News of the Week; December 30, 2015

GAMES

1. Imitation the Sincerest Form of Flattery? Court Dismisses Video Gamer’s Right of Publicity Claim
2. French Consumer Group Tries To Win Back Resale Rights For Digitally Distributed Games
3. Video game companies are collecting massive amounts of data about you: Haven’t read the “terms and conditions” on that video game system you got for the holidays? You may want to take a look.
4. Valve explains: DDoS-induced caching problem led to Xmas Day Steam data leaks and downtime – 34,000 people may have had their personal data seen by others.
5. The best video games of 2015, as picked by the Ars editors: From epic quests to entirely new sports, 2015 was packed with gaming gems.
6. Ars in 2015: The year in gaming conventions – A visual tour of the most memorable sights we saw during our gaming travels.
7. Using the new Apple TV to emulate classic game consoles

DIGITAL

1. Court Enforces Arbitration Clause in Amazon’s Terms of Service–Fagerstrom v. Amazon
2. YouTube Wins Another Case Over Removing And Relocating User Videos
3. European Court of Human Rights Rules Turkey’s YouTube Ban Violated Rights to Receive and Impart Information
4. Is Ottawa’s cyberbullying law also unconstitutional?
5. SCC requires tech neutrality in copyright negotiations
6. Book Publisher Has No Idea How Google Works But Pretty Sure It Could End Piracy If It Tried
7. Case Law, Canada: Warman v Fournier, Appeal dismissed, operators of website and liable for internet defamation (David Potts)
8. Greater liability for ISP’s?
9. DMCA and the Internet of Things (Bruce Schneier)
10. The Letters of the Law: 2015 in Technology Law and Policy (Michael Geist)
11. YouTube Kids, Disney promise safe online spaces for kids, but experts say buyer beware
12. Yes, emoji still have a racism problem
13. Hashtags, Trademarks and One #ProudMama
14. Diversity report card: YouTubers get the only ‘A’ grade of 2015
15. How Netflix won 2015
16. With 14.4M downloads, Game of Thrones is the most-pirated TV show of 2015: Other top pirated shows: Walking Dead, Big Bang Theory, and Arrow.
17. How The Beatles’ Streaming Marks a Turning Point for Digital Music
18. Even The Power Of The Dark Side Can’t Save Disney & ESPN From Cord Cutting
19. Musicians file $150M lawsuit against Spotify for copyright violations
20. Spotify sued for $150 million over allegations of cheating artists
21. Here are the tech gadgets we hope you didn’t get for Christmas
22. How the Soviet Union Sent Its First Man to the Internet in 1982
23. The DMCA Has Delivered Us Into The Hands Of The Proprietary Internet Of Disconnected Things
24. Microsoft patents a slider, earning EFF’s “Stupid Patent of the Month” award

CREATIVITY

1. Syrian Filmmaker Naji Jerf Killed in Turkey After Exposing ISIS Crimes in Aleppo
2. Syria, France most deadly countries for the press
3. Federal Circuit Decision Helps Defenders of “Redskins” Trademark
4. Canada Too Has An Issue With Abitrary Applications Of Morality In Trademark Applications
5. 50 Cent Files Stupid, Hypocritical Lawsuit Over Another Rapper’s ‘Theft’ Of His Song In A Mixtape
6. CBS Sues Over Star Trek Fan Film Because It Sounds Like It’s Going To Be Pretty Good
7. CBS, Paramount sue crowdfunded Star Trekfilmmakers for copyright infringement
8. Woman That Rapper 2 Chainz Called a “THOT” In Viral Video Loses Lawsuit–Chisholm v. Epps
9. Peyton Manning May Want to Consider an Audible
10. Activist-Journalist Reflects on Meeting the Iranian Ambassador at a New York Holiday Party
11. UK: “No rights, no cry!” – Court of Appeal rules on copyright in certain Bob Marley songs
12. 1996 Internet IPO’s
13. TPP’s Forgotten Danger: Stronger Trade Secrets Protection, With Criminal Penalties For Infringement
14. 2015 – The Copyright Year

COMMUNICATIONS

1. Telus will pay over $7-million in customer rebates for misleading ads
2. No blurred lines: FTC delivers clear native advertising guidance
3. Comcast, Which Wanted To Become Even Bigger, Leads The ISP Pack In Consumer Complaints To The FCC
4. Comcast Cap Blunder Highlights How Nobody Is Ensuring Broadband Meters Are Accurate
5. After A Decade Of Waiting For Verizon, Town Builds Itself Gigabit Fiber For $75 Per Month
6. The Cable Industry’s Response To A Banner Year For Cord Cutting? Massive Across The Board Price Increases For 2016 

SURVEILLANCE & PRIVACY

1. FTC Settles with Oracle over Charges of Software Security Misrepresentations
2. How does the Cybersecurity Act of 2015 change the Internet surveillance laws?
3. Exclusive: Feds Regularly Monitored Black Lives Matter Since Ferguson
4. China’s new anti-terror law: No backdoors, but decryption on demand
5. UK Home Secretary Wants Everyone’s Metadata; But If You Ask For Hers, Gov’t Says You’re Being Vexatious
6. One Of Congress’s Biggest Defenders Of NSA Surveillance Suddenly Aghast That NSA May Have Spied On Him
7. Russian “Right to be Forgotten” Law: Update
8. FTC Imposes Record $100 Million Civil Penalty For Violating Data Protection Consent Order
9. Google slams AVG for exposing Chrome user data with “security” plugin
10. Another Scandal Resulting from E-mails Gone Public
11. Proposed Cybersecurity Disclosure Act Shows Deep Misunderstanding of the Role of the Board of Directors
12. YouTube star Zoella at war with her fans over Twitter plea for privacy – after spotting die-hard followers peering through windows of her £1million mansion
13. If We’re Not Careful, Self-Driving Cars Will Be The Cornerstone Of The DRM’d, Surveillance Dystopias Of Tomorrow

jon