oozey mess
★
dirt enthusiast
Xuebing Du
blake kathryn
Lint Roller? I Barely Know Her
JVL
noise dept.
Alisa U Zemlji Chuda
Peter Solarz
Cosimo Galluzzi
occasionally subtle
roma★
KIROKAZE
if i look back, i am lost
titsay
Sweet Seals For You, Always
JBB: An Artblog!
Janaina Medeiros
d e v o n
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The iPhone X is Apple's most powerful and modern smartphone yet. However, it enters a world where privacy legislation is woefully outdated.
The iPhone X: Instead of getting a warrant just put the accused’s phone in front of his face and you’re in! While the legislators move at their usual pace, where is the code that is going to protect and benefit us?
Cybersecurity expert Bruce Schneier, a fellow with the Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society, discusses what consumers can do to protect themselves from government and corporate surveillance.
I’m not crazy about the headline for this interview but it’s worth reading. I respect that Schneier is not offering up any fast fix solution. His answers provide an underlying resignation to the current state of online privacy. I can personally become cynical and even depressed about that but I don’t get the impression that he feels that way. Makes me realise I need to adjust my negative attitude in this regard. As he says, this isn’t the first technological innovation that has rocked our world and it won’t be the last.
British security researcher Lauri Love's appeal against extradition to the US for trial on charges of hacking into NASA, the FBI, and the US Federal Reserve will be heard at the High Court in London on 28 and 29 November.
On 17 October, 56 respected academics co-signed a recommendation on measures to safeguard fundamental rights and the Open Internet in the framework of the EU copyright reform. This effort is a reaction to the multiple questions regarding the legality of the so-called...
They know of what they speak!
Musings on Piracy
When it comes to digital piracy, I’ll be honest, my head starts spinning. There is so much persuasive writing on the topic. I’ve never been a black and white kind of person and when it comes to illegal file-sharing, it’s no different.
The IPKat is an excellent IP/IT blog. Exploring the blog this week brought me to a review given of Nicholas Lovell’s book The Curve. From what I gather, Lovell is essentially telling us to get over our digital products being relegated to the free pile. IP owners need to realise that piracy isn’t their problem –it’s competing in this brave, free world. I haven’t read the book yet but I plan to.
Reading the IPKat’s review brought to mind the game-changing effect that technology disruptions have. I could be wrong but I don’t believe there are many examples in history of tech disruptions that came along and then forever retreated so that their less-efficient predecessors could continue –yes, you love your vinyl records but that’s a relative blip on the screen –I’m talking about horses and cars, typewriters and computers.
In a similar vein, I came across a Tedx Talk by Kester Brewin from 2013. Brewin persuasively shows pirates to be more than just thieves with eyepatches. He says that throughout history, pirates have appeared to correct injustices of the day brought on by an imbalance of power. Brewin posited in his talk that there has been an imbalance favouring private IP ownership interests and your friendly neighbourhood pirate has risen once more to rectify things.
It’s tough for me to disagree with these views. Having said that, when it comes to cyber-piracy, I can’t help but feel The Pirate Bay was not created by heroes of any kind. And if you steal something of mine, like my music or a film I made, it’s obviously within my rights to take action.
With this impasse between owners and users, combined with all the intricate, complex, hyper-specialized legal issues that arise with the advancements of information technology, what we essentially have is…. the same old same old.
IP litigation of course, isn’t going anywhere. We will continue to see tactics such as notices/demand letters that legally (arguably at least) stretch the truth and reverse class action suits. And why not? It’s all fair game. You use the arrows in your quiver and I’ll do the same. You call me a pirate? Sue me. Should you sue me, I deny, deny, deny. If I did infringe, your damages are £5. Are you really going to sue me for parking and not paying, I mean downloading and not paying, when, should you jump through all the hoops, your damages will end up being nominal?
The decision to take formal action is always fraught with a myriad of factors for potential plaintiffs to consider whether it’s parking violations, copyright infringement or any other cause of action. I’m not suggesting that IP owners cease using the collection and litigation avenues available to them. But they might consider spending some time reading a book like The Curve. That’s what I’m going to do!
Whether man-eating lion or adorable kitty, cats have occupied important roles in some of our favorite films. Here are 100 of the most iconic movie cats (big and small) of all time.
Reliable Enforcer Wanted; Apply to Cyberspace Immediately
In hockey, a team often employs an enforcer. It’s a preventative measure –should you do something inappropriate to one of our star players, Bambi will take to the ice and make you concussed. Our society relies on these preventative measures, fortunately, not all of which are threats of violence. You want to run a bar tab, we’ll need a credit card. Please know that we do not accept returns of purchased underwear. When you hire a kitchen contractor, you don’t give them the money up front. You dole it out in instalments and quit doling when the renovations go south.
In these latter examples, you might say that it’s all thanks to the law of contract. You get to decide what preventative measures you want in your contract. What is more, you even get to decide who you contract with. Two good things for sure. But it’s more than just what you negotiate in your contract. When things go wrong, what is arguably of more importance is who has to sue. Even if I’m in breach, you have to sue me and prove it. When we talk of copyright infringement in cyberspace, it’s even more problematic for the owner. There is often no contract to act as a foundation of their complaint and if you want to sue me, you’ll have to find me first.
In this respect, the cyberspace team has been looking for a reliable enforcer for a while now. And in the meantime, some of our players are getting hurt. Look at Pepe the Frog –I’m loathe to call Pepe a star player but perhaps that’s because of what has been made of him in the last few years by alt-right meme-sters. Pepe was the creation of Matt Furie for his cartoon Boy’s Club. It has been a popular character for memes since 2008 but in the last two years, Pepe went from slacker cartoon character to alt-right poster boy --and leader of Kekistan? Furie says he’s disgusted with how they have massacred his boy (Think Don Corleone mourning Sonny). Until recently, he felt there was nothing he could do. It’s tough to argue with that conclusion given the costs and difficulties involved with suing. With no other cyber-enforcer around, those are really his options. Sue or do nothing. Just this month, he finally decided to sue a citizen of Kekistan --worshipper of the god, Kek?. Read the article here from Motherboard and you’ll get an idea of what he’s in for. Will injunctions and damages get Furie his frog back? I seriously doubt it.
So what is the solution? Recently, Apple made the decision to be “Pepe-free.” I wouldn’t want my brand associated with the alt-right either but by this course of action, Apple is prejudicing legitimate owners of copyright for actions out of their control. Furthermore, relying on multinational tech companies as the arbiters of enforcement is not ideal; it’s scary. So far, the best approach seems to be to involve/affect/go after the intermediaries. A topic for discussion for another rainy day.
Little-known copyright provision allows reproduction of full book texts.
Sonny couldn’t sing so he brought new meaning to the phrase “carrying a tune.” Love this little form of payback.
Artificial intelligence can now produce original paintings, novels and music.
As much as I tend to find the current state of copyright law to be too protective, I can’t envision copyright not being granted for such computer-generated works. As for who will enjoy the copyright, follow the money. BTW, if you like to collect art but you’re on a budget, I saw that Tesco is selling what I assume are Andy Warhol pieces for quite cheap --aisle 4.
The company’s investigation at first feared a Russian hack. It then uncovered a sweeping disinformation campaign brought by shadowy accounts.
For my first post to this blog, I thought I would post two technology cartoons I created in 2015.
Both cartoons speak to how fast and far technology has advanced in the past 20 years. Can the law be expected to keep up given the Anglo-American tradition of relying on past precedent? Is our time-honoured legislation analogous to a telegram from Aunt Carol and Uncle Frank? Does the relatively new architecture that is cyberspace really require us to start from scratch? Easterbrook (Cyberspace and the Law of the Horse) and Lessig (The Law of the Horse: What Cyberlaw Might Teach Us) offer differing opinions on this topic. As reasonable and persuasive as they both are, I like to think at the very least, they don’t enjoy weddings.
I hope to develop a more informed opinion on this and other information technology law topics over the coming weeks. For now, I’d say that we need something old –but we need something new, too. Whether you need something borrowed or something blue is a matter of how far you can stretch a metaphor.