Posts under ‘Free Speech’

AP: Freelancer jailed over video released. Freelance journalist Josh Wolf was released on bail today from a federal prison where he had been held since Aug. 1 after challenging a grand jury subpoena that demanded outtakes of videos he shot at a San Francisco protest. Wolf’s advocates, who included national journalist organizations, saw the Ninth […]

BoingBoing has collected a number of links that strongly suggest India’s government, in the wake of last week’s bombings, is on a broad Internet censorship campaign. It’s bad enough to watch China do this kind of thing, but India is supposed to be a democracy. The terrorists must be delighted to see such an over-the-top […]

CNET: Apple abandons effort to unmask leaker. The case, filed in the superior court of Santa Clara County, drew national attention not only because it involved unreleased products–but also because it was one of the first to set the rules of how the rights of uncredentialed online journalists should be balanced against the rights of […]

Reuters reports that Wu Hao, a Chinese film maker and blogger and now a U.S resident, has been freed after a months-long imprisonment in China. This case has been one of the clearest examples of the Chinese regime’s loathing of truly free speech, and his release is good news. Kudos to all those who raised […]

Wall Street Journal: Free, Legal and Ignored. As a student at Cornell University, Angelo Petrigh had access to free online music via a legal music-downloading service his school provided. Yet the 21-year-old still turned to illegal file-sharing programs. The reason: While Cornell’s online music program, through Napster, gave him and other students free, legal downloads, […]

Letter From Bill Keller on The Times’s Banking Records Report : The press and the government generally start out from opposite corners in such cases. The government would like us to publish only the official line, and some of our elected leaders tend to view anything else as harmful to the national interest.

Wall Street Journal: Flag-Burning Debate Reclaims Spotlight. Polls tend to show that the flag issue is relatively low among voter priorities. Some voters who favor the amendment feel strongly about it, and the issue could make a difference in tight races, particularly in conservative-leaning states. This exercise is a direct attack on free speech. Many […]

AP: Fines to Rise for Indecency in Broadcasts. Congress gave notice to broadcasters on Wednesday that they would pay dearly for showing material like Janet Jackson’s 2004 Super Bowl “wardrobe malfunction,” passing legislation that would multiply indecency fines 10 times. Congress also gave notice — as if we needed it — that rather than deal […]

NY Times: Internet firms are asked to keep search records. Justice Dept. tells executives it may need data to counter terrorism and child porn. This is roughly akin to having them follow you around everywhere you go with a video camera, watching everything you do, including in your home, just to have a record later […]

Wall Street Journal: Yahoo Defends China Cooperation. Yahoo’s Terry Semel faced tough questions from Walt Mossberg — and the audience — over the search company’s decision to comply with requests for user data from the Chinese government, which has used the information to pursue dissidents. I’m one of the audience members who asked Semel a […]