Techdirt

I spent decades as a telecom beat reporter watching the mainstream press cover the telecom industry. I had a front row seat to the endless promises big telecoms like AT&T and Comcast made before a merger, and the way the U.S. business press repeatedly parroted pre-merger claims entirely unskeptically, without pointing out the harms of [...]

One of many ideas floated as a solution to police misconduct issues is the requirement that officers carry their own insurance. Almost every law enforcement officer is currently indemnified by the towns and cities that employ them, ensuring they're never personally responsible for any judgments or settlements stemming from their misconduct. And that's a very [...]

Because of the wonderful world in which we live, we get to learn about certain unhappy terms and practices, one of which is the concept of collective punishment." As a matter of war, collective punishment is a war crime. The idea is that a belligerent force cannot punish an entire population or group merely for [...]

The U.S. Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals has allowed Indiana's age verification law to go into effect - even as the Supreme Court has suggested a similar law in Texas might be unconstitutional. The Seventh Circuit panel handed down this ruling, letting the law go into effect just weeks after the U.S. Supreme Court decided [...]

For as long as the evening news has existed, America has been portrayed as a dangerous place to live. Reminding people we're a very safe country - especially over the past 30 years - doesn't draw in viewers. And it doesn't draw in voters, either. Among the many, many, many things Donald Trump lied about [...]

There are many things to say about Disney's recent self-induced litigation disaster. Not the case that good Disney lawyering just helped win; I am referring to the case where bad Disney lawyering tried to press the now-withdrawn legal argument that a plaintiff, suing over the death of their spouse allegedly stemming from an allergic reaction [...]

This 2-in-1 Keychain Wireless Charger with 2,500mAh battery will charge your Apple Watch 3-5 times on a full charge. Its magnetic design ensures perfect alignment and it works seamlessly with all Apple Watch series. It features Type-C port for versatile charging options for other devices. It's on sale for $19. Note: The Techdirt Deals Store [...]

So we just wrote about how advertising on ExTwitter remains in freefall and is likely down between 75 and 85% from when Elon took over. And now the Wall Street Journal has a piece recognizing that the banks that financed about $13 billion of the $44 billion Musk needed are admitting that it may be [...]

Americans are, apparently, tired of having every last shred of personal data over-collected, hyper monetized, then improperly secured by a rotating crop of ethics-optional corporations and lazy executives. A new survey from U.S. News and World Report took a look at prevailing U.S. consumer privacy beliefs, and found, among other things, that 84% of the [...]

We've written a ton about Taylor Swift's various adventures in intellectual property law and the wider internet. Given her sheer popularity and presence in pop culture, that isn't itself particularly surprising. What has been somewhat interesting about her as a Techdirt subject, though, has been how she has straddled the line between being a victim [...]

Like far too many legislators in far too many states, Tennessee's lawmakers have jumped on the book banning bandwagon. For years, public libraries and school libraries were stocked at the discretion of librarians and largely operated without a lot of interference from state governments. While attempts to ban certain books happened now and then, there [...]

Location and surveillance technologypermeatesthedriving experience. Setting aside external technology like license plate readers, there is some form of internet-connected service or surveillance capability built into or on many cars, from GPS tracking to oil-change notices. This isalready a dangerous situation for many drivers and passengers, and a bill in California requiring GPS-tracking in digital license [...]

Would you believe that Disney's famously copyright-maximalist lawyers have just brought us a nice victory for fair use? Earlier this year, we wrote about disgraced former Congressman George Santos suing Disney and Jimmy Kimmel after Kimmel used some of Santos' Cameo videos (that Kimmel had secretly requested) in a, well, somewhat trollish fashion. Santos, who [...]

It's never about the children. Supporters of age verification laws, book bans, drag show bans, and abortion bans always claim they're doing these things to protect children. But it's always just about themselves. They want to impose their morality on other adults. That's all there is to it. Abortion bans are just a way to [...]

The Python and Django Web Development Bundle has 7 courses to help you learn how to build your own sites and apps. Courses cover the basics of Django and Python and then build upon those skills by having you create your own to do list app and user authentication app, and more. It's on sale [...]

Turns out that when you tell advertisers to go fuck themselves, sue the advertisers who did so, and then promise you won't do anything to stop the worst people in the world from spewing hate and bigotry on your platform, it might not be great for business. Who knew? Elon, apparently. Last week we noted [...]

Now that streaming subscriber growth has slowed, we've noted repeatedly how the streaming TV sector isfalling into all of the bad habits that ultimately doomed traditional cable TV. That has involved chasing pointless growth of growth's sake" megamergers and imposing bottomless price hikes and newannoying restrictions- all while simultaneously cutting corners on product quality and [...]

It's about the stupidest thing anyone could claim in defense of an unlawful detention and search, but Waterbury, CT police office Nicholas Andrzejewski did it anyway. He actually told a court (twice!) that someone respecting every single law applicable to them at the point of this unwelcome interaction was at least reasonable suspicion for a [...]

Apparently, Judge Reed O'Connor doesn't think that owning a massive amount of Tesla stock constitutes a conflict of interest when it comes to judging Elon Musk's legal battles. Last week, we were briefly surprised when infamously partisan Judge Reed O'Connor recused himself from Elon's nonsense SLAPP suit against GARM and some advertisers. As we had [...]

There's a new lawsuit in Northern California federal court that seeks to improve child safety online but could end up backfiring badly if it gets the remedy it seeks. While the plaintiff's attorneys surely mean well, they don't seem to understand that they're playing with fire. The complaint in the putative class action asserts that [...]

We do know the DHS definitely wants as much facial recognition tech involved as possible when it comes to border crossings and international airports. That it might think now would be the time to add children to the mix is unwelcome, but not unsurprising. But maybe the DHS should make sure all of its officials [...]

Embark on the journey of language learning with the Rosetta Stone lifetime subscription for all languages. Rosetta Stone has been the go-to software for language learning for the past 27 years. With its immersive and intuitive training method, you might be reading, writing, and speaking a new language with confidence in no time. It's on [...]

Friday morning gave us a nice victory for free speech in the 9th Circuit, where the appeals court panel affirmed most of the district court's ruling finding California's Age Appropriate Design Code" unconstitutional as it regulated speech. There's a fair bit of background here that's worth going over, so bear with me. California's Age Appropriate [...]

As we recently noted, telecom giants like AT&T and Comcast are having some very good luck using a corrupt, MAGA-heavy court to not only kill popular net neutrality rules - but to effectively lobotomize the FCC's ability to protect broadband consumers at all. Leveraging the recent Supreme Court Lopper rulings, telecom lawyers are trying to [...]

This week, our first place winner on the insightful side is an anonymous comment about the Governor who told students to look the other way" if they are bothered by mandated postings of the Ten Commandments: Funny how theocrats never practice what they preach. They refuse to simply look the other way" when bothered by, [...]

Five Years Ago This week in 2019, we looked at the loss of Aereo and its impact on policy, and also dedicated the first of two episodes of our podcast to dissecting the FTC's Facebook settlement. The Wall Street Journal had Dennis Prager peddling complete nonsense about Google censorship", a Fox News commenter was calling [...]

It was just a few weeks ago that we were discussing how an update Apple made to its rules for its App Store allowed for some retro-console game emulator apps, but not retro-PC game emulator apps for some reason. When Apple made the policy change, developer Chaoji Li submitted his app, iDOS, for consideration, only [...]

Ctrl-Alt-Speech is a weekly podcast about the latest news in online speech, from Mike Masnick and Everything in Moderations Ben Whitelaw. Subscribe now on Apple Podcasts, Overcast, Spotify, Pocket Casts, YouTube, or your podcast app of choice - or go straight to the RSS feed. In this week's round-up of the latest news in online [...]

For a while, we've been pointing out how terrible KOSA (the Kids Online Safety Act) is. Our main concern is that the bill would fundamentally lead to the suppression of all kinds of speech. That's because the duty of care" provision, while limited, would allow officials (mostly at the FTC, which can get partisan) to [...]

I, for one, would welcome an opportunity for the inmates to run the asylum. It can't possibly be any stupider than this bit of news, which emanates from what I consider to be my hometown (I spent 15 formative years living here, beginning at age 5), El Paso, Texas. An El Paso middle school is [...]

The Premium Python Programming PCEP Certification Prep Bundle has 12 courses to help you become an expert Python coder. Courses cover everything from app creation to AI and machine learning. It's on sale for $35. Note: The Techdirt Deals Store is powered and curated by StackCommerce. A portion of all sales from Techdirt Deals helps [...]

A challenge for the mainstream media: can you stop saying that Elon Musk is a free speech absolutist? Over the past few years, we've had a number of posts highlighting just how laughable it is that Elon Musk claims that he's a free speech absolutist." He never has been. Remember that even before he took [...]

Last June scientists warned that low-Earth orbit (LEO) satellites constantly burning up in orbit could release chemicals that couldundermine the progress we've made repairing the ozone layer. Researchers at USC noted that at peak, 1,005 U.S. tons of aluminum will fall to Earth, releasing 397 U.S. tons of aluminum oxides per year to the atmosphere, [...]

One of the common excuses companies give when enforcing their trademarks in a way that is far more ham-fisted than is actually required is: Hey, we have to police our marks or else we risk losing them." This excuse often exaggerates that requirement, of course, as there is no need to police marks when there [...]

We learned earlier this year, it's not just the FBI targeting extremely vulnerable people with the intent of radicalizing them into arrests on terrorism charges. The FBI has been a world leader in this particular category, apparently incapable of being shamed (or sued) into altering its tactics, which often appear to be on the wrong [...]

You may recall that RFK Jr.'s nonsense-peddling anti-vax organization Children's Health Defense" (CHD) sued Meta back in 2020 for the apparent crime of fact-checking and limiting the reach of the anti-vax nonsense it posted. Three years ago, the case was tossed out of court (easily) with the court pointing out that Meta is (*gasp*) a [...]

Utah's plans to erect a theocracy within the United States continue uninterrupted. While it's always been more of a religious conclave than a US state for years, thanks to the outsized influence of the Mormon church, the past eight years have seen a much more dramatic drift to the far right of the political spectrum. [...]

Headway Premium is the revolutionary app designed to help you turn personal growth into a habit. With a lifetime subscription, you get unlimited access to a huge number of non-fiction bestsellers, summarized into 15-minute reads. Be it personal development, business strategies, or health insights, Headway has you covered. It's on sale for $60. Note: The [...]

Would you believe that Elon suing former advertisers for no longer advertising on ExTwitter isn't magically making advertisers want to come back and is, instead, driving them further away? A quick timeline: Many people, quite reasonably, called out the absolute absurdity of Elon basically suing advertisers for not wanting to advertise on his site. However, [...]

Last year Mozilla released a report showcasing how the auto industry hassome of the worst privacy practicesof any tech industry in America (no small feat). Massive amounts of driver behavior is collected by your car, and even more is hoovered up from your smartphone every time you connect. This data isn't secured, often isn't encrypted, [...]

It almost always takes a lawsuit to force the government to give up information that doesn't present it in the best light. That's the case here, where litigation has finally forced ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement) to hand over ICE use of force records. There are plenty of reasons to deeply dislike ICE and/or desire [...]

Over the last year especially, there's been a lot of talk about kid safety online and the role (if any) of social media in all of that. It's a complicated topic that requires nuance, not unproven claims of social media being the cause. Getting this wrong is likely to make kids' lives worse, not better. [...]

A few months ago, Mike wrote about the ways he uses AI tools when writing for Techdirt - not to do any of the actual writing, but to help improve it. The specific tool in question is Lex, a word processor with embedded AI features, and this week Lex founder Nathan Baschez joins Mike on [...]

I am not going to rehash this entire debacle again, but suffice to say a small town police department in Kansas - led by (the now-resigned) police chief Gideon Cody raided the offices of the Marion County Record (along with the home of its co-owners, one of which was 98-year-old Joan Meyer, who died less [...]

The Ultimate Adobe CC Training Bundle has 12 courses to help you get the most out of the Adobe Creative Cloud Suite. Courses cover Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign, Dreamweaver, After Effects, and more. It's on sale for $40. Note: The Techdirt Deals Store is powered and curated by StackCommerce. A portion of all sales from Techdirt [...]

Yesterday, we wrote about EU Commissioner Thierry Breton's preposterously stupid letter to Elon Musk, warning him that Elon had to make sure his Spaces conversation with Donald Trump did not include any harmful content" or it might violate the DSA. He also demanded that Elon tell Eurocrats what ExTwitter was doing to make sure that [...]

AT&T's never been much for worrying about the finer points of reality. This is, after all, a company that spent years lying to its users telling them that capped and throttled wireless service was unlimited." It's also the same company, you'll recall, that tried tricking customers into thinking 4G connectivity was actually 5G by simply... [...]

Re-branding isn't going to save ShotSpotter. While it would prefer to be called SoundThinking," its flagship product is still its acoustic detection tech - something the company claims reliably detects gunshots. Whatever the preferred (and trademarked) nomenclature, the claims the company makes are rarely backed up by facts. Even when it works, it still kind [...]

You might recall that AT&T's $200 billion acquisition of Time Warner and DirecTV was supposed to transform the telecom giant into a modern internet video advertising superpower. Instead, after a massive amount of debt and endless bumbling, AT&T wound up laying off more than 50,000 people, closing a bunch of popular brands (like Mad Magazine), [...]

Elon Musk's legal team probably thought they had the perfect strategy: file a SLAPP suit in a court with a judge known for partisan rulings, including rulings benefiting Elon himself in the past. But they didn't count on one thing - the judge recusing himself. Last week, Elon sued GARM and the others, claiming that [...]