Free Speech
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Crime, Free Speech, Masturbation, Non-Sequiturs, Sex, Technology, United Kingdom / Great Britain
* For some reason, the Supreme Court has hardly ruled on any of the First Amendment cases before it this term. Cue the Twilight Zone theme.[PrawfsBlawg]
* New strategy for closing the gender gap: stop relying on mentors so much. Because, you know, Jack Donaghy can only do so much before Liz Lemon has to start figuring stuff out on her own. [Careerist]
* He’s not saying your antivirus software is useless, it’s just not exactly useful. [Volokh Conspiracy]
* Happy Diamond Jubilee to that elderly English lady who wears big, old-fashioned hats and is always politely waving to large crowds. [Charon QC via Blawg Review]
* A man stole a $4,000 gold plated vibrator, but he forgot to nab the charger. Nothing to see here, folks. Move along. [Legal Juice]
* What not to do in a judge’s chambers. [Greedy Associates]
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Education / Schools, Free Speech, Kids, SCOTUS, Supreme Court, Technology
SCOTUS Denies Cert in Teen’s D-Bag First Amendment Suit
It is not hard to imagine an angsty teenager, angry at her school, hitting the ‘net and writing cruel words about a school employee on her blog. It’s also not hard to imagine word getting back to the school, and some unpleasant consequences for the student. What just doesn’t compute is how that scenario translates to a four-year legal saga culminating in an appeal to the United States Supreme Court….
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Bad Ideas, Facebook, Free Speech, Social Networking Websites, Technology
Even in the Internet Age, You Can’t Call Your Boss a ‘Super Mega Puta’
It’s strange how quickly the world changes. Things used to be so simple, but now Steve Jobs has resigned from Apple and we’re having earthquakes in Washington, D.C. Moreover, some fundamental rules of online conduct are beginning to look like artifacts from a bygone era when people were crazy for RAZRs and nu metal. Gone […]
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Bad Ideas, Crime, Cyberlaw, Free Speech, Police, Technology
San Francisco Subway Shuts Off Cell Service, Hackers Get Angry
I rode BART into San Francisco on Monday for dinner. As our train approached the Embarcadero station, the driver came on the intercom. “We aren’t stopping at this station. Don’t want to drop you in the middle of a protest.” So my roommate and I got off a block later and backtracked. We encountered a […]
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Alex Kozinski, Defamation, Federal Judges, Free Speech, Media and Journalism, Technology
Did Blogging Kill the First Amendment?
Our buddy, the Honorable Alex Kozinski, is on a roll. On Monday, the chief judge of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit benchslapped a pair of wealthy, persistently annoying and mildly famous identical twins. The same day, he gave a lecture at San Francisco’s Golden Gate University School of Law, where he […]
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Facebook, Free Speech, Social Networking Websites, Technology
Insulting Your Boss Online Is Now Protected Speech
In 2009, a paramedic in Connecticut went home and complained about her boss on Facebook. Then she got fired. “Love how the company allows a 17 to be a supervisor,” 42-year-old Dawnmarie Souza wrote. A “17” is the code her company, the American Medical Response ambulance service, uses for a psychiatric patient. She also called […]