Justice Department Censors Supreme Court Quote

via The Memory Hole: "It's hard to imagine a more public, open document than a decision written by the Supreme Court. It is incontestably public property: widely reprinted online and on paper; poured over by generations of judges, attorneys, prosecutors, and law students; quoted for centuries to come in court cases and political essays.
Yet the Justice Department had the incomprehensible arrogance and gall to strip this quotation from a court document, as if it represented a grave threat to the republic. Luckily, the court slapped down this redaction and several others. If it hadn't, we would've been left with the impression that this was a legitimate redaction, that whatever was underneath the thick black ink was something so incredibly sensitive and damaging that it must be kept from our eyes."

Dirty Tricks, Patrician Style

via CBS News: "Any student of Bush family campaigns could have seen the swift boat shiv shining a mile away. This old family has traditions -- horseshoes, fishing, bad syntax and having the help do the dirty work in campaigns as well as the kitchen. And they are very good at getting jobs done without leaving fingerprints, without compromising their patrician image and their alleged character. "

The NYT Must Stop Writing About "Culture." Now.

via The Primary Vivid Webloga>: "Holy Shit, You Mean I Can Randomize The Playback Order Of My Music?"

Copyright Bill Needs Big Changes

via Wired News: "In response to a request from a Senate committee, consumer electronics companies and public-interest groups on Tuesday submitted changes to a controversial copyright bill that would hold technology companies liable for encouraging people to infringe copyright."

Advice to Linux: Dump the GPL

via NewsForge: "BusinessWeek columnist Stephen Wildstrom recently wrote a piece called A Big Fly in the Open-Source Soup that concluded, "The future of commercial open source might be considerably brighter if Linux and other programs went to a more commerce-friendly license with fewer complexities and ambiguities than the GPL." At the risk of offending a great many NewsForge readers, I am going to say that I don't disagree with him. "

MOre on MGM v. Grokster

via Deep Links: "Here's why you should applaud today's decision: It brings us closer to monetizing peered sharing and putting real money in the pockets of artists, labels, publishers, and other rights holders. "

Language may shape human thought

via New Scientist: "Language may shape human thought -- suggests a counting study in a Brazilian tribe whose language does not define numbers above two."

Tiffany and eBay Clash Over Sales of Fake Goods

via law.com: "Tiffany and eBay are in court over a major question for Internet commerce%3A At what point does the online auction house bear responsibility for fake goods sold on its site%3F "

EFF wins Grokster case

via Boing Boing: "EFF has won its Grokster case in the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals -- this is the case that establishes that if you make truly decentralized P2P software -- like Gnutella -- you can't be held liable for any copyright infringement that takes place on their networks. This is the "Betamax principle" from the famous Supreme Court case that established that Sony wasn't responsoble for any infringement that its customers undertook with their VCRs. "

60 Cheap Places to Live

via Forbes.com: "This special report was adapted from Life 2.0, How People Across America Are Transforming Their Lives by Finding the Where of Their Happiness, a new book by Rich Karlgaard, the Forbes publisher and Digital Rules columnist.
In these 60 small towns, medium-sized cities and larger metro regions, you can live well and your dollar will go far. Of course, the "live well" half our claim is shot through with subjectivity."

Publishing industry tackles digital rights

via CNET News.com: "Publishing industry experts at the Seybold 2004 trade show here considered a variety of digital rights management (DRM) challenges during panel discussions on Wednesday, beginning with the proliferation of schemes for securing digital wares. "

Five Indispensable Tips for Law Students and New Lawyers

via Notes from the Legal Underground: "I thought I'd give my five tips to law students and new lawyers."

Going open source: A manager's guide to doing it right

via NewsForge: "The choice to release software to open source is based on one of two very general reasons%3A either to gain a marketing benefit%2C or to gain a software development benefit. The marketing benefit derives from the fact that open source software is freely available %28%22free%22 as in beer%29. The development benefit derives from the fact that the source is freely modifiable and redistributable %28%22free%22 as in speech%29. Some open source releases involve a gray area%2C where both marketing effects and development effects come into play. "

IBM strikes at SCO claims

via CNET News.com: "IBM has taken another swing at the SCO Group%27s faltering attack on Linux%2C filing a motion seeking dismissal of SCO%27s contract claims. %0D%0AThe motion for partial summary judgment%2C filed Friday in U.S. District Court in Salt Lake City%2C centers on SCO%27s claims that IBM violated a contract that permitted Big Blue to use Unix operating system code controlled by SCO. SCO contends that IBM overstepped its bounds by freely distributing Linux software that reuses parts of the Unix code. "

Turning Slackers Into Workaholics

via Wired News: "Procrastinating monkeys were turned into workaholics using a gene treatment to block a key brain compound, U.S. researchers reported on Wednesday.
Blocking cells from receiving dopamine made the monkeys work harder at a task -- and they were better at it, too, the U.S. government researchers found. "

Cancer Stem Cells Hint at Cure

via Wired News: "The promise of this line of research can only be realized, Weissman said, by studying adult stem cells as well as embryonic stem cells, which are controversial because an early embryo is destroyed when researchers remove stem cells from it. "

Lawyers Weigh In on Linux Patent Threat

via eWeek.com: "How serious are Linux patent concerns? We asked several intellectual property lawyers for their thoughts on Linux and the risk associated with it from patent lawsuits."

Congressional economists tackle copyright issues

via CNET News.com: "The Congressional Budget Office released a new study on digital copyright issues Tuesday, outlining economic problems that Congress should keep in mind as it grapples with making new laws. "

David Brooks's Rhetorical Tricks

via The New Republic Online: "WHAT IS DAVID BROOKS TALKING ABOUT?: One of David Brooks's standard tricks--those rhetorical techniques he uses to come across as a lovable moderate--is to indict Republicans and Democrats alike for some political heresy. By bashing both parties, Brooks appears to be above partisanship even while he does the work of the dutiful conservative. "

Bold Beattie ready to take his chance

via Scotsman.com: "The Celtic forward emerged with most credit from his club's North American tour, scoring four times in a series that nourished his club with funds if not always confidence, with three defeats suffered in four matches. Beattie, though, appeared to be energised by the punishing schedule against Premiership outfits crammed with stellar names. "

Reasons to be cheerful despite budgets

via TTelegraph online: "There is a powerful case for arguing that Scottish football is in its worst state in living memory, with the gulf between the Old Firm and the rest showing no signs of being reduced in the foreseeable future, while the Glasgow pair are hamstrung by limited domestic revenues in their attempts to make headway in Europe."

Fans prepare for the opening day ritual of myopic optimism

via Telegraph online: "Across the country, as the new season lurches into first gear, the scene will be the same. Refreshed by three months' abstinence, the supporters of our lower division teams will again be preparing for a nine-month odyssey full of hope.

From Darlington to Torquay, diehard fans in box-fresh replica nylon will unleash their season tickets in the fond expectation that this time it will be different. From Swansea to Colchester, those who put their faith in the vicissitudes of the second rate will be full of enthusiasm for what lies ahead."

For Shame

via The American Conservative: "Anyone who does not feel revulsion against this administration for what it is doing and has done in Iraq and elsewhere has something seriously wrong with his political digestive system."

Straight & Crooked Thinking

From a book by Robert H. Thouless: Thirty-eight dishonest tricks which are commonly used in argument, with the methods of overcoming them.

State AGs warn file-sharing companies

via CNET News.com: A group of 46 state attorneys general sent a deeply critical letter to file-sharing companies Thursday, asking them to take stronger action on privacy and intellectual-property violations.

Californa Supreme Court Upholds Regional Appellation Statute

via law.com: "State Business & Professions Code �25241 requires that wine sold for interstate or foreign commerce can use the word 'Napa' or the valley's viticultural regions, such as Rutherford, only if at least 75 percent of the grapes were grown in those areas.
Bronco, based in Ceres just south of Modesto, argued that state law was pre-empted by federal regulations that permit using the name as long as there is an appellation, such as 'Lodi' or 'Stanislaus County,' that identifies the real origin of the grapes used in the wine. "

Ex Parte Seizure Orders in Trademark Conterfeiting Cases

Plaintiff Bears Heavy Burden to Win Ex Parte Seizure Order in Trademark Violation Case: "Trademark owners battling the trafficking of counterfeit goods won a significant victory in 1991 when the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that luxury leather goods maker Louis Vuitton should have been awarded an ex parte seizure order in its case against a group of street vendors. "

Patent problems pester penguin

via CNET News.com: "The patent system is in crisis--something the former Patent and Trademark Office director himself acknowledged just last year.
The system is supposed to encourage technological innovation. Instead, it rewards those who have the knowledge and resources to work it to their advantage. Although many are beginning to recognize the problem, not enough is being done to fix the broken system--to the detriment of software users. "

Licensing Seminar at Stanford University

via fsf.org: The Free Software Foundation (FSF) is offering two day-long seminars on Free Software licensing and the GNU General Public License in partnership with Stanford Law School on August 24 and 25, 2004.

McKinsey Report: Exploding The Myths Of Offshoring

via Forbes.com: "By raising productivity, offshoring enables companies to invest more in the next-generation technologies and business ideas that create new jobs. And with the world's most flexible and innovative economy, the United States is uniquely positioned to benefit from the trend. After all, despite a large overall trade deficit, the country has consistently run a surplus in its international trade in services. "

SCO's 'Smoking Gun' Versus IBM?

via Forbes.com: "In private interviews during their annual user conference in Las Vegas this week, SCO executives said they have discovered that IBM lacks proper licenses for its Unix-based AIX operating system, heart of a multibillion-dollar business for IBM.

SCO alleges that since 2001, AIX has contained code for which IBM does not have a license. Moreover SCO claims to have found internal IBM e-mails in which IBMers acknowledge this shortcoming. "

Open Source Against Software Patents

via AlwaysOn.com: "Software patents stifle the innovation that the open source movement has helped foster by taking power away from the individual inventor and putting it into the hands of a few large or specialized companies that have the most patents and the most lawyers. "

The Geico Keyword Case Against Google

Public Citizen Files Amicus Brief.

Trade deal exports DMCA down under

via CNET News.com: "Australia will be required to adopt U.S. intellectual-property rules, including laws covering the 'circumvention' of copy protection, and software patents that have alarmed advocates of open-source software, according to a trade agreement that President Bush signed on Tuesday. "

At LinuxWorld: Solaris shift, copyright rift

via CNET News.com: "At the LinuxWorld show in San Francisco, everyone wants a piece of the open-source action. Sun, for instance, is linking its Solaris software with Linux, while HP loads Linux onto a laptop. "

SCO: No plans for new lawsuits

via CNET News.com: "'Our strategy right now is to focus all of our legal resources on the current litigation with IBM, Novell and AutoZone,' Stowell said in an e-mail. 'The outcome of these cases will set a precedent for how we will proceed with any future litigation.'"

Federal court broadens DMCA safe harbors

via CNET News.com: In a 56-page order handed down June 22, U.S. District Court Judge Lourdes Baird muddied the already troubled waters of determining what Internet businesses qualify for the "safe harbor" provisions of the 1998 Digital Millennium Copyright Act.

Best of the Web

Forbes.com Best of the Web

Linux Scare Tactics

via Forbes.com: "It used to be that enemies of Linux were the ones spreading 'fear, uncertainty and doubt' about the free operating system. Now the F.U.D. comes from Linux zealots themselves, who believe they have found a way to make money on it. "

Summer Reading for Smart Leaders

via Fast Company: "Skip the business books when you head for the beach, and try novels that teach leadership, purpose, and ambition."

John Kerry's real tech agenda

via CNET News.com: A careful review of Kerry's history in the Senate shows that his record on technology is mixed.

LinuxWorld's San Francisco shindig

via CNET News.com. As the LinuxWorld show kicks off in San Francisco, everyone wants a piece of the open-source action.