TURKEY BANS BLOGGER.COM DUE TO LINKS TO INFRINGING CONTENT

As the title implies, recently Turkey banned the use of this site, Blogger.com, due to alleged copyright infringement amongst those who use this site to blog. To me, this seems like censorship at it's finest and seems to be going too far. Thousands of people use this site to voice their opinion day and day out and I simply don't see their explanation as being legitimate. Who is to say that there aren't motives beyond those given as to why Turkey has shut the site down? In no way am I advocating Copyright Infringement, but at the same time I feel like the restriction of use regarding this site should be a case by case basis rather than punishing the entire population of bloggers.

YOUTUBE SNUBS MCCAIN CAMPAIGN PLEA

"YouTube has rejected a request from U.S. presidential candidate John McCain's campaign to review its fair use policy and stop removing political campaign videos that may infringe copyright so swiftly. The McCain campaign's general counsel sent a letter to executives from YouTube and parent company Google earlier this week asking for a "full legal review" of takedown notices submitted against videos posted by political candidates and campaigns." This article from BNA Law Internet News brings up a very interesting topic. It brings up the topic of the power of popular websites to influence the way people think. More specifically, it can be said (after reading this article) that popular websites have political influence. The very fact that the McCain campaign went to the length of sending a letter to Youtube acknowledges the fact that they realize this power.

BUSH SIGNS CONTROVERSIAL ANTI-PIRACY LAW

"President George W. Bush signed into law yesterday a controversial bill that would stiffen penalties for movie and music copyright infringement at the federal level. The law creates an intellectual property czar who will report directly to the president on how to better protect copyrights both domestically and internationally. The Justice Department had argued that the creation of this position would undermine its authority." This article, published by BNA deals with an already prevalent issue today. This article however provides a different dimension by recognizing the fact there is now an "intellectual property czar" that reports directly to the president. The question this brings up is whether or not this is a necessary step that the U.S. government really needs to be taking. It has been argued that this bill is unnecessary "because the recording and movie industry had the right to take accused infringers to court." Another argument against this idea points to the fact there are already many penalties for copyright violations. These opposing arguments bring to light another question: Is government overstepping their bounds?

LAWYER’S THREATS, INTIMIDATION SHUT DOWN WEB SITE

As the title implies, a Virginia lawyer was able to shut down a site using bullying tactics to reach that end. These tactics included defamation claims, as well as trademark infringement. I would like to focus on the Virgina lawyer's argument of defamation claims. My question would have to be where do you draw the line between freedom of speech and defamation of character? An interesting quote relating to this very issue is found right in the article: "The courts repeatedly have struck down these types of bullying tactics and upheld the public’s right to criticize people and companies on the Internet – something which Mr. Dozier was well aware of when he began his intimidation campaign against our client,” Levy said. “Not liking what someone says about you is not enough reason to throw out the First Amendment.” I'm yet to read anything about this case that makes it special other than the fact that the lawyer was in a power of position (due to the fact that he is a lawyer) and was able to exert that power in the form of having the site taken down.

Senate passes intellectual property bill

The senate recently passed a bill regarding the protection of intellectual property. In the article the importance of intellectual property is stressed and the content of the bill is described. "The bill also would authorize funding for federal and local law enforcement to fight intellectual property theft and expand the scope of things that could be seized in a criminal case." This quote from the article that I read brought up one large question. What kind of "things" will be able to be seized in criminal cases other than what is already being seized presently? This seems to grant enforcement agencies a lot more breathing room when investigating potential violations, which may or may not be a good thing in itself. It goes without saying that this increased power so to speak allows more room for abuse. What aspect of these investigations could possibly be abused by these agencies remains to be seen.

Hackers break into Sarah Palin's E-mail account

"It wasn't immediately clear how hackers broke into Palin's Yahoo! account, but it would have been possible to trick the service into revealing her password knowing personal details about Palin that include her birthdate and ZIP code. A hacker also might have sent a forged e-mail to her account tricking her into revealing her own password." This quote perfectly describes how foggy the idea of "privacy" really is in this country. No matter what precautions or safeguards are taken, there always seems to be ways around these very safeguards. This idea becomes that much more important when it involves a candidate in the Presidential race. What if these emails contained information that could potentially damage Mccain and Palin's campaign? And in the same sense, what if these emails were hacked out of Obama's account? Obviously the race would be tainted and in a sense history would be tainted as well as this invasion could of changed the outcome for both sides.

Another quote in this article perfectly sums up this idea of invasion of privacy within this country: "Todd Palin was the winner of the grueling Iron Dog snowmobile race, and "fek9wnr" also is Todd Palin's vehicle license tag in Alaska."

YouTube Bans Terrorism Training Videos

As the title suggests, the article that I read, which was from the BNA internet news, dealt with the problem You Tube has been having regarding "Terrorism training videos". These videos involve things such as instruction as to how to make bombs out of everyday household items. While it is understandable that You Tube doesn't want this kind of content on their site, I found it very interesting how You Tube goes about deciding which videos to take off. "YouTube has not identified specific videos on its site that led to the change, nor said exactly how it will choose those that are purged." As you can see, this explanation leaves a lot of room for Youtube to more or less pick and choose what they want on their site.
I realize that Youtube has every right to decide what they want posted on their site. The reason I find this especially interesting though is the popularity of the site itself. With thousands of hits a day, Youtube is more than capable of influencing what people think about certain issues whether it be conscience or subconscious by simply picking and choosing what videos are posted. The question that this brings up though is whether or not Youtube has the ability to arbitrarily not allow videos onto their site indirectly on the basis of issues such as race and ethnicity.