I’m reading Matt Mason’s The Pirate’s Dilemma, one of those hip this-changes-everything books, this time detailing how remix culture and digital technology is forcing the market to either adapt and compete with those it labels as pirates for modifying their intellecutual property, or die attempting to fight a distributed, faceless enemy that in many cases […]
I read this page a few weeks ago and I don’t agree with a lot of the things the author seems to pine for, like paddling kids, but the examples he uses of the “current alternative” would be amusing if they weren’t so appallingly likely to happen. For instance:
Scenario: Johnny […]
Ars Technica reports that a new law going into effect today make it a criminal offense to refuse an order to decrypt your own data.
Individuals who are believed to have the cryptographic keys necessary for such decryption will face up to 5 years in prison for failing to comply with police or military orders to […]
Technocrat carries two informative articles on the current savage military lockdown in Burma.
The Risk of Journalism discusses Courage against the Junta, an article I found painful to read.
We disguised his identity before putting the interview to air. Later, I learned he had been arrested by secret police. For telling the […]
People who start who start yelling “Rodney King!” make it look like the police get abusive only once every fifteen years.
Update: A much better angle which shows that the guy was restrained and already in handcuffs when he was tasered.
There’s an article on the L.A. Times detailing how putting all your communication eggs in the basket of a single unscrupulous provider can have serious privacy implications. For example:
There are red flags to be found in each telecom provider’s privacy policy. A close reading of Time Warner’s policy reveals:
[…]
A British judge is suggesting an all-inclusive DNA database. The twisted thing is the rationale:
The present database in England and Wales holds details of 4m people who are guilty or cleared of a crime.
Lord Justice Sedley said this was indefensible and biased against ethnic minorities, and […]
Maccabee on The Daily KOS has an superb post on a Navy officer discussing the current military situation, and how impending an attack on Iran is:
Like most Marines and former Marines, she is largely apolitical. The fact is, most Marines are trigger pullers and most trigger pullers could care less who […]
Two people have been charged with a felony for using flour and chalk to mark a trail through a parking lot to direct runners. For those who don’t know what a felony is, and on what category this pair is being charged, here’s a helpful description from Wikipedia:
Crimes commonly considered […]
Could well be an explanation of DRM.