Highlights

Manufacturer Price Fixing and Its Discontents: Online Stores Get Creative

September 3rd 2008

A recent Supreme Court ruling has emboldened manufacturers of goods ranging from baby food to clothing to set minimum pricing requirements of their distributors. The case has inspired protest from most states’ attorneys general, as well as economists who identify such agreements as a cause of inflation. The Wall Street Journal‘s political blog reports: Attorneys […]

Google’s Chrome Browser and IE8 Take On User Privacy

September 2nd 2008

Yesterday, Google introduced its browser, Chrome. Yes, Firefox may have seemed to already be Google’s. But Google has designed its own new browser, which will be distributed as Open Source software. “What we really needed was not just a browser, but also a modern platform for web pages and applications, and that’s what we set […]

Aaron Sorkin to Write Facebook Movie

September 2nd 2008

Last week, a seemingly fake Facebook group called Aaron Sorkin & the Facebook Movie popped up. Though there was initial skepticism, New York Magazine confirmed that really was him, and yes, he’s writing a movie about Facebook. Reuters and The Christian Science Monitor have covered it. He’s asked visitors to share their experiences and story […]

More Propaganda: MPAA’s Respecting Copyright “Merit Patch” for Scouts

September 1st 2008

LA’s Boy Scout Council has teamed with the MPAA to offer Scouts a patch for learning just how much it costs to make a film and how many people get hurt if you download it without paying. Really, take a look. Notice that the concepts of fair use and public domain are completely absent from […]

Comic Books Carry Copyright Propaganda for Kids

August 29th 2008

Two Years in Jail for File Sharing The National Center for State Courts has distributed 50,000 comic books and teachers’ guides to explain how courts work to America’s youth. As the Threat Level blog notes, the plot “reads like the Recording Industry Association of America’s public relations playbook: Download some songs, go to jail and […]

Lacking Innovation, Microsoft Patents the Obvious and Spends $300M to Rebrand

August 28th 2008

The USPTO has granted Microsoft a patent for a “method and system for navigating paginated content in page-based increments.” That would be the page up function. Specifically, it’s for a function that moves your view exactly one page, rather than one screen. Of late, Microsoft has been more prolific in producing press releases and security […]