Is any of this legal? This has been chronic in the Facebook news feed lately.  I’ve seen Hugh Jackman, Matt Damon, Sean Penn, and John Travolta featured so far in these ads for “men’s health products” all of which imply these movie stars are endorsing whatever secret ingredient or method is being pushed.  Click on the link, and Facebook warns ...

some tech thing is a new weekly roundup of tech-related stories you might have missed or even wished you missed.  Co-hosted by David Newhoff and Sandy Davis.  Take a listen and let me/us know what you think. In this episode:  Pixeom, Facebook Memorials, Techies bitch on “Secret,” Polar Bear Pitchfest, beer drones. ...

Shakespeare, a poet, wrote the line “The first thing we do, let’s kill all the lawyers,” for the character Jack Cade in the Henry VI cycle, and it refers to Cade’s vision of a utopian, social revolution in which he would be dictator.  Of course, the irony is that when it comes to establishing or maintaining autocratic rule, one must ...

This week, I paid a small fortune to have the instrument cluster replaced on my car, and the mechanic, sympathizing as I wincingly wrote out the check, said, “The days of mechanical failures are over.” By this he was of course referring to the reality that everything we depend on is supported by integrated electronics and computers, the downside of ...

According to this analysis by Chez Paznienza on The Daily Banter, toymaker GoldieBlox not only used copyright infringement as a marketing tool leading up to the 2013 holidays, but that same YouTube spot illegally using a song by The Beastie Boys was instrumental in their winning a $4 million dollar TV spot placement during tomorrow’s Super Bowl.  As Paznienza writes, ...