Topics /
The most popular blog posts about society, policy & culture on Hacker News. 268 posts.
In 1998, the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office issued Patent 5,718,632, on a method for avoiding “unnecessary wastage of time” in video games. What’s transpired in the 17 years since then can best be described as an unnecessary wastage of time. Namco’s patent covers “auxiliary games” that a player...
Yesterday, ten United Nations experts and special rapporteurs voiced their concern over the adverse impacts upon human rights posed by secret “free trade” and investment agreements such as the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), the Trans-Atlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) and the Trade...
It's been an exciting summer for the Library of Congress. Last month, the Librarian Dr. James Billington announced he would soon be stepping down, vacating a seat he's held for some 28 years. That announcement came hot on the heels of a new legislative proposal—the nigh-ungooglable CODE Act, which...
Only once in a while does an Internet censorship law or regulation come along that is so audacious in its scope, so misguided in its premises, and so poorly thought out in its execution, that you have to check your calendar to make sure April 1 hasn't come around again. The Draft Online Regulation...
The spread of knowledge about the NSA's surveillance programs has shaken the trust of customers in U.S. Internet companies like Facebook, Google, and Apple: especially non-U.S. customers who have discovered how weak the legal protections over their data is under U.S. law. It should come as no...
On the morning of April 1st, the White House issued a new executive order (EO) that asserts that malicious “cyber-enabled activities” are a national threat, declares a national emergency, and establishes sanctions and other consequences for individuals and entities. While computer and information...
Finally, statistical proof that bosses write the darndest emails.
Brewster Kahle, Chairman of the Internet Archive Federal Credit Union, November 2015 [NYtimes story, Motherboard, BoingBoing. Liquidation.] All deposits are safe, all loans performing, great and dedicated staff, wonderful members. So why difficult? Despite five years of effort, $1 million in donations spent (from the…
Over the past two years, as talk of copyright reform has escalated, we’ve also heard complaints about the supposed expansion of fair use, or "fair use creep.” That kind of talk woefully misunderstands how fair use works. Fair use provides breathing space in copyright law, making sure that control...
Posted by Tim Graham on May 7, 2015
Online advertising is often based around the idea of an "impression," but few of us actually know what that means. We assume it means some sort of interaction with a human being, but as it turns out, we're quite wrong. Today we dive into some staggering statistics with Samuel Scott.
What good is a breakthrough medicine, vaccine or test if the people who need it cannot afford it?
[Passenger Name Record (PNR) view from Amtrak “Police GUI”. Click image for larger version.]
Trade ministers are meeting behind closed-doors at the Westin Resort and Spa in Maui this week to finalize the terms of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP). This is the first formal round of talks since the U.S. passed the controversial Fast Track trade legislation in June, which has given U.S....
Today the FCC voted three to two to reclassify broadband Internet access as a common carrier service under Title II of the Communications Act, and forbear from the parts of the Act that aren’t necessary for net neutrality rules. This reclassification gives the FCC the authority to enact (and...
The United States makes an improper division between surveillance conducted on residents of the United States and the surveillance that is conducted with almost no restraint upon the rest of the world. This double standard has proved poisonous to the rights of Americans and non-Americans alike. In...
Posted by Iulia Ion, Software Engineer - Rob Reeder, Research Scientist - Sunny Consolvo, User Experience Researcher Today, you can find...
I recently came across the following question posted by Paul Buchheit (the founder of Gmail): Assume that I'm going to get rid of $20,000 and my only concern is the "common good". Which of these is the best use of the money: give it to the Gates foundation, buy a hybrid car, invest it in a promising startup, invest it…
Posted by Fred von Lohmann, Copyright Legal Director More than 400 hours of video are uploaded to YouTube every minute. Some of those upl...
China's social score system is full of rumor and speculation. We clear up the misconceptions and explain how the credit system really works.
In my view, what's most outmoded within science, most badly in need of retirement, is the way we structure and organize scientific knowledge itself. Academic literature, even as it moves online, is a relic of the era of typesetting, modeled on static, irrevocable, toothpaste-out-of-the-tube publication. Just as the…
Andrew Lewman, our current Executive Director, is leaving The Tor Project to take a position at...
This summer, Senator Sheldon Whitehouse introduced an amendment to the flawed Cyber Information Sharing Act (CISA) that would make it even worse, by expanding the broken Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (CFAA). EFF has proposed common sense changes to this federal anti-hacking law, many of which were...
The Graduate School of Education and the Computer Science Department engaged in a joint research project to advance new approaches to teaching.
