News of the Week; December 14, 2016

GAMES

1. Russia Accuses EA Of LGBT Propaganda Over Including Rainbow Shoelaces Soccer Players Wore In Real Life
2. California man spent $1 million playing Game of War: Mobile game described as “like gambling, but with no possibility of winning.”
3. China forces devs to reveal loot box drop rates in game: Players must be aware of the percentages behind random prizes, says new law
4. Loot box odds in all videogames available in China go public on May 1 (if devs listen)
5. Bethesda Bullies One Of Its Creative Fans Over Website Metatags
6. Report: Crytek once again failing to pay its developers on time
7. A dev is trying to crowdfund legal action against Crytek over unpaid wages
8. Vivendi stake in Ubisoft passes 25%, increasing takeover threat: French media company needs to acquire 30% of publisher’s stock before it can offer to buy the company
9. Ubisoft dev fears ‘constraints that kill creativity’ if Vivendi takes over: “Obviously [concern about a potential takeover] has struck us at some point. We are a company that has been creating and has been leading through independence and that is something that is key to our success, key to the way we are organized.”
10. French regulators fine Ubisoft execs 1.27 million euros for insider trading
11. Ubisoft says AMF claims “unjustified, unfounded and illegal”: Ubisoft has decided to appeal the French AMF’s decision to sanction its team members
12. White House hosts Girls Make Games game dev workshop
13. Super Mario Run is online-only to combat piracy, says Nintendo’s Miyamoto: Fans must have an Internet connection to play Nintendo’s latest game.
14. Hands-on: Super Mario Run might be the weirdest Mario game yet: Four-level demo looks and sounds like Mario but doesn’t play like it.
15. Game Review Site Says Square Enix Blacklisted Them To Punish Low Review Scores
16. Koch and Square Enix clarify review code policy: “We would never impose a blacklist or ban on any media for a review score”
17. Rocketwerkz’ Dean Hall defends VR devs who make exclusivity deals
18. Dean Hall on VR: “There is no money in it” – RocketWerkz CEO says medium currently relies on subsidies from platforms
19. The eSports Explosion: Legal Challenges and Opportunities (Jas Purewal & Isabel Davies)
20. To avoid conflicts of interest, 2 Twitch-owned eSports teams go independent
21. On the eSports Failure of Heroes of the Storm
22. How Riot Games used sports technology to help pro players communicate in tournaments
23. Boom.tv Raises $3.5 Million As World’s First 3D Live Streaming Platform For eSports
24. Ex-AAA devs form Drifter and raise $2.25M to develop VR eSports
25. Twitch divests itself of Evil Geniuses, Alliance eSports teams: Streaming company transfers team ownership to players, citing obligation to avoid preferential treatment
26. Twitch rolls out automated tool to stem wave of chat harassment: “AutoMod” uses machine learning to keep up with the trolls.
27. Twitch introduces automatic moderator tool to curb chat abuse: AutoMod evolves thanks to machine learning
28. Final Fantasy XV and The Last Guardian: The Last of their Kind – The end of two of the industry’s longest-running and most troubled development processes is a reminder of the excesses of the 2000s
29. Majesco Entertainment exits the video games business: Merger with medical firm marks the end for the Zumba, Cooking Mama, and Psychonauts publisher
30. Porsche’s exclusive deal with Electronic Arts is no more: After 17 years, the exclusive deal ends, freeing Porsches to appear in new games.
31. Report: Sony Considering Merging Film And Gaming Divisions
32. Did crowdfunding survive 2016?: Fig raised $8m of the $20m in gaming campaigns this year – was it enough?
33. South Korea To Tackle Video Game Cheating By Criminalizing Breaking A Game’s ToS
34. After cracks, developers remove Denuvo DRM from their games: Is Denuvo issuing refunds when its protection stops working?
35. The future of the European games industry is written in the telecom regulations: Jari-Pekka Kaleva examines the impact of EU negotiations
36. Where now for Call of Duty?: The world’s biggest shooter series is under threat, but Activision still holds all the cards
37. Game over for law outlawing pinball in Indiana town: Pinball ban included a $300 fine, six months in jail.
38. 2016: Did the “Year of VR” deliver? – Highs and lows of 12 months in a new medium
39. The 5 trends that defined the game industry in 2016

DIGITAL

1. Arista beats Cisco’s $335M copyright claim with an unusual defense: Jury found that Cisco command lines were “scènes à faire.”
2. Court endorsement of fair dealing rights splits bar
3. German judges explain why Adblock Plus is legal: Spiegel argued there’s no right to de-link its “unified offer” of news and ads.
4. Mediaplayers and streaming: AG Campos Sánchez-Bordona in Filmspeler proposes broad interpretation of notion of ‘indispensable intervention’
5. Hollywood Studios Win Injunction Against Streamer VidAngel
6. Commercial sites must check all their links for piracy, rules Hamburg court: Case shows “devastating consequences” of EU copyright ruling for the Web, MEP warns.
7. Application of problematic CJEU ruling on copyright infringement by hyperlinks is getting out of hand
8. Legacy Recording Industry To Trump: Please Tell Tech Companies To Nerd Harder To Censor The Internet
9. Canadian Copyright Reform Requires Fix to the Fair Dealing Gap (Michael Geist)
10. How the Supreme Court can avoid turning the Web into a Wild West (Michael Geist)
11. Magic Leap is actually way behind, like we always suspected it was
12. The Reality Behind Magic Leap
13. Magic Leap CEO: “we are making mini-production test runs of our first system”
14. How Streaming Is Changing Music (Again)
15. In 2017, media companies will finally realize they are being disrupted by the very platforms that distribute their content: “Smart pipes” are changing the way consumers interact with their favorite content — and traditional delivery systems want in on the future.
16. Casting Agency Looked to Fill Role of Alt-Right Neo-Nazi for Cadillac Commercial: Have the alt-right (and their ideas) become a target demographic? Apparently so.
17. The DDoS vigilantes trying to silence Black Lives Matter: The Web lets anyone be a publisher—or a vigilante.
18. Short Sighted Newspaper Association Asks Trump To Whittle Down Fair Use, Because It Hates Google
19. Can journalism be virtual? (Taylor Owen)
20. Right of Publicity Claims in a Digital Age
21. Why it’s dangerous to outsource our critical thinking to computers: It is crucial for a resilient democracy that we better understand how Google and Facebook are changing the way we think, interact and behave (Evan Selinger & Brett Frischmann)
22. Seeing without knowing: Limitations of the transparency ideal and its application to algorithmic accountability (Mike Ananny & Kate Crawford)
23. IEEE Just Published the First Draft Report on How to Make an ‘Ethically Aligned’ AI
24. The Public Policy Implications of Artificial Intelligence
25. Donald Trump has weaponized Twitter — with dangerous consequences
26. Source: Twitter cut out of Trump tech meeting over failed emoji deal
27. An Inconvenient Truth About Silicon Valley and Donald Trump: The President-elect’s disruptive platform sounds awfully familiar to the valley’s leaders.
28. Fake News: How a Partying Macedonian Teen Earns Thousands Publishing Lies
29. Iran The Latest Country To Use ‘Fake News’ As An Excuse For Widespread Censorship
30. Fake news peddlers and muckrakers risk “sickness of coprophilia,” says Pope – Pontiff: publishing fake news “probably the greatest damage that the media can do.”
31. In the era of fake news and broken politics, should we let computers decide how to rule the world
32. Gawker’s Demise And The Trump-Era Threat To The First Amendment: Hulk Hogan’s smashing legal victory shows us that publishing the truth may no longer be enough.
33. Schadenfreude with Bite
34. Is Doxing Unethical For Lawyers?
35. Attorney wants Google to unmask reviewer who only wrote, “It was horrible”: Attorney decries review as an opinion “to disparage a person in his profession.”
36. The Obligation To Experiment: Tech companies should test the effects of their products on our safety and civil liberties. We should also test them ourselves.
37. There Is No Neutral Interface: “What are we optimizing for? Is it for civic responsibility? Personal relevance? Quality? Truthiness? Diversity of sources and viewpoints? Time on site? Time well spent?”
38. PewDiePie claims he will delete his YouTube channel today: Problems with YouTube’s suggested and recommended lists affect high-traffic channels.
39. Yik Yak fires 30 of 50 employees, still has no business model: CEO still calls app a “special place for college students around the world.”
40. Looking for a Mind at Work: The FTC Presents a Staff Summary of its September 2016 Workshop on Disclosure Effectiveness
41. The Freedom to Yelp: Congress Curbs ToS Overreach 
42. Every US taxpayer has effectively paid Apple at least $6 in recent years: If you think Apple is cheating via overseas tax trickery, you’ll hate this move.
43. When robots read books: Artificial intelligence sheds new light on classic texts. Literary theorists who don’t embrace it face obsolescence
44. Selfless Devotion: Giving robots “feminine” personalities implies human women should stick to the program
45. New Publications Examine Harmful Speech Online (Berkman Klein Center)
46. The internet is broken. Starting from scratch, here’s how I’d fix it.

CREATIVITY

1. It Begins: Congress Proposes First Stages Of Copyright Reform, And It’s Not Good
2. China’s Richest Man Tells MPAA’s Chris Dodd To Tell Donald Trump To Be Nice To China… Or Else
3. 37 Professors and Scholars Respond To IPO’s “Call For Views: Modernising the European Copyright Framework”
4. RIAA, newspapers ask Trump to limit fair use, toughen copyright: Content companies still have a grudge against Google, and they’re telling Trump.
5. Freedom of Expression? Fair Use? Thank These Artists You’ve Probably Never Heard Of
6. “Is There Something I Should Know?” – Duran Duran loses High Court copyright battle
7. Lights. Camera. Legal Action! Jury finds iconic ‘Jersey Boys’ musical infringes copyright
8. Artist Sues Universal Music Over Plagiarism, Gets Called Out by Fellow Artist: The artist Kendell Geers has penned a scathing open letter against Attia in response.
9. Not Gone with the Wind: IP Rights Despite Public Domain Images
10. Media Organizations (Correctly) Worry That Rolling Stone Verdict Will Make Saying Sorry Actionable
11. Vegas Golden Knights trademark denied by U.S. government
12. What Rogue One Can Teach You about… Trade Dress?
13. Late Shift, the world’s first interactive cinema movie, reviewed: Does the protagonist kiss the girl? Kill the old man? Steal the car? You decide.
14. ‘Westworld’ Co-Creator Keeps Her Law License Active, Just In Case
15. Gender, IP, And Innovation: Open Air’s Future Research
16. The CEIPI Publishes An Opinion on the EU Commission’s Copyright Reform Proposal 

MEDIA, COMMUNICATIONS & NET NEUTRALITY

1. CRTC says it holds power over website blocking in Quebec gambling case
2. CRTC rules that website blocking provisions of Québec’s Bill 74 violate federal law: Pro-Internet advocates welcome ruling, having argued that Bill 74’s website blocking raises censorship concerns and violates rules which keep our Internet free and open
3. Upon Further Review, the Ruling Should Stand: Why the CRTC Made the Right Call on the Super Bowl Simsub Ban (Michael Geist)
4. Unnecessary at Best, Harmful at Worst: Melanie Joly Seeks Global Consensus on Culture Contributions from Digital Services (Michael Geist)
5. Canada leads charge to force Internet giants to support more localized content
6. Amazon Prime video service launches in Canada: E-retailer’s streaming service expands out of U.S. to more than 200 territories
7. FCC’s Ajit Pai says net neutrality’s “days are numbered” under Trump: Pai wants to “fire up the weed whacker” and cut down FCC regulations.
8. FCC Commissioner Pai Says Net Neutrality’s ‘Days Are Numbered’ Under Trump
9. FCC’s Tom Wheeler willing to “step down immediately” to make deal with GOP: Wheeler seeks deal as GOP refuses to reconfirm Democrat Jessica Rosenworcel.
10. FCC Chair Tom Wheeler won’t resign, for now, as FCC enters 2-2 deadlock: Democrat Jessica Rosenworcel must leave after Wheeler offer to GOP is rejected.
11. A big change to U.S. broadcasting is coming — and it’s one Putin might admire
12. A Comcastic odyssey: $2,000 billing error becomes bureaucratic nightmare – Once again, Comcast fixes a problem only after customer alerts the media.
13. Comcast raises controversial “Broadcast TV” and “Sports” fees $48 per year: Comcast also raising Internet and TV prices 3.8 percent in 2017.
14. Samsung Issues Update To Brick Remaining, Spontaneously Combusting Galaxy Note 7 Phones, Verizon Refuses To Pass It On
15. AT&T’s DirecTV Now plagued with outages and sports blackouts: AT&T vows to fix technical errors; licensing restrictions may also be a problem.
16. AT&T customers get $88 million in credits and refunds for illegal charges: 2014 cramming settlement finally gives money back to nearly 3 million customers.
17. Here’s How the AT&T-Time Warner Deal Is Influencing Fox’s Bid for Sky
18. Mossberg: Why the AT&T-Time Warner merger is dangerous
19. Last Minute Congressional Change Will Give Trump His Own Trump TV, Financed By Taxpayers

SURVEILLANCE & PRIVACY

1. Yahoo admits it’s been hacked again, and 1 billion accounts were exposed: That’s a billion with a b—and is separate from the breach “cleared” in September.
2. Hacked cheating site Ashley Madison will pay $1.6 million to FTC for breach
3. Vladimir Putin was directly involved in US election hack, report says: The hack was designed to harm Clinton and potentially aid Trump
4. President Obama Orders Intel Agencies To Produce Report On Russian Election Influence
5. Obama asks intel community to conduct “full review” of election-related hacks: As Trump denies Russian involvement, Congress calls for investigations—and consequences.
6. Fancy Bear ramping up infowar against Germany—and rest of West: Russian hackers part of broader campaign against West, German intel chief warns.
7. Did the Russians “hack” the election? A look at the established facts: No smoking gun, but evidence suggests a Russian source for the cyber attacks on Democrats.
8. Goodale weighing CSIS use of metadata gathered on innocent people
9. Google Publishes Eight National Security Letters That Have Been Freed From Their Gag Orders
10. Snowden leaks reveal GCHQ and NSA snooped on in-flight mobile calls: Increasing availability of airborne calls potentially makes this a rich source of information.
11. No, there’s no evidence (yet) the feds tried to hack Georgia’s voter database: State election official bungles the case that DHS tried to breach his office.
12. Evernote’s new privacy policy raises eyebrows: You cannot opt out of having humans read your notes.
13. The FCC Suggests Some Wishy Washy, Highly Unlikely Solutions To The Poorly-Secured Internet Of Things
14. Google just dodged a privacy lawsuit by scanning your emails a tiny bit slower: The company won’t do ad scans until after a message hits your inbox
15. Maker of Internet of Things-connected vibrator will settle privacy suit: Lawsuit says company chronicled “vibration settings” and how long toy was used.
16. Researchers Find Vulnerability That Enables Accounting Fraud, PwC Decides The Best Response Is A Legal Threat
17. Another Lawsuit Highlights How Many ‘Smart’ Toys Violate Privacy, Aren’t Secure
18. Disgraced IT worker stole confidential Expedia e-mails even after he left: Insider-trading scheme netted more than $331,000 in illegal profits.
19. Op-ed: I’m throwing in the towel on PGP, and I work in security – “If you need to securely contact me… DM me asking for my Signal number.”
20. Recoding Privacy Law: Reflections on the Future Relationship Among Law, Technology, and Privacy (Urs Gasser)

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