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Amazon Burns Orwell's E-Books
Everyone knows Ray Bradbury’s book Fahrenheit 451. First published in 1953, Bradbury imagined a world in which government “firemen” could enter your home at any time and burn your books “for the good of humanity.” This deeply dystopic vision has, thankfully, not come to pass. Nor could it. In the U.S., the First and Fourth Amendments project against unreasonable government intrusion, especially where it implicates ideas. The state will never be able to enter your house and burn your books, even in an age of terrorism. I really believe that.
That’s why I was so disturbed to learn that Amazon has managed to “burn” two other famous dystopias, these ones by George Orwell, without implicating the Constitution. According to reports, people who had purchased Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four and Animal Farm for Kindle woke up to find that Amazon had erased the e-books remotely.
Pay As You Drive “Black Boxes” Threaten Driver Privacy
The California Department of Insurance (DOI) is considering regulations that would enable insurance prices to depend on the precise number of miles a car is driven in a given billing period.
Facebook and the Phone Companies Try to Lock You In
What does Facebook have in common with wireless phone companies like AT&T? Both companies try to lock customers in, even if we'd rather take our business elsewhere. Facebook is suing Power.com, a company that gives users a tool to pull copies of their own friends lists, postings and other information out of Facebook so that they can aggregate it with their other social networking platforms.
Stamps, Sculpture and Free Expression
We filed an amicus brief today in Gaylord v. U.S., a potentially important but little-noticed fair use case on appeal in the Federal Circuit. We filed it on behalf of the Andy Warhol Foundation, and several other amici, including the Warhol Museum, contemporary artists Barbara Kruger, Thomas Lawson, Jonathan Monk, and Allen Ruppersberg, and a variety of law professors who care about the extent to which copyright promotes and protects free expression.
One of the important questions the case presents is whether this stamp makes fair use of the statue that appears in it. The image you see is a photograph of a sculpture taken at dawn in a snowstorm. The sculpture itself is called The Column, and is part of the Korean War Veterans' Memorial in Washington DC. It features nineteen larger-than-life soldiers arranged in two columns, representing a platoon of soldiers on patrol in the Korean War. The Postal Service got permission to use the photograph that appears on the stamp, but not the column depicted in it, so the sculptor sued the Postal Service for infringing his copyrights in the sculpture.
One of the important questions this case presents is whether and to what extent an artists has the right to use existing imagery to create new artistic expression. We think fair use does and should protect this right, which is crucial to huge amounts of expression, including vast amounts of modern art. We submitted an amicus brief because we thought the Federal Circuit should hear the views of those who create, promote and defend that art.
Read the brief here.
Regulating Search Engine Optimization
From an anonymous executive, today on Tech Crunch:
"Imagine, if you will, that the entire Internet is contained within a single continent. That continent is filled with countries, states and cities. Each jurisdiction is autonomous, relying on visitors to cross on to their turf to engage in commerce. Now, imagine if the only way to get into this continent involved just two methods: SEO and SEM.
Privacy and the Democratization of Fame
If privacy and the ability to preserve your reputation are essential components to personal freedom, then Michael Jackson was imprisoned. As the media hysteria surrounding his death exemplified, Jackson’s life was a cautionary tale about the weight of relentless public scrutiny. Popular wisdom holds that his woes are the unfortunate but inevitable costs of fame.
Self-Regulatory Principles For Online Behavioral Advertising: "Or" vs. "And"
I’ve blogged before about the Network Advertising Initiative’s opt out for behavioral targeting, noting that there is no guarantee that participants will stop tracking users (only that they will stop serving targeted ads with the data they gather). Now a distinct coalition of online advertisers has proposed its own self-regulatory program, modeled on principles released (PDF) by Federal Trade Commission staff earlier this year. I took a closer look at what the new industry program says about opting out of the collection of user browsing habits. Hint: pay close attention to the use of conjunctions.
Facebook's future: "Wall" or nothing?
In “The Great Wall of Facebook,” Wired’s Fred Vogelstein contends that Facebook and Google are approaching a “full-blown battle over the future of the Internet.” Vogelstein’s assessment boils down to two predictions: (1) Facebook will lead and monopolize a fundamental shift to “a more personalized, humanized” web search, based entirely on information supplied by one’s social network; and (2) the vast amount of personal information supplied to Facebook by third parties and users themselves will (barring user revolt) yield massive profits through online brand advertising. A prediction that Facebook will gain some advantage over Google through its proprietary data would be hard to argue against. But Vogelstein’s particular vision of that general future—in which Google is conquered by a News Feed search based purely on users’ networks—runs into problems.
Coming Through the Rye No More
The verdict has just come through in the US District Court of Manhattan that has effected an injunction versus a Swedish author's "unauthorized" sequel to JD Salinger's beloved "Catcher in the Rye." The judge argues that the story, revolving around the adventures of an elderly man named "Mr. C." escaping from his retirement home, does not adequately fulfill the qualities of being a parody of the iconic protagonist Holden Caulfield.
Technically Women
Inspired by a blog post last year by ZDNet's Dennis Howlett, a group of prominent women in technology have formed a new blog called Technically Women.
Spotlight on CIS
Securing Privacy in the Internet Age
Edited by Anupam Chander, Lauren Gelman, and Margaret Jane Radin.
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CIS Wiki
CIS welcomes your input! We have set up a wiki to facilitate collaboration and planning. You can reach the CIS wiki by clicking here.
Spotlight on Fellows
CIS Fellow Elizabeth Townsend Gard
Non-resident fellow Dr. Elizabeth Townsend-Gard is an Associate Professor of Law at Tulane University Law School. With the help of her students, Elizabeth has developed the "Durationator," an online tool and accompanying study that tracks copyright duration in the U.S. and abroad. A beta version is expected to be released in January 2009. Their progress can be followed on her blog.
CIS Publications
Cyberlaw Clinic
Cyberlaw Clinic archive.