In my basement at home, I have a handful of old gaming consoles that were left to our family after other family members either got too old to want them any longer or after they passed away. Coming along with them are a handful of games for those consoles. As a result of the physical […]
Kind of an odd bit of Fourth Amendment jurisprudence here, given all the factors. (h/t FourthAmendment.com) Obviously, some conversations have an expectation of privacy, even when they’re held in police interrogation rooms. Those would be ones between the suspect and their legal representation. But that’s not really a Fourth Amendment issue as it is about […]
In recent years, there have been concerns about social media and disinformation. The narrative has three dominant threads: (1) foreign troll farms pushing disinfo, (2) grifter “influencers” pushing disinfo, and (3) the poor kids these days suckered in by disinformation. A new study in Science suggests that instead of the kids or the trolls, perhaps […]
It appears Chicago’s city leaders (well… excluding the mayor, Brandon Johnson) aren’t afraid of spending nothing on do-nothing tech that even the city’s watchdog says is a waste of money. They’re not afraid to blow money on stuff that’s doing nothing to make residents safer, even as residents continue to complain about the level of […]
Microsoft Windows 11 Pro is designed with the modern professional in mind. Whether you are a developer who needs a secure platform, an artist seeking a seamless experience, or an entrepreneur needing to stay connected effortlessly, Windows 11 Pro is your solution. This version is designed for PCs that need a new license for Windows […]
In an indictment against Defend the Atlanta Forest activists in Georgia, state prosecutors are citing use of encrypted communications to fearmonger. Alleging the defendants—which include journalists and lawyers, in addition to activists—in the indictment were responsible for a number of crimes related to the Stop Cop City campaign, the state Attorney General’s prosecutors cast suspicion on the defendants’ use […]
Back in 2013, Netflix co-CEO Ted Sarandos noted that his company’s goal was to “become HBO faster than HBO can become us.” His point, at the time, was that Netflix wanted to become synonymous with quality and creative artistry in the same way HBO had after decades of hard work. 11 years later, and everything […]
This week, our first place winner on the insightful side is a simple anonymous reply to a complaint that Techdirt has become more politically biased: Perhaps it isn’t really Techdirt that has changed, have you ever considered that? In second place, it’s an anonymous comment about the UK moral panic about kids having phones: Yeah, […]
Five Years Ago This week in 2019, a report showed how EU ISPs were happily ignoring net neutrality rules. We wondered why Congress was moving forward with its plan to encourage more copyright trolling, and then Congress also started pushing a bill to bring back patent trolls. China was, once again, using the US’s obsession […]
This nonsense is somehow still going. To catch you up if you’re not familiar with this story, the Ravinia Festival Association operates the Ravinia Festival venue in the north suburbs of Chicago. When a small brewery opened its doors in Highland Park, calling itself Ravinia Brewing Company, the RFA objected to its name and convinced […]
Ctrl-Alt-Speech is a weekly podcast about the latest news in online speech, from Mike Masnick and Everything in Moderation‘s 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 response to a number of copyright lawsuits about AI training datasets, we are starting to see efforts to build ‘non-infringing’ collections of media for training AI. While I continue to believe that most AI training is covered by fair use in the US and therefore inherently ‘non-infringing’, I think these efforts to build ‘safe’ or […]
I don’t know why I’m drawn to doomed litigation but there’s no denying this impulse. I know what the plaintiff wants to achieve. That much is made clear by Justin Rodrich’s reporting on the lawsuit for the Daily Beast. But I don’t know how he (or any other pronoun! — it’s filed as “Doe”) expects […]
The real fight for free speech means more than just doing “that which matches the law.” It means being willing to stand up to extremist authoritarian bullies, even when the odds are stacked against you. Challenging regimes where a single satirical post, a meme, or a critical blog can put someone behind bars requires bravery. […]
Take your basic knowledge of cybersecurity to a whole new level with the Advanced Cyber Security bundle. This bundle offers you 6 courses on industry-standard certifications on cybersecurity so you can enjoy the wonders of modern tech without compromising your data and privacy. Courses cover CISA, CCSP, CISM, and CISSP certification prep. You’ll also get […]
This week all nine Supreme Court justices found in favor of the NRA. Not because they all like what the NRA is selling (although some of them probably do) but because the behavior of New York State, to try to silence the NRA by threatening third parties, was so constitutionally alarming. If New York could […]
We’ve noted repeatedly how the primary problem with U.S. media and journalism often isn’t the actual journalists, or even the sloppy automation being used to cut corners; it’s the terrible, trust fund brunchlords that fail upwards into positions of power. The kind of owners and managers who, through malice or sheer incompetence, turn the outlets […]
Alright, this one is going to get a bit convoluted, so stay with me here. There seems to be something going on in the foreign foodstuffs and restaurant industries lately when it comes to trademarking otherwise common phrases for niche foods in a way that pisses off other providers that operate in those same niche […]
More bad news for ShotSpotter, which recently re-branded to “SoundThinking” to distance itself from exactly this sort of negative press. Four legislators (three senators, one congressperson) are asking the DHS Inspector General to take a closer look at the tech the DHS is funding via one of its grant programs. The problem with Spotshotter is […]
Two years ago, the independent repair advocates over at iFixit launched a partnership with Samsung in the hopes of making Samsung phones and other tech easier and cheaper to repair. It didn’t work out. In an announcement issued this week, iFixit states that Samsung did very little to contribute to the partnership, and that its […]
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