MEDIA, COMMUNICATIONS & NET NEUTRALITY
- Telecom Train Wreck: Why It Is Time for the Government to Address the Mess That Is The CRTC (Michael Geist)
- Stepping In It: Why Navdeep Bains’ Failing Wireless Strategy is Not a Step in the Right Direction (Michael Geist)
- Big Telecom Claims Oversight & Accountability Violates Its First Amendment Rights
- FCC Does Wireless Carriers Another Favor By Reclassifying Text Messages
- FCC forces California to drop plan for government fees on text messages
- FCC’s O’Rielly Keeps Claiming, With Zero Evidence, That Community Broadband Is An ‘Ominous’ Threat To Free Speech
- 2018 Year In FCC Review
- Report: T-Mobile’s Merger With Sprint Is the Latest Battleground Over Huawei
- Growing security fears hobble global ambitions of Chinese tech giant Huawei
- T-Mobile lied to the FCC about its 4G coverage, small carriers say
- T-Mobile denies lying to FCC about size of its 4G network
- FCC Says It Will Finally Investigate Nation’s BS Broadband Availability Maps. Maybe.
- FCC Eliminates Broadcast License Posting Requirement and Begins Quadrennial Media Ownership Rulemaking Proceeding
- Charter users who didn’t get promised speeds will get $75 or $150 refunds
- Bahnhof Now Facing Net Neutrality Investigation Over Its ‘Protest’ Blocking Of Elsevier
DIGITAL
- No More Settlement Demands: New Rules for Canadian Copyright Notice-and-Notice System Receive Royal Assent (Michael Geist)
- Music to Copyright Owners’ Ears: Second Circuit Affirms Capitol Records, LLC v. ReDigi Inc.
- No Agreement Made On EU Copyright Directive, As Recording Industry Freaks Out About Safe Harbors Too
- Top EU Court’s Advocate General Says German Link Tax Should Not Be Applied — But On A Technicality
- Judge Sides With BuzzFeed Over Publication of Steele Dossier
- Screenshotting a Newspaper Page May Infringe a Licensed Photo–Hirsch v. Complex (Eric Goldman)
- Two Pro Se Section 230 Rulings–Scott v. Carlson & Watkins v. Carr (Eric Goldman)
- Arkansas Politician Introduces Bill To Make It Illegal For Social Media Companies To Block Content He Likes
- Report: Facebook let major tech firms access private messages, friends lists
- Facebook let Netflix, Spotify, and other companies read your private messages: Between 2010 and today, Facebook shared users’ private data, including private messages and contact info, with more than 150 companies.
- Turning Off Facebook Location Tracking Doesn’t Stop It From Tracking Your Location (Kashmir Hill)
- Facebook’s Latest Privacy Screwup Shows How Facebook’s Worst Enemy Is Still Facebook
- Netflix Denies Exploiting Its Alleged Ability To Read, Write, And Delete Facebook Users’ Private Messages
- Big Telecom Wants To Tax Netflix To Pay For Broadband Upgrades ISPs Refuse To Deploy Themselves
- Study Shows That No, Netflix Isn’t Killing Movie Theaters
- DC sues Facebook over Cambridge Analytica scandal
- “We’re sorry,” Facebook says, again—new photo bug affects millions
- Facebook says a bug affecting up to 6.8 million users exposed photos they hadn’t shared
- Facebook Watch Clocks 400 Million Monthly Viewers, Rolls Out Ad Breaks To 40 Countries
- Instagram May Have Been Key Tool in Russia’s Manipulation of U.S. Voters
- Massive scale of Russian election trolling revealed in draft Senate report
- Social Media’s Forever War
- As NAACP kicks off boycott, Facebook says content moderation, infrastructure changes are coming in 2019
- Amazon and Facebook Reportedly Had a Secret Data-Sharing Agreement, and It Explains So Much
- Facebook “partner” arrangements: Are they as bad as they look?
- NY Times Columnist Nick Kristof Led The Charge To Get Facebook To Censor Content, Now Whining That Facebook Censors His Content
- Hundreds March on Amazon Fulfillment Center in Minnesota
- Amazon Is Reportedly Sick of Hawking You Cheap ‘Crap’ That Doesn’t Make It Any Money
- Amazon Slapped With Trademark, Patent Lawsuit by Williams-Sonoma Over Chair Design, Storefront
- Screenshotting a Newspaper Page May Infringe a Licensed Photo – Hirsch v. Complex
- Clinic Releases Guide to Anti-Circumvention Exemption for Software Preservation
- Social Media Is Ruining Our Minds—It Also Might Save Them
- Apple will spend $1 billion and hire up to 15,000 people for new Austin office
- Apple to bring Charlie Brown and the Peanuts to its streaming service
- Apple’s iOS 12.1.2 fixes eSIM and cellular bugs, but there might be more to it
- Apple says iOS update will avoid Qualcomm patents, China iPhone ban
- Microsoft unveils Windows Sandbox: Run any app in a disposable virtual machine
- Microsoft issues emergency update to fix critical IE flaw under active exploit
- Report Finds Huge Gender Gap in Artificial Intelligence Workforce
- Why algorithms need auditing
- Embracing AI for the Social Good
- Artificial Intelligence and Ethics: Ethics and the dawn of decision-making machines
- Don’t Worry About Deepfakes. Worry About Why People Fall for Them.: The focus on the technology behind fake media obscures more pressing questions about the psychology and sociology of viral false narratives.
- Should We Be Worried About Computerized Facial Recognition?: The technology could revolutionize policing, medicine, even agriculture—but its applications can easily be weaponized.
- YouTube Announces Sitewide Spam Purge That Will See Reduced Sub Counts
- YouTube Deletes Hundreds Of Strange, Sexually Suggestive Mom And Kids Videos
- YouTube’s Own ‘Rewind 2018’ Becomes Most-Disliked Video Ever In Less Than A Week
- Top 50 Most Viewed YouTube Channels Worldwide • Week Of 12/16/2018
- YouTube Integrating New Music Charts As Live Playlists In ‘YouTube Music’ App
- Celebrated Author Alice Walker Recommends Conspiratorial, Anti-Semitic YouTube Videos
- Telemundo to Launch First English-Language Newscast on YouTube
- Mariah Carey’s ‘All I Want for Christmas’ Tops YouTube’s Holiday Songs Chart
- For the first time ever, Disney posts a Pixar “short” on YouTube for free
- Internal Google Docs Warn Not to Gift Contractors Shirts in Case They Start Thinking They’re Employees: Report
- The Pixel 3 Is Proof That Google Doesn’t Care About Hardware
- Google Chrome wants to stop back-button hijacking
- Google isn’t the company that we should have handed the Web over to
- Google announces major expansion in New York City
- The Biggest Tech Lies of 2018
- CenturyLink blocked its customers’ Internet access in order to show an ad
- Broadband ISP CenturyLink Is Blocking Users’ Internet Access Just To Show An Ad
- It’s time for a Bill of Data Rights
- Elizabeth Banks’ WhoHaha Launches Podcast Network, Seeks Women And Nonbinary Podcasters
- Insights: When You Legally Can’t Give It Away–Is Marijuana The Toughest Job In Influencer Marketing?
- Instagram Influencer Charged $500 for Social Media Master Class Scam: ‘I Wanted the Price to Be Painful’
- FBI Secretly Collected Data on Aaron Swartz Earlier Than We Thought—in a Case Involving Al Qaeda
- FBI Swept Up Info About Aaron Swartz While Pursuing An Al-Qaeda Investigation
- Wall Street Journal Site Hacked With Pro-PewDiePie Message
- Hackers Replace Wall Street Journal Page With Pro-PewDiePie Message
- Signal app to Australia: Good luck with that crypto ban – Country’s efforts to slow Signal and other apps is a “disappointing development.”
- BBB Launches New Online Tool to Report Bad Ads
- Twitter Is Indeed Toxic For Women, Amnesty Report Says
- Twitter is relaunching the reverse-chronological feed as an option for all users starting today
- Verizon says Oath is dead. Meet Verizon Media Group.: The un-rebranding of Verizon’s AOL/Yahoo properties comes just a week after the company told federal regulators the brand was all but worthless.
- Verizon cuts 10,000 jobs and admits its Yahoo/AOL division is a failure
- As A Final FU To Free Speech On Tumblr, Verizon Blocked Archivists
- Insights: As Tumblr Implodes Amid NSFW Ban And Protests, What Platform Steps Up?
- Twitch sells Curse Media after two years
- Twitch is giving more creators money, but it couldn’t keep YouTube’s biggest names
- YouTube’s $100 Million Upload Filter Failures Demonstrate What A Disaster Article 13 Will Be For The Internet
- Netflix Joins Forces With Taylor Swift To Air ‘Reputation’ Tour Film On New Year’s Eve
- Netflix Testing New Feature That Asks Users If They Want To Instant-Replay Popular Scenes
- Netflix To Adapt John Green Holiday Novel ‘Let It Snow’ Into Feature Film
- ‘Little Baby Bum’ Owner Moonbug Raises $145 Million To Build Brand-Safe Kids’ Content Empire
- 7-Year-Old Ryan ToysReview Unveils Sponsorship With Mandarin Orange Brand
- Samsung Can’t Afford to Hold Back Anymore
- The Deadly Recklessness of the Self-Driving Car Industry
- How ’90s Cybersex Pioneers Looked for Action and Found Community
- HQ Trivia and Vine co-founder dead at 34
- HQ Trivia and Vine co-founder found dead: Colin Kroll believed to have died from drug overdose on Sunday morning
- Computing pioneer Evelyn Berezin died this week—she should be remembered
- U.S. Grocer Kroger Has Begun Making Autonomous Deliveries
- A Child Was Immunized By the World’s First Drone-Delivered Vaccine
- Ohio Congressman: We can fund border wall with “WallCoin”
- Mass email hoax causes closures across the US and Canada: Emails threaten explosions unless people pay $20,000 in Bitcoin.
CREATIVITY
- Super Injunction Silences News About Vatican Official’s Child Molestation Conviction
- Ex-Sheriff Joe Arpaio Claims Three Publications Did $300 Million In Damage To His Pristine Reputation
- Blurred legal lines (part two) – the copyright debate
- Greene v. Paramount Pictures Corp.
- The law of journalist-source privilege is still taking shape
- Faith Goldy ordered to pay Bell Media more than $43,000 in legal fees: Faith Goldy had sued Bell over its refusal to air her campaign advertisements on a local television station, but the suit was tossed in October
- UK Advertising Codes to Ban Gender Stereotypes
- Iranian phishers bypass 2fa protections offered by Yahoo Mail and Gmail
- Thinking of Using Kim Jong-un in Your Marketing?
- Court Awards Six Figures to Model Falsely “Diagnosed” with HIV in Ad Campaign
- No Actual Malice In The Wolf Of Wall Street Lawsuit: Judge Tosses Defamation Claim Brought By Former Stratton Oakmont Executive
- Oxford University Gets Opposition To Its Attempt To Trademark ‘Oxford’ For All The Things
- If Your Trademark Case Depends on Showing Initial Interest Confusion, Save Your Money–Select Comfort v. John Baxter (Eric Goldman)
- Former NASA Engineer Builds Impressive Glitter Bomb to Make Life Hell for Package Thieves
SURVEILLANCE & PRIVACY
- Supreme Court of Canada Protects Digital Privacy in Shared Devices
- Reasonable expectation of privacy exists in shared electronic devices: SCC
- R v Reeves (2018 SCC 56)
- Federal Court Says Massachusetts’ Wiretap Law Can’t Be Used To Arrest People For Recording Public Officials
- Man sues feds after being detained for refusing to unlock his phone at airport
- German City Wants Names And Addresses Of Airbnb Hosts; Chinese Province Demands Full Details Of Every Guest Too
- Central Londoners to be subjected to facial recognition test this week
- How computers got shockingly good at recognizing images
- Data privacy: how much consent is enough consent?
- He sees you when you’re sleeping, he knows when you’re awake: Smart toys and regulating the IoT in Canada
- Senators aim to give internet companies doctor-like duties to protect our data
- Takeaways from the First GDPR Fines
- Navigating the New Data Privacy Landscape: A Guide for OTT Providers
- If Data is Exposed But No One is Around to Steal It, Can a Data-Breach Plaintiff Still Sue?
- OCIE Publishes Risk Alert Regarding Electronic Messaging
- Locational Tracking on iOS and Android Devices: Check the Platform’s Rules!
- Momentum Builds for a National Privacy Law in the United States
- The 25 Most Popular Passwords of 2018 Will Make You Feel Like a Security Genius
- He’s Making a List. Will Regulators Check His Privacy Practices Twice?
GAMES
- US School Safety Commission largely gives games a pass: Group convened by Trump in wake of mass shooting earlier this year suggests schools monitor internet access, media ratings bodies review policies
- 68% of games depict violence, says US school safety report
- South Korea Continues To Criminalize Behavior Around Online Gaming At The Behest Of Video Game Industry
- The first union for game industry workers has launched in the UK
- IWGB launches video game workers union branch: “The game workers’ decision to unionise with the IWGB should be a wake up call for the UK’s gaming industry,” says IWGB general secretary
- Escape From Tarkov devs file DMCA takedown over false accusations
- Escape from Tarkov developer issues DMCA to stop story about user info leaks: Battlestate Games issues takedown on over 40 videos from YouTuber Eroktic due to “misinformation” and “negative hype”
- Game Developer Admits It Filed Bogus Copyright Claims, But Says It Had No Other Way To Silence A Critic
- Call of Duty developer Infinity Ward evacuated after bomb threat
- Infinity Ward receives bomb threat – Report: Call of Duty development studio among dozens of businesses, schools, news outlets receiving threats today
- Fresh Prince star Alfonso Ribeiro suing Epic over Fortnitedance
- ‘Fresh Prince’ star Alfonso Ribeiro sues Fortnite over use of dance his character Carlton popularized
- Fresh Prince actor sues Fortnite for use of ‘iconic’ Carlton dance: Alfonso Ribeiro wants to stop the makers of Fortnite and NBA 2K from using the dance he first performed on the 1990s sitcom
- CAA Signs First Gamers, Facebook Star StoneMountain64 And ‘Fortnite’ Pro Nick Eh 30
- People of the Year 2018: Epic Games: Despite a year peppered with controversy, the Fortnite developer’s influence on 2018 remains undeniable
- Forget Fortnite—my son is still obsessed with Minecraft
- Minecraft lays its last brick on Xbox 360, other last-gen consoles
- Consumer advocates want FTC to investigate kids apps: Group files formal complaint alleging COPPA violations, spotlights on inappropriate titles
- GamesIndustry.biz presents… The Year In Numbers 2018: The global games market value, most watched YouTube videos, biggest mobile games and more
- Global games market value rising to $134.9bn in 2018: Revenues grew by over 10%, mobile accounts for almost half at $63.2 billion
- Sony inadvertently leaks player counts for PS4 titles
- Sony accidentally revealed playercounts for nearly every PS4 game
- Sony accidentally reveals PS4 player counts: Grand Theft Auto V the highest number pulled at 51.7 million
- Sony Released Its Playstation Classic Console In A Way That Makes It Eminently Hackable
- Kingdom Hearts 3 Leaked on Facebook Marketplace Six Weeks Before Release Date
- One of the most anticipated games of the decade has leaked over a month early, and outraged fans are trying to punish the person they think did it
- PUBG now has over 200 million registered players on mobile alone
- PUBG Mobile reaches 200 million downloads: Fortnite hit 200 million milestone across all platforms last month
- Industry experts worry some esports orgs are overvalued and headed for trouble
- The state of esports: Radical growth and inevitable failure – 2018 in Review – League of Legends soars, esports are subbed by the Olympics, and PUBG flounders
- Blizzard pulls devs off Heroes of the Storm and cuts eSports support
- Blizzard cancels Heroes of the Storm Global Championship: Devs to be reassigned elsewhere, but game will continue to receive live support
- Blizzard Abruptly Kills Heroes of the Storm Esports, Leaving Players And Casters Fuming
- Blizzard shifts developers away from Heroes of the Storm
- Check out our 16-page Game Publisher’s Guide To Esports: Produced in partnership with Esports BAR
- Intel and ESL announce $100m esports investment: Longest-running partnership in sector extended to 2021
- Esports BAR’s mission to get non-gaming brands excited about pro-gaming: Orange, AirAsia and Dominos amongst attendees at Cannes event in February
- Evil Geniuses founder unites esports agencies to form Popdog: Alex Garfield acquires Loaded, NoScope, and esports division of Catalyst; launches with $9m funding round
- Riot reportedly suspends COO over misconduct at work: Riot offers statement, full internal email confirms suspension
- Riot Games suspends COO Scott Gelb for workplace misconduct
- Epic shuts down Fortnite data miner: Developer says the takedown was for promoting and advertising game mod tools, “not directly related” to leaking
- Fortnite dev team removes Infinity Blade for being ‘overpowered’
- Fortnite Season Five announcement most watched trailer on YouTube in 2018: Viewed 46.8 million times, the trailer beat both the Fallout 76 and Red Dead Redemption II reveals
- Discord Store to offer developers 90 percent of game revenues
- Discord aims to disrupt by opening storefront to devs, offering 90% revenue share
- Why even avid Steam gamers should celebrate Epic’s new store: Bulkhead Interactive CEO Joe Brammer expects major gains from Epic’s new store — now it’s time for Valve to react and evolve
- Steam’s ‘Top Wishlists’ filter ranks recent wishlist numbers for unreleased games
- Epic’s Fortnite was the highest trending game on Google US in 2018: Red Dead Redemption 2 and Fallout 76 were second and third
- Capcom responds to complaints over Street Fighter’s in-game ads: Publisher will “consider how we can improve this new feature” based on community feedback
- Battlefield 5 is having trouble balancing for both new and experienced players
- Atari acquires stake in Animoca Brands as part of blockchain game deal: Partnership will see Animoca Brands develop blockchain version of RollerCoaster Tycoon
- Red Dead Redemption 2 reclaims No.1 in UK charts: Super Smash Bros tumbles to No.4
- Epic to launch cross-platform services for developers: Tools built for Fortnite will be made free and open for all engines, platforms, and stores
- EGX Rezzed 2019 sees return of Epic’s Powered by Unreal Engine zone: Unreal Engine devs exhibiting at the London show next March eligible to have their space doubled
- Facebook & ZeniMax Settle Major Legal Dispute Over VR Intellectual Property
- IMAX Officially Bails on VR Business
- IMAX to Close Down All Remaining IMAX VR Centres Soon
- Image courtesy Brilliant Sole: Brilliant Sole Wants to Put a VR Controller in Your Shoes
- HTC Thinks Virtual Reality’s Killer App Could Be Christianity: Christians adapted radio and rock music. Maybe VR will be next.
- DeltaDNA: In-game ads beginning to catch IAP as viable revenue stream – Study indicates that both casual and core mobile free-to-play games are making an increasing percentage of their revenue from ads
- Formula 1, Hutch partner on mobile games: Hutch to create official, licensed racing titles for iOS, Android in the new year
- What a Mobile App Lawyer Can Do for You
- The UK industry stares down a Brexit disaster – 2018 in Review – There are no silver linings to Brexit for the UK industry, as uncertainty and the threat of No Deal create a difficult business climate
- A German regulator is taking Nintendo to court over eShop preorder policies
- Nintendo: Red Dead 2 not being on Switch was down to timing – Reggie Fils-Aime says Switch emerged too late for Rockstar to consider the platform for its hit game
- ‘Super Smash Bros. Ultimate’ Fastest Selling Nintendo Switch Game
- Super Smash Bros Ultimate shoots to the top of EMEAA charts: Nintendo’s first-party line-up continues to pay dividends, Just Cause 4 the only other new entry in the top ten
- Super Smash Bros. Ultimate US sales reach 3 million: Switch is the fastest-selling US console this generation, and Smash Bros. is the fastest-selling Nintendo home console game ever in Europe
- Smash Bros. Ultimate has sold over 3M copies in the U.S.
- Report: Pokemon Go creator Niantic close to $3.9 billion valuation
- NPD: Switch, PS4, Xbox One all sell over 1.3 million units in November – This is the first time in history that three console platforms have all sold over one million in a single month
- Hands-on: Switch’s NES controllers offer unmatched old-school authenticity
- Minecraft modders form Hypixel Studios: Riot Games and former Blizzard exec Rob Pardo among initial investors as new developer announces debut title
- Twitch saw over 3 million streamers per month in 2018: Platform sees biggest year yet for streamers, viewership, Affiliates, and Partners
- Twitch sells Curse Media: Video streaming site offloads gaming media network to Fandom two years after acquiring it alongside Curse client and chat services
- Number Of Creators Monetizing On Twitch Grew By 86% This Year, Platform Confirms In Holiday Stream
- Ninja Scores Commentator Role For Tonight’s NFL Game, Streamed On Twitch
- Number Of Creators Monetizing On Twitch Grew By 86% This Year, Platform Confirms In Holiday Stream
- F2P dev survey: In-game mobile ads becoming viable revenue source
- Making Project Hospital: A realistic approach to medical simulation
- Why go for a surprise launch?: Studio Wildcard and Grapeshot Games co-founders Jeremy Stieglitz and Jesse Rapczak discuss the pros and cons of debuting their new MMO Atlas on short notice
- “Apathy is how games die”: Nathan Vella tells us how Capy has done everything it can to ensure Below is worth the five-year wait
- Supermassive Games: “We used to think awards didn’t matter” – On its tenth birthday, we ask the UK studio about its history and what its Dark Pictures Anthology says about the future
- Apptopia November report: Football Manager 2019 on Android outpaces all other new releases – Hyper casual continues to dominate the new release download charts
- AppsFlyer: Ads now generate more revenue than IAP in casual mobile games – Midcore games also see decline in share of IAP revenue, but ads still only make up 30%
- Razer launches cryptocurrency initiative: Peripheral maker asks users to install mining software in exchange for Razer Silver loyalty reward points
- Jägermeister launches video game soundtrack competition for indie studios: Track and Build contest open to all indies releasing game in 2019
- Keeping The Outer Worlds rewarding, no matter someone’s play style
- Blog: Putting a thought into play
- Blog: How to turn your mod into an indie game
- Blog: Why being an indie game dev is harder than ever
- Video: Total War: Rome II devs built all of Europe—and the AI ignored most of it
- How ‘user stories’ can help players grasp new content
- Human values in game design: An approach for emergent storytelling
- Old ways can still be the best ways – Why I Love: YoYo Games’ Mike Dailly explains how tech from the 1988 Commodore 64 shooter Armalyte is still used today
- League of Legends will no longer support Windows XP and Vista in 2019
- Blog: What trends should you know about going into 2019?
- People of the Year: Phil Spencer – PlayStation may have dominated the charts, but it was Xbox that got the games industry talking
- People of the Year: Rami Ismail – Vlambeer’s co-founder received the GDC Ambassador award, in recognition of years spent reaching out and giving voice to the world’s emerging development communities
- People of the Year 2018: Hello Games – After criticism, setbacks, investigations, and a PR nightmare, the creators of No Man’s Sky emerged this year to an optimistic future
- Best of 2018: Reimagining failure in strategy game design in Into the Breach
- Best of 2018: Dealing with the scourge of burnout in game dev
- Gamasutra’s Best of 2018: Alex Wawro’s top 8 games
- Gamasutra’s Best of 2018: Alissa McAloon’s top 10 games
- Gamasutra’s Best of 2018: Chris Kerr’s top 5 games
- Gamasutra’s Best of 2018: Bryant Francis’ top 10 games
- 5 trends that defined the game industry in 2018
- The Best Video Game Surprises of 2018
- The Biggest Video Game Disappointments of 2018
- 5 events that rocked the game industry in 2018
- 343 Industries is teaming up with Limbitless to provideHalo-themed prosthetics
Jon