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Keurig’s attempt to “DRM” their new coffee maker
Here is a link to the article mentioned in class today about Keurig’s attempt to “DRM” their new coffee machine and the general public dissatisfaction with this approach. http://www.theverge.com/2015/2/5/7986327/keurigs-attempt-to-drm-its-coffee-cups-totally-backfired Something I noticed upon re-reading the article is that they are actually being sued by some competitors for anti-trust violations after releasing this new machine (http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2014/04/22/lawsuits-claim-k-cup-maker-violates-antitrust-laws/8028197/). […]
This American Life – Online Trolling as a Limit on Expression
Interesting piece referred to in class today, about a blogger and how she was impacted by online trolls. http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/545/if-you-dont-have-anything-nice-to-say-say-it-in-all-caps?act=1#play
Copyright term extensions might be coming to Canada
This jumps off our discussions from last week. According to this post by Michael Geist, a law professor at the University of Ottawa and one of the foremost Canadian experts in this area, it looks as though Canada may be considering extending its copyright terms as part of its negotiations in the Trans-Pacific Partnership Treaty (TPP): “If […]
The Digital World Reviving Old News
Today in class, we briefly discussed how the BCTV footage of the 1994 Stanley Cup riots is available on YouTube, and how the digital age has a memory that seems to predate the (widespread) digital age. There was an even more amazing example of that memory which came out just today. The handwritten notes of Dr. Alan Turing — the […]
“We want privacy, but we can’t stop sharing”
Here is a link to Lawrence Lessig’s video interview with Edward Snowden. It may become relevant to our discussions of privacy/lack of privacy and its potential chilling effects on digital creativity, expression, and even the process of gaining/accessing knowledge through the Internet as a medium. A New York Times article entitled “We Want Privacy, But […]
The Super Bowl, and What is Legal
This article by Sherwin Siy is an amusing piece looking at the NFL’s copyright warnings, in light of “The Big Game” today. You may not make comments on this post I’ve written without my explicit consent. …which you can only get by giving me a cookie. And it better be oatmeal raisin (the best cookie), not that […]
Science Magazine on Mathematical Creativity
There was a great article published today in Science about mathematicians, where their funding comes from, and how it affects the research they do (and I’ll unabashedly say that I think mathematics is one of the most beautiful forms of creativity in the world 🙂 ). This article also serves as an interesting follow-up to my earlier […]
Sim City’s Simulacrum of Poverty
I was recently thinking over an article that appeared in News of the Week some time back, one dealing with the phenomenon of homelessness in the recently released video game Sim City. (In case anyone missed it, it’s available here.) As it turns out, many of the player-crafted cities within the game have been suffering […]
Online Monitoring
We’ve been hearing for a long time about NSA surveillance online. Turns out, our own CSE was at it as well. Not so much a constraint on online creativity, but certainly the monitoring of online creativity. Cheers!
When does similarity become plagiarism?
Tom Petty receives writing credit on Sam Smith hit Stay With Me This recent article in the Globe and Mail reminded me of our class discussion on stand-up comedians and the lack of protection for their jokes, and the problems that may arise from trying to create legal protections. I see somewhat of a parallel […]