How to Kick a Person in the Teeth | How to Contemplate the Back of Your Pate | How to Eat Beans Without Soiling Your Jeans | How to Get Your Beard Sheared | How to Sharpen Your Wits | How to Block a BackSlapper's Sock | How to Grope for Bathtub Soap | How to Eat Crackers in Bed | How to See TV | How to Keep a Cool Conk | How to Double Your Bubble Gum Bubble | How (Not) to Reel on a Banana Peel | How to Tweak a Beak | How to Fall on Your Face | How to Laugh at a Bum Joke
...and many more hilarious how-tos from Basil Wolverton's Culture Corner. [more inside]
posted by carsonb on Apr 3, 2009 - 12 comments

Ars Technica is reporting that, "A class-action lawsuit has been launched against domain registrar Network Solutions and ICANN over the controversial practice of domain tasting. The suit was initiated on behalf of Chris McElroy, a search engine optimization specialist who goes by the handle NameCritic. McElroy has long been an extremely vocal critic of ICANN and is a regular participant on the organization's mailing lists." Users everywhere, likely including a number of MeFites, rejoice. More: Network World article, Press Release, Network Solutions defense of the practice, ICANN comments on the practice.
posted by NotMyselfRightNow on Feb 26, 2008 - 12 comments

Stanford's new Copyright Renewal Database makes searchable the copyright renewal records of books published from 1923-1963, previously very difficult to do. Between those dates, a renewal registration was required to prevent the expiration of copyright, so books not renewed are now in the public domain. Publishing scanned books on Internet Archive.
posted by stbalbach on Apr 6, 2007 - 3 comments

A list of sites with public domain images was just posted by a DailyKos user and seems very useful.
posted by brookeb on Jan 20, 2007 - 20 comments

Hercules uses eminent domain to keep out Wal-Mart (previously). Fueling the eminent domain fire, now WalMart finds itself on both sides of the debate.
posted by analogue on May 24, 2006 - 32 comments

The days of needing to remember several telephone numbers, numerous VOIP or instant message identities and other points of contact for our social and professional networks are over.
posted by airguitar on May 17, 2006 - 20 comments

Belgian authorities allow free registration of .be domain names in a temporary promotion. Hilarity ensues. (apparently metafilter.be is still available)
posted by Count Ziggurat on Nov 13, 2005 - 62 comments

Ry Cooder's Ry Cooder's new album Chávez Ravine captures the world of the vibrant Chicano community that was bulldozed in the 1950's to build Dodger Stadium. Don Normark's book Chavez Ravine: 1949 provides more background on the place that was once a "poor man’s Shangri-la." of "wild roses, tin roofs, and wandering goats" where life "was lived fully, openly, and joyfully" before it was destroyed.
posted by robliberal on Aug 3, 2005 - 19 comments

The Supreme Court broadly expanded eminent domain in Kelo V. New London last Thursday. The city of Freeport, TX wasted no time. City attorneys are preparing legal documents to seize three pieces of waterfront property from two seafood companies for construction of an $8 million private boat marina.

Coming to a city near you soon?
posted by Steve_at_Linnwood on Jun 27, 2005 - 129 comments

The Sinking of Tuvalu, by Kevin Maney. The bizarre story of an island nations sinking fortunes.
posted by stbalbach on Apr 28, 2004 - 9 comments

Speaking of free audio books, Project Gutenberg is currently working on releasing about 500 free, public domain audio books in mp3 format. Among the titles included are Melville's Typee, A Midsummer Night's Dream,A Modest Proposal, Huck Finn, and many, many more. I have some Great Expectations for this one...
posted by kaibutsu on Mar 27, 2004 - 15 comments

Whoah. I accidentally typed our favorite blog's URL minus a period, and stumbled upon this educational reference site. Those devious hippies have gone too far....
posted by adamms222 on Mar 8, 2004 - 23 comments

Telltale Weekly launched today. It's public domain meets Creative Commons meets Ogg Vorbis. Their mission is to build a free audiobook library of public domain texts. Four are available now, but Twain, Chekov Doctorow (Corry, not E.L.) and more are on the way.
posted by turbodog on Feb 27, 2004 - 7 comments

Seven years in jail and a $150,000 fine. That's what domain owners will get if HR 3574 makes its way into law. HR 3574 will require all domain owners to make their current home address, telephone number and email address publicly known. Mr. Haughey's stalkers need no longer fear how to find him.
posted by ed on Feb 5, 2004 - 27 comments

The Anti-Squatter... A web-based sidebar to the recent passing of WKRP Manager and Maytag Repairman Gordon Jump: the 'dot-com' address with his name (as well as those for living and dead celebrities including Jack Palance, Bob "Captain Kangaroo" Keeshan and Flip Wilson) are owned by Richard Shumaker of "Wilmerding World Wide", who, on each homepage, editorializes against "Celebrity Name Cybersquatting", declares he has "captured" the names for "safekeeping", and promises "At no charge, I will be more than honored to transfer domain name ownership." [more inside]
posted by wendell on Sep 26, 2003 - 12 comments

kids.us ready to go. Hidden amongst the seemingly endless barrage of SOBig virii this morning was an interesting email from that ResourceShelf Guy on the new kids Domain.
Being billed as "an Internet domain that parents and children can trust for educational and appropriate online fun" kids.us Launches On September 4, 2003. You can read the Overview of kids.us Policies and Procedures, or Register A Name (starting next week).
Interestingly they Say a company called cyveillance will be "monitoring and reviewing" content for the domains.
The domain names will Look a little funny, but maybe Someone should snag www.metafilter.kids.us, you know, for the kids. They don't seem cheap, as "Registrants will be charged a combined registration fee and a non-refundable application fee for five-year registration.
posted by Blake on Aug 28, 2003 - 13 comments

There's a lot of news coverage this morning about Afghanistan going live with their official country domain ".af" - the first two advertised sites are here (?) and here (via the BBC). There's a less publicized, and much better site here via google. I guess you know you've made it as a civilization these days when the glass is lit. I remember how excited I was when the ADSL synchronized and my pop up adventure began. . . I hope this isn't our farewell present to this country, though.
posted by jdaura on Mar 10, 2003 - 11 comments

Looks like Verisign forgot to renew their UK domain name.
posted by timeistight on Sep 28, 2002 - 15 comments

Satire is dead. "On Monday 23rd September, the Metropolitan Police (acting with the support of The Internet Watch Foundation) contacted my web host, Webfusion (aka Host Europe), and requested that thinkofthechildren.co.uk be 'removed from the public domain'."
posted by MintSauce on Sep 25, 2002 - 31 comments

Judge orders VeriSign to stop ad campaign A U.S. court on Tuesday ordered Internet naming giant VeriSign Inc. to immediately cease a direct-mail campaign that used what a rival called deceptive advertising to poach its customers. A development in an earlier posted story.
posted by timeistight on May 16, 2002 - 7 comments

Verisign sued for false advertising. Domain registrar VeriSign has been mailing out thousands of "domain name expiration" notices that imply that domain-name owners could lose control of their name if they don't return the form (as noted previously on MeFi), and BulkRegister has filed suit in federal court. No lawsuits on that that other matter yet, but is the fall of Verisign impending?
posted by gleuschk on May 13, 2002 - 19 comments

Who's a .pro? The new .pro TLD will only be available to certified professionals —at first just lawyers, doctors, and accountants—with subdomain strings (“.law.pro, .med.pro and .cpa.pro with more to come”) to identify the professions. [more info at RegistryPro] Seems pretty clunky to me.
posted by kirkaracha on May 11, 2002 - 25 comments

Hoopla.com Stolen, Net Sol says, "Oops! Not Our Problem!" Leslie Harpold's Hoopla.com was stolen from her through a series of dodgy faxes (or something...) and now, Network Solutions is throwing up their hands and telling her they can't do anything. If this doesn't beg for Metafilter community action, I don't know what does.
posted by benbrown on Apr 12, 2002 - 103 comments

domain highjacking this also recently happened to our friends at k10k.com along with numerous other legitimate domains in the recent past... an outrage. the blood trail does not lead very far: heres what stinks my friends.... go to: www.k10k.com .... then click on merchant accounts... and take a look at who the number 2 listing is.... oh, i bet verisign comes up a few other places as well .... thoughts? - i suggest a boycott of netsol and versign until appropriate action is taken or at least their support for this organization ceases.
posted by specialk420 on Mar 22, 2002 - 59 comments

Ben Brown once had this thing called Teeth Magazine. I don't know how long it lasted. But visiting ye olde Glassdog, I saw a random adzert for it. Intrigued, I clicked on it. And it's a bit different now. Anyone else have funny lapsed-domain stories?
posted by solistrato on Aug 21, 2001 - 16 comments

Zeldman's seemingly constant problems with Network Solutions continue. It raises two questions for me. 1. Why wouldn't he change the domain and/or name rather cease publication of one of the best independant publications on the web? and 2. How come they haven't overhauled the domain registration system to have other methods for verification? At the company where I work we have over 50 domains and we're constantly having problems with peoples' names who are long since gone being on the registration and not being able to remove them. Hope it works out for him, I couldn't live without my ALA fix.
posted by abosio on Jun 27, 2001 - 37 comments

Welcome to Christian Fun Mail! Your source for fun Christian Email addresses. Please choose a domain that you would like to have an email address with below and have fun!
posted by tweebiscuit on May 25, 2001 - 14 comments

Bruce Springsteen didn't win the rights to BruceSpringsteen.com, because 2 out of 3 arbitrators decided that The Boss has no right to the domain name. Which is quite surprising considering most other celebs have won the rights to theirs. [ via Signal vs. Noise]
posted by riffola on Feb 11, 2001 - 2 comments

It's that time of year again... Here's a friendly reminder. When you go caroling this holiday season, be sure to get all your copyrights in a row before venturing about the neighborhood. You never know when someone might turn you in. [caution, the preceding was laced with sarcasm]
posted by ZachsMind on Nov 18, 2000 - 1 comment

johnsmith.name and many more silly new suffixes. Do we need this many? I have yet to see anything good with the previous additions, it all looks a bit like those http://take.me.to/, http://fly.to redirectional services.
posted by tiaka on Nov 17, 2000 - 2 comments

Madonna finally wins madonna.com Under what grounds warrent her rights to that domain name? At the bottom it notes singer Sting was denied his attempt at aquiring sting.com, which is merely owned by some online gamer called =Sting=.
posted by grank on Oct 16, 2000 - 14 comments

Don't just sit there, go buy some un-used 3 Letter Acronym domain names for the heck of it.
posted by riffola on Oct 2, 2000 - 12 comments

.ca for us normal folk Many of the old, tight-assed restrictions on the .ca domain are being lifted this fall. The change might be annoying to some existing .ca owners, but a blessing for us regular Joe canadians that wanted to be .ca'ed, instead of .com'ed. Internic.ca is taking prebookings now.
posted by mkn on Sep 4, 2000 - 0 comments

Read the letter to Jeff Bezos here.
posted by DragonBoy on Aug 8, 2000 - 5 comments

Julia wins
posted by tiaka on Jun 2, 2000 - 1 comment

verizonREALLYsucks Be good, or I'll sic the AntiCyberSquat on you!
posted by PaperCut on May 13, 2000 - 3 comments

Tuvalu, a tiny South Pacific nation measuring 26 square kilometers, has sold the use of its domain name -- .tv -- to Idealab! in a deal that promises to garner Tuvalu more than three times its national budget.
posted by TuxHeDoh on Apr 12, 2000 - 4 comments

Get in line...FREE DOMAINS at registerfree.com starts in 8 minutes...
posted by webshaping on Mar 23, 2000 - 7 comments