Recent Articles

Depressing

April 01, 2008 06:43

I must admit that at times I display a distinct naivety in my approach to life. I like people. I trust people. Sometimes my own experiences have provided me with reason to behave this way. For example, I worked for many years at the Government Law Center of Albany Law School. While there, I met...

Strange Reasoning

March 31, 2008 11:03

Via the Patry Copyright Blog, it seems there was a bit of an interesting discussion over the advertisement run in the UK for Transport for London and created by folks at or associated with WCRS. The interest was not so much over the advertisement itself, but over the fact that the idea (and perhaps...

Sometimes Location Matters

March 11, 2008 14:54

William Patry writes about a recent U.S. Federal District Court decision that is “a masterpiece of analysis and witty writing” (Ricky Gervais Inspires Copyright Opinion). Patry quotes from the decision (citations omitted): For example, presuming Shakespeare’s poetry was subject to...

Of Optimism

March 06, 2008 13:20

Cory Doctorow at BoingBoing tells of a talk by John Perry Barlow given at the O’Reilly Emerging Technology Conference: Today at the O’Reilly Emerging Technology conference, I attended the Electronic Frontier Foundation’s panel, “On a Brighter Note…”, a talk...

“You can’t make this stuff up”

March 05, 2008 20:57

There are times that technology actually changes things. As Michael Froomkin of discourse.net tells it, “To Really Foul Up Requires a Computer” (citing theinquirer.net): You can’t make this stuff up. Secret Airforce One flight data sent to Suffolk tourist web site: SINCE 2001, the...

The Return of the Copyright Extension

March 05, 2008 20:27

Some things just never die. In 2007, the UK House of Commons investigated extending the term for copyright protection for sound recordings from 50 years (which it is now) to 70 years. The Government ultimately decided not to pursue the extension, much to the dismay of its supporters. But now, less...

When news isn’t news

March 05, 2008 16:26

From the Telegraph: A man will become the first person in the UK to stand trial next month accused of harassing a woman on Facebook. Michael Hurst has pleaded not guilty to harassing ex-girlfriend Sophie Sladden via the popular social networking website. This, to me, isn’t particularly...

Plasticity and Ends

March 05, 2008 14:26

Ann Bartow at Feminist Law Professors writes: “Viola’s Bookshelf is a new project blog dedicated to publishing altered out of copyright, or creative commons licensed fiction, where the character’s genders have been reversed. The idea behind this is to help provide an understanding...

The Trusted Technology Fallacy Strikes Again

March 04, 2008 21:54

A few days ago, Ed Felten at Freedom to Tinker wrote about a new paper he and eight other authors have written concerning the ability of an attacker (physical) to access all the contents of an encrypted hard drive (the paper is linked from here). He followed up with a second post to clarify some...

We’re Back . . .

March 04, 2008 16:42

This blog used to be here. Now it’s here. Too much going on not to comment and analyse (or analyze) what’s happening. Look here for regular updates.This blog used to be here. Now it’s here. Too much going on not to comment and analyse (or analyze) what’s happening. Look here...