The Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) is delayed in Congress, but it is definitely not dead. The media company lobbyists and their Congressmen (hello, Lamar Smith!) are simply regrouping. Some of the more controversial aspects of the bill include transferring liability for copyright infringement to sites that host user-generated content and blocking that content via DNS servers.
To highlight the chilling effect this legislation could have on free speech on te Internet, today document-sharing site Scribd is protesting SOPA by making every document disappear word-by-word when you vist the site. All in all, there are a billion pages of documents on the Scribd. “With this legislation in place, entire domains like Scribd could simply vanish from the web,” warns Jared Friedman, CTO and co-founder, Scribd. → Read More
The Advocate General of the European Union Court of Justice, Cruz Villalón, says that national courts there should not have the ability to tell Internet Service Providers to filter their connections in order to prevent copyright infringement because such a move would conflict with the Charter of Fundamental Rights. That was a mouthful, yes. It should be noted that the Advocate General’s opinion isn’t binding in the least, so this shouldn’t be read as EUROPE BANS INTERNET FILTERING. Hardly. It’s more for the Court of Justice to consider as it goes forward than any sort of official, or even unofficial, ban. → Read More
How many of you have played “violent video games” since you were a wee pup? I certainly have, and you don’t see me stealing cars or robbing banks, do you? Exactly. The most violent I get is when I boo the TV when stupid Manchester United improbably comes back against the most entertaining team in England, Blackpool. I bring this up because a congressman from California has proposed a new warning label for video games rated Teen or higher that would say: “WARNING: Excessive exposure to violent video games and other violent media has been linked to aggressive behavior.” Sure it has. → Read More
Good news: the state of California can now seize and search your cellphone without a warrant. The new regime will only affect people who have already been arrested, so it’s not as if police officers will be able to search your cellphone at routine traffic stops. But still: yeah, it’s sorta lame. In 2011, even more of your rights will be chipped away. → Read More
Amazon and other holders of business method patents can breathe easy for now. (One of the most famous business method patents is Amazon’s One-Click shopping cart patent).
In a ruling today, the Supreme Court basically punted on whether or not business method patents, in general, should be upheld. Instead, it ruled narrowly on the business method patent in question in the case, Bilski v. Kappos . That patent was thrown out. In that sense, it affirmed an earlier U.S. Federal Appeals Court ruling.
But the Court also warned people not to read to much into its decision. → Read More
Part of me wishes President Obama would flip that so-called “Internet kill switch.” Imagine: a world without the Internet! That would be grand, indeed. But let’s not indulge in fantasies: there is no such kill switch. Well, there is, but it’s not as if the president is going to say, “I disagree with Nicholas’ opinion of anti-virus protection, I’m going to shut down CrunchGear.” → Read More
So this is either great or dumb, and I’ll leave it to you to make up your own mind. The Supreme Court is currently hearing a sexting case, in which police officers have sued their sergeant for reading sexually explicit messages that were supposed to be privately read amongst themselves. The question is, did the sergeant violate the officers’ privacy by reading the messages?
It got weird when the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court asked what’s the difference between a text message and pager. → Read More
At what point do you stop trying to track and prosecute cyber-criminals? Obviously, you can’t let criminals run around willy-nilly, but when you look at the resources involved in bringing those guys to justice—and are you really nabbing the right guys in the first place?—it’s worth at least talking about. Is fighting cyber-crime about as futile as fighting the war on drugs? → Read More
It’s the start of yet another lazy Saturday, so let’s make things a little more interesting with a side dish of outrage. A 15-year-old student in Pennsylvania has accused his high school of spying on him using a school-supplied MacBook. The school had accused the boy “inappropriate behavior” that it found him engaged in via the built-in Webcam. Lawsuits are flying, as you might imagine. → Read More
At what point do you consider something “unreasonable”? Let’s say you’re pulled over while speeding—do the police have the right to search your mobile phone? And let’s say they do, and they find other verboten material on the phone? Should you also be on the hook for that, on top of your speeding ticket? It’s a pretty important debate, and it’s one that going on right now. → Read More
Yesterday, August 11, wasn’t just Joe Rogan’s birthday. Nope, it was also the date when a judge in San Francisco ruled that RealDVD was illegal, and reiterated that it was illegal to manufacture or traffic software that makes it possible to copy DVDs. So, every time you fire up DVD Copier on your PC, make a copy of a DVD that you bought, well, you’re breaking the law. The DMCA just keeps on giving, doesn’t it? → Read More
Another day, another twist in that proposed French anti-piracy law. While the French upper house, the Senate, approved the bill as it was presented earlier today, the lower house, the National Assembly, rejected it. Oh don’t worry, since the Government said it will present a revised edition of the bill that would remove the main clause that upset the National Assembly. → Read More
Have any of you guys been following this anti-video game/movie bill that’s currently bouncing around Utah’s legislature? It’s gotten attention for a few reasons, one of which is because the original version of the bill—it has since been amended—was either written by or conceived by (depending on to whom you talk) famous video game hater (and disbarred lawyer) Jack Thomson. Legislatively speaking, it’s a pretty exciting progression. → Read More
Ars Technica is usually one of the better sites to read if you’re looking for a “serious” take on technology, but its profile of the Harvard Law students working on the RIAA v. Joel Tenenbaum case is in a league of its own. It’s a little on the long side, in this age of Twitter, but well worth the time invested if you’re interested in any of the following topics: the RIAA; music piracy; justice; or a good, old fashioned David v. Goliath story. → Read More
Kentucky-based CMI has come under fire on more than one occasion for not turning over the source code used in the breathalyzers that it sells to various law enforcement agencies, citing trade secrets as the reason for keeping the code under wraps. Well that hasn’t sat too well with people who have been pulled over and cited with DUIs, as some of them have claimed that the machines aren’t registering blood alcohol levels accurately. → Read More
The RIAA has decided to stop filing pointless lawsuits against John and Jane Doe for alleged copyright infringement. Rather, the bullying cartel will work with ISPs to get you kids to stop downloading Fallout Boy, the All American Rejects and other self-described popular music. → Read More
From the Department of Public Safety and General Preparedness comes this story of one man, a Cisco engineer, and his headline-making ordeal of having his possessions searched upon re-entry to the U.S. following an international flight. (It’s also the story of run-on sentences.) The man, Mohamed Shommo, told the Associated Press that border agents rifled through his digital camera’s photos, his Google searches and the files on his iPod. That’s all done in the name of Your Safety, mind. → Read More
This is great. There’s something to be said for the defense of exaggeration or idiom in advertising — for instance, Red Bull doesn’t literally give you wings. Of course, nobody’s suing Red Bull for false advertising. But when the statement is the totally believable “Twice as fast, half the price,” and you support the ad with fraudulent video showing the product in question accomplishing tasks at unrealistic speeds, you might be pushing it. And yet, Apple’s defense is that: “…No reasonable person in Plaintiff’s position could have reasonably relied on or misunderstood Apple’s statements as claims of fact.” Ha! Well, you can be sure nobody will consider Apple’s statements “claims of fact” now! Yeah, the lawsuit is questionable, but the response is classic. → Read More
Last week’s attacks in India have reminded us all of the keen danger that terrorism poses. But one tool that was to be employed at airports to combat terrorism, those body scanners that sometimes reveal a person’s, well, person, came under criticism. Fighting terror (inasmuch as you can fight it) is great and all, but should people literally be exposed in the process? The Germans say no, and are developing a body scanner that, while it does its job (detecting weapons and so forth), doesn’t show off your nude body to the leering airport screeners. The new scanner will undergo proper laboratory tests this week. The full-on “naked scanner” is already in use in other European countries such as the Netherlands. Also, Germany-Netherlands make a fine football rivalry. Three cheers for random, tangentially related information! → Read More
It’s no secret that Apple wants everyone to use iTunes, especially to sync with their iPod. I personally can’t stand iTunes and prefer Winamp, and many others share my view but have enjoyed Apple hardware. Some more code-savvy people than myself have in years past determined how to read and write to the proprietary iTunesDB file, allowing non-Apple software to sync with iPods. Apple countered by encrypting the file, which encryption was cracked before two days were out. They’ve now re-encrypted it, and some folks at BluWiki have been discussing how to once again get at the information to allow third-party programs to be able to sync. At least, until Apple sent them a takedown notice citing DMCA laws. → Read More
