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Posted on Techdirt - 22 September 2012 @ 12:00pm

Alana's Favorite Techdirt Posts Of The Week

from the stories-galore dept

It's that time of the week again! Yes, the time where a lucky person gets to list their favorite Techdirt articles of the week. Well, it's my turn at the bat, so no time for dilly-dallying, let's hop to it!

The first post is a rather interesting one. The internet never ceases to amuse, in this particular case it managed to outwit a political movement by registering the URL of their website before they did. I suppose this is a good lesson to teach movements and new businesses; register your URL's before you advertise them! (You'd think this would be common sense by now...)

While this member of the German Pirate Party has elected to shield her work under the DMCA, an independent game developer is thrilled to share his game online. This is quite an amusing flip side of what we normally see, if nothing else.

While the RIAA have not been innovative in the way they should be, they have certainly been innovative in ways of pushing customers AWAY from their services by way of DRM, region-locking, and high prices.

In a sign of bad news that everyone saw coming, the TPP 'treaty' still refuses to be exposed. However, it does not take a genius to know that anything that is completely withheld from the public for no good reason is automatically bad news. I have no good feelings about this bill, and everything about it leads me to believe that it should be shut down, or exposed, and properly debated. If one does not allow the latter, then nefarious intentions can easily be assumed.

In the modern age, it isn't unheard of to have a smartphone. So I was rather shocked, and slightly confused, at this particular decision to arrest an activist merely for having a live-streaming app installed on his phone. As they so often spout to us, "You have nothing to fear, if you have nothing to hide"-- now, while I don't agree with that statement... why are they trying to hide from us, when it is perfectly legal to have these things? It seems like they're just fabricating excuses in order to arrest people they just simply don't like. And that isn't good news for ANYONE.

The copyright maximalists never cease to befuddle me. In an exceptionally odd turn of events, the Royal Canadian Mint tried to force an artist to pay them royalties... over using pennies on his album cover. Now, this is just my 2c, but isn't that a little absurd? It makes little sense outside of someone being jealous of small cents. ...Now if you'll excuse me, I'll go find a hammer to whack myself with for that pun.

And last but not least, where would we be without a post about the MPAA/RIAA? They seem to think that having people able purchase *gasp* second hand content, would make the entire US economy collapse! It's almost like we're in a bad comedy of errors. I mean, it's not like people own the copy they purchase any more, right? Of course, that'd be ridiculous. I mean, think about it... People selling what's theirs. Absurd! This could be the end of the country as we know it! Quick! Call the police -- that person is selling a CD they bought! Terrorists! Anarchy! Won't someone think of the children!

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