Learning Python online has never been easier. If you’re a beginner developer looking to brush up on your Python skills, then CodeDirect is the place for you. We provide 16+ Python lessons, 100+ hands-on exercises, and solutions to all of them. You’ll also get up-to-date lessons covering HTML, CSS, JavaScript, and more! The lessons cover […]
It’s not often you see a civil forfeiture case handled by an appeals court. Most cases are never given their day in court. Many go completely unchallenged. The evidentiary bar for the government is low and the obligations placed on those whose property has been taken is high. Most people can’t afford to fight forfeitures, […]
We’ve noted a few times how there’s an absolutely historic amount of money being thrown at the U.S. broadband “digital divide” this year. The broadband infrastructure bill alone designates $42 billion to expanding broadband access. Billions more in COVID relief money started flowing this week courtesy of the Treasury Department. But there’s a tiny problem. Despite a […]
This week, both our winners on the insightful side come in response to our post about the impossibility of complying with the child protection bill being pushed in California. In first place, it’s That One Guy with a comment focusing on the carve-out for telcos and broadband providers: ‘They paid us off so of course […]
Five Years Ago As you probably know, this week was Techdirt’s 25th anniversary! And this week in 2017, of course, we were marking the 20th anniversary (and also published a podcast reflecting on the history of the site). As for other events this week in 2017: we saw yet another example of the problems with […]
The Los Angeles Police Department is one of the largest in the United States. To say it’s resistant to change would be an understatement. It — like the NYPD — is also resistant to oversight, transparency, and accountability. It may not be as openly antagonistic as the NYPD but it has a multitude of problems […]
After imploding in a spectacular fireball several years ago, MoviePass is giving things another try. The service has announced that it’s preparing to relaunch on Labor Day, nearly three years after the company was effectively shamed out of existence in spectacular fashion. While the remnants of MoviePass were sold to a private equity firm in […]
This week we’ve been writing about California bill AB 2273, a dangerous bill that has effectively sailed through the California legislature with little pushback, because it’s wrapped up in “protect the children” language and no one wants to be seen as not wanting to “protect the children.” But, like so many bills that frame themselves […]
Most protest activity targets government entities. So, it’s really no surprise that government entities prefer to target protesters. While most “free” nations won’t go so far as to introduce life sentences for protesting and/or fire a majority of local officials and replace them with handpicked loyalists, the general understanding is that protests targeting government entities […]
As was to be expected, the Twitter / Elon Musk showdown has been zooming ahead. With a trial set for mid-October (after the Chancellor overseeing the case mostly sided with Twitter on the preferred timeline), we’re deep in the discovery process, and there have been some disputes over how that’s going. On Wednesday, there was […]
The Microsoft Office Pro for Windows 2021 + HP EliteBook + Office Courses Bundle is pretty self-explanatory. You get one license for Microsoft Office Professional 2021 for Windows and 8 courses to help you learn how to get the most out of Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, Teams, OneNote, Publisher, and Access. You also get a refurbished HP […]
Here’s some amazingly good news amidst all of the nonsense of late. On Thursday, the Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) at the White House announced that they were updating policy guidance to mandate that all taxpayer-supported research should be immediately available to the public at no cost. According to the actual policy guidelines, […]
Thanks to their dominance over broadband access in the U.S., cable companies had spent the last decade seeing significant broadband subscriber growth each and every quarter, since, well, there weren’t any other options. That ended during the second quarter of 2022, when companies like Comcast failed to add any new broadband subscribers for the first […]
Xbox’s management team’s inability to put out a clear public message regarding exclusive titles is becoming a real thing. When the season of acquisitions kicked off last year and Microsoft bought up Zenimax/Bethesda studios, the muddled messaging began. First were conflicting statements over the exclusivity of those studios’ titles, then came Microsoft saying those titles […]
There’s presumptive access to court records under the First Amendment. But that presumption presumes a lot of other things, as this recent Sixth Circuit Appeals Court ruling demonstrates. Just because something is open doesn’t necessarily mean it’s accessible. But the Sixth Circuit has decided access (no matter how limited) is still access, and that’s all […]
As you may recall, in his response to Twitter’s lawsuit trying to force him to fulfill the terms of the purchase agreement he made, Elon Musk relied on the findings of a tool called Botometer to argue that there were more bots on Twitter than Twitter was claiming. Again, I have to remind everyone, as […]
Four years ago, the Laredo Police Department arrested a citizen journalist for the crime of receiving an answer to a question she asked. Priscilla Villarreal patrols the streets of Laredo with her camera, reporting on police activity simply by turning on her camera during traffic stops, arrests, and other incidents, and providing commentary. Her reporting […]
Would you be surprised to find out that the censorial, moral panic bill based on hype and nonsense, but very likely to pass in California and potentially change how the internet functions… was actually written by a British noble with a savior complex? Yesterday I wrote about California’s AB 2273 bill and how it is […]
The 2022 Big Data Visualization Toolkit Bundle has 7 courses to help you learn data analytics. Courses cover Tableau, Alteryx, Python, Qlik Sense, and more. It’s on sale for $39. Note: The Techdirt Deals Store is powered and curated by StackCommerce. A portion of all sales from Techdirt Deals helps support Techdirt. The products featured […]
Earlier this week, the popular Australian news publication Crikey, published what it is referring to as “The Lachlan Murdoch letters.” Lachlan Murdoch, as you likely know, is one of Rupert Murdoch’s sons, and who has increasingly been taking over the worst aspects of Murdoch’s approach to dividing society and profiting off of the carnage: namely […]
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