Tech headlines, argued out as legal questions.
Denise Howell hosts This Week in Law with co-host Stefan Spida. Together they take technology stories and ask what the law makes of them, covering privacy fines, copyright fights, patents and platform rules. The show is no longer in production, and its archive covers CGI influencers, defamation over retweets, bail algorithms and the first penalty issued under the GDPR.
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This Week in Law reads technology headlines for their legal consequences. Denise Howell hosts. She opens episodes with a fast rundown of the stories to come, usually capped with a cheerful 'All this and more', and then the conversation begins. Stefan Spida is her co-host, and Matt Curtis, introduced on air as a law student at Notre Dame, is named in the show's opening billing. Guests widen the conversation. Professor Mark Bartholomew, author of ADcreep: The Case Against Modern Marketing, appears on The Neuroscience of Cheetos. On Viral Ads With Legs, Emery Roan, described as no longer a regular co-host, comes back as the guest. Steve Embry and Irene Moe also appear as guests. Privacy recurs across these episodes. One conversation covers the first fine issued under the GDPR alongside privacy in the insurance industry, and a speaker insists that data given away was still once theirs to own. Another turns to a data tool now offered beyond EU residents, and one voice is uneasy that people can alter their records instead of just viewing or deleting them. The Best of 2018 compilation walks through who the GDPR reaches, including the line drawn at companies with 250 employees. Advertising and surveillance come up too. With Bartholomew, a Google patent for flagging raids on the liquor cabinet prompts a wry lament for a childhood rite of passage. That leads to a broader worry about how readily surveillance is being accepted, down to smart toothbrushes that report back to parents. Copyright brings its own eccentric cases. The EU's highest court is asked whether the taste of cheese can be copyrighted, a New York judge suggests embedding could be infringing, and the proposed EU copyright directive is described as possibly unaffordable even for YouTube. Other subjects resist a single label: defamation liability for retweets and likes, CGI influencers and whether their artificiality should be disclosed, algorithms deciding bail eligibility, AT&T getting aggressive with infringers, and Payless pioneering reverse counterfeiting. The sign-offs are affectionate and a little goofy. One wishes listeners lives as data vegan as they care to make them, another jokes about a stumble in enunciation, and one thanks listeners for twelve years of the show. The episode titles share the humor, with Make It 'Til You Fake It and Are You Feelin' Lucky, Punk? sitting beside Popularity Ponzi Schemes. Listeners are invited to send in stories and suggest guests, and the Best of 2018 episode is assembled from their votes. The show is no longer in production, which leaves a finished archive of tech law conversations to browse.
Made for: Suits a listener who follows technology news and wants to know where the legal lines fall on privacy, copyright and online speech. It also suits someone who enjoys an odd case, like copyrighting the taste of cheese, as much as a regulatory one.
What sets it apart: It puts major regulation such as the GDPR next to truly strange disputes, from cheese-taste copyright to reverse counterfeiting, in a relaxed conversation between host, co-host and rotating guests. Punning episode titles like The Neuroscience of Cheetos give it a lighter feel than its subject matter would suggest.
Join legal blogger (and trained attorney) Denise Howell discuss breaking issues in technology law, including patents, copyrights, and more.Although the show is no longer in production, you can enjoy episodes from the TWiT Archives.
A cheese copyright question and a watchful toothbrush give your legal curiosity an unusually specific workout.
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Short reviews from the PlayNext desk, based on the episodes we processed.
A listener-selected legal rewind linking the US public-domain return with GDPR's broad reach.
This Week in Law's year-end Best of 2018 episode works as a legal rewind with two sturdy anchors: the return of new works to the US public domain in 2019 and the practical reach of GDPR for companies handling EU users' personal data.
A measured look at advertising, location data, and household tech as private space keeps getting smaller.
Online advertising turns into a wider question of data collection and everyday surveillance in this episode of This Week in Law. Denise Howell talks with Mark Bartholomew, a University at Buffalo School of Law professor and author of Ad Creep, about the advertising business, New…
A first GDPR fine leads into a grounded discussion of medical data, insurance claims, and ownership.
This Week in Law uses the first GDPR fine as a clean way into a broader privacy question: who decides the value of personal data, and what follows when institutions act as if that data belongs to them.
A cheese-copyright case leads into a wider discussion of disclosure, platforms, CGI influencers, and algorithmic bail decisions.
This Week in Law frames copyright as a problem of edges, starting with the EU's highest court being asked whether the taste of cheese can be protected.
A wide legal-policy discussion lands best when it shows how data-access rules shape real consumer power.
Platform power is examined through the institutions and rules that turn online behavior into real consequences. The episode moves from AT&T's hard line on infringers to Ron Wyden's worries about poor data management, altered video, and the unsettled question of whether…
Uber agreed to pay Alphabet $245 million in equity after the Waymo self-driving trade-secret case settled during trial.
This Week in Law episode 446, recorded December 13, 2018, centers on Mark Bartholomew’s book Ad Creep and the shift from Cluetrain-style dialogue to 24/7 surveillance.
Denise Howell, Stefan Spida, and guest Steve Embry open This Week in Law #444 on November 30, 2018 with the first GDPR fine, privacy in insurance, and reverse counterfeiting.
Denise Howell and Stefan Schweider focus first on the EU copyright directive, where Article 11's link tax and Article 13's platform liability raise concerns for YouTube and smaller services alike.
AT&T may kick customers off ISP service over alleged infringement.
On This Week in Law episode 441, Denise Howell, Stefan Schweida, Josh Klayman, and Ethan Seary mark Bitcoin’s 10th anniversary and examine blockchain law.
Denise Howell, Stefan Speider and Matt Curtis open with the AI portrait sold at Christie's for $432,500 against an estimate of $7,000 to $10,000, and ask who owns work built on Robbie Barrat's open-source code.
Denise Howell, Stefan Spida and Matt Curtis examine Brett Kavanaugh's Supreme Court confirmation testimony on the Fourth Amendment, citing the Carpenter, Riley and Jones decisions and his past dissent calling expectation of privacy in movement outside the home 'basically zero.' They then cover California's net neutrality bill, which bars blocking, throttling and paid prioritization and needs Governor Brown's signature by September 30, alongside Kavanaugh's First Amendment dissent siding with Verizon and Jeff Sessions's announced scrutiny of Silicon Valley content moderation.
Aaron Wright, author of "Blockchain and the Law: The Rule of Code," tells Denise Howell and Stefan Schweida that ICOs raised over nine billion dollars from late 2017 into 2018 and put "an investment bank, a Kickstarter" in everyone's pocket.
Texas A&M law professor Saurabh Vishnubhakat tells Denise Howell and Stefan Schweida that the America Invents Act, effective September 2012 for inter partes review, shifted patent validity fights from federal courts to the Patent Trial and Appeal Board.
Episode 429 of This Week in Law (recorded August 10, 2018) examines VidAngel's legal fight with Disney and other studios after a Utah court dismissed its declaratory relief suit.
Legal experts discuss breaking issues in technology law, including embedding technology, YouTube moderation, and AI understanding terms of service.
Denise Howell and co-hosts discuss net neutrality, the Uber-Waymo dispute, and ADT's non-disparagement clause in the final 2017 episode of This Week in Law.
Denise Howell and guests discuss breaking issues in technology law, including stream rippers, copyright in CGI characters, and legal implications of draft text messages.
Denise Howell and guest Eric Goldman discuss legal issues in technology, including online sex trafficking legislation, smart contracts, and Apple's new emojis.