[legal] Forum Topics

The Washington State Supreme Court [URL="http://www.spokesman.com/stories/2010/may/06/libraries-can-filter-porn-washington-high-court-sa/"]ruled [/URL]earlier this month on a 6-3 decision that libraries had the right not only to use Internet blocking software, but to refuse to lift the block for a particular site even when an adult requested it. The case was significant because it's thought that …

The latest wrinkle in the lost iPhone story - in which someone left the prototype for the iPhone 4 in a bar and website [URL="http://www.gizmondo.com"]Gizmondo[/URL] got hold of it - has taken two unexpected turns. First, the police got involved. They have raided the editor's personal property and taken his …

Legal firm [URL="http://www.tbilaw.co.uk/"]Tilly, Baker and Irvine (TBI)[/URL] has agreed to stop sending letters to Internet users when they believe they may be infringing copyright. The ironic thing is that this is the same week in which UK law changed to allow the Government to cut users off for precisely the …

See SCO keep going. Stop SCO Stop. Seriously Stop SCO Stop. In a seriously OMG moment yesterday, [URL="http://www.sco.com"]SCO[/URL] lost another battle in its UNIX ownership claims. The Utah jury decided that [URL="http://www.novell.com"]Novell[/URL], in fact, did not transfer the UNIX copyrights to SCO when they sold UNIXWare to them years before. …

Now that [URL="http://www.microsoft.com"]Microsoft[/URL]'s big operating systems, Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008, are on store shelves, is it time again for them to pick up the legal sledgehammer and go after Linux? I think the evidence for it is mounting. Microsoft has signed a deal with [URL="http://www.novell.com"]Novell[/URL], penned an agreement …

You might be forgiven for thinking that Activision would be more than just a little pleased with game developers Infinity Ward which is responsible for the Call of Duty franchise, and which Activision acquired back in 2003. Forgiven, but wrong. Modern Warfare 2 is more than a game, it's [URL="http://www.daniweb.com/news/story252883.html"]the …

Three Google executives have been found guilty and given six month suspended sentences in a case revolving around the posting of a video to YouTube which shows a teenager with Down's Syndrome being bullied. According to the [URL="http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/8533695.stm"]BBC[/URL] Google itself is none too happy with the verdict, quoting the Chief …

I wish I had gotten this story before the [URL="http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/blogs/techchron/detail?entry_id=57438&o=3&gta=commentslistpos#commentslistpos"]San Fransisco Chronicle[/URL] or [URL="http://news.cnet.com/8301-17852_3-10455573-71.html?tag=rtcol;pop"]Cnet,[/URL] but the truth is they got it before me. A lady in Florida got a team of lawyers to sue Google, the Search Engine firm in San Fransisco, CA for breaching her privacy with Google Buzz. …

Legislators around the country are scrambling to look at their states' laws about lewd messages to minors after the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court overturned a conviction, saying state law didn't support it because it didn't specify online messaging. “The online conversations in this case, as they were not written with …

Online legal experts are salivating over cookies. Specifically, they are leaping to comment on the legal precedents involved over a lawsuit by Dr. Sanford Siegal, creator of the "[URL="http://www.cookiediet.com/"]Cookie Diet[/URL]," and his company, Dr. Siegal's Direct Nutritionals, LLC, against celebrity, model, socialite, and actress [URL="http://kimkardashian.celebuzz.com/"]Kim Kardashian[/URL] over what they allege …

It would appear that a political activist from New York has been arrested by the FBI in connection with helping orchestrate G20 summit protesters in Pittsburgh. According to [URL="http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/oct/04/man-arrested-twitter-g20-us"]The Guardian[/URL] the man, Eliot Madison from Queens, has been charged with hindering prosecution after helping G20 protesters evade police by using …

Just when it looked like every avenue to prevent the extradition of self-confessed NASA Hacker Gary McKinnon had been exhausted, especially when just last week a couple of High Court judges denied him leave to appeal his case to the highest court in the UK, it looks like the [URL="http://www.daniweb.com/blogs/entry3877.html"]hacking …

[url]http://mashable.com/2009/10/10/facebook-poke-arrest/[/url] In a society that has become as litigious as ours, this was inevitable. If you read the link above you will find out that a woman has been charged with violating an order of protection for poking someone on Facebook. If found guilty, the woman could get a month …

A judge has said a lawsuit can be delivered via [URL="http://twitter.com"]Twitter[/URL]. It's an interesting case, an odd idea and a pity there are going to be so many logistical obstacles. The scenario is simple. Someone is posing as a (real) right-wing blogger - they've effectively 'borrowed' his name for a …

It's been known for a while that current and potential future [URL="http://www.daniweb.com/blogs/entry2555.html"]employers[/URL] look at people's profiles on social networking sites such as Facebook. And it's also been known that people are using social networking sites to announce the status of their relationship -- or [URL="http://www.daniweb.com/blogs/entry3874.html"]lack of one[/URL]. Now the two …

Continuing on its charm offensive, the music industry is apparently not satisfied with the $675,000 fine for sharing 30 songs imposed on Joel Tenenbaum or the $1.92 million Jammie Thomas-Rasset was hit with for illegally downloading 24 tunes. Now it is going after the lyrics pirates. The what? Well, exactly. …

I'm not a great fan of the phrase 'total coincidence' and nor am I a fan of The Rt Hon Lord Mandelson, First Secretary of State, Secretary of State for Business, Innovation & Skills and Lord President of the Council to be formal. While I'm on the small matter of …

Do cats have a taste for porn? Somehow I doubt it, and I doubt that a jury will fall for it either no matter how much one alleged downloader of the most disgusting of pornographic images tries to insist that's what actually happened in his case. When found in possession …

Now if you had invested in an Apple iPod Touch and it, well, exploded after you dropped it you probably would not be too happy about. You probably would contact Apple and explain what had happened, and you might be happy to accept a refund. But what if that refund …

Skype might stop next year. The service's owner, eBay, has said that it is in dispute with the VoIP system's founders (see a report [URL="http://www.revolutionmagazine.com/news/rss/924222/Skypes-future-shaky-warns-eBay/"]here[/URL] but it doesn't say much more than I'm going to repeat here) and that if the new owners can't get the underlying technology from the …

Gary McKinnon is either a UFO-obsessed nerd who happens to suffer from a form of autism, or a fugitive from justice who was responsible for the biggest military hack of all time. The description varies depending upon whether you are a balanced individual with no axe to grind or the …

A company has been awarded a patent for providing episodic media downloads, which essentially gives it a patent on all forms of podcasting. The company, VoloMedia, calls itself the "leading provider of advertising and reporting solutions for portable media, extending the reach of video and audio from the PC to …

Seems like a silly question, right? But $80,000 per track is exactly how much Jammie Thomas-Rasset, a single mother from Minneapolis, has been charged. Well, I say charged but actually she was fined this amount for each of 24 songs downloaded via a file-sharing site at the end of a …

Strange but true, usually the best of enemies it would seem that [URL="http://www.daniweb.com/blogs/entry4331.html"]Microsoft[/URL] and the [URL="http://www.daniweb.com/blogs/entry4219.html"]Linux Foundation[/URL] are in full agreement over something for a change. What is more, they are working together in order to find a solution as well. According to Horacio Gutierrez, the Microsoft Corporate Vice President …

Looks like Google could be in deep water, along with the Open Handset Alliance and some 40 or so companies, over an apparent trademark infringement. Now you might think that there had been some pretty heavyweight due diligence before Google and the OHA determined to call the open source mobile …

The embattled WiMAX communications standard is taking another hit as WiMAX vendor Clearwire Communications is the recipient of a class-action lawsuit by users contending that its service is [URL="http://clearwiresucks.com/blog/"]slow and unreliable.[/URL] While the lawsuit is not about Clearwire's WiMAX service specifically, [URL="http://newsroom.clearwire.com/phoenix.zhtml?c=214419&p=irol-overview"]Clearwire[/URL] is the main company providing WiMAX services in …

Taser International, which makes electric stun guns, is [URL="http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601103&sid=aR6xHcnBMn9M&refer=us"]suing[/URL] Linden Research Inc., the owner of the [URL="http://secondlife.com/"]Second Life[/URL] virtual environment, for selling unauthorized virtual versions of its product. The trademark infringement case claims that the online sales of virtual products are damaging the company’s reputation and hurting its sales. Second …

It might seem like something of an odd question, unless your idea of a good night in is a box of popcorn and a copy of some dodgy DVD featuring a Captain Jack lookalike doing unmentionable things to his crew. Yet the answer is that these two things, the illegal …

Imagine my surprise when I learned this morning that an [URL="http://news.cnet.com/8301-13924_3-10216733-64.html?part=rss&subj=news&tag=2547-1_3-0-5"]IBM researcher believes[/URL] that Moore's Law-- that the number of transistors on a micro processor would double nearly every two years-- could be nearing the end of its run. Amazingly Moore made this prediction in 1965 and his law has …

The non-technical world is starting to understand the concept of Twitter -- which means that they're starting to try to control it. Courtrooms have [URL="http://www.daniweb.com/blogs/entry4148.html"]already begun dealing[/URL] with jurors Googling, Facebooking, and Twittering their way through the case. Now, some courtrooms are starting to set regulations ahead of time. The …