Formula E - First Jolt

One of the advantages of living near a race track is that sometimes you get to attend some interesting events. So it was yesterday when I went to see a new brand new Motorsport go through it's initial testing before hitting the world stage.

Formula E  is a new FIA single-seater championship. The unique selling point however is that this is the first championship where the cars will be totally electric powered.

When it was announced that they would be holding free test days at my local circuit, Donington Park,  I thought I would go and have a look and see what all the fuss is about.

The first thing that hits you as you enter the park is the amount of money spent on new Formula E facilities. Donington has been chosen as the official headquarters for the teams and in a relatively short period, new buildings have sprung up to house not only administration buildings, but also sites for the formula E teams. After the debacle of Donington parks attempt to host F1, this is a welcome boost to the park, although it does mean that its future is now irrecoverably tied to the success of an untried format.

On the plus side, it is clear that there is some serious money behind the formula. You cannot mention Formula E without being told that Leonardo Di Caprio is the co-owner of one of the teams. While his name adds a touch of glamour (go on, name a team principle of any other team in Motorsport), I'm pretty sure his technical input is probably minimal. However the list of the other owners shows a broad range of technical and high power financial backing. It is also significant that there is also a lot of backing from the emerging economies such as China and India.

The cars.

From the outside the cars look like any other single seat racing car. They do have a number of design points which make them stand out, such as the large side pods(which personally I am not sure about) on the front wings and the winglets on the sides(which are actually side impact bars). However apart from that, they could be any other formula type racing car.

It is only when they are running that you see the difference. Or to be more accurate, hear it. Compared to the roar of a V8, you get the whine of an electric engine. While not exactly silent, compared to any other sports car, it is so quiet that they almost creep up on you. One of the pit crew said that one of the issues they haver is that they do not hear them when they come into the pits, so catching the crew by surprise (Maybe the FIA will have to attach beepers to the cars when in the pit lane). They are so quiet that you hear the noises obscured on other racing cars such as the clunk as the gear slots home.

However these are racing cars and not souped up invalid carriages, so the most important factor is how fast do they go? Well on the day I visited they were completing the Donington's GP circuit in about 1 minute 35. This was an average speed of about 95 m.p.h

Comparing this with other formulas, you would find that a Formula 1 would be going at an average of 115 m.p.h, while Formula 3 would go at about 105 m.p.h. Even a historic racer such as the 1970's
Brabham BT30 can get round at 96 m.p.h.  A top end sport cars such as Porche's or Ferrari in race trim would outpace these cars by about 5 miles an hour.

So at first sight, this is not too impressive. However there are some caveats here. Firstly these were the first tests, so there is no doubt that  there is more to come from these cars. Also as part of the test they had added an artificial chicane to the circuit, so slowing the cars down. Finally unlike other formulas they will not be racing using super sticky slick tyres, instead they will only use a grooved tyre so reducing the overall grip.

Another factor is that these cars were not designed for race circuits like Donington, but for street circuits, which will be tight, twisty and without the long straights. This will be where the high torque produced by these electric engines will be at an advantage and they will not be so reliant on a ultimate top speed ( whichj is approx 140 m.p.h compared to a F1's 250 m.p.h) . If we compare it to a similar street racer such as a Caterham, the times start looking far more respectable (However it will be great to get a comparison such as a lap round somewhere like Monte Carlo).

One area where electric cars are definitely lacking however is range. A formula E car will last about 25 minutes at race speed, with the batteries requiring 45 minutes to recharge which, if happened, would be a long pit stop. To get around this, each driver will have 2 cars each and will swap at half race distance. Even so it will be interesting to see how they manage and predict the battery energy levels.

Will it be a success?

The organisers have definitely given the formula every chance, with the heavy use of social media to raise awareness. There will even be an opportunity to vote for your favorite driver during the race and in doing so provide them with a power boost. This may well in the long run prove a gimmick too far, however it does show that the organisers are not scared to think outside the box.

The drivers are no slouches either. While we will not be seeing the Hamilton's and Alonso's of this world,  the drivers signed up consist of a mixture of experienced ex-Formula 1 drivers such as Jarno Trulli, those just on the edge of Formula 1 such as Sébastien Buemi  and Lucas di Grassi and up and coming young drivers such as Nicolas Prost . Many are probably in with a chance of an eventual  F1 seat, so the fact they are racing in this formula says a lot about their confidence in the future of the sport. It is especially great to see the line up including women drivers. It is about time talented women got a chance in motorsport and it will certainly help raise media raise interest and hopefully introduce the sport to a whole new demographic.

There will be no problem viewing the sport, with the races being shown live across the world to both free terrestrial and pay per view services. There will also be plenty of opportunities for people to see it live by racing on city street circuits in some of the biggest cities in the world.

Because the cars are basically identical, the racing should be close and exciting. The use of the power boost function should provide more opportunities for overtaking and I personally cannot wait to see how these torquey cars will handle the wet.

However these cars are never likely to win over the hard core F1 fans, such as the type who complained bitterly about the move from V8 to V6 and the associated reduction in decibals . Nor will it win over the Jeremy Clarkson's of this world, who feel that if you cannot smell the benzene it is not racing. Formula E instead will haveto get it's supporters from both those who feel alienated from formula 1 due to its perceived elitism and attendant high prices together with those who at present have little interest in any motorsport at all. The use of street circuits should help here since it will allow the maximum exposure to those who would normally not watch motor sport if it was run on a normal circuit.

The big test however will be the cars reliability. With 4 cars per team competing, the chances are increased that at least one or more of the cars will not complete race distance. The last thing that the race requires is it to be marred by a large number of cars being stranded around the track through reliability issues or simply running out of battery power.

Does Formula E matter? 

In the old days of motor racing, cars used to have as much to do with the normal driving experience as a firework has with a Saturn V rocket.

As the technology level increased and its attendant costs, the need for major components to be developed using the resources of large multi-national companies became paramount. As it did, just having the name on the side on the car was not enough recompense for these companies. Instead the sport became a test bed for new technology, and the innovations gradually filtering down to normal road cars. In fact one of the reasons for the move from V8 to V6's in Formula 1 was that the engine manufacturers could not justify the cost of developing technology which increasingly was out of kilter with everyday cars.

Most major motor manufacturers have some sort of electric car program. Whether you consider them a sop to the green lobby or the future of motoring is irrelevant. The fact is they represent a considerable investment and at the same time  provide lots of good publicity to the respective companies. Formula E should eventually provide an excellent test bed for such technology.

I say eventually, because the first year will be about getting the cars on the road. The cars will basically be identical, with little room for innovation. However hopefully in subsequent years the formula rules will be relaxed to allow each team to bring in different technologies to advance the car design.

I have one slight query and that is about the present sponsors. While companies such as McAfee and Qualcomm are companies with interests in high tech, they are not known in the area of electrical power.

The organisers may have missed a trick by not encouraging companies like Siemens, ABB and GE to get more involved. I work for GE and I know that they have a huge investment in electrical technology such as motors and control. I can see a great synergy in  GE's use of technology and Formula E, such as the use of advanced prognostics and data gathering technology. This makes even more sense when you consider Formula E will be of great interest in emerging markets such as China and India, both places where GEis trying to expand.

Maybe that is for next year, once the race format and technology has proved itself. It is easy to foresee that there will be a lot of teething problems in the first year of competition, but hopefully we will also see some great racing around some of the greatest cities in the world.

So will it work?

While at the race track I took a very unscientific straw poll about how the spectators felt about the cars and the racing. Without exception the reactions were positive. Of course it is possible that these were the already converted, but it does show that there is an audience

For myself I cannot wait for the series to begin in September. I have already tied my colours to the mast by supporting the Amlin Aguri team on the very superficial basis that they have the nicest looking car and were definitely the most welcoming in the pits.

At the very least it promises an interesting year ahead. At it's best I may have seen the start of a revolution in Motorsport

The evolution of Electric vehicles 

Copy right or copy wrong?

Recently I had a phone call from someone I knew. After a few pleasantries they hit me with a bombshell. They accused me of stealing work that was to form part of a new book. Basically I was being accused of being a copyright thief!

Now I'm a guy who prides himself on being a pretty moral person, with a good idea of right and wrong, so this took me back a bit and it took a while to work out what had happened.

A few months ago I became interested in finding out some more information on a memorial for German P.O.W's in the local cemetery. I asked a friend, who put me in contact with someone in the local museum. They sent me a single page word document which contained the name of the soldiers plus a small paragraph on the causes of their death.

I decided it would be a good project to test if I could use social media tools such as blogging to gather any more information on the persons involved (Getting information on German 1st world war soldiers is especially difficult because unlike in the UK there is no central registry and probably it is not a subject they really want to talk about much). So I copied the soldiers details onto a blog page and thought nothing more of it.

That was it. No breaking in offices at midnight, No hacking of computers, no massed photocopying of illicitly gained materials. Surely I had done nothing wrong, had I?

However as a matter of interest, I decided to look up copyright law to satisfy myself that I was blameless.

Copyright Law

When it comes to copyright, we all instinctively feel we know what is right  and what is wrong .
Photocopying a book and erasing the authors name with your own, then selling the book as your work is wrong. Copying a DVD and selling it down the local market is wrong. Even copying a CD and giving it to a friend is wrong (Although if everyone who has ever done that was sent to jail, we would have to concrete over most of the country). However what I hadn't realised was how far copyright went and with it some of the general misconceptions.

So here is a little quiz, lets see how well you do.

1. When does copyright begin on a work?

If you said when you apply for it and it is granted, please pay the £1000 fine. If you said when it is published, please go to Jail, do not pass go and please pay £200.

By law, copyright begins when something original is transferred from the mind to a physical form. That's right, at this very moment I am creating copyrightable material, which if you use without my permission, I can bring the whole weight of the law down on you (Although whether the internet can be considered physical is a bit of a legal grey area.) Even if you write something down, dig a  large hole and bury it, without ever showing it to anybody, it is still copyrighted. Which is why I am so annoyed my parents threw away my school books with my story about a boy called Harry Trotter who had magical powers. It appears that anything on that basis is copyrighted be it a tweet, email, Facebook missive or even some word document you get sent of unknown provenance.

2. Public data is not copyrightable.

If you said yes -Wrong! In copyright law there is a sweat of the brow clause. Even if the data itself is available to anyone, just the process of collecting the data can make it copyrightable. So if I say, print the date of the battle of Hastings, the very work involved in me finding that information and cutting and pasting it from Wikipedia can make my work copyrighted.

3. As long as you do not intend to make money off the information, you can use it.

If that's what you think, I look forward to visiting you in one of her majesties finest hostelries. There is something called the fair use doctrine, but it has nothing to do with monetary recompense

The rules of fair use are as follows. Fair use is applicable if

• The use is deemed acceptable under the terms of fair dealing.
• That the quoted material is justified, and no more than is necessary is included.
• That the source of the quoted material is mentioned, along with the name of the author.

and only if the work is being used for

• Inclusion for the purpose of news reporting.
• Incidental inclusion.
• National laws typically allow limited private and educational use.

Actually this is an area where I have to admit I was guilty as charged because I had not attributed the work to the museum. My reason for this however, was up to that point I hadn't considered it any more then a trivial gesture of someone helping me, not some privileged access to the guarded vaults of treasured knowledge. Also my use of it was a throw away gesture, not an attempt at serious academic rigour.  If I had, I would of attributed it and I could claim it was research and therefore had fair use. Whether you can put that information on a public blog is another grey area where the copyright law has not caught up with reality.

Anyway as you can probably gather the whole concept of copyright is a minefield that anyone can blunder into despite their best intentions.

The rules on photographic copyright are just as complex. I have a hobby of using old photographs by finding where the original was taken, overlaying the old and my new photo and peeling away one from another to get an show the changes over time (The technique is called Rephotography). Up to this point I had assumed that since the photo's I had used were over a 100 years old  they would be out of copyright.

To show how wrong I was here's another question

A Photo goes out of copyright when :-

A. The photographer dies
B. The photographer dies + 70 years
C. It's complicated

If you said C, you are starting to get an idea of the minefield that copyright is.

I cannot even start to explain copyright law in this area. This is as clearest a description as I can find about  UK photographic coptright law.

OK got that? Basically to work out if you can use a photo, you need to know when it was taken, if it was ever published, who photographed it and when and if and when they joined the great developer in the sky. Good luck with that....

The problem with copyright

Which of course raises the whole problem with copyright. The reason for it's existence was noble. It was to guarantee that the worlds creators got fair dues for there efforts and protect them from those who wanted  a free ride from their talent. But it was based on a idea that information was difficult to copy and create. Nowadays, everyone is a creator, such as cat video's or blogs and twitters. Not only that, information has no longer the concept of physicality, but is stored in 0 and 1's that can easily be manipulated and transmitted. This means that it is no longer possible to restrict where your information ends up (Hollywood have been trying for years and have has little success, despite great efforts and money being put into stopping it). In truth only those with the biggest pockets can ever hope to assert their copyright and even then they will only ever scratch the surface.

The last copyright act was in 1995. Even in that time, technology changes has made the provisions already look archaic and outdated. One of the changes was that the copyright period was increased to 70 years.At the same time as it was becoming impossible to police the present copyright period.

As I said, once copyright had value, but it is getting to the point when actually copyright is actually constraining creativity. Take my photo's as an example. The work I create is then combined with another long forgotten photo from a deceased photographer to create something new. But the strict interpretation of the law is that I need permission first from the the original photographer, or locate their relatives, or work out if 70 years has passed, get permissions etc. None of which is greatly conducive to creativity.

In many ways I should be a be a proponent of copyright, because my job is one that depends on creation or original material rather than consuming it. As a software developer I make value by finding new ways to solve problems. If someone should steal or appropriate that solution, I should have the remit to sue and get fair recompense, shouldn't I? In the early years attempts were made to do just that. Large companies tried to claim their code was their crown jewels and should be protected at all costs. But the software industry has moved away from that. They realised that the actual process of copyright made their cost more and productivity less. When I write a program I don't want to have to check each time whether another programmer somewhere else had written similar code. We benefit from sharing our creativity so that we can all mix and merge the code in new and imaginative ways.

The other problem with the copyright model is that although the law is designed to protect the small and weak to encourage creativity, what it actually does is the opposite. Most of the present problems with creativity can be traced to Disney in the 70's who realising that Mickey Mouse was about to lose it's copyright protection, lobbied US congress to extend it. Remember this is the same Disney whose virtual whole business model was built on authors such as Hans Christian Anderson and the Brothers Grimm, without so much of a cent going to their descendants. Big corporations love copyright because it stops others entering the market. They, unlike us, have the ways and means of protecting there rights.

If you are an up and coming artist, writer, performer, copyright is an abstract problem. Yes you have copyright on your work, but the problem is not stopping others stealing it, but getting people to acknowledge your work has any value at all. I went to my Photographic club AGM recently and one of the longest discussions was protecting members work from being stolen from the website. Now to those whose living is made with photographs this was a big issue. To the rest of us, the attitude was if we would be so lucky! One of the results of this is that successful artists can live of their past labours protected by law without ever again having to lift a finger. If only the rest of us had such protection.

History has shown that protectionism of a business model in the long run is counter productive. Copyright protects the creative business model in a changing world. Rather than trying to stop that change, it is the business model that must change. A professional photographer admitted to me that there is no money to be made now in selling photographs.  With the low cost of entry, the market is awash with photos. So instead he now trains people to take better photos. He still uses his skills, but in a different way. Instead of his photos being his livelihood, they become his advertising. He still makes a good living, but in a different way.

Other people who at present use the protection of copyright need to do the same. If copyright disappeared tomorrow, great novels would still be written, music composed and films produced. It would just mean that creativity would be more encouraged and not restricted . The only people who would suffer are the big corporations who at present control the access to the magic kingdom.

Finally...

Anyway, what's the ending to this story? Did I say fair cop guv', admit my wrong doing and take the work down.

Well you can see the result here.

The information is now properly attributed, but to paraphrase Charlton Heston, they can take the information on the blog from my cold dead hands. After all, all revolutions start with a little civil disobedience.

The one truth of copyright which is not often mentioned,is that unlike criminal law, enforcement must be done by the copyright holder. Although copyright is a universal right, generally it is only taken up by those with deep pockets. So although it is within your rights to ask nicely to someone not to use your copyrighted material (and please note, ringing me 10 minutes after I get home from work accusing me of copyright theft is not the nice way), if they refuse there is actually very little you can do, unless you wish to consult a lawyer (and remember they charge by the hour). After all this the true arbiter of the content's worth.

Finally

One of definition of a good law is whether it does more good than bad. By that definition copyright law is not a good law. See you down the barricades, comrades...Bring a good book

© Tony Pedley 2014. All rights reserved but you can use it anyway if you really want.

Disclaimer: Do not in any way take this blog as legal advice. I have no qualifications in law, nor do I want one. If you have a copyright issue, talk to a lawyer. Or even better don't

References

1. UK copyright Service
2. Copyright law of the UK(Wikipaedia)
3. What makes a good law