News of the Week; March 16, 2016

GAMES

1. Judge Allows Lindsay Lohan to Advance in ‘Grand Theft Auto’ Lawsuit: The actress says the game publisher used her image in violation of New York civil rights laws.
2. Conspiracy Theories Over Steam Game Suddenly Crashing Wrong; Just More Broken Anti-Piracy Code
3. French politics places hard regulations over the esports industry
4. Kim Kardashian banks $80 million from Glu Mobile’s game
5. 16 years later, Blizzard is still patchingDiablo II: New update helps the game run on modern operating systems
6. Fake ‘Minecraft’ app puts spotlight on coding marketplaces that are “fuelling pirate community on app stores”
7. How free-to-play has evolved game marketing
8. Supercell books record sales of over €2bn for 2015
9. Riot Games acquires Radiant Entertainment
10. Nexon to acquire Big Huge Games
11. Paradox-Ruffian partnership “amicably terminated”
12. Steam Early Access is hitting its stride – EEDAR
13. Microsoft needs to clearly articulate its vision for PC gaming
14. Xbox Live adds cross-network multiplayer: Microsoft allowing developers to make Xbox One games that can connect with other console networks
15. Why Microsoft is finally pushing for cross-platform online gaming: The Xbox One can’t afford to lock out competing consoles, and gamers stand to benefit.
16. Xbox indie gaming opens the door to playing against PlayStation owners: MonoGame is also welcomed to the Xbox One, finally filling the XNA hole.
17. The Division Isn’t Just Ubisoft’s Next Game, It’s The Company’s Future
18. Ubisoft calls The Division a record breaker: Doesn’t share numbers, but says its first 24 hours are unprecedented
19. Inside the new book, ‘Sex, Drugs and Cartoon Violence: My Decade as a Video Game Journalist’VR devs call for restraint on horror games and jump scares
20. My virtual living room: Setting up a social VR space in the house – Drilling, furniture-clearing, ceiling-testing, and Pictionary hacking.
21. PlayStation VR surprises with $399 price point
22. Crytek announces CryEngine 5, adopts “pay what you want” model
23. Group Explorations of User-Generated Worlds with VRChat
24. “Our brains essentially are always screwing with us”: Radial Games’ Dr. Kimberly Voll tells devs the weird ways our brains work, and how that can be used (or abused) in VR
25. You Don’t Have as Much Control in Videogames as You Think
26. Google’s AI beats world Go champion in first of five matches
27. Google AI goes 3-0, wins Go match against Lee Se-dol: The last two games will still be played, but DeepMind’s AlphaGo has officially won.
28. In the Age of Google DeepMind, Do the Young Go Prodigies of Asia Have a Future?
29. The Sadness and Beauty of Watching Google’s AI Play Go

DIGITAL

1. DeepMind founder Demis Hassabis on how AI will shape the future: Beating Go was just the start — DeepMind has designs on healthcare, robots, and your phone
2. You can Google it: Supreme Court of Canada grants leave to appeal global injunction
3. Supreme Court of Canada to hear Google Injunction Appeal
4. FTC Announces Settlement With Lord & Taylor After Accusing Retailer of Deceptive Advertising
5. Google loses appeal against Russian search engine over Android bundling: Search and ad giant has to tweak contracts with smartphone makers in the country.
6. Microsoft upgraded users to Windows 10 without their OK
7. Baltimore school cops charged with beating boy after video goes online
8. Don’t Post About Me on Social Media, Children Say
9. Customer Loses Suit Over Employees’ Disparaging Facebook Posts–Howard v. Hertz
10. Google Defeats Lawsuit Over Duplicate Content Penalty–D’Agostino v. Appliances Buy Phone
11. New Zealand Expert paper #7 TPPA: Intellectual Property and Information Technology
12. White House’s Claims that the TPP Would Curb Internet Censorship are Fantasy (EFF)
13. Man accused of jamming passengers’ cell phones on Chicago subway: Windy City commuters were complaining for months about dropped phone service.
14. Big-name sites hit by rash of malicious ads spreading crypto ransomware
15. Searching Places Unknown: Law Enforcement Jurisdiction on the Dark Web (Ahmed Ghappour)
16. Inside Instacart’s fraught and misguided quest to become the Uber of groceries
17. The creepy, inescapable advertisements that could define virtual reality
18. The Intersection of Big Data and Antitrust Law − Finally a Case in the EU 
19. Adobe issues emergency patch for actively exploited code-execution bug: Critical bug was used to take control of vulnerable computers.
20. Botched Java patch leaves millions vulnerable to 30-month-old attack: Oracle said the flaw was fixed. Newly released exploit code shows otherwise.
21. Is Twitter Making Us More Productive?
22. Why we use adblockers: ‘We need to have more control over what we’re exposed to’
23. Inside the Artificial Intelligence Revolution: A Special Report, Pt. 1: We may be on the verge of creating a new life form, one that could mark not only an evolutionary breakthrough, but a potential threat to our survival as a species
24. Inside the Artificial Intelligence Revolution: A Special Report, Pt. 2: Self-driving cars, war outsourced to robots, surgery by autonomous machines – this is only the beginning
25. The Early History Of The Streaming Media Industry and The Battle Between Microsoft & Real
26. Internet of Things Bill Introduced 
27. Anti-swatting Representative leads first-ever SXSW Online Harassment Summit
28. SPJ ‘president-elect’ headlines SXSW panel about gaming
29. The disturbingly simple way dozens of celebrities had their nude photos stolen

CREATIVITY

1. Americans scooping up key jobs on Canadian film sets thanks to new rules from Ottawa
2. There Are Many, Many Things the Chinese Communist Party Doesn’t Want Shown on TV
3. Russia’s Paranoid Patriotism Gets a Cartoon Movie
4. Harry Potter Author Offends Native American Scholars With New Story 
5. Free Speech Protection for Critical Online Review
6. ‘Happy Birthday’ settlement terms made public
7. The Mass-Market Edition of To Kill a Mockingbird Is Dead: Harper Lee’s estate will no longer allow publication of the inexpensive paperback edition that was popular with schools.
8. Music Licensing Shop Harry Fox Agency Appears To Be Scrambling To Fix Its Failure To Properly License Songs
9. Can’t Make This Up: Paramount Says Star Trek Fan Flick Violates Copyright On Klingon And ‘Uniform With Gold Stars’
10. Paramount, CBS list the ways Star Trekfanfic Axanar infringes copyright: Suit cites Warp Drive, Klingon High Council, Uniform with Gold Shirt, more.
11. The Gloves Are Off: Competing Biopics Battle For Hollywood Purse 
12. I don’t go into yours, you don’t go into mine: copyright preempts Dirty Dancing trademark claim (Rebecca Tushnet)
13. ESPN Sends Cease & Desist Letter To Barstool Sports Over “Pardon My Take” Podcast
14. Middle Earth Enterprises Attempts To Block Wine Importer From Using The Word ‘Hobbit’
15. Glee Spins Us Wrong Way Round
16. The Registrability of the Trademark Consisting of an Acronym
17. Professor Rebecca Tushnet Says the CAFC’s Reasoning in In re Tam Was Wrong 
18. The First Amendment Walks Into A Bar: Trademark Registration And Free Speech (Rebecca Tushnet)
19. Supreme Court Declines To Hear Batmobile Copyright Case
20. Supreme Court won’t tinker with ruling giving copyright to the Batmobile: The Batmobile is for Batman and Robin, unless you get a license from DC Comics.
21. Should All Research Papers Be Free?
22. Silicon Valley writer: The show’s lack of diversity is accurate
23. The price of Hollywood whitewashing: How this complex drama about a Latina woman became just another Keanu Reeves cop movie: I watched “Daughter of God,” the original film that was mangled beyond recognition into “Exposed”
24. The Saga of Kesha, Dr. Luke and a Mother’s Fight: ‘He Almost Destroyed Us’ 
25. Ai Weiwei brings white grand piano to muddy refugee field 

COMMUNICATIONS & BROADCASTING

1. ‘Skinny Basic’ Cable Will Reduce Consumer Choice? Claim Earns Rating Of ‘Some Baloney’
2. “Drop Comcast today,” Yankees network tells baseball fans: Comcast won’t pay for Yankees games, so network urges viewers to switch.
3. ISPs won’t be allowed to serve targeted ads without customers’ permission: FCC chair proposes new privacy rules for fixed and mobile broadband.
4. Broadband Industry Has A Hissy Fit As FCC Unveils Some Fairly Basic New Broadband Privacy Protections
5. Canada lags U.S. privacy rules for ISPs
6. You Didn’t Notice It, But Google Fiber Just Began the Golden Age of High Speed Internet Access: Its “dark fiber” project in Huntsville creates a model that might finally thrust US Internet access into the 21st Century (Susan Crawford)
7. Verizon to Pay Nearly $1.4M Over Use of ‘Supercookie’
8. FCC Fines Verizon Wireless US$1.35 Million for Use of Tracking Cookies Without Consent
9. 5 Things You Should Know About the FCC’s Proposed Privacy Rules: It stops Verizon’s zombie cookie in its tracks, but allows AT&T to keep charging customers extra if they want privacy.
10. There Are Many, Many Things the Chinese Communist Party Doesn’t Want Shown on TV
11. Why Russian Television Said Nothing When a Nanny Beheaded a Four-Year-Old Girl
12. The Dragonslayer: A year ago, FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler saved the internet. In this exclusive interview, he tells us what’s next.
13. The Cord Cutting The Pay TV Sector Keeps Saying Isn’t Happening — Keeps Happening
14. How Donald Trump Proves the Equal Time Rule Is a Joke

SURVEILLANCE & PRIVACY

1. China is building a big data platform for “precrime”: Using online profile and movements, government aims to catch “terrorists” in advance.
2. We Now Have Algorithms To Predict Police Misconduct: Will police departments use them?
3. France votes to penalize companies for refusing to decrypt devices, messages: But UN official warns: “Without encryption tools, lives may be endangered.”
4. Where European countries stand on privacy versus security
5. UN tells UK to “desist from setting a bad example” with Snooper’s Charter: Says Investigatory Powers Bill “runs counter” to key European court rulings on privacy.
6. Time for Change: Reform of the Federal Privacy Act
7. In Apple vs. the FBI, There Is No Technical Middle Ground
8. There are ways the FBI can crack the iPhone PIN without Apple doing it for them: Getting Apple to write new firmware is the easiest route—but probably not the only one.
9. Feds fire back on San Bernardino iPhone, noting that Apple has accommodated China
10. Apple General Counsel Blasts Justice Department For Crazy Filing
11. We Read The DOJ’s Latest Apple Filing To Highlight All Of Its Misleading Claims
12. DOJ Keeps Pointing To A ‘3 Factor Test’ In Its Cases Against Apple; Except No Such ‘Test’ Exists
13. Obama weighs in on Apple v. FBI: “You can’t take an absolutist view”
14. President Obama Is Wrong On Encryption; Claims The Realist View Is ‘Absolutist’
15. Former cyber czar says NSA could crack the San Bernadino shooter’s phone: Richard Clarke tells NPR that the FBI just wants precedent and could have data already.
16. Last Week Tonight with John Oliver: Encryption
17. John Oliver explains why iPhone encryption debate is no joking matter: Comedian dissects FBI technical and legal fallacies without lionizing Apple.
18. John Oliver Explains Why You Should Side With Apple Over The FBI Better Than Most Journalists
19. Florida sheriff pledges to arrest CEO Tim Cook if Apple resists crypto cooperation: If Apple wouldn’t comply with a court order, sheriff vows: “I’ll lock the rascal up.”
20. Apple fires back: “Government is adept at devising new surveillance techniques”: In final filing before hearing, Apple says gov’t hasn’t shown “necessity.”
21. Apple’s Response To DOJ: Your Filing Is Full Of Blatantly Misleading Claims And Outright Falsehoods
22. Senator Lindsey Graham Finally Talks To Tech Experts, Switches Side In FBI V. Apple Fight
23. FBI v. Apple is a security and privacy issue. What about civil rights? – Jesse Jackson: “Activities of civil rights organizations and activists” at stake.
24. White House Begins To Realize It May Have Made A Huge Mistake In Going After Apple Over iPhone Encryption
25. John McAfee tells Ars he’s fighting a lonely battle, but that he’s not lying: The dangers of government overreach are real—and he just wants you to see them.
26. Encrypted WhatsApp messages frustrate new court-ordered wiretap: DOJ and Facebook, WhatsApp’s parent company, may clash just like in iPhone case.
27. Facebook, Google and WhatsApp plan to increase encryption of user data: Spurred on by Apple’s battles against the FBI, some of tech’s biggest names are to expand encryption of user data in their services, the Guardian can reveal
28. Go ahead, make some free, end-to-end encrypted video calls on Wire: Switzerland-based startup trumpets its strong security and pro-privacy stance.
29. Google says it won’t Google jurors in upcoming Oracle API copyright trial: Oracle worried Google might research jurors’ Gmail, ad-viewing, browsing history.
30. Surveillance and Our Addiction to Exposure

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