Can the Government Really Ban Twitter Parody Accounts?

Arizona is entertaining a law that will make it a felony to use another person's real name to make an  Internet profile intended to "harm, defraud, intimidate or threaten," which to some sounds like a law against parody Twitter accounts. The legislation, if passed, would make Arizona one of a few states, including New York, California, Washington and Texas, to enact anti-online-impersonation laws. If these regulations seek to put a stop to fake representations online, that does sound like the end of fake celebrity baby accounts and Twitter death hoaxes. Then again, these laws have existed in these other places for years, and that hasn't stopped the faux accounts from coming in. So what then does this mean?
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What kind of stuff is the law intended to prosecute?
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The law does not say that all uses of another person's real name can be charged as a felony, but only profiles made for the more nefarious purposes fall into that territory. The legislation is  targeted at more serious forms of impersonation, like cyber bullying. Two Texas teens were arrested and charged under this law for creating a fake Facebook page to ruin a peer's reputation, for example. Or, the case of Robert Dale Esparza Jr. who created a fake profile of his son's vice principal on a porn site might fall under this law, suggests The Arizona Republic's Alia Beard Rau. Or, in one of the cases brought to court under the Texas version of this law, an Adam Limle created websites that portrayed a woman he used to date as a prostitute. (The case was eventually dropped because of a geographical loophole. Limle lived in Ohio, not Texas.)
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Okay, the harm and threat in those situation is pretty clear. How can it at all apply to something relatively harmless, like a Twitter parody account?
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The term "harm" is pretty vague, as this Texas Law blog explains, referring to that state's version of this legislation, on which Arizona based its own law. "'Harm' can be very broadly construed–one person's joke is another person's harm," writes Houston lawyer Stephanie Stradley.
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So, that could extend to parody accounts then?
Well, possibly. Stradley suggests that politicians who had parody accounts created to mock them might have a case. Some of the impersonation of Texas lawmakers has gone beyond just the jokey fake Twitter handle. Jeffwentworth.com is not the official site for Texas state senator, but rather redirects to the web site of the anti-tax advocate group Empower Texans which considers the San Antonio politician the “the most liberal Republican senator in Austin.” Wentworth told The New York Times this domain squatting amounted to "identity theft," and could be the basis for the law's usage.
The law could also possibly effect sillier parody accounts, suggest privacy advocates. "The problem with this, and other online impersonation bills, is the potential that they could be used to go after parody or social commentary activities," senior staff attorney for the Electronic Frontier Foundation Kurt Opsahl told The Arizona Republic's Alia Beard Rau. "While this bill is written to limit 'intent to harm,' if that is construed broadly, there could be First Amendment problems."
Ok, but what about precedent? Has the law ever applied to a faux Twitter handle?
Twitter has its own parody policy that mitigates a lot of the possible damage that could ever lead to a court case. Saint Louis Cardinals manager Anthony La Russa sued Twitter in 2009 because of a made-up account, but the account was removed before the case went anywhere (And that was before these laws went into effect.)
But it's not clear that parody would ever be considered harmful enough for the law. When California's version went into effect, a first amendment lawyer suggested to SF Weekly's Joe Eskenazi that jokes could go pretty far without prosecution. "You're going to have to have room for satire," he said. The account would have to look fool people, he argued. "A key question is, 'is it credibile?'" asks Simitian. "Do people who read it think it's him?" Because of our increasing skepticism of things on Twitter, unless the site has verified checkmark, it's unlikely that most people believe in a fake account for long. So, unless the imitation tweeter does something extremely harmful to someone's character, it doesn't sound like anyone would have a strong case. Alas, parody Twitter accounts, for better or worse (worse, right?) are here to stay.

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Meet the Adorable Bulldogs That Rule College Sports Social Media

Here's Blue III, successor to Blue II, skating across campus.
Image courtesy Butler University
Click here to view this gallery.
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These are heady times for the basketball Bulldogs of Butler University. The team has reached college basketball's storied Final Four in two of the past three years, recently scored a monumental upset win over in-state powerhouse Indiana University and this season joined a new, more high-profile sports conference in the Atlantic 10.
But all that is just barely enough to overshadow the burgeoning reputation of Blue II, the school's adorable English Bulldog mascot who just launched a national tour and is steadily building a social media empire along the way.
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Along with their human assistants, Blue II and his eventual successor Blue III have been barnstorming the country in a van bearing their wrinkly likenesses, hitting major markets to further boost Butler's basketball profile through slobbery cuteness and social media savvy.
On Twitter, Blue II shares photos, updates and interacts with his 11,000 followers. He's also got his own blog and posts filtered photos to Instagram and video updates to YouTube. Oh, and he's on Pinterest, Foursquare and Facebook, too, and shares live video via Ustream.
"He was already so popular on campus, but thanks to social media and traveling around, that's automatically raised his status and put him on another scale," says Butler's director of web marketing Michael Kaltenmark, who doubles as Blue II's owner, chauffeur and ghost-tweeter.
So far, Blues II and III have hit Louisville and Nashville in conjunction with basketball team road trips. Next up are swings through Cincinnati, Philadelphia, Columbus, Pittsburgh, D.C. and New York City. Along the way they meet and greet fans and dog lovers, while making sure to hit the major tourist attractions.
But how do Blue II and Blue III feel about the grind of a traveling celebrity?
"The dogs love it," Kaltenmark says. "I think they just enjoy getting out of the office."
For more of Blues II and III, check out the photo gallery embedded above.

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Nielsen and Twitter Team to Track TV

Your favorite TV shows may soon need a strong social-media presence if they’re going to stick around for a while. Networks and advertisers are hip to social media’s power to publicize a show, as well as TV’s influence over the social media conversation. They’ve even found ways to quantify this relationship.
Twitter and Nielsen, the company that tracks TV viewership, are creating a Nielsen Twitter TV Rating for each U.S. program starting with the fall 2013 season. This rating will track the total number of couch potatoes watching TV and tweeting about it, as well as anyone who happens to see those tweets.
Madison Avenue will learn who’s watching and the extent of their influence online.
Twitter says its more than 140 million active users send one billion tweets every two-and-a-half days. The portion that is about TV viewing habits should yield unprecedented demographic data about both viewers and Twitter users.
One anticipated result: shows about hipsters that get high Nielsen Twitter TV ratings will feature even more ads for skinny jeans and coffee.

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Walter Alan Ray Announces the Release of ‘Is God Unnecessary?’

Why Stephen Hawking Is Wrong according to the Laws of Physics

Glendora, CA (PRWEB) January 10, 2013
When Stephen Hawking, the most famous scientist living in the twenty-first century, published “The Grand Design,” he provoked a lively response in the media. Hawking wrote that the laws of physics made God unnecessary when explaining the origin of the universe. In “Is God Unnecessary?,” (published by iUniverse) author Walter Alan Ray presents several lucid reasons why Hawking’s thesis is mistaken. Ray does not use philosophical or theological arguments, but presents the same laws of physics that Hawking says demonstrate his position.
Ray presents several reasons why Hawking’s thesis is mistaken.. In Is God Unnecessary? Ray examines:

    Hawking’s “Apparent Miracle”
    Hawking’s assumption that Charles Darwin explained the origin of life
    The question, “Can something come out of nothing?”
    The cosmological constant in Einstein’s equations – the factor that Hawking considers the most impressive coincidence
    Hawking’s solution to the “completely incomprehensible” value of the cosmological constant
    How physics and mathematics join to show that in the current state of our knowledge, physics and mathematics have something important to say about the origin of the universe.
Ray determined that the laws of physics and mathematics show there are two possible answers to the question ‘How did we come to live in a universe that is as astoundingly fine-tuned as ours?’ The arguments presented in Is God Unnecessary? show neither of these two answers is the solution proposed by Hawking.
“Is God Unnecessary?”

By Walter Alan Ray

Softcover | 5.5 x 8.5in | 76 pages | ISBN 9781475954630

E-Book | 76 pages | ISBN 9781475954647

Available at Amazon and Barnes & Noble
About the Author

Walter Alan Ray earned both a bachelor’s and a master’s degree in electrical engineering from MIT. He also earned a Master of Divinity degree from Fuller Theological Seminary and a Ph.D. in biblical studies from Princeton Theological Seminary. Ray has worked as an engineer and served as senior pastor of Glenkirk Presbyterian Church in Glendora, Calif. where he resides.
iUniverse, an Author Solutions, Inc. self-publishing imprint, is the leading book marketing, editorial services, and supported self-publishing provider. iUniverse has a strategic alliance with Indigo Books & Music, Inc. in Canada, and titles accepted into the iUniverse Rising Star program are featured in a special collection on BarnesandNoble.com. iUniverse recognizes excellence in book publishing through the Star, Reader’s Choice, Rising Star and Editor’s Choice designations – self-publishing’s only such awards program. Headquartered in Bloomington, Ind., iUniverse also operates offices in Indianapolis. For more information or to publish a book, please visit iuniverse.com or call 1-800-AUTHORS. For the latest, follow @iuniversebooks on Twitter.

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Jean Newland Offers New Collected WWII POW Stories

‘Guests of the Emperor’ presents carefully-researched historical and poignant stories of Allied captivity

MIAMI LAKES, Fla. (PRWEB) January 10, 2013
When author Jean Newland’s Uncle Richard died, he left her a trunk of personal papers and clippings. As she went through the papers, she discovered an incredible and horrifying true story of wartime sacrifice and death from World War II, which she turned into her new book “Guests of the Emperor: Allied POWs in Rangoon Burma” (published by AuthorHouse).
NEWLAND’S book is a tribute to the heroism of the soldiers who survived life in a brutal Imperial Japanese prison in Burma during the early 1940s. In addition to the narratives of her Uncle Richard, she includes stories of British, Australian, Chinese, Scots and New Zealanders, all men captured in battle.
An excerpt from “Guests of the Emperor”:
“On December 14, 1944, you had started your bomb run, and I had started mine (for the trenches) when a sudden tremendous explosion from above caused me to dive headlong into the nearest hole. ‘Oh, my God, look!’ One of our invincible B-29 Superforts was in a flat spin; two others were smoking and peeling off in opposite directions; opening parachutes were beginning to appear. What an unexplainable tragedy.

Forty years have passed since that day, and as I recall the many experiences of my 560 days of captivity, none in more vivid or painful than the memory of that day when some of you, our heroes, fell from the sky to join us in our misery.”
“I wanted (the soldiers’) story to be told,” she says. “To just close that trunk and put it away would have diminished what they had endured.”
“Guests of the Emperor”

By Jean Newland

Hardcover | 6 x 9 in | 316 pages | ISBN 9781477281130

Softcover | 6 x 9 in | 316 pages | ISBN 9781477281147

E-Book | 316 pages | ISBN 9781477283127

Available at Amazon and Barnes & Noble
About the Author

Jean Newland was employed for 34 years by the Bascom Palmer Eye Institute in Miami as director of patient financial services. In this capacity, she heard many sad and moving stories, but nothing prepared her for what she was about to read. When her Uncle Richard died, he left her all his personal papers in an old army trunk. When she began to read the trunk's contents she became so intrigued with the stories she found that it became clear that they should be told and these men honored.

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For Scared Children, Author Leeanne Brearley Creates New Picture Book Teaching Wisdom, Strength of Mind

Leeanne Brearley uses canny, practical wisdom and “Harlow the Helpful Ghost”, who represents the angelic side of the unknown, to guide children in understanding the world.

Pukekohe, New Zealand (PRWEB) January 10, 2013
Children who are scared of the unknown will have Harlow the Helpful Ghost as guide. He is what author Leeanne Brearley has created as the unknown from the angelic side, the side children often fail to call upon, wrapped as they are in their fear of the great big world. In this book, Brearley guides them through the many domestic instances which terrify children, when the instinctive urge to explore the dark and dank still cannot overcome the terror conjured by innocent imagination.
There are three instances when Harlow comes out from the ether and gives Johnny three ways to combat his fears. They are what an imaginative child might come up with to adjust to the unknown, a more practical, less effortful way than building a world of his or her own to which he or she retreats in moments of stress. First, Harlow gives Johnny a cloak of invisibility to help out in his fear of the dark just before sleeping. The cloak would make him invisible so nothing or no one can see him while he sleeps. He dozes of soundly, cloak wrapped around him. Next, Harlow appears to him just after Mum had ordered him to shower. Afraid of the shower’s heat, and cold, its dreary wetness and the possibility of drowning, Johnny is immobilized by his fears until Harlow suggests that he bring in his Buzz Lightyear action figure. That a little toy action hero can endure a shower to get clean inspires Johnny to appreciate the need for a shower every day.
A boy only has courage insofar as he can control a situation, like playing with toy armies as Johnny does one afternoon. Hiding behind a tree with some of his toys, a spider suddenly drops on his arm. The hairy, creepy thing, to Johnny, is a cause for crying out in fear. But Harlow comes out again to explain the creatures of nature and a natural law in terms Johnny understands. The little, little spider is deathly afraid of Johnny who is a giant compared to him! Johnny is convinced, even to the point of having the beginning of conscience for nature’s lesser creatures. Harlow the Helpful Ghost is one of the canny children’s books, a way for children to learn the basics of domesticity, of nature, and of the world with easily understood, practical wisdom.   
For more information on this book, log on to http://www.Xlibris.co.nz.
About the Author

Leeanne Brearley was born in New Zealand and has several years’ worth of experience working with children. With passion and interest in helping children’s needs and developments, she has dedicated her time to bring alive this book to help those with fears. The author lives in Auckland with Stewart and her son Cody.
Harlow the Helpful Ghost * by Leeanne Brearley

Afraid of the Dark

Publication Date: October 25, 2012

Picture Book; NZ$44.99; 60 pages; 978-1-4797-3178-7

eBook; NZ$3.99; 978-1-4797-3179-4
Members of the media who wish to review this book may request a complimentary paperback copy by contacting the publisher at 0800-891-366. To purchase copies of the book for resale, please fax Xlibris at (09) 353-1455 or call 0800-891-366.

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Seven Big East basketball teams leaving conference

(The Sports Xchange) The seven Catholic schools in the Big East that do not have Football Bowl Subdivision teams unanimously voted Saturday to take their men's basketball teams out of the conference, ESPN reported.
St. John's president Rev. Donald J. Harrington scheduled a news conference for 4:30 p.m. ET.
DePaul, Georgetown, Marquette, Providence, St. John's, Seton Hall and Villanova will leave the Big East on June 30, 2015. They will pursue another framework for their basketball teams.
The conference future of remaining Big East members Connecticut, Cincinnati and South Florida -- which have FBS programs -- is uncertain.
"Earlier today we voted unanimously to pursue an orderly evolution to a foundation of basketball schools that honors the history and tradition on which the Big East was established," the seven presidents said in a joint statement. "Under the current context of conference realignment, we believe pursuing a new basketball framework that builds on this tradition of excellence and competition is the best way forward."
The Big East will have 12 teams in its conference for football starting next season. Boise State and San Diego State join the Big East in football only next season. Rutgers and Louisville are leaving the conference after next season.

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Pennsylvania suit against NCAA a long shot: experts

(Reuters) - Pennsylvania Governor Tom Corbett faces serious obstacles to winning his antitrust lawsuit against the NCAA over the harsh sanctions it imposed on Penn State in the Jerry Sandusky child sex-abuse scandal, legal experts said on Wednesday.
While targeting the National Collegiate Athletic Association may be popular politically in a state where Penn State football is widely loved, the federal court handling the case might rule that the state lacks standing to bring the lawsuit in the first place, experts said.
Moreover, the state of Pennsylvania must demonstrate the NCAA penalties harmed consumers and constituted a breakdown in the competitive marketplace.
"It's not a frivolous lawsuit - there are real arguments to make - but, boy, is it weak," said Max Kennerly, a lawyer with the Beasley Firm in Philadelphia who has been following the case closely.
The sanctions the NCAA imposed on Penn State in July included an unprecedented $60 million fine and the voiding of all of the football team's victories over the past 14 seasons.
Corbett's lawsuit was distinct in that, unlike the university, the state of Pennsylvania was not a party directly affected by the sanctions. Instead, Corbett brought the suit on behalf of third parties such as stadium workers, shopkeepers, hoteliers and others whose businesses were disturbed because of the NCAA's penalties.
The obstacle Corbett faced was "converting what may be real and perhaps significant harm" to Penn State students and athletes and local businesses into an antitrust violation, said Gabriel Feldman, a professor at Tulane University Law School.
"This is an extremely uphill battle for Pennsylvania," Feldman said.
The NCAA has been sued on antitrust grounds fewer than 10 times over the past five years, estimated Matt Millen, a professor at Marquette University Law School and director of the National Sports Law Institute. Most of those cases were settled or dismissed because courts often defer to the NCAA when it comes to matters of rules and enforcement actions, Millen said.
Past antitrust suits against the NCAA that have been successful tend to involve operations such as marketing and licensing because the body has "a stranglehold" over those spheres, Kennerly said.
The Supreme Court ruled in the 1984 case of NCAA v. Board of Regents of the University of Oklahoma that the NCAA's policies on television broadcast rights to college football games violated federal antitrust laws. Former UCLA basketball player Ed O'Bannon led a class-action suit against the NCAA in 2009 that is still pending over the use of student-athletes' images and likenesses without compensation.
In contrast, antitrust lawsuits over NCAA sanctions have been less successful in court. In the 1988 case of NCAA v. Tarkanian, the Supreme Court ruled the NCAA was a private entity not obligated to abide by due process considerations when it hands down sanctions, Kennerly said.

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Pennsylvania suit against NCAA a long shot, experts say

(Reuters) - Pennsylvania Governor Tom Corbett faces serious obstacles to winning his antitrust lawsuit against the NCAA over the harsh sanctions it imposed on Penn State in the Jerry Sandusky child sex-abuse scandal, legal experts said on Wednesday.
While targeting the National Collegiate Athletic Association may be popular politically in a state where Penn State football is widely loved, the federal court handling the case might rule that the state lacks standing to bring the lawsuit in the first place, experts said.
Moreover, the state of Pennsylvania must demonstrate the NCAA penalties harmed consumers and constituted a breakdown in the competitive marketplace.
"It's not a frivolous lawsuit - there are real arguments to make - but, boy, is it weak," said Max Kennerly, a lawyer with the Beasley Firm in Philadelphia who has been following the case closely.
The sanctions the NCAA imposed on Penn State in July included an unprecedented $60 million fine and the voiding of all of the football team's victories over the past 14 seasons.
Corbett's lawsuit was distinct in that, unlike the university, the state of Pennsylvania was not a party directly affected by the sanctions. Instead, Corbett brought the suit on behalf of third parties such as stadium workers, shopkeepers, hoteliers and others whose businesses were disturbed because of the NCAA's penalties.
The obstacle Corbett faced was "converting what may be real and perhaps significant harm" to Penn State students and athletes and local businesses into an antitrust violation, said Gabriel Feldman, a professor at Tulane University Law School.
"This is an extremely uphill battle for Pennsylvania," Feldman said.
The NCAA has been sued on antitrust grounds fewer than 10 times over the past five years, estimated Matt Mitten, a professor at Marquette University Law School and director of the National Sports Law Institute. Most of those cases were settled or dismissed because courts often defer to the NCAA when it comes to matters of rules and enforcement actions, Mitten said.
Past antitrust suits against the NCAA that have been successful tend to involve operations such as marketing and licensing because the body has "a stranglehold" over those spheres, Kennerly said.
The Supreme Court ruled in the 1984 case of NCAA v. Board of Regents of the University of Oklahoma that the NCAA's policies on television broadcast rights to college football games violated federal antitrust laws. Former UCLA basketball player Ed O'Bannon led a class-action suit against the NCAA in 2009 that is still pending over the use of student-athletes' images and likenesses without compensation.
In contrast, antitrust lawsuits over NCAA sanctions have been less successful in court. In the 1988 case of NCAA v. Tarkanian, the Supreme Court ruled the NCAA was a private entity not obligated to abide by due process considerations when it hands down sanctions, Kennerly said.

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New Hope for Eastern and Carolina Hemlocks; Tree Savers (TM) Announces First-Ever High Volume Commercial Lab for the St Beetle

Tree Savers™ new state-of-the-art biological control laboratory is now producing hundreds of thousands of St Beetles for commercial release. There’s new hope in the fight to eradicate HWA in Eastern and Carolina Hemlock forests.

Greentown, PA (PRWEB) January 08, 2013
Tree Savers™ announces the most advanced private biological control laboratory for the mass production and distribution of what leading scientists and the USDA believes are the eastern and Carolina hemlocks only hope – the St Beetle. This voracious little ladybug is the natural born predator of the Hemlock Woolly Adelgid (HWA) – the invasive transplanted pest destroying entire hemlock forests from Maine to Georgia.
In 1995 the USDA approved the release of the St Beetle in public forests to biologically control HWA. The problem is that cultivation of the beetle has been limited to research laboratories. There’s simply not enough beetles being raised to combat the 50 year establishment and rapid advancement of HWA infestation.
That is, until now. According to Environmental Scientist Jayme Longo of Tree-Savers™ “we’ve created a state-of-the-art commercial laboratory that dramatically increases the availability of St Beetles. We raise them, we sell them directly to both the public and private sector, and we guide people through the process of releasing them. Our first harvest this year will guarantee that hundreds of thousands of beetles will be available for massive deployment. It’s going to be a game-changing year in the fight against HWA.”
In fact, Tree-Savers™ is the only American company currently supplying the beetle to anyone determined to save hemlocks. “HWA doesn’t stop at forest boundary lines” says Longo. “Neither do our beetles. Wherever there’s HWA, St Beetles attack.” St Beetles have been shown to reduce HWA densities by as much as 87% in just 5 months. That’s a startling statistic.
Until now, efforts to eradicate HWA have largely been limited to the use of chemical pesticides. But pesticides, while effective in the short term, have proven to be an unsustainable solution. Once the pesticide wears off, HWA returns. Repeated applications are expensive and quite simply – have not stopped the rapid infestation.
Why save the hemlock?
The destructive impact of HWA goes far beyond the death of a single tree by setting in motion a downward spiral of ecosystem decline. The hemlock provides critical habitat for over 96 bird and 47 mammal species. Streams with hemlock forests contain a higher richness and diversity of aquatic invertebrates and significantly greater trout populations. As hemlocks die, stream-side shading disappears, water temperatures rise, and trout die.
It gets worse. The natural ability of the soil to retain moisture diminishes (hydrological failure). Erosion happens and streams and waterways become clogged with sediment. Dead trees and underbrush become fuel for forest fires. Local economies that depend on a lush hemlock forest decline. Hemlock forests provide aesthetic beauty, tourism, increased property values and wood products.
About Tree Savers™

Tree Savers™ is part of a family of companies devoted to developing and implementing all-natural restorative technologies that are scientifically proven to reverse environmental destruction. According to John Tucci, President of both Tree Savers™ and Lake-Savers LLC, “We believe nature always has the answer if we’re willing to look deep enough. Don’t just treat the symptoms, restore the natural system. Whether it’s restoring a lake’s inherent capacity to process excess nutrients from the watershed or restoring hemlocks using biological control, we’ve found that nature has a better way. Not only are these all-natural technologies effective, they’re intrinsically sustainable.

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