More than a year ago, the music blog Dajaz1.com was shut down for supposedly abetting online piracy. The feds gave no warning, no due process, no trial, and kept all supposed court orders under seal. But that's not the even the most fucked up part.
Facebook might call it a settlement, but there's no question that the gigantic social network is effectively surrendering to scrappy Austin, Texas mockery hub Lamebook. The two sides have ended a federal lawsuit with Lamebook keeping its name and Facebook-like logo, and Facebook slinking back to California.
To convince a German court that Samsung's Galaxy Tab is an iPad knockoff, Apple altered a picture to make the Galaxy Tab look more like an iPad knockoff. But it's not like Apple has a long record of photo tampering!
A scrappy Chinese-speaking teenager sold $130,000 in parts for the white iPhone 4. Now he's being slapped with legal threats. Won't anyone defend Fei Lam's right to exploit fashion-obsessed gadgeteers?
It happened in Britain, and now it looks like the porn privacy invasion might reach American shores: U.S. companies are tracking porn downloads from networks like BitTorrent, and experts say they are easy prey for hackers.
Eben Freeman has had it with the injustice done to bartenders. "Someone needs to get sued," the "molecular mixologist" tells The Atlantic. Cocktails used to be intoxicating fun, but now they could land you in legal trouble.
If you're planning on setting up any kind of online community for your business — and who isn't these days? — know that Facebook has begun suing to protect "the distinctive BOOK portion" of its trademark, starting with Teachbook.com.
A landmark U.S. Copyright Office decision says it's now OK to "jailbreak" your iPhone and install unauthorized software, which Apple claimed was illegal. Also, you can now crack DVDs and e-books. It's the summer of data liberation; go nuts! [Pic]
Google's YouTube just annihilated Viacom in federal court, winning a summary judgement dismissing Viacom's $1 billion copyright infringement claim. The old media company will appeal the district ruling, of course, but for now humanity's precious freak-baby videos are safe.
YouTube's big court fight with Viacom is unearthing some fun stories, like this one: Viacom secretly doctored its content to look stolen, uploaded it to YouTube, and then promptly reported itself for copyright abuse, having forgotten about its own ruse.
If Apple wins its patent-infringement case against the Google Nexus One smartphone, it might be able to get all existing handsets bricked or crippled. It's not a far-fetched idea, a Harvard Law professor told the New York Times Bits blog.
The Jesus Tablet Blog recently uncovered documents deep within the US Patent Offices suggesting that the iPad was the Apple Tablet's name based on their battles against Fujitsu for it. Now they're moving ahead with a U.S. trademark battle.
Deep in the bowels of the Trademark Office is some fresh evidence that Steve Jobs intends to name his messiah machine the "iPad": the company is in a fight with Fujitsu over the trademark.
If Gilberto Sanchez is the new face of movie piracy, the studios should be worried. He's a 47-year-old motivational speaker from the Bronx who was trying to entertain his three grandkids on the cheap. Now he faces prison time.
It would seem Google failed to effectively use its flagship service before rolling out its much-ballyhooed new programming language "Go:" Another language already had that name, and a significant profile on Google's own servers.
Rupert Murdoch has revealed his secret plan for News Corp. to make money on the internet: Make News Corp. invisible, on the internet. Murdoch will leave The Google, rewrite copyright law, and teach you kids to stay off his lawn!
Just as we suspected he would, Matt Drudge demanded Apple kill iDrudge, the iPhone app created by a fan to read his website. But the right-wing protoblogger then reversed himself in a stunning flip fliop. Siren time!
Huzzah: A president at newswire operator Thomson Reuters says traditional journalism is not actually being strangled by Google, blogs and the rest of the internet. And that anyone who thinks so — *cough* AP *cough* — should get a grip.
Thomas Jefferson's compositions are in the public domain, but Boing Boing discovered the AP's licensing system demands $12 to quote 26 of the American statesman's words. To think the wire service only began tinkering with ridiculous fees last year. Innovative!
