Google will have to turn over every record of every video watched by YouTube users, including users' names and IP addresses, to Viacom, which is suing Google for allowing clips of its copyright videos to appear on YouTube, a judge ruled Wednesday.

Viacom wants the data to prove that infringing material is more popular than user-created videos, which could be used to increase Google's liability if it is found guilty of contributory infringement.

Although Google argued that turning over the data would invade its users' privacy, the judge's ruling (.pdf) described that argument as "speculative" and ordered Google to turn over the logs on a set of four tera-byte hard drives.

The judge also turned Google's own defense of its data retention policies -- that IP addresses of computers aren't personally revealing in and of themselves, against it to justify the log dump.

Judge Orders YouTube to Give All User Histories to Viacom | Threat Level from Wired.com

And the questions keep coming. How did Mr. Jakob wander into town and apparently leave the mayor, the aldermen and pretty much everyone else he met thinking that he was a federal agent delivered from Washington to help barrel into peoples’ homes and clean up Gerald’s drug problem? And why would anyone — receiving no pay and with no known connection to little Gerald, 70 miles from St. Louis and not even a county seat — want to carry off such a time-consuming ruse in the first place?

haha... Nice to see how the slant toward authoritarian rule is keeping us safe.

Con-artist convinces town he's a super Fed who doesn't need search warrants - Boing Boing

WASHINGTON — The Human Rights Campaign, the nation’s largest gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender civil rights organization, today participated in the first-ever Congressional hearing exclusively on the issue of workplace discrimination against transgender Americans. The hearing, held by the House Education and Labor’s Subcommittee on Health, Employment, Labor and Pensions, was titled "An Examination of Discrimination Against Transgender Americans." Coordinated by Congressional allies, including Subcommittee Chairman Rob Andrews (D-NJ), Rep. Tammy Baldwin (D-WI) and Rep. Barney Frank (D-MA), as well as a coalition of GLBT groups, the hearing was intended to send a strong message to Congress about the need for fully-inclusive federal workplace protections.

Frank hasn't exactly proven himself to be an ally, but I'll let that go.

HRC Business Council Member Diego Sanchez:

"It’s an injustice that we are ever evaluated for employment based on other people’s comfort with our existence… I am before you today to affirm that transgender and transsexual people, including me, are equally human and deserve to be treated like other people."

Human Rights Campaign President Joe Solmonese:

The transgender community, too long marginalized in American society and even within the gay, lesbian and bisexual community, has made enormous strides in recent years. There are many reasons to hope that the future holds even greater acceptance and understanding, including full equality under the law. But hope alone will not protect the transgender woman in Topeka, Kansas who loses her job and health insurance when co-workers learn that she is transitioning or the transgender man in Shreveport, Louisiana who, despite an advanced engineering degree, must work in a fast food restaurant. It is critical that Congress act to protect these, our transgender friends and family, colleagues and neighbors."

Historic Congressional Hearing on Workplace Protections for Transgender Americans

After questioning former White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan during a meeting of the House Judiciary Committee Friday, a Democratic congressman called for impeachment proceedings to be initiated.

Rep. Robert Wexler (D-FL) said that he believed McClellan's testimony implicated both Vice President Dick Cheney and President George W. Bush as the only two administration sources who could have leaked the identity of former CIA covert operative Valerie Plame-Wilson.

"The president and vice president have denied ordering this illegal leak, but logic and the chain of command dictates that it must have been one of them,” said Wexler. "Mr. McClellan, in your book, you state that you cannot believe President Bush authorized the leak of Valerie Plame Wilson's status as a covert agent. ... Who does that leave us? The vice president."

The Raw Story | Dem Rep. calls for impeachment at McClellan testimony: video

WASHINGTON - An infamous atomic smuggler may have had blueprints for a compact, sophisticated nuclear warhead, and that could mean that the world's proliferation problem is even worse than many experts had thought.

US officials have long declared the nuclear technology ring run by Pakistani scientist Abdul Qadeer Khan to be shattered. But revelations that a digitized bomb design turned up on the computer of an associate of Mr. Khan's show that US and UN investigators may not yet know everything Khan did, despite the fact that he has been under house arrest in Pakistan for years.

Did rogue network leak nuclear bomb design? | csmonitor.com

Four young residents of a North Philadelphia house who circulated petitions questioning police-surveillance cameras were rousted from their home Friday and detained 12 hours without charges while police searched their house.

The raid on the property on Ridge Avenue near Parrish Street was led by 9th District Police Capt. Dennis Wilson, who was quoted in an online story by the City Paper as saying of the residents: "They're a hate group. We're trying to drum up charges against them, but unfortunately we'll probably have to let them go."

He said he asked Wilson if he had a warrant, and none was produced.

Vanore said police will conduct a forensic examination of the items taken from the property to see if any charges are warranted.

Wow.

The cops came, searched and left a mess for puzzled homeowner | Philadelphia Daily News | 06/17/2008

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hahahaha

Somebody please start making hacked versions of these.

Talking Jesus Doll – Messenger of Faith Talking Bible Doll – One2Believe Toys

Rogers Cadenhead tells THREAT LEVEL on Monday he has taken down works from his Drudge Retort blog that The Associated Press has deemed an infringement of the nation's oldest and largest newsgathering operation's copyrights.

The AP recently sent seven takedown notices to his social news site for the offense of reposting a few sentences or more and reprinting their headlines, sometimes linking those sentences and headlines to the full stories generated from the New York-based media concern.

Drudge Retort Episode Highlights 'Fair Use' Uncertainties | Threat Level from Wired.com

In a move that critics have compared to the security clampdown in Baghdad, police are stopping motorists travelling through the main thoroughfare of Trinidad, a neighbourhood near the National Arboretum in the city's northeast section.

'Baghdad-style' checkpoints in US capital - Telegraph

Time Warner Cable said it will cease to offer customers access to any Usenet newsgroups, a decision that will affect customers nationwide. Sprint said it would no longer offer any of the tens of thousands of alt.* Usenet newsgroups. Verizon's plan is to eliminate some "fairly broad newsgroup areas."

This has to be the largest act of government coerced censorship in United States history. Granted, many of these newsgroups are still available via web interfaces like Google Groups, but the precedent set here is worse than the result. It is inevitable that if allowed to stand other content and protocols will be added to this regime. It is worth noting that the ISPs weren't required to block all of these newsgroups, just filter them with a government hash list. A hash list that would have inevitably expanded to include other verboten content that the government recommends that communications services "voluntarily" censor. Its likely that is not a business these ISPs wish to be in.

More here and here.

I have a feeling that June 10th, 2008 may replace February 8th, 1996 as the most infamous day in the history of the Internet.

N.Y. attorney general forces ISPs to curb Usenet access | The Iconoclast - politics, law, and technology - CNET News.com