In MetaPhone: The Sensitivity of Telephone Metadata a pair of Stanford researchers recruited test-subjects who were willing to install spyware on their phones that logged the same "metadata" that the… Read the rest of the article: Your metadata reveals sensitive, private information

Salgood Sam — who worked on great projects like Sea of Red and Therefore, Repent! sez, "In the last leg of a successful Kickstarter to print my next graphic novel,… Read the rest of the article: Kickstarting Dream Life, a solo comic from Salgood Sam of "Sea of Red" and "Therefore Repent!"

One year ago today How to fix the worst law in technology: Tim Wu's New Yorker piece on Aaron Swartz and the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act explains how Obama… Read the rest of the article: This Day in Blogging History: Fix the worst law in technology; London imposes 9PM curfew on under-16s; Bible-based marriage laws

Since Netflix CEO Reid Hastings published a statement on Net Neutrality and Comcast (whom Netflix has had to bribe in order to secure normal service for its users), Comcast has… Read the rest of the article: Irony not dead: Comcast claims it is Net Neutrality's best friend

Behold! The Diction-fairy! From This City's Lungs/Kelsey Parks. "Diction-fairy" (via Seanan McGuire)

Michael from Muckrock sez, "With a Freedom of Information Act request, MuckRock has received copies of two of the guides Homeland Security uses to monitor social media, one on standard… Read the rest of the article: Help Muckrock scour DHS social media spying guidelines and figure out what to FOIA next

This is well-said, from Will Potter on Mashable: "[NSA Deputy Director Richard] Ledgett said he didn't know what NSA surveillance was important, because it's all pieces of a bigger puzzle.… Read the rest of the article: NSA versus puzzles

Peter "brokep" Sunde, co-founder of the Pirate Bay and Flattr, a service that allows fans to pay artists, is running for the European Parliament on the Pirate Party ticket (what… Read the rest of the article: Pirate Bay founder runs for MEP

Microsoft's "Scroogled" campaign (no relation) boastfully compared Hotmail's privacy framework to Gmail's, condemning Google for "reading your mail." Now, Microsoft has admitted that it scoured the Hotmail messages belonging the… Read the rest of the article: Microsoft has always reserved the right to read and disclose your Hotmail messages

Hugh sends us An Illustrated Book of Bad Arguments: "This book is aimed at newcomers to the field of logical reasoning, particularly those who, to borrow a phrase from Pascal,… Read the rest of the article: Bad arguments, great illustrations

Turkish users: you can send Tweets using SMS. Avea and Vodafone text START to 2444. Turkcell text START to 2555. — Policy (@policy) March 20, 2014 Juha sez, "Looks like… Read the rest of the article: Turkey blocks Twitter in run-up to election

Hugh from the Electronic Frontier Foundation sez, "Sunshine Week may be just seven days in March, but fighting for government transparency is a year-round mission for the Electronic Frontier Foundation.… Read the rest of the article: Infographic: EFF's Freedom of Information Act files

Etsy seller MechWorld makes beautiful, ~$100 junkbots out of miscellaneous hardware. They're extremely poseable, have functional variations (like holding your phone), and there's even a Wall-E. They're pretty heavy —… Read the rest of the article: Junkbots made from miscellaneous hardware

Since Netflix CEO Reid Hastings published a statement on Net Neutrality and Comcast (whom Netflix has had to bribe in order to secure normal service for its users), Comcast has… Read the rest of the article: Irony not dead: Comcast claims it is Net Neutrality's best friend

The Humble Ebook Bundle continues to rock, raising hundreds of thousands of dollars for a bundle of great name-your-price ebooks, including Scott Westerfeld's Uglies, Steve Gould's Jumper, and Holly Black's… Read the rest of the article: Homeland audiobook: Wil Wheaton explains how Little Brother and Homeland make you technologically literate

The Heds Will Roll Tumblr collects headlines that were too weird, offensive, or beyond-the-pale to appear in print. Some examples: "Papa's Got a Brand New Body Bag" (An article on… Read the rest of the article: Graveyard for overly clever headlines

Marcin Wichary is a designer at Medium who took on the challenge of creating a considered, fine-tuned underline for the links on the site. In contrast to the normal "data-driven"… Read the rest of the article: How Medium designed its underlines

More than 25 tech companies — including Happy Mutants, LLC, Boing Boing's parent company — have signed onto a letter asking Senator Ron Wyden (chairman of the Senate Finance Committee)… Read the rest of the article: Tech companies to Senate Finance Committee chair Wyden: no Fast Track for TPP!

One year ago today Ray Bradbury's fan letter to Robert A Heinlein: YOUR INFLUENCE ON US ALL, FROM 1939 ON, CANNOT BE MEASURED. I CAN ONLY SAY I REMEMBER, WARMLY,… Read the rest of the article: This Day in Blogging History: Bradbury's fan letter to Heinlein; Guatemala: forensics lead to human rights arrests; Six years of Kottke

Thinkgeek bills their $40 Blobfish Plush as a "Grumpy Cat of the sea." While its true that the "world's ugliest animal" is actually pretty unremarkable looking when it is compressed… Read the rest of the article: Blobfish plush