Earlier this month Ryan Giggs, a professional soccer player who plays for the U.K.’s Manchester United, obtained a court-ordered injunction to keep secret the details of an extra-marital affair with British television personality Imogen Thomas. The short story is that he didn’t want the U.K. press writing about his …
law
Silly Legal Action Won’t Stop Twitter in the U.K.
Twitter is coming to London, despite the super-injunction row it got pulled into last week.
The company’s deal-maker Tony Wang has already moved across the Atlantic with his family, and is starting work on building a new London-based team to look after Twitter’s business in the U.K. and Europe.
The injunction row, centered on a …
Facebook Loosens Up Promotion Guidelines, Allows for Booze and Guns
In efforts to streamline its promotional guidelines, Facebook is relaxing on a few of its longstanding policies that have prohibited a number of goods from being communicated in contests and sweepstakes, including alarm-y things like “alcohol, dairy, gambling, & gasoline.”
The reason for the change? There are two, actually. First, …
Kerry-McCain Online Privacy Bill: Too Weak or Too Strong?
Senators John McCain and John Kerry have introduced an online privacy bill that would require companies to inform consumers when their personal data is being collected for marketing purposes and how it’s being shared.
“The bill, if it becomes law, would require companies to tell consumers why data was being
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TechFast: Microsoft Sues Everybody, Nintendo 3DS Reviews
Good morning. Here’s what’s been breaking in tech news while you’ve been sleeping and enjoying your breakfast.
Microsoft sues just about everybody
The lawyers will be opening another crate of champagne today, as Microsoft announces lawsuits against Barnes & Noble, Foxconn and Inventec for patent infringement. What patents, exactly?
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Who Owns Your Web Stuff After You Die? Good Question
Have you ever stopped to wonder what might happen to your digital stuff after you die?
The folk at Digital Beyond have, and they’ve been talking about it at the SXSW festival this week.
These days it’s easy to put stuff online thanks to dozens of free services offered by third party companies. Blogs, microblogs, social networks, …
Once Again, Facebook Will Share Personal Data with Third Parties
This article has been cross-posted from our partner site, Technologizer.
Social networking site Facebook created quite a stir last month when it announced that it would share much more personal details of its users — such as addresses and phone numbers — with third party developers. The move was so controversial that the company …
Facebook Won’t Block WikiLeaks Just Yet
Following Amazon and PayPal’s decision to block the WikiLeaks site, Facebook has issued a statement saying the social network has no plans to ban the WikiLeaks page.
(More on TIME: WikiLeaks’ Assange Arrested In London, Denied Bail)
Following a chaotic month due to the site’s latest “leak,” a site outage led by hackers in …
FCC Wants Cell Carriers to Warn People Before Overages Occur
The FCC is expected to propose rules that would require cellular companies to send text or voicemail messages to customers before they go over their minutes, according to Bloomberg. The rules would also provide for warnings to be sent to customers roaming on international networks outside the US, which can often result in expensive
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You May Now Legally Jailbreak Your iPhone and Rip DVDs
The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) has just announced some big, big wins for consumers. Labeled as “exemptions to the Digital Millenium Copyright Act,” a law enacted in the late ’90s to protect copyright holders against piracy, it’s now within consumers’ legal rights to jailbreak phones, rip DVDs (for certain uses), and a 2006 …
San Francisco Cell Phone Sales to Require Radiation Information
The little info cards next to the cell phones sold in San Francisco stores will soon contain data on the amount of radiation the handsets give off thanks to a citywide vote that passed yesterday, according to the New York Times.
There’s been conflicting scientific evidence over the years as to whether or not cell phone radiation is …