This Week In Techdirt History: June 23rd – 29th

Five Years Ago

This week in 2019, an Australian court ruled that media companies could be held liable for Facebook comments on their news stories, the Indian government used a national security law to block Twitter accounts all over the world, and the EU Intellectual Property Office released an utterly ridiculous propaganda film. Josh Hawley’s bill to remove Section 230 protections was not getting much support, and we dedicated an episode of the podcast to all the ways it sucked. We also released our Don’t Shoot The Message Board report about the impact of Section 230 on innovation and the economy.

Ten Years Ago

This week in 2014, former NSA boss Keith Alexander was chasing big paychecks for cybersecurity consulting, while we looked at how House leadership tried to misrepresent the amendment that defunded NSA backdoor searches. Meanwhile, the long-awaited DOJ drone memo revealed all the rights the AUMF trumps, and cited yet another secret drone memo in its text. Also, the Supreme Court finally killed Aereo with its bizarre “looks like a duck” test, leading even Hollywood publications to express their concern about the decision.

Fifteen Years Ago

This week in 2009, the Associated Press was still being weird about people “stealing” their content, newspapers were getting some early backlash over online-only stories, and we noted how newspaper websites rarely linked out to other sites. Musician Katy Perry started a dumb fight over designer Katie Perry’s clothing, Kindle DRM struck again, a German court demanded Rapidshare do the impossible, Spain rejected a three strikes law, and the Swedish court denied a Pirate Bay retrial. Also, an era came to an end when Kodak announced that it would discontinue its iconic Kodachrome film.