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A teacher received a huge shock last week after uploading a copy of a book to his website that offers free educational resources for students.

Pāvels Jurs (Photo: Torrent Freak)

Torrent Freak
May 21, 2013

The Latvian publisher behind the work, a $4.00 history book, complained to the authorities which resulted in the teacher being raided by the police. During interrogation the teacher learned that his mistake could cost him dearly – two years in jail, forced labor, or a fine.

While the online sharing of music has been widespread for close to a decade and a half, the sharing of books has only gathered real traction in the past few years.

When it came to legal action to prevent sharing the music industry led the way but even now, book publishers – Wiley aside – seem generally unwilling to follow the example. However, there are companies prepared to make uploaders suffer, even those with no malicious or commercial intent.

Pāvels Jurs is a teacher in Latvia who operates a website where children can research history topics, see presentations and find other learning aids. Jurs created the site so that children from poor families can still have access to education. According to Latvian media, Jurs even received recognition from the Ministry of Education for his efforts.

Last Thursday, however, Jurs was leaving home to go to school and found himself confronted by four police officers from the Economic Crime Bureau. They proceeded to search Jurs’ home and confiscate the computer he uses in his teaching job. He was arrested and subjected to two hours of interrogation during which he learned he had committed a serious offense that could result in a two year jail sentence.

Jurs’ crime was to upload a scanned copy of the high school history book “Vēsture Vidusskolai” to his website, an act which drew the ire of publisher Zvaigzne ABC and an official complaint earlier this year.

The publisher currently sells the book for the princely sum of $4.00 and it appears that Jurs had previously held discussions with its author but there was a misunderstandings over what content should have been removed from his site.

Nevertheless, the episode has left Jurs questioning why such heavy handed tactics were needed when a civil action would have sufficed. The police have taken down Jurs’ website and since exams are currently underway, students no longer have access to its resources.

“Is there really such a need for punitive action against these methods of teaching, such as the maintenance of a websites from which I did not receive any benefit, but, on the contrary, cost most of my salary payments for maintenance? I understand that I have violated copyright laws, but is it really necessary to act this way?” Jurs said.

Since the raid a meeting has taken place during which some kind of a settlement was discussed. Further meetings will take place this week but it’s now believed that the publisher will not raise any “substantive claims” against the teacher.

The post Police Raid School Teacher for Uploading History Book for Students appeared first on Intellihub.com.

(THE HILL) — White House officials were notified of a Treasury Department inspector general report on the IRS but elected not to tell President Obama about it.

White House press secretary Jay Carney said Monday that Chief of Staff Dennis McDonough and other senior officials knew of the general nature of the report but decided to keep the president in the dark about the report’s finding that the IRS had targeted conservative groups for extra tax scrutiny.

Carney said it was the White House counsel Kathryn Ruemmler’s judgment that the matter should not be told to the president, and that she conveyed this sentiment to senior staff.

Infowars.com | Organizer of July 4th armed D.C. march hauled away in white Suburban.

Jeffrey Lord | Obama met with anti-Tea Party IRS union chief day before agency targeted Tea Party.

Just months after a study was published showing that two Monsanto products, a genetically modified (GM) maize and Roundup herbicide, damaged the health of rats, the journal that published the study appointed a former Monsanto scientist to decide which papers on GM foods and crops should be published, a new article reveals[1].

Monsanto and GM foods suffered a storm of bad publicity after a study published in the journal Food and Chemical Toxicology (FCT) in September 2012 reported that a GM corn and Roundup caused organ damage and increased rates of tumors and premature death in rats[2].

But in early 2013 Richard E. Goodman, a former Monsanto researcher with close ties to the biotech industry, joined the senior editorial staff of FCT. Goodman was given the specially created position of associate editor for biotechnology.

Claire Robinson, research director at the science policy platform Earth Open Source and co-author of the new article, said, “Goodman’s fast-tracked appointment straight onto FCT’s upper editorial board raises the question of whether Monsanto is now effectively deciding which papers on GM foods and crops should be published and which should not.”

UN General Assembly vote reflects shift in Syrian public opinion.

Cindy Cohn & Trevor Timm
EFF

The journalism world has been rightly outraged by the Justice Department dragging the Associated Press (and now a Fox News reporter) into one of its sprawling leak investigations. As we wrote last week, by obtaining the call records of twenty AP phone lines, “the Justice Department has struck a terrible blow against the freedom of the press and the ability of reporters to investigate and report the news.”

But there are several other important lessons that this scandal can teach us besides how important free and uninhibited newsgathering is to the public’s right to know…

Original link:  Russia supplies Syria with sophisticated Yakhonts missile-system, making naval blockade largely impossible… Israel tells Russia that sending…

Sometimes in this crazy world we get lost in the noise and bustle of everyday life. We hear stories that cause us fear and concern. We know a friend-of-a-friend that has a second cousin that…

But stories are just a part of a person’s life. Each of us have a story. A snippet of our life that we hold onto and pass along. Many stories are cute and endearing, and then there are those at the other end of the spectrum.

These stories are of fear and pain.

These are stories of abuse by police.

These stories are becoming more frequent. Entire website networks have sprung up to alert readers and web searches of the abuse caused by police officers.

The Posse Comitatus Act of 1878 was originally established to protect American citizens from the federal use of military troops to enforce and execute the laws of the land unless expressly authorized by the Constitution or Congress. Since then, for over a century, this task has fallen upon local and federal law enforcement. But with the War on Terror taking center stage in the United States for the last decade, elements within the government have been working tirelessly to expand the mission of the US military on the domestic front.

First, they passed the Patriot Act, which gave the government sweeping new powers to categorize any individual as a terrorist, whether they are operating on foreign lands or here at home. In 2011, as America brought in the New Year, they signed into law the National Defense Authorization Act, which made it possible for American citizens who were categorized as domestic terrorists under the Patriot Act to be detained and imprisoned indefinitely without charge or trial.