Twitter’s giving itself all kinds of new powers in 2012. Aside from revising their privacy policy wherein they enabled themselves to censor tweets on a country-by-country basis, they’ve now assumed the power to arbitrate the definition of satire. First up: …

This week, the European Union and France’s National Commission for Computing and Civil Liberties (CNIL) asked Google to pause the rollout of its new privacy policy changes. The reason? To provide time for the EU’s Article 29 Working Party, which …

Google made news last week when they announced a new unified privacy policy for all their services. Although the new privacy policy is far simpler and more straightforward than the various policies Google had in place for their various services …

ACTA has taken a blow already today with the resignation of the French MEP (Member of European Parliament) who was in charge of investigating the bill. On his Web site, Kader Arif posted a statement titled, “ACTA: A masquerade I …

So SOPA news will be bursting from your Internets today what with Wikipedia (and others) disappearing till tomorrow. It’s a pretty bold message but it only directly affects the English-language page. But how might users of Wikipedia’s non-English pages be …

Apple is getting ready to expand its retail presence in France, according to a new report. Aix-en-Provence will become home to France’s second Apple Store sometime late this year, reports Aix en Dialogue, the official magazine of the city. The …

It would appear that France isn’t a big fan of Google’s automated search suggestions. The company has lost lawsuits related to the feature in that country on more than one occasion. Now, a court has ordered Google France to pay …

You thought some the rules lording over communication here in the States were infuriatingly pedantic, get a load of this: France’s broadcasting regulation organization, the CSA, has banned the casual use of the words “Facebook” and “Twitter” on the air. …

When Google admitted that its Street View cars had recorded sensitive data sent over WiFi networks, there were many different reactions.  UK authorities more or less brushed off the incident, for example, while Korean police raided Google’s offices.  And now …

Over the years, Google’s had to appear in French courts several times, and it now looks like a recent case didn’t go so well. Google’s been found guilty of breaching copyright laws, and unless something changes, the company faces a …

There’s good news and bad news for Google in France today.  The Autorite de la Concurrence – a competition watchdog – has decided it isn’t thrilled with the company’s power, but isn’t yet willing to assert that Google needs to be tamed with fines and legal measures, either.

Following a significant period of inactivity (brought on by outright hostility), Google Books has made a breakthrough.  France’s largest publisher has agreed to an arrangement that’ll allow Google Books to scan many of its out-of-print works.

Google and its CEO, Eric Schmidt, are in a little bit of trouble in France.  Due to the appearance of some controversial search suggestions in connection with a plaintiff’s name, a court’s convicted both the company and the man of defamation.

Specifically, it seems that Google France would suggest terms like "prison," "rape," "rapist," and "Satanist" when searchers would try to look up an individual (who was once convicted of corrupting a minor).

A country in which Google’s search engine enjoys a market share of around 90 percent is soon going to see even more of the company.  Google’s announced that it will build a research center and help create some sort of cultural institute in France.

Given that Google has encountered resistance to its book-scanning program in France, we should note that the country’s authorities support these plans.  In fact, Eric Schmidt actually met with French President Nicolas Sarkozy, who approved.

Anyone who had hoped the French Supreme Court would be able settle the dispute between Google and LVMH over keywords, advertising, and trademark infringement is in for an unpleasant surprise.  The French Supreme Court did in fact rule on the case today, but now both sides are celebrating.

In Europe, Orange is an almost omnipresent organization – the third-biggest mobile operator and the second-biggest broadband Internet provider, according to its own stats.  And so it seems MySpace has made an interesting compromise by entering into an advertising and content partnership with Orange in France today.

France is considering a proposal to tax online advertising revenues earned by companies such as Google.

The proposal would extend to other companies such as Microsoft and Yahoo and would put an end to "enrichment without any limit or compensation," newspaper Liberation quoted Guillaume Cerutti, one of the supporters of the proposal, as saying.

The Google Books project suffered a significant blow today in France as a Paris court found Google guilty of copyright violations.  The search giant’s been ordered to stop scanning books, remove information from its database, and pay some hefty fines.

European online Christmas shopping season got off to a strong start this year in the U.K., France and Germany, according to a new report from comScore.

Visits to retail sites were up 18 percent during the first week of November compared to an average week during the prior two months, and increased even more throughout the month to reach a 41 percent growth rate during the week ending November 29.

France saw solid gains, resulting in the same 41 percent growth rate during the last week of November, while Germany showed slight lower growth at 16 percent.

France saw widespread growth in online video viewing during the past year, as audience size and video engagement both increased significantly, according to a new report from comScore.

The number of online video viewers in France increased 36 percent to 34.6 million, while the number videos viewed grew 141 percent to 5.4 billion. The average time spent viewing videos online nearly doubled to 11.7 hours per viewer in September.

If a French court has its way, eBay will soon have to fork over $2.6 million.  The fine stems from a ban on the sale (or purchase) of LVMH goods, and actually ties to a case that ended in eBay being told to pay LVMH $61 million.