alt.interoperability.adversarial
Cory Doctorow’s latest piece for EFF uses the example of the evolution of Usenet to show how interoperability should work.
Boy, this brings back memories…
Tag: legal
Charles Duhigg’s article for The New Yorker suggests that Amazon will eventually fall, but not for lack of efforts to forestall that day.
Much like Facebook and Google, Amazon is a company employing many good people to do some seriously bad things.
So how’s that GDPR working out for ya?
One Year Into GDPR, Most Apps Still Harvest Data Without Permission
Protected Media is regularly approached by companies offering to sell data or social graphs. Greiner always makes a point of asking the salesperson how the data they’re peddling was obtained and what’s in it. “Invariably, they can never answer me,” Greiner said, “which leaves me to believe that they’re very rarely asked where they get the data from.”
See also: Websites not available in the European Union after GDPR—that’s a long list.
Google’s Chrome Becomes Web `Gatekeeper’ and Rivals Complain
Truly, Chrome has become the new IE6.
Ambient Surveillance
Idle Words > Talks > Privacy Rights and Data Collection in a Digital Economy (Senate hearing) (Testimony given by Maciej Ceglowski, creator of Pinboard.)
A characteristic of this new world of ambient surveillance is that we cannot opt out of it, any more than we might opt out of automobile culture by refusing to drive. However sincere our commitment to walking, the world around us would still be a world built for cars. We would still have to contend with roads, traffic jams, air pollution, and run the risk of being hit by a bus.
Similarly, while it is possible in principle to throw one’s laptop into the sea and renounce all technology, it is no longer be possible to opt out of a surveillance society.
The Dark Side of Amazon
Household Object: Amazon Package
While the Nike swoosh embodies confidence and cool, the simple curve of the Amazon logo recalls an obsequious service smile. The soft edges of the grin, and its winking right corner, are meant to put you at ease. No matter how unfair the working conditions, how miserable the workforce: a smile was here. Did I ever see a human smile at Amazon? I can’t recall a single instance. A security guard laughed once, while she was walking among a line of seasonal workers. She was carrying a large bolt cutter and saying, “One day I’m gonna smash one of you.”
Welcome To The Prude Internet: No More Sex Talk Allowed
However, with last year’s passing of FOSTA beginning to eat away at CDA 230, we’re actually moving back to a world described in the original CDA — where plenty of “sexual” content is being barred, in part out of a fear of getting sued under FOSTA. Take for example, the writer Violet Blue, who we’ve linked to many times in the past. Last week, she revealed that Amazon has now cut off her Associates’ account, which she had been using to support herself for years.
Most likely, what the supporters of FOSTA wanted all along.
The Inextricable Link Between Modern Free Speech Law and the Civil Rights Movement —This was an enlightening read for me; the backstory and link between the Rev. Fred Shuttleworth and the 1964 Supreme Court decision on New York Times v. Sullivan.
Cory Doctorow: Terra Nullius – Locus Online
Cory’s latest article for Locus, on John Locke, property rights, colonisation and the (ab)use of copyright and trademark law.
De La Soul’s Fight with Tommy Boy Over Copyright and Streaming Revenues
This makes me sad.