http://digitalgarbage.net law & policy of the infoglut Tue, 19 Aug 2008 14:52:17 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en For new STU students, welcome to law school! My home page is at http://nathenson.org. This site, digital garbage, is my academic blog on law and technology. I also run a personal blog at http://nathenson.org/blog. Course pages are available to STU students through Blackboard at http://webcourses.lexisnexis.com.   You’ll need to get your Lexis ID from ... http://digitalgarbage.net/2008/08/14/sites-and-course-pages/ Geek alert: the Large Hadron Collider ("LHC"), making its debut this year, is the world's largest particle accelerator.  Built by CERN (the European Center for Nuclear Research), the LHC is a 27 km particle accelerator near Geneva, running through both France and Switzerland.  As noted in the NYT, the LHC ... http://digitalgarbage.net/2008/08/13/physics-and-rap-music/ There's more to boredom than meets the eye.  In an article discussing research about the psychology of boredom, the New York Times writes that sometimes boredom can be a positive thing, allowing the brain time to work through things: [B]oredom is more than a mere flagging of interest or a precursor ... http://digitalgarbage.net/2008/08/05/boredom-information-overload/ I've written before about the "creepiness factor," the uneasy feeling some get when they realize their blogs and social-networking postings are read by "unwanted" visitors like police, employers, professors, etc.  Add to that list corporate America.  The New York Times writes about Comcast's efforts to reach customers complaining about it ... http://digitalgarbage.net/2008/07/24/comcast-creepiness-factor/ It must be Digital Preservation Week. Just a few days ago, I wrote about the Library of Congress' new report on digital preservation (which itself followed the report of the Section 108 Study Group issued last March).  Now, the Commission of the European Communities has released a green paper entitled Copyright ... http://digitalgarbage.net/2008/07/22/more-digital-preservation/ A joint report on the problems of copyright and digital preservation -- International Study on the Impact of Copyright Law on Digital Preservation -- was released this month by the Library of Congress National Digital Information Infrastructure and Preservation Program ("NDIIP"), the Joint Information Systems Committee, the Open Access to ... http://digitalgarbage.net/2008/07/19/copyright-digital-preservation/ The NY Times reports that Google and Viacom have reached a partial agreement regarding production of YouTube user data: Google said it had now agreed to provide lawyers for Viacom and a class-action group led by the Football Association of England, a large viewership database that blanks out YouTube ... http://digitalgarbage.net/2008/07/15/google-and-viacom/ CNet reports on what may be the stumbling block in Google and Viacom's failure to reach an agreement regarding YouTube user data (which I've blogged on here and here): Viacom wants to know which videos YouTube employees have watched and uploaded to the site, and Google is refusing to provide ... http://digitalgarbage.net/2008/07/14/google-balking-youtube/ Might the court order that Google hand over YouTube viewer records become, as Ed Felten and others termed a few years back, an "Exxon Valdez" of privacy that makes informational privacy a national priority?  Unfortunately, I suspect not.  If the parties reach an agreement to anonymize the data and keep ... http://digitalgarbage.net/2008/07/13/privacy-exxon-valdez/ I've written previously about judges using limericks in their opinions.  Here's another.  The ABA Journal notes that U.S. District Judge Ronald B. Leighton found a plaintiff's 465-page complaint to violate Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 8(a)'s requirement that a complaint contain "a short and plain statement" of the plaintiff's claim.  ... http://digitalgarbage.net/2008/07/11/another-civil-procedure-limerick/