Tag Archives: Law and Rights

Jury selection — which could last a month or more — begins today for the Michael Jackson trial on charges of “lewd acts on a child under the age of 14 and conspiring to commit the crimes of abduction, false imprisonment and extortion.” Jackson released a video-taped statement Sunday, with …

The Michael Jackson child molestation trial touched upon almost everything we ponder: celebrity, fabulous wealth, the media, sensationalism, law, image, race, sex, eccentricity, a whole lot of cosmetic surgery, and oh yeah, he’s a singer or something. We followed it. For coverage after the verdict see here. Michael Jackson Trial: …

The other shoe has dropped in the two-year investigation of rap label Murder Inc. (now called “The Inc.” for obvious PR reasons) — partly owned by Island Def Jam, a Universal Music label — for murder, money-laundering, gun charges and a variety of strong-arm tactics. Damn, these fuckers are unsavory: …

On December 10, 2004 the Supreme Court agreed to hear the entertainment industry’s case against two file-sharing services, Grokster Ltd. and StreamCast Networks Inc (Morpheus), through which millions of people swap music and movies online, a decision that could decide the future of digital copyright rules and related technology for …

Michael K. Powell, 41, will step down in March as chairman of the Federal Communications Commission after almost four years as the government’s top media and telecommunications regulator, he announced today. Poor Michael Powell, the son of Colin Powell, was in over his head as major domo of the FCC. …

The media machinery is scarcely able to control its glee with the approach of the Michael Jackson child molestation trial at the end of the month, most giddy of all are Court TV for obvious reasons, and E!, well, also for obvious reasons. While Court TV has a lurid special …

The Knitmedia settlement is significant for two reasons: it puts money directly in the hands of musicians and returns their copyrights to them, and every time a label is held accountable for underpaying it makes others less likely to behave similarly. Knitmedia Inc., which runs the Knitting Factory clubs in …

Goddamn, this whole Michael Jackson thing depresses me. There is no upside to any of it: either he really is a flat-out depraved pervert Skeletor pederast of the most manipulative motherfucking kind, or he is a misunderstood childlike freak who is being railroaded by opportunistic hangers-on and politicians bent on …

I have laid off the digital music wars for the most part of late because all parties — from the small-minded, self-defeating, niggardly record labels, to the disingenuous, spyware and corrupted file-laden file sharing services, to the morally oblique file sharers — share culpability for the current miasma. The legal …

Though nominally an anti-abortion party, the Republicans are as deceptive as they are smart on this exceptionally touchy subject. The Republicans know that they can speak the anti-abortion rhetoric to appease their most religious adherents — and help drum up social conservative voter turnout — as long as they don’t …