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October 13, 2012
14:56 • 7 months ago
newsweek:

Busting a Cyberstalker: How Carla Franklin Fought Back—and Triumphed

I remember feeling stunned, then sick. Sitting at my desk at a New York City consulting firm in 2009, I had randomly Googled my name. The jarring result: a series of strange montages on YouTube—all containing snapshots of me, along with the label “whore.” The photos, cobbled together from various corners of the Internet, were shots from a beauty pageant and a few acting jobs I had held in the past, when I was signed with a regional modeling agency. My mind raced. Who hated me this much to post these things? Who would call me a whore?
And then I knew exactly who had done it.

Carla Franklin shares her story.

A worthy read, even beyond the insights into Franklin’s compelling and creepy personal story, as it relates to laws (and the lack thereof) on internet harassment.

newsweek:

Busting a Cyberstalker: How Carla Franklin Fought Back—and Triumphed

I remember feeling stunned, then sick. Sitting at my desk at a New York City consulting firm in 2009, I had randomly Googled my name. The jarring result: a series of strange montages on YouTube—all containing snapshots of me, along with the label “whore.” The photos, cobbled together from various corners of the Internet, were shots from a beauty pageant and a few acting jobs I had held in the past, when I was signed with a regional modeling agency. My mind raced. Who hated me this much to post these things? Who would call me a whore?

And then I knew exactly who had done it.

Carla Franklin shares her story.

A worthy read, even beyond the insights into Franklin’s compelling and creepy personal story, as it relates to laws (and the lack thereof) on internet harassment.

August 25, 2012
13:04 • 8 months ago
It will lead to fewer choices, less innovation, and potentially higher prices. It is unfortunate that patent law can be manipulated to give one company a monopoly over rectangles with rounded corners, or technology that is being improved every day by Samsung and other companies.
A statement from Samsung • Expressing anger over yesterday’s ruling in their patent case against Apple, in which a jury largely ruled in favor of Apple, pushing a $1.05 billion fine on Samsung. For what it’s worth, Apple CEO Tim Cook came out with a statement of his own: “We owe a debt of gratitude to the jury who invested their time in listening to our story. We were thrilled to finally have the opportunity to tell it,” Cook said. “The mountain of evidence presented during the trial showed that Samsung’s copying went far deeper than we knew.” Samsung plans to appeal.
July 25, 2012
09:25 • 9 months ago
Get rid of ObamaCare! Now! It’s a really good idea … if your plan is to do the exact opposite of what you’re trying to achieve on controlling the deficit. The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office on Tuesday said ObamaCare will actually work to shrink, not enlarge, our fiscal budget headache.
More details from the CBO here. Important story for truth. (via hypervocal)

For fans of effects that are literally the opposite of what’s intended. 
July 19, 2012
17:31 • 10 months ago

reuters:

Twitter is appealing a judge’s decision requiring the social media company to turn over an Occupy Wall Street protester’s tweets and account information to Manhattan prosecutors.

In June, Criminal Court Judge Matthew Sciarrino ruled that releasing Malcolm Harris’s tweets would not violate his privacy, since he had posted them on a public website.

Harris, a Brooklyn-based writer, was arrested with hundreds of other Occupy members during a mass march across the Brooklyn Bridge last fall.

The case has focused attention on a number of murky legal questions surrounding the use of social media, including whether users own the content they post publicly and whether companies like Twitter can prevent authorities from using that information to prosecute social media users.

READ ON: Twitter appeals ruling to hand over Occupy protester’s tweets

Twitter has historically fought for its users’ rights in cases like these. So props.

February 1, 2012
10:13 • 1 year ago
reuters:

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange arrives at the Supreme Court in London February 1, 2012.
Assange was detained in Britain in December 2010 on a European arrest warrant issued by a Swedish prosecutor after two female former WikiLeaks volunteers accused him of sexual assault. [REUTERS/Stefan Wermuth]
Read more: Julian Assange appeals extradition to UK’s top court

In case you’d like to follow along at home, ABC (Australia) has live video from the event.

reuters:

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange arrives at the Supreme Court in London February 1, 2012.

Assange was detained in Britain in December 2010 on a European arrest warrant issued by a Swedish prosecutor after two female former WikiLeaks volunteers accused him of sexual assault. [REUTERS/Stefan Wermuth]

Read more: Julian Assange appeals extradition to UK’s top court

In case you’d like to follow along at home, ABC (Australia) has live video from the event.

December 3, 2011
09:15 • 1 year ago
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July 4, 2011
10:42 • 1 year ago
May 12, 2011
16:42 • 2 years ago

  • attempt When John Ensign resigned from his position as Nevada’s junior senator on May 3rd, it was widely believed he was trying to halt an ethics investigation into his affair with a staffer, and subsequent alleged payoffs to her family.
  • failure The Senate Ethics Committee isn’t letting their old buddy John off that easy. They’ve forwarded their findings to the U.S. Justice Department, saying they found that Ensign violated the law. Jeez, all that resigning for nothing. source

April 25, 2011
14:13 • 2 years ago
For a big law firm with an international reputation like King and Spalding, this could have gotten very ugly for them. This kind of thing could have stuck to them for decades. People no longer want to be associated with this kind of discrimination.
Richard Socarides, gay rights advocate • Speaking about legal firm King and Spalding withdrawing from their plan to defend the Defense Of Marriage Act (DOMA) in service of the House GOP. The decision has caused a split within the firm, as Paul Clement, one of the partners involved with the case, has resigned in protest and will continue to work for DOMA’s defense, saying that even unpopular causes deserve legal representation. Socarides disagrees, claiming the law is discriminatory and thus is un-American, and that there’s no merit in defending such a cause. We agree in the moral sense, perhaps, but ultimately Clement is correct — legal representation is a keystone of our system of justice, and even though King and Spalding has every right not to take this case, at some point some lawyer does have to step up, personal beliefs aside. source (viafollow)
April 11, 2011
23:07 • 2 years ago

  • then Remember Bart Stupak? During the health care debate, he was the pro-life Michigan Democrat who almost derailed the entire legislation over concerns that it would allow federal funds to be spent on abortions. He eventually buckled, of course, and the legislation passed.
  • now Stupak, who retired from Congress last year, has found a new job at Venable LLP, one of “America’s top 100 law firms,” according to it’s website. Why is this notable? Because Venable represents, amongst others, the Maryland chapter of Planned Parenthood. source

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March 28, 2011
12:46 • 2 years ago

Crime and punishment in China: Amnesty International claimed yesterday that while the exact number is guarded as a state secret, they believe thousands of people were executed in the China last year, more than every other country combined. While China has maintained they’ve taken steps to lower their rate of execution, such as mandatory review of all death penalty cases since 2007, Amnesty International says they’ve still been executing people for “a wide range of crimes that include nonviolent offences and after proceedings that did not meet international fair trial standards.” source

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March 5, 2011
13:55 • 2 years ago
Sucks to be a forensics expert: Solid state drives can wipe data
Solid state? Not so solid for data recovery. In perhaps the best complement to our earlier post possible is a report that many new solid state drives include a technology which, as a way to increase efficiency, have the side effect of making it easier to wipe data for good. “A few people in the forensics community had some awareness that something funny was going on with some SSDs, but everyone we’ve shown this to has been shocked at the extent of the findings,” said Murdoch University’s Graeme Bell, who co-authored the fairly alarming study. So, if you’re looking to commit a crime involving lots of information, buy a solid state drive. Leave the hard drives for the amateurs who don’t know what they’re doing. source
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Solid state? Not so solid for data recovery. In perhaps the best complement to our earlier post possible is a report that many new solid state drives include a technology which, as a way to increase efficiency, have the side effect of making it easier to wipe data for good. “A few people in the forensics community had some awareness that something funny was going on with some SSDs, but everyone we’ve shown this to has been shocked at the extent of the findings,” said Murdoch University’s Graeme Bell, who co-authored the fairly alarming study. So, if you’re looking to commit a crime involving lots of information, buy a solid state drive. Leave the hard drives for the amateurs who don’t know what they’re doing. source

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13:28 • 2 years ago
You tend to split a lot fewer infinitives when you think the FBI might be reading your mail.
Cataphora Chief Technology Officer Steve Roberts • Explaining the benefit of his company’s software, which can intelligently parse phrases and figure out when someone is changing their tone (presumably because they have something to hide). This is useful in law cases, particularly ones with a ton of documents – you know, the kind that once required armies of lawyers to do the dirty work. They’re just one of the companies who work in this pretty neat field, and their accuracy rate is actually way better than the people the machines are replacing. “Think about how much money had been spent to be slightly better than a coin toss,” said Bill Herr, a former chemical company lawyer who once herded lawyers in rooms to dig through documents en masse. Like cats. source (viafollow)
March 2, 2011
15:29 • 2 years ago

  • It was a social crime … In a highly-publicized incident, fashion designer John Galliano was captured on film saying “I love Hitler,” an anti-Jewish sentiment that cost him his job with Christian Dior and drew the public ire of none less than their Oscar-winning spokeswoman Natalie Portman. Galliano has apologized for the incident, but the damage has already been done.
  • … but is it a legal crime? Galliano will be forced to stand trial in Paris over his remarks. French law designates that incitement of racial hatred is a crime, and Galliano could face six months in prison. Obviously racism is abhorrent and deleterious to society, but the idea of going to prison for what Galliano did seems like a pretty good illustration of the First Amendment’s beauty. source

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