copyright

Researchers honor Swartz's memory with PDF protest

In a tribute to Aaron Swartz, the Internet activist who committed suicide Friday, researchers have begun posting PDFs to Twitter to honor his campaign for open access.

Swartz, 26, had faced the possibility of $4 million in fines and more than 50 years in prison for allegedly stealing 4 million documents from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Jstor, an archive of scientific journals and academic papers. The authorities claimed that he broke into a restricted-access computer wiring closet at MIT and accessed that network without authorization.

The PDF campaign was born out of a desire to honor Swartz's memory … Read more

BlackBerry App World said to hawk pirated Android apps

Sure, pirated apps can be found across the Web on sites like appbucket.net and snappzmarket.com, but you wouldn't expect to find them in legitimate app stores, such as BlackBerry App World. But, indeed, this is reportedly the case.

And, to make matters worse, the purportedly stolen apps found in the store and packaged as BlackBerry PlayBook and BlackBerry 10 apps are actually Android apps, according to a developer who posted his woes on Reddit today.

I recently had two users email me about certain compatibility problems. They did mention that they were using Playbooks, but I figured … Read more

Illegal file-sharer gets hit with 5-year prison sentence

Convicted file-sharer Jeramiah Perkins has been handed the longest prison sentence even given in a U.S. file-sharing lawsuit: five years.

The 40-year-old man from Portsmouth, Va., was given the sentence today by U.S. District Judge Arenda Wright Allen, according to Wired. During his lawsuit, Perkins pled guilty to conspiracy to commit copyright infringement by file-sharing movies, music, games, and more on the Internet.

Perkins -- a.k.a. Butch Perkins, Stash, and theestas -- is said to have been the head of a group that went to theaters, camcorded the movies, recorded the audio, synched the files, and … Read more

Google, Yahoo accused of funding piracy

Google and Yahoo's advertising networks are accused of financially supporting those who pirate music and movies online, according to a report from the University of Southern California.

The school's Annenberg Innovation Lab studied which ad networks placed the most ads on sites accused of infringing music and film copyrights and today issued a list of the top 10. Google is No. 2, and Yahoo came in at No. 6.

OpenX, a company based in Pasadena, Calif., that supplies digital and mobile advertising tools, was the top advertiser on pirate sites, the report said. To help compile the list … Read more

Apple ordered to pay Chinese writers in copyright dispute

A Beijing-based judge has sided with a group of Chinese authors in a copyright infringement lawsuit against Apple, according to China Daily. The judge ruled today that the tech giant must compensate eight authors who claim their books were illegally sold in Apple's App Store.

It's unclear exactly how much the writers will be paid. The Wall Street Journal reports the total compensation amount is 1.03 million yuan, or about $165,000, while China Daily writes that Apple must pay a total of 412,000 yuan, or around $66,000.

According to Mac Observer, the books appeared … Read more

Policy and privacy: Five reasons why 2012 mattered

This was the year of Internet activism with a sharp political point to it: Protests drove a stake through the heart of a Hollywood-backed digital copyright bill, helped derail a United Nations summit, and contributed to the demise of a proposed data-sharing law.

In 2012, when Internet users and companies flexed their political muscles, they realized they were stronger than they had thought. It amounted to a show of force not seen since the political wrangling over implanting copy-protection technology in PCs a decade ago, or perhaps since those blue ribbons that appeared on Web sites in the mid-1990s in … Read more

Instagram rivals try to lure users away after photo rights flap

Instagram's competitors are pouncing on the company's claim that it will be able to sell users' photos for advertising purposes without payment or notification.

They're hoping that irritation over Instagram's controversial decision -- which came three months after Facebook completed the acquisition -- will lure users away from the popular photo-sharing app, which passed the 100 million user mark in September.

"We will certainly do our best to make sure that Instagram users are aware of 23snaps as an alternative service," Meaghan Fitzgerald, head of marketing for 23snaps, a London-based company that makes an … Read more

How to back up your Instagram photos and delete your account

On January 16, the photos you upload to Instagram can be used for third-party advertising. This change in Instagram's policy means that the photos you take of your kids, pets, family, or anything else, can be sold without even notifying you. If you decide to wait until after January 16 to close your Instagram account, your photos could still be used or sold.

Not really feeling the change? You're not alone. Many users are wondering what they can do with their Instagram account -- whether they can download all of their photos and preserve their privacy, or if … Read more

Instagram says it now has the right to sell your photos

Update, December 18 at 2:50 p.m. PT: Instagram has backed down, as we report in this CNET article posted a few minutes ago. Instagram says it will "remove" the language that caused a user revolt over the last day.

Instagram said today that it has the perpetual right to sell users' photographs without payment or notification, a dramatic policy shift that quickly sparked a public outcry.

The new intellectual property policy, which takes effect on January 16, comes three months after Facebook completed its acquisition of the popular photo-sharing site. Unless Instagram users delete their accounts … Read more