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"from the free-culture-matters dept We're back again with another in our weekly reading list posts of books we think our community will find interesting and thought provoking. Once again, buying the book via the Amazon links in this story also helps support Techdirt. "

[ Ernesto on January 14, 2015 C: 0 News Hoping to deter and stop the ongoing threat of 'cyber' attacks President Obama unveiled new cybersecurity plans yesterday. While the plans don't reference copyright infringement, the MPAA notes that Congress should keep online piracy in mind as it drafts its new cybersecurity bill. ] # Again, gnarled 'Authorities, linking -falsely, of course- sharing with any kind of 'threats'... (since 2001: Peer-to-peer terrorism http://www.salon.com/2001/09/26/osama_bin_napster/ and, of course, earlier references -from Techdirt, for example, "Seriously: Where Is The Link Between Copyright Infringement And Terrorism/Organized Crime" https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20100129/0630057974.shtml)

"For several years, Techdirt covered the twists and turns of the "Marco Civil" saga, Brazil's bill of rights for the Internet, which finally passed back in March. Rather depressingly, this welcome move seemed to be something of a one-off, but now the Italian Parliament has announced its own draft bill of rights. Here's the introduction (original in Italian -- pdf): ... Statement of Rights on the Internet ...

"And while it's rarely a concern for rights holders and content protection companies, they also owe it to the rest of the internet to do their best to avoid targeting legitimate URLs -- especially those that have absolutely nothing to do with the content being "protected" and are, as in the case of IMDb, sites that can actually increase sales. "

"Nothing necessarily earth-shattering was said by anyone, but it did involve a series of high powered tech execs absolutely slamming the NSA and the intelligence community, and warning of the vast repercussions from that activity, up to and including potentially splintering or "breaking" the internet by causing people to so distrust the existing internet, that they set up separate networks on their own. The execs repeated the same basic points over and over again. They had been absolutely willing to work with law enforcement when and where appropriate based on actual court orders and review -- but that the government itself completely poisoned the well with its activities, including hacking into the transmission lines between overseas datacenters. Thus, as Eric Schmidt noted, if the NSA and other law enforcement folks are "upset" about Google and others suddenly ramping up their use of encryption and being less willing to cooperate with the government, they only have themselves to blame for completely obliterating any sense of trust. Microsoft's Brad Smith, towards the end, made quite an impassioned plea -- it sounded more like a politician's stump speech -- about the need for rebuilding trust in the internet. It's at about an hour and 3 minutes into the video. He points out that while people had expected Congress to pass the USA Freedom Act, the rise of ISIS and other claimed threats has some people scared, but, he notes: We need to look the world's dangers in the face. And we need to resolve that we will not allow the dangers of the world to freeze this country in its tracks. We need to recognize that antiquated laws will not keep the public safe. We need to recognize that laws that the rest of the world does not respect will ultimately undermine the fundamental ability of our own legal processes, law enforcement agencies and even the intelligence community itself. At the end of the day, we need to recognize... the one asset that the US has which is even stron

"from the and-let-us-never-speak-of-it-again dept Earlier this week, we wrote about widespread demonstrations against a monumentally stupid plan by the Hungarian government to tax internet usage on a per-gigabyte-downloaded plan. " [# ! #Taxing... # ! ... #knowledge #sharing: Another # ! #delirium of the -so-called- #democracy... # ! #will be #eliminated... W@rlwide]

"from the and-let-us-never-speak-of-it-again dept Earlier this week, we wrote about widespread demonstrations against a monumentally stupid plan by the Hungarian government to tax internet usage on a per-gigabyte-downloaded plan. "

"from the you-sure-you-want-to-go-there dept For many years I've been a huge fan of law professor James Grimmelmann. His legal analysis on various issues is often quite valuable, and I've quoted him more than a few times. However, he's now arguing that the now infamous Facebook happiness experiment and the similarly discussed OkCupid "hook you up with someone you should hate" experiments weren't just unethical, but illegal."

"from the you-sure-you-want-to-go-there dept For many years I've been a huge fan of law professor James Grimmelmann. His legal analysis on various issues is often quite valuable, and I've quoted him more than a few times. However, he's now arguing that the now infamous Facebook happiness experiment and the similarly discussed OkCupid "hook you up with someone you should hate" experiments weren't just unethical, but illegal."

"from the right-to-be-forgotten dept For years now we've explained why Europe's concept of a "right to be forgotten" is a terrible, dangerous and impossible idea. The basic idea is that if you were involved in something that you're not happy about later, you can demand that the incident be stricken from the record... everywhere. It's a clear attack on free speech -- allowing people to censor others from saying truthful and accurate things about someone. "

"from the because-of-course dept As we've mentioned in the past, every year for over a decade, Andy Baio scours the internet to see what Oscar-nominated movies have been put online (the answer is usually almost all of them)."

"from the because-of-course dept As we've mentioned in the past, every year for over a decade, Andy Baio scours the internet to see what Oscar-nominated movies have been put online (the answer is usually almost all of them)."

"from the liberte?-egalite? dept We had been noting, in the wake of the Charlie Hebdo attacks in France, how the country that then held a giant "free speech" rally appeared to be, instead, focusing on cracking down on free speech at every opportunity. And target number one: the internet."

"from the liberte?-egalite? dept We had been noting, in the wake of the Charlie Hebdo attacks in France, how the country that then held a giant "free speech" rally appeared to be, instead, focusing on cracking down on free speech at every opportunity. And target number one: the internet."

"These companies don't have to agree in writing to carry this out or even raise their prices; they can simply, within their separate geographic and product territories, bundle and tie their services, buy up inputs that a competitor might need, and refuse to connect to competitors - among many other potential tactics. It's in their interest for these local monopolists to cooperate, because any defection would make the whole system crumble."

"These companies don't have to agree in writing to carry this out or even raise their prices; they can simply, within their separate geographic and product territories, bundle and tie their services, buy up inputs that a competitor might need, and refuse to connect to competitors - among many other potential tactics. It's in their interest for these local monopolists to cooperate, because any defection would make the whole system crumble."

"These companies don't have to agree in writing to carry this out or even raise their prices; they can simply, within their separate geographic and product territories, bundle and tie their services, buy up inputs that a competitor might need, and refuse to connect to competitors - among many other potential tactics. It's in their interest for these local monopolists to cooperate, because any defection would make the whole system crumble."

"from the funny-how-that-works dept We've noted for a long time now that copyright laws are regularly used as a tool for censorship. In Russia, abusing copyright law for censorship and to harass political opponents has become standard. Remember how the Russian government teamed up with Microsoft to use questionable copyright claims to intimidate government critics? And then how the MPAA gleefully got into bed with Russia's media censor to celebrate copyright? Of course, Russia also expanded its ability to use copyright to censor the internet, following pressure from short-sighted US diplomats, demanding that Russia better "respect" copyright laws. "

[from the do-these-people-think? dept Last week was a good week for those who believe in the internet and culture, with the rejection of ACTA being a key moment in Europe, on par with the rejection of SOPA in the US six months earlier. Of course, as we saw with the defeat of SOPA, a number of ACTA supporters who haven't come to terms with why the public was so upset are lashing out. One of the more outspoken responses against the EU Parliament's decision came from Ewan Morrison for The Guardian, in a piece that I honestly read over a few times to make sure it wasn't satire. I don't think there's a single truly accurate statement in the entire thing. It sets the bar of misinformation so high that I think from now on I will compare any clueless article to the newly developed Ewan Morrison scale of wrongness, with this column scoring a perfect 10 out of 10. Let's explore why. ...]

"from the spying-in-the-service-of-seduction dept By now, most people who shop online are aware of the way in which companies try to tailor their offers based on your previous purchasing and browsing history. Being followed by strangely relevant ads everywhere is bad enough, but what if the government started using the same approach in its communications with you? That's one of the key ideas explored in an interesting new article by Zeynep Tufekci, strikingly presented on Medium, with the title "Is the Internet good or bad? Yes.""

"from the the-future's-here-if-you-want-it dept Musician and producer Steve Albini has never been a fan of the recording industry. He posted the definitive essay on how labels screw artists over 20 years ago, and it's just as relevant today as it was then. The internet (read: file sharing) has been public enemy #1 for the recording industry (and now the motion picture industry), despite offering a host of benefits to artists and labels. "

"from the good-luck-with-that dept You'd think that after years and years of pointless banter along these lines that people in power would understand just how ridiculous they sound when they try to blame search engines for infringement. TorrentFreak points out that the UK's Culture Secretary Sajid Javid gave a barn raising speech to folks from the British recording industry. "

# ! ...No Idea of how the Internet (and the #Culture) work # ! or just another desperate -and useless- anti-culture measure. [#Clue: Pe@ple wants #more #accessible, #cheaper... and -essentially- #Better stuff. They (us) deserve it and can be easily #done.]

"from the dysfunction-junction dept As we've noted a few times, there's really only two ways the telecom sector can successfully destroy U.S. net neutrality rules."