#breach of a court order

[darkartsanna]

This is bullshit! This website is dedicated to preserving not just books, but audio files, videos, websites, this is the source of the wayback machine! They have effectively lost the right to lend out digital books, regardless of origin. This now limits our resources even further. It's another book banning issue, and it needs to be heard.

[thisismenow3]

With Republicans, EAIAC (every accusation is a confession)

[hoe4hotchner]

please i beg to do a second part of “Langston and Bell” where aaron comes home to jack and reader wife and any other kids they have (up to you)

Court adjourned | [A.H]

Pairing: Aaron Hotchner x lawyer fem!reader | WC: 0.9k | CW: law words, fluff

A/N: Canon events did not happen in the correct order in this.

Part 1 here

The familiar click of the front door unlocking signaled Aaron's arrival home. He exhaled a long breath, leaving the weight of the day at the door—it was a ritual you'd implemented when you both did law, a signal that work would be work and home would be home. It eased him slightly as he stepped into the comfort of your home, the cases never left him, but somehow this made them a little less loud in the back of his head. He slung his suit jacket over one arm and loosened his tie but still kept it in place around his neck.

The scent of something delicious wafted from the kitchen, and Aaron couldn’t help the small smile that tugged at the corners of his lips. A hum of conversation, punctuated by the occasional laughter, floated through the house and into his ears.

“Jack, that’s not how you establish standing,” your voice rang out, it was light and teasing but tinged with mock seriousness—to any passerby, the mini court session would've seemed harsh, but to you, it was everything, and nothing. It had been a way for you to connect with Jack when you'd first met Aaron, and yet, it was the most normal thing in your day-to-day life. “You can’t just argue jurisdiction when you’re clearly in breach.”

Aaron placed his briefcase down near the entryway and followed the sound of your voice to the dining room. The scene that greeted him was enough to make his heart ache with love.

You were sitting at the table, papers spread out before you like a courtroom exhibit. Jack sat beside you, his brow furrowed in concentration as he worked on what appeared to be a legal-themed word puzzle. Across the room, your youngest son—Charlie—was seated on the floor with a pile of blocks and trucks, chattering away to his stuffed giraffe next to him.

Jack looked up first, his face lighting up with excitement. “Dad!”

“Hey, buddy,” Aaron greeted, kneeling just in time to catch Jack in his arms. He hugged him tightly, any stress left from the day melting further under the boy’s familiar embrace.

You looked up from the table, a soft smile gracing your face as you watched them. “There’s my favorite litigator,” you said, your tone playfully affectionate.

“Litigator, huh?” Aaron replied, his voice full of amusement as a smile spread across his lips. “What case am I arguing tonight?”

“Jack’s appeal for an extra hour of screen time,” you said with a sigh, gesturing to the puzzle in front of you. “But he’s losing points for trying to submit inadmissible evidence.”

Jack pulled back from the hug to protest. “Nuh-uh, (Y/N)'s being unfair! She said I couldn’t use my grades as evidence, but they totally prove I deserve it!”

Aaron chuckled, ruffling his son’s hair. “Sorry, buddy. She's a stickler for rules, she won't even ease the rules for me. You should’ve led with precedent instead.”

You laughed, placing your pen down as you leaned back in your chair. “Don’t encourage him. He’ll be quoting case law by bedtime.”

Charlie toddled over then, his little arms stretched wide. “Daddy!”

Aaron scooped him up with ease, pressing a kiss to the top of his head. “Hey, Charlie. Did you give your mommy a hard time at pickup today?”

“Nope,” Charlie said, grinning up at him. “I was good!”

“That’s debatable,” you interjected, though your smile betrayed your joy. “He tried to object when I told him it was time to go home from kindergarten AND wash all the mud off.”

“It was sustained!” Charlie announced proudly, eliciting laughter from everyone in the room.

Aaron carried Charlie to you, leaning down to press a kiss to your forehead. “Hi, Counselor. How was your day?” He greeted, repeating the nickname he'd called you earlier in the day.

“Busy,” you admitted, reaching up to brush a stray lock of hair from his face. “Depositions all morning, a meeting with the partners in the afternoon, and then a pro bono consultation that ran longer than expected. But I’m home now, and that’s all that matters.”

Aaron set Charlie down and took the seat beside you. “Did you get a chance to eat today?”

You arched an eyebrow at him. “Are you cross-examining me, Agent Hotchner?”

“Just establishing facts for the record,” he replied smoothly.

You rolled your eyes affectionately. “Yes, Your Honor, I ate lunch. Though it was more of a plea bargain with a vending machine than an actual meal.”

Aaron frowned, his brow furrowing. “You need to take better care of yourself.”

“I’ll allow that objection,” you said softly, reaching over to squeeze his hand. “But only if you promise to take your own advice.”

Jack’s voice interrupted, full of exasperated affection. “You guys are being all lawyer-y again.”

You and Aaron exchanged a look, both of you breaking into laughter.

“All right,” you said, standing and stretching. “Dinner’s ready. Why don’t you set the table, Jack? Charlie can help me grab the food.”

Jack groaned but complied, while Charlie eagerly toddled after you. Aaron stayed in his seat for a moment, watching the three of you move around the kitchen with ease.

It wasn’t the courtroom drama or high-stakes cases that made him feel alive—it was this. The moments at home, the playful banter that somehow always ended in legal terms, and the love you all shared although your family was a little blended.

When you returned to the table, carrying a steaming pot while Charlie followed right behind with a bowl of mixed leafy greens.

Aaron stood to help you.

“You know,” he said quietly, his voice meant just for you, “I think we make a pretty good team.”

You looked up at him, your smile was soft. “The best team.”

[mostlysignssomeportents]

The CFPB is genuinely making America better, and they're going HARD

On June 20, I'm keynoting the LOCUS AWARDS in OAKLAND.

Let's take a sec here and notice something genuinely great happening in the US government: the Consumer Finance Protection Bureau's stunning, unbroken streak of major, muscular victories over the forces of corporate corruption, with the backing of the Supreme Court (yes, that Supreme Court), and which is only speeding up!

A little background. The CFPB was created in 2010. It was Elizabeth Warren's brainchild, an institution that was supposed to regulate finance from the perspective of the American public, not the American finance sector. Rather than fighting to "stabilize" the financial sector (the mission that led to Obama taking his advisor Timothy Geithner's advice to permit the foreclosure crisis to continue in order to "foam the runways" for the banks), the Bureau would fight to defend us from bankers.

The CFPB got off to a rocky start, with challenges to the unique system of long-term leadership appointments meant to depoliticize the office, as well as the sudden resignation of its inaugural boss, who broke his promise to see his term through in order to launch an unsuccessful bid for political office.

But after the 2020 election, the Bureau came into its own, when Biden poached Rohit Chopra from the FTC and put him in charge. Chopra went on a tear, taking on landlords who violated the covid eviction moratorium:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/04/20/euthanize-rentier-enablers/#cfpb

Then banning payday lenders' scummiest tactics:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/01/29/planned-obsolescence/#academic-fraud

Then striking at one of fintech's most predatory grifts, the "earned wage access" hustle:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/05/01/usury/#tech-exceptionalism

Then closing the loophole that let credit reporting bureaus (like Equifax, who doxed every single American in a spectacular 2019 breach) avoid regulation by creating data brokerage divisions and claiming they weren't part of the regulated activity of credit reporting:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/08/16/the-second-best-time-is-now/#the-point-of-a-system-is-what-it-does

Chopra went on to promise to ban data-brokers altogether:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/04/13/goulash/#material-misstatement

Then he banned comparison shopping sites where you go to find the best bank accounts and credit cards from accepting bribes and putting more expensive options at the top of the list. Instead, he's requiring banks to send the CFPB regular, accurate lists of all their charges, and standing up a federal operated comparison shopping site that gives only accurate and honest rankings. Finally, he's made an interoperability rule requiring banks to let you transfer to another institution with one click, just like you change phone carriers. That means you can search an honest site to find the best deal on your banking, and then, with a single click, transfer your accounts, your account history, your payees, and all your other banking data to that new bank:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/10/21/let-my-dollars-go/#personal-financial-data-rights

Somewhere in there, big business got scared. They cooked up a legal theory declaring the CFPB's funding mechanism to be unconstitutional and got the case fast-tracked to the Supreme Court, in a bid to put Chopra and the CFPB permanently out of business. Instead, the Supremes – these Supremes! – upheld the CFPB's funding mechanism in a 7-2 ruling:

https://www.scotusblog.com/2024/05/supreme-court-lets-cfpb-funding-stand/

That ruling was a starter pistol for Chopra and the Bureau. Maybe it seemed like they were taking big swings before, but it turns out all that was just a warmup. Last week on The American Prospect, Robert Kuttner rounded up all the stuff the Bureau is kicking off:

https://prospect.org/blogs-and-newsletters/tap/2024-06-07-window-on-corporate-deceptions/

First: regulating Buy Now, Pay Later companies (think: Klarna) as credit-card companies, with all the requirements for disclosure and interest rate caps dictated by the Truth In Lending Act:

https://www.skadden.com/insights/publications/2024/06/cfpb-applies-credit-card-rules

Next: creating a registry of habitual corporate criminals. This rogues gallery will make it harder for other agencies – like the DOJ – and state Attorneys General to offer bullshit "delayed prosecution agreements" to companies that compulsively rip us off:

https://www.consumerfinance.gov/about-us/newsroom/cfpb-creates-registry-to-detect-corporate-repeat-offenders/

Then there's the rule against "fine print deception" – which is when the fine print in a contract lies to you about your rights, like when a mortgage lender forces you waive a right you can't actually waive, or car lenders that make you waive your bankruptcy rights, which, again, you can't waive:

https://www.consumerfinance.gov/about-us/newsroom/cfpb-warns-against-deception-in-contract-fine-print/

As Kuttner writes, the common thread running through all these orders is that they ban deceptive practices – they make it illegal for companies to steal from us by lying to us. Especially in these dying days of class action suits – rapidly becoming obsolete thanks to "mandatory arbitration waivers" that make you sign away your right to join a class action – agencies like the CFPB are our only hope of punishing companies that lie to us to steal from us.

There's a lot of bad stuff going on in the world right now, and much of it – including an active genocide – is coming from the Biden White House.

But there are people in the Biden Administration who care about the American people and who are effective and committed fighters who have our back. What's more, they're winning. That doesn't make all the bad news go away, but sometimes it feels good to take a moment and take the W.

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/06/10/getting-things-done/#deliverism

[zvaigzdelasas]

A court in Germany has overturned a Europe-wide travel ban imposed by German authorities on Dr. Ghassan Abu Sitta, the British Palestinian surgeon who spent weeks saving lives in Gaza at the beginning of Israel’s ongoing genocide.

In recent weeks, Abu Sitta has been barred from entering France and the Netherlands in order to speak about the Israeli war crimes he witnessed during his 43 days working as a doctor under Israel’s savage and indiscriminate bombardment.[...]

The draconian German ban constituted “a serious breach of freedom of movement and expression in Europe and now a judge has ruled that the travel ban should be overturned,” said the International Centre of Justice for Palestinians (ICJP) and European Legal Support Centre (ELSC), which assisted in the case.

“This is a significant victory for freedom of speech and a significant turning point in challenging the chilling environment that many Palestinian human rights advocates have to operate in,” the two civil rights groups added.

The ban on Abu Sitta had also drawn criticism from Human Rights Watch, which asserted that the “attempts to prevent him from sharing his experience treating patients in Gaza risks undermining Germany’s commitment to protect and facilitate freedom of expression and assembly and to nondiscrimination.”

15 May 24

[oceanreveuse]

𝗡𝗢𝗪 𝗥𝗘𝗔𝗗𝗜𝗡𝗚: 𝗵𝘆𝗱𝗿𝗼 𝗱𝗿𝗮𝗴𝗼𝗻, 𝗳𝗲𝗮𝘁𝘂𝗿𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗻𝗲𝘂𝘃𝗶𝗹𝗹𝗲𝘁𝘁𝗲.

◟sub!neuvillette, dom!reader, canon!au, two dick!neuvi send tweet!! overstimulation, orgasm denial, handjob(s), dacryphilia, forked tongue!neuvi… pet names (baby, mon amour - my love), not proofread, pronouns not used so can be read as gn!reader!!

‘hydro dragon, hydro dragon, don’t cry.’ you remember the rhyme as clear as day, like you’d been raised with it carved into your mind. it’s chimed like a chorus on the streets of fontaine by the children, small and innocent - and adherently unaware of the world around them.

the room fills with another choked sob, whimpering into the pillows of your shared bed. the bedsheets, silk and shiny, are sodden by numerous liquids; tears, drool and if you’re kind enough to your beloved husband, cum. if only that was the circumstance, dragging both of your lithe hands up and down red tipped cocks in languid strokes. you never lose your rhythm and as much as NEUVILLETTE has always held a candle of admiration to your resilience and dexterity, by the archons he wishes you would let up for just a moment - just for him.

neuvillette can feel himself slipping away, crumbling in the palms of your hands the longer he attempts to endure your torture. his cries seem to fall on deaf ears, drowned out ironically by children innocently on the streets of the court of fontaine, outside the window as they chime happily in the downpour, “hydro dragon, hydro dragon, don’t cry!”

there’s a smug look on your face, eyes glittering as you lean over the iudex’s muscular body, decorated nicely by those white hairs that almost pale in comparison to the man’s skin colour. plush lips linger by his pointed ears, breath fanning over his skin that’s warm to the touch. neuvillette has never been one for sweating but it feels like hours since you started and there’s beads glittering on his forehead and neck, threatening to run down crevices untold.

“how sweet of them, don’t you think baby?” you murmur and neuvillette chokes on a noise that gets caught in his throat, his adam’s apple bobbing as he tries to swallow the lump. his whimpers are so light and airy, almost as dainty as the way the large man carries himself - as if he’s fragile porcelain.

“m-mon amour— hhnngh— p-please—” you cut off the male by capturing his lips in a searing kiss, messy when he arches his back in order to press more against him. he uses it as an escape to muffle his moans that get louder, threatening to breach the walls - and windows - of the bedroom and reach the ears of unsuspecting bystanders. you use it as a means of silencing the otherwise loud dragon, saving yourself the time of hearing his pathetic attempts at begging you for mercy.

he ruts his hips into your hands, forked tongue slivering to fight against your tongue in a hopeless battle of dominance. he wants so badly to finish, for thick ropes of white to paint his abdomen or the back of your throat but you’re relentless and he should have known this from the start. crystalline tears run rivers down flushed cheeks and sharply carved jawlines, rain battering against the windows as the citizens of fontaine call for their children, ushering them into shelter.

the chorus of rhymes end but it doesn’t stop you from filling the silence with a symphony of neuvillette’s desperate whines and delicate whimpers, his moans breathy as he pants to catch his breath. you swipe a thumb teasingly over the tip of one of his cocks, collecting treasured drops of precum and eliciting a sharp hiss from the parted lips of your husband.

your hands pick up pace, watching the way he claws at silken sheets to grasp anything - literally anything. there’s a fire in his abdomen, heavy balls tightening when he’s finally climbing those precious stairs to climax. he’s ready, he’s oh-so-ready for your praise and the soft aftercare you’ll spoil him with, that he’s very much deserved. the poised man prepares himself, rocking his hips into your fists as he chases his high, only for your hands to pull away just at the precipice. his hips stutter, cocks needy and twitching from yet another denial as he chokes out a sob.

your amused voice chides into the hot air of the bedroom, soothing your palms over his tense thighs, “hydro dragon, hydro dragon, don’t cry.”

© oceanreveuse 2024 | reblogs appreciated | do not repost, steal, translate, etc. on any social media platform & do not feed to ai.

[ the magazine is affiliated with @houseofsolisoccasum ]

[vague-humanoid]

An 18-year-old hacker who leaked clips of a forthcoming Grand Theft Auto (GTA) game has been sentenced to an indefinite hospital order.

Arion Kurtaj from Oxford, who has autism, was a key member of international gang Lapsus$.

The gang's attacks on tech giants including Uber, Nvidia and Rockstar Games cost the firms nearly $10m.

The judge said Kurtaj's skills and desire to commit cyber crime meant he remained a high risk to the public.

He will remain at a secure hospital for life unless doctors deem him no longer a danger.

The court heard that Kurtaj had been violent while in custody with dozens of reports of injury or property damage.

Doctors deemed Kurtaj unfit to stand trial due to his acute autism so the jury was asked to determine whether or not he committed the alleged acts - not if he did so with criminal intent.

A mental health assessment used as part of the sentencing hearing said he "continued to express the intent to return to cybercrime as soon as possible. He is highly motivated."

The jury was told that while he was on bail for hacking Nvidia and BT/EE and in police protection at a Travelodge hotel, he continued hacking and carried out his most infamous hack.

Despite having his laptop confiscated, Kurtaj managed to breach Rockstar, the company behind GTA, using an Amazon Firestick, his hotel TV and a mobile phone.

Kurtaj stole 90 clips of the unreleased and hugely anticipated Grand Theft Auto 6.

He broke into the company's internal Slack messaging system to declare "if Rockstar does not contact me on Telegram within 24 hours I will start releasing the source code".

He then posted the clips and source code on a forum under the username TeaPotUberHacker.

He was re-arrested and detained until his trial.

[dostoyevsky-official]

Elon Musk Wants to Get Operational Control of the Treasury’s Payment System. This Could Not Possibly Be More Dangerous

I understated the extremity and danger of the situation we’re in even as a Judge on Friday issued a more comprehensive injunction against the executive orders which were designed to impound funds, OMB guidance or not, across the federal government. I also understated all the things ordinary Americans are in “danger” of learning about. It's now not just the “legal plumbing,” it's the payments plumbing too. This is now also the closest thing we’ve ever had to a payment system constitutional crisis.

So what happened? According to reporting on Friday — first at the Washington Post and then in more detail from CNN as well as the New York Times — the Fiscal Assistant Secretary of the United States Treasury David Lebryk has been put on paid administrative leave and plans to resign after refusing to give Elon Musk’s “Department of Government Efficiency” (DOGE) access to the operational details of the Treasury’s payment system and the data it processes. In particular, Musk’s DOGE team has been asking for what the New York Times reporting refers to as “source code information” since December and has been rebuffed. The CNN reporting specifically states that they were inquiring about the technical ability to stop payments.

Lebryk's understanding of the operational systems that undergird the functioning of the United States Treasury is far and away unparalleled. In particular, he is widely credited with being the person who is overwhelmingly responsible for the undisrupted continuity of cash inflows and outflows at the Treasury during the recurrent debt ceiling crises of the past 15 years while concurrently ensuring the debt ceiling limit was not breached.

[...] The danger is also not in the near future, it is here. Follow up reporting from the New York Times Saturday evening in an article straightforwardly informed readers in its headline that “Elon Musk’s Team Now Has Full Access to Treasury’s Payments System.”

[...] The internal treasury payments systems must function correctly; it just also matters what purposes it is being designed for. 

Musk and his cronies are clearly aiming to redesign the payments system to serve their agenda. This is not the attitude of people who are trying to simply technocratically make the payment system more “efficient.” They have a very clear and specific agenda, which involves unilaterally cutting spending, particularly spending they perceive to be going to their ideological foes. Is “Wokeness,” the “Green New Deal,” “Marxism,” and “Gender Ideology” going to be the new definition of an “improper payment"?

[...] Without political control of the payment's heart, the Trump administration and Elon Musk must chase down every agency and bend it to their will. They are in the process of doing that, but bureaucrats can notionally continue to respect the law and resist their efforts. They are helped in this effort by court injunctions they can point to. This is bureaucratic trench warfare. But if Musk and Trump can reach into the choke point, the Bureau of the Fiscal Service, they could possibly not need agency cooperation. They can just impound agency payments themselves. They could also possibly stop paying federal employees they have forced on paid administrative leave, coercing them to resign.

[...] For the past 36 hours (writing these words at Midnight on Saturday) my mind has returned over and over to the idea that they have been asking for “source code information” to the Treasury’s internal payments system.

[...] Anyone who knows or has known computer programmers of mission critical legacy IT systems can tell you about the stories of rafts of consultants who have come and gone attempting to understand how the system works so they can “modernize” it on the cheap. The vast majority of the time these consultants are either not able to do what they promise or are honest about the cost of updating the system without a mission critical system “going down,” leading management to balk.

[...] Does Elon Musk understand any of this? Does he have any grasp of the scale and complexity he is trying to reach into and exercise “influence”? Currently the most urgent and profound danger is not what he intends to make this sprawling apparatus do. The most immediate danger is what might break in the process of trying to get this apparatus to do what he wants.

[...] Elon Musk, however, has never shown respect or understanding of the concept of a mission critical IT system. All he sees is “inefficiency” because he doesn’t understand that there are some things in this world that need to function no matter what and you spend the additional money to make sure it runs, including when it's being updated.

This is ultimately not that big a deal when it comes to Twitter — Twitter can go down for a few hours, even a few days. [...] To put that another way, the same cannot be said about the system that makes sure the federal government is able to make payments reliably and on time. [...] It's also important to state that the number of people who comprehensively understand these legacy IT systems can likely be counted on two hands — and that may be optimistic.

[...] There is nothing more important on the entire planet than getting Elon Musk and DOGE out of the Bureau of the Fiscal Service and allowing career civil service employees to run the Treasury’s internal payments system without capricious and self-serving interference from billionaires and their allies. This effort must fail if we are to safeguard any semblance of due process and lawfulness in the executive branch. A vague anonymous promise that DOGE only has “read only” access is not enough. They need to be rooted out so that we can return to the slower moving, less dangerous, “five alarm fire” constitutional crisis we were having as of Friday morning.

[sayruq]

Spain became on Thursday the first European country to ask a United Nations court for permission to join South Africa’s case accusing Israel of genocide in Gaza. South Africa filed its case with the International Court of Justice late last year. It alleged that Israel was breaching the genocide convention in its military assault that has laid waste to large swaths of Gaza. The court has ordered Israel to immediately halt its military offensive in the southern Gaza city of Rafah but stopped short of ordering a cease-fire for the enclave. Israel has not complied and shows no sign of doing so. “There should be no doubt that Spain will remain on the right side of history,” Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez said after his foreign minister made the announcement. Mexico, Colombia, Nicaragua, Libya and the Palestinians are waiting for the International Court of Justice in The Hague, Netherlands, to grant approval to their requests to join the case.

[probablyasocialecologist]

Libraries have traditionally operated on a basic premise: Once they purchase a book, they can lend it out to patrons as much (or as little) as they like. Library copies often come from publishers, but they can also come from donations, used book sales, or other libraries. However the library obtains the book, once the library legally owns it, it is theirs to lend as they see fit.  Not so for digital books. To make licensed e-books available to patrons, libraries have to pay publishers multiple times over. First, they must subscribe (for a fee) to aggregator platforms such as Overdrive. Aggregators, like streaming services such as HBO’s Max, have total control over adding or removing content from their catalogue. Content can be removed at any time, for any reason, without input from your local library. The decision happens not at the community level but at the corporate one, thousands of miles from the patrons affected.  Then libraries must purchase each individual copy of each individual title that they want to offer as an e-book. These e-book copies are not only priced at a steep markup—up to 300% over consumer retail—but are also time- and loan-limited, meaning the files self-destruct after a certain number of loans. The library then needs to repurchase the same book, at a new price, in order to keep it in stock.  This upending of the traditional order puts massive financial strain on libraries and the taxpayers that fund them. It also opens up a world of privacy concerns; while libraries are restricted in the reader data they can collect and share, private companies are under no such obligation. Some libraries have turned to another solution: controlled digital lending, or CDL, a process by which a library scans the physical books it already has in its collection, makes secure digital copies, and lends those out on a one-to-one “owned to loaned” ratio.  The Internet Archive was an early pioneer of this technique. When the digital copy is loaned, the physical copy is sequestered from borrowing; when the physical copy is checked out, the digital copy becomes unavailable. The benefits to libraries are obvious; delicate books can be circulated without fear of damage, volumes can be moved off-site for facilities work without interrupting patron access, and older and endangered works become searchable and can get a second chance at life. Library patrons, who fund their local library’s purchases with their tax dollars, also benefit from the ability to freely access the books. Publishers are, unfortunately, not a fan of this model, and in 2020 four of them sued the Internet Archive over its CDL program. The suit ultimately focused on the Internet Archive’s lending of 127 books that were already commercially available through licensed aggregators. The publisher plaintiffs accused the Internet Archive of mass copyright infringement, while the Internet Archive argued that its digitization and lending program was a fair use. The trial court sided with the publishers, and on September 4, the Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit reaffirmed that decision with some alterations to the underlying reasoning.  This decision harms libraries. It locks them into an e-book ecosystem designed to extract as much money as possible while harvesting (and reselling) reader data en masse. It leaves local communities’ reading habits at the mercy of curatorial decisions made by four dominant publishing companies thousands of miles away. It steers Americans away from one of the few remaining bastions of privacy protection and funnels them into a surveillance ecosystem that, like Big Tech, becomes more dangerous with each passing data breach. And by increasing the price for access to knowledge, it puts up even more barriers between underserved communities and the American dream.

11 September 2024

[drdemonprince]

Yo! I'm writing a class assignment on why Internet Archive is so right for breaching copyright laws and why the court is so so wrong for siding with publishers, and I wanted to talk about some authors who encourage others to pirate their work because so little of the money from book sales actually goes to the author.

Do you have any writing on this philosophy?

Thanks!!

I don't have any formally published writing on it, but you can site this message as "personal correspondence" (yes that's a thing in APA/MLA/Chicago style whatever).

I encourage people to pirate my work because I care first and foremost about the ideas within the books to reach an audience. I started writing for a general audience because I cared deeply about making information more accessible, and removing financial barriers to access is a core element of that. I also write work that targets populations that tend to be very poor -- disabled people, queer people, overworked people, and so on. It's vitally important to me that they can read the books, which means not requiring that they pay. Philosophically, I recognize that my ideas come from a long lineage of scholarship from other thinkers, including many disabled activists who always made their work available for free, and I don't deserve to profit from that thinking while others can't. I don't believe an idea can be owned, and like all forms of property, I believe intellectual property to be theft.

The act of writing is labor and I do think that deserves to be valued and compensated -- to wit, it bears mentioning that most authors do not earn any money from book sales. In order for an author to receive royalties, a book must first sell enough copies to "earn out" its advance, which may require selling anywhere from 10,000 to 100,000 copies, depending on the size of the advance payment. And 95% of books sell fewer than 5,000 copies ever. This means the vast majority of authors never see a single cent from a book sale. Even if their books do "earn out", they are only looking at about 12.5% of the profits in royalties after that point. So it's hardly a lucrative venture. There's really no reason for me to be invested in the commercial success of my books, from a labor rights perspective, and certainly not from an intellectual or scholarly one. So I always tell people, steal, steal away, with my blessing.

[maslows-pyramid-scheme]

A teenage boy in the middle of the night found his father holding a brick over his unconscious mother on the kitchen floor. "I'm not going to stop until she's dead," the father, in his late 30s, told his son. The man ... smashed a window to enter the house ... hit his wife's head against a wall and repeatedly stomped and kicked her head, leaving her unconscious. The husband cut off her waist-long hair with a kitchen knife and left it on the bench [and] had repeatedly smashed his wife's face into kitchen tiles because he suspected she was cheating on him. The man had no prior criminal record. However, he did have an apprehended domestic violence order (ADVO) imposed on him. ... The Herald's analysis of ADVO's over a five-year period has found a rise in the number of offenders breaching ADVOs even amid a police crackdown [up 35% between 2019 and 2023], while punishments are becoming less severe [fines increased as a proportion of punishments from 12% to 21% between 2019 and 2023].

Domestic violence is so prevalent that, once a week, local courts dedicate an entire courtroom just to hearing DV offences (which they call 'DV day). The average DV hearing only takes 10-20 minutes, so you can imagine how many hundreds of men are have been charged with DV offences (and the key word here is 'charged,' because many women never contact the police, and so many men are never charged).

It's so prevalent that judges, prosecutors, and defendants don't even seem to take it seriously - I've seen a judge and defendant mock a victim's family, I've seen defendants turn up in old clothes full of holes and sports gear, I've seen prosecutors forget to bring court documents because of the sheer volume of DV cases.

[tsunami-of-tears]

A Fresh Start

Poly+ ACOTAR Week 2024 - Day 1 (Beginnings)

Cazriel x Healer Reader

Summary: Azriel rescues Reader and takes her back to the Night Court.

Pairing Masterlist

Wordcount: 2.4K

Warnings: mentions of violence; kidnapping; injuries.

✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:*✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:*✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:*✧･ﾟ:

You first met Azriel while he was spying on the human queens in the mortal realm. 

The queens had captured you from the small village in Spring where you worked as a healer and were now holding you to study your magic - attempting to harness it for themselves. 

Azriel had infiltrated their dungeons and was sneaking through the lower levels when he saw you. You were curled up on the rough stone floor of the cold, dim cell.

Azriel’s shadows whispered that you were covered in injuries - all at various stages of healing where they’d beaten you and taken samples of your blood and tissue. 

When Azriel scented your fae heritage, he knew he couldn’t leave you there. He didn’t care if it ruined his mission. He knew what it felt like to be caged, he couldn’t leave anyone else to that fate. 

Your eyes flutter open as a tall male shrouded in shadows, approaches the iron bars. He speaks to you in a calm and deep voice, “I’m going to get you out of here.”

You nod at the male, too weak to talk.

Azriel’s shadows allow him to slip into your cell easily, and just as easily winnow you away. He scoops you up, your body so frail in his arms, and he allows his shadows to envelop you both. He transports you to the River House where Rhys and Madja are expecting you. 

————

Reader

The cool wisps of darkness wrap around you, soothing your many open wounds as your cell disappears into the black. The shadows disperse and you find yourself in a charming living room. The sun streams in through the open curtains, so bright you have to cover your eyes as they adjust. 

You can’t remember the last time you felt the warmth of the sun on your skin. 

You lower your hands to find two fae standing before you - a tall, handsome male with black hair and an ancient healer with a kind face.

You can feel the healer’s magic pulsing towards you as your legs give out beneath you. You feel strong hands catch you and the world around you fades into nothing. 

————

Azriel 

Madja tuts as she examines the female. “She’s a healer. They’ve been using faebane to slow her abilities. She’s lost so much blood, it looks like they’ve been extracting it - Mother knows what they plan to do with it. Praise the Cauldron that you got her out safely.” 

Azriel looks over the female’s emaciated body, covered in wounds and bruises, and asks Madja, “Is she going to be okay?” 

“Yes, she will be. I just have to flush the last of the faebane out of her system, then her magic will do the rest.”

Azriel nods and looks up at Rhys. “I know I ruined the mission, but if they were using her blood - who knows what their plans are.”

“You disobeyed an order and revealed that their wards can be breached. You know what situation this puts us in,” Rhys sighs, pinching the bridge of his nose. “But, this is bad news. Whatever they planned to do - I’m glad you rescued her.”

Azriel pauses, he expected to argue with his High Lord, but he didn’t expect his support. 

“Come to my office and you can give me the full report. Madja will see to the female,” Rhys says, nodding at Madja as he turns and exits the room.

Azriel is torn between not wanting to leave the female on her own, and not wanting to disobey Rhys any further. Azriel doesn’t know her name, but he leaves her in Madja’s capable hands as he follows Rhys down the hall.

————

Reader

You awake to the sound of birds chirping and wind rustling through long grass. You glance around, taking in your surroundings. You recognise this place - it’s the meadow near your village. 

‘How did I get here?’

A spring breeze caresses your senses, filling your nose with the scent of lilacs and fresh grass; the scent of home. 

You walk through the meadow, and the grass withers and dies under each step. The shrill laughter of the human queens rings in your ears. Your heart pounds and adrenaline courses through you as you turn around, frantically searching for your captors. 

With no one in sight, you sprint to the edge of the meadow where the trees will provide you with some cover. 

You lean against a tall oak to catch your breath only to find it’s not real, and you fall to the floor. The illusion shatters and you’re back in your cell in the mortal realm. 

You cry out, rattling the iron bars like a caged beast. You can taste your freedom on the tip of your tongue. 

Feeling hopeless, you curl up against the stone wall, trying to find some warmth in the dark, damp place. 

You see a figure approaching you, A winged male shrouded in shadows, reaching out his hand to you. 

You crawl, trying to take hold of it but he’s too far from your reach. He slips away from you and fades away into the dark.

————

Your eyes open hesitantly and you try to make out where you are. You don’t recognise the room, but it’s not your cell.

You can’t tell if you were still among the living, or if you’d finally succumbed to your injuries and blood loss. Did you dream up the mysterious winged male? Did he save you? Or was he an angel of death sent to accompany you to the next life?

You sit up only for a splitting pain to shoot down the side of your abdomen, and a broken cry tears from your lips.

Pain. You are very much alive. 

Wincing, you peel back the covers to inspect your body. Most of your wounds have healed, leaving only faint yellow-green bruises. Jagged silver scars fleck your skin as far as you can see, all various sizes. Whatever the queens did to you left a mark. Marks that your magic couldn’t heal.

A soft knock at the door grabs your attention. “Come in,” you croak, your voice hoarse with disuse. You look up as a dark stranger slowly opens the door. Your saviour. 

“I heard you were awake,” he says softly.

“How long have I been out?” you ask.

“Two weeks.”

It’s a long time, but you’d been in that cell for months. Two weeks was nothing. 

“Do you have any family we can contact, to let know you’re safe?”

You had no more family, they were all killed during the conflict with Hybern. There was no one to miss you so you simply shook your head at the male.

“Madja, our healer, said they’d used faebane on you to prevent your healing. She’s on her way to check on you now that you’re awake.”

“Thank you,” you say. It’s not enough, but you’re too tired to say anything more.

“I’m Azriel,” He says. “What’s your name?” 

“It’s Y/N.”

Sensing you don’t want to talk, Azriel nods and exits the room as Madja enters with her supplies. 

————

Madja ordered you to remain in bed for another week. She arranged for all your meals and medicines to be delivered to the room with magic. You hadn’t seen another person aside from her and Azriel since you woke, but even with the added comforts - you were feeling as confined by the bedroom as you had your cell. 

By the third day, you’d had enough, so you decided to explore the house. 

You get up, no longer wincing in pain thanks to Madja’s tonics, and make your way across your bedroom to the closet. You didn’t expect there to be clothes for you, but it was worth a look for something other than the silk nightgown you were currently wearing. 

There wasn’t much clothing of use to you. There was a fair amount made from black leather, but nothing that seemed comfortable in your current state. You did find a robe, so you could at least cover up before potentially running into someone else. 

You exit the bedroom and walk down the red stone hallway into a large open dining room. 

Inside, Azriel is sitting at the table having breakfast with another male. They have the same broad leathery wings topped with great talons. This new male has longer hair, pulled back into a small bun on the back of his head. 

Azriel watches you enter the room as if he knew you were coming. “You’re up,” he states bluntly.

“If I have to spend another day in that room, I will lose my mind,” you reply.

“Fair enough,” Azriel shrugs. “ Are you hungry?” 

“Yes, very,” you say. 

In an instant, a late plate appears on the table with a full breakfast. You take a seat next to the other male and start cutting up your food. 

The male turns to you and says, “I’m Cassian by the way, I live here with Azriel. I’m Rhys’s general.” 

You pause before taking a bite to ask, “Who’s Rhys?” 

“You may not remember, but he greeted us when we got back here from the mortal lands,” Azriel explains. “He’s the High Lord of the Night Court.”

You look back and forth between Azriel and Cassian with wide eyes as the realisation of who they are dawns on you. 

“You are… This is… Oh gods,” you exclaim. 

Living in the Spring Court, you’ve heard the stories about the Lord of Night and his inner circle - none of them good. But, they certainly didn’t match the males sitting before you. 

Your thoughts are interrupted by the loud gurgling of your stomach growing impatient for food. 

“Eat,” Cassian says, a concerned look on his face, “You must be starving.”

“You don’t have to be worried, you’re a guest here,” Azriel chimes in.

You nod and tuck into your food. 

When the first bite hits your tongue you moan softly. After being fed mortal food for months, even the bland food Madja was giving you had been an improvement. But this? All etiquette was forgotten as you shovelled more and more food down. 

Your magic was using a lot of energy to heal all your injuries, so you easily polished off the large plate. You noticed Cassian staring at you with a slight smirk on his face. “Something wrong?” you question. 

Cassian laughs and shakes his head, “No, I just haven’t seen a female eat like that before.” 

Your cheeks heat with embarrassment. 

“Oh no, I’m impressed,” Cassian reassures you with a wink. 

You roll your eyes and shake your head, laughing. ‘Typical male.’

“If you’re feeling up to it, Y/N, Rhys would like to speak to you,” Azriel states.

You look down at your attire and grimace. “May I have something else to wear?” 

“Angel, I think you look great in that,” Cassian says, causing you to raise an eyebrow at him, “But we can find something else.”

————

After some searching, Azriel found a simple day dress in one of the other rooms. There was a slit on the side that showed more skin than you preferred, and the colour was not one you’d ever worn - a deep navy like the night sky.

It was still an improvement to the nightgown, so you changed and freshened up before returning to the dining room to meet Azriel and Cassian. 

Cassian gave you a wolfish grin and asked, “Y/N, have you ever flown before?”

————

You were sure your screams could be heard all over Prythian as you soared through the sky in Azriel’s arms. You kept yourself tucked in close to his chest, so close you could feel the vibrations of his laugh when you screamed.

He touched down on the ground very smoothly and gently placed you on your feet. He held your hands for a moment to steady you.

Cassian landed beside you, a wide smile on his face. “Seeing someone fly for the first time will never get old,” he laughs.

You turn to follow the two males towards the manor when Rhysand, the High Lord of the Night Court, appears in the doorway.

“I could hear screaming from the other side of Velaris,” Rhys laughs. “Nice to see you up and about, Y/N, please come inside.”

Once in his office, Rhys sits behind the large mahogany desk. You sit in the chair across from him while Cassian and Azriel stand behind you.  

“Welcome to the Night Court, I must say it suits you,” Rhys says, flashing a feline grin. “I was hoping you could shed some light on what happened in the mortal realm. Any information you can provide will help us in stopping the queens. I’m a daemati, so with your permission, may I look inside your mind?”

You pause, wondering why he bothered to ask. ‘At least he’s polite about it.’ You nod and take a deep breath before allowing the High Lord into your mind. 

You feel him sifting through your memories. Of years spent working in a village on the border of the Spring Court and the mortal lands, helping with war efforts. Of you being captured and the queens ordering experiments to be performed on you. From what you overheard in the dungeons, they were trying to figure out a way to use the magic to become immortal.

“Thank you, Y/N. This information will be very helpful. I also have a proposition for you. You can say no, but I believe your powers would be invaluable to my court. I’d like to offer you a permanent role here as a healer.”

“Thank you, my Lord, it’s an honour but I will have to think about it.”

“Please, call me Rhys. And of course. We can discuss the details once you’ve fully recovered. If you’re up to it, Azriel and Cassian can show you the city this afternoon.”

“I’d like that a lot, Rhys, Thank you.” You nod farewell to the High Lord, standing to face Azriel and Cassian. You give them a broad smile, “Shall we go?”

The three of you exit the manor and enter the streets of Velaris. Despite your injuries, you have a skip in your step as you walk along the winding paths. You feel oddly at ease with the two males and you can’t contain your excitement over your newfound freedom, over your fresh start. 

✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:*✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:*✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:*✧･ﾟ: *

Tags ♡ @littlestw01f @impossibelle @dream-alittlebiggerdarling @the-wall-willow @xasael

[flower-of-knighthood]

Marinette and Negligence

The recent leaks for Season 6 are pretty interesting with Marinette's return to chronic stalker behaviour, aren't they? When I first saw the leaks showing how Marinette caused caused severe damage to Sublime's prosthetic legs, one of my first reactions was this is a open and shut negilgence case, so I decided to explain how the events in the leak amount to negilgence by Marinette's actions. Keep in mind, I'm not an expert in French Tort law.

For those who are unaware, Negiligence is an legal tort under civil law where an individual who will be called the defendant causes harm to another individual who will be called the plaintfif by either recklessly acting when harm can be reasonably expected, or failing to act when one would be reasonably be expected to act. In order for the legal representation of the plaintiff to prove negilgence in a civil case and get damages from the defendant, the following four elements are required to be proven; Duty which means did the defendant owe the plaintiff a duty of care, Breach which means did the defendant breach the duty of care through their reckless actions or lack thereof, Damages which means was the plaintiff actually harmed by the breach of the duty of care by the defendant, and finally causation which means could the defendant's actions or failure to act be reasonably construed to lead to the plaintiff's harm.

The first element, Duty is easy enough to prove, because Marinette entered the sporting venue that Sublime was running in, therefore Marinette has a duty of care towards Sublime.

The seond element, Breach, is also easy enough to prove because Marinette pretending to be an akumatised villain and then recklessly answered her own false alarm as Ladybug, which clearly is a breach of her duty of care towards Sublime, though the latter isn't likely to be proven without Marinette's identity being revealed to the court.

The third element, Damages, Marinette's actions resulted in the serious damage to Sublime's prosthetic legs which most likely will require replacements, which from my research according to https://livingwithamplitude.com/amputee-running-blade-levitate-affordable-lasse-madsen typically costs at least 19392.00 Euros, which means there is plenty of damage done by Marinette's actions.

The Fourth and final element, Causation, Marinette's actions in pretending to be a soap based akumatised villain spreading soap around in the bathroom which stuck to Sublime's prosthetics was responsible for the damage, and I would think that someone slipping is a reasonably predictable outcome of playing around with soap, which is further worsened by Marinette's decision to answer her own false alarm as Ladybug, which is clear to see why that is a bad idea.

So in summary, Marinette's reckless actions in pretending to be a soap based akumatised supervillain which resulted in the damage to Sublime's prosthetic legs fulifil all four elements of negilgence and therefore Sublime would have a very strong case against Marinette if she chose to, and Marinette would have to pay at least 19392.00 Euros, and that's not even accounting for legal fees and other damages that the court might award Sublime. Ironically enough, the court or whoever is in charge of determining damages is likely to want to make an example out of Marinette because her actions make light of actual supervillains who are very much active. Reminder, I am not an expert in French Tort Law. Edit: Added details about how the court might want to make an example of Marinette, and added in disclaimers about my legal knowledge.

[zvaigzdelasas]

Israeli tanks, jets and bulldozers bombarding Gaza and razing homes in the occupied West Bank are being fueled by a growing number of countries signed up to the genocide and Geneva conventions, new research suggests, which legal experts warn could make them complicit in serious crimes against the Palestinian people.

Four tankers of American jet fuel primarily used for military aircraft have been shipped to Israel since the start of its aerial bombardment of Gaza in October.

Three shipments departed from Texas after the landmark international court of justice (ICJ) ruling on 26 January ordered Israel to prevent genocidal acts in Gaza. The ruling reminded states that under the genocide convention they have a “common interest to ensure the prevention, suppression and punishment of genocide”.

Overall, almost 80% of the jet fuel, diesel and other refined petroleum products supplied to Israel by the US over the past nine months was shipped after the January ruling, according to the new research commissioned by the non-profit Oil Change International and shared exclusively with the Guardian.

Researchers analyzed shipping logs, satellite images and other open-source industry data to track 65 oil and fuel shipments to Israel between 21 October last year and 12 July.

It suggests a handful of countries – Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Gabon, Nigeria, Brazil and most recently the Republic of the Congo and Italy – have supplied 4.1m tons of crude oil to Israel, with almost half shipped since the ICJ ruling. An estimated two-thirds of crude came from investor-owned and private oil companies, according to the research, which is refined by Israel for domestic, industrial and military use.

Israel relies heavily on crude oil and refined petroleum imports to run its large fleet of fighter jets, tanks and other military vehicles and operations, as well as the bulldozers implicated in clearing Palestinian homes and olive groves to make way for unlawful Israeli settlements.

In response to the new findings, UN and other international law experts called for an energy embargo to prevent further human rights violations against the Palestinian people – and an investigation into any oil and fuels shipped to Israel that have been used to aid acts of alleged genocide and other serious international crimes.

“After the 26 January ICJ ruling, states cannot claim they did not know what they were risking to partake in,” said Francesca Albanese, the UN special rapporteur on the occupied Palestinian territory, adding that under international law, states have obligations to prevent genocide and respect and ensure respect for the Geneva conventions.[...]

“In the case of the US jet-fuel shipments, there are serious grounds to believe that there is a breach of the genocide convention for failure to prevent and disavowal of the ICJ January ruling and provisional measures,” said Albanese. “Other countries supplying oil and other fuels absolutely also warrant further investigation.”

In early August, a tanker delivered an estimated 300,000 barrels of US jet fuel to Israel after being unable to dock in Spain or Gibraltar amid mounting protests and warnings from international legal experts. Days later, more than 50 groups wrote to the Greek government calling for a war-crimes investigation after satellite images showed the vessel in Greek waters.

Last week, the US released $3.5bn to Israel to spend on US-made weapons and military equipment, despite reports from UN human rights experts and other independent investigations that Israeli forces are violating international law in Gaza and the occupied West Bank. A day later, the US approved a further $20bn in weapons sales, including 50 fighter jets, tank ammunition and tactical vehicles.

The sale and transfer of jet fuel – and arms – “increase the ability of Israel, the occupying power, to commit serious violations”, according to the UN human rights council resolution in March.

The US is the biggest supplier of fuel and weapons to Israel. Its policy was unchanged by the ICJ ruling, according to the White House.

“The case for the US’s complicity in genocide is very strong,” aid Dr Shahd Hammouri, lecturer in international law at the University of Kent and the author of Shipments of Death. “It’s providing material support, without which the genocide and other illegalities are not possible. The question of complicity for the other countries will rely on assessment of how substantial their material support has been.”[...]

A spokesperson for the Brazilian president’s office said oil and fuel trades were carried out directly by the private sector according to market rules: “Although the government’s stance on Israel’s current military action in Gaza is well known, Brazil’s traditional position on sanctions is to not apply or support them unilaterally.

Azerbaijan, the largest supplier of crude to Israel since October, will host the 29th UN climate summit in November, followed by Brazil in 2025.[...]

The Biden administration did not respond to requests for comment, nor did Vice-President Kamala Harris’s presidential election campaign team.

Israel is a small country with a relatively large army and air force. It has no operational cross-border fossil fuel pipelines, and relies heavily on maritime imports.[...]

The new data suggests:

•Half the crude oil in this period came from Azerbaijan (28%) and Kazakhstan (22%). Azeri crude is delivered via the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan (BTC) pipeline, majority-owned and operated by BP. The crude oil is loaded on to tankers at the Turkish port of Ceyhan for delivery to Israel. Turkey recently submitted a formal bid to join South Africa’s genocide case against Israel at the ICJ.

•African countries supplied 37% of the total crude, with 22% coming from Gabon, 9% from Nigeria and 6% from the Republic of the Congo.

•In Europe, companies in Italy, Greece and Albania appear to have supplied refined petroleum products to Israel since the ICJ ruling. Last month, Israel also received crude from Italy – a major oil importer. A spokesperson said the Italian government had “no information” about the recent shipments.

•Cyprus provided transshipment services to tankers supplying crude oil from Gabon, Nigeria, and Kazakhstan.[...]

Just six major international fossil-fuel companies – BP, Chevron, Eni, ExxonMobil, Shell and TotalEnergies – could be linked to 35% of the crude oil supplied to Israel since October, the OCI analysis suggests. This is based on direct stakes in oilfields supplying Israeli and/or the companies’ shares in production nationally.[...]

Last week, Colombia suspended coal exports to Israel “to prevent and stop acts of genocide against the Palestinian people”, according to the decree signed by President Gustavo Petro. Petro wrote on X: “With Colombian coal they make bombs to kill the children of Palestine.”

20 Aug 24