Stanford Center for Internet and Society

Many people have been saying for a long time that one great benefit of publishing news online is that publishers are not constrained by page limits. Today, the NYT published the text of a Nov. 8 memorandum prepared for cabinet-level officials by Stephen J. Hadley, the national security adviser, and his aides on the National Security Council. The five-page document, classified secret, was read and transcribed by The New York Times. It is listed on the site as the most blogged news story. The second most blogged story was the NYT article about the memo.

This is great for free speech and for discourse more generally. People are able to read the document and comment on what the memorandum actually states, not what a reporter thinks is most interesting and chooses to quote.

Lessig will argue at the Appeal in Kahle v. Ashcroft at 9AM November 13, 2006. A post by the Plaintiff Brewster Kahle.

We Filed our Motion for attorney's fees in the Poulsen FOIA case. FOIA includes a fee-shifting provision to encourage people to litigate to defend their rights-- when the government loses, it has to pay the other side's costs if they "substantially prevailed" and meet the test that they are entitled to fees. We're asking for ~$70,000 dollars to cover our litigation costs and attorneys fees and believe we should get all of it given the government's obdurate behavior in the case.

Lots of bloggers are planning to cover the 2006 general elections on November 7. But what are the legal issues that you need to understand?

Such as: Can you be in the voting area except to vote? (Not in Delaware) Can you ask people how they voted? (Not within 50 ft of polling place in Rhode Island). Can you take photos? (In CA it is illegal to photograph, videotape or otherwise record a voter entering or leaving a polling place). And so on.

Student Fellows at Stanford University Law School's Center for Internet and Society will be answering those kinds of questions and more in coming days. Do you have one? Ask it here. We'll compile and publish a Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ), and post it before the election.

July 28- BlogHerCon workshop So you have this crazy idea: You want to start a community-based blog site, but aren't sure where to start. Susannah Gardner & Lauren Gelman are among those who will help you examine what's out there, define what you can do differently, and create a plan to develop content, promote your efforts and watch your back.

The Stanford Law School Center for Internet and Society (CIS) is now accepting applications for the CIS Non-Residential Fellowship Program for the 2006-2007 academic year.

CIS Non-Residential Fellows work independently and with CIS staff and faculty on projects related to CIS' mission. These non-supported fellowships allow practitioners to benefit from synergies with Stanford Law School in their scholarly research. Non-Residential Fellows are encouraged to make their work available through CIS and to present their work at the CIS Speaker Series.

This fellowship is particularly appropriate for individuals who are interested in studying a cyberlaw issue or working on a cyberlaw project that is outside the scope of their usual work and who would benefit from the affiliation with and support of Stanford CIS. Applicants must submit a specific research proposal which they plan to accomplish during the one- year fellowship. While fellowships are generally for one year, they may be renewed if the collaboration proves productive and would benefit from additional time.

We filed an amicus brief (.pdf) on behalf of a number of law professors arguing that the claims made against the phone company do not require disclosure of state secrets. From the summary:

Amici, law professors who specialize in electronic surveillance and constitutional law, urge this Court to protect the judicial branch’s role in overseeing electronic surveillance and to hold accountable Defendant telecommunications companies for their failure to protect their subscribers’ privacy. Federal law strictly prohibits interception of communications without a court order. It requires that telecommunications providers refuse to help the government listen in to citizens’ communications without a court’s approval. When it set up the statutory scheme, Congress recognized that telecommunications providers play a critical role in protecting subscribers’ privacy interests. In contrast to those whose houses are searched, victims of electronic surveillance rarely learn that someone has listened to their telephone conversations without authorization. For that reason, Congress tasked telecommunications providers with ensuring that any surveillance is properly authorized, and provided strict penalties for ignoring that responsibility. This case is about whether the Defendants violated their obligations under the law.

I did two podcasts for Podtech Network recently. This one is about the Apple Bloggers decision, and this one is about Network Neutrality.

The Appeals court issued its ruling today in Apple v. Does.

The Court held that the Stored Communications Act prevents Apple from requesting the emails from the ISP and says they must go to the account holders directly.

The Court also held that the website editors were journalists entitled to claim California's Journalist Shield to prevent them from being held in contempt for not disclosing sources and to claim the First Amendment's protections for journalists.

This is a *huge* win! Now journalists can feel safe knowing that they can protect their sources' identity no matter in which medium they choose to disseminate news (as we argued in our amicus brief).

April 21-- Speaking at Law Seminar conference "Blog Law and Blogging for Lawyers" on developments in the area of cyberlaw that bloggers and lawyers dealing with blogs should know about.