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Violent Games, Broken Trust, and Mistaken Acts
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By Jeff Foster, Section UnFairUse
Posted on Mon Jul 19, 2004 at 01:51:09 PM PDT
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As pointed out by this comment, I appear to have made a mistake in my roundup from 2 weeks ago. The bill I referenced was the Pirate Act, when it was in fact the ART Act. I apologize for the error. To make up for it, I'm going to do a feature sometime this week running-down all the bills that have passed or are in danger of doing so that threaten fair use. I hope you'll enjoy it.
I got a lot of responses both in the comments and in my E-mail about last week’s question on why people use Internet Explorer. A couple folks seem to be perfectly happy with IE, but the majority either didn't know there were any modern alternatives, or more commonly, were forced to use it by their employers. Bosses who subject their employees to the abomination that is IE -- they'll be first against the wall when the Revolution comes. Anyway, this week I'd like to ask a similar question: what E-mail client do you use? I have noticed a high rate of Opera E-mails (I didn't even know they had a client!) coming my way as a result of this column, but I would still imagine that IE rules all. Is it true? Tell me by leaving a comment below or e-mailing me Jeff@malgenic.org. Oh, and to the person who suddenly felt the need this week to send me 10 Mydooms a day, could you please stop? k, thanks!
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Violent Videogame Law Struck Down
A Washington law prohibiting the sale of violent videogames to minors has been overturned by a Federal judge. The judge found that the law violated Free Speech which “has been used throughout the country's history to convey important social messages, and that the Supreme Court has never upheld bans on violent depictions under obscenity laws.” I think that qualifies as good news, but you may disagree. I guarantee that every 13-16 year old in Washington state waiting for the now eminent release of Doom3 doesn't though.
President Signs Anti-phishing Law
On the Thursday, Bush signed the Identity Theft Penalty Enhancement Act, which increases penalties for the perpetrators of phishing scams, as well as for good old analog identity theft. Seems like a reasonable thing to do, but since most phishing schemes take place outside of the untied states, I kind of doubt that Nigerian princes in desperate need of your help to get their $100 Million out of the bank are going to be visiting jail anytime soon. Speaking of Nigerian Princes, see this BBC story about a group of vigilantes who decided to get a bit of payback.
More Anti-trust Litigation Against the Record Industry?
Ars-techinca has an interesting blurb speculating as to whether p2p United, a peer-to-peer advocacy group, could start pushing for anti-trust litigation against the RIAA due to their blacklisting of all peer to peer companies from distrusting music legitimately (see the article for details). Why in the world would the RIAA NOT want as many distribution outlets as possible for their music? Hmmm....could it be....this?
LawMeme's Induce Act Guide
The Induce act is scary. Basically, it states that anyone who “induces” copyright infringement is in violation themselves. The bill is aimed at peer-to-peer networks, but where would it really stop? CD burners? PVR's? Network cards? I don't know, I'm not a lawyer. The people at LawMeme are though, and so they tossed up a handy guide to the Induce act, explaining the In's and outs, with lots and lots of links thrown in for good measure. Good stuff.
To the Poster who didn't Want me to Link to the NY Times
There is an interesting story at wired discussing the New York Times presence on the web, and how despite their massive amount of content, they have a terrible Google search ranking on most of their content, even though they are often the ones to break important stories (Abu Grahib anyone?). The article also reveals that the Times charges “Tens of millions of dollars” to Lexis-Nexis for their back catalog. Wow. No wonder Lexis-Nexis costs like $100 an hour.
Other News Of Note
Lawyer's Use Google-Sponsored Links...On Each Other?
Microsoft Purchases Lindows Name
The Amazon Contrarian Review Game
Edonkey Hanging in There
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