In an apparent response to attorneys general in 17 states demanding that Craigslist remove its adult services section because the site doesn’t adequately block potentially illegal ads promoting prostitution and child trafficking, the section was replaced Saturday with a black bar that says, simply, ”censored.” Michael Arrington notes that Craigslist has taken a disproportionate share of the heat over prostitution and sexual trafficking claims. “A half page ad was recently...

The difference in a nutshell: Analyst Michael Gartenberg sums it up nicely on Twitter: “Apple and Google taking two different approaches. Google wants input one. Will never get it. Apple wants input two and might.” He’s referring to the input jacks on your TV set. Google is trying to replace your cable box or satellite TV box as “input one.” That’s really ambitious, and a big risk. Apple wants “input two,” where your DVD player is today, or your PlayStation....

The on again off again rape investigation into Wikileaks founder Julian Assange is on again: Public Prosecutions Director Marianne Ny said there was “reason to believe a crime has been committed” and that the crime was classified as rape. … In a statement about her decision to review the case, Ms Ny said of the rape allegation that “more investigations are necessary before a final decision can be made”. She also said that an accusation of molestation – which is...

In a statement the Sheriff’s office says, “We are confident the actions of our deputies will be found to have been both within the law and department policy.” Then the law has to change… I saw the story on GMA this morning, where a “former homicide detective” defended the tasering because the 64 year-old victim was “intoxicated” and officers thought he might become violent. Call me skeptical. More on the disturbing video here. Then there’s the...

I don’t make predictions. But I read a lot of them. And repeat the ones I like. Some swirling around Wednesday’s Apple event (10 a.m. Pacific)… Nearly everyone expects Apple TV to be renamed iTV and go on sale for $99 ($130 less than the current model). One hold out, NewTeeVee’s Darrell Etherington: While I don’t doubt that Apple has big plans in store for the iTV, I find it very unlikely that we’ll see its introduction tomorrow. Changes this big would merit their own...

Chase Whiteside (interviews) and Erick Stoll (camera), still students at Wright State University in Dayton, OH, are New Left Media. They were at Glenn Beck’s Restoring Honor rally. Say they: The participants spoke abstractly about the need to restore “honor” and “pride” to a country that had lost it. When pressed for when our country had lost its honor, most cited the election of Barack Obama. … While the speaker list was diverse, the overwhelmingly white crowd...

This is really the least interesting of the seven questions for Jay Rosen asked by The Economist of the NYU journalism professor and media critic. But perhaps it will stir good discussion: DiA: What are some examples of newspapers, magazines or news shows that are practicing the right kind of journalism, in your opinion? Mr Rosen: Particularly good at what they do: Advertising Age. Gawker. Wired. Voice of San Diego. The New Yorker. The Economist. (Disclosure: You’re The Economist!) Rachel Maddow....

The Koch (pronounced COKE) brothers, David and Charles who head up Koch Industries, are much in the news these days. Following up on a 10,000 word Jane Mayer essay in The New Yorker last week, Frank Rich calls them “the sugar daddies who are bankrolling” the Tea Party. From his column today: Koch Industries began with oil in the 1930s and now also spews an array of industrial products, from Dixie cups to Lycra, not unlike DuPont’s portfolio of paint and plastics. Sometimes the...

In its story noting the relative lack of controversy around Ken Mehlman saying that he is gay, the NYTimes concludes that the GOP cares now about fiscal issues: The center of gravity of the conservative movement in this election season is with fiscal conservatives. The Tea Party is infusing the Republican Party with new energy, and Tea Party leaders and supporters say they do not want to talk about social issues: even if they do not personally support same-sex marriage or abortion, they think the...

Former FEMA administrator turned talk radio host, Michael Brown, in New Orleans to host his show for the fifth anniversary of Hurricane Katrina: “Put yourself in my shoes…you’ve just come out of a meeting where you’ve just told your boss that nothing’s working, I can’t make stuff happen, state and local government aren’t doing what they need to do, the federal government isn’t doing what it needs to do, things are bad. And he comes out and tells me I’m doing a heck of a job?” Brown...

Google announced yesterday free voice phone calls via GMail to the U.S. and Canada and calls to other countries billed for as little as $0.02 per minute. (Here’s their price comparison table.) The feature was rolled out to everyone in the U.S. today. (If you don’t see the feature yet, try logging out of Gmail and signing back in.) It looks like GMail users like it: This afternoon Google tweeted that there were 1 million calls placed from Gmail in 24 hours. Farhad Manjoo is impressed: In...

On the occasion of Ken Mehlman’s decision to come out as a gay man, I re-post in full my reaction to seeing Brokeback Mountain from December 2005: Homosexual and gay are not synonymous; all homosexuals are not gay. Homosexual acts may be circumstantial – a man in prison, a drunken evening – or experimental and do not mean an individual is homosexual by nature. But experimentation can lead to the discovery of a homosexual inclination. Once that inclination is realized, how it is...

Is anyone surprised? Marc Ambinder got the get: Mehlman is the most powerful Republican in history to identify as gay. Because his tenure as RNC chairman and his time at the center of the Bush political machine coincided with the Republican Party’s attempts to exploit anti-gay prejudices and cement the allegiance of social conservatives, his declaration to the world is at once a personal act and an act of political speech. “I wish I was where I am today 20 years ago. The process of not...

A very sad day for those of us who believe he is an innocent man. AJC: In a 172-page order, U.S. District Judge William T. Moore Jr. said Davis failed to prove his innocence during an extraordinary hearing in June ordered by the U.S. Supreme Court. Davis, on death row for 19 years, now has one final appeal before his death sentence can be carried out.

Writing in The Chronicle, Geoff Nunberg kicks off his criticism with a look at publication dates: To take Google’s word for it, 1899 was a literary annus mirabilis, which saw the publication of Raymond Chandler’s Killer in the Rain, The Portable Dorothy Parker, André Malraux’s La Condition Humaine, Stephen King’s Christine, The Complete Shorter Fiction of Virginia Woolf, Raymond Williams’s Culture and Society 1780-1950, and Robert Shelton’s biography of Bob Dylan,...

To those who mindlessly quote the great Supreme Court Justice Louis D. Brandeis line that “sunlight is … the best of disinfectants” I reply, if you go outside without sunscreen on you’ll get sunburned. Stay out and you’ll die. Information without context is not knowledge. Sadly, context doesn’t sell newspapers, or drive web traffic or build television and radio audiences. As a consequence, the traditional media doesn’t do so well as we like to think in that...

Der Spiegel on a historian who argues Germany’s rapid industrial expansion in the 19th century was due to an absence of copyright law: Höffner has researched that early heyday of printed material in Germany and reached a surprising conclusion — unlike neighboring England and France, Germany experienced an unparalleled explosion of knowledge in the 19th century. German authors during this period wrote ceaselessly. Around 14,000 new publications appeared in a single year in 1843. Measured...

Shirley Sherrod in an open letter on behalf of the NAACP: Not long ago, I sat here in my living room in Albany, Georgia for an afternoon of deep conversation with NAACP President Benjamin Jealous. As he has done in public, Ben movingly apologized for the fact that the NAACP was initially hoodwinked by Breitbart and Fox into supporting my removal. I told him what I want to tell you. That’s behind us, and the last thing I want to see happen is for my situation to weaken support for the NAACP....

On the heels of Michael Hirschorn’s July declaration in the Atlantic that the era of browser dominance is coming to a close — the app model is where it’s at — Chris Anderson and Michael Wolff affirm in Wired that the web is indeed dead. Long live the Internet. Anderson: You wake up and check your email on your bedside iPad — that’s one app. During breakfast you browse Facebook, Twitter, and The New York Times — three more apps. On the way to the office, you listen...

Doug Saunders, writing in The Spectator about his new book, Arrival City: How the Largest Migration in History is Reshaping Our World, says that in 100 years we will be an entirely urban species: [T]he defining force of this century, almost certainly more significant than war, recession and perhaps even climate change, will be the huge and final shift of human populations from rural areas to cities. It’s a crucial issue — one that every politician, every economist and sociologist should be considering....

Volokh’s Orin Kerr pens a Generic Op-Ed for Judge Walker’s SSM Decision. He’s invited all publications to use it… Just pick the right word you want in parenthesis — conservatives pick the first word, and liberals pick the second. FOLLOW THE CONSTITUTION Judge Walker’s decision on same-sex marriage is a reminder of the proper role of judges in our society. Above all else, judges should follow the Constitution. For that reason, Judge Walker’s decision should be [condemned/celebrated]. Judge...

I’ll be in Atlanta today for the “Love + Commitment = Marriage” rally. The event is a counter-protest to coincide with the National Organization for Marriage (NOM) Summer for Marriage Bus Tour’s arrival there. You will recognize my partner and me by our t-shirts. They were commemorative gifts handed out at a Renewing Our Commitment ceremony we held for our 10th anniversary celebration last year. The service took place in a small country Baptist church. Pretty much the entire...

This is so annoying: Coca-Cola is being sued by a non-profit public interest group, on the grounds that the company’s vitaminwater products make unwarranted health claims. No surprise there. But how do you think the company is defending itself? In a staggering feat of twisted logic, lawyers for Coca-Cola are defending the lawsuit by asserting that “no consumer could reasonably be misled into thinking vitaminwater was a healthy beverage.” The non-profit is The Center for Science...

Google Books aims to catalog and make searchable, scan and digitize, all the books in the world. In order to do that first they have to determine what exactly is a “book?” We’re not going to count what library scientists call “works,” those elusive “distinct intellectual or artistic creations.” It makes sense to consider all editions of “Hamlet” separately, as we would like to distinguish between — and scan — books containing, for example,...

One standout from all that’s being said in reaction to Judge Walker ruling Prop 8 unconstitutional on both Equal Protection and Due Process grounds comes from Adam Bink: Of course, it’s only judicial “arrogance” or “activism” when they don’t like the decision. District of Columbia v. Heller [link], which struck down popularly supported gun control laws, legislated by the duly elected representatives of the people in DC? Not judicial activism at all. Can someone on the pro prop 8...