I recently read a Vice article entitled “I Miss My iPod Classic More Than Anything” with a mixture of appreciation and smugness. As the proud owner of an iPod Classic, I tend to agree with all the sentiments expressed, with the added pleasure of still being able to listen to Read more…
It’s been an interesting few weeks in Cryptoland. Facebook finally unveiled it’s rumoured cryptocurrency called Libra, a joint effort with companies such as PayPal, Uber, Visa, Mastercard, and many others. Libra’s stated purpose is to provide a payment system that will be easy to use and cheap, bringing financial services Read more…
It’s been an eventful couple of weeks for YouTube specifically, and for Internet moderation in general. It all started with YouTube’s controversial decision not to ban a famous content creator for instigating anti-gay and racist abuse. Then they were applauded in some circles for banning a number of neo-Nazi and Read more…
There is a very interesting dispute taking place in cryptocurrency circles right now that has nothing to do with price, hacking, exchanges, or any other of the usual hot topics surrounding this area. This time copyright is being used to try to answer one of the most important questions for Read more…
It’s no secret that many of the organisations involved in governing the Internet have had a strong involvement with US interests, both public and private. The Internet started as a US military project, and that country remained influential in key decision-making bodies, but most importantly, the Internet grew out of Read more…
There is an overwhelming narrative at the heart of the current push for Internet regulation, and it is that the Internet is like the Wild West, and unregulated anarchic cesspit filled with filth, terrorism, abuse, and Nazis. At every corner teenagers are presented with self-abuse images prompting them to commit Read more…
The UK government has now released its awaited Online Harms White Paper., detailing some potential changes to the law regulating intermediaries to try to curb damaging material found on the Internet. To say that the white paper has been controversial would be an understatement. While there are specific problems with Read more…
What if I told you that The Matrix was first released 20 years ago? That can’t be real, you think. I still remember seeing it in the cinema! Morpheus would just look at you and say “What is real? How do you define ‘real’?” In this reality, The Matrix was Read more…
It would be fair to say that the Christchurch terrorist attack has been one of the most shocking events in recent history, not only because of the heinous act itself, but because the perpetrator live-streamed the attack on Facebook, and the video has then been shared countless times online. After Read more…
Whenever I have presented about artificial intelligence in the last few years, I often get asked the question of whether training an AI with data can infringe copyright. Take for example Bot Dylan, a machine learning project that has been trained using 23,000 folk songs. Does the music it produces Read more…