MEDIA, COMMUNICATIONS & NET NEUTRALITY
- Pick-and-pay TV system a hit with Canadians, nearly one third bought solo channels: report – Although the vast majority of subscribers continue to buy larger packages, MTM’s research suggests a massive jump in interest in the smaller packages
- Judge Kills AT&T’s Attempt To Thwart Google Fiber Competition In Louisville
- AT&T’s attempt to stall Google Fiber construction thrown out by judge: AT&T sued Louisville over pole attachment rule, but judge says rule is valid.
- Trump’s DOJ not trying to stop AT&T/Time Warner merger: AT&T and DOJ “discussing merger conditions” that would let deal go forward.
- Former FCC Commissioner Tries To Claim Net Neutrality Has Aided The Rise Of White Supremacy
- Stop hiding 47,000 net neutrality complaints, advocates tell FCC chair: FCC now says it will release net neutrality complaints “as soon as we can.”
- Crowdfunded Billboards Shame Politicians For Selling You Out On Net Neutrality
- FCC’s claim that it was hit by DDoS should be investigated, lawmakers say: FCC hasn’t shown proof that it was attacked, Democrats say in call for probe.
- Lawmakers Want The GAO To Investigate The FCC’s Flimsy DDoS Claim
- Cox starts charging $50 extra per month for unlimited data: Or you can get another 500GB for an extra $30 every month.
- Verizon Begins Throttling Wireless Users, Effectively Bans 4K Streaming
- Verizon to start throttling all smartphone videos to 480p or 720p: No 4K video allowed—new bandwidth limits apply to mobile hotspots, too.
- Patent-licensing company loses its $30M verdict against Sprint:Prism Technologies saw through three jury trials against big cell carriers.
- This is Sinclair, ‘the most dangerous US company you’ve never heard of’: Sinclair is the largest broadcast company in America. But its partisan politics – and connections to the White House – are raising concerns
- James Murdoch donates $1 million to the Anti-Defamation League following events in Charlottesville
- James Murdoch Rips Trump: “Standing Up to Nazis Is Essential” – In a memo, he also pledged a donation of $1 million to the Anti-Defamation League.
- Looking at Music Royalty Issues for Radio and TV Broadcasters
- Tech Journalists Keep Completely Missing The Point Of Cord Cutting
DIGITAL
- Judge sides with YouTubers Ethan and Hila Klein in copyright lawsuit
- YouTubers Ethan And Hila Klein Win Copyright Case, Court Says h3h3Productions’ Use Of Video Is Fair Use
- Appeals Court Grapples With Digital Files, and the Business of Selling “Used” Songs
- Uber’s Contract Upheld in Second Circuit–Meyer v. Uber
- Legal ruling in: Facebook ‘friends’ aren’t necessarily real friends
- Browsewrap/Clickwrap Distinction Vexes Another Court–Nevarez v. Ticketmaster
- Aspiring Actor Forges Court Order To Delist Content, Gets Busted By Judge, Forges Court Order To Delist Article About Contempt Charges
- Supreme Court asked to nullify the Google trademark: The case comes two months after court’s “offensive” trademarks ruling.
- Failed Cybersquatter Asks Supreme Court To Declare ‘Google’ A Generic Term
- Federal Judge Upholds Magistrate’s Ruling, Says Google Must Hand Over Data From Overseas Servers
- How the tech sector can legally justify breaking ties to extremists: Generally speaking, private enterprise may refuse service on ideological grounds.
- Code for tolerance: How tech companies can respond to hate but respect human rights
- The Tor Project Defends the Human Rights Racists Oppose
- Tor “can’t build free and open source tools” and stop racists from using them: “We are everything they claim to despise,” but Tor won’t prevent vile usage of its tools.
- Neo-Nazi Daily Stormer loses its Russian domain, too: Russian official cites “strict regime” for combatting extremism online.
- After bouncing around the Web, Daily Stormer lands a new CDN provider – BitMitigate founder: “I thought it would really get my service out there.”
- Spurned by Major Companies, The Daily Stormer Returns to the Web With Help From a Startup: The 20-year-old founder of BitMitigate said he had taken on the neo-Nazi website because he believes in free speech and because, “I thought it would really get my service out there.”
- Unable to get a domain, racist Daily Stormer retreats to the Dark Web: “We can’t keep trying random registrars,” site’s admin writes.
- After years of investigation, feds bust one of AlphaBay’s largest drug rings
- So, just how guaranteed is your freedom of speech online?
- Google explains why it banned the app for Gab, a right-wing Twitter rival: Gab’s free-speech stance makes it popular with right-wing trolls and racists
- Here’s a way to silence Trump on Twitter: Buy the microblogging service – White House says it’s a “ridiculous attempt” to silence Trump’s 1st Amendment rights.
- YouTube Briefly Nukes Video Of Nazi Symbol Destruction For Violating Hate Speech Rules
- Defining ‘Hate Speech’ Online Is An Imperfect Art
- OkCupid bans white supremacist “for life,” asks daters to report others: A white supremacist featured in a Charlottesville documentary can’t use OKC any
- One-Time Allies Sour On Joining Trump’s Tech Team
- Mnuchin’s Wife Mocks Oregon Woman Over Lifestyle and Wealth
- Mnuchin’s Wife Goes Full Marie Antoinette In Instagram Meltdown: The millionaire wife of the millionaire Treasury secretary bragged about how much they pay in taxes and accused a critic of being “adorably out of touch.”
- Before she was poor-shaming on Instagram, Louise Linton wrote a “white savior” Africa memoir
- Killer robots are coming, and Elon Musk is worried: Technology leaders warn autonomous drones could become “weapons of terror.”
- Sorry Elon Musk, the machines will not win – Weblog: Cyber expert Ryan Calo writes paper to demolish belief in looming AI apocalypse
- Killer robots: Experts warn of ‘third revolution in warfare’
- We can’t ban killer robots – it’s already too late
- Sorry, Banning ‘Killer Robots’ Just Isn’t Practical
- Taryn Southern Shares First YouTube Music Video For Album Composed Entirely By AI
- Dunce’s App: How Silicon Valley’s brand of behaviorism has entered the classroom
- Reddit Launches An In-House Video Player In Beta
- Now you can post videos directly to Reddit, no third-party service required: Upload .mp4 and .mov files directly from your phone or computer.
- Whatever Your Side, Doxing Is A Perilous Form Of Justice
- Fighting Neo-Nazis and the Future of Free Expression (EFF)
- The Great Free Speech Online Debate (Andres Guadamuz)
- Moving On From Obviously Fake News To Plausibly Fake News Sites
- Mapping The Most And Least Troll-Ridden Places In The U.S.
- We Live in Fear of the Online Mobs: Internet shaming spreads everywhere and lives forever. We need a way to fight it.
- Woman: My Uber driver went wrong way, I said something, he pushed me out – According to Courthouse News Service, Uber has been sued at least 433 times in 2017.
- SEC Report Asserts Cryptocurrency Tokens Are Securities Under US Law
- A Very Dumb Mistake Costs Cryptocurrency Investors Big Time
- Not a Token Gesture: Compensating Service Providers with Virtual Property
- A Google Tax Isn’t Going To Give Publishers The Payout They Think It Will
- Sharp sues Hisense over a foreign “gag order”: Sharp files a lawsuit in order to talk about the TVs being made in its name.
- Lawsuit revived over Apple retail workers’ pay during security checks: Dispute has widespread ramifications about pay for time spent in security checks.
- Proposed California Law Targets Sexual Harassment In Venture Capital
- Machines Taught By Photos Learn A Sexist View Of Women
- Quebecker files class action against Netflix over fee hike
- Insights: Breaking Up is Easy To Do—Netflix Rolls On After Disney Announcement
- Netflix Is Using The Defenders To Understand Its Audience
- This is how Netflix’s top-secret recommendation system works: Netflix splits viewers up into more than two thousands taste groups. Which one you’re in dictates the recommendations you get
- Why You Can’t Download All The Streaming Media You Want
- Roku Increases market share ahead of Amazon, Google, Apple
- Amazon’s Turker Crowd Has Had Enough
- Wisconsin lawmakers vote to pay Foxconn $3 billion to get new factory: State taxpayers could end up paying Foxconn $500,000 per job, or more.
- YouTube Music Chief Lyor Cohen: Promoting And Breaking New Artists Is A Top Priority
- YouTube, Facebook and Moral Rights
- ‘They could destroy the album’: how Spotify’s playlists have changed music for ever – Custom playlists on the streaming site can bring unknown artists to millions. But are they altering how songs get written?
- CNN launches daily news show on Snapchat
- Facebook really is losing teen users to Instagram and Snapchat
- Snapchat to Move Into Scripted Content by Year’s End
- Facebook, NASA To Host 4K, 360-Degree Live Stream Of Total Solar Eclipse
- Solar Eclipse Brings 3.1 Million Views To NASA’s Facebook Live Stream, Takes 10% Of Netflix Audience
- Facebook Takes New Steps To Crack Down On Video Clickbait
- Facebook’s evolutionary search for crashing software bugs: Ars gets the first look at Facebook’s fancy new dynamic analysis tool.
- Twitter To Stream From Inside Race Cars During NASCAR Playoffs
- Disney Tops BuzzFeed In Monthly Social Video Views For First Time In A Year (Study)
- Turner To Launch OTT Sports Platform, Live Games On Bleacher Report
- YouTube TV Adds 14 New Markets To Reach 50% Of US Households
- Angela Merkel Discusses Gender, Emojis During Studio71-Produced YouTube Stream
- YouTube Rolls Out ‘Breaking News’ Feed On Desktop Site And Mobile Apps
- Studio71 Sues Bethany Mota And Her Dad/Manager Over Brand Deal Gone Awry
- Moviepass Wants To Save Moviegoing – If Theaters Will Let It
- Australia blocks another 59 popular pirate sites
- Cambridge University Press backs down over China censorship: Publisher will reinstate articles to which it blocked online access in China in the face of international protests by academics
- ‘Smart’ Lock Vendor Locks Hundreds Out Of Their Home With Bungled Firmware Update
- “Bing is bigger than you think,” Microsoft boasts, at 33% of US searches: It turns out that “But nobody uses Bing!” isn’t actually true.
- Microsoft’s Speech Recognition is Now as Good as a Human Transcriber
- Intel first 8th generation processors are just updated 7th generation chips: No Coffee Lake or Cannonlake here; these are doubled up Kaby Lake parts.
- NAFTA Negotiations: Authors Alliance Joins Public Interest Groups In Support Of Transparency And Balanced Copyright Policy
- Civil society urges trade decision-makers to consider the impacts of NAFTA on digital rights
- Who Falls for Fake News? The Roles of Analytic Thinking, Motivated Reasoning, Political Ideology, and Bullshit Receptivity (Gordon Pennycook & David Rand)
- The NAFTA E-commerce Chapter: Ensuring the New Chapter Reflects Canadian Priorities (Michael Geist)
CREATIVITY
- The Tragedy Of Charlottesville In Two Powerful Photos
- Op-Ed: Speech in America is fast, cheap and out of control
- NFL Tells ICE That Parody Shirts Are Counterfeits
- Freedom of panorama in Portugal: content and scope of the exception
- Why the CJEU cheese copyright case is anything but cheesy
- Is 2 seconds of television time too much to be a fair use?
- Toblerone shape not distinctive enough for trademark, Poundland claims: Defending its right to launch Twin Peaks bar, budget chain cites Toblerone version with fewer chunks brought out last year
- Chateau Marmont, Hotel For Celebrity Humans, Sends Trademark C&D To Cateau Marmont, Hotel For Cats
- Comparative advertising using P’s logo is nominative fair use (Rebecca Tushnet)
- Forgetting Functionality (Christopher Buccafusco & Jeanne Fromer)
- Court Rules Ford Trucks’ Claim Is Puffery: A false advertising suit against Ford Motor Co. was limited after a federal court judge found the company’s “Built Ford Tough” claim is non-actionable puffery.
- Directing a Spotlight on the Feud over Ownership of Château Miraval’s Lights
- Because Of Course There Are Copyright Implications With Confederacy Monuments
- Louisiana’s Criminal Defamation Law Abused Again, But This Time The Gov’t Gets Away With It
- What Europe Can Teach America About Free Speech: In an unregulated marketplace of ideas, private citizens need to take up the burden of holding the line against racist extremism.
- The Right to Attention in an Age of Distraction
- Canada’s Diva of Doodlers has Definitively Distilled in this Divine Depiction the Diverging Directions of Debate on Canadian Copyright
SURVEILLANCE & PRIVACY
- Feds drop demand for 1.3 million IP addresses that visited anti-Trump site: Despite warrant’s language, feds say they didn’t want disruptj20.org visitor logs.
- Another staged body cam leads to 43 more dropped Baltimore prosecutions: Latest video “was self-reported as a re-enactment of the seizure of evidence.”
- Australian Gov’t Accessed Domestic Metadata Thousands Of Times, Shared Some Of It With China
- Federal Judge Upholds Magistrate’s Ruling, Says Google Must Hand Over Data From Overseas Servers
- Wanted: Weaponized exploits that hack phones. Will pay top dollar – Exploit broker Zerodium ups the ante with $500,000 to target Signal and WhatsApp.
- Border Device Searches Continue To Increase, Threatening More Than Just The 4th Amendment
- Indians have right to privacy, Supreme Court rules
- Spyware backdoor prompts Google to pull 500 apps with >100m downloads: Google killed secret plugin download capability after being alerted by researchers.
- Court Says Gov’t Needs More Than The Assumption Someone Owns A Cellphone To Justify A Search
- FOIA Lawsuit Filed Over DOJ Data Complainant Is Pretty Sure Doesn’t Even Exist
- Sonos Users Forced To Choose Between Privacy And Working Hardware
- As HBO Screams About GoT Episodes Leaking From A Hack, HBO Leaks Next GoT Episode Early
- Breaking Down HBO’s Brutal Month Of Hacks
- North Carolina Election Agencies First Learned They’d Been Hacked From Leaked Documents Published By The Intercept
- ICE: We don’t use stingrays to locate undocumented immigrants – Letter adds that, even when you’re targeted via stingray, you can still call 911.
- GCHQ Knew FBI Wanted To Arrest MalwareTech, Let Him Fly To The US To Be Arrested There
- Palantir’s Law Enforcement Data Stranglehold Isn’t Good For Police Or The Policed
- Contractor Exposes Personal Information Of 1.8 Million Chicago Voters On AWS
- Code chunk in Kronos malware used long before MalwareTech published it: Marcus Hutchins, the researcher who stopped WCry, complained his code was lifted.
- Secret chips in replacement parts can completely hijack your phone’s security: Booby-trapped touchscreens can log passwords, install malicious apps, and more.
- Welcome To The Technological Incarceration Project, Where Prison Walls Are Replaced By Sensors, Algorithms, And AI
- Driver’s license facial recognition tech leads to 4,000 New York arrests: “We will continue to do everything we can to hold fraudsters accountable.”
- When Government Rules By Software, Citizens Are Left In The Dark
Jon