Google has been ordered to turn over all of its electronic records of the videos watched by users on YouTube to Viacom. The 12 terabytes of data include records of every video watched by every user, including the user's login name (if any) and IP address. Google had complained that the disclosure would invade user's privacy, but this argument was blunted somewhat by Google's earlier statement that IP Addresses are not, in and of themselves, personally identifying information. Google was also ordered to turn over certain other information, including its video classification database schema, but was not ordered to turn over information regarding videos marked as private, its source code, or its advertising database schema.
posted to MetaFilter by The Bellman at 6:59 AM on July 3, 2008 (282 comments)

A Magistrate Judge in the U.S. District Court in Vermont has ruled that a man allegedly caught with child pornography on his laptop need not reveal his PGP password (yes, authorities shut down the laptop and now can't get at the alleged porn) pursuant to the Fifth Amendment's protections against self incrimination. The decision is here[PDF]. A decent write-up (from CNET of all places) is here. This appears to be the first decision ever to directly address this issue, and many commentators had thought it would come out differently. The major question is whether revealing one's PGP key is "testimonial" or not. According to the Supreme Court, giving up fingerprints or blood samples isn't, nor is standing for a lineup, nor is handing over the key to a safe, but if it's combination safe, well maybe that's different. Never let it be said that your Fifth Amendment rights are easy.
posted to MetaFilter by The Bellman at 3:18 PM on December 15, 2007 (57 comments)

Being But Men. Every year around this time, this interstitial runs and I am reminded of the genius of Dylan Thomas and how much fun it must be to make interstitials for TNT.
posted to MetaFilter by The Bellman at 1:17 PM on December 10, 2007 (8 comments)

It's the first Monday in October and time for Supreme Court Justices to compare liberals, unfavorably, to the Ku Klux Klan. In his new memoir, released on the first day of the Supreme Court's 2007 term, Justice Clarence Thomas writes that he grew up fearing the KKK, but now knows he had "been afraid of the wrong white people all along. My worst fears had come to pass not in Georgia but in Washington, D.C., where I was being pursued not by bigots in white robes but by left-wing zealots draped in flowing sanctimony. " No small man, he also comments on Anita Hill's bad breath. Slate's spectacular legal columnist, Dahlia Lithwick, notes that "in the few hundred pages of his new book, Thomas has managed to undo years of effort by his colleagues to depoliticize the judicial branch." As usual, only Jon Stewart can make us laugh through the tears.
posted to MetaFilter by The Bellman at 8:12 AM on October 4, 2007 (110 comments)

Physics Phun [Phlash, not Phriday]. Orbit is a game where you try to set up, well, orbits. How many levels can you finish?
posted to MetaFilter by The Bellman at 1:30 PM on November 7, 2006 (23 comments)

Stanley Kubrick's "lost" first movie, Day of The Fight, has apparently been found. Assuming it's real, this 16-minute 1951 reel is the director's debut. Sadly, unless you're a fight fan, that's about all it has to recommend it.
posted to MetaFilter by The Bellman at 12:52 PM on June 29, 2006 (16 comments)

Never, ever leave flashlights, shampoo bottles, beer bottles or any long, circular object on the floor because someday you will fall on it and it will somehow, work its way up your rectum. And other important life lessons learned by student doctors from their emergency room rotations.
posted to MetaFilter by The Bellman at 12:42 PM on February 2, 2006 (79 comments)