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Looks like everybody who’s anybody has got a set of hacking tools in Canada. Well, at least in terms of the federal government. Documents obtained by the CBC shed some light on the prevalence of phone-cracking tech within the government. And what that light shows isn’t all that flattering. Tools capable of extracting personal data […]
Automakers are increasingly obsessed with turning everything into a subscription service in a bid to boost quarterly returns. We’ve noted how BMW has embraced making heated seats and other features already in your car a subscription service, and Mercedes has been making better gas and EV engine performance something you have to pay extra for — even if […]
Earlier this year we discussed an app being removed from the Google Play store over copyright concerns and a DMCA notice that was sent in by a firm representing several Israeli television networks. The app, called “Downloader,” was created by Elias Saba, and he was very confused by the takedown. The reason for his confusion […]
I continue to be sickened and saddened that this country — considered the Land of the Free — continues to devolve (rapidly!) into a place where intolerance and bigotry are being written into law. And all it took was a four-year calamity headed up by one of the worst presidents in history, Donald Trump. His […]
About a year ago, the Filecoin Foundation for the Decentralized Web asked if I would help edit and compile a “magazine” talking about decentralization and why it’s important. It was a fun and interesting challenge, and now the final product is out, the D-Web Digest. There are a bunch of fascinating articles in there, which […]
It’s simply not enough to be part of one problem. The DEA feels the need to be part of several problems. You’d think it would have its hands full blowing billions of dollars on a lost drug war and filling people’s heads with hysterical stupidity about the magical powers of fentanyl. But, as FOIA terrorist […]
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There’s been this weird idea lately, even among people who used to recognize that copyright only empowers the largest gatekeepers, that in the AI world we have to magically flip the script on copyright and use it as a tool to get AI companies to pay for the material they train on. But, as we’ve […]
Every few weeks for the last fifteen years there’s been a massive scandal involving some company, telecom, data broker, or app maker over-collecting your detailed personal location data, failing to secure it, then selling access to that information to any nitwit with a nickel. And despite the added risks this creates in the post-Roe era, […]
This week, our first place winner on the insightful side is a simple anonymous response to the claim that Elon Musk fights censorship: Remember when Elon happily complied with the Turkish government’s request to censor anti-Erdogan content during its presidential election? In second place, it’s a double-winning comment from Thad that also takes first place […]
Five Years Ago This week in 2018, consumer groups accused the FCC of weakening oversight of cell carriers under the pretense of battling text message spam, activists were making one last push to restore net neutrality via the Congressional Review Act, and senators were continuing to point out that US broadband maps suck. The FBI […]
Law enforcement for profit is an ugly proposition. Most of us immediately think of civil asset forfeiture, which is generally just cops going shopping for stuff they want or cash to buy the stuff they want that isn’t subject to outside oversight. But there’s another undercurrent of corruption that runs through small town America — […]
Hormel, the foodstuffs company that makes Spam, amongst other items, has made it onto our pages before. And not for good reasons. Ages ago, the company attempted to sue anti-spam proprietors, arguing that its “Spam” trademark somehow translated into the world of IT and email. Separately, the company also bullied a Canadian brewery into changing […]
We’ve long known the Fifth Circuit is the worst circuit to hear your case involving rights violations by law enforcement. Despite one particularly blistering dissent from Judge Don Willett calling qualified immunity a “rigged game” litigants almost always lose, the Fifth Circuit continues to coddle cops and overreaching government officials to give them what they […]
This wasn’t hard to predict. When Montana passed its TikTok ban in April we called it “laughably unconstitutional.” Montana’s very silly Attorney General, Austin Knudsen, who claimed to have been the driving force behind the bill, had insisted that the state would be vindicated in court. As we noted when the bill passed, his public […]
Most people seem to understand the First Amendment protects their right to say stupid or offensive things, especially when they’re the ones saying them. These same people often forget the First Amendment does not protect them from counter-speech, during which they may be publicly decried as stupid or offensive. The same goes for most government […]
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Okay, okay, I think this is the last of my posts about Elon Musk’s unhinged appearance at the DealBook Summit with ill-prepared interviewer Andrew Ross Sorkin. We already covered his cursing out advertisers, while predicting that “earth will judge” them, as well as his statement that AI copyright lawsuits don’t matter because “Digital God” will […]
For decades, cable TV giants have nickel-and-dimed customers with a rotating assortment of bullshit cable TV fees, whether it’s “regulatory recovery” fee (a misleadingly named fee designed to have you blaming government for industry greed), regional sports fees (charged whether or not you watch sports), or the completely meaningless “broadcast TV fee” (which has ballooned […]
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