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The first draws upon Haraway’s desire that “[a]ny interesting being in technoscience, such as a textbook, molecule, equation…can – often should – be teased open to show the sticky economic, technical, political, organic, historical, mythic and textual threads that make up its tissues.” (Haraway Modest Witness 1997: 68). While Haraway criticizes him, this seems similar to the type of sociological and historical studies by Bruno Latour, in which complex relations between “agents” - scientists, engineers, corporate leaders, government officers, political, social and cultural events and concerns of the time, and the very machines that scientists and engineers use -interrelate in any technoscientific endeavor. This body of research suggests an approach to law and technology that undertakes detailed examinations of the networks at play behind, not just technological change, but legal responses to technological change.

The Office of Compliance Assistance Policy would like to bring to your attention compliance assistance news from the Internal Revenue Service:

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A joint project of the Electronic Frontier Foundation and Harvard, Stanford, Berkeley, University of San Francisco, University of Maine, George Washington School of Law, and Santa Clara University School of Law clinics.

Do you know your online rights? Have you received a letter asking you to remove information from a Web site or to stop engaging in an activity? Are you concerned about liability for information that someone else posted to your online forum? If so, this site is for you.

ADA Watch is a project of the National Coalition for Disability Rights (NCDR), a nonprofit alliance of hundreds of disability, civil rights, and social justice organizations united to defend and strengthen disability rights.

I can just imagine the howls of protest–”Lock-in is the whole Web 2.0 business model! Give ‘em stuff for free, use their UGC, and monetize the eyeballs!” But my hope is that (user sunk costs + lock-in) becomes a much less compelling business model over the coming decade. Although optimism on “innovation markets” has largely anesthetized antitrust authorities looking at these situations, we should reconsider whether encouraging big players to compete to capture a market produces more gains and innovation than rules that reduce the cost of exit from dominant players.

"Piracy is not just a problem on the high seas or the internet: fashion designers have fallen victim, too. Current copyright laws protect only the artwork of a design, such as labels, logos, prints and embroidery. Leave off the label or change the logo slightly, and manufacturers and copy-cat designers have free reign to duplicate the cut, shape, style, and silhouette of an item of clothing or an accessory. This widespread practice of design piracy by popular retailers is legal…for now."