Speech on the Internet requires a series of intermediaries to reach its audience. Each intermediary is vulnerable to some degree to pressure from those who want to silence the speaker. Even though the Internet is decentralized and distributed, “weak links” in this chain can operate as choke points to accomplish widespread censorship.

Oh, by the way, the officer in the pepper-spraying incident, Anthony Bologna, is accused of civil rights violations at the time of the 2004 Republican national convention protests. That case is pending in NY Federal Court.

Look, you may not agree with the protesters, but this is the United States, the right to disagree with government is part of our DNA. When we let police (or anyone) interfere with this right we’ve basically given up on the principles upon which this nation was founded.

The law is now clear, if you’re not sucking the hind teat of a corporation, there’s almost no chance of you being elected. Your opponent will simply outspend you, simple as that.

Oh, and isn’t this originating in Arizona just the icing on the cake? If there was a more anti-democratic state in the union I’d be surprised.

You may think that this was wrong, you may think the wealthy photographer is a jerk for doing this, you may shake your head at our messed up legal system favoring the rich. But there’s more to this than just that.

‘Fair Use’ is one of those things that everyone thinks they understand. Andy was not in any way representing the pixel cover art as the original and did not profit from its use (he didn’t even create it himself). Most ordinary folks would consider that not a copyright violation. But the photographer, who could afford expensive legal representation, did and by threatening legal action got Andy to give up.

That surrender is what makes fair use so hard to deal with legally. The legal profession relies on precedent, the accumulation of previous court cases and judgements. But when cases are settled before cases even get to court or before the trials end they don’t contribute to precedent. Had precedent been in Andy’s favor, he might have had a chance in court. But it isn’t, and given the stakes he couldn’t take that chance. That’s not how the legal system is supposed to work. We pride ourselves on the blindness of justice but the reality is that the legal system is biased heavily in the favor of those with money. And that’s a shame.

The tribute, Kind of Bloop, is still available, sans cover art of course.

But you will note that Emily Good is not accusing the police of anything in relation to the arrest they were conducting when she was filming. She was also standing on her own property and did not physically interfere with the police in any way. The police claimed they did not feel “safe”, but other than being a commonly-used statement by police in such instances, does the simple act of filming from a distance constitute a real safety issue?

[Update 6/27/2011] All of the charges against Emily Good have been dropped.