PicApp, the image Website that lets small-time bloggers use big-time images, has rolled out several changes designed to make user’s lives a bit easier. read more

In copyright law, the big news is always made by cases such as the Jammie Thomas verdict, the Tenenbaum trial or even The Pirate Bay trial in Sweden. As importance as these cases are, their legal applicability to the average person is dubious, especially since the RIAA has stopped suing file sharers.

For the cases that could have a direct impact on your life, you often have to dig deeper. This is true for the case of Brayton Purcell LLP v. Recordon & Recordon, a seemingly dull case about two law firms in a dispute over content posted on their respective Web sites.

However a recent decision by the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals in the case, if upheld by other circuits or the Supreme Court, could have a drastic impact on the way copyright issues are litigated in the United States.

How big is the difference? The dissenting judge on the panel said the following, “Under the majority’s opinion, every website operator faces the potential that he will be hailed into far-away courts based upon allegations of intellectual property infringement, if he happens to know where the alleged owner of the property rights resides.”

In short, if you are accused of copyright infringement, it is no longer safe to assume that you would be sued in your own district, but rather that you could be forced to litigate in the plaintiff’s court, enduring the extra costs and expense that comes with it. read more

The identity of a blogging British police officer going by the pseudonym “Night Jack” has been discovered by The Times newspaper and is soon to be published, after attempts by his lawyers to get an injunction preventing the exposé failed.

In the High Court, Mr Justice Eady ruled that blogging was “essentially a public rather than a private activity” and as such it was in the public interest to reveal his identity.

Unlike The Daily Telegraph, whose revelations regarding MPs expenses were definitely in the public interest, all The Times is likely to achieve is the loss of an interesting and insightful blog. Well done. read more

In a story so short it could fit into a handful of tweets, notorious British tabloid The Sun reports that Beyonce Knowles is planning legal action against those who are pretending to be her on Twitter.

Apparently, her sister Solange said that she was being pestered by someone pretending to be the singer.

Whether this is a legitimate story is another matter. Though Twitter has been known to shut down accounts that either impersonate or are otherwise dubious, it’s possibly a better idea to ensure that your official Twitter account is well publicised so that the fakers can then be easily identified.

(Hat tip @kevindixie)

In “The Outing of a Blogger: Social Transparency or Violation?” I started this short series on the outing of a popular Alaska personal blogger, Mudflats (aka AKMuckraker or AKM), unveiled by a state politician.

The question I want to tackle in this article is the issue of the legality of blogger anonymity and what protects bloggers and not. This is a huge topic, so I’m only going to scratch the surface.

In many countries, there are no laws protecting freedom of speech nor journalists or bloggers. There may be protections for journalists, but none for bloggers. In countries where you would expect there to be such laws…it’s amazing how few there are and how flexible those laws can be.

Does a blogger have the right to privacy and anonymity? What rights do others have to expose them and why? read more

While courts can slap gagging orders on established media to stop certain information being published, it’s very clear that they have little control over what members of the public post online on blogs and forums.

So it is with the case of Brendan Sokaluk, the man accused of deliberately starting one of the bush fires in Victoria, Australia.

The court may have stopped the newspapers from divulging Sokaluk’s photo and street address, some bloggers have been posting such information online. read more

For someone who’s not an US citizen, the lawsuit scare is somewhat far into the back of my head. That might be a luxury you can’t afford, so you might want to consider some kind of insurance for potential lawsuits. Silicon Alley Insider points to Media Bloggers Association, which offer law services for bloggers, including liability insurance programs that are way more economic than the expensive ones geared at the old media guard.

While this might be a good idea, I must second SAI on another point as well: health insurance. You might want to look up that alley first, because after all, your health is more important than your money, and you’ll probably not piss people off like Michael Arrington does.

In part one, we discussed the DMCA safe harbor provision as it pertains to bloggers, we looked at the elements of the law, what exactly they said and even the elements that compose a proper DMCA notice.

But even though the law itself is generally well understood, that does not mean it is not abused. Some, either through accident or malice, file false DMCA notices and demand removal for content that is not infringing. Others, unwittingly sacrifice the protections the law provides by not responding appropriately.

Bearing in mind that I am not an attorney, it is worth taking a few moments to think about strategies for using and handling DMCA notices. Because, whether you receive one or have to send one, it is best to be prepared for what is expected of you. read more

There are few laws that affect bloggers more directly than the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (PDF) safe harbor provisions. Not only do bloggers use it to secure removal of their works when copied without permission, but many also take advantage of its protections to offer new services to their readers.

But the safe harbor provisions are also one of the least understood laws actively being used. Many do not understand exactly what the DMCA safe harbor protections do and what they protect protect. As such, they do not understand what their rights and obligations are under the law.

So we’re going to take a moment and analyze what the law actually says and how it applies to bloggers, both as content creators and as hosts, and look at how we can best use the law as it is written today.
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A recent article in ABC News paints a fairly grim picture about the current state of blogging. According to the article, as well as the Media Law Resource Center, there have been 159 civil and criminal court actions taken against bloggers since 2004 with countless others threatened into silence before any kind of action was filed.

Though the number of actions taken are still very small compared to the number of bloggers writing (Technorati was tracking over 70 million blogs at its last report), the threat of legal action is enough to scare many bloggers into changing the way they write, removing content or otherwise altering their site.

The problem is that, even if the image of bloggers being sued is an exaggerated one, the image of bloggers being threatened with such suits is much less so. For every lawsuit that reaches trial, there are dozens that are settled and for every one that is settled there are likely hundreds that are threatened, but never filed.

This has helped to create a climate of fear, one that bloggers need to be prepared for.
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