News of the Week; April 19, 2017

GAMES

1. Sweeney: “The future of the games industry? Make everyone a creator” – The Epic Games CEO discusses the importance of open platforms, the benefits of non-games projects and why he’s preserving a forest
2. Twitch Builds Innovative Features For Its Most Popular Game, ‘League Of Legends’
3. 2022 Asian Games adds eSports as medal sport: Professional gaming will also feature in next year’s event in Indonesia
4. “We want to be the global community for people to play, watch and share games”: Facebook is rolling out new features for Instant Games, Gameroom and its gaming videos
5. Nintendo Ended Up Creating A Competitor After DMCAing Fan-Game It Decided It Didn’t Want To Make Itself
6. Nintendo Switch becomes fastest-selling system in Nintendo history: NPD reports that 906,000 units were sold in March, and Zelda broke records as well
7. Nintendo Switch Tops PS4, Xbox One In US March Sales – Report: The new Nintendo console was No. 1 in March.
8. Why Zelda: Breath of the Wild is the biggest system seller in history: The game is actually selling better than the system it runs on, somehow.
9. Nintendo Discontinues The NES Classic
10. Why Did Nintendo Just Kill One of Its Coolest Products in Years?
11. One-upping the NES Classic Edition with the Raspberry Pi 3 and RetroPie: NES Classic is no more, but luckily cheap hobbyist boards are great for little projects.
12. Sony is cutting online support for Kill Strain and 5 other games this summer
13. In Australia, Microsoft offers free in-store game dev classes
14. Ricky Gervais Says Magic Leap Will “Change the World,” as Company Courts Celebs
15. Andre Iguodala has tried Magic Leap. What’s it like?: The Golden State Warrior and 2015 NBA Finals MVP talks about his favorite tech and the mixed-reality eyewear that blew his mind.
16. Xbox chief Phil Spencer is not a fan of VR game exclusivity deals: “I do not like that people are having to say, which of these VR verticals do I go pick right now, as a developer? Because I don’t think any of them are really big enough yet to support a single experience.”
17. Global Virtual Reality Industry to Reach $7.2 Billion in Revenues in 2017
18. Original StarCraft is finally free-as-in-beer after delayed patch: Version 1.18 now live for Windows and Mac, will be compatible with summer remaster.
19. Gaming video to generate $4.6 billion this year – SuperData: Research firm says there are now 665 million viewers of gaming video content worldwide
20. That Was Fast: Denuvo’s Version 3 Update Has Been Cracked
21. Digital sales now represent 74% of the US game market: The games industry added $11.7 billion to the US GDP in 2016, according to ESA’s new Essential Facts report

DIGITAL

1. Facebook video of elderly man being murdered gets over 1.6 million views: Grandson urges the public to stop sharing footage of his grandfather being killed.
2. Moral Panics: Don’t Blame Facebook Because Some Guy Posted His Murder Video There
3. The man behind the neo-Nazi Daily Stormer website is being sued by one of his ‘troll storm’ targets
4. Lawsuit: Neo-Nazi website owner is liable for harassing Montana real estate agent: “It’s that time, fam… ready for an old fashioned Troll Storm?”
5. China’s Precision Censorship Machine Allows Some Controversial Keywords, But Blocks Combinations Of Them
6. Facebook highlights its fight against “Fake News” in print: The 10 tips are basic news literacy, but Facebook wants the world to know.
7. Facebook Launches New Camera Tools as a Foundation for Advanced Augmented Reality
8. Video Calling, 3D Drawing, and Shared Experiences Inside Facebook’s Social VR App
9. Facebook’s first VR app surprises, lets us collaborate and be juvenile: Has serious issues, but hand tracking, doodling, media sharing work great in VR “Spaces.”
10. Facebook Finally Released Details on Their Top Secret Brain-Computer Interface
11. Facebook is Researching Brain-Computer Interfaces, “Just the Kind of Interface AR Needs”
12. Tumblr Is The Latest Platform To Launch A Co-Viewing App
13. ‘Alien’, ‘Blade Runner’ Director Ridley Scott Launches VR Film Division
14. Social Media Is Not Contributing Significantly to Political Polarization, Paper Says
15. Secret Sorority Handshakes, Questionable Lawsuits, Free Speech, The Right To Be Forgotten And Section 230
16. IoT garage door opener maker bricks customer’s product after bad review: Startup tells customer “Your unit will be denied server connection.”
17. The Strange Story Of Why Millions Of Indians Are Furious At Snapchat: The social media company’s CEO allegedly said India and Spain were too poor to care about expanding there.
18. How Opioid Addicts Are Using Social Media To Get Clean: Facebook groups and other online forums offer many addicts a digital path to recovery
19. Everything on the Dark Web is not illegal, only half!
20. FTC Staff Reminds Brands and Influencers About Disclosure Requirements
21. Kim Kardashian West promotes morning sickness drug on Instagram despite previous FDA warning
22. Top 100 Most Viewed YouTube Channels Worldwide • March 2017
23. Music industry goes to war with YouTube: Record labels are angry about the relatively small fees the platform pays for music videos compared with streaming services
24. Patent troll with an “Internet Drink Mixer” and a nonexistent office could be in trouble
25. EFF Goes To Court To Stop Australian Patent Troll From Stifling Free Speech
26. How a Law School Is Preparing Its Students to Compete Against AI
27. Machines Learn To Stereotype Humans Just Like Humans: Researchers find AI systems are ready and willing to adopt racial and gender biases
28. Princeton researchers discover why AI become racist and sexist: Study of language bias has implications for AI as well as human cognition.
29. Report: Google will add an ad blocker to all versions of Chrome Web browser – The owner of the Web’s biggest advertising platform is building an ad blocker?
30. FTC Explains Why It Thinks 1-800 Contacts’ Keyword Ad Settlements Were Anti-Competitive–FTC v. 1-800 Contacts (Eric Goldman)
31. The Future of Ad Blocking: An Analytical Framework and New Techniques (Grant Storey, Dillon Reisman, Jonathan Mayer & Arvind Narayanan Princeton University)
32. How Copyright Law Creates Biased Artificial Intelligence (Amanda Levendowski)

CREATIVITY

1. Legal Threat From Creator Of Wall St. Bull Statue Even More Full Of Bull Than Expected
2. No, The ‘Charging Bull’ Artist Can’t Force Anyone To Take Down ‘Fearless Girl’
3. ‘Fearless Girl’ and ‘Charging Bull’ lurch towards courtroom showdown
4. Public Art Installations: Is Fearless Girl ’s girl power trampling moral rights in Charging Bull ? We say no.
5. On Fearless Girl, women & public art; or, no, seriously, the guy does not have a point.
6. Separating Art from Function: Supreme Court Creates Copyright Test for Designs
7. Asos Accused Of Ripping Off Indie Brand After Visiting Its Showroom
8. My Other Bag Seeks Nearly $1 Million in Legal Fees in Louis Vuitton Case
9. Bushwick Street Artists Threaten Legal Action Against McDonald’s for Using Their Work: The work appeared in a Dutch ad titled “McDonald’s Presents the Vibe of Bushwick NY.”
10. Copyright Society’s ‘World IP Day’ Lesson: Give Us Your Copyrights For Nothing
11. An interview with Michael Geist: copyright reform in Canada and beyond
12. Fair Dealing in Canada: Dry Erase Boards and Overhead Projectors – Believe It Or Not?
13. European Court Of Human Rights Revisits Once More Intermediary Liability
14. Cara Delevingne Rimmel mascara ad banned for airbrushing: Watchdog pulls TV campaign promising ‘dangerously bold lashes’ for using inserts and redrawing to exaggerate effects
15. How Artists Push Social Change
16. Copyright in the Public Interest: How Canada Can Establish a Pro-Innovation Reform Agenda
17. Someone tried to own ‘take off, eh’: Secrets from the Canadian trademarks database
18. Copyright’s missing voices
19. Copyright Reform in Canada and Beyond (Michael Geist)

MEDIA, COMMUNICATIONS & NET NEUTRALITY

1. Bill O’Reilly out at Fox after harassment allegations
2. Fox News Found the Perfect Woman-Hater to Replace Bill O’Reilly 
3. Alex Jones’ Defense in Upcoming Custody Battle Is That He’s a Fake
4. When Is An Insane Conspiracy Theorist A Bad Parent?: Bizarre strategy in Alex Jones case.
5. FTC Commissioner: If The FCC Kills Net Neutrality, Don’t Expect Our Help
6. Web Firms Urge FCC to Preserve Open Internet Order
7. Don’t Wait For Google, Netflix Or Facebook’s Help If You Want To Save Net Neutrality
8. Roku Hires DC Lobbyists For First Time To Fight For Net Neutrality
9. Verizon CEO: We’d consider merger with almost anyone, including Comcast: No deal is imminent as Verizon CEO claims no one has the fiber to match Verizon.
10. FCC helps AT&T and Time Warner avoid lengthy merger review: Time Warner sells a TV station to avoid public interest review of AT&T deal.
11. One broadband choice counts as “competition” in new FCC proposal: Price caps would be eliminated when there’s one more ISP within half a mile.
12. Future of FCC Privacy Rules Unclear
13. NBC Reaches Deal With TV Affiliates for Opting in to Internet Video Distribution Agreements
14. T-Mobile dominates spectrum auction, will boost LTE network across US: Dish, Comcast, and US Cellular also bought plenty of 600MHz spectrum.
15. Ofcom fine BT a record breaking £42 million: A move to a more punitive approach?
16. The Internet as Cable: The Risk of Treating Telecommunications as Cultural Policy (Michael Geist)
17. Canada’s analog broadcasting policy makes no sense in a digital world

SURVEILLANCE & PRIVACY

1. Plaintiff Can’t Erase Court Order From the Internet–Nelson v. Social Security Commissioner (Eric Goldman)
2. Lawyers, malware, and money: The antivirus market’s nasty fight over Cylance – On the front lines of the antivirus industry’s “testing wars.”
3. Massachusetts AG Settles Geofencing Case 
4. Geotargeting Medical Facilities? Massachusetts Says ‘No Snoop For You!’ 
5. These Popular Headphones Spy on Users, Lawsuit Says
6. Bose headphones spy on listeners: lawsuit
7. German Consumers Face $26,500 Fine If They Don’t Destroy Poorly-Secured ‘Smart’ Doll
8. Microsoft Latest Service Provider To Pry A National Security Letter Free From Its Gag Order
9. Apple Takes Heat For Software Lock That Prevents iPhone 7 Home Button Replacement By Third-Party Vendors
10. The Teddy Bear And Toaster Act Is Device Regulation Done Wrong
11. The Illicit Aura of Information
12. NSA-leaking Shadow Brokers just dumped its most damaging release yet: Windows zero-days, SWIFT bank hacks, slick exploit loader among the contents.
13. Liberal inaction frustrates Canada’s exiting information watchdog: Stepping down, but not quietly, Suzanne Legault urges reforms to open up Ottawa
14. Hypocritical CIA Director Goes On Rant About Wikileaks, Free Speech
15. Vigilante botnet infects IoT devices before blackhats can hijack them: Hajime battles with Mirai for control over the Internet of poorly secured things.
16. Legislation allowing warrantless student phone searches dies for now – Proponent: California law aimed to bolster student safety, help investigate cyberbullying.
17. Why one Republican voted to kill privacy rules: “Nobody has to use the Internet”: Republicans encounter angry citizens after killing online privacy rules.
18. Trump Privacy Rollback Continues, States Step Up 
19. Claims under the Data Protection Act can be linked with defamation claims (U.K.)

Jon