I’m a bit behind on my podcast listening so sorry for the delay in posting this. The first 45-ish minutes of This Week in Tech episode #144 covers the following topics and is definitely worth a listen.
- Microsoft to shut down book search program in face competition from Google Book Search. Microsoft’s comments.
- Text Archive, Open Content Alliance, and OpenLibrary.org. OCR is corrected by reCAPTCHA.
- Orphan works legislation now in Congress. Could be good or bad depending on how law is implemented.
- Internet Archive served by FBI in 2007 with national security letter seeking identity and behavior of Internet Archive user.
- Kahle and attorneys were under immediate gag order with penalty of incarceration.
- FBI served 200,000 such letters in four years, circumventing FISA court.
- Archive’s only legal recorse was to sue government (Internet Archive v. Mukasey) with help of ACLU and Electronic Frontier Foundation, arguing law was unconstitutional.
- FBI settled before case was challenged before judge. Internet Archive settled on condition that it could go public.
- Six senators ask FBI for information on this case. Full text.
- Video on Archive.org about NSLs
The episode is listenable and downloadable from the TWiT site.