The driver of a Boston trolley that caused a crash that injured about 50 people was apparently sending text messages at the time of the accident, despite a transit authority ban on such activity. This latest incident comes after the horrible crash in California last year that killed scores of people, in which the train conductor was said to be texting, and highlights how bans like this, whether covering the drivers of trains or cars, really aren't effective. A reasonably intelligent person driving a trolley or other mass-transit vehicle doesn't need a ban to tell them that texting while driving isn't such a good idea. If they aren't smart enough to figure that out, they're probably just going to ignore the ban anyway, like this driver in Boston, undermining the point of the rule. Again, it goes back to personal responsibility, something that politicians and rulemakers won't be able to conjure up out of legislation, try as they might. This isn't to say that people like trolley drivers should be allowed to text while working -- far from it. But to think that putting a ban into place will, in itself, simply and easily eliminate the problem and make everybody safer is misguided.

We discussed recently how entertainment industry lobbyists have been pushing this story about how P2P software needs to be regulated to prevent gov't data from leaking, incorrectly blaming the software for user error. So, of course, it's no surprise that legislation has been introduced that tries to force any P2P software used for transferring files from one computer to another to include a big warning and require the user to give "informed consent" when installing the software and every time it's used. Yes, every time it's used. This is a bad idea for a variety of reasons. Has it occurred to anyone crafting such a bill that when you pop up such a notice and require "consent" every single time software is used, most people will just ignore it? But, more importantly, as Declan McCullagh points out, the wording of the bill suggests that this "notice and consent" solution would apply to lots and lots of products, including browsers, FTP clients and backup software. Tons of software these days involves transferring files between two computers. This is, of course, symptomatic of legislation being written and introduced by people who don't understand the technology. They think that software to transfer files is limited to things like LimeWire or BitTorrent, not recognizing that it's a core part of the internet itself.

A new antipiracy law went into effect in Sweden on Wednesday, allowing copyright holders to demand the IP addresses from ISPs if a court finds that there's evidence of illegal activity -- and, as News.com notes, internet traffic took a major dip in Sweden, though it's not entirely clear if the two things are connected (though, it notes a similar dip occurred, back when The Pirate Bay was taken offline a few years ago). Not surprisingly, some audio book publishers wasted no time in trying to use the law, filing lawsuits to get information on certain file sharers. Sweden, as many of you know, has had very consumer-friendly copyright laws for quite some time. The departure from this (and the introduction of other new laws that are being pushed) has come from massive international pressure, usually starting with the American entertainment industry. It will be worth watching how the country reacts to increased and more draconian copyright rules.

With Congress' latest attempt to force data retention on anyone who operates a network (including home users), some are realizing that other parts of the government have been equally adamant about getting these same folks to destroy the very same information for the sake of keeping people's data private. It does seem like we're on a crash course between privacy on the one hand, and the demands of law enforcement, the entertainment industry and a few others who want all data to be kept for as long as possible. A few years back, when stories of how the government was misusing data that it got access to were revealed, we had hoped that it would lead politicians to recognize the downsides of data retention. But, of course, that's not quite how Washington DC works.

AT&T has been testing a plan to distribute residential phone books on CD, rather than on paper. That sounds like a great idea that marries environmental benefits with cost savings, and could probably be taken a step further by only distributing the white pages in any format on request. Yellow-pages publishers are struggling as the web steals away their audience, and it's hard to imagine the white pages gets much use any more, either. But there's at least one obstacle standing in the way of the elimination of the white pages: laws in some states that require the company to publish and deliver a residential directory to every one of its customers. I'm hard pressed to remember the last time I used the white pages, and given that they don't list cell phone numbers, they're growing more and more irrelevant to many people. Burdening the phone companies with their production and distribution seems pretty pointless these days, not to mention the environmental impact of millions of the books, the vast majority of which are never used, and only a small portion of which are recycled.

While there's an effort underway to repeal the federal government's ban on online gambling, a recent legal ruling could help out a bit as well. A judge in South Carolina found that poker should be considered a game of skill, rather than a game of chance. Of course, in dealing with the state law at issue in that case, the result didn't matter -- as the law didn't distinguish between skill and chance. However, the rather murky set of federal laws that have been used to fight online gambling may not cover "games of skill." The problem is... well... no one's quite sure what it really covers. Basically, there's no real anti-gambling law. There are certain laws, like the Wire Act, that have been used against online gambling -- and the more recent law (oddly included as part of a harbor protection bill) was more focused on stopping financial institutions from accepting money used for gambling. But, with the judge's ruling, some are pointing out that this means online poker shouldn't be considered gambling -- and the other federal laws shouldn't apply (state laws are a different matter, however).

Over at CNET, a blogger is decrying the latest epidemic to hit New York City: people walking while texting on their phone. One imagines this has been happening in the city (and plenty of other places) for some time and people have been managing to survive, but this blogger apparently just arrived there on a business trip and noticed. It's the typical "man-these-people-are-annoying" type of thing, but his final suggestion is that "some fine district attorneys might find it in themselves to create a little misdemeanor out of this peculiar habit." Sure, it's annoying to get run into by somebody walking down the street and paying more attention to their phone than the sidewalk, but it's not too much more annoying than getting run into by somebody lost in a newspaper, or daydreaming. Perhaps we should codify laws making that stuff a crime, too, if we're looking for suggestions on how to waste police time. As has been pointed out before, this phenomenon really isn't anything new, but rather the latest iteration of the intersection of pedestrians and technology. Jaywalking laws haven't stopped people from jaywalking; pointless bans on doing certain activities while walking aren't likely to stamp out that behavior, either.

Damn. Techdirt reader Yehuda Berlinger alerts us to the fact that he recently completed rewriting UK Copyright Law, in verse. Yes, he's reimagined the law as a poem. Here's just a clip:

3
You copyright books
And programs, all sized
Written or recorded
Even unauthorized

3A

Databases, too,
By which they mean lists
Of things, are also
In this here gist

4

Art includes maps
And casts of all sorts
Buildings and sketches
So on and so forth

And it's not just UK Copyright Law. He's actually done US Copyright Law, Canadian Copyright Law, US Patent Law and US Trademark Law. It's impressive, to say the least. Berlinger is the first to admit that the poetry isn't particularly good, but says "that's part of the point." He says he does it "because I want to read the actual copyright codes, but can't do it unless I'm entertaining myself in the process. Also, writing summations of each section helps me to remember." Check them all out...

As the nation gears up for the inauguration of a new President and Congress and state and local governments laying out their legislative priorities for the coming year, one group says that in addition to pressing issues like the economy, legislators should take up a nationwide ban on cell phone use while driving. They've trotted out the usual rhetoric, equating yakking while driving to drunk driving in an attempt to evoke an emotional response, but ignoring some salient facts. First, while it's hard to argue that driving while talking is completely safe, it may not be as big a risk as some of these groups would lead us to believe. Second, the laws are very hard to enforce and don't automatically decrease the number of accidents. Instead of adding another law narrowly focused on one particular behavior, why not more stringently enforce existing traffic laws dealing with dangerous driving? Laws already exist covering all manner of unsafe driving; perhaps a good way to make the roads safer would be to increase enforcement of them and work to clamp down on all types of unsafe driving, rather than single out particular ones.

All too often these days, we've seen murderers try to pass off the blame for their crimes by blaming video games. This comes after years of techno panic around weak and often misinterpreted studies concerning links between video games and violence. Despite the fact that there's been no actual evidence that video games lead to increased violence (and the fact that youth violence has continually dropped as video games became more popular should be quite telling), it makes for a great news story -- and, thus, a great excuse for murderers. Luckily, no one's buying it.

In the latest such case, where teen-aged Daniel Petric shot both his parents, killing his mother and wounding his father, after they took away his copy of Halo 3, a judge has rejected Petric's claim that it was his video game addiction that inspired the murder (and subsequent attempt to frame his father). It probably didn't help the teen's case at all that there was evidence he had planned the murder for weeks, rather than spontaneously acting following the video game confiscation. The judge still does, unfortunately, suggest that the video game warped Petric's mind, despite little proof that was true. However, the judge notes that even if he was under the influence of the video game, that's no defense for what he did.

In the meantime, of course, politicians are still overreacting to the still unproven idea that video games lead to violence -- to the point that Rep. Joe Baca has introduced a law that would require health warnings on video games, similar to cigarette warnings, saying that: "WARNING: Excessive exposure to violent video games and other violent media has been linked to aggressive behavior." So, it certainly looks like politicians and the media will continue overreacting when it comes to video games and violence.