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Another Missouri Mom Arrested for Cyberharrassment of Teen Girl

One would think that after the Megan Meier suicide and the case and cyberbullying law that flowed therefrom, that no right-thinking adult would be horrid – or foolish – fake posts on a public forum targetted at harrassing a teenager. But that’s just what Elizabeth Thrasher did, and to add to the unbelievable nature of her actions, she is from the same area of Missouri as Megan Meier’s tormentor!

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Facebook Sued Over Privacy Concerns

A group of Facebook users has sued Facebook for violation of their privacy, and privacy law in general. The group, which includes two children under the age of thirteen, an actress, and a professional photographer, have sued Facebook in California Superior Court, alleging that Facebook’s practices violate California online privacy laws which make it illegal to reveal users’ private data for commercial gain.

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Gunfight at the Password Corral – Showdown Over Passwords Between Sheriff and County Officials

It has all the makings of a classic western: trouble brewing between two factions in Arizona over disputed territory, the law unable to head the confrontation off, people taking matters into their own hands, and it all culiminating in the inevitable showdown. Only in this case, the dispute is over computer territory, one of the factions is the law, and the other side is the county itself!

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State of Illinois Defines “Social Networking Site”

The next time someone asks you about social networking, and what it is, or to describe a social networking website, you need look no further than the laws of the state of Illinois. Because Illinois has taken the unusal step of defining just what makes a social networking site, in the context of their new law banning sex offenders from using any social networking site.

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AT&T’s New ToS Prohibits Customers from Class Action Suits Against AT&T

AT&T has amended the language of its Terms of Service (TOS) to prohibit AT&T’s customers from participating in any class action lawsuits or class arbitrations against AT&T.

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Amazon Sued for Reaching Out and Removing 1984 from Student’s Kindle

In a scene that seems straight out of, well, 1984, Amazon reached out across its WhisperNet network and removed all copies of Animal Farm and 1984 itself from every Kindle and Kindle 2 which had purchased and downloaded the books from Amazon. So high school student Justin Gawronski has sued them, claiming in his lawsuit that the loss of his copy of 1984 has cost him far more than the cost of the book, and includes the loss of all of the notes he’d taken and attached to the book on his Kindle, and the value of the effort in creating them.

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Property Management Company Sues Tenant Over Single Tweet on Twitter

Amanda Bonnen – the woman formerly known as @abonnen on Twitter – was apparently unhappy with the mold growing in the apartment which she rented from property management company Horizon Group Management LLC. Earlier this year she said as much on Twitter, tweeting a Tweet (a Twitter message) in which she said “Who said sleeping in a moldy apartment was bad for you? Horizon realty thinks it’s okay.”
Whether or not Horizon thinks that a moldy apartment is ok, they clearly think that talking about their moldy apartments isn’t – this week Horizon slapped Amanda Bonnen with a lawsuit in which they ask for $50,000 in damages for that single Tweet.

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Apple Sued for Colluding with Mafia in Bugging Man’s iPods

From our “Now I’ve heard it all” department, Gregory McKenna (misreported in many articles as “George McKenna”) is suing, among others, the St. Louis County Police Department, the FBI, and Apple Computers for allegedly allowing the Mafia to bug his iPods (along with his house, his cars, and more) and allowing them to play sinister songs with hidden messages to him on his iPods.

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Apple Throws Down Gauntlet – Disables iTunes Sync for Palm Pre and Other Smart Phones

iTunes won’t sync with your Palm Pre or other smart phone, when previously it would? Your Palm Pre isn’t broken – Apple has intentionally disabled the ability for non-iPod or iPhone phones to synch with iTunes in it’s newest version of iTunes, iTunes 8.2.1.

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Class Action Lawsuit Against Facebook for Click Fraud and Overcharging Advertisers

A class action lawsuit has been filed against Facebook, alleging that Facebook is charging advertisers for more clicks than their ads actually receive, and also that Facebook is not doing enough to curtail click fraud which is resulting, the lawsuit says, from competitors clicking on an advertiser’s Facebook advertisment in order to use up their allotted clicks and run up the advertiser’s Facebook advertising bill.

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Positive Recommendations on LinkedIn Used in Lawsuits Against the Recommender

Employment attorneys are warning of a new trend: the use of positive recommendations on Linked-In as evidence in lawsuits against the recommender. Here’s how it works: an employer gives a positive recommendation on Linked In for an employee. The employee is later let go. The positive recommendation on LinkedIn now becomes ammunition and evidence in a lawsuit against the employer for discrimination, harrassment, or other improper firing practices.

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Lori Drew MySpace Suicide Conviction Overturned

If you were among those who were upset by the criminal conviction of Lori Drew – the mother behind the MySpace incident that lead to the suicide of thirteen-year-old Megan Meier – you are either about to be relieved, or outraged, depending on where you stood on the case. Lori Drew, who had been facing felony charges due to her involvement in the case, received, instead, three misdemeanor convictions. Now a Federal court is overturning those convictions.

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California Governor Schwarzenegger Vetoes California Affiliate Program Tax, Overstock Reinstates California Affiliates

It seems like only yesterday we were reporting that, due to California’s legislature (among others) being poised to pass a tax on affiliate programs (which some were also calling an “advertising tax”) such as those run by Amazon and Overstock, these and other companies were resorting to dumping the affiliates in those states and that, in fact, Overstock had just dumped all of their California affiliates for that very reason. In fact, it was yesterday. And in response, California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger vetoed the tax increase which the California legislators had passed, including the problematic affiliate tax provision.

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Affiliates Getting Dumped from Coast-to-Coast as States Contemplate Internet Sales Tax Laws

With ever more states either passing or contemplating passing an Internet affiliate program sales tax, the two edges of that particular sword are being felt from coast-to-coast, as associates are being slashed from the lucrative affiliate programs of some of the largest Internet companies.

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Paypal Introduces “Proposition and Pay People to Do Stuff” Service

In an interesting move that may or may not be tied to the economic times, Paypal has introduced a new service in which it exhorts you to proposition people and offer to pay them to do stuff. Or, as they say in one of their online ads, “Get stuff done for money”. “Get stuff done for money,” says the ad. “Use PayPal’s “Do Stuff for Money” to get your friends to do stuff for money. Because sometimes just asking isn’t enough.”