Posts

News of the Week; May 27, 2015

By Jon Festinger on July 7, 2015

GAMES

1. Rockstar sues BBC

+ Take-Two sues BBC over ‘Grand Theft Auto’ movie

2. These two Diablo III players stole virtual armor and gold — and got prosecuted IRL

3. ‘League of Legends’ player admits swatting and stalking multiple victims in the U.S. and Canada

+ 17-year-old pleads guilty to swatting: British Columbian admits to 23 offences, harassment mostly aimed at young women who played League of Legends

4. Wii blamed for RV Fire in Colorado Springs

5. Dodgy Elder Scrolls Online keys deactivated from today

6. Desura addresses delays in payments to developers

7. GTA Player Says He Hired Cheater To Rescue Him From…Another Cheater

8. BioWare Writer Talks Gay Romances and Sexual Diversity in Gaming: “Ultimately, it hasn’t really affected our sales insofar as we can tell.”

9. Multiplayer video games may improve cooperation, mitigate aggression: Research suggests cooperative gamers play nicer, even when the game is violent.

10. F2P Comes of Age: How to make money without being ‘evil’

11. Zynga’s old sports team hired by FanDuel – Report

12. Double Fine regains Iron Brigade publishing rights

13. How Sony Or Microsoft Could Use Subscription To Win Video Games

14. Kickstarter, or, Every Publisher’s New Greenlight Process

15. The First First-Person Shooter

16. This Is What Pac-Man‘s Creator Thinks 35 Years Later

17. My son has $23.6 billion. How is yours doing?

DIGITAL

18. The Mary Meeker Internet Trends 2015 Report

19. »Intellectual property rights are not human rights«, UN special rapporteur tells European Parliament

20. Garcia v. Google reversed; many sigh in relief (Rebecca Tushnet)

21. The NSA tried to use app stores to send malware to targets

22. The End of Privacy

23. Young Saudis, Bound by Conservative Strictures, Find Freedom on Their Phones

24. Anti-NSA Pranksters Planted Tape Recorders Across New York and Published Your Conversations

25. Which Students Get to Have Privacy?: There’s a fresh push to protect student data. But the people who need the most protection are the ones being left behind. (danah boyd)

26. If You Know About It, You’re the Publisher – Website Operator Liability for Defamation (Bob Tarantino)

27. This Is What It’s Like To Fall In Love With A Woman Who Doesn’t Exist: Leah Palmer was a high-flying fashionista with a jet-setting lifestyle and a host of admirers on social media. But her entire existence was a fraud – a multiyear hoax that depended on stealing someone else’s life. BuzzFeed News tells the extraordinary story.

28. Reddit CEO: Getting Rid of Salary Negotiations Helps Everyone, Not Just Women -Ellen Pao says her fight against gender discrimination in Silicon Valley isn’t over.

29. What If Facebook Actually Paid People For Content?

30. Lawyers circling lawyers in frenzied Facebook ownership flap: Attorneys who assisted fugitive’s claim to Facebook are fighting Zuckerberg back.

31. Trivial thoughts on substantial parts (Bob Tarantino)

32. Why It’s Time to Stop Hating Spotify

33. Robot Journalism: Algorithms are More of a Tool than a Threat

34. Will Periscope and Other Live-Streaming Apps Kill the Cable TV Star?

+ Fan streaming apps have sports world debating TV rights

35. David Letterman and the long, Internet-enabled decline of the nightly talk show

36. More Provinces Crowd into Crowdfunding, but Not Yet Ontario or Alberta

37. This Artificial Intelligence Pioneer Has a Few Concerns

38. Hacking Our Moral Compass

39. How The Raspberry Pi Sparked A Maker Revolution

40. What’s Hot in the Art World? Algorithms: Admirers hold on to computerized formulas; paying $2,500 for a ‘qrpff’ necktie

CREATIVITY

41. Brands, The New Merchants of Cool: What happens when corporations replace major labels as patrons of independent music?

42. Creative Thinking Can Inspire Unethical Behavior

43.  Pop Music Is More About Advertising Now Than Before — And Nobody Realizes It

44. 7 Deadly Sins: Where Hollywood Is Wrong About The Future Of TV

45. Jorge Ramos: Of journalists and dinosaurs

46. How Indie Rock Changed the World: The influence of geeks with guitars on culture, from DIY to social media

jon

Read More | No Comments

News of the Week; May 20, 2015

By Jon Festinger on July 6, 2015

GAMES

1. Duke Nukem rights suit settled

+ Duke Nukem lawsuit ends with settlement, possible license transfer: Screenshot confirms that embroiled Mass Destruction game reborn as Bombshell.

2. ASA spanks Sony and GAME over 20th Anniversary Edition PS4 competition

3. Daybreak Game Company bans nearly 25K ‘H1Z1’ players for cheating and hacking

+ Daybreak Game Company on H1Z1 banning blitz

4. Microsoft severely punishes testers who leaked ‘Gears of War’ remake info, video

+ Microsoft disables online capabilities for Gears leakers

+ Xbox One still suffers from Microsoft’s need for control

5. YouTube Reinstates Metal Gear Video Konami Took Down, Warns Konami Not To Be Jerks

6. AMD says Nvidia’s GameWorks “completely sabotaged” Witcher 3 performance: There are plenty of performance issues in The Witcher 3, but who’s to blame?

7. Keen offers $100k for Space Engineers mods: Czech studio also makes source code available to the public as an incentive to modders

8. ‘World of Warcraft’ bot maker admits defeat

9. 100,000 WoW players banned for using bots – report

10. Bethesda clarifies: ‘The Elder Scrolls Online: Tamriel Unlimited ‘ does not use one-time activation code

11. The Witcher 3 Downgrade Controversy Sucks

12. Del Toro reacts to Silent Hills cancellation

13. GamerGate critic posts death threat voicemail, requests subpoena: Wu complains about “radio silence,” wants “to get anyone to bring a case to trial.”

14. Psychologist Philip Zimbardo: ‘Boys risk becoming addicted to porn, video games and Ritalin’

15. Inside The Research That Could Change The Perception Of Kids, Gaming And Gender

16. Why Indie Video Games Can Be Great For Kids

17. Gaming cooperatively makes you more sociable, say scientists

18. Let Your Children Play Video Games, Mark Zuckerberg Says: “I definitely wouldn’t have gotten into programming if I hadn’t played games.”

19. How Violence is Perceived in Game Design

20. Barriers breaking down for disabled videogamers

21. When Art Targets Marginalized People

22. Games poised to outstrip broadcast TV revenues, SuperData finds

23. Global games market at $74.2 billion annually – Superdata

24. Nevada approves Call of Duty-for-cash concept

25. Analysis: GTA V Live Viewership on Twitch

26. E-Sports, Real Sports?

27. Here’s the insane training schedule of a 20-something professional gamer

28. eSports an advertising goldmine

29. eSports is now a $612 million business – Superdata

30. Why Blizzard is committed to Heroes of the Storm’s esports future

31. Toy Story: Another Fad or Future of Videogames?: ‘Skylanders’ and ‘Infinity’ transport figurines into virtual worlds; now Lego wants to cash in

+ Toys-to-life category primed for more growth – NPD

32. Analysts turn against Candy Crush maker King Digital: ‘3 out of 5 launches will be a commercial failure’

+ Candy Crush Saga maker King reports strong Q1 with $569M in adjusted revenue and 61 cents-a-share profit

33. Unity chief John Riccitiello on clash of big ideas: ‘Sony nailed it, and they deserve the victory’

34. Zynga cuts 18% of staff

35. Xbox One gets a price cut in China and Japan

36. Tencent clears $1.1bn profit for Q1

37. CD Projekt accused of freezing out rival retailers on The Witcher 3

38. GTA V ships 52m as Take-Two’s annual revenue dips to $1.1 billion

39. Where in the world did blockbuster educational games go?

40. Xbox One Over-The-Air TV Tuner Now Available

41. The Hopes And Fears Of Using A Videogame As An Online Confession Booth

42. “The old publishing model has died”

43. The Horrible World Of Video Game Crunch

44. ‘GameSpot Game Guide’ and ‘Delta Force Extreme 2 Videogame Guide’ found in Osama bin Laden’s Compound

45. A Red Flag for Greenlight: Valve was laudably quick to deal with homophobia, but Greenlight is still failing devs and consumers alike

46. Microsoft celebrates 25 years of wasting time at work with Solitaire tournament

47. Reality Check: The real origin of GamerGate — a different GamerGate

48. Eve Online: how a virtual world went to the edge of apocalypse and back – The video game Eve Online is one of Iceland’s biggest exports and has become the world’s largest living work of science fiction. While rival games have come and gone, it has survived – thanks to a unique experiment in democracy

49. Behind the indie video game sensation that caught NASA’s attention

50. World Without End: Creating a full-scale digital cosmos.

51. Deconstructing Videogames For The Purpose Of Art

DIGITAL

52. The info moralist: Persecuted little guy, or powerful revolutionary – what sort of wunderkind was Aaron Swartz?

53. Did judge who ruled NSA phone dragnet illegal call Snowden a whistleblower?: “Secretive bureaucratic agencies… benefit from a breath of fresh air,” judge says.

54. The Anxiety of Being Watched by Machines: There’s an App for That

55. Why Google and other tech giants are creating tools for political dissidents: After taking fire for caving to repressive regimes on data privacy, can the tech industry rehabilitate its reputation?

56. Who The Smartphone Revolution Left Behind

57. Verizon-AOL, Facebook Instant Articles, And The Future Of Digital Advertising

58. Counterpoint: Bring telecom into the Internet age (Timothy Denton)

59. Order restored—copyright claim to individual performance in “Innocence of Muslims” fails 

+ Appeals Court Gets It Right The Second Time: Actress Had No Copyright Interest In ‘Innocence Of Muslims’

+ I didn’t say that – the ability of actors to control their performances under Canadian copyright law (Bob Tarantino)

+ 9th Circuit Judge Slams His Colleagues For First Amendment Failings In Waiting So Long To Fix Cindy Garcia Ruling

+ Actor did not have copyright interest in Mohammed film, Ninth Circuit rules 

+ Full 9th Circuit nixes controversial copyright decision 

+ Google v Garcia 9th Circuit en banc decision

60. Another copyright absurdity: using film screenshots

61. CMRRA Confirms Denial of Licences for Public Domain Recordings (Michael Geist)

62. Appeals Court chops Apple’s 2012 $930 million patent case award nearly in half

63. Rightscorp loses more cash than ever, tells investors all is well: Sending thousands of alleged pirates a bill for $20 per song isn’t working out.

64. Canadian Piracy Rates Plummet as Industry Points to Effectiveness of Copyright Notice-and-Notice System (Michael Geist)

65. While Other Countries Debate Copyright Terms, Canada Just Takes Record Labels’ Word That It Needs To Increase

66. Open Letter to Google From 80 Internet Scholars: Release RTBF Compliance Data

+ Call For Google To Show Its Right To Be Forgotten Workings

67. The philosophy of privacy: why surveillance reduces us to objects

68. South Korea’s New Law Mandates Installation Of Government-Approved Spyware On Teens’ Smartphones

69. Keurig didn’t learn a damned thing about DRM: You just don’t know what’s best for you

70. Why Patents And Innovation No Longer Mix

71. ISPs really don’t want to follow new customer data privacy rules: Lawsuit to overturn net neutrality also complains about privacy requirements.

72. Secret Information Undermines the Legitimacy of CRTC Decisions

73. RIP AOL: Where the Net Was Born for Many

74. To Take On HBO And Netflix, YouTube Had To Rewire Itself

75. Periscope ushers in wild-west era for sports broadcasting

76. Why publishers had to partner with Facebook

77. More media companies need to think of themselves the way Quartz does

78. The New York Times And Its Faustian Facebook Pact

79. Inside ViralNova, the Most Cynical, Amazing, Horrific, and Ingenious Media Company in New York

80. Facebook and the Illusion of Safety: After the massive earthquake in Nepal, the social network implemented a post-disaster check-in button. It may be reassuring, but it isn’t necessarily accurate.

81. Spotify Inks Deal With Starbucks Tasking Customers With Picking In-Store Music

82. After years of false starts, Apple is finally poised to kill Spotify and take over streaming music. There’s just one catch…

83. Snapchat is going to be huge in 2016 — and regulators have no idea how to handle it

84. Read the NDA a Comcast customer was told to sign to get a $600 refund: Comcast: Here’s your money—please don’t tell anyone.

85. How Bots Seized Control of My Pricing Strategy

86. The Ultimate Interface: Your Brain

87. How Old Do I Look Microsoft website raises privacy concerns: Microsoft says it won’t keep your photos, even though users agree to allow that

88. How Blockchain Tech is Inspiring the Art World

89. Truth in Digital Advertising: As we consume more and more of our media on mobile devices, advertisers are finding sneakier ways to deliver their messages

90. “Rachel” robocaller victims to get $1.7 million in refunds: Consumers lost money to credit card debt reduction scam

91. Did this cybersecurity firm use a data breach for extortion?: A whistleblower claims his company fabricated evidence in retaliation for a lost contract

92. The Computers Are Listening: How The NSA Converts Spoken Words Into Searchable Text

93. Listicles, aggregation, and content gone viral: How 1800s newspapers prefigured today’s Internet – “Many 19th-century newspapers are comprised primarily of content from other newspapers.”

94. Clinkle Implodes As Employees Quit In Protest Of CEO

95. Inside Zappos CEO Tony Hsieh’s radical management experiment that prompted 14% of employees to quit

96. Sorry Milan, only one fashion week boasts drone models and fiber optic dresses

97. Copyright for Literate Robots (James Grimmelmann)

98. When Bots Collude

99. Why you should confront bigots and racists on Facebook

100. Bob Bowman, CEO Of MLB Advanced Media, On Deciding To Build A Streaming Video Service In 2002

101. The Debacle of Google Glass

CREATIVITY

102. Appeals Court Rightly Overturns NAACP’s Successful Attempt To Censor Speech Via Trademark Law

103. “Copyright trolling” movie studio gets hit with Godzilla-sized lawsuit: Voltage Pictures sued thousands for torrenting. Now, it’s the alleged infringer.

104. Is the Long War Between American Radio and the Record Business About to End?

105. When metrics drive newsroom culture

106. How Hollywood stays white and male

107. How the cable industry became a monopoly

108. The TV Industry’s Lack of Imagination

109. How the biggest hit in TV history predicted the death of TV

110. Why the Comic Book Store Just Won’t Die

111. Blood, sweat and DVDs: owning a video store in the age of Netflix

112. The First Kiss in Cinema: How Thomas Edison Scandalized the World in 1896

113. The State of Music Distribution in China

114. J.J. Abrams on the Secret Movie References He Snuck into Star Wars: The Force Awakens

jon

Read More | No Comments

News of the Week; May 13, 2015

By Jon Festinger on July 6, 2015

Games

1. ‘Killzone: Shadow Fall’ lawsuit dismissed

+ Killzone:Shadow Fall’s 1080p class action lawsuit dismissed

2. Rockstar addresses GTA5’s mod policy: “No one has been banned for using single-player modifications.”

+ Rockstar to GTA V PC players: We don’t issue bans for single-player mods – Official response doesn’t address how online mode’s current P2P mesh enables cheats.

3. ArenaNet publicly shames ‘Guild Wars 2’ cheater

4. ‘Reclaim Your Game’ shutting down, going offline

5. ASA spanks Sony and GAME over 20th Anniversary Edition PS4 competition

6. Konami Gets YouTube To Take Down Video It Doesn’t Like; Streisand Effect Ensures Neverending Discussion Of Video

7. Missoula, Montana ‘Minecraft’ player swatted

8. Warning: PS4s with PT demo could lock down your entire library

9. Head Transplant Doctor Ponders Likeness Lawsuit Over Supposed Appearance In Metal Gear Solid 5

10. New book claims video games and porn are causing a ‘crisis of masculinity’ among young men

11. The great GamerGate debate: Mercedes Carrera v. Chris Kluwe

12. Rhode Island Secretary of State drops 38 Studios-related lobbying cases

13. The Charlie Hebdo Debate Arrives In The Videogame World

14. Game explores impact of dementia

15. How two games helped resurrect Wii U sales

16. Nintendo to launch five smartphone games by March 2017

17. Your ‘Candy Crush’ Obsession Is Worth Billions: Game makers mint a fortune off of a tiny sliver of gamers who spend upwards of $100 a month on in-app purchases

18. A Red Flag for Greenlight: Valve was laudably quick to deal with homophobia, but Greenlight is still failing devs and consumers alike

19. What’s So Great About Esports?

20. Zynga beats estimates with $183M in revenues — but it’s cutting 364 jobs

21. Video Game Trend: The Decline Of The ‘Game’ And The Emergence Of The ‘Living Game World’

22. Eve Online exhibit to become a permanent fixture at New York’s Museum of Modern Art

23. With Existenz, Cronenberg Created The Only Videogame Movie We’ll Ever Need

24. Your cyberpunk games are dangerous: How roleplaying games and fantasy fiction confounded the FBI, confronted the law, and led to a more open web

25. Who Invented Let’s Play Videos?

Digital

26. Court of Appeals rules that NSA data collection was not authorized by Congress

+ NSA phone dragnet is illegal, appeals court rules: The snooping program “exceeds the scope of what Congress has authorized.”

27. Exposure to ideologically diverse news and opinion on Facebook (Eytan Bakshy, Solomon Messing, Lada Adamic)

+ The Facebook “It’s Not Our Fault” Study (Christian Sandvig)

+ How Facebook’s Algorithm Suppresses Content Diversity (Modestly) and How the Newsfeed Rules Your Clicks (Zeynep Tufekci)

+ Why doesn’t Science publish important methods info prominently? (Eszter Hargittai)

+ Opinion: Facebook’s Internet.org Isn’t the Internet, It’s Facebooknet

28. Youtuber Sues Google, Viacom Over Content Id Takedowns

29. Sound of Silence: Why the Government’s Copyright Extension for Sound Recordings Will Reduce Access to Canada’s Musical Heritage (Michael Geist)

30. Prison ‘Enforces’ Messaging Company’s ‘IP’ Rights By Sending Prisoner To Solitary

31. And Then… Court Rejects Rightscorp’s Bogus DMCA Subpoena Argument

+ Small ISP stands up to Rightscorp’s “piracy fishing expedition” and wins: A Rightscorp DMCA subpoena, asking for 71 subscriber identities, is thrown out.

32. TTIP explained: The secretive US-EU treaty that undermines democracy – A boost for national economies, or a Trojan Horse for corporations?

33. Rightscorp loses more cash than ever, tells investors all is well: Sending thousands of alleged pirates a bill for $20 per song isn’t working out.

34. Appeals court upholds Pandora’s victory over songwriters: ASCAP says 1.85% royalty isn’t enough; 2nd Circuit feels otherwise.

+ Appeals Court Rejects Labels’ Collusion Scheme To Try To Force Pandora To Pay Higher Rates

35. Will the tort of misuse of private information disappear if the Human Rights Act is repealed? 

36. How marketers are plotting to use neuroscience to control what you buy

37. Warrantless airport seizure of laptop “cannot be justified,” judge rules

38. The philosophy of privacy: why surveillance reduces us to objects

39. Philippines Deports Thai Worker for Insulting Filipinos on Facebook

40. How secure will our data be in the post-quantum era?

41. UN Experts Say TPP and Fast Track Threaten Human Rights

42. Super-scholars: MPAA offers $20,000 for academic research in copyright battle – Leaked email describes programme ‘to solicit pro-copyright academic research papers’, but group says it won’t influence experts’ findings

43. The First Amendment, The Second Amendment And The 3D-Printed Gun

44. Why I’m Excited for Medium’s Partnership With Creative Commons (Lawrence Lessig)

45. PGA Joins NHL In Yanking Reporter Credentials Over Use Of Periscope On Golfers Practicing

46. The CRTC Knows Best: Why the Wireless Decision Doesn’t Go Far Enough (Michael Geist)

47. Verizon Buys AOL, Because Two Lumbering Dinosaurs Who Can’t Figure Out The Modern Internet Must Be Better Together

48. AT&T finally ramps down throttling of unlimited LTE customers: Facing lawsuit, AT&T now throttles 4G customers only when network is congested.

49. FCC: stop complaining about net neutrality and start competing

50. EU court rules “Skype” is too similar to “Sky,” blocks trademark application: Apparently Skype’s logo resembles “that of a cloud,” which can be “in the sky.”

51. Keurig CEO Sort Of (But Not Really) Apologizes For Company’s Ridiculous Foray Into Obnoxious Coffee DRM

52. Hostage saves herself via Pizza Hut app: “Please help. Get 911 to me.”

53. The Short Life and Speedy Death of Russia’s Silicon Valley

54. Engineers of Addiction: Slot machines perfected addictive gaming. Now, tech wants their tricks 

Creativity

55. Indie cinemas fight back against bullying by corporate movie chains: 3 chains own half of American theaters. Is the DoJ finally waking up from its long Reagan-induced slumber?

56. Retired Music Promoter Claims Trademark Infringement On Trademark He Admits To Abandoning

57. Cable Industry Tries To Distance Itself From Decades Of Poor Service By Eliminating The Word ‘Cable’

58. Hall and Oates Suing Granola Company Over ‘Haulin’ Oats’

59. FBI Spent Years ‘Researching’ The Lyrics To ‘Louie, Louie’ Before Realizing The Copyright Office Must Have Them

jon

Read More | No Comments

News of the Week; May 6, 2015

By Jon Festinger on May 25, 2015

GAMES

1. Valve gives developers power to ban players

2. Sooner or later, paid-for mods are coming

3. id Software planned to pay mod makers in 1995

4. Internet Archive’s MS-DOS Twitter games suspended

5. Glu Mobile gains $126 million Tencent investment and signs up Britney Spears

6. ‘Dota 2’ The International 2015 Compendium generates $2 million for prize pool at launch

7. Revenues up 33% YoY for PlayStation

8. EA grows sales to $4.5 billion in Fiscal 2015

9. Lawyer: 38 Studios documents shouldn’t be released piecemeal

10. What is happening at Konami?

11. A Saudi Prince Is Using Video Games To Fuel An Intellectual Renaissance In The Middle East

12. Homophobic game gets pulled from Steam Greenlight, developer issues statement

13. Valve: “Getting people sick isn’t a choice”

14. Game of Fear: What if a stalker had an army? Zoe Quinn’s ex-boyfriend was obsessed with destroying her reputation—and thousands of online strangers were eager to help.

15. GamerGate D.C. gathering targeted by bomb threat

16. Interzone CEO faces 120 years in prison for wire fraud and money laundering

17. Myst TV show reportedly heading to Hulu

18. Headline: The Era of Japan’s All-Powerful Videogame Designers Is Over

19. These are the first finalists for the new World Video Game Hall of Fame

20. Madden 16 simulation predicts which players will be arrested this season

21. Ten Old Car Video Games That Are Still Great Today

22. A reenactment of Floyd Mayweather v. Manny Pacquiao in ‘Mike Tyson’s Punchout’

23. This Video Game Has Solved The Problem of Learning Guitar: I tried taking lessons. I tried reading guitar tabs online. The only thing that worked was Rocksmith.

24. A Rediscovered Mainframe Game From 1974 Might Be The First Text Adventure

DIGITAL

25. “Homophobe” brings Ireland’s first “right to be forgotten” court case

26. Revenge porn – the need to legislate between privacy and copyright?

27. Protecting Users’ Location Data From An Unconstitutional Search

28. Privacy trade-offs in retail tracking

29. Apple Has Plans for Your DNA: The iPhone could become a new tool in genetic studies.

30. How YouTube and Build-A-Bear Engage Kids Without Collecting Data

31. Secret Shuts Down

32. Norms of Computer Trespass (Orin Kerr)

33. The Great Database of China: Rating Moral Behavior, Blacklisting Citizens

34. And Another One Bites The Dust: Mass Surveillance Ruled Unconstitutional In Slovak Republic

35. New EFF ‘404’ Report Shows How Draconian Copyright Policies Stifle Online Speech Worldwide

+ Executive Summary: Missing Stories From the 301 Blacklist

+ USTR Releases Its Annual Special 301 ‘Naughty’ List Of Countries; EFF Responds With ‘Special 404’ List

36. Apple pushing music labels to kill free Spotify streaming ahead of Beats relaunch: Aggressive tactics from the music giant have garnered scrutiny from the Department of Justice and the Federal Trade Commission

37. Fair Use At Risk When Private Companies Get To Make The Decision For Us

38. Grooveshark Shuts Down to Settle Copyright Infringement Suit

39. The Great Unbundling

40. Why Film Bizzers Are Still Outraged Over Europe’s Digital Single Market Plan

41. Rogers agrees to $5 million refund for charges resulting from misleading ads

42. Forget, Mayweather v. Pacquaio: The Big Fight Was Apparently Hollywood v. Periscope Streaming

43. Pro-Russian Videos Get Fake Views With Help From Malware

44. 3D printing and intellectual property rights in Canada

45. Facebook legacy contact initiative expands to Canada

46. Facebook Opens Internet.Org To All Developers In Response To Net Neutrality Concerns

47. Dear Tom Wheeler: I’m Sorry I Thought You Were A Mindless Cable Shill

48. Someone Has A Domain For Carly Fiorina’s Name And Is Pretty Upset With Her Layoffs While At HP

49. Snapchat, Twitter, and Facebook are at war over the future of news — and one of them tried to buy a media company

50. The (Very) Big Fight For The Small Screen: A rising class of Internet video companies is challenging the supremacy of broadcast TV—and they’ve come with a list of 10 Totally Awesome Reasons Why They’re Doing It Wrong.

51. Coding has become the fourth literacy 

CREATIVITY

52. ‘Blurred Lines’ Judge Asked to Grant New Trial

53. FBI Spent Years ‘Researching’ The Lyrics To ‘Louie, Louie’ Before Realizing The Copyright Office Must Have Them

54. Judge Upholds State’s Alamo Trademark

55. John Green’s Brandcast Speech

56. Is the news behaving more like advertising?

57. Katy Perry’s left shark – take 2 

58. How Hollywood Keeps Out Women

59. Billionaire investor Peter Thiel: ‘Always aim for a monopoly. From society’s perspective, it’s complicated. But from the inside, I always want to have a monopoly.’

60. Technology is disrupting Hollywood and its gonna hit hard

jon

Read More | No Comments

News of the Week; April 29, 2015

By Jon Festinger on May 3, 2015

GAMES

1. Valve letting users sell Steam Workshop content

+ Steam allowing paid mods is awesome. Here’s why

+ Steam’s Most Popular Skyrim Mod Is A Protest Against Paid Mods

+ Skyrim paid mod pulled from Steam

+ Valve kills paid Skyrim mods feature: “It’s clear we didn’t understand exactly what we were doing”

+ Gabe Newell to the internet: “You need a more robust Valve-is-evil hypothesis”

2. Valve Announces It’s Handing Its Banning-Keys Over To Game Developers

3. World of Warcraft and the battle against black market gold

4. EA submits to the authority of the Australian Consumer Law

5. Will Hillary Clinton’s historically anti-game attitude harm her 2016 presidential run?

6. Latest Pointless Moral Panic: Minecraft Is Ruining Our Children

7. Indie iOS developer accuses Ketchapp of outright theft

8. British judge rules the brain is a muscle, paving way for esports as sport

9. MMA fighter: game developer used my likeness without permission

10. Call of Duty Gets First Playable Female Lead With Black Ops 3: Black Ops 3 will offer a “gender neutral” story, according to Treyarch.

11. Minecraft adds free female avatar to console versions

12. “For kids’ games, I think it’s out of the question”: Joyful Works’ Basar Simitci draws a line under free-to-play apps for children

13. Rahul Sood’s Unikrn is an eSports betting platform

14. ESPN’s Colin Cowherd really, REALLY doesn’t want to cover video games

15. Killing Floor 2 EULA threatens to revoke licenses for trolls: Online cheaters and “cyber bullies” could lose access to the single-player game, too.`

16. IGDA: Gender, GamerGate and the need for action

17. PlayStation Network grabbing bulk of publishers’ ad dollars – EEDAR

18. Konami delists itself from the New York Stock Exchange

+ What’s Going on With Konami, Kojima, and Metal Gear Solid? Here’s a Timeline

19. Sony on road to recovery thanks to strong PS4 and camera sensor sales

20. Xbox revenues dip 24% thanks to price reduction

21. Halo: The Master Chief Collection problems force official tournament cancellation

22. Microsoft Advertises The Witcher 3 On Xbox With Footage From The PC Version; Fans Not Fooled

23. China expected to soon pass Japan in digital gaming – Superdata

24. ‘Video game developer’ the top career choice for children in Hasbro survey for ‘Game of Life’

25. WoW Patch Adds Katy Perry’s Super Bowl Left Shark

26. These are the games you can play on your new Apple Watch

27. Growing up gaming: The five space sims that defined my youth 

DIGITAL

28. Farmers Unable To Repair Tractors Because Copyright: Never A Side Effect, But Core Intention Of Law

+ Carmakers Want To Use Copyright Law To Make Working On Your Car Illegal

29. Music Licensing Groups Argue That An Homeowners Association Playing Music At The Pool Is A Public Performance

30. MPAA Gets Court To Block Popcorn Time Websites In UK, Despite Judge Admitting The Sites Don’t Actually Infringe

31. Comic Artists Claim Copyright On Metallic Suits And The Three Point Landing

32. DVD Makers Say That You Don’t Really Own The DVDs You Bought… Thanks To Copyright

33. Can You Sue For Copyright Infringement Before It’s Actually Happened?

34. Canadian Government on Copyright Notice Flood: “It’s Not a Notice-and-Settlement Regime” (Michael Geist)

35. A Moral Defense for Copyright Breach?

36. If You’re Promoting Copyright Without Fair Use, You’re Promoting Out And Out Censorship

37. Competition Killer: Why the Copyright Term Extension For Sound Recordings Will Limit Consumer Choice and Increase Costs (Michael Geist)

+ Sound Recording Copyright Extension to 70 Years is a MONEY GRAB! (Cameron Hutchison)

+ Dice Loaded Against Public in Canada’s Copyright Term Extension

+ The Power of Backroom Lobbying: How the Recording Industry Got Their Copyright Term Extension (Michael Geist)

38. Federal Budget proposes statutory privilege for Canadian intellectual property agents

39. German Federal Court says that libraries have a right to digitise their collections

40. 6 Current Copyright Cases More Important Than Blurred Lines

41. Why Balanced Copyright Is Essential For Creativity

42. Aaron’s Law Reintroduced To Try To Reform Dangerous, Broken Anti-Hacking Law

43. UK Tribunal Rules GCHQ Conducted Illegal Surveillance And Must Destroy Legally Privileged Documents

44. Egypt’s Draft Cybercrime Law Undermines Freedom of Expression

45. Woman behind Pakistan’s first hackathon, Sabeen Mahmud, shot dead by unknown gunmen

46. One year on, jailed Ethiopian bloggers are still awaiting trial

47. Iranian Cleric Suggests The West Ban And Criminalize Negative Portrayals Of Muslims To Prevent Radicalization

48. Facebook Is Shutting Down Its API For Giving Your Friends’ Data To Apps

49. Study Reports Big Drop in Spam Following Canadian Anti-Spam Law Implementation (Michael Geist)

50. ISPs really, really want to be able to share your data

51. Sen. Al Franken offers five take-aways from failed Comcast-TWC merger

52. Web encryption technology is 20 years old. So why isn’t every site using it?

53. Comcast brings fiber to city that it sued 7 years ago to stop fiber rollout

54. Why Bitcoin’s male domination will be its downfall

+ Bitcoin’s Q1: Record VC Investment, Falling Prices, And Slow Consumer Adoption

55. Why Does The US Patent Office Keep Approving Clearly Ridiculous Patents?

56. Google to disarm trolls by buying patents before they become weapons

57. Streaming Overtakes Live TV Among Consumer Viewing Preferences: Study

58. Periscope Saw Over 1 Million Sign-Ins During Its First 10 Days

59. State of the News Media 2015: Call it a mobile majority. At the start of 2015, 39 of the top 50 digital news websites have more traffic to their sites and associated applications coming from mobile devices than from desktop computers, according to Pew Research Center’s analysis of comScore data.

60. A Decade of YouTube Has Changed the Future of Television

61. Why is Snapchat getting into the news business?

62. The Basics Of Open Patent Licensing

63. Futuristic Simulation Finds Self-Driving “Taxibots” Will Eliminate 90% Of Cars, Open Acres Of Public Space

64. Does the digital era herald the end of history?

65. In Memoriam: Greg Lastowka

+ In Memoriam Greg Lastowka (James Grimmelmann)

CREATIVITY

66. Comcast officially abandons Time Warner Cable merger plans

67. Court case reveals feud among CRTC’s upper ranks

68. Competition Bureau supports CRTC’s proposal on video‑on‑demand

69. Trademark Examiner Not Swayed By Katy Perry’s Attempt To Trademark The Left Shark

70. Does a cover band’s use of a singer’s first name infringe trade mark rights in a celebrity’s name?

71. Winter is coming – Print revenue could be headed for another cliff: Media watcher Clay Shirky argues that instead of a gradual decline, print readership — and as a result, print advertising — could be headed for a cliff

72. Effort by Japan to Stifle News Media Is Working

73. Is Garry Trudeau Right About Charlie Hebdo?: Punching Idols (Quinn Norton)

74. Is Investigative Journalism a Joke?

75. Playmakers, The Show The NFL Killed For Being Too Real

76. Who created Caitlin Snow on #TheFlash? According to @DCComics, nobody

77. How Photography Was Optimized for White Skin Color

jon

Read More | No Comments

News of the Week; April 22, 2015

By Jon Festinger on April 27, 2015

GAMES

1. US government takes on legal fight over console jailbreaking once more: US Copyright Office considers arguments as part of DMCA rulemaking.

2. How The DMCA And Anti-Piracy Measures Conspire To Keep Video Games In Their Cultural Place

3. How It’s Done: Rockstar Releases Video Production Editor For GTA So Fans Can Make Films

4. Is the US gov’t finally over video game violence?

5. University of Missouri researchers find that violent video games do not cause aggression in adults with Autism Spectrum Disorder

6. Sore loser swats Long Island home after losing a round of ‘Call of Duty’

7. Killing Floor 2’s EULA reserves the right to ban you for being a jerk

8. Turkish scholars launch petition against possible Minecraft ban

9. Pastor Dollar says ‘Pokémon’ makes you gay

10. Human rights advocates, military see violent video games as teaching tool

11. Mortal Kombat X: The Most Violent Video Game Ever?

12. MMA Fighter Upset Over Possible Homage In Mortal Kombat

13. Anita Sarkeesian named to Time 100

14. GamerGate and the Balkanization of Videogames

15. Net Neutrality-themed game ‘404Sight’ released

16. Pirate Bay co-founder denied bid to play original Nintendo in prison

17. Woman sues Google claiming she lost “thousands” through Google Play Store hack: Google never reimbursed her after agreeing that the purchases weren’t hers, she says.

18. Valve puts limits on customers who haven’t spent $5 on Steam to fight spamming and phishing schemes

19. Gaming will hit $91.5 billion this year – Newzoo

20. Strong year sees Sony climb above Microsoft in revenue rankings

+ PlayStation pushes Sony’s sales forecast up

21. Why The Next Sports Empire Will Be Built On Esports

22. Codemasters to renew F1 license

23. Guitar Hero is Back And I Really Like What I’ve Seen

24. BBC’s Grand Theft Auto TV show to star Bill Paxton and Daniel Radcliffe: Drama to detail cultural impact of GTA, with Radcliffe as Sam Houser and Paxton as Jack Thompson.

25. Simulection – What happens when you run the 2015 Conservative manifesto through a video game?: We are running the parties’ manifestos through Democracy 3, an election simulation video game. Here’s what happens if the Tories win…

26. A Game About Cancer, One Year Later

27. Video games can power up from merely fun to meaningful experiences

DIGITAL

28. A Robot That Bought Drugs Online Is Now Free From Police Custody

29. Do Killer Robots Violate Human Rights?: When machines are anthropomorphized, we risk applying a human standard that should not apply to mere tools.

30. Concerns of an Artificial Intelligence Pioneer: The computer scientist Stuart Russell wants to ensure that our increasingly intelligent machines remain aligned with human values.

31. Netizen Report: The Spring of Cybercrime Laws

32. Complaints To FTC About Rightscorp Detail Robocalls, Harassment And Baseless Threats To Sever Internet Connections

33. MPAA Pirated Clips From Google Commercials To Make Its Own MPAA Propaganda Videos

34. NHL bans media from using Periscope, Meerkat to subvert rights-holders

35. Bell faces $750M lawsuit over advertising program: Bell Canada is facing a $750 million class action lawsuit over a program that tracked its users’ internet usage to sell advertising

36. Meet the lawyer taking on Uber and the rest of the on-demand economy

37. Internet.org is a failed exercise in misdirection (Doc Searls)

38. Why India’s Net Neutrality Activists Hate Facebook: Mark Zuckerberg’s Internet.org philanthropy finds itself cast as the villain in India’s fight over Internet rules

+ Facebook’s Internet.org sees defections over alleged harm to net neutrality: App to get impoverished online gives free access, but only to select websites.

39. How Blogging is Held Hostage by Ethiopian Politics

40. Details Leak From Inside Putin’s ‘Humourless And Draconian’ Internet Troll Army

41. FBI can’t cut Internet and pose as cable guy to search property, judge says: “This is a monumental ruling protecting Americans’ privacy in the modern age.”

42. Robert Campbell sentenced to 6 years for cyberbullying campaign: Ottawa man pleaded guilty to 63 charges of identity fraud, defamation and criminal harassment

43. Apple refuses to answer questions over ‘homophobic’ Russian Siri: Russian voice-assistant for iPhones and iPad accused of answering questions with homophobic responses, while company dismisses issue as ‘a bug’

44. On The War On General Purpose Computing

45. Hollywood Collectively Loses Its Mind About Latest Set Of Livestreaming Apps

46. It wasn’t easy, but Netflix will soon use HTTPS to secure video streams

47. “It’s not that we control NewsFeed, you control NewsFeed…” Facebook: please stop with this.

48. An oral history of the epic collision between journalism and digital technology, from 1980 to the present

49. Age Of Technology: Generational Video Viewing Preferences Vary By Device And Activity

50. Who Says the Internet is Bad for Morality?

51. Should Reddit’s powerful mods be reined in?

52. Is Netflix Friend or Foe to the TV Industry? It’s More Confusing Than Ever.

53. Nobody’s Perfect: Leaked Contract Reveals Sony Requires Netflix To Geo-Block But Acknowledges Technology Is Imperfect

54. How the Computer Got Its Revenge on the Soviet Union: Condemned as a capitalist tool, the computer would help expose the USSR’s weakness.

CREATIVITY

55. Kate Taylor: We should judge pricey tax credits as job creators, not culture builders

+ Race to the Bottom: Why Government Tax Credits For Film and TV Production Don’t Pay (Michael Geist)

+ Ontario Tax Expenditure Review: Screen Based Sector

56. Op-ed: What if MLK’s “Letter from Birmingham Jail” had been on Facebook?: Under current Alabama law, it would have been a crime. Other states feel similar.

57. Copyright claims asserted in viral video of cop shooting fleeing suspect

+ The News Media’s Use of the Walter Scott Video Is – Surprise! – A Newsworthy Use

58. Copyright For Sale: How the Sony Documents Illustrate the Link Between the MPAA and Political Donations (Michael Geist)

+ Sony Once Again Ridiculously Warns The Media Not To Report On Leaked Emails

+ As Sony Continues Threatening Reporters, NY Times Reporter Wins Pulitzer For Reporting On Sony’s Emails

+ Our Response To Sony Sending Us A Threat Letter For Reporting On The Company’s Leaked Emails

59. Student Sues College After Campus Cops Demand He Get A Free Speech ‘Permit’ Before Handing Out Fliers

60. In Big Ruling, Sony Beats ‘Iron Man’ Composer’s Lawsuit

61. ‘Traditional TV viewing for teens and tweens is dead. Not dying. Dead.’

62. Comcast-Time Warner Cable Merger Hits Setback After FCC Staff Recommend Hearing (Report)

63. The great unbundling: cable TV as we know it is dying

64. The Great Canadian Copyright Giveaway: Why Copyright Term Extension for Sound Recordings Could Cost Consumers Millions (Michael Geist)

jon

Read More | No Comments

News of the Week; April 15, 2015

By Jon Festinger on April 21, 2015

GAMES

1. Baker v. Microsoft Corporation: game companies beware, Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals decision may make it more difficult to defeat class actions 

2. Publishers fight to block third-party revival of “abandoned” game servers: ESA sees proposed DMCA exemption as encouraging piracy, limiting copyright.

+ The legal battle for gaming’s past

3. Grand Theft Auto V for PC ships with built-in mods and machinima tools

4. The first gay character in ‘Mortal Kombat’ revealed

5. Koei Tecmo Goes DMCA On DOA Modders For Undressing Its Already Scantily Clad Characters

6. Theorizing gender and digital gameplay: Oversights, accidents and surprises (Jennifer Jenson & Suzanne De Castell)

7. Thoughts from a woman who posts on the Internet: On being scared

+ Ms. Quinn goes to Washington

8. Google Rejects Postal For Google Play Store Due To Violence; GTA Games Still Available For Purchase

9. Modders Un-Region-Restricting Halo Online Undeterred By Microsoft DMCA

10. Cops nab murder suspect who played with victim’s stolen PlayStation: Online gaming activity traced to defendant’s mother’s house, where he was living.

11. Man ruptures tendon in hand playing ‘Candy Crush Saga’

12. Microsoft Facing New Criticisms Over Xbox One Energy Consumption

13. Phantom Dust dev collapsed under Microsoft’s demands – report

14. EA Shutting down ‘Battlefield Heroes’ and three other free-to-play games

15. Don Mattrick leaves Zynga, stock tanking

16. Sandra Day O’Connor’s post-court legacy: Civics games

17. Bill Paxton to play Jack Thompson in BBC’s ‘Grand Theft Auto’ film

18. NCSoft invests $5m in mobile start-up: This Game Studio focused on mobile, based in Vancouver

19. How Tax Is Giving Video Games A British Accent

20. New research using video games explores how people justify violent acts

21. Modern Games Are Easily Patched. So How Can We Review Them?

22. Square Enix Launches A Cloud-Powered Final Fantasy XIII For iOS And Android In Japan

23. Good Game: Why Esports Is The Next Major League Sport

24. Fantasy eSports—Think Fantasy Football for Video Games—Is Officially a Thing

25. Devastatingly Challenging Modern Games

26. Video Games’ Place in American Culture 

DIGITAL

27. Russia’s Internet censor reminds citizens that some memes are illegal

+ Russian censor warns against meme ‘misuse’

+ Latest Russian Censorship Move: Banning Internet Memes Using Photos Of Celebrities

28. NSA dreams of smartphones with “split” crypto keys protecting user data: Proposal is part of a tense stand-off between US government and tech industry.

29. Apple and the Self-Surveillance State (Paul Krugman)

30. The most concerning element of Facebook’s potential new power (Trevor Timm)

31. Canada’s Non-Commercial Copyright Fail: Why Did YouTube Mute a Holocaust Memorial Video? (Michael Geist)

32. The Copyright Notice Flood: What to Consider If You Receive a Copyright Infringement Notification (Michael Geist)

33. A Japanese court has ordered Google to take down negative business reviews

34. Internal Google Memo Responds To EU Antitrust Objections

35. Judge: Browsing Data Shared With Facebook Doesn’t Violate Privacy Law

36. Our Transparent Future: No secret is safe in the digital age. The implications for our institutions are downright Darwinian. (Daniel Dennett & Deb Roy)

37. Meet “Great Cannon,” the man-in-the-middle weapon China used on GitHub: Powerful weapon could easily be used to inject malware attacks into traffic.

38. Netizen Report: Turkey’s Erdogan Fights to Control the Conversation, Online and in Print

+ Everyone Is Getting Turkey’s Twitter Block Wrong: Turkey isn’t trying to be North Korea, China or Iran; it’s trying to be Azerbaijan

39. Rights groups take UK surveillance fight to Europe’s highest court

40. NJ lawmaker seeking tougher penalties for swatting gets targeted over the weekend

41. Big Names in Canadian Tech Sign ‘Stop Bill C-51’ Letter

+ The Real Agenda behind Bill C-51 (Craig Forcese & Kent Roach)

42. Lawyer representing whistle blowers finds malware on drive supplied by cops: Says police department brass tried to infect him, seeks criminal sanctions.

43. Police asked telcos for client data in over 80% of criminal probes

44. Kim Dotcom Megaupload case falters over sharing Canadian data

45. Hacked French network exposed its own passwords during TV interview: Post-it note on wall revealed network’s passwords for YouTube, Instagram.

46. Wireless, Cable Industries Show Their Love Of An ‘Open Internet’ By Suing To Overturn Net Neutrality Rules

+ Telco Lobby Sues FCC Over Net Neutrality Rules Yet Again… Just In Case The First Time Didn’t Work

47. The Mere Threat Of Google Fiber Has Time Warner Cable Offering Speeds Six Times Faster At The Same Price

48. Report: popular online gambling sites taken out by DDoS attacks

49. Japanese Court Orders Google To Delete Critical Reviews From Google Maps

50. Maximum sentence for internet trolls raised to 2 years in the UK

51. This Year’s Fight for the Tech Industry: Patent Trolls

52. Court Adds Much-Needed Element Of Malice To Nova Scotia’s Terrible Cyberbullying Law

53. The Mobile Video Moment Has Finally Arrived

54. Twitter shakes up the big data supply chain: What are the privacy law implications?

55. Facebook is facing 25,000 users in Vienna court over EU privacy violations

56. Drug Information Startup Diagnosia Sued By Big Pharma

57. Another Competitive Keyword Advertising Lawsuit Fails–Infogroup v. DatabaseLLC (Eric Goldman)

58. Mapping Out the Copyright Semicommons (Bruce Boyden)

59. Copyrights & Patents Have Become A Religion; All Data Will Be Ignored

60. EFF Successfully Challenges Key Claims in “Podcasting Patent”

+ Infamous “podcasting patent” knocked out

61. Should you pay if you get an illegal download notice?

62. Eighth-grader charged with felony for shoulder-surfing teacher’s password: The larger crime may be school administrators’ poor op sec.

63. Large-scale Game of Thrones leak has HBO targeting Periscope streams: Piracy in various forms didn’t hurt too much, as 8 million watched GoT premiere.

64. Amazon drops the hammer on website that sells 5-star reviews: SoCal Web designer’s reviews-for-sale biz is illegal, Amazon lawyers say.

65. Why Google’s Robot Personality Patent Is Not Good for Robotics (Kate Darling)

66. Can we stop killer robots? UN meets to debate possible treaty

67. The Path of Robotics Law (Jack Balkin)

68. The Case For An Internet Ratings System

69. Will autocomplete make you too predictable? 

CREATIVITY

70. Photos secretly taken of family through window are art, not invasion of privacy: court

71. Hecklers Try To Veto University Screening Of ‘American Sniper;’ May Find Themselves Watching ‘Paddington Bear’ Instead

72. The Abuse of Satire: Garry Trudeau on Charlie Hebdo, free-speech fanaticism, and the problem with “punching downward”

73. Joss Whedon On #GamerGate, JURASSIC WORLD, Adam Baldwin And Speaking Out

74. Kristen Stewart and the Movie Actor’s Dilemma

75. Who Owns the Copyright to “Happy Birthday”?

76. The Full History Of Board Games

77. The secret history of Monopoly: the capitalist board game’s leftwing origins

78. Rachmaninov on the future of broadcasting: A revealing interview with Sergey Rachmaninov from April 1931

79. Time Warner, Viacom Back Away From Nielsen Guarantees For Ads

80. “Quite Unintelligible,” Derrida’s Scathing Criticism From A Teacher

jon

Read More | No Comments

News of the Week; April 8, 2015

By Jon Festinger on April 13, 2015

GAMES

1. YouTube gaming stars blindsided by Nintendo’s ad revenue grab: Game companies may not have legal right to claim a cut, lawyer says

+ YouTuber Angry Joe Swears Off Nintendo Videos After The Company Claimed His Mario Party 10 Take

2. Report: Gamers in Crimea lose access to Blizzard games due to U.S. sanctions

3. Videogame Publishers: No Preserving Abandoned Games, Even for Museums and Archives, Because All “Hacking” is Illegal

4. Report: Firmware update sets Chinese Xbox Ones region free

5. Microsoft Hits Halo Online Modders With Copyright Complaint

+ Github complies with Microsoft DMCA takedown of Halo Online mod repo: Gameplay footage of new game has also been removed from YouTube.

+ Modders want to remove Halo Online’s microtransactions, georestrictions: Leakers say they have multiple backups to avoid Microsoft’s DMCA requests.

6. Project Cars Hit With Its Third Delay

7. Publishers must stop marketing adult games to kids

8. ‘GGautoblocker’ creator and ‘Online Abuse Prevention Initiative’ founder targeted by swatting attempt

9. Copyrighting player-generated content in video games

10. Rovio awarded $2.7 million in copyright case

11. Does Paula Deen’s new mobile game infringe on an artist’s copyright?

12. Iranian cleric urges Western countries to ban ‘Islamophobic’ games and movies

13. Dollar’s buying power plummets in first day of “official” WoW gold trading: $20 game time “tokens” have already lost 27 percent of initial gold value.

14. Sony announces shutdown of ‘Destiny of Spirits’

15. FTC approves Sony PS Vita settlement

16. GameStop halts online pre-orders for newest Nintendo amiibo figures

17. Amazon licensing deal may have saved Crytek – report

18. Nexon acquiring Boolean Games

19. AR/VR to hit $150 billion by 2020 – Report

20. Minneapolis man steals 8-year-old’s video games, gets caught on camera

21. What Really Happened To Arcades

22. Nobuo Uematsu: the video game composer shaking up classical music

23. An all-too-accurate parody of YouTube gamers 

DIGITAL

24. DDoS attacks that crippled GitHub linked to Great Firewall of China: Whitehat hacker’s traceroute wizzardry pinpoints origin of denial-of-service code.

25. The Kremlin’s comment trolls are real — as is the media’s amnesia about them

26. The Surveillance Engine: How The NSA Built Its Own Secret Google

27. Facebook faces lawsuit over facial recognition software

28. How Facebook knows who all your friends are, even better than you do

29. Microsoft drops Do Not Track default from Internet Explorer: New language in W3C standard twisted its arm

30. Hulu beats lawsuit claiming it illegally shared user data with Facebook: The “Like” button collects data, but there’s no master list of videos watched.

31. The Battle Is For The Customer Interface: Uber, the world’s largest taxi company, owns no vehicles. Facebook, the world’s most popular media owner, creates no content. Alibaba, the most valuable retailer, has no inventory. And Airbnb, the world’s largest accommodation provider, owns no real estate. Something interesting is happening.

32. Chrome extension collects browsing data, uses it for marketing: Downloaded 1.2M times, “Webpage Screenshot” no longer available in Chrome Store

33. Privacy Commissioner of Canada Rules Bell’s Targeted Ad Program Violates Canadian Law (Michael Geist)

+ Privacy watchdog not yet satisfied with Bell’s about-face on ad tracking

34. AT&T enters into largest data breach settlement with FCC to date

35. Commissioner cautions children’s websites to tread carefully when it comes to privacy: Privacy Commissioner launches tips on protecting children’s privacy after website investigation highlights lessons such as the need for better, age-appropriate information and involvement of adults in privacy decisions

36. Leaked TPP Investment Chapter Reveals Serious Threat to User Safeguards

37. The Internet of Kafkaesque Things (Jay Stanley)

38. How the DMCA’s Online Copyright Safe Harbor Failed (Eric Goldman)

39. Court Declines To Dismiss Hashtag Infringement Claim

40. Two Court Rulings Completely Disagree With Each Other Over Whether Websites Need To Comply With Americans With Disabilities Act

41. FCC Moves To Give Internet Video Startups The Same Protections As Cable Companies

42. Dallas Buyers Club ruling: iiNet must hand over names of downloaders

43. A New Kind of Internet Pirate: What’s stopping people from using apps like Periscope and Meerkat to livestream video they don’t own? Not much.

+ Periscope, Meerkat, and sports: Can fans, media live stream from the game?

44. Microsoft, Getty Images settle dispute over online photo tool

45. Microsoft halts Kinect for Windows production

46. Teen rakes in $6,000 on “Uploader for Instagram” app, told to shut down:  The 17-year-old has removed his app after receiving demand letters from Instagram.

47. Barrett Brown suddenly stripped of prison e-mail after talking to press: Activist writes arbitrary punishment is part of “pattern of state retaliation.”

48. USPTO Demands EFF Censor Its Comments On Patentable Subject Matter

49. Net neutrality rules differ widely across developed nations

50. Police granted extra 12 months to try to crack suspect’s computer encryption

51. Taking Down Bigots With Their Own Weapons Is Sweet, Satisfying — And Very, Very Wrong: Actually, it’s about ethics in doxxing.

52. If you’re worried about Facebook hosting news content…you’re already dead.

53. The Rise of ‘Studyblrs’: Teens take to social media to show off their…study habits?

54. Would telepathy help?: Will the next generation of telepathy machines make us closer, or are there unforeseen dangers in the melding of minds?

55. The Internet Ruined April Fool’s Day: The holiday’s jokes are unfunny and misleading. They’re also, often, redundant.

56. The Meme as Meme: Why do things go viral, and should we care?

57. The Definitive Oral History Of 1980s Digital Icon Max Headroom

CREATIVITY

58. The cost of silence: mass surveillance & self-censorship

59. Warner Bros. And Rightscorp Argue That Copyright Trolling Is Protected By The First Amendment

60. Prince Gives Away Someone Else’s Artistic Efforts, Gets Sued

61. Consent to the use of copyrighted material not required to be in writing

62. Three’s fair use too: play is transformative work (Rebecca Tushnet)

63. Let’s talk TV – CRTC roadmap to “maximize viewer choice”

64. Comparison of Canadian content, production services, co-ventures and treaty co-productions

65. Rolling Stone’s investigation: ‘A failure that was avoidable’

+ Rolling Stone’s ‘A Rape on Campus.’ Notes and comment on Columbia J-school’s investigation.

+ Rolling Stone and the Temptations of Narrative Journalism

jon

Read More | No Comments

An all-too-accurate parody of YouTube gamers

By Jon Festinger on April 12, 2015

The title says it all. Enjoy the lulz…

jon

Read More | No Comments

News of the Week; April 1, 2015

By Jon Festinger on April 5, 2015

GAMES

1. Zynga investors can sue FarmVille creator for alleged IPO fraud, judge says: Lawsuit back on the table for Zynga, where fortunes have plunged since 2011 IPO.

2. This Guy Remade Super Mario 64’s Most Iconic Level In HD And Playable In Your Browser

+ Nintendo Takedown Notice for Super Mario 64 HD

+ Fan-made Super Mario 64 game pulled after Nintendo cries foul

+ Fan-made Mario 64 remake disappears following Nintendo copyright complaint

+ Poll: Should Nintendo have DMCA’d a fan’s free Super Mario HD remake?

+ Why Does Nintendo Want This Superfan’s YouTube Money?

+ Nintendo’s physical DLC: Supply-limited toy needed for new gameplay puzzles

3. Lone modder’s Half-Life 2: Update brings modern graphics to a classic: Source engine overhaul four years in the making sees free Steam release tomorrow.

4. Andrew Eisen Video: ‘My Favorite Thing About Anita Sarkeesian’s Tropes vs Women Videos’

5. Julia Hardy’s Misogyny Monday

6. Community questions Obsidian over ‘Pillars of Eternity’ in-game trans joke

7. Mortal Kombat producer “quits” Twitter over violent threats to family

8. Game store swatted, nearly became complicit in inciting police response: Received phony call encouraging employees to shut blinds, shout about weapons.

9. Oracle settles with Rhode Island in 38 Studios bankruptcy case

+ 38 Studios auction brings in $90K for Rhode Island

10. UK school district will report parents to authorities for letting their children play R18 rated games

11. Secondary schools in NI to receive free copies of Minecraft

12. Brave Frontier publisher Gumi cuts 11% of staff following IPO

13. GameStop annual sales up slightly to $9.3 billion

14. The Unbalanced Design Of Super Smash Brothers

15. Meet America’s First Video Game Varsity Athletes

16. Epic Awards One Of Three Unreal Dev Grants To Makers Of Net Neutrality Game

17. Bioware makes Orbit framework open source

18. Japanese devs will soon be able to pitch games using Bandai Namco IP

19. MOBAs will overtake MMORPGs in F2P revenue this year – EEDAR

20. What does Google Play’s increase in game sessions mean for iOS?

21. Video Gaming Made Me a History Major: Empire of Earth and Medieval 2 Total War made me actually care about school.

DIGITAL

22. In Final Verdict, Jury Rules Against Pao On All Four Claims In Ellen Pao Vs. Kleiner Perkins

+ Two Jurors On Opposite Sides Share Their Pao Vs. Kleiner Perspectives

+ Ellen Pao and the Myth of Meritocracy

+ Ellen Pao’s Statement On Losing The Kleiner Perkins Case: “The Battle Was Worth It”

23. China Uses Unencrypted Websites to Hijack Browsers in GitHub Attack

+ China’s Great Firewall Turned Around: Why China Wants To Censor Global Internet

+ Google Chrome will banish Chinese certificate authority for breach of trust:  Draconian move follows the issuance of certificates masquerading as Google domains.

24. Obama signs executive order imposing sanctions on overseas hackers: President: “From now on, we have the power to freeze their assets.”

25. Feds subpoena reddit in effort to learn about users behind Dark Web chatter: ICE agent demands e-mail, IP logs, “means and source of payment,” and more

26. Judge: Mississippi investigation of Google likely violates 1st Amendment

27. Who Knows What Evils Lurk in the Shadows?: The story of the powerful spy agency most Canadians still don’t know, and the security bill that would expand its resources and reach (Ron Deibert)

+ An amended Bill C-51 is still a problem: insights from the U.S. (Jon Penney)

+ The government has not made its case for C-51 (Kent Roach & Craig Forcese)

+ From Obama Birthers to Anti-Immigration Activists: Who the Government Turned to for Bill C-51 Support During Committee Hearings (Michael Geist)

+ How C-51 undermines privacy (Lisa M. Austin, Benjamin J. Goold, Avner Levin and Andrea Slane)

28. Quebec Takes on the Internet: Government Announces Plans to Require Website Blocking & Studies New Internet Access Tax (Michael Geist)

29. Corporate Sovereignty Provisions Of TPP Agreement Leaked Via Wikileaks: Would Massively Undermine Government Sovereignty

30. Report: Facebook tracks all visitors, even if you’re not a user and opted out: In the EU, where free and informed prior consent is required, there could be an issue.

+ Facebook tracks logged-out users in ‘violation’ of EU law, study says

31. Tech companies are sending your secrets to crowdsourced armies of low-paid workers

32. 5 other insane things a corrupt DEA agent did while allegedly stealing Bitcoin from Silk Road

33. A Precautionary Approach to Big Data Privacy (Arvind Narayanan, Joanna Huey & Edward W. Felten)

34. Court Rejects Bizarre Attempt To Scrub Consumer Review–Goren v. Ripoff Report

35. Meerkat, YouNow, Periscope and the future of live-streaming

+ Meerkat is dying – and it’s taking U.S. tech journalism with it

+ Tech reporters blew the Meerkat story but, no, I can’t name a single one because fear!: My strange exchange last night with the author of that post: ‘Meerkat is dying – and it’s taking U.S. tech journalism with it.’

36. The Most Important Social Media Company You’ve Never Heard Of: Damien Patton has created a way to find out what is happening anywhere in the world–instantly. The inside story behind Banjo–and the gold rush sure to follow.

37. Gen Con issues letter to the community on SB 101, event stuck in Indianapolis until after 2020

38. Really, Rupert?

39. Fox News, Jeanie Pirro Facebook Lawsuit Could Change Copyright Landscape On Social Media

40. CRTC finds something fishy about dating site’s unsubscribe mechanism, operator nets $48,000 fine under anti-spam law 

41. Massive Anti-Net Neutrality E-mail Campaign Shows Signs Of Faking Many Signatures

42. Judge awards damages in false DMCA takedown case

43. Another invalidated clickwrap agreement

44. Those NDAs may not be worth the paper they are written on 

45. It’s Not Easy Being Scientology: Since its founding in the 1950s, L. Ron Hubbard’s organization has put a premium on controlling the flow of information—an increasingly impossible enterprise in the Internet age.

46. Facebook’s Message to Content Makers: We Own the Audience

47. How The US Government Legally Stole Millions From Kim Dotcom

48. The NFL Will Stream a Game on the Web Next Year. Don’t Get Used to It.

49. Two Years Later, Snowden’s Mangled Laptop Is More Than an Empty Symbol

50. One Artist’s Take on the Future of Personal Data

51. ‘Avengers’ 3D Firm Brings Patent Lawsuit Against ‘Divergent’ 3D Firm

CREATIVITY

52. CRTC dramatically shifts Canadian television regulation

+ Canada Forces A La Carte Rules On Cable Industry, Bell Pouts By Refusing To Show Regulator On Television

+ At Bell Media, editorial meddling by execs appears to be a recurring problem

+ Bell censorship: the status quo can’t endure

+ Don’t bundle me, bro: Life under the shadow of Big Telecom

+ Can CTV News and BNN be trusted to report on themselves? Depends on Kevin Crull’s mood

53. Judge Rules ‘Three’s Company’ Parody Play to Be Fair Use

54. In defense of Trevor Noah’s stupid, tasteless tweets

55. Rap lyrics are fiction — but prosecutors are treating them like admissions of guilt

56. Why Traditional TV Is The Real Walking Dead

57. Why curation could be at the core of future reporting

jon

Read More | No Comments



Creative Commons License