News of the Week; September 11, 2019

DIGITAL

1. 8chan owner testifies to Congress about extremism on the site
2. Months After Christchurch Shooting, The Australian Government Is Issuing Site-Blocking Orders Targeting Footage Of The Incident
3. Google And Facebook To Face Antitrust Probes Investigating Their Impact On The Digital Ad Market
4. Yes, News Sites Need To Get Out Of The Ad Surveillance Business — But Blame The Advertisers As Well
5. DOJ Wants Apple, Google To Hand Over Names And Phone Numbers Of 10,000 App Users
6. 50 states and territories launch massive joint probe into Google
7. Google Bans Ads for Experimental Medical Treatments
8. Amazon Probed by U.S. Antitrust Officials Over Marketplace: The FTC is interviewing merchants to determine whether the e-commerce giant is using its market power to hurt competition.
9. Watchdog Group Files FTC Complaint Against Ryan ToysReview For Improper Ad Disclosures
10. In Blockbuster Ruling, Ninth Circuit Affirms hiQ Injunction – CFAA Claim Likely Not Available for Scraping Publicly Available Website Data
11. Big News: Appeals Court Says CFAA Can’t Be Used To Stop Web Scraping
12. Web scraping doesn’t violate anti-hacking law, appeals court rules
13. HIQ LABS, INC. v. LINKEDIN CORPORATION (USCA 9^th Circuit, September 9, 2019)
14. China Issues New Cybersecurity Law to Protect Children
15. New Huawei rule: what it means for US companies
16. Chinese professor stole hard drive secrets for Huawei, US government charges
17. How China is Cashing in on Group Chats
18. 18 months after indictment, Iranian phishers are still targeting universities
19. YouTube Lets Indonesian Government Block Satirical Video That Criticizes The Indonesian Government
20. How an Élite University Research Center Concealed Its Relationship with Jeffrey Epstein: M.I.T. Media Lab aware of Epstein as a convicted sex offender & that Epstein contributions far exceeded what M.I.T. admitted.
21. Inside the bizarre world of internet trolls and propagandists
22. How online harassment threatens press freedom
23. Microsoft President Brad Smith: Tech sector needs to face up to responsibility and embrace regulation
24. Federal Gov’t Gives Customs Officers Permission To Break Social Media Platform Rules Forbidding Fake Accounts
25. A feel-good story about social media!
26. Facebook on the hook as states launch competition, privacy probe
27. The Technology 202: Facebook, Microsoft team up with academics in race to thwart deepfakes
28. Facebook tightens policies around self-harm and suicide
29. Facebook Dating launches in the United States today
30. Facebook dating is now available in the US. Here’s how it works
31. Facebook Watch Partners With International News Organizations To Produce New Slate
32. Section 230 Applies to Facebook’s Post Removals and Account Suspensions–King v. Facebook (Eric Goldman)
33. The NY Times Got It Backwards: Section 230 Helps Limit The Spread Of Hate Speech Online
34. Ninth Circuit Says LinkedIn Wrongly Blocked HiQ’s Scraping Efforts
35. California Court Of Appeal’s Midvale Decision Opens The Floodgates For More Website Accessibility Lawsuits
36. FTC’s Latest Fine Of YouTube Over COPPA Violations Shows That COPPA And Section 230 Are On A Collision Course
37. FTC and Google reach $170 Million Settlement over children’s privacy on YouTube
38. FTC announces record $170 million COPPA settlement with Google and YouTube for children’s privacy violations
39. Google and YouTube Pay Record $170 Million Fine for Allegedly Violating Children’s Privacy Law in Settlement with the FTC and the New York Attorney General
40. Hotel Lobbyists Push Forward Their Plan To Kill The Internet Because They Hate Competing Against Airbnb
41. Canadian YouTube Giant WatchMojo Invests In Digital Video Festival ‘Buffer’
42. Video-sharing site reaches $170 million settlement with FTC and New York AG
43. Tom Brady Joins TikTok on Heels of NFL’s Deal With Video Platform
44. Insights: The Future Of The NFL Is TikTok, And Other Hail Mary Passes For Continued Relevance
45. A Quick Study in Doxing and Personal Jurisdiction: Vangheluwe v. GotNews
46. Execution in a Digital Age
47. What Happens To Your Digital Assets When You Die?
48. That Time Taylor Swift Threatened To Sue Microsoft Over Its Racist Chatbot
49. The Internet Remains Broken In The Ninth Circuit And, At Least For Now, The Third
50. ThinkProgress, a Top Progressive News Site, Has Shut Down: A search had been underway for a new publisher. But none was found.
51. YouTube launches a dedicated Fashion vertical
52. Bart Baker Says He’s Quitting YouTube, Moving To China To Pursue Social Superstardom
53. YouTube network Studio71 is expanding into streaming
54. YouTube Forges New ‘Red Diamond Creator Award’ For Channels With 100 Million Subscribers
55. YouTube Taps K-Pop Groups TVXQ! And Super Junior For Travel Docuseries
56. Tubular Labs Unveils New Metrics That Seek To Measure Social Video Like TV
57. How to Avoid a Complaint to the ASA as a #Socialinfluencer When Posting #Ads in the UK
58. New NLRB Advice Memo Clarifies Social Media Policy Rules
59. Viacom Digital Studios Readies Facebook Watch Slate With Grace Helbig, MatPat, Joey Graceffa
60. No, Netflix Is Not Ditching Binge-Watching. It’s Just “Trying Something New” With Competition Series ‘Rhythm + Flow.’
61. Apple Music launches its official web-app in beta
62. Apple TV Plus to Launch on Nov. 1, Cost $4.99 per Month
63. Apple TV+ subscription service soft-launches November 1 for $4.99/mo
64. Apple releases first trailer for new sci-fi series See, starring Jason Momoa
65. Apple continues health push with three new medical studies
66. Apple: The First Hope-Based Company
67. Apple, Foxconn caught breaking Chinese labor laws while making iPhones
68. Apple Wanted to Revolutionize the Way Streaming Pays. Here’s Why It Wasn’t Allowed: Spotify and Amazon are battling the Copyright Royalty Board over streaming royalty rates.
69. Spotify users can now share music and podcasts to Snapchat
70. Snapchat Prepares a Dedicated News Channel Ahead of 2020 Debates: Snapchat has made forays into the news business before
71. Howard Stern is Getting Ripped Off: Why podcasting may have minted its first billionaire, subscription podcasting is the next great business model, and how to join the revolution
72. Was Etsy too good to be true?
73. WarnerMedia’s Crunchyroll Invests In European Anime Firm Viz Media Group
74. WarnerMedia centralises distribution leadership for HBO, Turner
75. Patreon Eyeing Providing Loans, HR Support, Health Care To Creators, CEO Says
76. “Everything as a service” is coming—but we’re not there quite yet
77. US tech IPOs on track for record year in money raised, reaching $17.1bn in 2019 H1 – Linklaters reports
78. A Paranoid Tech Bro, a Homemade Nuclear Bunker, and a Shocking Death: In the tunnels beneath a placid suburban home, an angel investor turned into an angel of doom.
79. China is close to releasing a Libra-like digital currency
80. It’s just emojions misleading us over [laughing tears of joy face]?
81. Emojis Have Unsettled Grammar Rules (and Why Lawyers Should Care) (Eric Goldman)
82. Someone moved $1 billion in a single bitcoin transaction
83. The hacker, bitcoin, the Proceeds of Crime Act and the Criminal Courts (Sentencing) Act.

A.I.

1. CDA Section 230 Immunizes Platform From Liability for Friend and Content Suggestion Algorithms
2. An AI app that turns you into a movie star has risked the privacy of millions
3. Algorithms should have made courts more fair. What went wrong?
4. Texas Law Could Signal More State, Federal Deepfake Bans
5. Cops Digitally Erase Suspect’s Facial Tattoos To Make Him Look More Like The Robbery Suspect Caught On Camera
6. ‘Years ahead of the pack’: uOttawa’s renowned robot researcher Ian Kerr remembered as a leader in his field
7. How do intellectual property rights apply to AI?
8. Construction Robots Learn to Excavate by Mimicking Humans: Human movements can teach robots the skills they need to dig holes and – maybe someday – build the first colonies on Mars 
9. Leveraging Data Analytics and AI Through the M&A Life Cycle 
10. AI & Privacy: The Struggle is Real: meAnIngful consent and retAIning data
11. Ethical Implications of AI and Ubuntu as an Intervention
12. The Age of AI: How Will In-house Law Departments Run in 10 Years
13. Hunting for the Sharpest Tools in the AI Shed
14. Will AI Chatbots Replace Your Employee Handbook? 

COMMUNICATIONS

1. Disruption drags on for some Telus email customers
2. Much Of The Assault On ‘Big Tech’ Is Being Driven By ‘Big Telecom’
3. Comcast sues Maine to stop law requiring sale of individual TV channels
4. T-Mobile Metro stores sell used phones as new, charge “fake taxes,” NYC says
5. New York City Sues T-Mobile For Ripping Off Its Prepaid Users
6. T-Mobile Employees Want Promises They Won’t Be Fired Post Merger
7. Charter Spectrum Once Again ‘Competes’ By… Raising Prices
8. Verizon’s 5G network isn’t good enough to cover an entire NFL stadium
9. Verizon Can’t Stop Over-hyping 5G; This Time In NFL Stadiums
10. Supreme Court Punts On Whether FCC’s Interpretation of the TCPA Binds Federal Courts

PRIVACY

1. White House Pushing Proposal That Would Subject Mentally Ill People To Increased Surveillance
2. DMVs Are Selling Your Data to Private Investigators: You gave them your data in exchange for a driver’s license. DMVs are making tens of millions of dollars selling it, documents obtained by Motherboard show.
3. Hyp3r-misappropriation of data gets Instagram’s attention, but is enough being done?
4. Senator pushes Amazon for details about Ring “partnerships” with police
5. Ring Let Cops Know How Often Their Requests For Camera Footage Were Ignored
6. Ring Has A ‘Head Of Face Recognition Tech,’ Says It’s Not Using Facial Recognition Tech. Yet.
7. Appeals Court Says An IP Address Is ‘Tantamount To A Computer’s Name’ While Handing The FBI Another NIT Win
8. FBI’s Operation reWired Targets International E-mail Scams
9. The CCPA and COPPA: Looking for the “Betwixt and Between”
10. Back to school: With latest attack, ransomware cancels classes in Flagstaff
11. 600,000 GPS trackers for people and pets are using 123456 as a password
12. Zero-day privilege escalation disclosed for Android
13. Exploit for wormable BlueKeep Windows bug released into the wild
14. CCPA Privacy FAQs: If a company collects personal information through a cookie, is it required to provide a consumer with a privacy policy?
15. Apple takes flak for disputing iOS security bombshell dropped by Google
16. MoviePass Left Tens Of Thousands Of Credit Card Numbers Exposed Online
17. Firefox is stepping up its blocking game
18. Riding in cars with hackers
19. How The Cyber Insurance Industry’s Bottom Line Is Fueling Ransomware
20. Cybersecurity Starts at the Top: Risks and Concerns for Directors and Officers
21. Nevada’s New Privacy Bill Requires Website Operators That Collect Information About Consumers to Update Privacy Policies by October 1, 2019
22. Equifax Victims Jump Through Hoops To Nab Settlement Money They Won’t Get Anyway

CREATIVITY

1. A Famous Argument Against Free Will Has Been Debunked: For decades, a landmark brain study fed speculation about whether we control our own actions. It seems to have made a classic mistake.
2. “Precious hours were wasted”: Trump’s doctored map affected hurricane forecasters
3. Devin Nunes Drops One Ridiculous Lawsuit, Only To File Another One
4. Court Tosses $100 Million Defamation Suit Brought By Former Trump Spokesman Over Reporting On Court Documents
5. Judge Orders White House To Restore Reporter’s Press Pass It Illegally Removed
6. Elections Canada’s third-party advertising controversy ignores regulatory discretion, says lawyer
7. Football, gambling and advertising: The opposite of a young man’s game
8. A New ‘Taco Tuesday’ Trademark Challenger Approaches: LeBron James
9. Ariana Grande Sues Forever 21, Asserting Right of Publicity, Lanham Act and Copyright Claims
10. Never ever getting back together: Taylor Swift Re-Records back Catalogue
11. Charlotte Tilbury – highlighting the pow(d)er of using copyright against copycats
12. Update on Canadian Copyright Mass Litigation – September Snapshot (Howard Knopf)
13. The music modernization act: A primer for copyright holders
14. That’s All He Wrote: Copyright Owners No Longer Enjoy Presumption of Irreparable Harm
15. Myth #4: The 30 Seconds/500 Copies/Two-Thirds/200 Words Rule
16. Using copyright to stop copycats – Islestarr Holdings Ltd v Aldi Stores Ltd
17. New NAD decision addresses incentivized reviews
18. Stouffer v. National Geographic Partners, LLC
19. U.S. Supreme Court Issues Decisions Resolving Two Major Copyright Law Issues
20. Queen Anne’s Revenge?
21. Wu-Tang Clan’s “C.R.E.A.M.” Is Not the Capitalist Anthem You Think It Is
22. Heirs to stolen painting seek its return from Japanese museum

GAMES

1. UK High Court orders ISPs to block Switch hacking sites: Judge sides with Nintendo in blacklisting a handful of sites advertising circumvention devices and software
2. Nintendo wins UK court case over Nintendo Switch piracy and modification
3. Nintendo gets UK ISPs to block Switch piracy sites
4. Nintendo launches infringement lawsuit against ROM site RomUniverse
5. Nintendo sues ROM site: Switch maker’s anti-piracy legal efforts continue with copyright and trademark infringement suit against RomUniverse
6. Capcom wins patent infringement lawsuit against Koei Tecmo
7. Chinese Giant Tencent Is Suing Bloggers Who Criticize The Company For ‘Reputational Damage’
8. Gears 5 review: An obvious gaming recommendation—if you already paid for it
9. Gears 5 launch delayed in China: Sales and pre-orders suspended due to unspecified issue
10. Niantic settles Pokemon Go public nuisance class action lawsuit
11. Niantic agrees to combat trespassing Pokémon Go players: Developer settles class action lawsuit after three years, committing to new preventative measures
12. Unionized Nexon staff rally for job security amid company-wide reorganization
13. Nexon Korea union holds demonstration one year after formation: South Korea’s first games industry union demands job security, protests restructuring
14. Steam rejects LilithSoft visual novel featuring rape scenes: Employee of Taimanin Asagi developer says Valve is “extremely strict with regards to characters that might be perceived as underage”
15. Is Valve still censoring adult games on Steam?: Taimanin Asagi removal puts question to Valve’s hands-off moderation policy.
16. Valve kept quiet on Epic exclusives following Metro Exodus backlash: Statement on “unfair” exclusivity was not intended to be a “lightning rod,” Valve said
17. Tales From The Platform Wars: Steam Dev Says Calling ‘Metro Exodus’ Epic Exclusive Unfair Wasn’t Intended To Incite
18. Epic Accuses Cheating Minor Of Continuing To Promote Cheat Software Even After Lawsuit
19. The (not) new Russian games store taking on Epic and Steam: My.Games on how a 70/30 split and lack of exclusives won’t prevent it from making “the best platform ever”
20. How Steam users see your game: An analysis of what players are looking for
21. A platter of experimental discovery features are heading to Steam
22. Valve updates experimental Steam Labs features: Micro Trailers coming to every game, plus new algorithms to help users explore Steam catalogue
23. Crunch not needed for live ops game dev, says Zynga producer
24. Why Ubisoft isn’t abandoning its open worlds: CEO Yves Guillemot explains why the growing audience for games means the publisher’s blockbuster model is sustainable
25. EA readying cloud gaming technical trials: PC players will test cloud versions of FIFA, Titanfall, Need For Speed and Unravel
26. EA is running a closed trial for its Project Atlas cloud gaming service this month
27. John Justice: “We are trying to implement cross-progression with every title on Stadia” – Google Stadia VP and head of product confirms service will include free trials, parental controls, mods, more features
28. Apple Arcade offers up 100+ exclusive(-ish) mobile games for $4.99 a month
29. Apple Arcade subscription offers 100+ games for $4.99/month on Sept. 19: Pac-Man, Frogger, Chu Chu Rocket, Rayman, and a new Square Enix RPG in the lineup.
30. MWM Immersive turns game publisher, debut title will beCreature in the Well
31. Team Rocket event pays off for Pokémon Go: Sensor Tower data puts $110m August haul in the game’s top five months since launch
32. Drivetime grabs $11 million in funding for voice-powered games for drivers
33. Drivetime raises $11m for games drivers can play on the road: Makers Fund leads Series A round with participation from Amazon and Google; Jeopardy offering launches today
34. Team17 draws up acquisition hit list as revenue jumps 97%: The UK publisher’s office move is set for November as staff count rises
35. The role of Double Fine’s publishing biz is still up in the air after joining Microsoft
36. Starbreeze applies for third extension on reconstruction period: If granted, troubled Swedish publisher would have had an entire year to avoid insolvency
37. Tim Schafer: “I don’t know if it makes sense to have a publisher within a publisher” – Double Fine founder says he isn’t certain about the future of publishing arm Double Fine Presents following Microsoft acquisition
38. Nintendo Direct shows off surprise sequels, new ports in aggressive year-end pitch
39. Nintendo teases Switch peripheral focused on physical exercise: New controller extends motion control functions of the Switch console
40. Wii Fit redux: Nintendo shows mysterious exercise ring for the Switch
41. Say goodbye to a “regular schedule” of emulated classics on Switch
42. What Sega’s Dreamcast launch keynote would have looked like, 20 years ago
43. Dreamcast 20th anniversary interview extravaganza
44. Dreamcast devs reflect on how the industry has changed since the console’s debut
45. Crash Team Racing was the UK’s best-selling game in August: But Nintendo dominates the month in terms of unit sales, revenues and top-selling titles
46. UK Charts: NBA 2K20 is No.1 in poor sales week
47. Marry everything: The satisfying sandbox of Fit for a King – Kitfox CEO Tanya Short on sandboxes and micro-publishing
48. Sony’s upcoming Xperia 5 phone supports the PS4’s DualShock controller
49. Celeste developers form new studio: Matt Makes Games team sheds its old name, emerges in new Vancouver offices as Extremely OK Games
50. Twitch kicks off partnership with the Raiders & Allegiant Stadium 
51. Report: Disney plans to sell Marvel Strike Force dev FoxNext Games
52. Up to 200 more GameStop stores set to close, with more to follow
53. 200 GameStop closures planned ahead of “a much larger tranche” coming
54. Sales continue to slide downhill as GameStop continues its reboot
55. The exciting uncertainty of esports’ future: Nielsen Esports’ Nicole Pike shares her patient views on the esports landscape ahead of her keynote at Esports BAR Miami 2019
56. BoomTV acquires American Video Game League in bid to expand collegiate esports: Deal is “huge step forward” for collegiate esports, says AVGL CEO
57. Why NASCAR raced into esports in 2019
58. Veloce Esports headed for series A investment after angel round: Initial investors include former Liberty Global exec Eric Tveter
59. Growing Pains: Issues Affecting eSports Stakeholders
60. DLA Piper’s Media, Sport and Entertainment sector, sports magazine: e-Sports update – “Loot boxes” in the crosshairs
61. RetroArch brings real-time translation to emulated games
62. Game-focused social video platform Medal.tv raises $9 million
63. Medal.tv raises $9 million in new funding: Horizons Ventures led the round, which takes social video platform to $12.5m lifetime funding
64. WoW Classic reminds us of all we’ve lost | Opinion: Nostalgia for an earlier version of Blizzard’s MMO is a stark reminder of how much of gaming’s creative history continues to be lost entirely
65. Blizzard’s World of Warcraft Classic hit with weekend DDoS attacks
66. Everspace 2: Rockfish’s not so difficult second album
67. Igniting a Chinese fighting game revolution: China isn’t known for its fighting game scene, but Next Studios wants to change that with Metal Revolution
68. Call of Duty developer Sledgehammer Games opens new studio in Australia
69. Sledgehammer Games is opening a studio in Australia: Call of Duty to expand its presence in Australia with new dev studio in Melbourne
70. VRChat raises $10 million to expand its virtual reality platform
71. VRChat secures $10m Series C funding: New investor Makers Fund joins HTC to help “open unique opportunities” in virtual reality space
72. VR firm MWM Immersive expands into games publishing: Rebrands as MWM Interactive, debut title is Creature In The Well
73. Here’s What 100 Hours of VR Drum Practice Gets You
74. Digital Frontier: Where Brain-computer Interfaces & AR/VR Could One Day Meet
75. The Coalition’s Gears 5 includes an expansive list of accessibility options
76. Gears 5: Critical Consensus – Reviewers agree The Coalition’s second tour of duty is vintage Gears with an assortment of twists, but split on how good that makes it
77. Blog: How I discovered the world of user acquisition and advertising
78. Blog: I am the cheapest bastard in indie games
79. Blog: Kickstarter tactics based on our campaign forUnbound: Worlds Apart
80. Blog: Unity Addressables – It’s never too big to fit
81. Blog: How music enhances virtual presence – Part 3
82. Don’t Miss: How Maxis avoided sequel-itis on The Sims 2
83. Watch John Pearl discuss the procedural design ofRemnant: From the Ashes
84. Video: Understanding Halo 5’s geometry caching optimizations
85. Video: Designing levels for a video game mixtape
86. Video: How to survive and thrive as a small studio without a big hit
87. Practical game writing insight from No Man’s Sky: Atlas Rises’ Greg Buchanan
88. U.S. Patent No. 9,174,128: Dynamic quests in game
89. U.S. Patent No. 9,545,571: Methods and apparatus for a video game magic system
90. Home Office confirms games roles will be added to UK occupation shortage list: Migration Advisory Committee’s industry-informed recommendations have been approved
91. UK regulatory roundup: Where we are and what lies ahead – Harbottle & Lewis on four imminent developments that will impact the games industry in the UK and Europe
92. Ars goes back to school: The video games that threatened our college GPA
93. BAFTA shuffles categories for 2020 Games Awards as submissions open

Jon