This Week In Techdirt History: December 10th – 16th

Five Years Ago

This week in 2018, the Australian government passed a law forcing tech companies to break encryption, Hollywood and record labels were quietly asking congress to bring back SOPA, and the UK intelligence community said it was moving on from bulk data collection in favor of bulk equipment interference. The latest EU copyright proposal was not only bad, but impossible, and while legacy copyright industries were lobbying hard for it, it still wasn't enough for some and no agreement was reached, but it was about to be upstaged anyway by even worse regulations on terrorist content.

Ten Years Ago

This week in 2013, the newest Snowden leak revealed that the NSA and GCHQ infiltrated World Of Warcraft and Second Life, while most big internet companies started speaking out for major surveillance reform, and Keith Alexander told senators that he couldn't think of any way to keep the US safe other than bulk metadata collections. Meanwhile, the latest TPP leak revealed that the US was isolated in its desire to push through corporate exceptionalism, and was indeed the sole party pushing for a lot of bad demands, while the USTR was defending secrecy around the negotiations on the basis that the public is too stupid to understand.

Fifteen Years Ago

This week in 2008, we looked at how geographic restrictions were harming online video sites, at the increasingly blurry lines between personal and commercial use of material, and at the many reasons that a music tax is a bad idea. The UK culture secretary was pushing for copyright extension, Universal was continuing its war on Redbox DVD rentals, Australian ISPs were refusing to censor the internet, and a New Zealand hairdresser got a bill for playing music in her shop. We also saw a patent lawsuit so completely bogus that the judge ordered sanctions and attorney's fees paid.