Stanford Online Deliberation Presentation

My notes from my talk entitled “Media Regulation and Deliberative Democracy.” I’m still trying to figure out exactly what “deliberative democracy” is, but the presentation notes recap some of my thinking about the matching problem of marketing.

Travel Plans and Presentations

I’ll be on the West Coast for the next three weeks. During that time, I’ll be making three presentations: Conference: Second Conference on Online Deliberation: Design, Research, and Practice / DIAC 2005 at Stanford University Topic: Media Regulation and Deliberative…

New Gripe Site Case–Faegre & Benson v. Purdy

Faegre & Benson v. Purdy, Civil File No. 03-6472 (D. Minn. Apr. 27, 2005). Another ruling in the long-running story of William Purdy, an anti-abortionist who uses extreme forms of gripe sites against his targets. This particular ruling was a…

New Lawsuit Over Blogging–Steinbuch v. Cutler

Steinbuch v. Cutler (D.C. D.C. complaint filed May 18, 2005). Interesting and risqué lawsuit for invasion of privacy and intentional infliction of emotional distress (warning: the complaint is not 100% office-safe). Jessica Cutler ran a blog under the name “Washingtonienne.”…

FTC Commissioner: “Somebody has got to pay”

FTC Commissioner Orson Swindle goes off about corporate data security practices. Internet News quotes him as saying “industry has, to a great extent, been irresponsible, and somebody has got to pay.” The article also quotes him as saying the lax…

Keeping Vermont Safe from Dangerous Billboards

This one made me laugh. It’s illegal to drive without a seat belt in Vermont. Billboards are also illegal in Vermont. So when the Vermont Highway Safety Program wanted to remind people to buckle up, they bought billboards in Massachusetts…

BNA on Mandatory Disclosure Laws

BNA (registration required) runs an article recapping state-level activity on mandatory security breach notification laws. Seven states (Arkansas, California, Georgia, Indiana, Montana, North Dakota, and Washington) have adopted laws, and Florida is expected to join this list soon. The laws…

Supreme Court on Interstate Shipment of Wine–Granholm v. Heald

Granholm v. Heald, 544 U.S. __ (May 16, 2005). The US Supreme Court, in a 5-4 vote, has declared that states cannot discriminate between out-of-state wineries and in-state wineries in allowing direct-to-consumer sales. Such discrimination violates the dormant commerce clause….

Racine Man Plans to Fight RIAA

The Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel reports on Dave Bink, a Racine dad who was sued by the RIAA because of KaZaA downloads made by his 13 year old daughter. He has decided to fight the lawsuit in court because (a) his daughter…

Orphan Works Comments, Round 2

After the first 716 comments on orphan works, you’d think the Copyright Office would have had enough. Instead, they allowed the filing of “responses” to the initial 716 comment salvo and got another 145 comments. Whew! That’s a lot of…