Facebook a Threat to Democracy, says Nobel Peace Prize winner from Manila

Nobel Peace Prize winner Maria Ressa used her new prominence to criticise Facebook as a threat to democracy, saying the social media giant fails to protect against the spread of hate and disinformation and is "biased against facts".

https://www.reuters.com/world/philippine-nobel-winner-ressa-calls-facebook-biased-against-facts-2021-10-09/

I guess we should realize that social media is not really media, just like oat milk is not milk. 

From the Washington Post:

"The first time I heard Ressa speak, she told how she had once tried to explain to Mark Zuckerberg that the company’s dominance in her country brought with it a huge social responsibility. Ressa told Zuckerberg that 97 percent of Filipinos used Facebook, and she invited him to the Philippines to get a better understanding of the problems that result. Zuckerberg seemed to ignore the invitation, concentrating instead on how Facebook could increase its domination in the country. “What are the other 3 percent doing, Maria?” he allegedly asked."

 

Vermont Law School sued as it wants to cover up slave mural

Vermont Law School is being sued to prevent it covering up a painting, depicting the Underground Railway and slaves.  The Law School commissioned with work in 1994.  The artist is fighting for the integrity of the art work.  The case concerns moral rights.

The centre of the case is the Visual Artists Rights Act.  Or is the case really about changing community standards? 

A local paper has this story about the case.  An earlier newspaper article.  It is hard to determine who is morally right.

Internet Law cases - top 10?

A United States digital contracting company (Ironclad) has listed what it considers to be the top 10 major internet law cases since 2000.   Being U.S. centric, they have only listed U.S. decisions.  Strange, as one key feature of the Internet is that it is global, and is helping break down borders.  My guess is that Ironclad is not interested in expanding its business outside of the U.S.

In any event, here is their U.S. centric list.

Internet Privacy

Good articles from the NY Times regarding Internet and privacy:

The Battle for Internet Privacy is Reshaping the Internet

and

What the Privacy Battle means for you

Privacy and Opt-Out

Many people are aware of the use of cookies for tracking purposes.  But that is old technology.  Many advertisers use more sophisticated techniques for targeting advertisements, such as tracking pixels or audience matching or audience matched advertising.

In Australia, some advertising systems allow consumers to opt-out of audience matching targeting.  This is not well-known or promoted.  To opt-out, go here.

Responsibility for User Comments Posted on Facebook

The High Court of Australia decided today that a newspaper with a Facebook page is responsible for defamatory comments posted by Facebook users on the newspaper's Facebook page.

"The appellants' attempt to portray themselves as passive and unwitting victims of Facebook's functionality has an air of unreality. Having taken action to secure the commercial benefit of the Facebook functionality, the appellants bear the legal consequences."

None of this is surprising.  There are many prior cases in different areas that reach the same result.  There was an Advertising Standards Board decision against VB that came to a similar conclusion in a different area of law, and also the ACCC v. Allergy Pathways case from about 10 years ago.

The next question is whether Facebook could be liable for defamation for user content.

Fairfax Media Publications v Voller [2021] HCA 27 

And see Social Media Best Practice Guide from the ACA and the Diageo case from ASB.

What is interesting about the High Court decision is that it focuses on cases and texts from over 100 years ago, and looks at very few cases concerning the Internet or social media.

Privacy and Streaming Services

A recent report from the USA found that most of America’s popular streaming services and TV streaming gadgets such as Netflix, Roku and Disney+ failed to meet minimum requirements for privacy and security practices. The lone exception was Apple.

See Common Sense Media report

US Court says AI machine cannot be inventor

Reaching a different conclusion to an Australian Federal Court decision, a US District Court looking at the same facts decided that an AI machine cannot be an inventor on a patent.

See Bloomberg story: “The unequivocal statements from the Federal Circuit that ‘inventors much be natural persons’ and ‘only natural persons can be inventors’ supports the plain meaning of ‘individual’ in the Patent Act,” the judge ruled.

Real Estate Photographs Online

A recent Federal Court appeal considered the scope of the right to use photographs taken when marketing a house for sale.  This decision is relevant to anyone who wishes to commercialise data that they obtain for one purpose for a different purpose.

The real estate agent engages a photographer to photograph a house that is for sale, with the intent to upload the photographs onto a real estate sales portal such a RealEstate.com.au or Domain.com.au to advertise the property for sale.  The REA portal has terms that bind the real estate agent.  These terms include the right to sublicense the photographs and the listing information to CoreLogic RP Data for their property information database. 

The court found, in a 2-1 split judgment, that merely because the photographer allowed the photos to be uploaded to REA did not mean that the photographer agreed to REA's terms or agreed to allow the photographs to be sublicensed to CoreLogic RP Data.

In effect, the real estate agent is in breach of the REA contract by uploading the photos in these circumstances.  The license from the photographer to the real estate agent to allow the upload to REA is, in effect, useless unless the agent also obtains terms from the photographer that match the REA license.

CoreLogic RP Data is now in breach of the photographer's copyright.

A strange result. 

Hardingham v RP Data Pty Limited [2021] FCAFC 148

Direct Registration of Domain Names in Australia

Finally, what is called direct registration of domain names is coming to Australia.

See https://www.auda.org.au/statement/australias-internet-domain-growing-get-ready-getyourau

This will allow registrations such as swinson.au and telstra.au, without the .com part of the domain name.

This arose out of the work of the 2017 Policy Review Panel, of which I chaired.  See Paper and website.

Tweets not Journalism

The Federal Court of Australia has decided that a person who published allegedly defamatory tweets on Twitter does not receive the benefit of the journalists' privilege under the Evidence Act.

See Kumova v Davison [2021] FCA 753

This does not mean that a person who tweets can never be considered to be a journalist.  In this case, looking at the Twitter feed as a whole, the defendant was not considered to be a journalist.

See this helpful note from Clayton Utz.  Also Bennett & Co.  Story in the AFR and The Age.

 

Automonous Vechicles

 “The real problem is going to be, at what point is it still ethical to let the human drive,” Lunn said. “But before that, AI has to continue to learn from human drivers. Autonomy will have to make sure that we never have a trolley problem.”

Washington Post, 6 August 2021