“Big Brother” apologizes as Amazon offers affected customers gift certificates or replacement copies of George Orwell’s “Nineteen Eighty-four” and “Animal Farm”, which were deleted without explanation earlier this summer.

Covered earlier in George Orwell’s 1984 and Other Books Go Down Project Gutenberg’s Memory Hole

Bill got rich, often with buggy bloated code. But he was a real innovator and the technology he and his guys brought to the world changed the world.

The octopus at Google is based on a whole different philosophy. They are the kings of “Reintermediation”. Their only accomplishment is to get in between searchers and content, between writers and readers. Nothing new is created. Nothing new is contributed. Their only skill is capturing a part of the transaction and information costs for themselves. But this week they outdid themselves. They released a new slick browser. They suggest that it is faster and more efficient than Firefox or Explorer. (we have our doubts, which we’ll discuss on another post) but here’s the catch.

THEY OWN EVERY THING YOU EVER WRITE OR POST OR CREATE USING THEIR BROWSER AND THEY CAN SELL IT TO ANYONE THEY WANT TO AND THEY NEVER OWE YOU A DIME.

amazing. unbelievable.

oh please bring back the old king bill.

Here’s more from Gizmodo:

So, are you enjoying the snappy, clean performance of Google Chrome since downloading yesterday? If so, you might want to take a closer peek at the end user license agreement you didn’t pay any attention to when downloading and installing it. Because according to what you agreed to, Google owns everything you publish and create while using Chrome. Ah-whaaa? Update: It was a copy & paste mistake, apparently, and the offending language is being removed as we speak. Thanks, Googe!

Here are the juicy bits in question:

11. Content license from you

11.1 You retain copyright and any other rights you already hold in Content which you submit, post or display on or through, the Services. By submitting, posting or displaying the content you give Google a perpetual, irrevocable, worldwide, royalty-free, and non-exclusive license to reproduce, adapt, modify, translate, publish, publicly perform, publicly display and distribute any Content which you submit, post or display on or through, the Services. This license is for the sole purpose of enabling Google to display, distribute and promote the Services and may be revoked for certain Services as defined in the Additional Terms of those Services.

11.2 You agree that this license includes a right for Google to make such Content available to other companies, organizations or individuals with whom Google has relationships for the provision of syndicated services, and to use such Content in connection with the provision of those services.

11.3 You understand that Google, in performing the required technical steps to provide the Services to our users, may (a) transmit or distribute your Content over various public networks and in various media; and (b) make such changes to your Content as are necessary to conform and adapt that Content to the technical requirements of connecting networks, devices, services or media. You agree that this license shall permit Google to take these actions.

11.4 You confirm and warrant to Google that you have all the rights, power and authority necessary to grant the above license.

Well, I guess I shouldn’t have used Chrome to put some posts up yesterday, because I certainly do not have the rights, power or authority to hand over my work from Gawker to the Googe. Oops! You’ll have to pry the rights to my posts from Nick Denton’s cold, dead hands, Google.

In any case, it’s a pretty unnecessary and unreasonable thing to put in the EULA for a browser, of all pieces of software, which makes it pretty questionable. Why in the hell would Google want ownership of every single blog post or email written in its browser? It’s so unreasonable that it borders on the insane. I can’t really imagine Google actually invoking this and suddenly publishing heavily edited entries from your LiveJournal for profit, but I think a lot of people would feel much better about hopping on board with Chrome if this little piece of sketchy legalese was axed.

What say you, Google overlords?

BestBuy should be on the hook for damages and penalties related to identity theft linked to the lost laptop. Hard to add that up to $54M, though.

Raelyn Campbell seems to be VERY highly connected and if her contacts — maybe many with unlisted phone numbers — have been compromised, there is more to this story than is covered in the article.

Lost laptop? Sue for millions!

Is your laptop worth $54 million? Raelyn Campbell of Washington, D.C., is suing Richfield-based Best Buy for that amount after it lost her laptop computer while it was in for repairs.

Campbell, who could not be reached Tuesday, filed a negligence lawsuit suit against the company in Washington Superior Court on Nov. 16, seeking fair compensation for replacement of the $1,100 computer and extended warranty, plus expenses related to identity theft protection.

Best Buy spokeswoman Nissa French said in an e-mail that Campbell “was offered and collected $1,110.35″ as well as “a $500 gift card for her inconvenience.”

According to Campbell’s blog at bestbuybadbuyboycott.blogspot.com, Geek Squad employees spent three months telling her different stories about where her laptop might be before finally acknowledging that it had been lost.

Students Must Carry And Pay For GPS-Based Cell Device reports this headline from Montclair State.

Here’s the money quote from the article:

“What it does is allow students to have an extra pair or group of people watching over them when they’re going from one location to another,” Montclair Police Department Chief Paul Cell said.

Going back as far as 2004, when PC World noted Privacy Watch: Soon, Your Cell Phone May Be Tracking You: GPS chips in handsets make cell phone tracking services a reality, you were warned that the chips in your phones may also be used to spy on you. More recently, this year, the more left-leaning PBS had a special entitled GPS Technology Helps Parents Track Teens.

I don’t know about you, but I am a big bearded guy between the ages of 20 and 50 who doesn’t mind being wanded at the airport. I’m more concerned about leaving my cell phone powered on and who might be tracking where I am when I am not aware of it.

What do you think? Comment.