Financial firms that sell investment products have long been restricted in how they speak about or present those products to customers and potential customers. But social networking sites, where the line between personal and professional speech is blurred, present huge problems for regulators.

Australia's national Internet filter still lives, but South Australia has pledged to repeal a tough law forcing all bloggers and online commenters to use real names and addresses when talking about politics in the run-up to an election. Score one for anonymous speech.

Car analogies are about as helpful to digital copyright debates as jet fuel is to my Nissan. But despite his own use of such analogies, an influential UK MP makes important points about how "three strikes" regimes could be made more humane.

Over the past 14 years, patent trolls received 2 to 3 times the awards that companies actually selling stuff did. It seems like a good time to sue someone for infringement, especially with patent reform making little headway in Congress.