Illegal fishing (IUU)

The EU rules to combat illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing

Vessel fishing illegally for Patagonian toothfish in waters south of Australia, being inspected by the Australian navy. Picture courtesy Australian Customs and Border Protection Service.
Illegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU) fishing depletes fish stocks, destroys marine habitats, distorts competition, puts honest fishers at an unfair disadvantage, and weakens costal communities, particularly in developing countries.
The EU is working hard to close the loopholes that allow illegal operators to profit from their activities:

• Under recently adopted rules only marine fisheries products validated as legal by the relevant flag state or exporting state can be imported to or exported from the EU.
• A European black list has been drawn up covering both IUU vessels and states that turn a blind eye to illegal fishing activities.
• EU operators who fish illegally anywhere in the world, under any flag, face substantial penalties proportionate to the economic value of their catch, which deprive them of any profit.
• The new EU regulation to prevent, deter and eliminate illegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU) fishing entered into force on 1 January 2010. The Commission is working actively to inform all parties on how to apply the new rules.

HP to Make the Late, Great, WebOS Open Source

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HP TouchPad HP/Palm

HP has spent the last year or so, as the new owner of the WebOS mobile operating system, alternately making arbitrary decisions about the platform's future and making sure to not release any nice hardware for it. After the company ignominiously shut down WebOS for good this summer, we thought that was it for the best smartphone platform nobody used--but today, HP surprised us with an announcement that WebOS will be going open-source.

Designed by Matias Duarte, the man largely responsible for Android's greatest achievement to date, WebOS was the ultimate fizzle: packed full of great ideas, some of which are still unparalleled and others of which are shamelessly stolen, the platform died due to unuse, misuse, and generally shoddy hardware. Eventually TouchPad tablets were jettisoned for $100 a pop and the new flagship phone, the Pre 3, was never even released Stateside. But today's announcement gives us some hope.

HP is releasing all of WebOS's underlying code to open source, meaning anyone can alter it as they choose. That could mean tons of new apps, it could mean new hardware with a newly free OS (unlikely, but possible), and it could mean a new explosion of interest in the little OS that never made it. HP will try to make this sound like a noble enterprise, helping the open-source community and whatnot, although at this point the company has absolutely nothing to lose in doing this. But we're excited that WebOS may have some life in it yet--perhaps only a kit OS, a hobby for a small community. But anyone who snatched up a $100 tablet should take another look at it--it may not be as dead as it seems.