Some linkage for your Friday reading pleasure and amusement:
(1) PoetryFoundation.Org has up an interview with Richard Blanco, the United States' fifth inaugural poet. At 44, Mr. Blanco is the youngest inaugural poet, and he is the first openly gay one.
(2) TechDirt has a brief article about a lawsuit filed by Universal Studios against a film company that is making a pornographic version of the book "50 Shades of Gray", which in itself began as fan-fiction. The film company's response is Quixotic and bit baffling, as there are better legal theories to argue in my IANAL opinion. However, the lawsuit may allow the court to address the issues of fan-fiction and derivative vs. transformative works, so it will be interesting to see how it turns out.
(3) This article at PlagiarismToday.com contains an update on the U. S. House of Representatives's IP Subcommittee's process in looking at creating essentially a "small claims court" for copyright issues. I wasn't even aware this was in the works until I read this article, but I wholeheartedly support the goal of this process.
(4) Finally, from the WTF Department, we have the case of copyright-troll Prenda Law, who seems to have incurred the wrath of federal judge Otis Wright for their recent actions. Judge Wright has ordered a group of people associated with Prenda Law and their alleged clients to show up in his courtroom on Monday, March 11, 2013, to explain themselves. Ken at Popehat has covered Prenda Law here, here, and here, and ArsTechnica's latest article is here (with links to earlier coverage). The Most-Evasive-Deposition-Ever can be read here if you like that legal stuff . So grab a big cup of coffee and settle in for some entertaining reading.
