2012. — #10yrsago Major studios send legal threats to Google demanding removal of links to their own Facebook pages and more https://torrentfreak.com/movie-studios-ask-google-to-censor-their-own-films-facebook-and-wikipedia-121203/ #10yrsago Computer classes should teach regular expressions to kids https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2012/dec/04/ict-teach-kids-regular-expressions Cory Doctorow (craphound.com) is a science fiction author, activist, and blogger. He has a podcast, a newsletter, a Twitter feed…

Welcome to the self-destructing space-ship future. — There were two competing visions at the dawn of the modern digital era: in one camp, you had people who saw computers as a way to empower people to push back against corporate and state control; in the other camp, there were the people who wanted to use computers to…

2007. — #15yrsago Holy crap, I love the cover of my next book! https://memex.craphound.com/2007/12/03/holy-crap-i-love-the-cover-of-my-next-book/ #15yrsago Canadian Industry Minister refuses to defend Canadian DMCA in public https://web.archive.org/web/20071205061815/https://www.cbc.ca/searchengine/blog/2007/12/jim_prentice_says_no.html Cory Doctorow (craphound.com) is a science fiction author, activist, and blogger. He has a podcast, a newsletter, a Twitter feed, a Mastodon feed, and a Tumblr…

Seize the means of computation! — The original sin of both tech boosterism and tech criticism is to focus unduly on what a given technology does, without regard to who it does it to and who it does it for. When it comes to technology’s effect on our daily lives, the social arrangements matter much more…

2007, 2017, 2021. — #15yrsago Britain’s Data Chernobyl: more lost CDs full of thousands of personal records https://web.archive.org/web/20080207210610/http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml;jsessionid=NR12Q0CT3XVTLQFIQMGSFFOAVCBQWIV0?xml=/news/2007/12/02/nbenefit102.xml #5yrsago Tim O’Reilly’s WTF? A book that tells us how to keep the technology baby and throw out the Big Tech bathwater https://memex.craphound.com/2017/12/02/tim-oreillys-wtf-a-book-that-tells-us-how-to-keep-the-technology-baby-and-throw-out-the-big-tech-bathwater/…

A year in books. — Every year around this time, I round up all the books I reviewed in the previous 12 months; both as a convenience for readers and to remind myself that I don’t need to feel quite so horribly guilty about all the books I didn’t review (to those authors: rest assured…

2007, 2012, 2017, 2021. — #15yrsago US government tells UK that the US can legally kidnap Britons https://harpers.org/2007/12/kidnapping-not-a-crime-claims-bush-justice-department/ #10yrsago Dairy farmer protests hose down EU and cops with milk https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/picturegalleries/worldnews/9706213/Dairy-farmers-spray-milk-at-the-European-Parliament-in-Brussels.html #5yrsago The DoJ is going to make Shkreli sell off his unreleased Wu-Tang and Lil Wayne albums, his Picasso and his Enigma machine https://www.theverge.com/2017/12/1/16724402/shkreli-album-forfeiture-wu-tang…

An arms dealer makes millions on junk fees from National Parks visitors. — Ticketmaster’s spectacular failure to competently sell tickets to Taylor Swift’s first concert tour in five years has revived scrutiny of the ticketing/venue/promotion/management monopoly created by Ticketmaster’s merger with Live Nation, especially the “junk fees” the company sucks out of fans’ pockets: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YfPiqgLPro8

2007, 2012, 2017. — #15yrsago Magazine subscription cards are a pack of lies https://longtail.typepad.com/the_long_tail/2007/11/when-is-my-indu.html #10yrsago Danish entrepreneur helps people with autism get jobs that require focus, attention to detail https://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/02/magazine/the-autism-advantage.html #10yrsago TechDirt schools a copyfraudster who tried to censor a critical post with copyright threats https://www.techdirt.com/2012/11/29/open-letter-to-human-synergistics-international-response-to-your-accusation-that-techdirt-is-infringing/…