This week, we announced the winners in all six categories of the fourth annual public domain game jam, Gaming Like It’s 1926. For the next few weeks, we’ll be taking a closer look at each of the winning games (in no particular order). Today, the spotlight is on the winner of the Best Adaptation category: […]
For all the posts we’ve done on the impact of video games on society, I have found myself typically either beating back the notion that gaming is a terrible thing responsible for all the world’s problems or talking about common IP conflicts. On the topic of the internet generally, well, it’s mostly the same. But […]
By now you surely know that former Congressman and current satirical cow censor Devin Nunes has become quite well known for his series of SLAPP suits against people who made him feel bad. It started with his lawsuit against the satirical parody cow Twitter account, but that lawsuit also included political consultant Liz Mair, who […]
A month ago, the controversial EARN IT Act sailed through a markup hearing in the Senate Judiciary Committee. If enacted, the bill would strip the providers of online services of Section 230 immunity for their users’ child sexual exploitation offenses, meaning they could be subject to civil suit by private plaintiffs and criminal charges under state law. The idea is that […]
DuckDuckGo, of course, is a popular “alternative” search engine, using Microsoft’s Bing as its underlying search engine but then doing a bunch of generally good stuff for the wider internet/public, such as not trying to collect as much information on you as possible for tracking based ads, but focusing instead of intention based ads around […]
The Department of Justice has been keeping an eye on the Portland (OR) Police Bureau (PPB) for nearly a decade now, finding that officers routinely engage in excessive force, especially when dealing with residents suffering from mental illness. A consent decree was put in place in 2014. Since then, the Portland PD has violated the […]
Merge your creativity with science as you build exciting circuits using Circuit Scribe’s conductive ink pen, sweet magnetic modules, and plain old printer paper. By placing the paper over a steel sheet, included in every kit, your paper becomes the base for blinking lights, beeping buzzers, and whirling motors. Circuit Scribe’s DIY kit gives you everything you […]
Not only have corporate efforts to monopolize repair resulted in a flood of proposed state and federal laws, the idea was also included in the Biden Administration’s recent executive order on monopoly power and competition. Said order urged the FTC to tighten up its rules on repair monopolization efforts, whether it’s ham-fisted DRM, or making […]
There’s no business like cop business. When business is bad — like it can be following a high-profile murder by one of your officers — cops double down. They complain there’s too much scrutiny. They attack and punish people for engaging in First Amendment-protected activities. They engage in the very violence being protested against. And […]
We’ve been talking quite a bit lately about consolidation within the video game industry. As is often the case in times of economic strife, the pandemic has led to large entities in the gaming industry gobbling up smaller entities. Microsoft acquired Zenimax. Then Microsoft acquired Activision Blizzard King for a wild amount of money. Soon […]
Last fall we had a whole series of blog posts explaining just how dangerous Rep. Jerry Nadler’s SHOP SAFE bill would be. It’s one of those bills that if you just hear what it’s about — stopping the sale of counterfeit goods online — sounds good. But only if you don’t understand how basically anything […]
Qualified immunity has been heavily criticized for what it allows law enforcement officers to get away with. The Supreme Court-created doctrine excuses officers from civil rights lawsuits even when it’s been shown rights were violated… so long as the rights violation hasn’t been previously ruled a rights violation by other courts with jurisdiction over the […]
We’ve already noted how several of the business decisions to shut down integral parts of the Internet to “punish Putin” aren’t really punishing Putin, but the Russian public. For example Cogent’s decision to sever Russia from the rest of the Internet is something that Putin generally wants given his longstanding desire to forge a sort […]
Last month, the NY Times published a really great article by (the always innovative) tech reporter Kashmir Hill, in which she tested out a bunch of those location tracking tools by hiding them (with permission) on her husband, Trevor Timm, executive director of the Freedom of the Press Foundation. It was a great and eye-opening […]
The Complete 2022 Linux Training Bundle has 12 courses to help you master Linux. You’ll start with the basics and move on to security techniques, shell scripting, command line, and more. The bundle is on sale for $69. Note: The Techdirt Deals Store is powered and curated by StackCommerce. A portion of all sales from […]
Tennessee has long been home to a truly astounding amount of First Amendment violations, some of which were enabled by courts’ willingness to entertain far too many bogus defamation lawsuits. And Daniel Horwitz has been a constant thorn in these courts’ sides, securing wins for clients facing bogus lawsuits. Fortunately, the legislature recently improved the […]
Fun fact: about 2,950,000 new subscribers signed up for broadband last year, and roughly 95 percent of them signed up with the biggest cable companies (primarily Comcast and Charter). These two cable giants’ market share continues to grow not really because they’re good — but because they’re the only option countless Americans have if they […]
A decade ago, we discussed how the pressure brought against Russia to more greatly enforce copyright laws was a mistake. A mistake mostly because of how Russia would choose to enforce those laws, namely by applying them only against critics of the state or undesirables, whether actual infringement was occurring or not. While Russia’s misuse […]
Remember NetzDG? This is the German content moderation law that has been a complete disaster from day one. It puts all sorts of requirements on social media companies to remove undesirable content in a very short period of time. Other countries, like Turkey, have used it as inspiration to pass their own laws to censor […]
It took a little longer than usual, but we’ve finally announced the winners of the fourth annual public domain game jam, Gaming Like It’s 1926! In this episode, Mike and I are joined by Randy Lubin (our partner in running the jam) to discuss the winners in all six categories, as well as some of […]
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