DIGITAL

1. Association Isn’t Liable for Its Members’ Message Board Postings–Inge v. Central Motorcycle     Roadracing Association (Eric Goldman)
2. European Court Rules On Internet Jurisdiction (Andres Guadamuz)
3. TripAdvisor removed warnings about rapes and injuries at Mexico resorts, tourists say
4. Appeals court keeps alive the never-ending Linux case, SCO v. IBM: SCO says IBM released a “sham” version of Monterey OS to prop up AIX for Power.
5. Here are the Kremlin-backed Facebook ads designed to foment discord in US: Ads bash Clinton before election and cap on Trump after he won the presidency.
6. What Congress Should Ask Tech Executives About Russia
7. These Are the Ads Russia Bought on Facebook in 2016
8. Congress Asks Tech To Face Hard Truths About Russian Meddling
9. Spinoff: Whatever The Reports About Russian Trolls Buying Ads Is Initially, It’s Way, Way Worse
10. Facebook, Google and Twitter grilled by Congress over Russian meddling – as it happened
11. Facebook, YouTube admit to wider-ranging campaigns by Russian “state actors”: Disclosure of even bigger numbers comes ahead of Tuesday testimony on Capitol Hill.
12. Facebook, Google, Twitter tell Congress their platforms spread Russian-backed propaganda – Twitter: “We are committed to working every single day at solving this problem.”
13. Eight Revealing Moments From The Second Day Of Russia Hearings
14. Top Experts: Can Facebook Legally Disclose Russian Ads–What does the Stored Communications Act say?
15. Facebook Steps Up Efforts to Sway Lawmakers: Amid Russia probes and online ad scrutiny, social-media giant boosts lobbying spending and work on messaging
16. Lawsuit accuses Facebook of scheming to weasel out of paying overtime: Lawsuit says Facebook has a “systematic, companywide wrongful classification” system.
17. Collateral Damage Not Russian Site-Blocking’s Only Failure: Pirate Video Market Has Doubled As Well
18. Reddit conducts wide-ranging purge of offensive subreddits
19. NY Times Uncritically Says Fake News Debate Supports Chinese Style Censorship
20. Trump adviser Roger Stone has been booted off Twitter: Stone fired off a profanity-laced tirade against a CNN reporter.
21. Roger Stone, President Trump’s Attack Dog, Banned From Twitter For Harassing Journalists 
22. Roger Stone suing Twitter over suspension
23. The College Kids Doing What Twitter Won’t
24. Is Wikileaks Protected by Section 230? The Trump Campaign Thinks So (Eric Goldman)
25. Trump Campaign Tries To Defend Itself With Section 230, Manages To Potentially Make Things Worse For Itself
26. APNewsBreak: Georgia election server wiped after suit filed 
27. Craig Brittain’s Senate Race Page Reports Craig Brittain’s Personal Account As An ‘Imposter’
28. Days after activists sued, Georgia’s election server was wiped clean: Main server deleted in July, two backups were “degaussed three times” in August.
29. Georgia Election Server Mysteriously Wiped Clean After Lawsuit Highlights Major Vulnerabilities
30. Georgia insists server deletion was “not undertaken to delete evidence”: “Narrative asserted in the media that the data was nefariously deleted… is without merit.”
31. Russian Site-Blocking Operation Embroiled In Corruption Scandal
32. Forcing Internet Platforms To Police Content Will Never Work
33. Twitter drops hammer and sickle on RT, Sputnik ad buys over election shenanigans: No more sponsored Tweets, but Russia-funded media sites can still post “organic” Tweets.
34. Twitter adds 4 million users amid ongoing harassment problem
35. Ikea’s Ingenious Pre-Roll Ads Turn The Viewer Into A Voyeur
36. YouTube Says New Technology Will Result In 30% Fewer Videos Being Deemed Advertiser-Unfriendly
37. Google CEO: Viewers Accrue 100 Million Hours Of Daily YouTube Watch Time From Their Living Rooms
38. YouTube TV Arrives On More Smart Devices, Including Xbox One Consoles, Android TVs
39. Brands Beware: FTC Continues Campaign on Social Media Influencer Disclosures 
40. Florida Legislator Thinks First Amendment Should Be Trimmed Back A Bit To Deal With Social Media Threats
41. How Google Goggles Won, Then Lost, The Camera-First Future
42. Google Limits Access To Airfare Data, Risking Antitrust Concerns
43. Dennis Prager Sues YouTube For Filtering His Videos In A Way He Doesn’t Like 
44. YouTube Responds To Lawsuit From Conservative Outlet, Says Restricted Mode “Is Not Censorship”
45. Musician-Run Organization Runs Anti-YouTube Ad Campaign…On YouTube
46. Finally, RIAA Front Group Admits That Forcing YouTube To Police Site Doesn’t Work Well
47. Marketing Guy: Google Image Search Is A Honeypot Set Up By Aggressive Copyright Litigants
48. Google’s AI Wizard Unveils A New Twist On Neural Networks
49. Copyright Law Makes Artificial Intelligence Bias Worse: But it could be used to help fix the problem too.
50. Artificial intelligence and copyright (Andres Guadamuz)
51. We’re building a dystopia just to make people click on ads (Zeynep Tufekci)
52. Universal Music Group Announces Strategic Alliance With Virtual Reality Company Within
53. Amazon Amassed 7.1 Million Streaming Views In Four NFL Games 
54. Website copying allegations allow potpourri of claims (Rebecca Tushnet)
55. Three female engineers sue Uber for sex and race discrimination: Plaintiffs claim that “stack ranking” was stacked against them.
56. In shift to content distribution, Roku may stream to third-party devices: Roku’s mobile app could become a new hub for ad-supported channels.
57. GoFundMe Jumps into Original Content, Launches New Studio
58. Spotify Cancels Its Current Crop Of Original Video Series As It Looks To Design A New Format
59. Apple Taking Family-Friendly Approach To $1 Billion Original Content Push 
60. Apple’s $1 billion TV lineup will be family-friendly, not Game of Thrones: Hollywood insiders paint a picture of a conservative company testing the waters.
61. Is X > 8? Solving Apple’s iPhone sales equation: The iPhone 8 saw slow sales, while iPhone X demand quickly outstripped supply.
62. Apple Reportedly Fires Engineer After Daughter’s iPhone X Video Goes Viral
63. Apple Let YouTubers Review The iPhone X Ahead Of Traditional Tech Outlets
64. Don’t drop that iPhone X—a screen repair will cost you $279
65. Apple reportedly building iPhones, iPads without Qualcomm chips: Qualcomm has reportedly withheld software needed for testing its chips in Apple devices
66. Microsoft Partners With NFL Stars For ‘Create Change’ Campaign
67. AMD, which lost over $2.8B in 5 years, takes a hit after new report – Morgan Stanley: Demand for graphics chips, video game consoles will slow in 2018.
68. GrubHub “gig economy” trial ends with judge calling out plaintiff’s lies: Small details of a part-time actor’s delivery job have become a federal case.
69. The Little Black Box That Took Over Piracy 
70. The Rights of Synthetic Lifeforms is the Next Great Civil Rights Controversy
71. DARPA’s New Brain Device Increases Learning Speed by 40%
72. Prepping Self-Driving Cars For The World’s Most Chaotic Cities
73. Future of Invasive Neural Interfaces & Uploading Consciousness with Ramez Naam
74. Machine Learning Is Aiding in the Fight Against Mental Illness
75. The Robot Tank Designed To Fight Russians
76. Do Robots Have More Rights Than Women In Saudi Arabia?
77. Sony’s Aibo robot dog is back, gives us OLED puppy dog eyes: You can adopt Sony’s newest robo dog today for $1,700 down and a mandatory monthly fee
78. CAA Unveils Digital-Incubator Venture Creative Labs With $12.5 Million in Funding
79. CAA Launches Startup Studio To Found New Tech And Media Companies
80. Canadian Copyright, OA, and OER: Why the Open Access Road Still Leads Back to Copyright (Michael Geist)
81. Information Disorder: Toward an interdisciplinary framework for research and policymaking
82. This stupid patent was going to be used to sue hundreds of small businesses: A patent litigation factory was stopped from suing hundreds of small printers.
83. Whois? No, Whowas: Incoming Euro privacy rules torpedo domain registration system: Internet policy wonks scramble over GDPR
84. ‘I Forgot My Pin’: An Epic Tale Of Losing $30,000 In Bitcoin
85. Samsung’s Mining Rig Lets You Collect Cryptocurrency Using 40 Old Galaxy Smartphones
86. How Netflix works: the (hugely simplified) complex stuff that happens every time you hit Play
87. Netflix Cancels ‘House Of Cards’ In Response To Sexual Misconduct Claims Against Kevin Spacey
88. The Government’s Role in E-commerce: My Appearance Before the Standing Committee on International Trade (Michael Geist)
89. Prepping Self-Driving Cars For The World’s Most Chaotic Cities
90. Best-Ever Algorithm Found For Huge Streams Of Data
91. Rethinking Data Ownership in the Age of the IOT
92. Inside The Downfall Of Doppler Labs
93. The underground story of Cobra, the 1980s’ illicit handmade computer: In their poor, Communist country, Romania’s computer curious built an underground industry.
94. Google, others showcase emoji cheeseburger construction faux pas: Emoji fragmentation of a small stakes, culinary variety. 

CREATIVITY

1.  Gag order silencing Comic-Con producers declared unconstitutional: Appeals court says silencing online speech over trademark suit is unconstitutional.
2. Florida’s top court stops 1960s band from earning pre-1972 copyright royalties: Do states want copyright to sprawl even further? Two have said “no.”
3. Eight Mile Style v New Zealand National Party: National ‘Loses itself’ to Eminem in copyright case
4. New Zealand political party infringed Eminem copyright, must pay $412k: “Sound alike” track used by ad firm was too close to Eminem hit “Lose Yourself.”
5. CBS sues man for copyright over screenshots of 59-year-old TV show: Asked about the lawsuit, CBS says only that plaintiff will “end up on boot hill.”
6. Regulators crack down on gambling ads appealing to children
7. Australian Lawmakers Propose Outlawing Parody, Having A Sense Of Humor
8. There’s no free speech right to refuse wedding cakes to gay couples
9. Standing to Sue for Copyright Infringement: No Bright Line Rule for Stock Photo Agencies
10. Not every pattern is protected by copyright, even if creating it involved many choices
11. Evidence Continues To Show Benefit Of “Openness” In Copyright Regimes
12. The #MeToo moment
13. Against Allegedly
14. Reporter Arrested, Thrown To The Ground For Cursing
15. What future for UK copyright after Brexit? Report on IPKat-BLACA panel discussion
16. The Prehistory of Music: A conversation on the deep history of humans and music with Gary Tomlinson, author of A Million Years of Music.

MEDIA, COMMUNICATIONS & NET NEUTRALITY

1.  New CASL Ruling: CRTC Provides Guidance on B2B Messaging and the Due Diligence Defence
2. Ajit Pai submits plan to allow more media consolidation: Rules that preserve media diversity in local markets will be eliminated.
3. FCC chair wants to impose a cap on broadband funding for poor families: Pai proposes Lifeline budget cap and new limits on which ISPs can get subsidies.
4. Another broadband merger: CenturyLink gets FCC approval to buy Level 3: CenturyLink gets bigger while it faces lawsuits alleging overcharges.
5. Dead People Mysteriously Support The FCC’s Attack On Net Neutrality
6. Sprint/T-Mobile merger is off, preserving wireless competition (for now): Sprint owner wants to maintain control and invest in its network, report says.
7. How Right-Wing Media Is Ignoring The Mueller Indictments: “Much ado about nothing.”
8. Charter CEO Tries To Blame Netflix Password ‘Piracy’ For Company’s Failure To Adapt To Cord Cutting
9. Portugal Shows The Internet Why Net Neutrality Is Important
10. Verizon-Funded Group Claims Killing Net Neutrality Would Really Help Puerto Rico Right Now
11. Verizon Will Graciously Now Let You Avoid Video Throttling For An Additional $10 Per Month
12. Verizon creates new $10 monthly charge to remove video throttling: $10 add-on charge removes limit that restricts mobile videos to 720p.
13. Verizon Lobbies FCC To Block States From Protecting Broadband Privacy, Net Neutrality
14. Verizon has a new strategy to undermine online privacy and net neutrality: FCC should declare state broadband laws invalid, Verizon tells commission.
15. San Francisco, Seattle Tire of Comcast, Mull Building Citywide Fiber Networks
16. AT&T admits defeat in lawsuit it filed to stall Google Fiber: Judge dismissed AT&T’s lawsuit against Louisville, and company won’t appeal.
17. Pirate TV services are taking a bite out of cable company revenue: Millions of North Americans are using illegal TV services, research finds.
18. Careful what you wish for – Bill O’Reilly version 
19. Brian Williams Opens Up About His Unexpected Re-Invention: “Second Acts Are Possible, With A Little Spiffing Up”: Most broadcasters would have been cooked if they had undergone the sort of scandal that Williams faced in 2015. But a slow-and-steady revival—a mixture of dutiful penance, clever planning, and a dramatic change in the media—has Williams turning 11 p.m. into the new primetime.

SURVEILLANCE & PRIVACY

1. What Did Cambridge Analytica Really Do For Trump’s Campaign?
2. China Tests The Limits Of Its Us Hacking Truce
3. BlackBerry CEO Promises To Try To Break Customers’ Encryption If The US Gov’t Asks Him To
4. Rumors That Facebook Is Secretly Recording You Refuse to Die
5. A surge of sites and apps are exhausting your CPU to mine cryptocurrency: Coinhive harnesses the resources of 500 million people with no questions asked.
6. New Evidence Shows Defense Dep’t Abusing Surveillance Procedures To Spy On Americans
7. Video dooms cop who arrested nurse for not letting him take patient’s blood: Nurse told officer to get a warrant. Cop grabs her and arrests her for no reason.
8. Judge Doesn’t Care Much For DOJ’s Boilerplate, Refuses To Grant One Year Gag Order
9. FBI Says It Can’t Get Into 6,900 Encrypted Phones. So What?
10. Declassified Docs Show NSA Trying To Prosecute A Journalist For His Successful FOIA Requests
11. A new, virulent ransomware epidemic is fuelled by yet another leaked NSA cyberweapon
12. Assessing the threat the Reaper botnet poses to the Internet – what we know now: Whatever the threat posed by the new IoT botnet, a worse one has lurked for months.
13. Apple’s Machine Learning Engine Could Surface Your iPhone’s Secrets
14. Facing privacy suits about facial recognition
15. Back Down The Rabbit Hole About Encryption On Smartphones
16. Researcher Still Being Pursued By Russian Bank Over Last Year’s Mistaken Trump Connection Story
17. European Parliament Agrees Text For Key ePrivacy Regulation; Online Advertising Industry Hates It
18. Kim Dotcom settles case he filed against NZ police over “military-style raid”: Cops could have “knocked at our door at a reasonable hour and advised me of my arrest.”
19. Wyden’s Reform Bill Would Also Deter Misuse Of NSA Powers To Compel Tech Company Assistance
20. Members of Congress want you to hack the US election voting system: Bug-bounty program would exempt participants from federal hacking laws.
21. CIA releases 321 gigabytes of Bin Laden’s digital library, Web cache crap: “There is no absolute guarantee that all malware has been removed.”
22. Man finds USB stick with Heathrow security plans, Queen’s travel details: Secrets discovered when USB was plugged into library computer; data unencrypted.

GAMES

1. Dev draws flak for making a game about resisting oil pipelines
2. Energy Group Labels Creators Of Video Game As ‘Eco-Terrorists’
3. Oil lobbyists accuse game of promoting “eco-terrorism”: Thunderbird Strike “an eco-terrorist version of Angry Birds,” says Republican senator
4. Opinion: When Big Oil attacks your game
5. EA shuts down community-led classic Battlefield revival project
6. EA shuts down fan-run servers for older Battlefield games: Modified game clients were being used to get around defunct GameSpy servers.
7. Kotaku’s scum-and-villainy story of why EA shuttered a Star Wars game: The ripple effects of LucasArts’ closure apparently set Visceral’s demise into motion.
8. EA kicking a studio when it’s downsizing: 10 Years Ago This Month: EA Chicago’s closure makes the announcement of Visceral Games’ demise seem like a lesson in tact
9. Visceral devs share the story of the studio’s closure
10. EA CEO on Visceral closure: “It wasn’t about single-player vs live service” – But publisher says live services continue to be “the bedrock of our business”
11. EA CEO Comments On Closing Visceral And Why Its Star Wars Game Was Refocused: “It does happen from time to time as part of the creative process.”
12. EA tweaks Star Wars Battlefront II’s loot box drops following beta feedback
13. EA execs address Battlefront II loot box concerns: Publisher insists Star Wars shooter will offer good value to players, won’t be pay-to-win
14. Star Wars: Battlefront II changes its loot box plans… but is it enough?: Worst damage is fixed, but is this still too much Dark Side in a Star Wars game?
15. How the ESRB is Promoting Children’s Gambling
16. EA takes a loss in Q2 as digital sales continue to outshine physical
17. EA Sports helps EA grow revenue, narrow losses: Digital growth more than offsets 19% year-over-year decline of packaged goods revenues
18. PlayerUnknown Battlegrounds could face ban in China: Game deviates from values of socialism, according to China’s content watchdog
19. Football Manager to include gay players for first time in series’ history: “I just think it’s crazy that in 2017 we are in a world where people can’t be themselves,” says game director
20. So 52.45% of People Playing my Indie Game Have Pirated it…
21. Ubisoft says DRM isn’t the reason Assassin’s Creed: Origins pushes CPUs: VMProtect has “no perceptible effect,” game uses “full extent” of CPU by design.
22. With Denuvo Broken, Ubisoft Doubles Up On DRM for Assasin’s Creed Origin, Tanking Everyone’s Computers
23. Ubisoft has made its Sharpmake game dev tool open-source
24. U.S. gov’t stands by DMCA exemption for museums preserving online games
25. Amazon opens dedicated ‘Retro Zone’ for selling ‘retro’ games and gear
26. Wolfenstein II: a good argument for games to get political
27. Does Wolfenstein II’s brutal opening have design value?
28. Wolfenstein 2 Collectible Mocks Progressive Magazine Over Its Coverage Of White Nationalists 
29. The New Colossus: Building Wolfenstein II atop a million small decisions
30. Wolfenstein 2: The New Colossus Review – If the only good Nazi is a dead Nazi, I just made a whole pile of good Nazis.
31. Ethics 101: Designing Morality in Games
32. Dev Q&A: A Mortician’s Tale challenges how games depict death
33. The economics of single-player games: As many top studios focus on multiplayer, service-based games, does the business case for narrative-driven single-player titles still add up?
34. Reclaiming Assassin’s Creed’s lost identity
35. Sales and profits up at Nintendo as the Switch continues to shine
36. Nintendo Switch closing in on 8M sales worldwide
37. SNES Classic and Super Mario Odyssey hit 2M sales
38. Super Mario Odyssey hits 2 million sales: With Switch sales “tracking those of the Wii,” latest Mario game reached almost a third of the console’s audience
39. Odyssey breaks 3D Mario week one sales record in Japan
40. Super Mario Odyssey Review: Mario’s new romp joyously fuses old with new.
41. Switch shipments will near 17 million units by the end of March: Six-month results show big increases in revenue and profit, with 50 million units of software expected to ship this fiscal year
42. Nintendo survey reveals who’s purchasing the Switch
43. Data shows versatility of the Switch is more than just a gimmick: Nintendo still has a knack for designing unique hardware
44. Nintendo promises improved Switch availability for holiday season: Company bumps planned production by 4 million units to meet unexpected demand.
45. Nintendo: The least popular way to play Switch games is primarily on a TV
46. Super Mario Run is still short of Nintendo’s profit expectations: Despite reaching 200 million downloads, Nintendo tells investors that Mario’s mobile debut has “not yet reached an acceptable profit point”
47. Sony’s games division drives strong growth in profits
48. PlayStation drives Sony’s Q2 2017 revenues up to $18.25bn: Game and Network Services division saw sales more than double on 2016, PS4 shipments up to 67.5m units
49. Sony focus moving from hardware sales to active user base: PS4 maker the latest to underscore the increasing importance of engagement metrics over unit sales
50. Resident Evil 7 doubled PlayStation VR session time, says Sony
51. Daybreak gives PS3 version of DC Universe Online 3 months to live
52. Gartner’s Brian Blau on the State of the VR & AR Industries
53. Oculus’ Bernard Yee: “Everything we’ve done to date is the warm-up for VR” – Executive producer posits that VR is about ‘the fantasy of the small space’ during View Conference talk
54. Rob Pardo: VR MMOs not happening any time soon – World of Warcraft designer also offers advice to aspiring developers during his View Conference keynote
55. “VR’s potential is literally infinite” – Oculus: Jason Rubin on the VR road-map and why analogies to failed tech from analysts and critics “all fall flat for me”
56. CCP closes 2 studios as it backs away from VR development
57. CCP exits the VR business: EVE Online studio has shuttered its Atlanta studio and is selling its Newcastle studio – the strategy shift impacts about 100 staff
58. Google launches VR and AR object library called ‘Poly’
59. Free-to-play Fortnite: Battle Royale surpasses 811k concurrent players
60. Profits and revenue on the rise for Konami’s video game branch
61. Profits up at Konami thanks to strong performance in mobile market: Konami enjoys 24.5% year-on-year profit growth in games industry
62. Doubt cast on future of Amazon Game Studios’ first major development: Breakaway on “indefinite hiatus” according to report
63. Steam beta tests Curator changes: Valve adds tools to help devs deal with influencers, hopes to roll them out wider in coming weeks
64. Valve’s big Steam Curator overhaul aims to streamline key distribution
65. Xbox software and services Q1 revenue offsets hardware decline: CEO Satya Nadella positions revenue balance as “leading indicator” of Microsoft’s ambitions in the gaming sector
66. How Microsoft Delayed A Wildly Popular Xbox Feature To Clean Up Its Wildly Unpopular Always Online Plans
67. Microsoft has stopped making the Kinect, and that makes me sad: Robbing the Xbox of its eyes and ears makes it a lesser platform.
68. Microsoft could bring first-party titles to rival platforms
69. HoloLens availability expanded as Microsoft continues pushing it to industry: Redmond insists that Mixed Reality isn’t just for gaming.
70. Warner Bros. Interactive takes over Rocket League retail distribution
71. Firefly Games partners with Dreamworks for franchise-laden RPG
72. Riot Games introduces revenue sharing in EU LCS overhaul: Developer rethinks Challenger Series and looks to reward teams that “positively contribute to the success of the LCS”
73. A New Cornerstone of Human Culture is Transforming Our Oldest Institutions: The future of eSports is in the hands of the players. Can they take it?
74. Esports Execs Discuss Barriers, Advantages To Olympic Inclusion
75. Olympic Committee agrees eSports ‘could be considered’ legitimate sport
76. International Olympic Committee takes steps to recognise esports: IOC and international sports federation “in a dialogue with the games industry” on esports
77. Olympic committee lays out expectations for esports’ inclusion: They will need an international governing organization
78. Applying entrepreneurial skills to be a better game dev
79. Juggling the chainsaws of work-for-hire vs. original projects
80. Video Game Mini-Maps Might Finally Be Going Away
81. The untapped potential of games to shape the future: “The popular imagination of games hasn’t quite caught up to the reality,” says Near Future Society co-founder Oliver Lewis
82. Razer partners with devs to debut $700 game-focused Android phone
83. Razer Debuts Its First Phone, And It’s Built For Games
84. Essential Facts (Entertainment Software Association of Canada)

Jon

DIGITAL

1.  Demers v. Yahoo Inc: Québec Court Confirms that Québec Consumer Law Applies to Free Online Services
2. Google Removed Catalonian Referendum App Following Spanish Court Order
3. Another Court Rejects ‘Material Support To Terrorists’ Claims Against Social Media Sites–Gonzalez v. Google (Eric Goldman)
4. Controversial “Gripe Site” Protected (Again) by the Communications Decency Act and Defeats Novel Copyright Attack with Website “Browsewrap” License to User Generated Content
5. Spanski Enterprises, Inc. v. Telewizja Polska, S.A.: How Far Is Too Far When It Comes to the Extraterritorial Reach of US Copyright Law? 
6. Nielsen Data says 89% of OTT Viewing Takes Place on TV Sets
7. Apple calls report of reduced iPhone X Face ID specs “completely false”: Apple says Face ID will still only have a one-in-a-million chance of failing.
8. All The Face-Tracking Tech Behind Apple’s Animoji 
9. After Supreme Court detour, Apple v. Samsung goes to a fourth jury trial: Apple wields design as a weapon, a strategy that has led to judicial paralysis.
10. Apple’s Billion-Dollar Bet on Hollywood Is the Opposite of Edgy: A conservative corporation takes its first steps into a new industry.
11. Empathy – the latest gadget Silicon Valley wants to sell you: The tech world wants us to believe that virtual reality will unlock human understanding on a global scale. But it’s also a business strategy 
12. Vox Media Fires Editorial Director Lockhart Steele For Misconduct, Says Investigation Is “Ongoing”
13. Open for business, ransomware authors and perpetrators cashing in on emerging dark web marketplace economy 
14. Two-week-old Pixel 2 XL displays are already showing burn-in: LG’s terrible OLED panels have yet another issue.
15. Gab Drops Its Lawsuit Against Google; Considers Trying Its Hand At Lobbying
16. Copyright Office Will Renew Previous DMCA Exemptions Without Much Fuss — But Why Is This Even Necessary?
17. Report: Twitter CEO took a Russian impostor’s bait in 2016: The retweets were for innocent, “positive” stories.” And that was the point. 
18. Proposed law would regulate online ads to hinder Russian election influence: Honest Ads Act requires Google, Twitter, Facebook to open ads to public review.
19. When Russian Trolls Attack: Anna Zhavnerovich knew she was taking a risk when she publicized the details of her assault online. But in doing so, she joined a growing movement of survivors fighting back against Russia’s Kremlin-influenced trolling machine. 
20. Political ads on Twitter will now be labeled with lots of spending data: Follows mounting congressional pressure about social media ads and disclosure.
21. In its new timeline, Twitter will end revenge porn next week, hate speech in two: The company has laid out a “safety calendar” with changes through January.
22. Lawyers: Trump’s Twitter Account Not Presidential; Also: Trump Is President, Can’t Be Sued
23. Trump’s Favorite Law Firm Loses Massive RICO SLAPP Suit Against Greenpeace, But Has Another One Already Going
24. This Week’s Best Twitter Is College Kids Pretending to Flunk Midterms for Viral Fame 
25. Mercedes handles the competition because it knows how to handle data, too: Ahead of (another) Mercedes win, Ars gets a look at the team’s network stack.
26. High-tech mirror for cancer patients only works if you smile
27. UK Gov’t Considering Redefining Social Media Services As Publishers To Make It Easier To Control Them
28. How Social Media Endangers Knowledge
29. How Fiction Becomes Fact on Social Media 
30. The Responsibility of Online Platforms: a Marginal Challenge in Québec
31. Russian Cyberspies Are Rushing to Exploit Recent Flash 0-Day Before It Goes Cold
32. Computer Parts Site Newegg Is Being Sued for Allegedly Engaging in Massive Fraud [Updated]
33. Korean banks sue Newegg, allege online retailer aided massive fraud: Both Newegg, ASI will “vigorously defend” their companies and deny wrongdoing.
34. When Government Fails, Social Media Is The New 911
35. How blockchain technology can set us free from this Brexit time warp
36. Blockchains Explained In Two Minutes
37. MasterCard Announces That Payments Can Now be Made on Blockchain 
38. Your Browser Could Be Mining Cryptocurrency For A Stranger
39. An AI god will emerge by 2042 and write its own bible. Will you worship it?
40. Elon Musk Eviscerates People Who Discuss “A.I. Gods”
41. Artificial Intelligence in Christian Thought and Practice: This series by Christian computer scientists introduces questions for Christians about AI and its role in society
42. These Are The Ethical Dilemmas We Face As AI Takes Over Our Lives 
43. Using Abstract VR Art for Neural Entrainment & Brain Research + Can Creative AI Become Conscious?
44. The Surreal Comedy Bot That’s Turning AI Into LOL
45. Google Is Honing AI That Can Recognize Human Actions Using YouTube Videos
46. Insights: Google Knits Artificial Intelligence Into Everything, But Are We Sure It Won’t Be Evil?
47. Welcoming Our New Robot Overlords: Once, robots assisted human workers. Now it’s the other way around.
48. The Future of Online Dating Is Unsexy and Brutally Effective
49. Facebook is struggling to meet the burden of securing itself, security chief says: Chief Security Officer described security report as a “very painful process.”
50. How People Inside Facebook Are Reacting To The Company’s Election Crisis
51. Monopoly Power and the Future of Facebook
52. Will Facebook Kill All Future Facebooks?
53. Court Not Impressed With Sneaky Plan To Sell Patents To Native Americans To Avoid Review… But New Lawsuits Filed
54. Several women accuse tech pundit Robert Scoble of sexual harassment
55. Tech Writer Robert Scoble Accused of Sexual Harassment, Assault by Multiple Women
56. The Slippery Slope of Internet Censorship in Egypt: In response to a recent, dramatic increase of Internet filtering in Egypt, Internet users take to social media and Google Drive to protest filtering and disseminate banned content.
57. A Joke Tweet Leads To ‘Child Trafficking’ Investigation, Providing More Evidence Of Why SESTA Would Be Abused
58. Beyond ICE In Oakland: How SESTA Threatens To Chill Any Online Discussion About Immigration
59. Study On Craigslist Shutting ‘Erotic Services’ Shows SESTA May Hurt Those It Purports To Help
60. Is Hollywood ‘Exploiting’ Anti-Trafficking Organization To Support SESTA?
61. How A Startup’s Legal Battle With A Software Giant Could Redefine Tech Workers’ Rights
62. Uber, Intel, and other tech firms will urge Congress to let “Dreamers” stay – Uber: “We plan to support Dreamers as long as they need help.”
63. Regulators of ‘sharing economy’ platforms caught between competing interests
64. Cities around US offer billions in tax breaks to be Amazon’s HQ2: Cities and states are trying to one-up each other, showing off their best features.
65. Another German decision warns against broad application of GS Media presumption for for-profit link providers
66. NAFTA Modernization and IP/E-commerce: My Appearance at the Senate Open Caucus (Michael Geist)
67. Netflix Plans To Fund Its Increased 2018 Content Budget With Additional $1.6 Billion Of Debt
68. Netflix to Raise $1.6 Billion More Debt Financing to Fuel Content-Buying Binge
69. Nielsen Now Vends Ratings Info For Netflix Shows To Top Media Companies
70. Using YouTube Takedowns As Extortion
71. YouTube’s brilliant ad was one of the biggest stories from Game 1 of the World Series
72. As YouTube TV Begins World Series Ad Campaign, Its Play Button Vexes Viewers
73. Billboard Will Decrease Weight Of YouTube Views In Hot 100 Charts
74. How YouTube Entrepreneurs In Their 20s Are Disrupting Traditional Record Labels
75. “Despacito”, YouTube’s Most-Viewed Video, Was Shot In 14 Hours And Edited On Final Cut Pro X
76. Amazon Video Direct Funds Programming For The First Time By Investing In Funny Or Die Shorts
77. BroadbandTV Signs Yousef ‘FouseyTube’ Erakat, Bart Baker, And h3h3Productions
78. Snap Has Hundreds Of Thousands Of Unsold Spectacles Sitting In Warehouses 
79. The Judge’s Code: Meet the judge who codes — and decides tech’s biggest cases
80. Digital Goods Are Valued Less Than Physical Goods
81. How has digital journalism changed your work day?
82. How Big Tech Became A Bipartisan Whipping Boy 

CREATIVITY

1. Eminem Wins New Zealand Copyright Lawsuit; Awarded Over 400K In Damages
2. Author Who Lost Copyright Case Over The Da Vinci Code In The US In 2007 Looks To Revive It In The UK In 2017
3. TV formats potentially eligible for copyright protection as dramatic works under UK law
4. Forgetting Functionality (Christopher Buccafusco & Jeanne Fromer)
5. Copyright Laws Make Photographs of the Eiffel Tower at Night Illegal
6. Does a French copyright smell anything?
7. Judge Bars News Station From Showing Pictures In News Story, Admits It’s Prior Restraint, Shrugs
8. Hate speech is protected free speech, even on college campuses: My students trust colleges to control offensive speech. They shouldn’t.
9. Communism’s Answer to Mickey Mouse Is Thrust Into a Very Capitalist Dispute
10. Long Trail Brewing Sues East Coast Apparel Company Over ‘Take A Hike’ T-Shirt
11. Harvey Weinstein Case Brings Sexual Harassment Back to the Spotlight 
12. Photographer Spends Eternity Waiting For Museum Visitors To Match Artworks And The Result Is Worth The Wait
13. Serialized Television Has Become a Disease
14. How (not) to protect an idea for a TV format 
15. Arnold Schwarzenegger Thinks Last Action Hero Bombed Because of Bill Clinton 

MEDIA, COMMUNICATIONS & NET NEUTRALITY

1. Government Rejects Call for an Internet Tax: “Conflicts With Principle of Affordable Access” (Michael Geist)
2. Compliance and Enforcement Decision CRTC 2017-367: 3510395 Canada Inc., operating as Compu.Finder – Constitutional challenge to Canada’s Anti-Spam Legislation
3. Bill O’Reilly says he was one of many employees accused of sexual harassment at Fox
4. James Murdoch Says Size of O’Reilly Settlement Was ‘News to Me’ 
5. Local TV and radio stations no longer required to have local studios: Republicans eliminate rule, make it easier for stations to close local studios.
6. The Main Studio Rule Is Dead; Long Live the Main Studio 
7. FCC Approves Repeal of Main Studio Rules and Starts Proceeding to Examine Broadcast Public Notices and Filing of TV Ancillary and Supplementary Revenue Reports 
8. FCC Likely To Use Thanksgiving Holiday To Hide Its Unpopular Plan To Kill Net Neutrality
9. A Public Focused Approach To Net Neutrality
10. Michigan Lawmaker Flees Twitter After Reports Highlight She Helped AT&T Push Anti-Competition Broadband Law
11. Verizon brings back full-quality video streaming for $10 more: If you want your mobile video to stream in 4K on Verizon, you’ll need to pay extra. And have the right phone.
12. Report: Verizon struggling to launch streaming TV service in crowded field – It’s had two delays and now plans to launch in the spring, says Bloomberg. 
13. Verizon’s Long-Shot Bet To Disrupt Google And Facebook
14. Michigan Lawmaker Doesn’t Understand Her Own Bill Hamstringing Broadband Competition
15. The Cable Industry’s Ingenious ‘Solution’ To TV Cord Cutting? Raise Broadband Rates
16. After Report Suggests It Ripped Off Taxpayers, Frontier Communications Shrugs When Asked For Subsidies Back
17. $100 Internet bill became $340 for no reason, Frontier customer says: Overcharges continue for months despite customer service promising a fix.
18. Google Fiber is now in Louisville thanks to new fiber deployment strategy: Microtrenching sped up work in Louisville during court battle over utility poles.
19. Wireless Carriers Again Busted Collecting, Selling User Data Without Consent Or Opt Out Tools
20. Jails pocket up to 60 percent of what inmates pay for phone calls: “Site commissions” raise prices by sending up to 60 percent of revenue to jails. 

SURVEILLANCE & PRIVACY

1. DOJ changes “gag order” policy, Microsoft to drop lawsuit – Brad Smith, Microsoft’s attorney: “It is an unequivocal win for our customers.”
2. New DOJ Policy Restricts Use Of Warrant/Subpoena Gag Orders
3. Government Drops Its Demand For Data On 6,000 Facebook Users
4. Amazon Key Is Bigger Than Package Delivery
5. Amazon Key unlocks your door for in-home package deliveries: Will you let Amazon be the gatekeeper to your home?
6. Court Has No Problem With All House Residents Being Forced To Hand Over Fingers To Law Enforcement
7. Judge: MalwareTech is no longer under curfew, GPS monitoring – Marcus Hutchins, awaiting trial, can now live and work unencumbered in LA.
8. New Ransomware Linked To Notpetya Sweeps Russia And Ukraine
9. New wave of data-encrypting malware hits Russia and Ukraine: Highly advanced “Bad Rabbit” hits train stations, airport, and media.
10. DOJ Subpoenas Twitter About Popehat, Dissent Doe And Others Over A Smiley Emoji Tweet
11. The DOJ’s Bizarre Subpoena Over An Emoji Highlights Its Ridiculous Vendetta Against A Security Researcher
12. The Reaper IoT Botnet Has Already Infected A Million Networks
13. Equifax Deserves The Corporate Death Penalty
14. Key e-mail from feds got caught in body-cam maker’s spam filter: Axon hopes “to resolve these matters as expeditiously as possible.”
15. Police body cams had no “statistically significant effect” in DC: “There was no indication that the cameras changed behavior at all.”
16. NYPD Tells Judge Its $25 Million Forfeiture Database Has No Backup
17. NYPD can’t get story straight on evidence system backups: Deputy commissioner says the system is “backed up”; IT staff affidavit says otherwise.
18. FBI director: Unbreakable encryption is a “huge, huge problem”: “I get it, there’s a balance that needs to be struck,” Christopher Wray said.
19. Law Prof Argues Cell Location Records Shouldn’t Need Warrants Because Cell Phones Have Encryption
20. Time For The Feds To Say What They Know About Kaspersky
21. Worker who snuck NSA malware home had his PC backdoored, Kaspersky says: Kaspersky presses its case it didn’t knowingly help Russia steal NSA secrets.
22. Kaspersky pledges independent code review to cast off spying suspicions: After accusations by DHS of ties to Russian intel, company seeks to reassure customers.
23. Crippling crypto weakness opens millions of smartcards to cloning: Gemalto IDPrime.NET almost certainly isn’t the only smartcard vulnerable to ROCA.
24. How To Avoid Future Krack-Like Failures: Create Well-Maintained ‘Fat’ Protocols Using Initial Coin Offerings
25. “Security concerns” lead to LTE service shutdown on Chinese Apple Watches: The Chinese government doesn’t know what to do with eSIMs yet.
26. Amazon Key Puts Deliveries—And Delivery People—In Your Home
27. Computer hacking victims to receive up to £6,000 compensation for ‘distress’ caused by cyber crime, under new plans: There are fears the EU regulations will spark industry of bogus hacking claims – Companies with millions of customers could be left crippled if they have to pay – Bill would give right for payout for ‘psychiatric and psychological damage’ – In 2013 157,000 TalkTalk customers were affected when it was hacked – If everyone affected claimed, the company would have to pay £471 million 
28. On Internet-Connected Toys and Human Flourishing: Hello, Privacy
29. Police Camera Study Shows New Tech Having Little Effect On Misconduct And Excessive Force
30. Google, Facebook & Comcast Jointly Lied to California Lawmakers To Scuttle Broadband Privacy Bill
31. How lobbyists convinced lawmakers to kill a broadband privacy bill: Leaked documents reveal scare tactics that helped ISPs avoid privacy rules.
32. A comparative guide to data security penalties in 10+ jurisdictions

GAMES

1. Slot machine denies Horizon: Zero Dawn DLC trademark – US patent office suspends The Frozen Wilds DLC trademark for similarities to mobile game Frozen Wild
2. ‘Hey dude, do this’: the last resort for female gamers escaping online abuse – In the toxic environment of online gaming, women play incognito, pretend to be male or say nothing to avoid harassment
3. The games industry responds to #MeToo: “By acting now, we can save countless individuals from physical, mental, and emotional pain, suffering, and distress”
4. Implied sexual assault scene in Call of Duty modified for Australia: The “threat of sexual violence” no longer listed as content warning, but title remains rated R18+
5. What’s next for Activision Blizzard’s $300m merchandise business: Consumer Products CEO on Activision Blizzard’s new franchise philosophy
6. Hearthstone Player Waves His Hand, Sets Off Controversy
7. Game Boss interview: How Zoe Quinn survived Gamergate and lived to fight Internet hate
8. NeoGAF goes offline in wake of sexual assault allegations: “The story doesn’t reconcile logically with the facts,” says site founder
9. Community Fallout from UploadVR’s Harassment Settlement, and Bearing Witness to Testimony
10. Andromeda dev chalks up some of the game’s problems to a lack of diversity
11. What do you do when a hate group steals your logo?: How a Star Citizen player group responded to white nationalists adopting their branding, and what publishers could learn from Cloud Imperium’s response
12. NPD: Loot box controversy having no impact on game sales – Despite consumer outcry, the analysis firm tells GamesIndustry.biz AAA titles with microtransactions still appear among biggest sellers
13. Destiny 2 PC Players Reporting Mass Bans, And No One Has Explained Why
14. Bungie denies reports that innocuous apps led to PC Destiny 2 bans: But hundreds of angry players say they’ve been banned “for nothing.”
15. Why LeBron James Doesn’t Own the Rights to His Tattoos
16. How GTA Online painfully pulled Rockstar into the ‘live games’ biz
17. Rockstar wants to return to single-player DLC in future games: GTA V was “very, very complete,” and absence of add-on content wasn’t a “conscious decision”
18. EA ‘pushing for more open-world games [because] you can monetise them better,’ says ex-Bioware dev – Manveer Heir: “I’ve seen people literally spend $15,000 on Mass Effect multiplayer cards.”
19. Opinion: The game industry must face up to its gambling problem
20. Harmonix lays off 14 in bid to ‘reduce overhead’
21. Gaming’s Fall Season Ain’t What It Used To Be
22. Facebook updates Instant Games platform with video ads and ‘robust’ dev tools
23. Facebook Instant Games trialling monetisation options for developers: In-app purchases and ads coming to a select set of games
24. Mobile App Sweepstakes and Social Media – A Legal Perspective
25. Google Play and App Store downloads and spending hit record levels
26. Mobile downloads and consumer spending hit record high: iOS and Google Play enjoyed a 28% year on year growth in revenue for Q3, report says
27. Adding multiplayer would “dilute” Wolfenstein’s storytelling: MachineGames’ Tommy Tordsson Björk on the benefits of single-player focus to “pushing the boundaries” in The New Colossus
28. Gran Turismo Sport review: A brilliant, but very new, direction for the series: The latest game in this legendary franchise is all about racing online and e-sports.
29. Nintendo Switch surpasses 2M sales in the U.S.
30. Nintendo Switch passes 2 million US sales: Console was the best-selling games device in America for third consecutive month, according to NPD data
31. Skipmore’s Kamiko sells 150,000 on Switch: Two-person Japanese studio sees a big return on Nintendo’s new console
32. Switch update brings video capture and pre-purchasing
33. Nintendo Switch’s first portable dock offers freedom, but with new shackles: Nyko dock delivers a much-needed option—but it comes with serious dealbreakers.
34. Nintendo revisiting freemium model in Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp
35. Nintendo fully embraces in-app purchases with Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp: Publisher moves past its “deep-rooted suspicion” of free-to-play for next mobile release
36. Nintendo quietly adds GameCube controller support in latest Switch update
37. Your old GameCube controllers now work with the Nintendo Switch: Stealth update could pave the way for Virtual Console, new Smash Bros..
38. Unreleased Super NES game to come packed with every Analogue Super Nt – Super Turrican: Director’s Cut unearths the uncut 6 Mbit version of the game.
39. Denuvo’s DRM now being cracked within hours of release: Best-in-class service can’t even provide a full day of protection these days.
40. Multiple Titles Using Denuvo Cracked On Release Day As Other Titles Planning To Use It Bail On It Completely
41. Devs tell tales of what happens when you give your game to pirates: “It’s definitely been a good decision. Your game is going to end up on piracy websites regardless, and you might as well have fun with it, and in a way prevent it from being a virus or some malicious software.”
42. Eye Tracking Shows Where ELEAGUE Gamers Look On The Screen
43. New York Yankees invest in Vision Esports: Most valuable team in baseball ventures into the world of competitive video games
44. Why the NCAA doesn’t have a place in esports
45. Investors pour $25M into eSports team Cloud9
46. Esports firm Cloud9 raises $25m in latest funding round: Investors include WWE, Beverly Hills Sports Council, Washington Wizards owner and more
47. Intel: VR is “eye-opening moment” for computing –  Kim Pallister, director of the Intel VR Center of Excellence, on the chip maker’s goals for VR and why it sees VR making esports more accessible
48. From taverns to tournaments: The rise of Gwent as an esport: CD Projekt Red’s Rafał Jaki explains why the studio’s competitive gaming ambitions are “not some calculated decision based on a spreadsheet”
49. Microsoft launches TruePlay, an anti-cheat for UWP games
50. Windows now includes gaming cheat detection at the system level: Optional “TruePlay” protects game memory, monitors OS for common cheating patterns.
51. Microsoft introduces anti-cheating tool for UWP games developers: TruePlay aims to help studios monitor their games for common attacks, locks opt-out players from selected modes
52. Microsoft kills the Kinect as production shuts down
53. Microsoft discontinues Kinect: Depth-sensing Xbox camera shelved after seven years and 35 million units sold
54. Microsoft Fully Discontinues The Kinect
55. Microsoft has stopped making the Kinect, and that makes me sad: Robbing the Xbox of its eyes and ears makes it a lesser platform.
56. Now we know why Xbox One backward compatibility took so long: Response to “always on” Internet fiasco put “back compat” on the backburner.
57. Steam users can now send gift cards digitally
58. Five reasons why Christmas 2017 might not be a disaster for games retail: It hasn’t started well, but there are still reasons to be hopeful
59. Researchers expect close holiday competition between Xbox One X and PS4 Pro
60. Xbox publishing head: Single-player games aren’t dead, just more complicated
61. Sony: Planet of the Apes and PlayLink will help us reach non-gamers – Platform holder expects recognisable IP to play a big role in selling PlayStations to the masses
62. Does Visceral’s closure prove AAA single-player games are dying?
63. Ex-Visceral dev calls death of single-player fears “totally absurd”: Studio’s former level designer saddened by studio closure, but supports EA’s shift towards service games
64. What the F&*K is a Gamerunner, and why do we need them?
65. 666M tuned in to video game streams and videos last year, says SuperData
66. A game dev’s romp through interesting 2017 game market data
67. Over three times as many video game projects fail than succeed on Kickstarter: Video games continue to stagnate on the platform while board games are breaking records
68. Interview With Ryan Morrison, Video Game Attorney – High Noon Hot Seat
69. Gaming video content has an audience of 665 million: SuperData report forecasts ads and direct consumer spending to push GVC earnings to $4.6 billion in 2017
70. Making the industry’s voice heard on Brexit: Exiting the EU is one of the biggest challenges the UK games sector has ever faced; the industry desperately needs its access to skilled staff to be protected
71. Games for the Many: how Labour plans to win elections with video games – Designer Rosa Carbó-Mascarell on using video games to make politics accessible
72. Gabe Newell’s $5.5bn net worth puts him in US’ top 100 wealthiest: Valve boss reaches No.97 on latest Forbes rich list, believed to own just over half his company
73. Keywords agrees to $66.4M deal for game testing giant VMC
74. British Games Institute seeking support from UK government
75. Cognitive Biases to Watch Out For When Running a Games Business
76. The Philosophy of Grinding and how to Reduce it
77. Devs push back on Patreon’s ‘clearer stance’ regarding adult content
78. A Brief History of Rappers Who Dress Like JRPG Villains
79. Engare review: The geometry of Islamic art becomes a treasure of a game
80. How games media can work more effectively with PR: LittleBig PR’s Gareth Williams offers a counterpoint to our recent piece on the relationships between journalists and the industry
81. Returning to Second Life: Long after its grandest ambitions have faded, the platform still boasts people and profit.
82. How Neopets influenced a generation of devs
83. UNC Star Joel Berry II Loses Video Game, Punches Door, Breaks Hand

Jon

DIGITAL

1. Catalan independence websites blocked by Spanish government in bid to stop referendum: ‘Blocking domain name servers is doing what Turkey does and what China does and North Korea does’
2. The Disturbing Rise Of Cyberattacks Against Abortion Clinics
3. Iran Cracks Down On Movie Pirates In The Most Inception-Esque Manner Possible
4. Russia Moves to Block Cryptocurrency Exchanges
5. Miami Beach Police Unaware Of The First Amendment, Arrest Guy For Twitter Parody Account
6. Miami Beach cops arrest man for Twitter parody of police spokesman – Police chief: Parody “threatened to damage the reputation” of police department.
7. Congress members threaten Twitter with regulation if it doesn’t suppress ‘racially divisive communications’ and ‘anti-American sentiments’
8. Alt-White: How the Breitbart Machine Laundered Racist Hate – Here’s How Breitbart And Milo Smuggled Nazi and White Nationalist Ideas Into The Mainstream – A cache of documents obtained by BuzzFeed News reveals the truth about Steve Bannon’s alt-right “killing machine.”
9. Fantasy gambling is newsworthy, doesn’t violate players’ rights of publicity (Rebecca Tushnet)
10. Suing Doe reviewers under the Lanham Act fails (Rebecca Tushnet)
11. Hyperlinking to Sources Can Help Defeat Defamation Claims–Adelson v. Harris (Eric Goldman)
12. B.C. social-media terror case shows pitfalls for prosecution (Benjamin Perrin)
13. Real Talk About Fake News: Towards a Better Theory for Platform Governance (Nabiha Syed)
14. How to seek truth in the era of fake news
15. Supreme Court Leaves Troubling CFAA Rulings In Place: Sharing Passwords Can Be Criminal Hacking
16. Potential Lawsuit Could Reveal How Trump Targeted Voters on Facebook and If There’s Any Connection to Russia
17. How Israel Caught Russian Hackers Scouring the World for U.S. Secrets
18. Kaspersky reportedly modified its AV to help Russia steal NSA secrets: Hackers used company’s software to secretly scan for top-secret information, WSJ says.
19. Kaspersky, Russia, And The Antivirus Paradox
20. Silicon Valley’s Russian ads problem, explained: Why Facebook, Google and Twitter find themselves in the middle of an investigation into the 2016 election.
21. Report: Facebook removed references to Russia from fake-news report – Facebook decided it didn’t have enough evidence to name Russia in April report.
22. Atone? He’d better: Facebook is still the biggest source of right-wing fake news – From Hillary rumors to the nonexistent Puerto Rico truckers’ strike, Facebook continues to spread total garbage
23. The Threat of Big Tech Is Real: Why it’s time to panic about what Google and Facebook are doing to our lives.
24. “The Industry Is Fundamentally Broken”: Women On Sexism In Silicon Valley
25. How Facebook Rewards Polarizing Political Ads
26. The science behind why fake news is so hard to wipe out: It’s time for Facebook and Google to pay attention to the psychology of the illusory truth effect.
27. How Facebook Outs Sex Workers
28. Facebook outsources its fake news problem to Wikipedia—and an army of human moderators
29. Accidental Dow Jones News Report Claims Google to Buy Apple for $9 Billion
30. Dow Jones posts fake story claiming Google was buying Apple: Story claims Jobs arranged the $9 billion acquisition in his will.
31. Why Apple could be slapped with a massive $15 billion Irish tax bill: Tech giants use shell companies to defer corporate income tax bills indefinitely.
32. Jony Ive’s creativity pales compared to Apple’s App Store lawsuit defense: Apple sells “software distribution services to developers” who lease App Store space.
33. Supreme Court says live streaming would “adversely affect” oral arguments: Court wants transparency “while preserving the integrity of its proceedings.”
34. Facebook’s Promise of Community Is a Lie: Under increasing criticism for spreading fake news, the internet giant is using communitarianism as a shield.
35. Monopoly Men: After an eventful summer in Silicon Valley, there is blood in the water. At stake is democracy itself.
36. Should Facebook And Twitter Be Regulated Under The First Amendment?
37. Insights: New Year, New Start for Facebook’s Ad Targeting Troubles
38. Dove apologizes for ‘racist’ ad that caused outcry on social media
39. Twitter Temporarily Blocks Campaign Ad… Getting It Much More Attention
40. “Baby body parts” campaign ad from US House member blocked by Twitter
41. Algorithms Have Already Gone Rogue
42. Most people saw the Las Vegas shooting as a tragedy. Propagandists saw an opportunity.: Fake rumors designed to spread anti-leftist bias included making up victims, wrongly identifying the shooter, and feeding false narratives to media.
43. YouTube Enacts Search Algorithm Changes After Las Vegas Conspiracy Videos Run Rampant
44. Return of the algorithm monster: YouTube auto-promoted conspiracy theory videos – Dubious search results have led YouTube to “accelerate the rollout of planned changes.”
45. Algorithmic Consumer Protection: To manage the risks & benefits of AI, we need to look beyond the fairness and accuracy of AI decisions.
46. Vegan’s life upended after Facebook rant about “carnists” killed in Vegas: “It’s almost like a lynch mob is forming,” she says about the fallout from her post.
47. YouTube Restricts Videos Related To Bump Stocks In Wake Of Las Vegas Shooting
48. When YouTube Removes Violent Videos, It Impedes Justice
49. Creators Cry Foul After YouTube Demonetizes Casey Neistat’s #LoveArmyLasVegas Video
50. Jake Paul Sued For Damaging Man’s Hearing During Car Horn Prank
51. German YouTube Star Finds Himself Facing Trial One Year After Ill-Advised Prank
52. Defy Media Fires ‘Honest Trailers’ Creator Andy Signore After Wave Of Sexual Misconduct Allegations
53. Amazon Weighing New Ad Programs To Make It A More Formidable YouTube Competitor (Report)
54. GAW Miners founder owes nearly $10 million to SEC over Bitcoin fraud: Homero Josh Garza’s now-defunct companies must also pay $10 million.
55. The Creator of Bitcoin Comes Clean, Only to Disappear Again
56. How a Silicon Valley Striver Became the Alt-Right’s Tech Hero: Andrew Torba founded Gab.ai as a “free speech” alternative to other social networks
57. Google CEO Sundar Pichai: ‘I don’t know whether humans want change that fast’ – From artificial intelligence to cheap smartphones, Google is on the frontline of technological development. But is it growing too big and moving too fast?
58. Google’s New AI Can Mimic Human Speech Almost Perfectly
59. Google’s Internet-Beaming Balloons Will Soon Be Floating Over Puerto Rico
60. Google Fiber is losing interest in old-school TV: Existing TV customers will be kept on, but some will see a price increase.
61. Kurzweil Claims That the Singularity Will Happen by 2045
62. The Last Invention of Man: How AI might take over the world.
63. The Seven Deadly Sins of AI Predictions: Mistaken extrapolations, limited imagination, and other common mistakes that distract us from thinking more productively about the future.
64. Put Humans at the Center of AI
65. Waiting for the AI claims hurricane 
66. We Almost Gave Up On Building Artificial Brains
67. As IBM Ramps Up Its AI-Powered Advertising, Can Watson Crack the Code of Digital Marketing?: Acquisition of The Weather Company fuels a new division
68. Should drunk drivers be charged with DUI in fully autonomous cars?: New laws will have to be written based on the level of automation you have.
69. How Smartphones Hijack Our Minds: Research suggests that as the brain grows dependent on phone technology, the intellect weakens
70. ‘Our minds can be hijacked’: the tech insiders who fear a smartphone dystopia: Google, Twitter and Facebook workers who helped make technology so addictive are disconnecting themselves from the internet. Paul Lewis reports on the Silicon Valley refuseniks alarmed by a race for human attention
71. While You Were Offline: The People Of Twitter Agree With Rex Tillerson
72. Does The Media Cover Trump Too Much? Too Harshly? Too Narrowly?
73. Your Data is Being Manipulated (danah boyd)
74. Six Features of the Disinformation Age
75. Facebook Security Chief Alex Stamos Hits Back at Media Coverage of Its Algorithms
76. Facebook security chief rants about misguided “algorithm” backlash
77. Facebook Quietly Enters Starcraft War For AI Bots, And Loses
78. At UN, robot Sophia joins meeting on artificial intelligence and sustainable development
79. The Reports Are In: AI and Robots Will Significantly Threaten Jobs in 5 Years
80. District 9 Director’s New Short Movie Offers A Disturbing Look At Our AI Future
81. New Theory Cracks Open The Black Box Of Deep Neural Networks
82. Why Don’t We Know the 100s of Women Writing About Tech?: When the Los Angeles Review of Books included only one woman writer in its tech issue, the Internet responded with a glorious list of women writers we should all know.
83. How To Tell When Someone Else Tweets From @Realdonaldtrump
84. What Rick and Morty fans’ meltdown over McDonald’s Szechuan Sauce says about geek culture: The mass revolt illustrated what increasingly toxic fandom culture looks like in real life.
85. McDonald’s apologizes after ‘Rick and Morty’ Szechuan sauce deal makes adults mad, kids cry
86. Dubai Prince Shows Off His Life Like No Other Royal
87. Netflix Is Raising Prices Again
88. Netflix raises its US monthly fee again, but only for two plans: The lowest tier stays the same, and the others are still competitive.
89. Why Shonda Rhimes left TV for Netflix: ‘I love the creative freedom’
90. Publishers seek removal of millions of papers from ResearchGate: Academic social network accused of infringing copyright on a massive scale
91. New ‘Coalition For Responsible Sharing’ About To Send Millions Of Take-Down Notices To Stop Researchers Sharing Their Own Papers
92. Library trolls copyright zealots by naming collection after Sonny Bono: Little-known copyright provision allows reproduction of full book texts.
93. Authors Alliance & Creative Commons Launch New Termination Of Transfer Tool
94. Windows Phone is now officially dead: A sad tale of what might have been
95. “Technical difficulties” plague Arizona lottery; same winning numbers drawn: Yet again, Arizona Lottery investigates a glitch with a random number generator.
96. 7th Annual Streamy Awards Live Stream Scores One Million Unique Viewers On Twitter
97. AOL Is Shutting Down AIM in December
98. kthxbai: AOL Instant Messenger is being turned off on December 15^th – 20 years is a long time on the Internet.
99. So Long, Aim. For Years, For Millions, You Were The Internet
100. Fact: Asking Whether We Live in a Simulation is Not A Scientific Question
101. Tim O’Reilly on why the future probably won’t be all that terrible: Economies as AI, humans as gut bacteria for tech, and how the Luddites got it wrong.
102. What is the Value of Re-use? Complementarities in Popular Music (Jeremy Watson)
103. Online Platforms and Free Speech: Regulating Fake News (Yale Law Journal)
104. DPLA Exchange Offers Library-Centered Ebook Marketplace
105. EU Commission issues guidance to online platforms for tackling illegal content online

CREATIVITY

1.  Ennio Morricone Loses Bid to Reclaim Rights to Film Scores
2. Appeals Court Skeptical About Overturning Marvin Gaye Family’s “Blurred Lines” Victory
3. Salt Lake Comic Con Fights Back Against Judge’s ‘Unprecedented’ Gag Order
4. Courtroom “Feud” Leaves Accurate Speech About Celebrities Unprotected
5. Who Can Create Copyrightable Work in Canada? Musings on a Monkey’s Selfie
6. Books from 1923 to 1941 Now Liberated!
7. Gender stereotyping in UK advertising – staying on the right side of the line  
8. Entertainment trade associations looking for opportunity to push a false narrative
9. From Aggressive Overtures to Sexual Assault: Harvey Weinstein’s Accusers Tell Their Stories – Multiple women share harrowing accounts of sexual assault and harassment by the film executive.
10. Men Must Step Up to Change the Hollywood Culture That Enabled Harvey Weinstein 
11. Caroline Gleich Fights Back Against Cyber Harassment: Caroline Gleich’s Instagram feed is full of epic shots of the pro skier conquering the planet’s hardest lines. But in recent years, it was marred by an ugly shadow: anonymous bullies whose abusive comments left a wake of anxiety and doubt. Then Gleich spoke out about her tormenters—and realized she wasn’t the only adventure athlete being harassed online. 
12. The share of women in newsrooms has increased barely 1 percentage point since 2001, ASNE data shows: Things are almost as bad when it comes to the hiring of people of color: The share of POC working in American newsrooms is up 2.9 percent since 2001.
13. The fight for the First Amendment, on campuses and football fields, from the sixties to today.
14. Can the First Amendment save us?: It took a long time for the press to gain freedom and respect in America. Now both are in peril.
15. How hip hop became the force behind Gabon’s political activism
16. Bassel Khartabil’s Story Proves Online Activism Is Still Powerful
17. Is Trump-Whisperer Maggie Haberman Changing The New York Times?: She’s a West Wing-beat colossus and a sui generis creature at the paper of record. “Maggie’s success is very much part of that tabloid, Twitter-fied sensibility bleeding into the Times,” says a colleague.
18. Trump and the Watergate effect: Will young journalists still be inspired by today’s watchdog reporting?
19. The Liberation of Kesha: Before she could make one of the year’s best albums, Kesha had to save her own life
20. Whoops: Drug ads gloss over risks with a mind trick – that’s backed by the FDA – Drug makers are supposed to be forthcoming with health risks – and the more the better.
21. France Has ‘Champagne,’ Portugal Has ‘Port.’ Should Australia Have ‘Uggs?’
22. Marvel Keeps Making TV—But How Many Networks Is Too Many?
23. Canada: The cult of personality (rights)

MEDIA, COMMUNICATIONS & NET NEUTRALITY

1. Netflix in campaign to ‘set record straight’ on $500-million pledge for Canadian productions
2. Think There Should be a Netflix Tax?: Why There is Nothing Stopping Canadian Subscribers From Paying Today (Michael Geist)
3. Donald Trump tweet suggests that FCC should take NBC off the air: That’s “not how it works,” FCC commissioner tells the president.
4. Zero Rating & Internet Adoption
5. Advertised broadband speeds should actually be realistic, UK tells ISPs: ISPs would have 30 days to improve speeds or risk losing customers.
6. Anybody Claiming Net Neutrality Rules Killed Broadband Investment Is Lying To You
7. Wall Street Predicts Apathetic Regulators And Limited Competition Will Let Comcast Double Broadband Prices
8. Analysts Predict Sprint, T-Mobile Merger Will Be A Massive Job Killer 

SURVEILLANCE & PRIVACY

1. SCC rules residential school survivors’ testimony should be kept private
2. US Government Has ‘No Right To Rummage’ Through Anti-Trump Protest Website Logs, Says Judge
3. Court significantly reins in what data anti-Trump website must give to feds – Judge: DOJ can’t “rummage through the information contained on DreamHost’s website.”
4. Treasury Department Wing Latest To Be Accused Of Domestic Spying
5. Supreme Court: Hacking conviction stands for man who didn’t hack computer: High court refuses to hear appeal of hacking conviction, one-year prison sentence.
6. Russia reportedly stole NSA secrets with help of Kaspersky—what we know now: Proven or not, the accusations almost certainly mean the end of Kaspersky as we know it.
7. How Kaspersky AV reportedly was caught helping Russian hackers steal NSA secrets: Reports say Israeli spies burrowed inside Kaspersky’s network caught Russia red handed.
8. Hackers Grab More NSA Exploits, Possibly With Assistance Of Russian Antivirus Developer
9. The NSA’s ‘Time Machines’ Make It Incredibly Easy To Violate Section 702 Restrictions
10. The Worst-Case Scenario For John Kelly’s Hacked Phone
11. House Judiciary Committee Introduces Weak Surveillance Reform Bill
12. Deputy AG Pitches New Form Of Backdoor: ‘Responsible Encryption’
13. Trump’s DOJ tries to rebrand weakened encryption as “responsible encryption”: DOJ rekindles fight with Apple, wants government access to encrypted devices.
14. DOJ Says No One Has Any Right To Question The Adminstration’s Handling Of Records, Not Even The Courts
15. How the Chinese cyberthreat has evolved
16. UK Home Secretary Calls Tech Leaders ‘Patronizing’ For Refusing To Believe Her ‘Safe Backdoors’ Spiels
17. Man who sued over Facebook childbirth livestream slapped with $120k in fees: Plaintiff stayed mum about possible money received in three other cases.
18. The Equifax Aftermath – We Need More Hacking
19. Man: My wife and I were secretly filmed at our Airbnb rental – “I hope more victims will come forward,” says man who claims he was recorded naked.
20. T-Mobile customer data plundered thanks to bad API: T-Mobile missed bug that allowed harvesting of IMSI numbers, security question answers.
21. Hackers Score Touchdown: NFL Players Association Hit With Data Breach 
22. Google is permanently nerfing all Home Minis because mine spied on everything I said 24/7 
23. Sex Toys Are Just As Poorly-Secured As The Rest Of The Internet of Broken Things
24. Locking Your Phone Like This Is Pretty Much Useless
25. Mattel withdraws kid-focused “smart hub” from market after complaints: Lawmakers, child advocates expressed concern about caregiving being “outsourced.”
26. Beware of sketchy iOS popups that want your Apple ID: Benign iOS prompts are indistinguishable from those generated by malicious apps.
27. Schrems Redux: What’s the Future for Transatlantic Data Transfers?
28. An Irish Court Clouds the Future of EU Data Transfers: The Luck of the Model Clauses May Be Done

GAMES

1. Epic sues alleged Fortnite hackers Brandon Broom and Charles Vraspir
2. How anime landed BattleTech and the MechWarrior games in legal trouble
3. “It’s disturbing that Wolfenstein can be considered a controversial political statement”: Bethesda marketing boss Pete Hines discusses publisher’s marketing for upcoming anti-Nazi shooter
4. Bethesda: Anti-Nazi game wasn’t meant to “incite political discussions” – Exec responds to anonymous vitriol, says Wolfenstein II is “on right side of history.”
5. Dirty Chinese Restaurant mobile game canceled after racism criticism: Developer issues apology to Chinese community after call-out from US Congresswoman.
6. Telltale’s Batman seemingly shows real image of assassinated ambassador
7. Sex and gaming: Selling Japan’s Senran Kagura to the West – Marvelous Entertainment’s Michael Fisher and Harry Holmwood discuss the challenges and surprises this series presents
8. Spreading social acceptance through a mobile game: Accidental Queens discusses the impact of exploring social themes in A Normal Lost Phone and Another Lost Phone
9. Games as a service has “tripled the industry’s value”: Digital River report finds consumers prefer games with a steady stream of content over a $60 boxed title
10. Rising game dev costs put squeeze on mid-tier studios
11. Equity crowdfunding’s early success asks tough questions of Kickstarter: Kingdoms and Castles’ success proves the model, Tim Schafer says, and Fig’s Justin Bailey sees a niche future for donation-based crowdfunding
12. Video: Game career advice from women who have been there and done that
13. Bethesda’s Creation Club mod platform is live in Skyrim
14. Creation Club brings paid mods to Skyrim: Bethesda finds acceptable face of paid mods and microtransactions after a long and difficult history
15. Popular YouTuber calls for ESRB to step in over loot boxes: As controversy bubbles over, review aggregator OpenCritic takes “a stand against loot boxes”
16. Loot boxes in video games will soon get a review flag from OpenCritic: “We’re going to take a stand” following poisonous boxes in new LOTR, Star Wars games.
17. Loot boxes don’t count as gambling in the ESRB’s books
18. Loot boxes aren’t gambling – ESRB: European ratings board PEGI says it’s gambling commissions responsibilities to define loot box rules
19. What can game developers learn from road safety?: Epic Games UX researcher Ben Lewis-Evans details how creators can curb bad behavior through education, enforcement, and engineering
20. The Untold Tale Of How Porsche’s Supercar Got Into Microsoft’s New Game
21. ‘Yeesh, let’s not try and do that again’: Valve dev reflects on The Orange Box
22. Nintendo shares hit-ten year high: Production of the Switch upped to two million units per month amid speculation of Chinese release
23. The Nintendo Switch indie gold rush
24. How Nintendo may be encouraging Switch hacking by trying to stop it: Fans look to hackers for save backup feature that Nintendo blocked to thwart hackers.
25. SNES Classic outsells Switch’s launch during first week in Japan
26. SNES Mini sells over 360,000 units in Japan in four days: The console is on track to outsell its predecessor, though stock shortages remain an issue
27. Super NES Classic hacks are now oh, so easy to pull off—you can even addfeatures: One year after working on NES Classic, Russian hacker returns with similar exploit.
28. Tekken 7 surpasses 2M copies sold on consoles, 3 months after launch
29. Tekken 7 has sold over two million units on consoles: It took three months to outsell Street Fighter V which sold 1.7 million console units since February 2016
30. PUBG reaches nearly two million concurrent players: The last-man-standing shooter continues to break records in spite of growing competition
31. Microsoft backtracks on controversial changes to Forza 7 VIP pass
32. Turn 10 studio head apologises to fans over Forza 7 VIP passes: Developer folds to community pressure following controversial changes and communication issues
33. What happens to your Steam collection when you die?
34. COPPA: A game developer’s primer: “COPPA has many easy-to-miss trip wires,” and Reed Smith’s John P. Feldman and Wendell J. Bartnick are here to help
35. Fired Riot employee discusses toxicity and community engagement: Rutledge says that talking to players can be scary, but it’s better than “feeling like total silence out there”
36. Nielsen Report: ESports Fan Base Growing, Increasingly Complex
37. American esports audiences most receptive to corporate sponsorship, Nielsen report reveals: The Nielsen Esports Playbook finds esports fans are divided on VR and esports as an Olympic event
38. Hulu Forays Into Esports, Strikes Exclusive Content Deal With ESL
39. Hulu Dives Into eSports With Pact for Four Shows From ESL 
40. Oculus Rift sees permanent price drop: $399 with Touch controllers
41. Zuckerberg announces $199 Oculus Go as “sweet spot” standalone VR headset: Shipping “early next year,” also teases wireless “Santa Cruz” headsets.
42. At Oculus’ Developer Summit, VR Progress Is A Game Of Inches
43. Microsoft mixed reality guru Alex Kipman believes communication will be VR’s killer app
44. Tim Cook says the tech “doesn’t exist” for quality AR glasses yet: Cook compared AR’s rise to that of the App Store in scope and importance.
45. Survey: 28% of fans in the West think eSports belong in the Olympics
46. Activision Blizzard is ready to deliver on Overwatch League hype: Mike Sepso on easing tensions between publishers and players, and the firm’s long-term plans for esports
47. Blizzard looks to ‘evolve’ Battle.net with new social features
48. The ESports Playbook Maximizing Your Investment Through Understanding The Fans
49. How one bad joke morphed Dave Mirra Freestyle BMX 3into the ill-fated BMX XXX
50. Immortals appoint former hockey league officer as new president and COO – CrossCut managing director: “I believe we found a great fit and a world-class executive in Ari Segal.”
51. Ubisoft to repurchase 4M shares as it continues fight against Vivendi
52. Ubisoft to buy back 4m shares as it fends off Vivendi takeover: Anonymous investment services provider called in to help complete program by December 29th, 2017
53. Nissan modified this GT-R to be driven with a PS4 controller: Remote-controlled by helicopter, it hit 131mph at Silverstone in the UK.
54. AI isn’t just learning to play video games, it’s helping us build them
55. The second death of the immersive sim (2007-2017) and a dark prophecy for a third-wave immersive sim
56. Star Control II devs unite for a ‘passion project’ sequel
57. How Video Games Satisfy Basic Human Needs

Jon