Monthly Archives: May 2014

Google Glass targeted as symbol by anti-tech crowd

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“The $1,500 device, which displays Web content on a tiny screen, signals its wearer as a likely member of an affluent tech elite. And Glass also can discreetly shoot photos or video, which some people view as invasive.  That’s caused unease for some folks and, in some cases has led to arguments, altercations and even attacks against people wearing the technology.  It’s relatively new for Glass to be targeted, either over privacy concerns or as a presumed symbol of the tech industry as a whole.  In late February, a woman says she was attacked at a bar on San Francisco’s famous Haight Street after fellow patrons began heckling her and trying to rip Glass off of her face.”

http://www.cnn.com/2014/04/14/tech/mobile/google-glass-attack/

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Union’s Pay Negotiations Play Big Role In Protests Over ‘Google Buses’

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“As it turns out, many of the fights are actually being stoked by the politically powerful Service Employees International Union, which represents thousands of San Francisco city workers. Coincidentally they are also in the midst of negotiations with the city for a new proposed contract.  What is the union’s pitch? ‘We want a program that makes the city a place not just for the wealthy can thrive, but where low, moderate, middle income people can also thrive,’ said Larry Bradshaw of the SEIU. That contract would include a 15 percent pay raise over the next three years. The city would pay 85 to 100 percent of medical coverage, and a $21 an hour minimum wage for full and part time city workers.”

http://sanfrancisco.cbslocal.com/2014/04/16/union-plays-big-role-in-san-francisco-protests-over-google-buses-tech-tax-breaks/

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Protesters target Apple for offshore tax shelters

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“SEIU USWW, the union that organized the march, represents security guards and janitors at many companies, not just tech, in San Francisco and the East Bay.  But Tuesday’s event appealed to tech companies’ moral goals, which have become more relevant as other activists call for the rapidly growing companies to give back to the cities they affect, ranging from other union demonstrations outside of Twitter to activist-led marches on Google employees’ houses.  ‘We’re trying to have a little fun on Tax Day and show how Apple’s unpaid tax revenues could help Bay Area infrastructure,’ said Alfredo Fletes, the union spokesman.”

http://blog.sfgate.com/techchron/2014/04/15/protesters-target-apple-for-offshore-tax-shelters/

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Chilling Effect: Oracle Wins Appeal Against Google to Copyright Java APIs

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“The federal appeals court that handles U.S. intellectual property cases ruled that APIs can be copyrighted, a finding that may have significant consequences for cloud computing, software interoperability and innovation in general.  The decision came as part of a ruling in Oracle’s favor in its appeal against Google over the use of Java APIs in Android. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit today overturned an earlier ruling in the Oracle-Google fight over whether or not software application programming interfaces, or APIs, are subject to copyright.  Judge William Alsup ruled in Google’s favor in 2012, stating that APIs were purely functional.”

http://readwrite.com/2014/05/09/google-oracle-java-copyright-appeals-court

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Court Orders YouTube To Delete Every Copy Of ‘Innocence Of Muslims’

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techdirt1

“While the video had been out for months prior to the controversy, once it started generating so much attention, Garcia tried pretty much every trick in the book to make the movie disappear. She sued both the producer and YouTube in California state court. That failed. Then she moved on to federal court, where she claimed that the movie violated her copyright, an argument that is and has always been laughable. We assumed, naturally, it would fail quickly — and it did. However, she and her lawyers kept arguing, and in a somewhat shocking — and incredibly troubling — move, the 9th Circuit appeals court has ruled in her favor, in a ruling written by Judge Alex Kozinski.”

https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20140226/12103626359/horrific-appeals-court-ruling-says-actress-has-copyright-interest-innocence-muslims-orders-youtube-to-delete-every-copy.shtml

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Google to Microsoft Face User-Request Overload in Europe

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“The European Union’s top court yesterday ruled citizens have a ‘right to be forgotten’ online, meaning people may ask search-engine owners to remove personal information and request that a court or data-protection authority step in if a company doesn’t comply. The EU decision doesn’t spell out what types of information must be removed and doesn’t provide exemptions for data that are true or from a reputable source.   The ruling opens the way for European users to flood the firms with Web takedown requests, adding costs and time to what they already do in content removal.  Google and others may now have to [charge] a fee for European users to cover the costs of staff to comb through requests.”

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-05-14/google-to-microsoft-face-user-request-overload-in-europe.html

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New European ruling game-changing for U.S. companies

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“The judgment was handed down by the Luxembourg-based Court of Justice of the European Union. The court ruled that Google, if asked to do so, must amend links to information shown to be outdated or information deemed to be irrelevant.  The case followed complaints from a man in Spain who argued that when Google’s search results revealed details published in a local newspaper about an auction of his repossessed home, that infringed on his privacy rights.  The European high court effectively said that any company that gathers or indexes information about European citizens is subject to its laws, even if the company has no physical presence in that nation.”

http://www.usatoday.com/story/money/business/2014/05/13/google-search-european-court-of-justice/9027645/

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U.S. Government Calls for Limits on Companies’ Use of Web Data

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“The White House, hoping to move the national debate over privacy beyond the National Security Agency’s surveillance activities to the practices of companies like Google and Facebook, released a long-anticipated report on Thursday that recommends developing government limits on how private companies make use of the torrent of information they gather from their customers online.  Because the effort goes so far beyond information collected by intelligence agencies, the report was viewed warily in Silicon Valley, where companies see it as the start of a government effort to regulate how they can profit from the data they collect from email and web surfing habits.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/05/02/us/white-house-report-calls-for-transparency-in-online-data-collection.html?_r=0

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Mozilla caves to pressure, will enable HTML5 DRM in Firefox

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“The organization is partnering with Adobe to make the change. Mozilla will provide the hooks and APIs in Firefox to enable Web content to manipulate DRM-protected content, and Adobe will provide a closed source Content Decryption Module (CDM) to handle the decryption needs.  In a more technical post, Mozilla CTO Andreas Gal outlines some of the ways that the Firefox developers have tried to isolate the Adobe CDM to ensure that this closed source black box cannot breach user privacy or undermine system security. HTML5’s DRM system also includes a unique identifier that content providers can use to identify devices. Mozilla has taken pains to make this as minimally invasive as possible.”

http://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2014/05/driven-by-necessity-mozilla-to-enable-html5-drm-in-firefox/

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“Russian Facebook” founder flees after refusing to turn over user data

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“Pavel Durov, the founder of Vkontakte (VK)—the largest social network in Russia—said on Tuesday that he fled the country one day after being forced out of the company, claiming that he felt threatened by Kremlin officials.  In a post on his profile page on Monday, Durov explained that he was fired from his position as CEO of VK and that the so-called ‘Russian Facebook’ is now ‘under the complete control’ of two oligarchs close to President Vladimir Putin.  ‘I am out of Russia and have no plans to go back’ Durov told TechCrunch on Tuesday. ‘Unfortunately, the country is incompatible with Internet business at the moment.'”

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2014/04/russian-facebook-founder-flees-country-after-being-forced-out-as-ceo/

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