Copyright

Techdirt: Piracy Killing Hollywood So Bad That Disney Made More Money In 2016 Than Any Studio Ever »

Article 13 (in the European Union’s draft Copyright Directive), fewer than 250 words, is designed to provoke such legal uncertainty that internet companies will have no option other than to block, filter and monitor our communications, if they want to have any chance of staying in business. Ultimately, only the current internet giants, shedding crocodile tears at the prospect, will be able to survive. From global internet to “Googlebook”.

When I told people I was writing my history dissertation about music piracy, the typical response was, “But… that’s not history.” But, in fact, piracy has a history as long as sound recording – even as long as written music itself. Jazzheads swapped copies of shellac discs in the 1930s, and shady operators even copied music in the wax cylinder era of the 1910s. Sheet music was bootlegged in the 19th century, just as printed materials had been since Gutenberg unleashed the printing press 400 years earlier.

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Julia Reda, Pirate MEP: Experts unanimously slam EU copyright expansion plans – but are politicians listening? »

Terrible affronts, illegal subtitles and entering "The Circle" + this day in history w/Port Arthur massacre and our song of the day by Goldfrapp on your Morning Monarchy for April 28, 2017.

A group of fansubbers who turned the tables on BREIN by taking the anti-piracy group to court have lost their legal battle. The Free Subtitles Foundation sought a legal ruling determining that fansubbers act within the law, but this week the Amsterdam District Court sided with BREIN on all counts.

Seditious puns, quiet influence and "The Forgotten Man" + this day in history w/the Boston Marathon cheater and our song of the day by Lana Del Rey on your Morning Monarchy for April 21, 2017.

German Member of the European Parliament Julia Reda has published an open-letter signed by UK MEP Lucy Anderson, raising alarm at the fact that the W3C is on the brink of finalising a DRM standard for web video, which — thanks to crazy laws protecting DRM — will leave users at risk of unreported security vulnerabilities, and also prevent third parties from adapting browsers for the needs of disabled people, archivists, and the wider public.

Carl Malamud of Public.Resource.Org. (Photo: Kirk Walter/Public Domain)
Carl Malamud is a law advocate, but not the kind who represents plaintiffs or defendants in a court of law. No, Malamud is a proponent for the free access to one’s ability to read the law. Sounds simple right? Unless you live in Georgia, that is.