Bonum Certa Men Certa

Links - New and Old Censorship, Anti-trust, Privacy Violations and Pollution.

Reader's Picks



  • Hardware



  • Health/Nutrition



  • Security



  • Defence/Police/Aggression



  • Environment/Energy/Wildlife





  • Finance





  • Anti-Trust

    • Pay TV piracy hits News
      The actions are documented in an archive of 14,400 emails held by former Metropolitan Police commander Ray Adams who was European chief for Operational Security between 1996 and 2002. The Financial Review is publishing thousands of the emails on its website at URL afr.com.

      The emails show that Murdoch used "piracy" as a competitive weapon, helping people to break the digital handcuffs of rival's pay TV boxes. The loss of face and revenue helped Murdoch to consolidate his media empire.



    • Microsoft all but buys Netscape with AOL patent acqusition

      This Microsoft friendly news source uses gloats over this superposed "end of the browser wars" and uses the term "intellectual property" while glorifying and validating software patents.



  • Censorship

    • The reason I'm helping Chris Hedges' lawsuit against the NDAA
      the Homeland Battlefield Bill has already a chilling effect upon my ability to investigate and document matters of national controversy that would ordinarily be subject to my professional inquiry. It has therefore prevented my readers from receiving the full spectrum of truthful reporting which, in a functioning democracy, they have a right to expect.


    • Iraq’s internet on the brink
      A year since the Arab Spring, the internet in the region is facing significant threats from governments trying to gain more control over it.


    • Media companies & ISPs outline plan to stop piracy

      Not so voluntary censorship is set to roll out on people in the US. Appealing accusations of sharing will cost people $35.



    • World Without Web
      ... we underestimate the alarming degree of contingency lurking behind ‘inevitable’ developments. ... The divergence point for this history is in 1983-1984, when the leadership of DARPA lied through its teeth to Congress about who was being allowed access to the Internet. ... what if DARPA had been caught in that lie, funding for its network research scaled back, and a serious effort made to kick randoms off the early net?


    • CISPA – The Sneaky Son Of SOPA

      A good collection of links about a nasty law against sharing.





  • Civil Rights



  • Privacy



  • Education Watch



  • DRM

    • How Adobe DRM Requires People to Pirate Library Books
      Open standards make sense. What makes no sense is that large companies in the field still do not understand this. ... It turns out that a majority of the 6,495 titles available at my local library were accessible only through a locked .acsm file format. ...you can think of a .acsm file as being very much like a .torrent file. If you use Windows or Mac, you can (theoretically) download and install Adobe Digital Editions (ADE). This software reads the .acsm file and then it will download the actual .epub book, complete with DRM. ... there is no legal way to access the content without breaking the law if you are using free (libre) software.

      Tell your local librarian to never use a system like this!





  • Intellectual Monopolies

    • Another Patent Attack on Google with More Wild $$ Predictions ~pj
      Nokia and Microsoft. Partners at law, so to speak. Is this another Microsoft/Nokia outsourced production? Remember when Barnes & Noble told us that it views Microsoft and Nokia's patent campaign as an antitrust violation, a deliberate campaign to destroy Android and maintain Microsoft's monopoly on the desktop and extend it to smartphones, with Nokia piggybacking with its patents for weapons and MOSAID being brought in to do some of the dirty work? So when you read the scare headlines, remember this: Google is awesome at patent litigation. It tends to prevail. I told you that when Oracle first sued Google


    • Oracle’s Position is Worse Than I Thought


    • USPTO Issues Interim Mayo Guidance ~pj
      "...the claimed product or process amounts to significantly more than a law of nature, a natural phenomenon, or an abstract idea with conventional steps specified at a high level of generality appended thereto." Why *wouldn't* that apply to software?


    • Mayo Decision Impacts Myriad Genetics - Judgment Vacated, Remanded ~pj
      Things are looking up in PatentLand


    • Prometheus bound: An important precedent for the next software patent case
      Plainly, this was not a dispute about software patents, but the Court’s unanimous opinion will guide it and lower courts as they analyze future software patent cases.


    • Copyrights

      • Judge rules file sharing is not a "conspiracy"
        The litigators are trying to get around the fact that judges aren't happy with allowing mass lawsuits, so what they are doing is taking one internet user to court but using that lawsuit as a pretext to subpoena other defendants who had participated in the same BitTorrent swarm. ... James Holderman of the Northern District of Illinois raised his eyebrow in disgust at this trick, saying that it was trying to get around the "stiffening judicial headwind."


      • 5000+ Artists Line Up For a Pirate Bay Promotion
        “We’re one of the worlds top 60 sites in the Internet. This brings us a responsibility to use the site to do something good. When I think about it, it’s insane that all the other top 100 sites only blast ads and self-centered stuff on their front pages. We do this for fun and for the love of culture, so we’re everything the major labels are not.”


      • 3 Major Publishers Sue Open-Education Textbook Start-Up

        See also this excllent summary

        To gain access to the digital alternatives, students select the traditional books assigned in their classes, and Boundless pulls content from an array of open-education sources to knit together a text that the company claims is as good as the designated book. The company calls this mapping of printed book to open material “alignment”—a tactic the complaint said creates a finished product that violates the publishers’ copyrights.


      • DRM is crushing indie booksellers online


      • MPAA Lines Up With Porn Studio in Steamy Copyright Dispute

        A video site that published movies as urls is surprised that people would download those movies. They also found a judge that agrees enough to shut down a website where users share the urls, sometimes as embedded movies.







  • Recent Techrights' Posts

    Sponsored by Linux Foundation
    All the pages are full of 'Linux' Foundation ads that are not about Linux
    It's Hard to Dispose or Get Rid of Swasticars Now
    'Memecars' only sell as long as people have a 'belief' in them
     
    The Fall of the Open Source Initiative (OSI): Microsoft-Sponsored OSI is Probably Not Even the Real Steward of the Open Source Definition, It's More Like an Identity Thief at This Point (Like "FSFE", a Microsoft-Sponsored Imposter of FSF)
    As we'll show later, many people (even inside OSI) are very angry at the OSI right now
    Gemini Links 12/03/2025: Cataloging Books, Ramen, and MElon
    Links for the day
    Links 12/03/2025: Anti-Union Actions and New Efforts at Truce/Ceasefire in Ukraine
    Links for the day
    CodeWeavers Ads Weaved by LLM Slop at BetaNews
    How much of this was even touched by a human being?
    Springtime Plans
    We currently have two long series underway
    In Australia, iOS Estimated to be Bigger Than or Equal to Windows
    Not even counting macOS
    Brett Wilson LLP Does Not Deny Microsoft or Another "Third Party" Secretly Funds the SLAPPs Against Techrights, Bankrolling Despicable People Who Deserve Criticism
    Writing about crime is not a crime
    Gemini Links 12/03/2025: LLM Slop Lacks a Future, Wordle Clone Comes to Gemini Protocol
    Links for the day
    Using FUD That Blames "Linux" for Typos, Turning It Into LLM Slop That Blames "Linux" for Typos
    It is probably the "leader" at LLM slop (fake 'articles') about "Linux"
    Links 12/03/2025: Big Cuts to US Education and Science (e.g. NOAA)
    Links for the day
    Over at Tux Machines...
    GNU/Linux news for the past day
    IRC Proceedings: Tuesday, March 11, 2025
    IRC logs for Tuesday, March 11, 2025
    Crossbow murders: prevention, missed opportunities
    Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
    This yt-dlp Bug Report Shows Us That the Future of YouTube is DRM and It's Time to Leave (yt-dlp Should Also Leave Microsoft GitHub, Which Censors YouTube Downloaders)
    GAFAM traps aren't "free hosting"; they herd us all into a world of tollbooths and locks, surveillance and planned obsolescence (you own nothing, you only rent)
    Ukraine Didn't Take Twitter/X Down, Microsoft or Windows Likely Did
    There are many debunkings (to likely false accusations), but won't that just be another example of Windows TCO, exacerbated externally in the form of Windows botnets?
    The Fall of the Open Source Initiative (OSI): Worse Than What the Media Has Focused on, Losing Sight of Who Owns and Runs the OSI
    Members' dues are less than 3% of the income; where does the 97+ percent come from other than Microsoft?
    Apple Seems to Have Run Out of Things to Boast About After Apple Vision Pro Failed Spectacularly
    With "Apple Intelligence", Apple has finally named a product after what target customers lack
    Slopwatch: Reckless FUD and Machine-Generated Spam from LinuxSecurity.com, cybersecuritynews.com, and gbhackers.com (Google Boosts LLM Slop About "Linux")
    Google and so-called 'Google News' continue to yield anti-Linux misinformation
    Gemini Links 11/03/2025: 'Chainsaw Politicians' and Proprietary Software Hell
    Links for the day
    Links 11/03/2025: Covid-19 5 Years On and Violence in Syria
    Links for the day
    Links 11/03/2025: NASA Besieged and "DOGE Has Become What It Claimed To Destroy"
    Links for the day
    Fresh IBM Layoffs Reported in Europe and North America, Jobs Allegedly Moved to South Asia (Low Salaries)
    As usual, IBM does not talk about this
    Illuminating Injustice is Critical When Reckless Microsofters and Law Firms Try to Silence Reporters of Violence Against Women
    I want to clarify that I'm well within my right (and not running afoul of any rules) by explaining what goes on here
    EPO Central Staff Committee: "The Strategy of the Office Lacks Transparency and Cannot be Understood"
    Microsoft and the EPO violate data protection laws
    Microsoft Has Not Much Left to Show Investors, Shares Fall Almost 20%
    It's not even clear how Microsoft makes money anymore
    Links 11/03/2025: Spring and Misfin Server
    Links for the day
    Over at Tux Machines...
    GNU/Linux news for the past day
    IRC Proceedings: Monday, March 10, 2025
    IRC logs for Monday, March 10, 2025
    Latvia (and Lithuania) Stepping Away From GAFAM, Microsoft
    Windows becomes unessential as Android and GNU/Linux rise
    Microsoft Layoffs Are Infectious (Don't Get Acquired or Become a Partner)
    It seems like companies choosing to become "buddies" with Microsoft are dooming themselves and their products
    The Fall of the Open Source Initiative (OSI): The OSI Election is Rigged, Biased Against People Who Oppose the Openwashing of GPL-Violating Bots Operated by Microsoft for Profit (OSI Gets Paid to Promote This)
    they reckon that pretence of calm would serve them best, helped by puff pieces
    A Closer Look Inside the EPO, Courtesy of Benoît Battistelli's Submissive Lapdogs Roberta Romano-Götsch and Elodie Bergot
    new report comes from the Local Staff Committee Munich (LSCMN)
    In Vietnam, statCounter Sees Microsoft Windows Falling Below 7% "Market Share"
    Can Microsoft still demand $500 or more per Windows licence?
    Links 10/03/2025: Staff Strikes, Mass Layoffs in Gaming Industry
    Links for the day
    Gemini Links 10/03/2025: "Eat The Rich" and Two-Year Anniversary of the 'Space Elevator' Orbit (Like 'Webring')
    Links for the day
    Links 10/03/2025: Small Web Praised, LLM Chatbots Exposed as Worse Than Useless Again
    Links for the day
    A Call for GNU/Linux and BSD Developers to Unite Against GAFAM and the Regime They Empower
    We have long encouraged and continue to encourage people who value Software Freedom to altogether boycott GAFAM
    The Ludicrous Mythology of Commonality as Signal of Value, Merit, Popularity
    Devalue what's true, promote marketing?
    [Video] Richard Stallman on the Four Essential Freedoms (Manuel Cuda News, 2025)
    Added to a channel several days ago by Manuel Cuda News
    Gemini Links 10/03/2025: Realisation About Young People, Punks, and Discord IPO
    Links for the day
    Over at Tux Machines...
    GNU/Linux news for the past day
    IRC Proceedings: Sunday, March 09, 2025
    IRC logs for Sunday, March 09, 2025