FOIA Lawsuit Featuring A DC Police Whistleblower Says PD Conspired To Screw Requesters It Didn't Like

It's no secret government agencies love to screw with FOIA requesters. This is especially true when the responding agency doesn't care for the requester's attitude or thinks the release of information might lead to future negative...

Auguste Rodin's Sculptures Are In The Public Domain; 3D Scans Of Them Should Be, Too

Auguste Rodin is without doubt one of the greatest sculptors in history. Equally without doubt, his works are now in the public domain, since he died in 1917. Unfortunately, the situation in France is a little more complicated, for reasons the...

Alabama Speed Trap Town's PD Called Out On Its Bullshit By Nearby Sheriff, Limps On Without Most Of Its Officers

No one cuts cops more slack than other cops. You really have to be an impressive kind of awful to lose the support of your Thin Blue Line brothers and sisters. But the police department in Brookside, Alabama has managed to do exactly that....

Nonprofit Forced To Delete Thousands Of Court Documents Obtained With A Fee Waiver Because PACER Is Greedy And Stupid

If you're not familiar with the Free Law Project, you should be. It's a nonprofit that does everything it can to make access to court documents free. It all starts with the RECAP extension, which automatically saves copies of documents...

Senator Klobuchar's Next Unconstitutional Speech Control Bill: The NUDGE Act

Is there a contest in the Senate to see who can propose the highest number of unconstitutional bills? You might think that the leader in any such contest would have to be a crazed populist like a Josh Hawley or a Ted Cruz, but it seems like...

Judge And Jury Say Sarah Palin Failed To Prove 'Actual Malice' In Defamation Case Against The NY Times

The last time we wrote about Sarah Palin's defamation lawsuit against the NY Times was in 2017 when Judge Jed Rakoff was dismissing the case, noting that Palin had failed to show "actual malice," by the NY Times, which is the necessary...

NASA Says 2nd Gen Starlink Satellites Will Cause Headaches For NASA, Hubble

The problem with Space X's Starlink, as we've noted a few times, is several fold. One, the initial deployment of roughly 12,000 low orbit satellites is only going to be able to service around 500,000 to 800,000 total subscribers. In a...

Content Moderation Case Study: YouTube Doubles Down On Questionable 'graphic Content' Enforcement Before Reversing Course (2020)

Summary: YouTube creators have frequently complained about the opaque and frustrating nature of the platform’s appeals process for videos that are restricted or removed for violating its Community Guidelines. Beyond simply removing...

EARN ITs Big Knowledge 1st Amendment Problem

We've talked about so many problems with the EARN IT Act, but there are more! I touched on this a bit in my post about how EARN IT is worse than FOSTA, but it came up a bit in the markup last week, and it showed that the Senators pushing for this...

Some Senators Are Freaking Out Because The White House Is Pitching Some Extremely Minor Police Reforms

Some senators are getting all angried up about proposed police reforms President Biden possibly might deliver as an executive order. Reporting earlier this month indicated Biden had something planned, but no one involved in breaking the news...

Israeli Police (Mostly) Cleared Of NSO-Related Wrongdoing While NSO Issues Legal Threats To Calcalist Over Cover-Up Claims

This won't change much for NSO Group, but at least it helps the Israeli Police rehab its image a bit. An "initial investigation" has (mostly) cleared the Israeli police of wrongdoing in one of the latest surveillance scandals tied to...

Superbowl Ads Try To Make 5G Sexy, But Consumers Still Aren't Buying The Hype

For years now, wireless carriers have struggled to make fifth generation wireless (5G) interesting to consumers. While the technology does provide faster, lower-latency connectivity, that's more of an evolution than any kind of revolution. But in...

DC Comics Goes To UK High Court Over Trademark Granted To Unilever For 'Wonder Mum'

Regular Techdirt readers will not be shocked when I say that DC Comics has a long and often ridiculous history when it comes to "protecting" its intellectual property. From trademark bullying over a barbeque joint, to trying to bully a...

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Eleventh Circuit Smacks Georgia Sheriff Around For Posting 'Don't Trick Or Treat Here' Signs In Sex Offenders' Yards

In 2018, the sheriff of Butts County, Georgia (no, really), Buford T. Justice Gary Long instructed deputies to ruin the Halloween holiday spirt by planting damning signs in the yards of released sex offenders. The sheriff cited no reason for doing...

The Intersection Of Section 230, SLAPP Threats, The Streisand Effect And Sex Discrimination In Corporate Structures

Make sure you read the update at the end This is a story that appears like it was created just to get Techdirt coverage, given how many issues we cover it touches on. Here's how it starts: Tulane law professor Ann Lipton, an expert on...

FCC To Take A Closer Look At Racial Discrimination In Broadband Deployment

The regional monopolization of U.S. broadband comes with all manner of nasty side effects. The lack of competition at the heart of the country's monopoly and duopoly problem contributed to high prices, comically bad customer service, slow speeds...

Missouri's Governor Still Insists Reporter Is A Hacker, Even As Prosecutors Decline To Press Charges

Last autumn, you may recall, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch published an article revealing that the Missouri Department of Elementary and Secondary Education (DESE) was leaking the Social Security numbers of teachers and administrators, past and...

YouTube's Content ID System Flags, Demonetizes Video Of Cat Purring

YouTube's Content ID automated copyright system sucks. There, I said it. Any review of the different posts we've done specifically on the topic of Content ID can only leave you with one impression: the system doesn't work. Not that it...

How EARN IT Could Give Abusers A Get Out Of Jail Free Card: By Making Evidence Inadmissible

In admitting that his EARN IT Act is really about attacking encryption, Senator Richard Blumenthal said he wouldn't agree to keep encryption out of the bill because he worried that it would give companies a "get-out-of-jail-free card.&quot...