Lauren Gelman's blog

The United States District Court for the Northern District of California, granted plaintiffs’ Video Software Dealers Association (VSDA) and Entertainment Software Association (ESA) motion for a preliminary injunction prohibiting enforcement of a California law (“the Act”) that requires violent video games to be labeled and prohibits their rental or sale to minors. Read more about California District Court Enjoins Enforcement of Violent Video Game Law

The district court for the Southern District of Texas remanded this Internet libel action to state court. Plaintiff had originally filed suit in state court against Defendant, an Internet site administrator and site author who allegedly posted defamatory material on his website. Defendant had then removed the case to federal court. The federal court rejected two possible grounds for removal. First, it did not have original jurisdiction as the parties were not diverse and no federal question was raised in the complaint. Read more about Communications Decency Act Does Not Protect Internet Author-Administrators

This case involves the GNU General Public License (GPL), which governs the use of many products sold and distributed by the Free Software Foundation (FSF), including GNU/Linux operating systems. The GPL requires, among another things, that users who distribute or publish any work derived from GPL-covered software to license that work to under the GPL to all third parties at no charge. The plaintiff, Daniel Wallace (Wallace), was not a user of FSF software; rather, he was a competitor of FSF’s, trying to sell his own operating system. Read more about Court Finds No Antitrust Injury From GNU General Public License (GPL)

Defendant Thomas Millot worked for Aventis Pharmaceuticals as a systems analyst in the company’s information security department. Among other duties, Millot was responsible for the administration of computer user accounts at Aventis’s Kansas City, Missouri facility. Read more about Eighth Circuit Holds that a Computer Security Contractor May Be Considered a “Victim” Under the CFAA

This decision granted a motion by intervenor the United States to reconsider a motion to dismiss granted on December 21, 2004, in the United States District Court for the Central District of California by the late Judge William Rea. Read more about California District Court Finds Anti-Bootlegging Statute Constitutional

The California Court of Appeals for the Second Appellate District found that the forum selection clause in defendant EarthLink, Inc.’s (“EarthLink”) membership contract, which would have required consumers (in this case, putative class plaintiff California residents), to travel 2,000 miles to Georgia in order to recover claims of $40 to $50, is unenforceable because it is unreasonable as a matter of law. Read more about Internet service provider’s forum selection clause that requires California residents to travel to Georgia to recover small sums

Reporters Without Borders reports that Yahoo supplied personal data about a user in China to Chinese police, leading to the dissident's jailing in 2003. This is the second time RWB reported about imprisonment of a Chinese Internet user with the help of Yahoo. The house will hold hearings on February 15 on the operating practices of U.S. Internet companies in China. Read more about Another Internet user in China disclosed by Yahoo

It's been sort of funny watching Oprah struggle with the meaning of truth, and watching the entire publishing industry on edge waiting to adopt her meaning. But it's really such a sad commentary on our culture. This is another pathetic episode. According to National Journal's Technology Daily: Read more about Does it matter if it is not true?

A top Entertainment story on googleNews right now is Bond Helmer Busted for Prostitution. Right next to it is a picture of Pierce Brosnan:

When I read this, I thought it was Brosnan who had been arrested for prostitution. Read more about The Problems of Automation

Feb 3-4- Presenting paper on teaching privacy and technology to law and computer science students at DATA DEVOLUTION: Corporate Information Security, Consumers and the Future of Regulation, University of Florida Law School. Read more about Florida

According to TechWeb News Read more about Kudos on Microsoft's new Blog Policy

In President Bush's State of the Union he urged citizen's to support his efforts to promote democracy overseas.

But what about democracy at home?

There were two people kicked out of the State of the Union adress because of the tee-shirt they were wearing. Pause. Can you believe this is the "democracy" we are living in. Read more about Two kicked out of State of Union for Tee-Shirts

I will be speaking at BlogHerCon again this year. This time at a workshop described like this on their website.

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. Read more about Find the women bloggers at BlogHer

Monday January 30, 2006
12:30-1:30 PM
Room 280A
Stanford Law School
Open to All
Lunch Served

Computer technologies that I collect under the heading "social software" increase the salience of informal groups. Their salience raises important questions about both the significance and the benefits of informal groups. I organize analysis of those questions around the concept of governance, and the concept of information governance in particular. Read more about Michael J. Madison

January 26, 2006 - "Mastering the News Media to Boost Your Bottom Line." Speaking on: Corporate Blogs: They're here to stay so how do we leverage them? This talk will explore how companies are leveraging blogging tools to impact their corporate image. First we will look at company blogs, and discuss the benefits and potential pitfalls. Next, we will examine employee blogs, how first adopter companies are addressing employees who blog and how to develop a good blogging policy for your employees. Read more about Mastering the News Media to Boost Your Bottom Line