News of the Week; July 11, 2018

MEDIA, COMMUNICATIONS & NET NEUTRALITY

1. Government Memo Suggests Netflix Outspends Canadian Private Broadcasters on Canadian English Scripted Programming (Michael Geist)
2. The State of Canadian Wireless in One Chart: No One Has Carriers That Generate More Revenue With Less Usage (Michael Geist)
3. Ajit Pai’s FCC Doesn’t Want to Hear Your Complaints Unless You Pay Them $225
4. “This is bonkers”: FCC wants to stop reviewing most complaints about ISPs
5. FCC stands by decision to raise broadband prices on American Indians
6. FCC Refuses to Back Down From Plan to Strip Phone and Internet Subsidies for American Indians
7. Ajit Pai finally gets around to fighting fraud in FCC comment system 
8. Second Circuit Follows D.C. Circuit’s Reasoning in Vacating FCC’s Interpretation of an Autodialer
9. SCOTUS Nominee Kavanaugh Bought Verizon’s Silly Argument That Breaking Net Neutrality Is A 1st Amendment Right 
10. CRTC Issues $250,000 in Penalties for Malware Distribution
11. CASL Enforcement Action – $250,000 in Penalties for Aiding the Distribution of Malvertising
12. Net neutrality makes comeback in California; lawmakers agree to strict rules 
13. Yes, Privacy Is Important, But California’s New Privacy Bill Is An Unmitigated Disaster In The Making
14. Ten Reasons Why California’s New Data Protection Law is Unworkable, Burdensome, and Possibly Unconstitutional 
15. DOJ’s Challenge to Vertical AT&T/Time Warner Merger Experiences Failure to Launch
16. Magic Leap grabs investment from AT&T as it sets up US distribution deal
17. Echoing Apple’s iPhone Launch, Magic Leap Taps AT&T for Exclusive US Distribution
18. AT&T wants to overhaul HBO, says it isn’t profitable enough 
19. After Backlash To AT&T Chicanery, California Salvages Tough Net Neutrality Law 
20. Streaming Video Sees Wave Of Price Hikes In Apparent Bid To Mimic Cable & Embolden Piracy
21. Two years after buying, Univision wants to sell its Gawker, Onion portfolios
22. Charter launches mobile service, throttles all video to 480p
23. US forces smartphone giant ZTE to fire its CEO and leadership team
24. Comcast’s Wireless Service Will Charge You More To Stream HD Video 

DIGITAL

1. NZ court rules Kim Dotcom can be extradited to US on copyright charges
2. Kim Dotcom Loses Latest Round In Extradition Fight, Will Try To Appeal Again
3. Technoleviathan: China, Silicon Valley, and the rise of the global surveillance state.
4. Spy For Us – Or Never Speak To Your Family Again: China is using its huge digital surveillance system, and the threat of sending family members to reeducation camps, to pressure minorities to spy on their fellow exiles.
5. China producing x86 chips nearly identical to AMD server processors
6. iPhone crashing bug likely caused by code added to appease Chinese gov’t
7. Uganda Bans VPNs To Prevent Users From Dodging Its Absurd New Social Media Tax
8. A Numerical Exploration Of How The EU’s Article 13 Will Lead To Massive Censorship
9. EU sends controversial internet copyright reforms back to the drawing board: It’s a strong rejection of the legislation in its current form, but not the end of the battle
10. European Parliament rejects discussions on controversial copyright law
11. EU Parliament Votes To Step Back From The Abyss On Copyright For Now
12. EU copyright law sent back for a rethink
13. Don’t Believe Those Who Wish To Diminish Digital Rights By Falsely Implying It’s All Big Tech Lobbying
14. What can the Copyright Directive vote tell us about the state of digital rights? (Andres Guadamuz)
15. Movie Industry Denies Lawsuit Strategy Despite Proliferation of Legal Actions and Settlement Demands Against Thousands of Canadians (Michael Geist)
16. Lawyer loses appeal, fails to expand internet privileges
17. Trump’s Supreme Court pick: ISPs have 1st Amendment right to block websites
18. Online Review Website Cannot Be Forced To Remove Defamatory Posts
19. Section 230 Immunity Protects Yelp from Injunction Order to Remove Defamatory Posts
20. Section 230 Helps Facebook Defeat Pro Se Defamation Suit–Jefferson v. Facebook
21. Amazon Again Avoids Liability for Defective Marketplace Item–Fox v. Amazon
22. Over The Top Sports Streaming Comes To Europe With Amazon’s Deal With The Premier League
23. Court Rejects Evidentiary and CFAA Vagueness Challenges to Conviction for Botnet Hacking Scheme
24. Sales tax in the digital era : major impacts for retailers in the United States
25. How Facebook’s Rise Fueled Chaos And Confusion In Myanmar: The social network exploded in Myanmar, allowing fake news and violence to consume a country emerging from military rule.
26. Facebook Says It’s Sorry for Removing a Part of the Declaration of Independence That Includes a Racial Slur
27. Facebook Runs Full-Page Ads in Indian Newspapers to Fight Fake News
28. Blaming The Messenger (App): WhatsApp Takes The Blame In India Over Violence
29. Fake News Is A Meaningless Term, And Our Obsession Over It Continues To Harm Actual News 
30. Fining Facebook: ICO issues £500,000 fine following data breach 
31. Facebook could face legal claims totalling ‘hundreds of millions of pounds’
32. When a Facebook Like Lands You in Jail: NYPD’s Social Media Monitoring Raises Civil Liberties Issues
33. Sex, Beer, And Coding: Inside Facebook’s Wild Early Days – When the young Mark Zuckerberg moved to Palo Alto in 2004, he and his buddies built a corporate proto-culture that continues to influence the company today.
34. Cory Doctorow: Zuck’s Empire of Oily Rags
35. Regulation coming for Facebook
36. Facebook Watch May Pay Upwards Of $10 Million For Cristiano Ronaldo Reality Series
37. Facebook will broadcast live Premier League games in Asia: The £200 million deal helps Facebook’s push into the world of sports.
38. Facebook To Launch News Programming On July 16, Will Organize ‘Watch’ With New Categories
39. Reddit CEO tells user, “we are not the thought police,” then suspends that user
40. More Than Half of ICO-Funded Startups Fail Within 4 Months, Study Says
41. Are the UK’s intellectual property laws ready for AI?
42. Google Applies More Machine Learning To Increase The Reach Of Ads Across Its Properties
43. “Google Was Not A Normal Place”: Brin, Page, And Mayer On The Accidental Birth Of The Company That Changed Everything
44. Inside X, The Moonshot Factory Racing To Build The Next Google: Seven years after its secretive launch, X is starting to spawn mind-blowing companies – and show us what an ever expanding Google means for the world.
45. Despite Chrome’s pending “mark of shame,” 3 major news sites aren’t HTTPS
46. What Soda Taxes And Lead Paint Have To Do With Internet Regulation
47. Malaysian Government Decides To Dump Its Terrible Anti-Fake News Law
48. YouTube, Whose Users Promoted Fraudulent Cryptocurrency Bitconnect, Is Added As Defendant In Lawsuit
49. After Losing NCAA Scholarship Due To YouTube Channel, Donald De La Haye Gets A Win In Court
50. YouTube to fight fake news with links to real news and context
51. YouTube Tweaks Site Design, Dedicates $25 Million to Combat “Fake News”
52. YouTube Pledges $25 Million To News Organizations As It Continues Fight Against Fake News
53. YouTube Launches Initiative to Fight Fake News, Pledges $25 Million to Support News Orgs
54. YouTuber in row over copyright infringement of his own song
55. YouTube Guitarist Claims He Got A Copyright Strike For Infringing Upon His Own Song
56. YouTube Rolling Out ‘Copyright Match’ Tool To Creators With More Than 100,000 Subs
57. YouTube to Launch Tool to Detect Re-Uploaded Videos Automatically: New Copyright Match tool initially will roll out to channels with more than 100,000 subscribers
58. YouTube TV Outages Draw Ire From World Cup Viewers
59. Two Co-Creators Of Travel YouTube Channel High On Life Die After Waterfall Accident
60. Constitutional Challenge Against FOSTA Filed–Woodhull v. US
61. More Police Admitting That FOSTA/SESTA Has Made It Much More Difficult To Catch Pimps And Traffickers 
62. Preparing for the Next Phase of Influencer Marketing – The CGI Influencer 
63. Jake Paul’s Team 10 Involved In Yet Another Lawsuit For Trashing Rental Property
64. Logan Paul Is Filming A Documentary About “What Actually Happened” During Suicide Video Scandal 
65. Hank Green Apologizes To Tana Mongeau For VidCon Slight, But Calls TanaCon “Inexcusable And Terrifying”
66. Twitter is Suspending More Than One Million Accounts Per Day in Latest Purge
67. Twitter Users To Lose Tens Of Millions Of Followers After Company Excludes ‘Locked’ Accounts
68. Twitter Sheds $3.1 Billion After Suspending Millions of Questionable Accounts
69. These are the ‘invisible’ challenges that make it harder for Snapchat, Facebook and Twitter to grow
70. Snap and Amazon Are Reportedly Working on a Visual Search Feature for Snapchat
71. Tinder Users Can Now Upload Two-Second Looping Videos On Their Profiles
72. Are You Ready for Even More Expensive Netflix Options?
73. Netflix To Create A Digital Comedy Festival By Releasing 47 Specials At Once
74. Netflix Is Shutting Down User Reviews This Summer
75. Netflix is killing off user reviews
76. European Networks Are Joining Forces to Take On Netflix and Amazon
77. HBO must ‘change direction’ to flourish, says its new boss: User engagement must be increased to make HBO into a perennial product.
78. AT&T Is Very Excited To Try And Ruin HBO 
79. Here are all of the future TV shows that Apple has signed deals for
80. Feds arrest Apple employee for stealing self-driving project secrets
81. Woman who once bought bitcoins for $300,000 cash in paper bags sent to prison
82. ‘It’s not just video games’: Concordia partners with Ubisoft on VR: The initiative will focus on a set of technologies called extended reality, or XR.
83. Ubisoft Opens XR:MTL An Innovation Factory Focused On XR Technologies At Concordia University – The Factory’s focus will be on developing applications that have market potential. 
84. 10 Projects That Have Us Excited About the Next Generation of VR & AR
85. VR Treatment, Even Without a Therapist, Helps People Overcome Fear of Heights
86. Driving Without a Smartphone: A new law in Georgia discourages drivers from even touching a screen. Whether or not it improves safety, it could help break people’s phone habits.
87. How Music Fans Built The Internet
88. What I’ve learned from nearly three years of enterprise Wi-Fi at home
89. Strategies for the Shadows: Protecting your Company’s IP Rights on the Dark Web
90. A Field Guide to “Social Engineering” Cyber Scams
91. How will 3D-printing challenge IP rights?
92. A Landmark Legal Shift Opens Pandora’s Box For DIY Guns: Cody Wilson makes digital files that let anyone 3-D print untraceable guns. The government tried to stop him. He sued—and won.
93. Wait—the RateMyProfessors.com “hotness” chili was about attractiveness? 
94. Hulu Hit ‘The Handmaid’s Tale’ Bafflingly Launches Wine Line
95. How Wattpad Is Rewriting the Rules of Hollywood
96. What the Russian Revolution would have looked like on social media
97. The AI revolution has spawned a new chips arms race 
98. Understanding Media and Information Quality in an Age of Artificial Intelligence, Automation, Algorithms and Machine Learning (Yochai Benkler, Robert Faris, Hal Roberts & Nikki Bourassa)
99. Algorithms and Justice (Christopher Bavitz & Kira Hessekiel)
100. Global Governance and Inclusion: Reframing the Global Debate Around AI (Ryan Budish, Urs Gasser & Amar Ashar)
101. Designing frameworks that allow for Intentions, Commitments and Exuberance in AI (Bobi Rakaova)
102. The Industrial Era Ended, and So Will the Digital Era
103. Q2 2018 Quick Links, Part 4 (Social Media, Section 230, Defamation) (Eric Goldman)
104. Q2 2018 Quick Links, Part 3 (Privacy, Advertising, E-Commerce) (Eric Goldman)

CREATIVITY

1. Unpacking Canada’s IP Strategy: Countering IP Abuse, Addressing IP Administration and Removing IP Barriers to Innovation (Michael Geist)
2. No, you can’t patent the ability to pause a lesson recording, EFF says
3. Lombardo v. Dr. Seuss Enterprises L.P.
4. Selling Items with Political Messages? What about “Impeach 45”?
5. President Trump Sends North Korean Dictator a CD of Elton John’s ‘Rocket Man’ Because Our World is Just One Big Joke
6. Girl Arrested in Iran for Posting Videos of Herself Dancing on Instagram
7. How Warner Brothers Resisted a Hollywood Ban on Anti-Nazi Films in the 1930s and Warned Americans of the Dangers of Fascism
8. Free Speech Doesn’t Protect Nazis. It Protects Us From Nazis
9. Ninth Circuit Recently Slams PETA Over Monkey Selfie Lawsuit
10. Post Office owes $3.5M for using wrong Statue of Liberty on a stamp
11. Police Union Upset Not All Books Paint Cops As Heroes, Calls For Removal Of Titles From School’s Reading List 
12. You Can Only Listen To Jaden Smith’s New Album On Instagram
13. Hobbyists Lose Fight to Escape the FAA’s Toy Drone Rules
14. Why local US newspapers are sounding the alarm
15. 54 newsrooms, 9 countries, and 9 core ideas: Here’s what two researchers found in a yearlong quest for journalism innovation: “Our angle on the current state of journalism is this: The crisis of journalism and legacy news media is structural.” 
16. Cortés-Ramos v. Martin-Morales
17. What You Need to Know About Toronto’s New Arts and Culture Property Tax Subclass 
18. Keep on moving: the bizarre dance epidemic of summer 1518 – Five centuries ago, the world’s longest rave took place in Strasbourg – a ‘plague’ of dancing that was fatal for some. What caused it? Art, poetry and music of the time can provide some clues
19. Creative types all go through hot streaks of superior production  

SURVEILLANCE & PRIVACY

1. Court Compares Car Crash Data To CSLI, Cellphone Contents; Tells Cops Best Bet Is To Always Get A Warrant
2. “Stylish” extension with 2M downloads banned for tracking every site visit
3. Stolen certificates from D-Link used to sign password-stealing malware
4. German Court Issues First GDPR Ruling 
5. CARU Protects Privacy for Child Karaoke Stars
6. California Passes Consumer Privacy Act With “GDPR-Like” Provisions
7. European Parliament Votes to Suspend EU-U.S. Privacy Shield
8. Don’t Misrepresent Your U.S. – E.U. Privacy Shield Status: FTC Brings An Enforcement Action 
9. California Corporation Settles FTC Complaint Regarding U.S.-EU Privacy Shield Compliance Claim
10. Police Chief Tries To Blame Newspaper Shooting On The Loss Of Social Media Monitoring Tool, But It Doesn’t Add Up
11. For $80 Million, Yahoo! Settles Shareholder Class Action Claiming Stock Price Losses from Data Breaches 
12. What we buy can be used to predict our politics, race or education – sometimes with more than 90 percent accuracy
13. DOD seeks classification “Clippy” to help classify data, control access
14. Year-old router bug exploited to steal sensitive DOD drone, tank documents
15. Tech-support scammers know EVERYTHING about my computer, Dell customer says

GAMES

1. Nintendo, Valve, Sony, and EA reported in Norway for breaching European consumer law – UPDATE: NCC reports Nintendo to German authorities after dropping other complaints
2. We need parents on board if we want to protect their children: Following news of a sexual assault in Roblox and ‘addiction’ to Fortnite, parents want to cut kids off from these games – but that will only make the problem worse
3. Video Game Deep Cuts: Livestreaming Your Fortnite Addiction
4. The Truth About ‘Video Game Addiction’
5. French gambling regulator concerned by loot boxes, but won’t take legal action
6. How Journey eliminated online toxicity with a simple ping
7. Fighting a toxic Steam community – and winning: Creative Assembly’s Grace Carroll said the “visible presence of moderation” was enough to turn around a toxic Steam forum in just a week
8. Valve quickly shuts down developer method for estimating Steam sales: Steam API suddenly altered after The End Is Nigh co-dev uses achievements data as SteamSpy alternative
9. Valve swiftly removes new method for estimating Steam sales
10. Valve highlights the best selling and most played Steam games of 2018
11. Valve leaks Steam game player counts; we have the numbers
12. Team Fortress 2 leads as biggest player counts on Steam revealed
13. Steam Spy and the need for numbers: For indie developers in need of metrics Steam Spy is imperfect, “but the other option is absolutely nothing”
14. Launching a successful indie game in 2018: TheMoonlighter story
15. Guild Wars 2 writers dismissed after Twitter spat with streamer
16. ArenaNet cuts ties with Guild Wars 2 writers after Twitter spat: “Their attacks on the community were unacceptable,” says ArenaNet president
17. ArenaNet sends all the wrong messages: Guild Wars 2 studio terminating employees after backlash discourages fan interaction, encourages player outrage
18. ArenaNet “promised me that I wouldn’t have to check my identity at the door”: Fired writer says Guild Wars studio has damaged its reputation, but ArenaNet maintains that Jessica Price “attacked” community over a “perceived slight”
19. ArenaNet firings inspire IGDA to remind devs: Ask about harassment protection
20. IGDA asks studios to “clarify the guidelines and expectations around social media use”: ArenaNet firings show how “interacting with people as a game developer can jeopardize someone’s job and career”
21. ArenaNet president: Fired devs ‘could have chosen not to engage’ on social media
22. Women in Games launches strategy on improving gender diversity in esports: Encouraging women to participate in the industry is critical for the commercial success of the industry, says advocacy group
23. Blizzard’s Pink Mercy event raised over $12 million for a breast cancer charity
24. ESPN, Disney XD, and Blizzard pen deal to bring Overwatchmatches to primetime TV
25. Blizzard and Disney partner to bring Overwatch League to ESPN, other networks: ESPN, Disney XD, ABC, related networks will broadcast the competition’s inaugural season
26. Todd Howard: Games as a service ‘doesn’t mark the future’
27. ESA president: Crunch “hasn’t been a significant issue” for ten years: Industry body’s leader Mike Gallagher also believes call for unions is “in its infancy”
28. ESA: Strong wages and opportunities keep unionization from being a ‘significant issue’
29. Disney’s ‘Moana’ production assets now available for the public
30. RuneScape generates $800M in lifetime revenue during its 17 years online
31. RuneScape has brought in over $800 million in lifetime revenue: After 17 years and three iterations, Jagex’s MMO has over 250 million player accounts and continues to grow
32. Xbox: Accessible games can “mean the difference between existing and living” for disabled people – But platform holder’s Tara Voelker urges developers to add more accessibility options to their titles
33. Monster Hunter World concerns trigger 13% drop for Capcom shares: US analyst predicts “significant risk of sales decline” as console version slows ahead of PC launch
34. Supercell becomes first publisher to operate two multi-billion-dollar mobile games: Clash Royale breaks $2 billion lifetime revenue
35. Durham College embraces eSports with construction of gaming arena
36. ‘The Unspoken’ VR League eSports Final is Cancelled & Not Coming to Oculus Connect 5 After All
37. Valve: Monthly Active VR Users on Steam Are Up 160% Year-over-year
38. “There is no magic formula” for getting noticed on Steam
39. Jurassic World already one of Steam’s 2018 top sellers: Frontier’s dino park management sim rubbing elbows with Grand Theft Auto 5, Far Cry 5 after less than a month on sale
40. The Sims Mobile has amassed $15M in revenue in four months
41. The Sims Mobile brings in over $15 million in four months: Popular life sim game was only EA’s eighth highest earning mobile game in June
42. The Sims Mobile brings in over $15 million in four months: Popular life sim game was only EA’s eighth highest earning mobile game in June
43. EA acquires Industrial Toys: Midnight Star development studio brings mobile expertise to EA Worldwide Studios
44. id Software: Avoiding cannibalization in the post-apocalypse – Tim Willits on the role of Fallout 76 in Rage 2’s pre-E3 reveal, and why id no longer uses its tech to sell its games
45. Nexon and EA cancel Asia-exclusive Titanfall Online
46. Asia-focused Titanfall Online canceled: Nexon, EA, Respawn collaboration abandoned after over three years of development
47. Electronic Arts snaps up Alex Seropian’s studio Industrial Toys
48. THQ Nordic acquires German developer and publisher HandyGames
49. Coming out from under Grand Theft Auto’s shadow: For years, Take-Two’s other games have lingered in the shadow of Rockstar’s series, but GTA V’s monumental status means it’s pointless to compare it to the upcoming Red Dead Redemption 2
50. Todd Howard: Service-based Fallout 76 doesn’t mark the future direction of Bethesda – “Anyone who has ever said ‘this is the future and this part of gaming is dead’ has been proven wrong every single time”
51. “Millions of people” are still playing Skyrim every month – Todd Howard on the many Skyrim ports: “If you want us to stop releasing it, stop buying it.”
52. How do companies like Nintendo and CD Projekt Red approach crunch?
53. ‘Gatcha’ is a good fit for Fire Emblem, but it isn’t Nintendo’s standard for mobile
54. Many more indie games will be coming to Switch if Nintendo has its way
55. Nintendo aiming for 20 to 30 Switch indie releases per week
56. NPD: Nintendo Switch on track to be the best-selling console of Q4, and all of 2018 – Industry analyst predicts all three current generation consoles will sell at least 4m units total this year in the US
57. Nintendo reportedly rolls out hardware patch following Switch exploit
58. Nintendo reportedly rolling out new, more hack-resistant Switch hardware
59. Ideally, Nintendo wants 20 to 30 new indies to hit the Switch per week
60. GameStop says Nintendo Switch sales doubled following E3 
61. Pokemon Quest nabs 7.5M downloads across Switch and mobile
62. Analyst: Two years in, Pokemon Go crosses $1.8B lifetime revenue
63. Pokemon GO has brought in $1.8 billion since launch: Pokemon’s foray into augmented reality sees players spending $2 million per day
64. Pokémon Quest downloads pass 7.5 million: Free-to-play mobile and Switch game gets off to a strong start
65. Niantic’s Ingress to get Netflix animated series later this year: Series based on Pokémon Go forebear will be used to introduce upcoming sequel Ingress Prime
66. The Binding of Isaac card game raises $1 million in a week on Kickstarter
67. Games account for 94% of Google Play revenue in South Korea: Messaging and communication apps only bring in 2.2%, even less from social media and dating apps
68. Newzoo: Taiwanese gamers expected to spend $1.3 billion in 2018 – With 14.5 million players, Taiwan is the world’s 15th largest gaming market
69. Warner Bros. acquires mobile platform Plexchat to improve social features in its games
70. Tencent to publish Game of Thrones mobile game in China: Yoozoo is developing Game of Thrones: Winter is Coming through a partnership with Warner Bros
71. Tencent going global with WeGame digital marketplace as Steam targets China
72. The negativity of Keita Takahashi: The developer behind Wattam and Katamari Damacy has spent his career trying to show the potential of games, but doesn’t think he’s been successful
73. The European TV channel making documentaries with video games: Arte project manager Adrien Larouzée tells us why games are the perfect storytelling media to spread culture from the continent
74. The video games of Ecuadorean fishing village Santa Marianita: We take another look at how people find ways to play games everywhere
75. Shuhei Yoshida reflects on the PS2 launch: “We were awfully unprepared”: President of SIE Worldwide Studios discusses what went wrong and what went right for PlayStation over the years
76. Levine on BioShock: ‘I don’t think I was conscious of how Jewish it was until afterwards’
77. Meet the dev making his first DOS game — in 2018
78. Time bandits: Check out the ’80s and ’90s titles still going strong
79. The 80s and 90s PC games still unbelievably being updated today
80. Blog: Retro games as a revivalist movement

Jon