15 Years Late, The FCC Cracks Down On Broadband Apartment Monopolies

from the do-not-pass-go,-do-not-collect-$200 dept

A major trick dominant broadband providers use to limit competition is exclusive broadband arrangements with landlords. Often an ISP will strike an exclusive deal with the owner of a building, apartment complex, or development that effectively locks in a block by block monopoly. And while the FCC passed rules in 2007 to purportedly stop this from happening, they contained too many loopholes to be of use.

Susan Crawford wrote pretty much the definitive story on this at Wired a while back, noting that the rules are so terrible, ISPs and landlords can tap dance around them by simply calling what they're doing... something else:

"...The Commission has been completely out-maneuvered by the incumbents. Sure, a landlord can’t enter into an exclusive agreement granting just one ISP the right to provide Internet access service to an MDU, but a landlord can refuse to sign agreements with anyone other than Big Company X, in exchange for payments labeled in any one of a zillion ways. Exclusivity by any other name still feels just as abusive."

Fifteen years later and the FCC is finally doing something about it. After being nudged toward the action via Biden's executive order on competition, the FCC has finally voted to update its rules on this front, tightening rules banning outright building by building monopolies.

There's still some wiggle room for ISPs though, even under the new rules that should be formally adopted later this year. One thing ISPs enjoy doing is striking a financial partnership with a landlord, then signing a deal that bans anybody but the primary ISP from advertising in the building. Under the updated rules ISPs and landlords can still do this, they just have to be transparent about it.

The updated rules do tighten up the rules to clearly prohibit other shady tactics, however. For example the FCC's original 2007 rules prohibited ISPs from blocking any competitors from using in-building wiring (which in many cases was installed by a regional monopoly years ago). So to get around this, cable and phone monopoly lawyers came up with a workaround: the ISP would deed ownership of the in-building wires to the landlord, who would turn around and grant exclusive access to those wires to their favored ISP (read: whichever ISP gave them the most money or had the best lawyers).

According to a statement by FCC boss Jessica Rosenworcel, the rule update specifically prohibits this practice:

"We clarify that sale-and-leaseback arrangements violate our existing rules that regulate cable wiring inside buildings. Since the 1990s, we have had rules that allow buildings and tenants to exercise choice about how to use the wiring in the building when they are switching cable providers, but some companies have circumvented these rules by selling the wiring to the building and leasing it back on an exclusive basis. We put an end to that practice today."

Again, it's fairly inexcusable that it took the FCC literally the better part of a generation to outlaw these kinds of practices to help boost building-by building competition. But it's fairly representative of a U.S. regulatory apparatus that's consistently handcuffed, under-funded, and lobbied into apathy by regional monopolies who very much prefer the profitable status quo (cable providers, as you'd expect, fought against these latest rule updates). And while it's great news the FCC still did something about it, enforcement and actual tough penalties (not the FCC's strong suit) will be key. As will acting more swiftly and competently when they find telecom monopoly lawyers have crafted entirely new convoluted legal workarounds.

Filed Under: apartments, broadband, competition, exclusive deals, fcc, monopolies

Funniest/Most Insightful Comments Of The Week At Techdirt

from the conversationalism dept

This week, our first place winner on the insightful side is an anonymous comment about what happens when medical companies implode, leaving people who rely on their products in the lurch:

One partial solution for medical devices is to requires that the software source code and hardware design are held in escrow and released if the manufacturer goes out of business or refused to continue to support the device.

In second place, it's That One Guy with a comment about Josh Hawley's mug:

'I don't support insurrections, just those doing them!'

He says its a "perfect way to enjoy Coffee, Tea, or Liberal Tears!" and is "not a pro-riot mug."

... He says of the picture of him showing support for a bunch of deranged insurrectionists storming the capitol, but I suppose if you want to split hairs there is a difference between 'riot' and 'insurrection' so technically he's correct, just not in a way that leaves him looking better.

For editor's choice on the insightful side, we start out with a comment from TheDumberHalf about sex offender registries:

Outlawing someone's existence

Sex offender registries are not the only harm. Some cities outright prohibit you living in the city at all - a result of cumulative boundaries around sensitive areas. We can all agree, parole should help you integrate and keep you on the straight and narrow. However, people need an actual chance. Then there's instances where peeing in public or even hugging is a sex offense. Scope creep is a bitch.

Next, it's PartTimeZombie sharing a reaction to our post about Alabama cops:

MRAP?

I'm not American, so I had to look up the term "MRAP".
Imagine my amazement when my search returned a bunch of pictures of armoured military vehicles.
Police don't need those, armies do.

Over on the funny side, our first place winner comes from our post about Amy Klobuchar's next unconstitutional speech control bill, "the NUDGE Act". One commenter wondered if these acronym games would lead us to the "WINK, WINK, NUDGE, NUDGE" Act — and Strawb had the perfect rejoinder:

Amy Klobuchar: "Say no more."

In second place, it's another comment about cops and military equipment — this time from an anonymous commenter on our post about Senators who are freaking out about the White House's minor police reforms (and one response in particular):

"Police officers will face a grim reality if this EO is enacted and their lifesaving equipment is restricted from them."

Huh. I didn't know that the 1033 program offered N95 masks, and training in epidemiology.

For editor's choice on the funny side, we've got a pair of puns. First, it's David with a response to YouTube's ContentID demonetizing a video of a cat purring:

Dude, it's obvious.

Clearly it was a copycat.

Finally, it's an anonymous comment about cops seizing cash generated by the legal marijuana business:

They're taking marijuana proceeds, from a transport.

They're High waymen.

That's all for this week, folks!

This Week In Techdirt History: February 13th - 19th

from the back-then dept

Five Years Ago

This week in 2017, Oracle filed its opening brief in its renewed attempt to overturn Google's fair use win on Java APIs. The UK rolled out a "piracy alert system" that was mostly but not entirely benign, while politicians there were looking to follow up on the Snooper's Charter with an even worse anti-whistleblowing law. In the US, things weren't looking good for net neutrality between the opinions of FCC commissioners and the shifty activities of telco. Meanwhile, prosecutors and anti-sex-trafficking advocates were speaking out about the government's treatment of Backpage, while a new report on encryption showed that its proliferation was not much of a problem for law enforcement.

Ten Years Ago

This week in 2012, there were mass protests against ACTA all across Europe. The European Parliament President criticized the agreement, and the EU official who resigned over it was detailing its many problems — but the EU Commission was trying to claim the widespread concerns were all based on 'myths', and lobby groups like the IFPI were claiming that the protests were anti-democratic. Meanwhile, US Senators were ramping up the fearmongering to push for a cybersecurity bill that they insisted was nothing like SOPA — but which also didn't seem necessary.

Fifteen Years Ago

This week in 2007, we examined Universal Music's ridiculous 'settlement' with small video sharing site Bolt, while Hollywood was expressing its ongoing displeasure with Google (as were some very confused Belgian newspapers). Broadcasters were making yet another attempt at anti-satellite radio legislation, sample troll Bridgeport Music won an unfortunate victory, and the RIAA was trying to get ISPs to help it hound customers into settling its lawsuits.

Filed Under: history, look back

Letter From High-Ranking FBI Lawyer Tells Prosecutors How To Avoid Court Scrutiny Of Firearms Analysis Junk Science

from the cheating-to-win-is-how-the-FBI-defines-'justice' dept

Law enforcement -- including the FBI -- like to claim they're heavily invested in science. The use of forensic "science" has been with us for years, but nowhere is it more sketchy than in law enforcement labs, where zero accountability rubs elbows with zero outside review of methods.

For years now, evidence historically claimed to be almost certain indications of guilt has been shown to be, in many cases, no better than a coin flip. Even DNA has its problems, especially when "expert" witnesses overstate their ability to exclude "innocent" DNA from cluttered crime scenes. The unwillingness of police to police themselves has been aggravated by the unwillingness of courts to question statements made by forensic techs -- ones that include things like claiming a person can be positively identified by the wrinkles and creases in their mass-produced clothing.

One judge -- Jed S. Rakoff -- did speak up. He excused himself from the DOJ's examination of law enforcement forensics once it became clear the Justice Department was more interested in finding supporting claims than dissenting voices. The DOJ's Deputy Attorney General informed Judge Rakoff that examination of pre-trial evidence procedures was beyond the "scope" of the Commission, resulting in Rakoff's resignation.

Blood pattern analysis, bite mark patterns, hair matching, etc. Nearly every supposedly inarguable form of forensic evidence has been determined to be junk science under closer examination. Even the FBI has admitted its forensic experts have routinely overstated the certainty of their findings during sworn testimony.

You would think all of this would add up to a major overhaul of forensic procedures and requirements that testing methods be subjected to peer review or blind testing or literally anything other than the zero scrutiny it has enjoyed for years. You'd be wrong. Instead, law enforcement officers and officials have been putting their energy into finding ways to keep their junk science from being rejected by courts.

A letter obtained by The Daily Beast shows the FBI would rather lie to courts than give up the use of yet another questionable forensic technique: bullet matching. Investigators claim bullet fragments contain unique markings from the barrel of the gun they're fired from and these can be used to uniquely identify the weapon used to fire the bullet. This, of course, assumes there are no similarities between mass-produced weapons and mass-produced bullets that might result in "matches" that say nothing more than a certain kind of gun fired a bullet designed to be fired from that model of gun.

This supposed form of evidence was called into question by the Obama Administration:

The most damning criticism of the field came in a 2016 report by the President’s Council of Advisers on Science and Technology, or PCAST, which found that “firearms analysis currently falls short of the criteria for foundational validity,” and that the studies the field’s practitioners often cite to support their work are poorly designed and “seriously underestimate the false positive rate.”

Following this report, some judges began to push back against this questionable evidence. Law enforcement is pushing back, led by none other than a high-ranking lawyer representing the FBI's forensic team.

Late last year, a forensic firearms analyst in Wisconsin emailed a remarkable document to more than 200 of her colleagues across the country. It was a handout from an online lecture given by Jim Agar, the assistant general counsel for the FBI Crime Lab.

[...]

In the two-page handout, Agar instructs firearms analysts on how to circumvent judges’ restrictions on unscientific testimony. He even suggests dialogue for prosecutors and analysts to recite if challenged. Most controversially, Agar advises analysts to tell judges that any effort to restrict their testimony to claims backed by scientific research is tantamount to asking them to commit perjury.

The letter [PDF] is quite the read. The FBI lawyer refuses to even consider the idea that bullet-matching forensics might be faulty. Instead, he instructs prosecutors and expert witnesses to work together to undermine any attempt the court (or defense lawyers) might make to depict these findings as questionable. It starts by implying courts are wrong to even question the expertise of forensic techs.

So far, no court has excluded the testimony of a firearms identification expert witness. The greater likelihood is that the court will attempt to compromise and craft some kind of language that weakens or neuters the expert’s identification opinion, substituting that terminology for the examiner’s identification opinion. Some courts have put in place so-called “limitations” to that testimony, which fundamentally alter the examiner’s opinion. However, these are not true limitations because they make material and substantive changes to the expert’s testimony. These are wholesale attempts to rewrite the firearm expert’s testimony by a layman with no experience in forensic science. This practice is not supported by either science or the law.

And it wraps up by suggesting forensic experts opt out of testifying completely rather than have their expertise and statements called into question:

If the court insists on limiting the firearms expert testimony to GRC or class characteristics, I probably would not call the examiner at all. Instead, I would put on a lay witness such as the case agent or an armorer for the police department to testify about the similar class characteristics of the weapon and the bullets and/or cartridge cases.

Does this sound like science to you? Anything backed by actual science would be able to survive evidentiary challenges. Since this isn't, it's not strong enough to even survive cursory examination. Any case relying solely on this junk science should be doomed. But by forcing the court to play by the FBI's terms (or, conversely, preventing the forensic expert from being questioned), the agency can still roll the dice on bypassing scrutiny of its means and methods.

The problem for the FBI now is that this letter is out there in the public domain. Judges paying attention to these issues will know exactly why the prosecution is asking leading questions of its forensic expert or why there's no forensic expert being asked to testify. This letter alone should cause most firearms analysis to be tossed immediately. It probably won't, but it should, unless the law enforcement agency can definitively show it uses methods not used by the FBI or has completely disregarded the suggestions of the FBI's counsel.

Real evidence should be able to survive scrutiny. It should be able to stand on its own without the prosecution playing "hide the witness." This letter is a tacit admission that firearms analysis is more guesswork than science. As such, it should be considered damning evidence of its own -- something that will force law enforcement experts to thoroughly and scientifically justify their assertions. And it should definitely encourage the DOJ to consider halting the use of firearms forensics until it can find a scientifically sound way of doing so. But, if history is any indicator, the DOJ would rather score cheap wins that use forensic evidence backed by sound science.

Filed Under: evidence, fbi, forensics, junk science

Nintendo Is Beginning To Look Like The Disney Of The Video Game Industry

from the into-the-vault dept

Techdirt, and myself specifically, have had an awful lot to say about Nintendo. To be fair to me, not every post I write about the company is negative. But to be fair to anyone with a pair of eyeballs, much of it certainly has been negative. I find that the company prioritizes control of every last ounce of its IP over its own customers and fans, that the company behaves in a manner so aloof as to be almost comical, and that the company seems perfectly willing to break the entire concept of the American copyright system incentives by combatting all forms of "piracy" or use of its IP while also being perfectly willing to silo that IP in places where the public simply cannot legitimately access it.

Does that sound like anyone else to you? Because it sounds like Disney to me. And, frankly, Nintendo's latest move sounds like the gaming industry equivalent to precisely what Disney has historically done with its "vaulting" of certain movies for periods of time. In this case, Nintendo has shut down the 3DS and Wii U stores, all while saying that it doesn't currently plan to make those classic games available elsewhere.

- As of May 23, 2022, it will no longer be possible to use a credit card to add funds to an account in Nintendo eShop on Wii U or the Nintendo 3DS family of systems.

- As of August 29, 2022, it will no longer be possible to use a Nintendo eShop Card to add funds to an account in Nintendo eShop on Wii U or the Nintendo 3DS family of systems. However, it will still be possible to redeem download codes until late March 2023.

To be fair and clear, owners of a Wii U and 3DS will still be able to redownload purchased games and engage in online play after those dates. For how long? Well, according to Nintendo, for "the foreseeable future." Which... yeah. Part of the problem here, as Kotaku notes, is that the 3DS and Wii U were also places where gamers could actually purchase and own classic Nintendo titles. There really isn't an equivalent to that once those stores are shut down as the newer consoles rely on subscriptions for gamers to play those classic games. No game purchases, just access via the subscription. So with this ownership option going away, will Nintendo replace it somewhere else? Nope!

Across our Nintendo Switch Online membership plans, over 130 classic games are currently available in growing libraries for various legacy systems. The games are often enhanced with new features such as online play.

We think this is an effective way to make classic content easily available to a broad range of players. Within these libraries, new and longtime players can not only find games they remember or have heard about, but other fun games they might not have thought to seek out otherwise.

We currently have no plans to offer classic content in other ways.

And so, there you have it. This reads much like a Disney message. You can have the content you want only in the way we want you to have it, under the subscription model we prefer, and only at times we make it available to you. Oh, and we can change all that up at any time because, once again, you're not actually buying anything, you're just subscribing to a service.

Oh, and one more thing you may be thinking if you've been following along with my posts about video game preservation needing some attention. You may be remembering that Nintendo had a section on its site that specifically talked about game preservation. Well, don't go looking now, because it's gone.

Especially wild, then, is the fact that not long after publishing this, Nintendo wiped that particular section of the Q&A from its site. Go and check it now and the “Doesn’t Nintendo have an obligation to preserve its classic games by continually making them available for purchase?” part is gone.

All the while, of course, the company will continue to punish fans by going after ROM sites, fan-made creations and recreations, YouTube channels featuring classic Nintendo music, and all the rest. If Nintendo isn't the Disney of the gaming industry, it's as close as we're likely to get.

Filed Under: 3ds, locking up, stores, vault, wiiu
Companies: disney, nintendo

Seattle Public Radio Station Manages To Partially Brick Area Mazdas Using Nothing More Than Some Image Files

from the may-we-offer-you-a-tote-bag-bearing-our-logo.null dept

Welp. This isn't going to help future fundraising drives. Not when a public radio station is negatively affecting, you know, driving.

Drivers of certain vehicles in Seattle and other parts of Western Washington are shouting at their car radios this week. Not because of any particular song or news item that’s being broadcast, but because an apparent technical glitch has caused the radios to be stuck on public radio station KUOW.

The impacted drivers appear to all be owners of Mazda vehicles from between 2014 and 2017. In some cases the in-car infotainment systems have stopped working altogether, derailing the ability to listen to the radio at all or use Bluetooth phone connections, GPS, the rear camera and more.

Behold the collision of OTA and IO(car)T. This unique situation -- limited solely to drivers in the Upper West -- presented a host of new problems and a lot of speculative answers. The radio station had absolutely no idea why this was happening. One local dealership told a customer it had something to do with 5G, which apparently meant affected Mazdas were now infected with a car-borne form of COVID, presumably necessitating plenty of expensive diagnostics and what have you.

Fortunately, the cars' manufacturer was actually able to pinpoint the cause of the malfunction -- which left some drivers staring at in-car systems stuck in a perpetual "loading…" loop. The answer arrived roughly a week after the problem presented itself. The problem -- discussed in this entertaining Reddit thread -- had nothing to do with network upgrades or an unexplained bug in Mazda software.

Instead, the public radio station had done something completely unexpected, sending affected vehicles into in-car entertainment purgatory. This is the statement Mazda gave to Geekwire.

“Between 1/24-1/31, a radio station in the Seattle area sent image files with no extension, which caused an issue on some 2014-2017 Mazda vehicles with older software,” the Mazda statement said. “Mazda North American Operations (MNAO) has distributed service alerts advising dealers of the issue.”

While it's somewhat troubling to note that Mazdas manufactured within the last eight years are running what Mazda considers to be outdated software, the good news is that it can be fixed. The bad news follows the good news: due to shipping constraints affecting goddamn everything, drivers affected by this oddity shouldn't expect to see a fix anytime soon. "Part delays" cited by Mazda could put permanent fixes months off.

On the other hand (good news!), even older models will be covered by these repairs, whether or not they're still under warranty. The company has instructed dealers to honor "goodwill requests" for free repairs of affected vehicles. Back to the bad news: the part that apparently needs to be replaced is the ominous-sounding "connectivity master unit," which indicates a whole lot of connectivity will be affected until dealers get the part in stock and start dealing with the backlog of semi-bricked Mazdas. Some users have reported in-car entertainment systems stuck in permanent loops, non-functioning GPS systems, and bricked back-up cameras.

This isn't going to go well for Mazda, considering it's the only manufacturer whose systems have been rendered useless by a misconfigured file distributed by a radio station. While this situation is certainly an outlier, there's likely a reason other in-car entertainment systems weren't similarly affected, which suggests a crucial shortcoming in the tech installed in those models -- one that could be exploited by entities far more nefarious than local public broadcasters.

Filed Under: images, public radio, radio, seattle, washington
Companies: kuow, mazda

Thankfully, Jay Inslee's Unconstitutional Bill To Criminalize Political Speech Dies In The Washington Senate

from the don't-criminalize-free-speech dept

Over the last few years, it's been depressing to see politicians from both major political parties attacking free speech. As we noted last month, Washington state governor Jay Inslee last month started pushing a bill that would criminalize political speech. He kept insisting that it was okay under the 1st Amendment because he got a heavily biased constitutional lawyer, Larry Tribe, to basically shrug and say "maybe it could be constitutional?" But the bill was clearly problematic -- and would lead to nonstop nonsense lawsuits against political candidates.

Thankfully, cooler heads have prevailed in the Washington Senate and the bill has died. The bill's main sponsor is still insisting that it would survive 1st Amendment scrutiny, but also recognized that it just didn't have enough political support:

State Sen. David Frockt (D), who sponsored the bill, said, "We have to respect that the bill in its current form did not have enough support to advance despite the care we took in its drafting through our consultation with leading First Amendment scholars."

Inslee, for his part, still insists something must be done:

After the bill was defeated on Tuesday, Inslee said in a statement, "We all still have a responsibility to act against this Big Lie ... we must continue to explore ways to fight the dangerous deceptions politicians are still promoting about our elections."

And, look, I don't disagree that the Big Lie about the 2020 election is a problem. But you don't solve problems by censoring 1st Amendment protected speech. That never ends well. At all.

Filed Under: 1st amendment, election misinformation, free speech, jay inslee, lies, misinformation, political speech, washington

How Our Convoluted Copyright Regime Explains Why Spotify Chose Joe Rogan Over Neil Young

from the one-of-them-is-a-lot-more-costly dept

Spotify’s decision to hitch its star to podcaster and font-of-COVID-misinformation Joe Rogan has sparked a wave of pushback from musicians, some of whom--among them Neil Young, India Arie, and Joni Mitchell--have pulled their music from Spotify in protest. Spotify, for its part, has stood firmly by Rogan. 

That Spotify would stand by a show that consistently undermines vaccines and blithely spreads misinformation is disappointing--but, financially, it’s perfectly predictable. 

The short version: 

The law and economics of music streaming lead to one inevitable result: Spotify pays money when it streams music. It makes money when it streams podcasts. Therefore, Spotify has an incentive to keep people using Spotify -- just not for music. 

The legal regime around music licensing makes breaking even -- let alone turning a profit -- nearly impossible. Because the industry is notoriously secretive about its financials (a problem in and of itself), raw data is hard to come by. But the fact remains that investors (and industry observers) agree that music streaming as a loss-leader -- something that incurs a net loss for the service doing it, in the hopes of potentially looping consumers into the parent company’s product ecosystem. Apple Music and Amazon Music, the second and third largest streaming services by market share, both operate at a loss. Spotify, which has been in the US market since 2011, turned its first profit in 2021. It is still unclear whether it will manage to repeat the achievement. 

In short, experience indicates that a streaming service that plays only music will consistently lose money. And while this is a complex issue with many moving parts, one of the biggest is the law -- the market it creates, and the behavior it incentivizes. 

But First, How Does Music Copyright Work?

Each track involves not one, but two copyrighted works; the recorded performance (the “sound recording”), and the underlying composition (the “musical work”). Legally, these are two distinct things. This is partly a historical artifact; songwriting hit its stride in the very early 20th century, before mass distribution of recorded music was even a glimmer in anyone’s eye. Compositions got copyright protection in 1906 (and were thus given the now-confusingly-vague designation of “musical work”). Over the first half of the century, publishers and performing rights organizations sprang up to promote, distribute, and license songwriters’ work. It wasn’t until mid-century that the recording industry began to flourish on its own, and sound recordings didn’t even gain copyright protection until the late 1970s.

Because of this history, the two industries – songwriting and recording – operate under wildly different licensing structures. Copyright is, at its core, a government-granted right to exclude; when one player starts to accumulate a high volume of those rights, the risk of abusive market behavior rises. The composition side of the equation messed around and found out early. By the 1940s, the government had intervened and set up a complex system of antitrust enforcement, rate-setting, and mandatory licensing regimes. The result was a market that, for all its faults, remains relatively stable and predictable for licensees (and, as a side benefit, provides some transparency on how songwriters are paid).

The recording industry, by contrast, gained its copyright (and thus its monopoly power) in the mid 1970s. By then, antitrust law was in the middle of a Chicago school backlash that considerably narrowed its scope and purpose and regulators had lost the taste for the kind of vigorous enforcement that marked the early part of the 20th century. While regulators in the 1940s were willing to go after the songwriting industry’s bad behavior (cartels, extractive pricing, strong arm tactics, etc) their counterparts in the late 1970s were less enthusiastic. And so, unlike their composition-side brothers, labels exist in an unconstrained free market. 

Why It’s So Hard For Streaming Services to Make Money

As mentioned above, we have very little hard and fast data about how much labels are charging and what kinds of side deals they are striking to extract value from these services. But given what we do know about the industry -- and what the U.S. government has outright assumed is going on when doing things like setting royalty rates -- we have a pretty good idea.

Because labels have no meaningful guardrails on their licensing practices, they are free to maximize their own profit however they see fit. When it comes to streaming, their ideal situation is to extract as much value as possible without forcing the service completely under. This means that licenses are priced with the assumption that the streaming service will have to take on some (ideally sustainable) amount of debt to cover their licensing obligations. The alternatives to this aren’t a whole lot better, either; things like equity stakes, sweetheart deals, and algorithmic preferencing or promotion are commonplace. 

The result of all this is that it is structurally impossible for a streaming service to turn a profit using standard music deals alone. Labels are rational economic actors. Profit is value that is not being captured by labels; labels will rationally set prices to ensure that none of that value goes un-captured. Labels have the power to shut a service down simply by walking away from the table. 

Why Spotify Can’t Quit Joe Rogan 

It means that, despite being a music streaming company, music is (and will always be) a revenue loss for Spotify. To have any hope of turning a profit, it needs a low-cost, high-revenue offering. Enter podcasts – specifically Rogan’s podcast, which commands a minimum ad buy of $1M, along with a commitment to buy other ads on Spotify-hosted podcasts. 

So, when forced to choose between retaining portions of its legacy music catalog and keeping one of the only offerings that actually makes the service money, Spotify made the obvious (if morally objectionable) choice. It chose Joe Rogan.

And barring a major overhaul of music licensing law, starting with sound recordings, this will keep happening. We’ll either end up in a world where all mainstream streaming services will be backed by deep-pocketed tech giants (such as Apple, Amazon, and Google), or where music services are stuck relying on non-music content to stay afloat--even when that content is harmful.

Meredith Rose is Senior Policy Counsel at Public Knowledge

Filed Under: business models, copyright, joe rogan, licensing, loss leaders, neil young, podcasts, streaming
Companies: spotify

Daily Deal: The Complete Blocs Website Builder Bundle

from the good-deals-on-cool-stuff dept

The Complete Blocs Website Builder Bundle will help you create responsive websites without writing code. Blocs works on the concept of stacking pre-built sections to create fully coded websites. It’s incredibly fast and a very natural way to build. Intuitive visual styling controls let you easily customize the finest details of any element to create beautiful, modern websites. Add a wide range of eye-catching animations and parallax scroll effects to any element with just a few simple clicks. The bundle also includes Site Search, Page Transition, and Image Overlay add-ons. It's on sale for $50.

Note: The Techdirt Deals Store is powered and curated by StackCommerce. A portion of all sales from Techdirt Deals helps support Techdirt. The products featured do not reflect endorsements by our editorial team.

Filed Under: daily deal

Arizona Prosecutor Who Brought Bogus Gang Charges Against Protesters Files Ridiculous Defamation Suit Against Her Boss

from the going-to-be-hard-surmounting-the-'truth'-defense dept

Protests against police violence erupted around the country following the killing of an unarmed black man, George Floyd, by Minneapolis (MN) police officer Derek Chauvin. Chauvin ended Floyd's life by placing his knee on his neck for nearly nine minutes… and for more than three minutes after another officer informed Chauvin he could no longer detect Floyd's pulse.

The protests continued for months. Some were in solidarity. Others were provoked by recent acts of police violence. Protests in Phoenix, Arizona were nothing out of the ordinary. But the law enforcement response certainly was. It wasn't that the cops did anything that was unusual, per se. They did the normal stuff: they responded violently to protests against police violence, attacking protesters, stripping them of their belongings, and justifying these actions with overblown claims about fearing for their safety.

But it was prosecutors in Maricopa County, Arizona who took things to the next level. Apparently working in conjunction with a number of law enforcement entities, lead prosecutor April Sponsel, an attorney with the Maricopa County Attorney's Office, lied to a grand jury and abused local laws to add gang enhancements to the criminal charges brought against 15 arrested protesters. Sponsel, working with the Phoenix PD, claimed the use of black umbrellas (which protesters used to deflect tear gas canisters and "non-lethal" ammunition) and the acronym "ACAB" ["All Cops Are Bastards"] made the arrested protesters gang members.

This was serious shit. People arrested for rioting, failure to disperse, resisting arrest, or disorderly conduct were being saddled with (completely bullshit) gang charges that had the potential to add another 10 years to their sentences if convicted.

Prosecutor April Sponsel appeared to have been integral to the addition of gang crime sentence enhancements. The wife of a state trooper, Sponsel was the one who presented allegedly false information to a grand jury for the purpose of portraying the arrested protesters as a violent gang, rather than people coincidentally united by their desire to protest police violence. Shortly after the news broke about these bullshit prosecutions, Sponsel was placed on administrative leave while an outside investigation -- requested by Maricopa County prosecutor Allister Adel -- commenced.

Sponsel has been in the public eye for months. And she doesn't appear to like it. She may have enjoyed the backchannel support of local law enforcement as she found ways to stick it to people who were upset with the law enforcement status quo, but she apparently feels litigious about being called out over her gang enhancement bullshit.

April Sponsel, the lead prosecutor who handled the now-dismissed criminal case, filed a lawsuit against Maricopa County Attorney Allister Adel and the county itself in superior court on Friday seeking $10 million.

The Arizona Republic obtained a copy of the lawsuit on Tuesday, which asserts Adel defamed Sponsel in the media, invaded her privacy and caused the county to breach Sponsel’s employment contract.

Inexplicably, the Arizona Republic has decided not to share the obtained copy with readers. Instead, the copy of the lawsuit, embedded below, comes courtesy of Paul Weich, who is running for a position in the Arizona House. He also runs a blog covering area political activity.

Back to the matter at hand: Sponsel is claiming [PDF] the County Attorney defamed her by turning her into a scapegoat for prosecutions that resulted in significant political and public blowback. She claims Adel was fully aware of what was happening and never made any move to alter the course of the prosecution. She also claims she had full support of law enforcement when making the decision to treat the ACAB protesters as a gang. This is unsurprising. But it won't do much to help her win her lawsuit. All it really does is make involved law enforcement members look as petty and ignorant as Sponsel.

For instance:

The claim says she called Phoenix police Sgt. Doug McBride, a gang expert, who agreed the protesters should be classified as a gang on Oct. 20, 2020.

Of course a cop would want this to happen. It was, after all, a protest against law enforcement. If given the opportunity to make anti-police violence protesters suffer, law enforcement officers will opt to do so nearly every time. And it wasn't just this so-called "gang expert." It was every law enforcement agency involved in the arrests.

The lawsuit describes a meeting on Oct. 21, 2020 where “there were more than 30 law enforcement officers in the room, including a number of FBI and Phoenix Police Sergeants, Lieutenants, Commanders and Assistant Chiefs. No one in the meeting was opposed to the criminal street gang charges, and all agreed the charges were appropriate.”

Welcome to the herd and its mentality, April. Surely you were already aware of it. And you must also realize it isn't an adequate defense of your actions, nor does it further the defamation claims being brought against someone who apparently wasn't in the room during this discussion: County Attorney Allister Adel.

Making this battle even more uphill is the fact that an independent judicial review [PDF] of the arrests and prosecutions delivered by an Arizona judge last August contains plenty of evidence Sponsel pushed for gang charges and crafted her prosecution to bring the full pain of these sentence enhancements.

There's a lot in there that points to Sponsel being the person pushing for gang enhancements, over the protests of others. And there's evidence that she moved ahead with a grand jury presentation before a scheduled meeting with the County Attorney's office during which the disposition of these cases was supposed to be discussed.

On Friday October 23, 2020, according to his statement, [Maricopa County Attorney's Office Division Chief] Vince Goddard got a call from April Sponsel informing him there was going to be a press conference at the Phoenix Police Department and they wanted MCAO Allister Adel to attend. The chief of police was also asked and/or was scheduled to attend. He was told this was going to be the “big gang” case that she had talked about in September. Since he only heard about approximately 4 people, he was not sure what she was talking about. He again told her he did not like the “big case theory” where you have limited targets and you charge a large group people. He did not attend the press conference nor did he know if the County Attorney did. No information was provided if a press conference was held.

[...]

During the call with Vince Goddard, the subject of “warrants” was discussed, however, [Chief Deputy County Attorney] Ken Vick assumed he meant search warrants for houses and/or phone records. He was not aware nor was he told a Grand Jury presentation was scheduled for October 27th which would have been before the meeting on October 30th. He provided me the email exchange between Vince Goddard and himself which showed Ken Vick’s surprise and dismay that they had gone to the Grand Jury prior to the meeting.

This is going to make it very difficult to prove Adel was aware of the charges Sponsel was seeking and at least tacitly approved of them by not making any effort to stop her. So is this, from the report released last August:

Based upon the information given to the undersigned, the County Attorney Allister Adel was not briefed on the Grand Jury presentation in this case in the ten (10) days prior to the Grand Jury presentation. CA Adel never got a head's up that the case was going to a Grand Jury nor the charges April Sponsel would be seeking in a draft indictment. The County Attorney did not know a Grand Jury presentation was taking place on October 27th for arrests made on October 17th. The County Attorney was made aware on October 30th about the October 27th Grand Jury Indictment after the media made an inquiry with the office's communication director on Thursday, October 29th. The County Attorney did not attend the ‘incident review” on October 30th since she had been hospitalized on October 28th and she was not discharged until October 31st. This is collaborated by Ken Vick who was not told about the Grand Jury, nor the charges being sought and he did not know what was presented until the day before the October 30th “incident review”.

This lawsuit looks like the flailing of a suddenly toxic prosecutorial asset who thinks she was treated unfairly when the rest of Maricopa County Attorney's Office distanced itself from her and her overzealous prosecutions. The judicial investigation shows Sponsel went a bit rogue, bypassing most of the Attorney's Office to pursue her own vendetta. Unsurprisingly, when it blew up in her face, Allister Adel distanced herself from Sponsel and her actions.

So, this debacle will continue to make headlines for a few more years. No matter how this lawsuit goes, it's not going to rehabilitate Sponsel's image. Win or lose, it's already on the record she was the one that came up with the idea of saddling arrested protesters with gang charges. And she was the one who decided the interests of justice should take a backseat to her vindictive prosecutions.

Filed Under: acab, allister adel, april sponsel, arizona, defamation, gang charges, maricopa county, police, police violence, protests, slapp