Citizensheep. "Michael Grimes lives in Birmingham (UK). This is his blog about anything that he fancies."

In January, the European Commission proposed a major reform of data protection law. This morning, lawyers from Pinsent Masons took us through some of its more significant aspects. Some elements are just an evolution of the current situation, but others are very disruptive. Here I highlight those that stood out most to me. For a fuller picture [...]

I am very sorry to have had to cancel my cookie law event in Birmingham. Please accept some links as compensation. The cancellation is a big disappointment. The key speakers could no longer make it so we tried to find someone else at short notice to give a neutral, authoritative overview of the legal situation. Sadly, without [...]

The good folk at civicuk have built a free tool that takes all the sweat out of complying with the cookie regulations. Cookie Control creates an opt-in for your visitors that is clear, uncluttered and unobtrusive. You can tell it whether to pop up when the page is loaded, how long to pop up for, where to [...]

I’ve drawn up a legal primer for people commissioning or managing websites. This is by no means detailed or comprehensive: it is intended as a starting point and to raise awareness of the issues. I welcome feedback on anything that’s unclear or factually wrong. I’ve posted it here initially, but I may well move it [...]

I’m trying to draw up a list of key legal considerations for people commissioning websites. I welcome your input. There is a lot of this information littered around the Internet, but I want a simple list of key points with links to further information that I can share with people; so I thought I’d try [...]

The first session I went to at yesterday’s Talk About Local un-conference was on the legal problems of managing sites that allow user feedback or investigate stories of public interest. It’s very depressing to hear of the crippling situations people repeatedly find themselves in, simply through a determination to get at the truth in the [...]

Yesterday my iPhone stumbled upon a wireless network with a very vulgar name. It made me think: if someone found that offensive, could the owner be charged with public indecency? It’s a curious (albeit pretty boring) question: because the network owner would, I suspect, presume that their wifi name is confined to the privacy of [...]

Thanks to Gavin Wray for spotting this. “The Open Database License (ODbL) is an open license for data and databases which includes explicit attribution and share-alike requirements. “This license, the first of its kind, is a major step forward for open data. There are currently very few licenses available suited to data and databases and [...]

"Downloading music without the permission of the copyright holder should qualify for copyright laws' exemptions for 'fair use', a Harvard academic has said. Partial responsibility lies with the music industry itself for failing to adapt, he said."

Visit Harvard professor says downloading is 'fair use'

Apparently we may kill but not procreate. Not the most obvious strategy for maintaing a species. This is of course the story that Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas has effectively been banned in Australia because of hidden sex scenes, which can be unlocked by the player. So it’s OK to play at stealing cars, running [...]