Your Rights Online, Privacy and Surveillance, Google Glass, Bloomberg; Copyfight, Piracy, DMCA, e-Books; Prenda, Pr0n

Your Rights Online

• 'The future of freedom on the internet is at stake'
• U.N.'s ITU pursues Internet control -- again
• Interpol filter scope creep: ASIC ordering unilateral website blocks

Privacy and Surveillance

• Eric Schmidt: we have to fight for privacy, or we're going to lose it
• Your digital identity and why you cannot escape it
• Fears of U.S. Mass Surveillance Spur Data Protection Proposals in Europe
• The Government Wants A Backdoor Into Your Online Communications
• Kiwis Want To Spy On All Communications, VPNs, And Be Able To Use Secret Evidence Against You
• How the FBI's online wiretapping plan could get your computer hacked
• Dear hacker: Please help us eavesdrop on our customers—"Saudi telecom seeks help monitoring encrypted Twitter data according to e-mails."
• Skype with care – Microsoft is reading everything you write—Are they really doing that? The evidence seems to say yes.
• So This Is How It Begins: Guy Refuses to Stop Drone-Spying on Seattle Woman
• How to permanently delete Snapchat photos

Google Glass

• Glass questions
• Lambda Labs Is Launching A Facial Recognition API For Google Glass
• At Google Conference, Cameras Even in the Bathroom NYT

Bloomberg

• Privacy Breach on Bloomberg's Data Terminals NYT
• Bloomberg reporters allegedly used financial terminals to spy on Wall Street
• Bloomberg chief apologizes for data snooping

Copyfight

• Goods from kiosks at two malls seized—"Jim Spero, Special Agent-in-Charge of the Buffalo office of Homeland Security, says the sale of counterfeit goods - in Buffalo and beyond - poses a major security threat." Emphasis mine.
• Obama Stops Championing Treaty That Gives the Blind Better Access to E-Books
• 'Mockingbird' Writer Harper Lee Sues To Regain Pulitzer-Winning Novel's Copyright
• Day of the Dead trademark request draws backlash for Disney—No Dia de los Muertos for Mickey.
• Jail Terms For Unlocking Cellphones Shows The True Black Heart Of The Copyright Monopoly
• Defeat for EA over faces of sports stars—"A former college football player has won the right to sue Electronic Arts for using his likeness without permission."
• A YouTube Piano Teacher Took Down His Competition With Phony Copyright Claims

Piracy

• Hollywood should not decide our copyright laws
• US entertainment industry to Congress: make it legal for us to deploy rootkits, spyware, ransomware and trojans to attack pirates!
• RIAA stamps its feet again, demands Google improve anti-piracy efforts
• Banking Privacy More Important than Copyright Enforcement, Dutch Court Rules
• Megaupload Launches Frontal Attack on White House Corruption

DMCA

• Judge Tosses DMCA Defenses, Creating Unexpected Copyright Liability For Web Services In New York
• Hollywood Studios Censor Pirate Bay Documentary—"Viacom, Paramount, Fox and Lionsgate have all asked Google to take down links pointing to the Pirate Bay documentary TPB-AFK."
• Blogger Issues DMCA Notice To Take Down Posts Infringing His 'How To Infringe' Post

e-Books

• Apple denies DoJ accusations, says eBook publishers were fixing prices before iBooks
• Penguin will pay $75M back to e-book buyers over alleged price fixing
• The Steve Jobs emails that show how to win a hard-nosed negotiation
• Judge says leaning toward U.S. in Apple e-books case
• Amazon: Victim or Aggressor? Issue Will Frame Apple E-book Trial

Prenda

• New Prenda letter threatens to tell neighbors about porn accusations—"Sprawling case may be porn troll's 'last stand,' but it looks massive."
• Prenda lawyer gets kicked off 9th Circuit case—"Paul Hansmeier's motion to delay an $81,000 sanctions order was also denied."
• Prenda blows sanctions deadline, ordered to pay an extra $1,000 per day

Pr0n

• Yahoo won't restrict porn on Tumblr
• EU votes to reject 'porn ban' proposals
• Does Bible Belt love porn as much as the godless do?
• "Revenge porn" suit targets generic porn sites, Web hosts
• Chinese "spy" caught with NASA laptop full of porn, not secrets

TPP, ACTA, Hollywood, Net Access, Piracy, Domain Name Seizures, Megaupload, SurfTheChannel, Music, Big (and Freed) Content

TPP

• TPP: the Son of ACTA will oblige America and other countries to throw out privacy, free speech and due process for easier copyright enforcement
• The Biggest Threat to Free Speech and Intellectual Property That You've Never Heard Of
• Don't Let Them Trade Away Our Internet Freedoms--"The Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) endangers the Internet and digital freedoms on par with ACTA, SOPA, and PIPA, and it does so in two significant ways: First, its intellectual property (IP) chapter would have extensive negative ramifications for users' freedoms and innovation, and second, the entire process has shut out multi-stakeholder participation and is shrouded in secrecy. The TPP is a major threat because it will rewrite global rules on IP enforcement and restrict the public domain."
• Prominent Academics Respond to the TPP
• USTR Tells Public Interest Groups They Have 8 Minutes To Talk To TPP Negotiators--And the EFF gets "an entire two minutes more."

ACTA

• CETA Update, Part Two: ACTA Provisions Are Still Very Much Alive
• EU Wants to Sneak in a Mini-ACTA by the Backdoor
• India's ACTA: Intellectual Property Rights And Secrecy Stall Treaty

Hollywood

• How Hollywood Is Encouraging Online Piracy--"The death of the DVD is pushing users to piracy."And Hollywood seems to think artificial scarcity is a sustainable business.
• 5 Ways Hollywood Can Stop Digging Its Own Grave--Pogue's follow-up.
• This Is Why People Pirate--"Do you know why people hate movie studios? Why, increasingly, they're driven to download content illegally, even though they're perfectly willing to pay for it? Because of crap like this."

Net Access

• Australia: ABC warps time to put Dr Who online early at IView--"Piracy is wrong, as you are denying someone their rights and income for their intellectual property. The fact that it is happening is indicative that as broadcasters we are not meeting demand for a segment of the population. So as broadcasters we need to find convenient ways of making programs available via legal means to discourage the need for piracy." Emphasis mine.
• Why Arrested Development on Netflix could change everything--"As plans for Arrested Development‘s return spread, many details indicate that thanks to Netflix, the popular cult series has the opportunity to not only legitimize the world of web content, but create a new business model for an industry that desperately needs it."
• HBO cuts the cord, brings streaming-only service to Europe
• Potluck for the Eyeballs: Amazon's Streaming Service
• Waiting for Apple TV? Don't Hold Your Breath--Even they can't cut TV's gordian knot yet.
• Broadcasters Defeat TV Streaming Service
• Streaming Site Admin Detained 7 Months Without Bail, Faces Deportation

Piracy

• 100k+ People Demand Pardon For Peter Sunde Of The Pirate Bay
• Obama Ambassador In Cambodia On Day Pirate Bay Founder Was Arrested
• German ISPs must hand over file sharer info to rights holders, high court rules
• RIAA Lobbyist-Turned-Judge: ISPs Deserve Copyright Trolls For Not Stopping Infringement--Like something like this wasn't foreseen.
• FileSonic cyberlocker offline after piracy complaints

Domain Name Seizures

• Feds Back To Seizing Websites Over Claims Of Copyright Infringement
• Oops! Copyright Cops Return Seized RojaDirecta Domain Names – 19 Months Later
• Members of Congress Demand Answers for Homeland Security’s Unjust Domain Name Seizures

Megaupload

• FBI must handover Dotcom evidence – judge
• Kim Dotcom promises that disruptive new music service, Megabox, will launch this year
• Kim Dotcom: MPAA / RIAA Corrupted the U.S. Government
• New Megaupload Will Be Massive Global Network To Change The World
• Dotcom's Frozen Funds Partially Thawed by New Zealand Court

SurfTheChannel

• Surfthechannel owner sentenced after piracy conviction
• Private justice: How Hollywood money put a Brit behind bars
• Fact's victory over Surfthechannel is a decisive blow in the copyright wars

Music

• Major Labels Claim Copyright Over Public Domain Songs; YouTube Punishes Musician
• RIAA Revenue Dwindles As Labels Cut Back--And budget cuts are hitting the MPAA too.
• Motion to reduce $675,000 verdict denied in SONY v Tenenbaum--Guess is the way the RIAA will be earning their paycheck.
• Grooveshark CEO on empowering musicians and beating the labels
• YouTube is teens' first choice for music--"Google's video streaming site is the most popular way young people listen to music, according to a new survey."
• Who inherits your iTunes library?--If Bruce Willis gets his way, it will be his kids. UPDATE: T'was a British tabloid rumor.
• Pop music too loud and all sounds the same--Kinda like how Rock N' Roll was during its day.

Big (and Freed) Content

• Musopen.org--"Musopen is a... non-profit focused on improving access and exposure to music by creating free resources and educational materials. We provide recordings, sheet music, and textbooks to the public for free, without copyright restrictions. Put simply, our mission is to set music free."
• Archive.org: Over 1,000,000 Torrents of Downloadable Books, Music, and Movies
• Alexandria 2.0: One Millionaire's Quest to Build the Biggest Library on Earth
• Award-Winning Manga Author Opens Up His Work To Be Used By 'Anyone, Anywhere, For Anything,' Royalty-Free--"Sato will not actually be renouncing his copyright. Instead, he has chosen to not enforce it, in essence granting the entire world free rein to use his work to create foreign language adaptations, applications, commercial films, TV series, produce merchandise or anything else the 'second users' can come up with."
• B-Movie Legends Troma Entertainment Releases 150 Films On YouTube

ACTA, SOPA, IPAA, Copyfight, Piracy, Megaupload

ACTA

• VICTORY! ACTA Suffers Final, Humiliating Defeat In European Parliament--But over the pond, Mexico signed ACTA though its Senate still needs to ratify it.
• ACTA IS BACK: Leaked docs show Canada/European Commission trying to sneak ACTA into Canada & back into Europe
• Don't believe every leak you read says EU Commission on CETA--"CETA text regarding the Internet is totally different from ACTA, the Commission said."

SOPA/IPAA

• SOPA IS BACK: Lamar Smith trying to quietly revive SOPA and cram it down the world's throats
• SOPA reborn by Congress as IPAA--And it's even worse.
• SOPA author wants to arrest journalists over leaks

Copyfight

• Canada: Copyright fees on music, video, struck down by top court--"The Supreme Court of Canada has decided that Internet providers do not have to pay copyright fees when their consumers download or preview music, and that teachers don't have to pay fees when they photocopy copyrighted materials for their students."
• Victory for Open WiFi: Judge Rejects Copyright Troll's Bogus "Negligence" Theory--The case was dismissed on preemption grounds.
• Supreme Court: RapidShare Liable For Copyright Infringement – Sometimes
• Censored by Copyright: Dan Bull video removed from YouTube after criticising copyright abuse
• Lawsuit Against BitTorrent Users Falters, Band Brands Action "Bullshit"--"A lawsuit against fans of the metal band All Shall Perish has faltered after it was revealed that the copyright troll plaintiff in the case has failed to register the required copyrights."
• Op-ed: MPAA/RIAA lose big as US backs copyright "limitations"

Piracy

• U.K. Home Office won't block O'Dwyer extradition in copyright case
• U.S. Pursuing a Middleman in Web Piracy--"The government’s antipiracy case against Richard O’Dwyer is unusual because he did not publish pirated content himself but pointed the way for others." NYT
• Artists Score Victory in Mass-Piracy Lawsuit Against CBS, CNET
• US "Six Strikes" Anti-Piracy Scheme Will Roll Out Gradually
• Why we are breaking the Pirate Bay ban--"We must not hand courts and governments censorship powers without a public debate about digital rights."

Megaupload

• FBI Continues To Insist There's No Reason For Kim Dotcom To Be Able To See The Evidence Against Him
• New Zealand Police Investigated over MegaUpload’s Founder Arrest
• Kim DotCom extradition hearing postponed until 2013
• Kim Dotcom offers US Department of Justice a deal
• US 'the enemy' says Dotcom judge

Hollywood, HBO, MegaUpload, Copyfight, International

Hollywood

• TV Networks Say You're Breaking The Law When You Skip Commercials
• Tell Old Media to Keep Their Hands Out of Your DVR
• TV Network Exec Argues That Anything That Causes Cable Subscribers To Cut The Cord Is Illegal

HBO

• Shut up and take my money, HBO: Website pushes for standalone HBO streaming service
• The Reasons Why HBO Doesn’t Want Your Money
• HBO Says No Go To "Take My Money, HBO"

MegaUpload

• Kim Dotcom wins right to FBI files
• MegaUpload asks U.S. court to dismiss piracy charges--"The cloud-storage service accused of piracy says the U.S. lacked jurisdiction and Justice Department lawyers 'should have known' that before taking down the service and throwing its founder in jail."
• Dotcom info not 'physical'--"FBI agents who copied data from Megaupload founder Kim Dotcom's computers and took it overseas were not acting illegally because information isn't 'physical material', the Crown says."

Copyfight

• Should Websites Charge A Fee To Process Copyright Takedowns?
• Undercover MPAA Agents Expose Alleged Movie Pirates
• Verizon Succesfully Defends Privacy of Alleged BitTorrent Pirates
• The Pirate generation: Are we 'unreasonable'?
• Study: Despite Tougher Copyright Monopoly Laws, Sharing Remains Pervasive
• Feds Urging Appeals Court to Reinstate $1.5 Million File-Sharing Verdict - against a Minnesota woman for sharing two dozen songs on Kazaa
• Bowing to U.S. pressure, Spain and Malaysia dropped from copyright blacklist--"After bowing to pressure from the U.S., Spain and Malaysia have been dropped from a high-profile copyright violations watchlist that officials use to pressure countries into changing their laws to align with U.S. intellectual property safeguards."

International

• The Game of ACTA: Mid-Battle Analysis, Next Actions--"After the well-received ACTA rejection by the three first committes in the European Parliament, things are looking hopeful to prevent this middlemen-regime treaty from ever becoming reality. But we’re not there yet; here’s where we are."
• Dead on arrival? Dutch Parliament kills ACTA before EU vote--"Dutch MPs have also ruled the government will never sign any such agreement."
• Germany increases USB flash drive tax by over 2000 percent
• Canada: Music played at public events to be subject to new copyright fees
• French court says YouTube not obligated to control content

Copyfight, ACTA, North America, Europe, ANZ, Movies, Music

Copyfight

• RIAA CEO Hopes SOPA Protests Were a 'One-Time Thing'
• RIAA (sort of) responds to SOPA critics, says copyright "offers little real protection"
• Copyright Math: The lies MPAA/RIAA are saying to convince politicians to pass their bills
• Copyright kings are judge, jury and executioner on YouTube
• The Pirate Bay's Peter Sunde: It's Evolution, Stupid

ACTA

• Dutch Parliament Rejects ACTA On Human Rights Violations
• Danish Trade Minister Apologizes For Using Bogus Industry Numbers To Support Pro-ACTA Argument
• Bulgaria Withdraws From ACTA, following Poland and Germany
• Michael Geist's magisterial ten-minute ACTA takedown
• European Commission Blames Social Networks For ACTA Failure; Worried About Its Imminent Directive On Copyright Enforcement

North America

• Verisign Seizes .com Domain Registered via Foreign Registrar on Behalf of US Authorities
• Uncle Sam: If It Ends in .Com, It's .Seizable
• American ISPs to launch massive copyright spying scheme on July 12
• Canadian Music Industry Wants Its Own Lawful Access: Subscriber Disclosure Without a Court Order
• Canadian Music Industry Takes Aim At Google, Facebook, Reddit & Tech Startups With Bill C-11 Demands

Europe

• Copyright wars heat up: US wins extradition of college kid from England
• SOPA, meet SOCA - British Police Take Down Website, Threaten Visitors
• BT and Talk Talk lose file-sharing appeal.
• Ireland Signs Controversial 'Irish SOPA' Into Law; Kicks Off New Censorship Regime
• Hactivistas protest brutal Spanish copyright law with flood of complaints

ANZ

• Australian Govt holds second secret anti-piracy meeting
• Blackout: Govt piracy meeting completely censored
• Megaupload Seizure Order "Null and Void" Says High Court

Movies

• MPAA: Ripping DVDs Shouldn't Be Allowed Because It Takes Away Our Ability To Charge You Multiple Times For The Same Content
• Stop innovating, please: Kaleidescape loses DVD ripping case
• BitTorrent doesn't hurt US box-office
• Fox, Warner want secure, high-def film players--DRM rears its ugly head.
• Heavy Hangs The Bandwidth That Torrents The Crown--"The Oatmeal made an unintentional point that was just as important as the first, however: The single least-attractive attribute of many of the people who download content illegally is their smug sense of entitlement."

Music

• UK Manager Says Major Labels Steal More Music Than Filesharers
• Massive Copyright Shitstorm Brewing, And iTunes Is Involved
• RIAA Insists That, Really, The Music Industry Is Collapsing; Reality Shows It's Just The RIAA That's Collapsing
• Paper Lions gets fed up with not being paid for their Album, Releases for free.
• iPass away – do my digital downloads die with me?

ACTA, Copyfight, Piracy, Music

ACTA

• KILL ACTA--There's still time to act.
• European Commission Slip Reveals Censorship In ACTA
• Slovenia's ambassador apologizes to her children and her nation for signing ACTA
• Poland freezes anti-piracy pact ratification
• As Anonymous protests, Internet drowns in inaccurate anti-ACTA arguments

Copyfight

• Enough, Already: The SOPA Debate Ignores How Much Copyright Protection We Already Have
• 70 Groups Tell Congress To Put The Brakes On Any Further Efforts To Expand Intellectual Property
• Senator Ron Wyden's Favorite Techdirt Posts Of The Week
• Paramount "humbled" by SOPA protests even as CEO blasts "mob mentality"
• RIAA still raging against Google, Wikipedia for "misuse of power" in SOPA battle
• Meet Richard Mack, Republican challenger to SOPA's author
• Infographic: Hollywood's long war on technology

Piracy

• Lies, Damned Lies and Piracy
• NY Times: RIAA & MPAA Exaggerate Piracy Impact Stats... But We're Going To Assume They're True Anyway
• UK woman responds to Obama on son's 'web piracy'
• Why Piracy is Not Responsible for 'Ruining' Comics
• Angry Birds boss: 'Piracy may not be a bad thing: it can get us more busines
• Why History Needs Software Piracy--"How copy protection and app stores could deny future generations their cultural legacy."
• Pirate Bay Founders' Prison Sentences Final, Supreme Court Appeal Rejected

Music

• Neil Young on music and Steve Jobs: 'piracy is the new radio'
• Google and Bing accused of directing users to illegal copies of music
• Universal Music May Have Inadvertently Exposed a Flaw in the YouTube Takedown Process--They had an unsigned band's videos removed over a piece of music the band themselves made.
• SCOTUS lets stand ruling that downloads are not performances
• Five Things Pete Townshend Got Wrong About iTunes and the Online Music Industry
• New Danger Mouse CD Released As A Blank CD-R Due To Legal Fight With EMI
• Judge Refuses to Shut Down Online Market for Used MP3s