a familiar face emerges in the last paragraphs of https://www.nytimes.com/2023/07/29/technology/mike-masnick-techdirt-internet... “He understands the internet in a deep way that I don’t think is common,” said Corynne McSherry, legal director at the Electronic Frontier Foundation. The digital liberties organization gave Mr. Masnick an award for digital activism in 2017 <https://www.eff.org/awards/pioneer/2017>, when fighting a defamation lawsuit almost bankrupted Techdirt. A man who claimed to have “invented email” had sued Techdirt for $15 million over its blog posts questioning those claims. The suit garnered significant media attention; it’s not among the examples in the Wikipedia article on the Streisand effect, but it really should be. Mr. Masnick knew the lawsuit was ridiculous and unlikely to succeed, but the legal bills were a hardship. Techdirt turned to the internet and asked for donations. It got the support it needed, and the suit was eventually settled with no money changing hands. Stay sane, Jonathan Jonathan Coopersmith Fellow, American Association for the Advancement of Science Professor Emeritus Department of History Texas A&M University College Station, TX 77843-4236 979.739.4708 (cell) "Technological obsolescence, <https://www.nationalacademies.org/news/2023/05/technological-obsolescence>" National Academy of Engineering *Perspectives* May 23, 2023 It's taking longer to vote - especially if you are Black or Hispanic <https://theconversation.com/its-taking-more-time-to-cast-a-ballot-in-us-elections-and-even-longer-for-black-and-hispanic-voters-191711> , theconversation.com Preserving space archives: https://www.toboldlypreserve.space/ *FAXED. The Rise and Fall of the Fax Machine* (Johns Hopkins University Press)