-competitive measure, to give authorization to the smartphone manufacturer to embed Google Play in devices that offer dual persona services based on UVST.

[23] Possibly based on webRTC and/or innovative JS streaming frameworks such ORBX.js

[24] Founder and Exec. Dir. of the Open Media Cluster, here his linkedin profile

[25] http://www.rufoguerreschi.com/2007/05/07/how-to-create-a-user-controlled-google-to-land-floss-in-the-internet-age/

OPEN WEB NEXT Interactive Entertainment Platform

UPDATE: Click here for an updated version

PROPOSAL SUMMARY

Open Web Next (“OWN”) is a €6,5M R&D project to develop a mobile and mobile-to-TV platform and ecosystem for consumer and business communication, media fruition, creation and monetization, to be controlled by Italian entertainment content rights holders, Italian consumers, world-class media technology and digital human rights experts, in partnership with global open technology leaders. It will be presented with world-class partners before September 20th 2013 as a €6.5m proposal, headed by the Open Media Cluster, to a Lazio Region EU Grant and, subsequently, as a proposal to EU Horizon 2020 and as a international crowdfunding project.

In a global market phase when all communications, business and personal, as well as all entertainment rapidly converge into a few leading mobile Internet platforms, which in turn are gradually overtaking broadcasters as gatekeepers of the TV – and when NSA surveillance disclosures have enormously raised the bar for the security and privacy of communication of citizens and businesses – Open Web Next aims to substantially exceed, through a single mobile meta-platform interfaceable and integrated with leading mobile platforms, both the security and privacy provided by best-of-breed mobile dual-persona services (Samsung Knox, VMware Horizon Mobile, or BlackBerry Secure WorkSpaces,General Dynamics) as well as the quality of user experience and the choice offered by media services likeChromeCast, Apple AirPlay/AppleTV and Samsung Media Hub, leveraging HTML5 and the open Web platform.

OWN will create a mobile and mobile-to-TV meta-platform fully interacts with and functionally extends leading mainstream mobile platforms (Android, iOS, MS), and aims to integrate and fully side with one or more open and open-Web-based mobile platforms (FirefoxOS and/or Ubuntu Phone, possibly[2] Android) and/or Amazon Store, to provide users with the following key competitive advantages respect to market leader: (A) uniquely immersive, comfortable and effective mobile, desktop and TV interaction and user experience; (B) beyond-state-of-the-art privacy, security and authentication; (C) wide choice of global content due to integration with emerging open Web Platforms, and a wider choice of Italian content expected due to the control of the platform by Italian consumers and content right holders; (D) Uniquely extensive and privacy-respecting user-profiling for ads, both automated and user-driven, and immersive living room entertainment applications, that are made uniquely acceptable to consumers by unprecedented and guaranteed levels of user privacy, and by pseudonymity-based profiling.

OWN will come in 2 versions, a more conservative OWN Basic, and a more ambitious OWN Premium.

OWN Basic will be a cross-platform entertainment content aggregation and production platform centered on upcoming Web standards (HTML5 and related) as the chosen source content development format, as well as the preferred fruition format. It will directly (through partners) and indirectly (through development kits and communities building) produce meta-content, techno-formats, formats, and pilots with high levels of immersivity, stickiness and social involvement. Although all content will be available as native or closed web apps (and stores where allowed) on all major TV/mobile platforms, it will befor the most part optimised for (and/or exclusive to) one or more of: (a) the open Web, FirefoxOS, and full-featured HTML5; (b) A dedicated HDMI TV Dongle (CivicDongle) and/or (c) one or more special capabilities and features of the OWN Premium platform and/or its devices (CivicPhone, CivicPod, CivicDongle)[3].

OWN Premium will add the ability to transfer and interact highly efficiently with any Web content on any TV and to communicate, monetize and consume media, and with beyond-state-of-the-art levels of security, authentication and privacy. OWN Premium is a more ambitious variation of the platform, with high potential for economic return, but also with high risk of consumer uptake and commercial competition. So the success of the Own Basic will be largely insulated from any failure or partial success of Own Premium.

Through dedicated innovative server-side IT infrastructure and procedures, a set of low-cost electronic end-user devices connectable (CivicPod, CivicDongle) to any TV and/or mainstream commercial smartphones, and custom-built dual persona (dual OS) smartphones (CivicPhones FirefoxOS, Ubuntu Phone and/or Android[4]), it will enable OWN Premium users to:

Display, interact with and remote-control – on any TV, and in a uniquely ergonomic or immersive manner – any Web content (linear or interactive): running on a commercial smartphone[5], any Web app and major web open platforms (FirefoxOS, Amazon, Ubuntu Phone), any free-to-air digital TV (and pay, following agreements); any standard TV or TV-connected device (i.e. universal remote).
Engage in beyond-state-of-the-art levels of privacy, security and authentication and for communications (content and metadata), data manipulation and storage, and media fruition, through a unique end-to-end mobile security architecture and platform, User Verified Social Telematics (UVST). UVST consists of organisational, procedural and technical infrastructure centered on paradigms of “security through transparency”, “security and privacy by design”, and the extensive application of pervasive ballot-box-like democratic monitoring procedures, that intrinsically and concurrently guarantee beyond-state-of-the-art high-levels of the following functionalities: user privacy, security and authenticity; ability of military and civilian security agencies to pursue criminal activities, including insider threats and abuses; content rights security.

We will achieve beyond state-of-the-art mobile privacy and security by enhancing the highest-standards time-proven standard-grade end-to-end mobile & server-room security hardware, software and procedures, through paradigms of “security through transparency”, open innovation, expensive security bug bounties, continuous world-expert review and, in particular, through innovative monitoring procedures and technologies inspired by best-practice paper-based ballot-box democratic election procedures. For instance, any physical access to the server room (CivicRoom), where all service servers are located and all new devices are flashed, is physically conditional on the presence of at least 5 citizens or users randomly-selected and/or with conflicting interests. The latter idea – that was first presented in this2007 blog post I wrote and constituted the core project of theTelematics Freedom Foundation (that i founded) – has recently been solidly validated by the”2-man rule” for access to NSA server rooms that constitutes one of the 2 key improvements that the NSA Director has committed to implement in the wake of Datagate.

A OWN Ecosystem of content, meta-content, content partner, community, tools and will be developed for both Basic and Premium. Own Basic Ecosystem will be of all kinds but mostly: both linear and interactive; mainly entertainment, infotainment and edu-tainment, cross-media and transmedia, video-intensive, designed for the highest levels of involvement, stickiness or immersivity, and primarily for live performance or interactive use in real time. Typical areas of application will be: live cross-media and transmedia TV-centric shows, programs and channels, Web TV content and channels, corporate events, theatrical performances and artistic live streaming and / or interactive.

At least 40% of total hours of work of each R&D activity of the partners will be executed in Open Media Cluster to-be-established rented dedicated facilities in central Rome.

GRANT PROPOSAL: TIMELINE AND OPPORTUNITY

It will be presented to aLazio Region “Winning Together” Grant with world-class partners before September 20th 2013 as a €6.5M proposal, headed by theOpen Media Cluster (and subsequently to EU Horizon 2020). Funds are awarded on a first come first serve basis, with proposals approved every 30 days.

The President of the Region of Lazio, the president of the public grant issuing agency, Sviluppo Lazio, and the Call manager have all been active promoters of our father project, OpeOpn Media Park technology park, since its inception in 2008[6].

The Open Media Cluster is contributing 1,5M€ of those funds to cover at least 50% of the expenses of the parnters not covered by the grant, using a part of a 3M€ donation formally committed by the Open Media Park to ensure those at least 50% of the R&D activities are physically localized in the Open Media Cluster premises in central Rome, to be moved eventually to the Park when it ones in 2016.

PROJECT DOCUMENTS

Find Below links to continuously updated versions of:

Open Next Web Proposal (General Information; objectives; description of the project and WorkPackages; list, links, and forms of the partners confirmed to date, as well as consultants and prospective partners)
User Verified Social Telematics: Details of OWN Premium beyond state-of-the-art end-to-end security architecture, and exemplificatory descriptions of the end-user devices, such as CivicPod, CivicPhone and CivicDongle.
Partners and Consulting Partners Roles, Total Expenses and Coverage (InPDF) (Role of partners; expenses for partners, WP, by type, and covers the costs.)
Other:
1. Over 55 News Clippings concerning issues OWN Base;
2. Over 150 News Clippings concerning issues of OWN Premium, UVST and related devices

ABOUT US

By early 2016, the Open Media Park of Rome will be constitute EU leading media technology park, with 46,021 sq.mts of spaces over 12 hectares of owned stunning landscape in a key location, 150M€ of private investments, and 13 world-class localizing and co-investing media partners. It will revolve around a 8,000 sq.mts. research, acceleration and educational center, Open Media Cluster, centered on next generation open Web standards (Open Web Platform, HTML5, FirefoxOS, etc.), NewTV, open innovation, user experience design, and privacy and security enhancing technologies. By adding 23 cross-media production studios, the Open Media Labs, to the 8 already existing in the adjacent media and business park, it will constitute EU second-largest media production center by number of studios, after Pinewood Studios. The Park aims to become the leader in Europe for onsite artistic and technical competencies in those sectors, and for the variety and quality of onsite professional, hospitality and entertainment services. The Open Media Cluster, already very active today, plans to shift to full operational mode at the start of Park construction by mid 2014, jump starting its 6,5M euros Open Web Next R&D project in temporary location in central Rome with tens of partners.

PARTNERS

H3G (one of the top mobile operator in the world with 78M customers, mostly in Europe).
Hermes Center for Digital Transparency and Human Rights(THE non-profit leader in Italy / technical aspects of the digital human rights, similar to EFF or Epic in the US),
Center for Cyber Intelligence and Information Security of La Sapienza University of Rome(THE leading Italian research in Cyber Intelligence and Security),
Open Media Park. By early 2016, will be constitute in Rome EU leading media technology park, with 46,021 sq.mts of spaces over 12 hectares of owned stunning landscape in a key location, 150M€ of private investments, and13 world-class localising and co-investing media partners. It will revolve around a 8,000 sq.mts. research, acceleration and educational center,Open Media Cluster, centered on next generation open Web standards (Open Web Platform, HTML5, FirefoxOS, etc.), NewTV, open innovation, user experience design, and privacy and security enhancing technologies.
Fondazione Ugo Bordoni(THE main research institution of the Italian Ministry of Economic Development).
UCLA School of Cinema, Television and Theatre Remap.
Cedeo/WimLabs (lead by Leonardo Chiariglione, co-founder and Chairman of the MPEG association),
IT Media Consulting,
Flyer /LPM,
Binario Etico,
Telematics Freedom Foundation,
Wildside
Meway
In discussion:

? Fremantle Media (the largest TV producer in the world) has already confirmed its interest and has started a final formal approval from their UK HQs. We are in active and extensive negotiations for 8 weeks withTivu/Tivusat (owned by Rai, Mediaset, LA7, the top 3 Italian broadcasters; it manages and evolves their joint satellite and IP platforms),Reply* (500M/yr Italian media IT integrator company) andNois3lab* (organisers of Mozilla events in Italy), and others.

(For more information on the current Role of partners; expenses for partners, WP, by type, and covers the costs this doc: Partner and Consulting Partner Roles, Total Expenses and Coverage (Also inPDF)

BUSINESS CASES AND COMPETITION ANALYSIS

BUSINESS CASE AS A SECURE COMMUNICATION & HOME ENTERTAINMENT END-TO-END PLATFORM

Key to the economic success of the OWN Basic and Premium platforms – and therefore of each or most of its partners – is its uptake by: (1) Italian content rights owners and key media service providers, that must be assured (a) Reasonable prospect for a critical mass of cumulative consumers of the html5 content and OWN; (b) the protection against abuse of their IP in the platform and, most of all, (b) the solidity of their role in the governance of the platform, that prevents lock-in scenarios by mobile and TV Internet platform oligopolies which progressively reduce their negotiating power over revenue share agreements; (2) Italian citizens and businesses that must be convinced by the cumulative utilities of: choice of content, quality of content interaction and, in particular, the fact that the service truly offers unprecedented levels of actual levels of privacy and security.

BUSINESS CASE AS A UNIQUE SECURE/PRIVATE COMMUNICATION SERVICE FOR CITIZENS, BUSINESS AND SECURITY AGENCIES

Some recent news. Gigaom sees an emerging gap market of ultra-secure mobile devices (and related cloud services) after the demise of Blackberry and the security doubt in regards to iOS and Android in the wake of Datagate. As of early sep 2013, Mozilla and OpenPGP have started collaborating with Deutsche Telekom – that declared to aim at providing NSA-proof email service in Germany – to embed openPGP infrastructure in both the client and server sides, obviously higher levels of security than just on the server-side and transit. NSA can spy on data and voice on almost all Android, iOS and Blackberry smartphones, and the risk of being discovered and the cost person per minute of interception seems to be very low.

Recent market reports, that argue that consumer and businesses are predicted to move away from US cloud services at the tune of tens of billions or even $180bn according to Forrester Research, and thegreat market opportunity that Gigaom sees for Ubuntu Phone (+ Ubuntu One), which we’d extend to FirefoxOS + Mozilla cloud services, and possibly to Android[7] device makers and/or mobile operators.

“Encryption works. Properly implemented strong crypto systems are one of the few things that you can rely on. Unfortunately, endpoint security is so terrifically weak that NSA can frequently find ways around it.”

Edward Snowden, in a recent interview.

Brazil Is designing an anti-NSA Email System for its institutions and for any business; Deutsche Telekom is building private NSA proof email system for Germany-to-Germany emails; India plans to outlaw US-based emails for governmental use. Under a new feb 2013 law, of dubious constitutionality, Italian state security agencies have made 300K info requests to private ICT providers without a warrant.

Our unique value proposition in terms of privacy that we would:
OWN Premium (UVST) aims to offer a user-friendly communication/entertainment service that, for under 100-200€/person/year, raises manifolds the costs per minute per person, in terms of money and the risks of being discovered – that both private and state actors would have to incur to operate continuous, or intermittent, unlawful or unconstitutional interception (and storage) of a citizen, business and public official communications.

Business Case for Mobile OS, Mobile Network, and/or Cloud Providers

Through OWN Premium, and UVST, Mobile OS makers, cloud providers, mobile operators and/or non-US cloud providers could seize the great market opportunities emerging in the wake of the NSA surveillance scandal.

OWN Premium, based on UVST, would be appealing not only to consumers but also to businesses since, in the case of company-provided telephones, as in typical dual persona use cases (like Telefonica Dual Persona Service, Blackberry Balance and similar), the secure UVST space would be fully controlled by the company instead of the user, although in this case the company would have much higher levels of security and privacy than those provided by other dual persona device and device+cloud services.

We believe that, in particular, that many security conscious consumers and businesses, will move away from current main providers that are mostly US-based and/or too involved in the US market, towards providers that locate their operations (and possibly HQs) in privacy-respecting countries[8], BUT ALSO provide very-high and inherently independently end-to-end services. After all, the scandal is as much about NSA, as it is about the overall organizational settings and security procedures in place to prevent abuse (including information leaking).

Open-source or open process IT players (ubuntu, Mozilla, etc) could leverage the unique openness of their development process and the security expertise of their communities, by providing, via dual-persona-type scenarios, truly end-to-end mobile and cloud services that are resistant to abuses by the strongest external and internal hacking threats, including rogue and/or unconstitutional NSA activities while remaining constitutional “and legal” in the US, and fully-legally compliant with most European interception legislations.

In fact, device and server/cloud security and privacy are thoroughly linked, you cannot secure one without securing the other, unless you are have in place a P2P solution that includes OS and hardware[9]. World expert Bruce Schneier declared to NBC how even having a perfect NSA-proof messaging, email or cloud services, would still leave users vulnerable to their mobile own devices. Hacking a cloud service is more practical, but doing it for device in a large scale is also very easy and cheaply for thousands or millions, by a large number of private and public criminal entities. In addition, many high security mobile devices in the market, even “dual persona” (i.e. dual OS) mobile devices for mission-critical use, that provide for a separated ultra-secure environment (controlled by the user or its company) , have been known to have many vulnerabilities, while many other fundamental hardware related vulnerabilities are possible and probable, given precedent of hardware backdoors[10].

Q: Why would an end-to-end solution aimed at consumer-privacy centered appeal to businesses? A: For most companies “privacy=security”, the privacy of their data and communications is their primary security concern; 2. With trends like BYOD (Bring-your-own-device) and BYOC (bring-your-own-cloud service) the easy availability of (as in Dropbox, etc), it is crucial to enable workers to use a single device commercial device for personal use and for ultra-secure business use (dual-persona). Problem is that even the highest-grade dual persona mobile solutions available today do not give adequate guarantees on the device[11] AND on the server sides, which we aim to fix.

Business Case for use by high-worth businesses and individuals

UVST will be of great value to ordinary citizens and businesses that are even moderately security or privacy conscious: the service and devices would come cheap, and easy and would include extensive entertainment features. In fact, it is more and more widely known, that for a few hundreds of euros, or a few thousands, allows anyone – from a business or political competitor to a former spouse – through moderately competent hacker and/or a criminal connected to insiders in telecom company, to decrypt cell communications, install malware to listen to all calls, read all email, copy all documents.

UVST would be much more valuable to medium, high and super-powerful business, financial and political persons and/or companies, in proportion to the potential worth of the information the store and exchange.
In fact, while all UVST users would will still be at risk of privacy abuse through environmental spying techniques, such activities however require a comparatively very much higher marginal cost and risk of being discovered, which increases proportionally to the number of people and the length of time to be intercepted. The risk of being targeted by such environmental techniques of spying would be proportional to the economic worth of the spying of a given user to criminal actors, and they will have to protect themselves adequately from threats. But even for those powerful actors, by far the most important protection of their privacy AND security will come from the full confidence that remote and potentially continuous spying comes when their own computing device, or server infrastructure that stores data or keys, are compromised. UVST aims to provided unprecedented level o confidence in being protected from such threat.

Case for deployment within Security Agencies and Public Institutions[12]

Provided that UVST R&D project fully delivers on its aims and promise, in addition to providing means for citizens to access ultra-high privacy of communications in accordance with the constitution – it could be deployed by state security agencies and other public institutions in one or both of the following scenarios:

For their internal communications to substantially enhance their protection against internal abuse by groups or individuals of one security institution against – not only citizens or businesses – but their own institution and state institutions.
For existing and/or future legal and constitutional data mining programs[13] operated by public Security agencies. UVST could be applied (or even mandated by law) to provide fully-automatic generation of leads to possible criminal activity, through free/open-source fully-transparent user-verifiable big-data semantic and sentiment analysis software and configuration settings, that constantly analyzes the data inside the server room.
Such software would send a flag when a certain threshold of suspicious elements and connections emerge. Such flags may, under some current or future legislation, amount to probable cause sufficient for the issuance of a warrant by a court.
A fully-public process would be used to determine algorithms and software settings by a dedicated committee of international experts, elected by and accountable directly to an informed sample of ordinary citizens through deliberative polling(™) or similar procedures[14], similar to the body that would re-elect the international board that re-elects and regulates the standards the CivicAuthority of UVST.
Such functionality would allow for the full capability of analyzing all communications for suspicious activity without the huge risk of abuse and discretionality of a manual, or also manual process, as well explained by Prof. Lawrence Lessig.[15] It would concurrently radically promote both privacy AND security, by fulfilling concurrently: (A) the very legitimate need(and proposals[16]) of security agencies to have access to all endpoints, when supported by warrant; (B) the great utility for security agencies to apply the latest big data analysis techniques to help identify suspected criminal activity, and (C) protect the constitutional rights of citizens and businesses to privacy and security of communications unless a judge determines there is probable cause that justifies interception or log access.

Such use would substantially increase the actual capacity of state security agencies to fulfil their mandates, proving to a large extent that privacy and security are not a zero-sum-game. On the contrary, there are combined technical and legislative solution whereas one can strongly enhance the other.

Given the huge public opinion backlash due to the US surveillance scandal, and the consequent “privacy pressure” on US and all national governments[17], a law mandating law could be drafted as a way in accord among civil liberties associations, security agencies, and elected officials,

Provided UVST research project fully delivers on its aims and promise, we could see it possible, and surely advisable, that new legislation may be drafted (in Italy, in the US) that provides strong incentives and (progressively stronger) disincentives that all Internet communication end-points (devices and server rooms) be UVST certified (or similar).

UVST may be at the core of an offering to the Italian government to offer a solution similar to the one outlined by the Brazilian government, that will have to include devices, and related software and procedure to make any sense, given the very serious vulnerabilities of commercial phones and PC OSs and firmwares,

THE PUBLIC-INTEREST CASE OF UVST FOR CITIZENS AND CONSUMERS[18]

All democratic political systems have a constitutional foundation in the right secrecy of vote, and right to private communications, which have been and are a basic requirement

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to ensure the effectiveness of democratic process through the maintenance of a sufficiently free “market of ideas” and encourage widespread free participation formal and informal democratic citizens’ organizations and social networks.

Over the last few decades, human communications have moved from being based on face-to-face (and some post) – as they have been for centuries – to being based on remote communication based on software-driven electronic devices connected through voice and data networks, increasingly Internet and the Web.

This remote communications create both (A) an historical opportunity to make the public sphere and citizens’ democratic participation much more informed, frequent, continuous and direct and (B) a huge risk of a further worsening of the democratic effectiveness of our national and global governance systems, by disguised forms of illiberal and undemocratic social control in addition to new pervasive post-TV modes of control of formation of public opinion.

In disrespect of constitutional rights, laws in all western countries allow companies to market and distribute computers, electronic devices and telematic services, that are blatantly exposed to the illegal security, privacy and authentication rights breaches by one or more of the following: IT companies, governmental agencies, network operators or criminal groups, or just as well by sub-groups or individuals within such entities.

You may argue that such risks have been around since the times of postage and telephone, but what has changed dramatically during the last 2 decades is the hugely decreased cost per person and per minute of such communications rights breaches, and the concurrent greatly reduced ability of police and judiciary to prevent or even ascertain such breaches.

At the same time, since virtually unbreakable secure operating systems and encrypted communication software and protocols are widely available throughout the world to criminal individuals and groups (including entities illegally and/or unconstitutionally mass abusing citizens privacy). They can communicate via voice or text Internet communications with a very very low possibility of even (legal) military or NSA agencies to decrypt, or even detect such communications about illegal activities.

Use of UVST for political participation through public or private deployments: Even after UVST will have been successfully used by thousands of end users, reviewed by many paid and unpaid security experts, and bounty reward has been not been awarded for months, there is still some possibility that: (a) even the strongest and longest-standing protocols may have become breakable, at affordable per-person cost, by some powerful third party, through already-developed, but undisclosed, computers technologies (quantum computing, etc) and algorithms; (b) the solutions has critical flaws in procedures, software and/or hardware that have been discovered but not disclosed to CivicAuthority; (c) other problems. Therefore, after the UVST has been thoroughly tested in real life scenarios, we will advise its use for e-government, e-democracy and private social and political communication, but we would not support it’s use for remote voting for government elections and political primaries, for the above mentioned reasons and other reasons.

PROPOSAL DETAILS AND WORKPACKAGES

WP 1 – €200K – SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS

Analysis and definition of the system requirements for the construction OWN Basic and Premium as defined in Project Description section above.

WP 2 – €1800K – OWN BASIC

(See above Project Description for the basic info. Only details follow below.)

A Web app store for FirefoxOS
Web apps and/or native app stores for primary mobile or TV platforms, and for partnering platforms (Firefox for Android, Ubuntu Phone, Opera TV Store, ChromeOS, Chrome Web Store, etc.).,
Native multipurpose Apps for primary mobile platforms, with capacity for App Launcher (native or web), of notifications, etc.. (As in the case of Facebook Home).
Native apps or web apps for direct (or indirect via Internet or Web) wireless interaction With TV content on TV devices certified[19] Gold by DGTVI MHP standard and/or HTML5.
Other forms of dissemination and marketing anywhere anytime of the platform and its contents.

WP 3 – €1400K – OWN PREMIUM

(See above Project Description for the basic info. Only details follow below.)

It offers a similar service and experience to Telefonica Dual Persona Service[20] but with much-higher, user-verifiable and expert-verified levels of security, authentication and privacy. Levels of service should be sufficient to enable a UVST service provider to reasonably “sale” privacy, in a financially sustainable way, with a money-back guaranteed policy of up to several thousands of dollars per user, for the coverage of damages due to the provisioning of the UVST services.

It aims to develop a set of software, hardware, procedures and organizational processesthat enable any willing service provider, to offer to ordinary non-technical citizens and businesses, access to (at least) basic internet-based mobile and mobile-2-TV end-to-end communication, media consumption and monetization service, that is affordable (~150$/year), very user-friendly, and with actual levels of end-to-end privacy, security and authentication of content, and partially communications metadata, that are: beyond state-of-the-art; fully constitutional and legal; and intrinsically and completely top-expert-verified and user-verifiable.

UVST aims to intrinsically (i.e. inherently) ensure that the actual end-to-end software, hardware and procedures running “at any given time” match that whose security, privacy and authentication levels has been very extensively assessed (paid or volunteers) by top-experts, hackers and crackers, and what’s allowed by applicable (non-secret) local laws and constitution.

We will achieve beyond state-of-the-art mobile privacy and security by enhancing the highest-standards time-proven standard-grade end-to-end mobile & server-room security hardware, software and procedures, through paradigms of “security through transparency”, open innovation, expensive security bug bounties, continuous world-expert review and, in particular, through innovative monitoring procedures and technologies inspired by best-practice paper-based ballot-box democratic election procedures. For instance, any physical access to the server room (CivicRoom), where all service servers are located and all new devices are flashed, is physically conditional on the presence of at least 5 citizens or users randomly-selected and/or with conflicting interests. The latter idea – that was first presented in this2007 blog post I wrote and constituted the core project of theTelematics Freedom Foundation (that i founded) – has recently been solidly validated by the”2-man rule” for access to NSA server rooms that constitutes one of the 2 key improvements that the NSA Director has committed to implement in the wake of Datagate[21]. Onion routing functionality is provided to protect the privacy of non-voice communications metadata, and it is directly or indirectly provided through the dedicated devices and/or server room.

A CivicPod is a multi-function ipod-like tamper-proof touch-screen electronic device, ? the size of a average smartphone, 3mm-thin, with encryption hardware, that wirelessly connects to any mobile device, to one of more dedicated or compatible TV-connected devices which users can (1) engage in ultra-secure text and audio communications through a dedicated [or ordinary] bluetooth earpiece; and (2) display, remote-control and interact on TV, in a highly-ergonomic or immersive manner, with any Web and free-to-air digital TV content, and dedicated content. It is typically used while firmly lodged at all times into a hard external smartphone case, custom-built for most smartphone models, even when detached from smartphone, to increase form factor, reduces heat and weight. While at home, it is used with 2 hands, with 1 hand on the sofa arm-chair, or docked on a TV-frame or a Desk-keyboard docking stations.

A CivicPhone is an ordinary (Firefox and/or UbuntuPhone, and possibly[22] Android) commercial smartphone that is modified by a partnering manufacturer to host a CivicPod inside its built-in case rather that in an external additional case. It’s available in 2 Types: (Type A) embedded by a partnering manufacturer inside the internal phone case that has been slightly modified (together with its structural frame) to house a CivicPod as a fully indipendent devices facing outwards from the back of the phone; (Type B) as in Type B, but sharing the phone screen and with a physical swtich for OS switching. Interaction between the Smartphone and the “embedded CivicPod” happen the same way as for ordinary CivicPod.

The CivicDongle/Box is a bare-bone dedicated or compatible TV-connected device with HD video and full HTML5 rendering capabilities. It is a pen-drive-shaped device (or a very small set-to-box) that connects physically to HDMI and/or USB ports of most TVs, and wirelessly (Wireless HDMI, Miracast, Wifi Direct, BT 3.0, or other dedicated) connects to a CivicPod or a CivicPhone, and to mainstream commercial mobile devices via native web browser apps. It contains basic DVT-B(2) decoder and dedicated decryption and decoding[23] hardware.

The CivicLab is the assembling laboratory, sales office and administrative office of CivicProvider. They are the places in which CivicPods are assembled and tested in public view and delivered to end users, and all the encryption and decryption keys associated to each CivicPod are generated, and where the CivicRoom is located. The production processes of certain hardware components of CiviPad and CivicPhone will be subject to similar procedures and those governing the CivicLab (and likely located in the country providing the services).

The CivicRoom is a small server room inside the CivicLab, that hosts the servers providing UVSTservices, the latest version of the CivicPod/Phone firmware and approved applications, and the keys that are necessary for law officers to decrypt communications among UVST end users. The keys are not accessible to CivicLab personnel. In order to guarantee against unauthorised, unlawfull and/or uncostitutional access, any physical access to the server room (CivicRoom) will be physically conditional to the presence of at least 5 citizens (or users) randomly-selected and/or with conflicting interests, in ways similar to the security management of ballot boxes during well-run paper-based governmental elections

WP 4 – €900K – OWN ECOSYSTEM: META-FORMATS, TECHNO-FORMATS, PILOTS

(See above Project Description for the basic info. Only details follow below.)

Areas of application will be primarily by viewers / users from home, but also by viewers / users outside the home, as spectators on the set, and sample viewers from home.

(From home) Participation in live TV events in second screen mode, but where the “second screen” can be superimposed on the “first screen” (TV), i.e. with interaction, comments and other info superimposed on a broadcast or IP video stream.
(From home, in the studio or mobile) Active participation in decision-making or advisory with the highest levels of privacy, security and authentication, with possibility ‘of anonymity’, pseudonymity and other configurations; television programs such as web series (talk show (comments, comments anonimo, vote, …), reality (choose the winner, etc.), political (real time survey), news.
(From home) Participation with immersive Kinect-like interactions, by individual or family, by lodging the CivicPod device in the docking station of the TV frame, which enable the activation exploit the double camera for body tracking and other sensors.

WP 5 – €1100K – CONTENT DEVELOPMENT KITS & COMMUNITY

(See above Project Description for the basic info. Only details follow below.)

Development tools and community activities will be centered on cross-platform HTML5-based content, especially video-intensive.

Development and testing of models, technologies and organizational practices for incubation and acceleration of partners for content development and remixing, constituted by internal teams, freelancers, spinoff or micro-enterprises.

It will follow economic paradigms of open innovation and inspired also to community development of software and hardware free / open-source software.

Development of dedicated software technologies and processes for audiovisual, cross-media and immersive production studios aimed at real-time performance, which is world-class by the following standards: support for cross-media and immersive content components, modularity and centralization of equipment, environmental sustainability and energy consumption reduction, reduction of production time and other costs.

WP 6 – € 500K – PILOT TESTING AND VALIDATION OF THE SOLUTION (SS)

WP 7 – €300K – GOVERNANCE (DURING AND AFTER), DISSEMINATION AND EXPLOITATION OF RESEARCH RESULTS

GOVERNANCE DURING DEVELOPMENT

Current Governance of the OWN project in this preliminary phase is exclusively by the Open Media Cluster.

OWN R&D Governance Board is the body that – starting from the date of approval of a first grant proposal for the realization of the project – will have total decision making power over the R&D phase of the project, and all R&D activities resulting from the approval of grant requests, including the appointment of the Exec.Dir. (currently Rufo Guerreschi[24]) and proposal and prj management consult companies (currently Theorema). It will be constituted by well-paid advisors of world-class expertise and independence. It will be comprised, for a majority, of individuals or no-profit institutions expert in state-of-the-art IT privacy and security mostly from a citizen and business perspectives; and, for a minority, by experts with world-class expertise in the economics of living room linear and interactive entertainment from the point of view of the content rights owners. It will be composed of 11 to 21 members. All members will obviously retain their full right to make public their dissent over decisions taken by the majority.

GOVERNANCE AFTER DEVELOPMENT

OWN Governance Board will be managed by 3 main Italian actors: (1) actual Italian content partners, in proportion to their direct and indirect monetization via the platform (Confindustria Cultura*, Associazione Produttori Televisivi** and OWN R&D content partners); (2) actual users of the platform (initially Altroconsumo* and/or others**), and (3) a committee of experts of digital freedom (Hermes Center for Transparency and Human Digital Rights, others), state security (Research Center for Cyber Intelligence) and monetization of digital contents (eg. Leonardo Chiariglione, others). Governance will be open to new partners for each category with full rights. The members of the initial proposed governance mentioned above which have not yet accepted (i.e. with * or **), have received, and will receive repeatedly from the start of the project, an offer of options for their paid (5K euros) participation in the governance, exercisable until 30 days by end of the grant financed R&D project. In case of non-acceptance, or subsequent waiver, such option will be divided among other parties representative of the same category.
OWN Privacy Governance Board (also identified elsewhere, as UVST CivicAuthority), will be appointed by OWN R&D Governance Board. It will manage the IP and trademarks, relative to the security, privacy and authentication aspects; will have veto rights on OWN platform governance decisions that affect in any substantial way the levels of security, privacy and authentication; will manage and update the certification specifications and process for User Verified Social Telematics and OWN Premium services compliant services. It will be a global dedicated body made mostly of leading individual and institutional IT security experts digital civil rights organizations – but with also consumer, authors and content rights holders associations. It is run by proceeds from certification revenue and from % of revenue generated by CivicProviders. We’ll propose membership in order to: Privacy International, EFF, EPIC, CDT, Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International, Altroconsumo, and more. Such board would be re-elected by and accountable directly to an informed sample of ordinary citizens throughdeliberative polling(™) or similar procedures.

ECONOMIC EXPLOITATION

Planned Exploitation Activities include:

Economic Analysis and strategic positioning of the economics of the project for each partner, in light of the expected changes over the next 18-30 months in the relevant markets, technologies, industry standards, technology strategies of leading players, as well as national and Community legislation in this field, in particular with respect to the freedom of the Web and the contrast dominant positions.
The Business Plan will include the identification of the market potential of the innovations developed. Economic scenarios will be analyzed and centered on a variety of business models, in the context of expected regulatory contexts. Ad-supported business models that combine both very high levels of privacy and very high levels of user profiling (also user-driven) will be analyzed.
Models of open innovation will be applied to increase the critical mass of innovation: the majority of technology, will be released with use free/open-source license (and / or “delay open source”, released 3-9 months after the first release), but at least with a shared source license to enable security review for the Own Premium. Such model is intended to promote knowledge transfer activities and stimulate a wide array of derivative innovations – between the partners, partners spinoff, as well as local leading broadcasters, mobile operators, micro innovators – to market variations of the original innovations to take advantage of unforeseen applications and market opportunities. Any patent will be contributed to Open Invention Network and/or similar organizations. More innovative licensing schemes will be evaluated to stimulate copyleft-like open innovation dynamics for UVST-compliant code[25]. Linear media and HTML5-centered innovations will be considered content and not technology.

DISSEMINATION

Planned dissemination activities include:

Organization of seminars, conferences, meetings with key stakeholders in the sector
Sending newsletter
Publication of the main results

WP 8 – €300K – PROPOSAL COORDINATION