When we first heard about President Obama’s “broadband” stimulus, we worried that it was nothing more than a boondoggle for incumbents rather than an actual broadband plan.
One of the most common sayings in economics is “there’s no such thing as a free lunch.”
Another weekend goes by and another old school newspaper guy writes a long screed condemning Google as a menace hellbent on destroying all that is good and right in the news business.
A few weeks back, someone pointed me to a Twitter message where one Twitter user was (jokingly) accusing another of copyright infringement for repeating a message. While the situation was amusing, you knew it was only a matter of time until the question became more serious. Mark Cuban put up a blog post this weekend asking about the copyrightability of Twitter messages. His question revolves around whether or not it’s copyright infringement for someone like ESPN to repeat what he wrote in a Twitter message, which he would have preferred they didn’t quote.
There have been a series of ridiculous articles lately claiming that, with the collapse of some newspapers recently, somehow investigative reporting and local coverage won’t work, meaning an era of corruption and the collapse of democracy. Fortunately, some are demonstrating the fallacies underlying these proclamations of doom.
It’s sometimes quite amusing to watch how various economic ecosystems grow, where multiple companies have symbiotic relationships, and then start to freak out when they think that other companies in the ecosystem are somehow earning “too much.” That, of course, is at the heart of many recent battles we’ve seen.
If you’re the sheriff, aren’t you supposed to understand at least the basics of the law? Apparently not in Cook County, Ill. Sheriff Thomas Dart is now suing Craigslist because it’s “the single largest source of prostitution in the nation.” Of course, we’ve been through some of this before.
A lawyer in Houston is suing Citibank after he got scammed in a variation on the classic Nigerian email scam. There are a few interesting tidbits here that are worth discussing. First, the details…
Just a few weeks ago, we warned that, while the thought of increasing broadband is a good idea, the details of any sort of “broadband stimulus” plan were important–especially if it just looked like giving money to the same old incumbent players who have a long, and rather disgusting, history of accepting tons of public money and then not delivering.
Another day, another case where someone tried to blame a Web site for the actions of its users. In this case, a guy used the Web site SexSearch (seriously) to find someone to have sex with (ah, the Internet…). The woman he met claimed in her profile that she was 18 years old.
It’s difficult to see how Hasbro could have handled the Scrabulous situation any worse. Scrabulous, of course, was a Scrabble-like game made for Facebook, which quickly became one of the most popular apps on that social-networking site.
Back in 2005, when Microsoft was first mulling the idea of offering security software, we noted that the company was between something of a rock and a hard place. If it decided to charge for the software, people would accuse the company of trying to get people to pay to protect themselves from the security vulnerabilities in Microsoft’s own software.
It would appear that Wal-Mart’s lawyers need to come up with excuses to keep billing Wal-Mart every year around this time. Despite the fact that Wal-Mart employees admit that sites posting “Black Friday Ads” help drive more business, Wal-Mart’s hired guns keep threatening sites for posting the ads, falsely claiming a copyright on the content (hint: you can’t copyright prices).
Another day, another ridiculous intellectual property fight. Remember Lebanon claiming ownership over hummus? This is worse. Apparently, there’s a city in Turkey named Batman. Guess what they’re now claiming? You got it.
Today the tech/business press was filled with stories about how Google has settled the lawsuits from authors and publishers over its book scanning project. Google is paying $125 million, and will be changing some of how its book search system works.
This is a section of the All Things Digital Web site featuring posts from around the Web, from other Dow Jones properties and also original pieces we solicit. The section is now explicitly labeled that it comes "from other Web sites."
We are fully aware of the controversies around how linking and aggregating is done on the Web and we, in no way, are attempting to "scrape" original content created by others. Instead, regarding third-party posts, we are trying to point readers of this site to other posts from around the Web that we admire and are trying to do so in the quickest manner possible.
The Internet is full of terrific content that is not ours and we want to help our readers find it by making editorial suggestions--Look, Mom, no algorithm!--of posts we think are worth their time.
That is why we have made even more changes to Voices to ensure we do this in the most transparent and timely way. While we don't expect that everyone will agree with our policies, we have made changes that reflect our intent in pointing to content outside our site.
So here is exactly what we do: Read more »
Because the site is wholly owned by Dow Jones, publisher of The Wall Street Journal, we aim to adhere to the journalistic standards of the best of the mainstream media. But, because it is run autonomously as a small online startup, we aim to exhibit the fresh thinking and nimbleness of the best of the new media. We want to be first, and sassy, but also well sourced and accurate. We will offer lots of opinion and analysis, but plenty of fact as well.
D is unlike any other executive conference. Since its debut in 2003, D has brought to life the energy and excitement of the digital revolution in an unscripted, upfront and unparalleled way. Read more »
Don't miss a post! Sign up for our Daily Email and get AllThingsD.com delivered each day.
Get columns, blogs and video from D and All Things Digital on your iPhone. Download now »
