“AI” (or more accurately language learning models nowhere close to sentience or genuine awareness) has plenty of innovative potential. Unfortunately, most of the folks actually in charge of the technology’s deployment largely see it as a way to cut corners, attack labor, and double down on all of their very worst impulses. Case in point: […]
The NYPD has plenty of problems with accountability and transparency. The main problem is this: the public wants some of this and the NYPD wants none of this. So, it does stupid things repeatedly that do little more than remind the public it’s not to be trusted. Like any cop shop, it’s manned by cops […]
The copyright system is flawed at many levels, as hundreds of posts on this blog make clear. One particular class of problems concern takedowns. The best known of the ‘notice and takedown’ systems, that of the US Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), allows the copyright industry to send takedown notices when they discover infringements on […]
Holy shit. So, in 2021 there was a car accident in Atwater California that killed a married couple, Pam and Joe Juarez. According to police reports at the time, a 20-year-old Stanford student, King Vanga, struck their car from behind. Here’s how ABC 30 reported on the matter: The California Highway Patrol says Pam, 56, […]
Some city officials in Illinois are now engaged in a round of “How Can I Get Sued?” Sounds like fun, but Calumet City officials might do well to remember the only way to win is not to play. That’s the upshot of the latest bit of officious nonsense to surface in the Chicago area. Granted, […]
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The fakest “free speech absolutist” who ever lived is at it again. As you may recall, earlier this year, Elon Musk sued the Center for Countering Digital Hate (CCDH) claiming that its report documenting an alleged “surge of hateful content” on exTwitter somehow violated contracts (after first threatening to sue for defamation, but not actually […]
Right to repair reform continues to have a moment here in the U.S., with four states (California, Minnesota, New York, and recently Maine) having passed state level protections. The goal: to fight repair monopolies and make it easier and more affordable to repair the technology you own, whether it’s your car, game console, cell phone, […]
This week, our first place winner on the insightful side is Thad with with a comment about Elon Musk citing The Hitchhiker’s Guide To The Galaxy as the inspiration for his new “Grok” AI product, and our point that the titular guide was compiled by humans: Yeah, if you want a real-life equivalent of the […]
Five Years Ago This week in 2018, the RIAA made a court filing where it warned about overprotection from copyright, Nintendo secured a huge settlement against ROM site (probably just to scare other ROM sites), and the Girl Scouts sued the Boy Scouts over trademark. CNN filed a lawsuit seeking to show that Trump can’t […]
The things said by law enforcement when trying to keep evidence from being tossed all sound the same. There are only a handful of acceptable excuses for performing warrantless searches and, man, do they get used so frequently we can probably all repeat them in our sleep. “Exigent circumstances.” This one means things were happening […]
Video game addiction. Sigh. Big sigh, even. Like, the biggest of sighs. We’ve talked about claims that video game addiction is a documentable affliction in the past, as well as the pushback that claim has received from addiction experts, who have pointed out that much of this is being done to allow doctors to get […]
We’ve done this a few times now where people start talking about a social media trend that actually only went viral because of the media coverage of the supposed (but not really) social media trend. And each time there’s some outrage moral panic about how “social media” is destroying the children or whatever, when it’s […]
There’s nothing new about cop shops letting their tech providers write their press releases for them. Law enforcement officers love power but often think nothing of surrendering their autonomy to the providers of the snooping tools. For years, Harris Corporation — the maker of Stingray devices — told cops what they could or couldn’t say […]
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At this point you need to assume that organizations still advertising on exTwitter know that they’re supporting a new fascist movement… and are okay with it. Yes, many advertisers on exTwitter have pulled the plug on advertising on the site. And even the ones that Linda Yaccarino has been able to coax back appear to […]
For decades, big ISPs like AT&T have refused to upgrade low income and poor communities to fiber, despite billions in subsidies, regulatory favors, and tax breaks that were supposed to accomplish precisely that. Groups like the National Digital Inclusion Alliance (NDIA) have released studies on cities like Cleveland and Detroit, documenting how this discrimination lines […]
Three years ago we discussed an interesting trademark battle between McDonald’s and Hungry Jack’s in Australia. It’s interesting for a number of reasons. For starters, Hungry Jack’s is a part of Burger King, McDonald’s chief rival globally, making this something of a proxy war. Second, this suit was filed on the heels of McDonald’s losing […]
Last week in our Error 402 series on the history of web monetization, we wrote about the earliest forms of web advertising: banner ads. As we noted, this “simple” way of making money seemed to derail other forms of monetization, including early attempts at paywalls (which had many other problems and were destined to fail). […]
The courts in Indiana have made significant moves in recent years to do what the legislature won’t: limit asset forfeiture abuse. A case that made its way from Indiana’s Supreme Court to the US Supreme Court ended with a declaration that certain forfeitures violated constitutional protections against excessive fines. In that case, Tyson Timbs was […]
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