The New Year's Ball in Times Square is relying on people power to light the numerals 2-0-0-9 as the clock strikes midnight. Visitors to the Duracell Battery Center in the heart of the Big Apple have had the chance to "put the pedal to the metal" on specially designed "snowmobikes," which capture energy through their spinning wheels when the bikes are pedaled. That power has being stored until it is routed to light the night's most important moment. More than 200 pedal hours are needed to illuminate the sign. Duracell is also offering a "Recharge Rest Stop" that allows pedestrians to plug-in and charge their personal entertainment and digital devices -- including digital cameras, cell phones, BlackBerrys, iPods, MP3 players and gaming devices.
For the first time ever, anyone with access to a Wi-Fi network, an iPod, or Internet connection can enjoy the New Year's Eve party in Times Square, live all night long, thanks to the Times Square Corporation and Web streaming service Mogulus. The event starts at 4 p.m. Wednesday and ends at 12:15 a.m. Thursday. The Web stream will also embedded on this blog so you can watch the ball drop and ring in 2009 right here.
Need some reading material for your holiday vacation? Adam Thierer at the Progress and Freedom Foundation has some suggestions. He recently posted his picks for the most important tech policy book of 2008. Thierer's top 10 include:
The Future of the Internet, and How to Stop It
The Big Switch: Rewiring the World, From Edison to Google
Born Digital: Understanding the First Generation of Digital Natives
Here Comes Everybody: The Power of Organizing without Organizations
Against the Machine: Being Human in the Age of the Electronic Mob
Access Denied: The Practice and Policy of Global Internet Filtering
Blown to Bits: Your Life Liberty and Happiness After the Digital Explosion
Remix: Making Art and Commerce Thrive in the Hybrid Economy
Patent Failure: How Judges Bureaucrats & Lawyers Put Innovators at Risk
Understanding Privacy
Consulting firm Precursor, which is run by analyst Scott Cleland and bankrolled by major telecom companies, released a study Thursday alleging that Google "is by far the largest user of Internet bandwidth," the company's share of bandwidth usage is rising rapidly, and it's bandwidth use "is orders of magnitude greater than its payment for its cost."
Cleland, a frequent Google critic, estimated the firm used 16.5 percent of all U.S. consumer Internet traffic in 2008, and that share could grow to 25 percent in 2009 and 37 percent in 2010. The driving force is Google’s search bots that "regularly copy every page on the Internet, some as frequently as every few seconds," and the YouTube video sharing site, which streams almost half of all video on the Internet, the paper alleged. Cleland estimated Google’s payment to fund just the U.S. consumer broadband segment to be approximately $344 million in 2008.
Google's Washington telecom counsel Richard Whitt responded to the attack on the company's policy blog, pointing out that Cleland is paid by AT&T, Verizon and Time Warner and his report is "the latest in what one blogger called his 'payola punditry.'" "In his zeal to score points in the net neutrality debate, he made significant methodological and factual errors that undermine his report's conclusions," Whitt said.
Continue reading 'Payola Pundit' Picks Fight With Alleged Bandwidth Hog.
Experts Spell Out Privacy Platform For Next Congress
The Homeland Security Department's first chief privacy officer recommended today that the new Congress consider strengthening the nation's 34-year-old Privacy Act and a 2002 statute on electronic government services to uphold privacy and civil liberties safeguards for national security. Read More
Martin Won't Tackle Biggest Priorities At FCC Meeting
The FCC's final public meeting of 2008 will not include action on FCC Chairman Kevin Martin's three biggest priorities: overhauling a multibillion-dollar federal fund subsidizing telecom services in rural and low-income areas; revamping fees carriers charge to terminate traffic on each other's networks; and issuing revised rules for the auction of communications spectrum designed to enhance the capabilities of emergency responders. Read More
FDA To Post Information On WebMD
FDA warnings and consumer information will appear on the online medical information portal WebMD under a partnership announced today. The agency will provide food-safety warnings, recalls and other alerts in a dedicated, ad-free section of WebMD's Web site, FDA Commissioner Andrew von Eschenbach said.
Read More
Tech Coalition Presses Open Internet Agenda
A coalition of consumer and grassroots groups, as well as businesses including Amazon.com, eBay, and Google, urged President-elect Obama's transition team today to ensure that his administration keep the Internet "fast, open and accessible to all Americans."
Read More
The National Association of Manufacturers, which employs one of the highest paid DC trade association executives, John Engler, who received total compensation of $1.2 million in 2006, has laid off staff just weeks before Christmas, my colleague Bara Vaida at National Journal's "Under The Influence" lobbying blog reported Tuesday. The group has joined hands with the tech sector on a number of issues recently, including advocacy for stronger intellectual property rights for U.S. goods.
NAM is cutting its budget by 10 percent resulting in the elimination of 17 full-time positions. In an email to his board, Engler wrote that the action was "difficult but necessary" and by "acting now to reduce costs, we preserve our ability to provide you, our members, with critical services." "In this time of unprecedented political change and economic turmoil, our manufacturing agenda is essential to our nation's recovery. The NAM remains dedicated to its success," he stated. Read the full email here.
Will Google soon be joining the recently launched Future of Privacy Forum -- an AT&T-funded initiative intended to advance a national privacy agenda that promotes transparency and user control and is practical for businesses? Probably not… unless Christopher Wolf, a longtime attorney for AT&T and co-chair of the forum rolls back his contempt for the Web firm, which was recently exhibited in a Bangkok Post op-ed.
In Wolf's weekend column ominously titled "Google Is Watching You," the Proskauer Rose partner writes: "There is no doubt that the Internet search giant has helped people around the world access useful information. But what if Google's technology was used to keep track of you -- your whereabouts and your activities and records were kept of where you have been? That would be a little worrisome to say the least. And yet that may well be happening."
Wolf explains that Google, which has gone a long way to bolster its privacy protections, has developed a "geolocation" application for mobile and wireless devices "designed to let restaurants, salons, malls and other businesses and interested parties advertise to you while you are on the move." "This raises a host of concerns about privacy and safeguarding personal information," he writes, noting that the company already scans and stores "mind-boggling" amounts of data about its users.
Continue reading New Privacy Group Co-Chair Blasts Google In Op-Ed.
From my colleague Winter Casey at NationalJournal.com...
There's little question that the technology community in Washington is excited by what they expect to be the elevated embrace of technology by President-elect Obama's administration. "He gets it," tech insiders say. Insiders say they're looking forward to having a more tech-savvy team in the White House and hope that the administration's use of technology will help usher in an era of greater transparency in government. An Obama reign is expected to channel more federal resources toward technology initiatives and spur pro-tech changes in trade and tax policy. Obama has also said he supports network neutrality "to preserve the benefits of open competition on the Internet," but it remains to be seen what will happen on this policy front.
Business Software Alliance president Robert Holleyman said that "Obama sees a central role for technology and technology policy" in his administration. Obama seems to "look at tech sector as a unique driver of growth and solutions" and not just as another industry sector, agreed Ralph Hellmann of the Information Technology Industry Council. Robert Atkinson, president of the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation, called Obama "ambitious on the spending side," which could mean "more serious federal resources going behind e-government" initiatives, health IT, broadband and education.
Read the full story here.
In what its sponsors are describing as an "unprecedented display of consensus," a coalition of corporate, labor and public advocacy groups Tuesday will release a "call to action" intended to provide the incoming Obama administration with a framework for a national broadband strategy. The session, sponsored by the New America Foundation, includes two panels that feature top officials from AT&T, the Benton Foundation, Google, the Telecommunications Industry Association, and the Communications Workers of America, among other groups.
In the call to action, the groups state that broadband is becoming as important to the United States as railroads, electricity, telephones, and highways were in the last two centuries. It concludes with a commitment of the signatories to continue to work together to address key issues and priorities and to hold an event to present more specific recommendations to Obama, Congress and the American people. See the list of signatories here and read more about the event here.
A coalition of companies that have pressed Congress to regulate rather than ban Internet gambling in the United States said Monday that a segment [view above] on CBS News' "60 Minutes" demonstrated "unambiguously that the existing government prohibition on Internet gambling is a failure and a mistake." "The millions of Americans who continue to gamble online are vulnerable to being defrauded by offshore operators who exploit U.S. prohibition policies, leaving U.S. consumers without legal protections when they make a bet or play poker online," Safe and Secure Internet Gambling Initiative spokesman Jeffrey Sandman said.
Left out of the story, which aired Sunday, were details about legislation introduced last year by House Financial Services Committee Chairman Barney Frank, which would establish an enforcement framework for licensed gambling operators to accept bets from U.S. individuals. "As the coverage reveals, the structure of the Internet allows for greater protections since there is a complete audit trail of all Internet gambling activity and transactions. A companion piece of legislation would ensure the collection of taxes on regulated Internet gambling activities," Sandman said.
Surf on over to CongressDaily's TechCentral for a new "Issue of the Week." Here's a taste:
The United States lacks a fully defined policy and legal framework for using offensive cyberwarfare capabilities against adversaries, making it difficult for policymakers to determine the origin of computer attacks and when pre-emptive action is justified against criminals, terrorists and hostile foreign nations, according to current and former government officials.
The information networks of U.S. government agencies and critical industry sectors, such as the nation's power and banking companies, are under persistent and increasing cyber attack from foreign foes, including major criminal organizations and countries like China, according to officials and recent high-level reports. Although the U.S. government has an arsenal of cyberwarfare capabilities at its disposal, policymakers are grappling with how and when to use them, along with what kind of privacy and civil liberties issues are raised in doing so.
High-tech spending projections for the first quarter of 2009 are "abysmal -- the worst ever," reports ChangeWave, a firm that has surveyed companies since 2001. The bottom line: 45 percent of respondents said their business's IT spending will decrease (or there will be no spending at all) in the quarter -- that's 16 points lower than the previous survey, ChangeWave's Paul Carton said in a blog post. Ten percent of respondents said IT spending will increase -- a three point drop from earlier reports.
Meanwhile, spending is plunging at a time of year when the industry normally experiences seasonal increases. ChangeWave asked respondents if their IT spending was on track thus far in the fourth quarter and by a wide margin, the results were the worst on record. In one of a few upbeat findings, the corporate smart phone market continues to show growth -- with BlackBerry maker Research in Motion maintaining its lead, but Apple continuing to make inroads in small to medium-sized businesses.
Google CEO Eric Schmidt spoke to a crowd convened by the New America Foundation in Washington on Tuesday about the ways technology can help Barack Obama's administration and Congress address two of the biggest challenges ahead: generating short- and long-term economic and job growth that can help pull the nation out of financial turmoil, and restoring public trust in government. Schmidt, who chairs the foundation's board and is a member of Obama's transition team, said America "has the intellectual foundation, leadership and literally the people in the room not just to solve problems but build a better place."
"A hundred years ago, nobody had information. Now all of you are significant users of the Internet," Schmidt said. "In our lifetime, almost all people will have access to almost all the world's information. That’s a remarkable achievement on par with Gutenberg." Just about every American can now create and publish their ideas, he said, noting that "some of them are absolutely wacko." Nevertheless, the power of communication is in everyone's hands, he said, noting that the U.S. government and individual citizens are only now beginning to understand that power. His thesis: "Technology makes a difference."
Schmidt's talk was not without controversy. During the question-and-answer session, Consumer Watchdog's John Simpson confronted him with a question about the need for Google to build greater privacy and security protections into its applications. Simpson urged Congress not to use Google programs because of certain alleged vulnerabilities and said representatives from the Internet giant are trying to sell Capitol Hill staffers on the firm's software and services. Schmidt said he read a letter Simpson sent to him and would be happy to discuss his concerns at a later date. Read more in CongressDaily's AM edition on Wednesday.
The Securities and Exchange Commission charged Dallas entrepreneur Mark Cuban Monday with allegedly engaging in insider trading for selling 600,000 shares of the stock of an Internet search engine company based on non-public information. The commission’s complaint, filed in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas, alleges that in June 2004, Mamma.com invited Cuban to participate in the stock offering after he agreed to keep the information confidential.
The complaint further alleges that Cuban knew that the offering would be conducted at a discount to the prevailing market price and that it would hurt existing shareholders. After Cuban received this information, the complaint holds that Cuban called his broker and told him to sell his stake in the company. This move enabled Cuban to avoid losses in excess of $750,000. “It is fundamentally unfair for someone to use access to nonpublic information to improperly gain an edge on the market,” said Scott Friestad, deputy director of the SEC’s enforcement division, in a statement.
-- Winter Casey
Update: Cuban responded to the claims by posting a statement on his blog. "I wish I could say more, but I will have to leave it to this, and let the judicial process do its job," he said. Follow the jump to read the statement by attorney Ralph Ferrara.
Eric Schmidt, chairman and chief executive officer of Internet giant Google, will speak Tuesday on “What’s Ahead: Technology, Economic Growth and Open Government.” During his address to the New America Foundation, Schmidt will discuss the need to build a 21st century infrastructure, support for research and innovation, repairs to the U.S. education system, and ways to make government more open and responsive. Schmidt, who is on the foundation's board, is said to be in the running to serve as the nation’s chief technology officer -- a position that President-elect Barack Obama envisioned as part of his technology policy platform. Schmidt threw his support behind Obama in the final weeks of the campaign and is on the transition team's economic advisory board. Learn more about this event here.
Gawker.com founder Nick Denton has released his 2009 Internet Media Plan. The key message: "Publishers should be planning for the worst -- now." Private companies, he writes, can move more nimbly than established behemoths to boost revenues and reduce costs." There are six main levers, the details of which you can read here.
1. Get out of categories such as politics to which advertisers are averse.
2. Renegotiate vendor contracts.
3. Consolidate titles.
4. Offshore more.
5. Variable compensation.
6. More value for marketers.
Denton's bottom line: "It looks pretty bleak: but at least lean Internet businesses can make it through!"
From Monday's CongressDaily PM Edition...
Senate Commerce Panel Expects New Faces, Shakeup
Change is coming to the Senate Commerce Committee in the new Congress with Commerce Chairman Daniel Inouye expected to take over for Sen. Robert Byrd, D-W.Va., as head of the Senate Appropriations Committee. His departure, paired with Election Day losses for Republican Sens. Gordon Smith of Oregon and John Sununu of New Hampshire, opens at least two spots on the committee. There is also the question of what happens to the seat of Sen. Ted Stevens, R-Alaska. He may lose his bid for an eighth term, but if he wins he could be expelled from the Senate because of his Oct. 27 conviction on corruption charges. Stevens served as ranking member -- and before that as chairman -- but relinquished his leadership post to Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, R-Texas, before his trial began.
Read the full story here.
Groups: DTV Shift May Leave Behind Millions Of Viewers
With the nation's shift to digital television signals just 100 days away, officials representing the interests of the disabled, elderly and minorities warned today that those populations are among the most vulnerable to losing reception when the Feb. 17 transition occurs. "On Feb. 18, there will be millions of Americans who will wake up and will not have [television] service available," said Wade Henderson, president and CEO of the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights, at a news briefing intended to reinforce the message of a transition on track.
Read the full story here.
Tech Daily Dose's parent company, National Journal Group, has unveiled Under the Influence, a blog that aims to take coverage of lobbying, lobbyists and the K Street community to new heights by helping readers grasp the business of the powerful $3 billion-plus industry. Contributors include a handful of scribes with their fingers on the pulse of the lobbying game -- Bob Gettlin, Julie Kosterlitz, Peter H. Stone and Bara Vaida.
Why this blog? Why now? Because the lobbying and advocacy sector is poorly understood and heavily stereotyped by the media, the public, politicians, and, at times, by K Street professionals themselves, the blog says in its mission statement, adding: "We want to give voice to the individuals - the contract lobbyists, corporate representatives, trade group officials, nonprofit advocates, public affairs practitioners, and thousands of other professionals - who make up the diverse K Street community."
A few samples of recent posts:
▪ No Lobbyists in the White House in 2009?
▪ Adelson's Troubles Hit Freedom's Watch
▪ Engler Angling for Bigger NAM Role
Under the Influence is the latest in a series of blog launches by National Journal Group. The company started a healthcare blog on Oct. 6, an economy blog on Oct. 14 and an energy blog on Oct. 20. Read more about those blogs here. Tech Daily Dose welcomes you all to the blogosphere!
The Technology CEO Council and the Digital Energy Solutions Campaign unveiled BehindTheGreen.org this week -- an online forum to learn about and explore how green technologies are helping to improve energy efficiency in the United States and beyond. The Web site comes on the heels of the group's introduction of Greenville, a virtual green community that exemplifies what can (and in some places already is being done) to go green at home, at work and elsewhere.
"From higher energy and consumer expenses to global climate change, Americans are increasingly aware that our ever-increasing demand for energy has very real consequences for our economy," Council Executive Director Bruce Mehlman said in a blog post on the site. "The desire to 'go green' is urgent, and people want to learn more about how they can help." "The good news: there's a lot we can do -- right now -- if we act together," he said. The group is backed by the chief executives of Dell, IBM, Intel, Hewlett-Packard, Motorola and a handful of other companies.
Microsoft, Yahoo, the African Development Bank and Western Union have joined together to combat a growing online menace -- lottery scams, also known as advance fee fraud -- by helping law enforcement agencies around the world gather information and build evidence to identify, locate and prosecute scammers. The schemes are a form of cybercrime in which the victim is deceived into paying money upfront to receive a fictitious gift or cash prize. [Read more about these scams in this FTC briefing paper.]
The Tuesday announcement coincided with the annual German Anti-Spam Summit where Tim Cranton, Microsoft's associate general counsel, said the online threat differs from those that try to exploit software code or attack computers. "Lottery scammers prey not on software, but on the hope of their victims – and with scams that can be so creative and plausible, Internet users simply don’t know who they can believe," he said. International collaboration is necessary because Web shysters typically operate out of several countries at the same time and are truly global in reach, Microsoft said.
Google's settlement with a group of authors and publishers regarding the Internet giant's book digitization project was hailed Tuesday as a landmark announcement by the company but Public Knowledge's Sherwin Siy believes that the deal, which still must be approved by a court, might not alter the legal landscape but could impact future digital innovators' efforts. Under the agreement, Google will pay at least $45 million to copyright holders whose works were scanned and displayed without permission.
"Rightsholders and other potential plaintiffs might view this settlement as the model for all future relationships with digitization efforts," he wrote in a blog post. "If Google pays for digitizing, why shouldn’t everyone else? Such a landscape might make a plaintiff more likely to sue, although the results in court, ideally, shouldn’t differ, with or without this settlement in place. Read Siy's lengthy analysis of the arrangement and its potential implications here.
Arts + Labs, a recently launched coalition backed by AT&T, Viacom, NBC Universal and others, also offered comment. The group's co-chairs Mike McCurry and Mark McKinnon issued a statement saying the settlement "shows that creators’ rights and consumer benefit can go hand-in-hand in the Internet age." The arrangement demonstrates that "collaboration between the technology community and the creative community can give consumers access to a wealth of resources while also preserving copyright owners right to control how their work is distributed."
Internet behemoth Google announced an agreement on Tuesday with a number of authors and publishers and with its library partners, starting a new chapter in its Google Book Search project, which began almost four years ago. The deal will give readers digital access to millions of in-copyright books; create a new market for authors and publishers to sell their works; and further efforts of Google's library partners to preserve and maintain their collections while making books more accessible to students, readers and academic researchers.
The agreement also resolves lawsuits that were brought against Google in 2005 by a group of authors and publishers, along with the Authors Guild and Association of American Publishers. While Google, the Authors Guild and the AAP have disagreed on copyright law, they have always agreed about the importance of creating new ways for users to find books and for authors and publishers to get paid for their works, Google's top lawyer David Drummond said in a blog post.
AAP President Pat Schroeder issued a statement saying her group is "proud to have been a part of the process that has produced this historic, landmark agreement." "This settlement, the product of many years’ hard work, is a great 21st century solution," she said. To date, Google has worked with libraries worldwide to make more than 7 million books searchable "and we're just getting started," Drummond said. "Ultimately we'll provide access to many times that number, and if approved, this agreement will unlock access to millions of these texts." Read more here.
Continue reading Google Starts New Chapter For 'Book Search'.
As economic woes persist in the United States and around the world, the Consumer Electronics Association last week released a prediction that sales of its industry's products will grow 3.5 percent in the fourth quarter as compared to last year. The bad news is that increase is only half what was seen in 2007. Still, consumer electronics remain "must have" items for many American shoppers and comprise about 40 percent of the items on adults' holiday wish lists.
CEA's holiday trends survey indicated that 87 percent of consumers feel that the U.S. economy is worse then it was at this time last year. About 64 percent of consumers expect to spend money on gifts this year, compared to 74 percent in 2007, the trade group said, noting that a decline in overall spending for the holiday season is expected. That said, the percentage of the U.S. family’s gift budget in 2007 allocated to electronics was 22 percent and in 2008, it jumped to 28 percent. GPS and in-car video, mobile phones and audio/video products are expected to be top sellers.
Surf on over to CongressDaily's TechCentral for this week's Executive Summary. It's a great cheat sheet for all the news that you should have been paying attention to this week if you weren’t so caught up in Obama/Biden/McCain/Palin madness.
Some highlights:
▪ FCC Looks To NASCAR To Spread DTV Message
▪ ICANN To Unveil Plan For Net Address Expansion
▪ Social Security Numbers Widely Available In E-Records
▪ Pressure For 'Fair Use' Of Campaign Footage Surges
▪ Microsoft Announces Worldwide Anti-Piracy Blitz
▪ Identity Theft Task Force Cites Progress
▪ TSA Issues Final Rule On Taking Over Watch List
▪ Group Urges Greater Info Sharing Between Government, Private Groups
▪ DHS Seeks Court OK On Employment Verification Fix
▪ Microsoft, Net Activists Fueling Democratic Challenger's Campaign
▪ Growth In Tech Spending Expected To Continue
It appears that John Hodgman -- best known to some as "PC" in Apple's series of quirky PC vs. Mac advertisements and to others for his hysterically deadpan delivery of satirical news for Comedy Central's "The Daily Show" -- is now going to be a guest blogger for BoingBoing. This makes perfect sense. It's a pairing like peanut butter and jelly and we can't wait to see what this union brings forth. If it's anything like Hodgman's work on the small screen or his tome "The Areas of My Expertise," we're in for a treat.
Hodgman writes in his inaugural post that it was a mention on BoingBoing "which first convinced me to descend from the airy heights of minor television renown and return to my ink-stained former life of writing big books of fake trivia." BoingBoing co-editor Cory Doctrow brought Hodgman's attention to the "completely implausible but distressingly real" product Dick Van Patten's Hobo Chili For Dogs. It was Van Patten's creation that led him to write his latest book "More Information Than You Require," which hits bookstores on Tuesday. (Photo Credit: spi516 via Flickr)
Surf on over to CongressDaily's TechCentral for a new "Issue of the Week." Here's a taste:
With more than three months to go before the new Congress and administration come to Washington, policymakers are already feeling pressure to implement new safeguards for federal agencies' use of counterterrorism programs that collect or "mine" personal data, such as telephone, medical, and travel records or Web sites visited. A recent report by the National Research Council suggests lawmakers consider imposing restrictions on how personal data as part of a broader re-examination of national security laws to assess how privacy can be protected in conjunction with data-mining. The special panel of university academics, privacy specialists and technology experts was created at the request of the Homeland Security Department and the National Science Foundation.
The 376-page paper, which examines the technical effectiveness and privacy impacts of data-mining and behavioral surveillance techniques, picks up where a number of congressional inquiries and stakeholder debates left off by offering two sets of criteria to help agencies and policymakers move forward in crafting smart data-mining solutions. One set is designed to gauge whether a program is likely to be effective, while the other assesses likely privacy impacts and helps ensure that a program protects privacy to the greatest extent possible. Each should operate with the least amount of personal data consistent with its objective and should have a process for the reporting and redress for those whose privacy is improperly breached.
On Friday, the Advanced Communications Law & Policy Institute at New York Law School will host a congressional staff briefing on recalibrating regulation in the advanced communications sector. Participants will analyze the differences between the financial sector and the advanced communications sector and discuss why calls for greater regulation in the former don’t translate well regarding the latter. Kind of timely, huh?
Speakers will also focus on ways in which industry stakeholders can work together to enhance transparency, promote collaboration, and increase accountability among firms in the advanced communications sector. An afternoon panel will bring together public and private sector representatives to discuss how to affect meaningful regulatory oversight of the sector, including a possible recalibration of FCC and FTC regulatory authority.
The roster of participants includes representatives from House and Senate offices, CTIA – The Wireless Association, the FTC, the Heritage Foundation, the Information Technology & Innovation Foundation, the National Cable & Telecommunications Association, the Progress & Freedom Foundation the U.S. Telecommunications Association and others. For more details about ACLP, click here.
High-tech giant Microsoft and big screen star Angelina Jolie are joining forces with leading law firms and corporate law departments on Friday to announce the formation of Kids in Need of Defense, an organization dedicated to providing legal counsel to unaccompanied immigrant and refugee children in the United States. Microsoft General Counsel Brad Smith will hold a Washington luncheon to launch the effort. The titillating "Tomb Rader" star is not on the guest list for the event.
Key invitees include Ronald Schechter (not Jolie), a senior partner at Arnold & Porter, and Mauricio Vivero (not Jolie), executive director of Ayuda, a D.C. based group that protects the legal rights of low-income immigrants in the metropolitan region. KIND's pro bono network of attorneys will serve children in areas of the country where the need is greatest, including Los Angeles, Seattle, Houston, and the northeast corridor. In Washington state, Microsoft already spearheads Advocates for Immigrant Justice, a coalition of law firms, corporations and NGOs that offer pro bono help.
Others involved in KIND include Covington & Burling, Holland & Knight, Perkins Coie, Latham & Watkins, Sidley Austin, Morrison & Foerster, News Corp., and many more. (Photo Credit: KIND)
Surf on over to CongressDaily's TechCentral for a new "Issue of the Week." Here's a taste:
With a worsening economy and a changing administration on the way, the technology policy community in Washington is looking at new ways of managing risk -- both politically and financially. According to Information Technology Association of America President Phil Bond, the weakening economy is putting "greater pressure than ever on the expense side" for tech associations to be efficient regardless of size.
At the same time, the importance of government policy is greater than ever. This explains why some companies are trimming costs while others are increasing spending on lobbying. The latter "is becoming more important to the business," says Bond, who worked under the Bush administration. "Each company weighs where they are going to take some efficiencies."
Roger Cochetti, a director with The Computing Technology Industry Association, agrees that the weakening economy will put a "premium on efficiency" for the industry. Other stakeholders see new areas of focus.
The nationwide Amber Alert electronic system that alerts the public when children go missing has made great strides since April 2003, when the program's coordinator role was statutorily established, the Justice Department said Tuesday as more than 300 officials from all 50 states gathered in Orange County, Calif., for a conference on the initiative.
▪ All 50 states now have statewide Amber Alert plans, creating a network of systems nationwide to aid in the recovery of abducted children.
▪ A secondary distribution effort undertaken in partnership with wireless companies, online service providers, and other private and public entities enables Amber Alerts to be sent directly to the public.
▪ Tribal nations are working to develop their own tailored plans so that children in Indian country may benefit from Amber Alert.
▪ More than 90 percent of the 426 Amber Alert recoveries have occurred since Amber Alert became a nationally coordinated effort in 2002.
▪ Anecdotal evidence demonstrates that perpetrators are well aware of the power of Amber Alert, and in many cases have released an abducted child upon hearing the alert.
“Amber Alert has helped to rescue hundreds of children from abductors and return them safely to their homes,” Assistant Attorney General and national Amber Alert coordinator Jeffrey Sedgwick said in a press release. "Thanks to cooperation among law enforcement agencies, the media, transportation officials, public and private partners, and concerned citizens, the Amber Alert system has become part of America’s public safety landscape.”
An interesting report by the Washington Post's Brian Krebs...
An effort by the state of Kentucky to seize more than 140 online gambling Web site names is raising novel legal questions about the physical location of digital property and the reach of local and regional governments on the global Internet.
Last month, a Kentucky circuit court judge granted a request by the governor to have 141 Web site names used by online gaming operations transferred to the state's control. The action was filed by a Chicago law firm on behalf of Gov. Steve Beshear (D), who was elected in part on the strength of a promise to bring casino gambling to the state.
The domains include some of the most popular online gaming sites on the Internet, including UltimateBet.com and FullTiltPoker.com. According to the state, residents spend roughly $170 million each year gambling at online casinos, potentially taxable revenue that might otherwise have been spent at the state's own gaming operations, which include regulated betting on horse racing and bingo.
Read the full story here.
As CongressDaily reported on Thursday, the Information Technology Industry Council surprised some tech policy watchers by announcing that longtime president Rhett Dawson’s successor will be Dean Garfield, who is currently chief strategic officer for the Motion Picture Association of America. Garfield will take the helm at ITI when Dawson retires in December. Garfield took a moment during ITI's board meeting in California to chat with us about his new gig.
Q: What experience do you bring to the job, particularly from MPAA?
A: Over the last three years I've spent lot of time doing strategic planning and working on the convergence between media and information technology. The combination of those two things will serve us well at ITI. An important part of what I do with my work is looking at how we can make sure ITI remains and grows into a thought leader for IT issues in the U.S. and globally. I have learned from my time at MPAA that in this world of growing convergence, it's impossible for media to be successful on its own. Much of our success is due to IT.
Continue reading High-Tech Group Makes Surprise Pick For President.
Corporate, government and academic institutions on Tuesday announced the formation of the Center for Applied Identity Management Research -- an initiative focused on developing research and solutions for society’s most daunting identity management challenges such as cyber crime, terrorism, financial crimes, ID theft and fraud, weapons of mass destruction, and narcotics and human trafficking. Backers include the U.S. Secret Service, LexisNexis, IBM, Cogent Systems, Visa and business solutions provider Intersections. Indiana University economic crime expert Gary Gordon will serve as executive director of the center.
“As a non-profit organization governed by its partners with a strong affiliation with its host academic institution, Indiana University, CAIMR is uniquely positioned to foster a collaborative applied research environment that brings together the multi-disciplinary talent, resources, data sources, and analytical capabilities to take up this challenge,” Gordon said in a press release. LexisNexis Chief Businses Officer Norman Willox, who chairs CAIMR's board added: “A collaborative, multi-disciplinary applied research approach is required to provide pragmatic solutions to diverse areas such as cyber crime.”
Speaking at the National Press Club announcement, Indiana University professor and cybersecurity researcher Fred Cate, stressed that "how you determine quickly, reliably and affordably that a person is who he claims to be and that he is entitled to the access -- whether to a Web site, a network, or a government facility -- he seeks is an enormous challenge that has long plagued industry and government." That challenge will only be solved through close cooperation among public and private sector stakeholders, he said.
The project was a long time in the making -- National Journal's now-defunct Technology Daily reported on plans for the center back in June 2006.
Here's a quick follow-up to Tuesday night's post about the launch of a new effort to spur the creation of innovative Internet content and distribute in safe, reliable ways. The clumsily titled campaign, Arts+Labs, was unveiled at a Wednesday briefing in New York City and its founding members are a who's who of high-tech and content industry powerhouses -- AT&T, Viacom, NBC Universal, Cisco, Microsoft and the Songwriters Guild of America.
Arts+Labs is co-chaired by Mike McCurry, former White House press secretary to President Bill Clinton and Mark McKinnon, former media adviser to the campaigns of President Bush and current GOP presidential nominee John McCain. SGA President Rick Carnes and Chuck Sims of the law firm Proskauer Rose also have agreed to join Arts+Labs as the first members of its advisory board.
"Quality content drives the Internet and that distribution of easily accessible, affordable content in the Internet age requires new business models," McKinnon said in a press release, noting that consumers should know where to get safe and legal online content while protecting artists' and innovators' rights. McCurry said consumers want greater opportunities to access content "with confidence that they are safe from viruses, hackers, malware, illegal file trafficking and other net pollution."
Buzz is building about the Wednesday launch of an advocacy coalition intended to draw attention to "the opportunities and challenges that the Internet presents for consumers, artists and the technology community alike." The kick-off is being held in New York City -- not in Washington -- which already smells a little funny to me if this group's intention is to influence policy. Organizers have been tight-lipped about the affair but there are a few clues I can offer.
Among the notables scheduled to be trotted out at the event are Mike McCurry, former White House press secretary to President Bill Clinton; Mark McKinnon, former chief media adviser to the campaigns of President Bush and current GOP presidential nominee John McCain; Chuck Sims, a copyright and First Amendment lawyer; and Rick Carnes, president of the Songwriters Guild of America.
McCurry, a principal at Public Strategies Washington, co-chaired Hands Off the Internet, a group formed during the 109th Congress to counter calls for so-called "network neutrality" legislation. That coalition was affiliated with AT&T, NetCompetition.org and other telecom industry fueled ventures. McKinnon was an early backer of the short-lived HotSoup.com, a Web site launched in 2006 with the aim "to spark debate over hot-button topics of the day in the worlds of politics, business, and culture."
Continue reading Sneak Peek: New Internet Coalition To Launch.
The MacArthur Foundation on Tuesday announced 25 new fellows for 2008 after the recipients learned last week in a single phone call that they will each receive $500,000 in “no strings attached” support over the next five years. The new fellows work across a broad spectrum of endeavors.
A few tech-related examples:
▪ An astronomer designing experiments and devices to advance understanding of the geometry of the universe and the story of both its beginning and its end
▪ A neuroscientist tracing the natural interactions of differentiating neurons, bringing us closer to developing effective methods for treating central nervous system damage
▪ An inventor of musical instruments that transform and transcend the musical experience and navigate the boundaries between live and recorded sound
▪ An optical physicist demonstrating that power can be transmitted wirelessly, opening the door to the possibility of a range of devices operating free of traditional power sources
▪ A structural engineer restoring cathedrals and other structures of the distant past and identifying ancient technologies for use in contemporary constructions
Read more here.
Tech Daily Dose welcomes the launch of another inside the Beltway blog -- K Street Café, a Web site sponsored by the public affairs firm Adfero Group where experts from a variety of backgrounds share novel ways technology, the Internet and social media are being used to shape public policies.
"As new media tactics are introduced, K Street Café will examine how advocacy organizations are continually changing the way they execute public affairs campaigns," Adfero's Jeff Mascott said in an e-mail. "Contributors to the blog will highlight and analyze the shift from one-directional communications to multi-layered conversations as the method of choice for individuals engaged in issue advocacy."
Contributors include Alan Rosenblatt of the Center for American Progress Action Fund; ePolitics.com's Colin Delany; Verizon's John "CZ" Czwartacki; John Wonderlich of the Sunlight Foundation; the Congressional Management Foundation's Kathy Goldschmidt; the Heritage Foundation's Rob Bluey and others.
Some recent posts:
Movement from email to social media for grassroots activism
Rise of Millenials and their effect on advocacy campaigns
What Washington can learn from the Cluetrain Manefesto
Measuring the effectiveness of social media marketing
Surf on over to CongressDaily's TechCentral for a new "Issue of the Week." Here's a taste:
With six weeks left until Election Day, Sens. John McCain, R-Ariz., and Barack Obama, D-Ill., are feeling pressure to communicate their views on issues from national security to the economy. The presidential candidates have also been pressed to address challenges related to U.S. leadership in science, math, engineering and tech -- tenets of their innovation agenda.
In public speeches and on their campaign Web sites, McCain and Obama have both noted the importance of American innovation and leadership. As part of that effort, they responded to a questionnaire sent to each campaign asking 14 key questions on science and technology. The survey provides a side-by-side comparison of their views on energy, education, climate change, stem cell research, security and more. McCain's answers to the Science Debate 2008 query were published Sept. 15, and Obama submitted his responses to the grassroots group two weeks earlier.
Weeks after being named one of the Top 100 Undiscovered Web Sites of 2008 by PC Magazine, Tech Daily Dose has been awarded a rank of "8.4" out of a perfect 10 in the technology category at Blogged.com. Our little spot on the Internets was evaluated on frequency of updates, relevance of content, site design and writing style.
Others that earned an "8.4" include The New Scientist's technology blog and British newspaper The Daily Mail's science and technology section. We're in good company and we appreciate the distinction, so thanks! Unsurprisingly, tech blog royalty like Slashdot.org, BoingBoing.net and TechDirt.com were among those that ranked the highest.
Internet experts will join members of Congress and FCC Commissioner Jonathan Adelstein on Monday, Sept. 22 to “bury” an e-democracy time capsule and discuss the state of the Web as part of an effort launched there years ago as "Earth Day for the Internet" by law professor Susan Crawford. The One Web Day event will feature presentations on government transparency, online tools for participatory democracy and the problem of broadband accessibility
Meanwhile, some of the Web’s great visionaries, including Tim Westergren (Pandora); Lawrence Lessig (Stanford Law); Craig Newmark (Craigslist); John Perry Barlow (Electronic Frontier Foundation); S.J. Klein (One Laptop Per Child) and others will gather for a rally in New York City's Washington Square Park.
San Francisco will witness a massive volunteer effort, coordinated by the mayor’s department of technology, to bring residents in public housing online with wireless Internet and donated computer equipment. Chicago will host a seminar sponsored by the Future of Music Coalition. In Cincinnati, technology activists will convene a meeting on “The Next President, the Internet and the Disconnected City.”
A complete description of events worldwide, including in India, Tunisia, Australia and Europe can be found here.
Jay Bhatti, co-founder of Internet-based people finder Spock.com has an interesting take on how the economic meltdown, which has dominated national news coverage this week and sent stock markets spiraling, will affect the high-tech industry. Bhatti, a former Microsoft product manager, secured $7 million in venture capital in 2006 to take his start-up Web offering to the next level. Here are some excerpts from his blog:
Big players like Oracle, Sun, Microsoft, and SAP: "These guys will feel an immediate impact. Financial service firms are some of the biggest spenders of IT budgets around. I can imagine memo’s coming from the top to CIOs at banks telling them to cut costs ASAP. Naturally, they will start to push back on upgrades to new software (sorry Vista), ask for greater concessions on license pricing, and in some cases, abandon plans for new technology deployments such as new hardware or new ERP applications."
Why green technology may be in for a scare: "I can see the biggest impact happening on green tech investments. Green technology requires a lot of capital (wind energy is not cheap, have you seen how big those turbines are?). Most software start-ups can be funded in under $20 million and get to profitability or an exit with that investment. However, in Green Tech, the amount of investment needed in many cases go well past the billion dollar mark."
More traditional start-ups in the valley are also being impacted: "When hedge funds were popping up all over the place, they needed a new place to invest their money. One of the investments they started looking into was high tech startups. Entrepreneurs welcomed this with joy. It gave them another outlet to get funding outside of traditional VCs (just look at the private investments made in Facebook less than a year ago). However, with hedge funds now reverting back to their traditional channels and many closing shop, a lot of funding that entrepreneurs were expecting may never surface." Read his full blog post here.
The 10 most tech-savvy states in the nation were announced Wednesday by e.Republic’s Center for Digital Government, a national research and advisory institute focused on information technology policies. State chief information officers and senior executives from across the nation participated in the survey, which benchmarks progression in digital government. Verizon Business sponsored the study.
Top Ten States:
1st Place Utah
2nd Place Michigan
3rd Place Virginia
4th Place Arizona
5th Place California
6th Place Washington
7th Place Kentucky
8th Place South Dakota
9th Place Maryland
10th Place Tennessee (tie)
10th Place Pennsylvania (tie)
The Associated Press reports that the Smithsonian Institution will work to digitize its collections to make science, history and cultural artifacts accessible online and dramatically expand its outreach to schools. "I worry about museums becoming less relevant to society," said Secretary G. Wayne Clough told the newswire's Brett Zongker in his first interviews since taking the helm of the museum complex in July.
Clough, 66, who was president of the Georgia Institute of Technology for 14 years, says he's working to bring in video gaming experts and Web gurus to collaborate with curators on creative ways to present artifacts online and make them appealing to kids, AP reports. "I think we need to take a major step," Clough said in an earlier interview. "Can we work with outside entities to create a place, for example, where we might demonstrate cutting-edge technologies to use to reach out to school systems all over the country? I think we can do that." Read the full story here.
From Tuesday's CongressDaily's AM edition:
Stark IT Bill Differs From Energy And Commerce Version
House Ways and Means Health Subcommittee Chairman Fortney (Pete) Stark, D-Calif., Monday introduced a bill to create a nationwide system of electronic medical records that would use Medicare reimbursement to prod physicians and hospitals to adopt new technologies. Read more here.
Election Could Spur Effort To Limit Spectrum Ownership
The nation's largest and second-largest mobile telecommunications carriers, AT&T and Verizon respectively, could face substantial curbs on their ability to participate in future spectrum auctions under an administration run by Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., in an effort to boost opportunities for small and mid-sized players. Read more here.
ID Theft Bill Approved, On Its Way To President
Legislation intended to combat identity theft passed the House by voice vote Monday after being folded into a bill to extend Secret Service protection to former vice presidents. The bill now goes to President Bush's desk. Read more here.
Commerce To Ask Congress For $7M For DTV Coupons
The Commerce Department is poised to ask Congress for an additional $7 million to cover administrative costs for its $1 billion coupon program designed to help Americans buy digital television converter boxes. Read more here.
Provocateur Sandra Bernhard opens her electrifying one-woman show at the Washington, D.C. Jewish Community Center on Thursday evening and folks might be shocked to learn that the comic incorporates tech topics into the act. Early in her shtick, Bernhard riffs on the blogging phenomenon, revealing that she was asked to contribute to pundit Arianna Huffington's left-leaning Web 'zine for $200 a week. Bernhard declined, saying she prefers to vent on stage -- a kind of live-blogging where she can wear designer garb and interact with her audience.
Then, as she reflects on the good old 1980s, Bernhard explains "Rickrolling," an Internet meme involving the music video for the 1987 Rick Astley song "Never Gonna Give You Up". The meme is a bait and switch, she says, where an individual provides a Web link they claim is relevant to a topic at hand but the link actually leads to the Astley video. Later, she channels blues singer Nina Simone who carps about never receiving royalties for songs she recorded from George Gershwin's opera "Porgy and Bess." "Where's my Porgy money?" she screeches. Have the performing rights organizations looked into this?
Much of the show is a revival of "Without You I'm Nothing," the performance that propelled her into the stratosphere 20 years ago. Bernhard's four-letter-word-filled cabaret is worth the money and tickets will go fast. One note for the politically sensitive and easily offended: Bernhard isn’t a fan of Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, Sen. John McCain's vice-presidential running mate and she makes her viewpoint crystal clear.
The show runs through Sept. 28. Click here for information. (Apologies if this post was a bit far afield. I attended a special performance last night).
Notable musicians and members of the Copyright Alliance will exhibit creative works, the latest in copyright protection, and release new information detailing how copyright benefits each state at its second annual expo on Capitol Hill later this month. VIP guests at the Sept. 24 event will appeal to graying lawmakers (and fans of the golden age of music) but might be lost on some young staffers.
Martha Reeves, a Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductee who belted out catchy Motown tunes like "Heat Wave" and "Dancing in the Street," will be on hand to sign autographs at the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists booth. Fellow hall-of-famer Felix Cavaliere of the Young Rascals ("Groovin,'" "People Got to Be Free") will meet and greet attendees at the ASACP booth. Last year's expo featured soul singers Isaac Hayes, Chuck Brown and David Porter.
Other exhibitors will include American Society of Media Photographers, Association of American Publishers, Broadcast Music Inc., Entertainment Software Association, Graphic Artists Guild, Motion Picture Association of America, National Music Publishers’ Association, Professional Photographers of America, Recording Industry Association of America and Vobile Inc. For more information, click here.
CongressDaily's PM edition on Monday includes a free trade story based on my interview with Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez at last week's Republican National Convention. During our chat, we also discussed other topics like the nationwide digital television transition and intellectual property rights. Here are some of his thoughts:
On the February digital TV deadline:
"We've had almost a billion dollars of advertising from industry. We've had over 20 million coupons requested. We've mailed out a good portion of the coupons. The redemption rate is about 50 percent. That could mean some people are ordering them who don’t need them or some people are ordering coupons and they forget about it or they lose them. The program is on target. We've got enough coupons. We've got a lot of people working the phones. Our website is open, we've got local partnerships, and we've got national media. The date is coming and if people aren’t aware and don’t do what they need to do, on the 17th of February, their TV will go blank."
Continue reading Interview: Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez.
Gossip blog Gawker.com reports that Bloomberg accidentally published its lengthy obituary of Apple CEO Steve Jobs on Wednesday. Major news organizations routinely write, maintain and update obits of celebrities and once in a while there's a slip-up. The financial newswire quickly retracted the story about the high-tech titan (who successfully beat pancreatic cancer earlier this decade) but Gawker published the death notice. Read the whole kit and kaboodle here.
Interestingly, Bloomberg's internal notes for reporters included a list of people to call for comment if Jobs, who is still very much alive, kicks the bucket. Among them were Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak; Jon Rubinstein, former head of Apple's iPod division; and Heidi Roizen, a venture capitalist who once dated Jobs. Former Vice President Al Gore, California Attorney General Jerry Brown and Oracle's Larry Ellison were also on the list. (Photo Credit: Danny Novo via Flickr)
A handful of education and education technology associations launched a print and radio public service announcement campaign on Wednesday themed "One Giant Leap for Kids" that asks the presidential candidates to make K-12 student access to ed-tech and modern learning environments a top national priority. The PSAs will be sent to campaigns of of Sens. John McCain, R-Ariz., and Barack Obama, D-Ill., along with five questions about each candidate's vision for the future of the modern classroom.
The PSAs will also be placed in a number of education and education technology trade publications. The campaign, which includes an online petition in support of making 21st century education a public policy priority, was developed by the Consortium for School Networking, the International Society for Technology in Education, the National Education Association and the State Educational Technology Directors Association.
"The future competitiveness of the United States is inextricably linked to the investments we make today to improve education, enhance learning and provide our students with the skills and knowledge that will afford them the opportunity to succeed among the best and brightest competitors in the world," CoSN's Keith Krueger said. "The presidential candidates have an opportunity to develop solid education platforms focused on achieving this goal." Read more about the PSA here.
"As the Democrats and Republicans gather at their national conventions, it is time to really think about a comprehensive national technology policy for the Internet age," TechCrunch's Erick Schonfeld wrote this week in a plea for the creation of a Digital Bill of Rights. Such a document would spell out "what freedoms and rights consumers can expect from Internet service providers, content companies, device manufacturers, and the government itself," he wrote.
Both presidential candidates have already outlined their technology platforms but nobody in either party has pulled together a focused set of principles that can truly guide both lawmakers and policymakers, Schonfeld said. "It’s a tall order, but it is important to have a consistent policy governing everything from Internet Protocol regulations to intellectual property on the Web," he added.
Key components of Schonfeld's Digital Bill of Rights include:
▪The Right to Use and Reuse Content
▪The Right To Control Digital Property On Your Own Device
▪The Right To The Free Flow Of Information
▪The Right To (Some) Privacy
▪The Right to Control Your Digital Identity
Read more details here.
Internet giant Google on Tuesday unveiled more than $10 million in investments and grants in Enhanced Geothermal Systems (EGS) technology including funding for research on next-generation geothermal resource mapping, EGS information tools, and a policy agenda for geothermal energy. According to a company press release, EGS expands the potential of traditional geothermal energy by orders of magnitude.
Google's EGS partners to date include: AltaRock Energy ($6.25 million), Potter Drilling ($4 million), and the Southern Methodist University Geothermal Laboratory ($489,521 grant). "While the U.S. debates drilling in the ocean for oil, we are focused on drilling for renewable energy -- and lots of it -- right beneath our feet," Google said. Find out more here and here.
Local media Web sites have the upper hand when it comes to delivering results for advertisers, according to a new report by the Online Publishers Association. The study found that consumers trust advertising on local newspaper, magazine and television sites, and are very likely to take action after viewing ads on these sites.
The results are part of “Local Online Media: From Advertising to Action,” an OPA report looking at consumers who get local information from online city guides, classifieds, magazines, newspapers, portals, television sites, user review sites, or yellow pages. “With strong brands and trusted environments, local media sites deliver concrete results for local advertisers,” OPA President Pam Horan said. The study, which was conducted by JupiterResearch, is available here.
XM and Sirius satellite radio networks are moving quickly toward consolidating operations in the wake of the FCC's approval of their merger so I thought it would be a good time to take a look behind the curtain. Last week I toured Sirius's Manhattan headquarters, which will serve as home base for the new entity, and here's what I found:
Sirius chief Mel Karmazin's office is curiously accessible to staff, separated only by glass walls. Other executive offices are similarly positioned along the edge of an expansive cubicle farm. Some of the cubes were deserted (the downsizing has already begun and there's more to come).
Howard Stern's compound is isolated from the rest of the Sirius studios and requires an additional key-card swipe to gain access. That's by design so the shock jock's guests (celebrities, porn stars, exotic dancers) and props (don’t make me explain) do not offend folks at The Catholic Channel, Martha Stewart Living and other family friendly stations.
Speaking of the magical Ms. Stewart, guests on her channel are not allowed to cook in-studio due to building code but there's nothing against a little potluck. Covered dishes and plastic utensils lined the countertop of her glass-walled domicile. Another note about dear Martha -- she reportedly brought in her own experts to stencil a perfect studio logo.
PC Magazine has named Tech Daily Dose one of the Top 100 Undiscovered Web Sites of 2008. Here's what the widely read high-tech publication said about our little spot on the World Wide Web: "It's a bit nichey for most, but for those interested in the role technology plays in government would be hard-pressed to find a better news outlet than this National Journal-run blog. From piracy to Net neutrality to online campaigning, this site is a fantastic resource for exploring tech policy inside the Beltway." See the rest of the honorees in the technology category here and the entire top 100 list here.
The airlines are facing tough times -- charging us for pillows, peanuts and extra luggage -- but Delta announced Tuesday that it would offer broadband wireless Internet access on its full domestic fleet by next summer… assuming anyone can afford to fly by then. The Atlanta, Ga.-based company said it would sell Wi-Fi service to customers traveling throughout the continental United States and is working with Aircell, an airborne communications provider, to install the network on more then 300 aircraft.
The system, known as Gogo, will enable Delta customers traveling with Wi-Fi enabled devices, such as laptops, smartphones and PDAs, to access the Internet, corporate VPNs, corporate and personal e-mail accounts, as well as SMS texting and instant messaging services. Gogo will be available to customers for $9.95 on flights of three hours or less and $12.95 on flights of more than three hours. Read Delta's press release here.
Surf on over to CongressDaily's TechCentral for a new "Issue of the Week." Here's a taste:
When Democratic lawmakers on Capitol Hill unveiled legislation over the past two years to tighten regulation of the wireless phone industry, carriers largely turned a deaf ear because they knew the bills stood little chance of passage. But if the Democrats hold both chambers in November, as expected - perhaps with significantly enlarged majorities -- and take the White House, regulatory-minded legislators may have a smug message for the wireless industry: Can you hear me now? Consequently, the possibility of a Democratic sweep in November is spurring the wireless industry to urge the Republican-controlled FCC to act this summer to head off potentially onerous regulation come January.
Here's some sad news in the intellectual property community -- noted copyright attorney William Patry is shutting down his popular blog after writing about 800 postings over about four years. He provided readers with two explanations for his decision: (1) The inability or refusal to accept the blog for what it is: a personal blog (2) The current state of copyright law is too depressing.
Patry wrote: "It is profoundly depressing, after 26 years full-time in a field I love, to be a constant voice of dissent. I have tried various ways to leaven this state of affairs with positive postings, much like television news shows that experiment with "happy features" ... But after awhile, this wore thin, because the most important stories are too often ones that involve initiatives that are, in my opinion, seriously harmful to the public interest. I cannot continue to be so negative, so often."
Participatory online news network NowPublic.com unveiled it's second MostPublic Index, identifying the 50 most influential individuals in Silicon Valley/San Francisco. The rankings are a barometer of who's voices are most heard in the digital landscape as new channels -- Twitter, Facebook, Flick, YouTube and the like -- transform how media is created and spread.
Here's the top 10 list:
Blogger and tech visionary Robert Scoble
TechCrunch's Michael Arrington
Twitter's Jack Dorsey
Twitter's Biz Stone
Google's Matt Cutts
Mashable's Pete Cashmore
Blogging pioneer Dave Winer
Venture capitalist Guy Kawasaki
Entrepreneur Loïc Le Meur
Digg cofounder Kevin Rose
MENLO PARK, Calif. -- July 28, 2008 -- Cuil, a technology company pioneering a new approach to search, unveils its innovative search offering, which combines the biggest Web index with content-based relevance methods, results organized by ideas, and complete user privacy. Cuil.com has indexed 120 billion Web pages, three times more than any other search engine.
Cuil (pronounced COOL) provides organized and relevant results based on Web page content analysis. The search engine goes beyond today’s search techniques of link analysis and traffic ranking to analyze the context of each page and the concepts behind each query. It then organizes similar search results into groups and sorts them by category.
Read the full press release here.
Initial thoughts -- the main page took too long to load; the results are displayed in an interesting, un-search-engine kind of way. I'm not sold yet but will continue to tinker.
Surf on over to CongressDaily's TechCentral for a new "Issue of the Week." Here's a taste:
When Super Tuesday rolled around this past February, and Minnesota Democrats faced the prospect of caucusing for their U.S. Senate pick, many supporters of Democratic aspirant Al Franken were prepared.
They had already watched the campaign's instructional video online designed to explain the complicated process. What's more, the organization of the one-time "Saturday Night Live" comic had relied on its Web site to manage and recruit volunteer precinct captains to turn out voters in more than half of the 4,000 precincts in Minnesota.
"It's a really important part of what we do, and we use it to amplify our activities," said Franken spokesman Andy Barr of the campaign's use of the Web. He noted that, in the run-up to the caucuses, large numbers of volunteers were able to self-schedule their time and coordinate with staffers at the campaign headquarters by using a simple application on the Franken Web site.
Welcome to the 2008 congressional campaign, Web 2.0 style.
Friday was the last installment of National Public Radio’s edgy, Web-savvy morning news show, “The Bryant Park Project.” It was a favorite of mine (and of many listeners around the globe) and it will be missed. The BPP staff posted a “WKRP In Cincinnati” inspired goodbye video, which you can watch here. They also created a music mash-up of the five stages of grief – denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance. Listen to those songs here. The team will soon be posting its final “tweet” on its Twitter page here but the show lives on (kind of) at the BPP Diner here.
Motion Picture Association of America chief Dan Glickman on Tuesday championed the need for intellectual property protections and the importance of bipartisanship to improve public policy. Hollywood's top lobbyist (and former Kansas congressman) spoke to the Bipartisan Policy Center at a luncheon, emphasizing the need for lawmakers to traverse party lines even during the partisan presidential election season.
“You have to look no further than the record-breaking box office success of The Dark Knight from last weekend to know that the appeal of American movies transcend political boundaries,” he said. “I believe the same can be true as we tackle the major issues facing our country and our world.”
Glickman has worked closely with policymakers from both parties, labor and a wide range of business communities to support efforts to broaden protections for copyrighted goods – from fashion and pharmaceuticals to music and movies. The MPAA has been part of a coalition supporting a bill awaiting action in Congress that the group believes would strengthen the U.S. economy and generate more jobs for American workers.
“I do believe we will see greater global cooperation on intellectual property,” Glickman added. “The more sophisticated work countries do in the global economy, the greater their own stake. And, same as any of these issues, the more it’s about all of us rather than some of us—the more progress we can make together.”
Senate Majority Whip Richard Durbin and Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Okla., Monday asked three prominent Internet companies for an update on a voluntary code of conduct being written by the industry, academics and human rights groups to regulate businesses' activities in countries that restrict Internet use and content. The full story can be found in CongressDaily's AM edition.
While Google, Microsoft, Yahoo and others involved in the rulemaking have until September to decide whether to sign on to agreed upon language, a Google spokesman offered me this much: "Promoting freedom of expression and privacy around the world are top priorities for Google and our users. We are actively working on the code of conduct with all parties and look forward to reaching a consensus."
Colin Maclay, managing director of the Berkman Center for Internet & Society, which is helping stakeholders reach a consensus, added in an e-mail on Monday night that "it's beyond unrealistic to think that the deadline could move up" because the behind-the-scenes work represents significant commitments by a multitude of Internet players. Even if companies, including European partners that went unaddressed, did speed things up, non-corporate entities would not be able to (nor have any incentive to do so), he said.
Those involved in the dialogue have come a long way in nearly two years, Maclay said. "The trust developed among all partners in this process - while still somewhat fragile - has been the biggest story," he said. Maclay also noted that negotiations "were not along a two-dimensional continuum -- rather the parties definitely sought (and reached) common ground along a third dimension in a number of areas."
A handful of prominent technology experts got together Tuesday morning to provide congressional staffers with some insight into their industry's varied policy interests and legislative priorities. Speakers noted that the sector is often puzzling to legislators and regulators because it is complex and fast-moving and because IT is so diversified. Stakeholders rarely speak with one voice, they said.
Getting beyond buzzwords like innovation, openness, jobs, or economic growth is sometimes difficult but when you peel back the rhetoric, most policy differences among IT companies are the result of competing business models. Examples discussed at the Association for Competitive Technology event included network neutrality, privacy and tech standards. The Cato Institute's Jim Harper, CompTIA's Chris Katopis and others took part.
ACT also released a report at the event called: "Understanding The IT Lobby: An Insider's Guide," which is intended to help lawmakers make more informed decisions on policies that impact industry, consumers and the overall economy. In it, the authors describe IT business models and examine lobbying tactics employed on Capitol Hill today.
Longtime AOL executive, Washington Capitals hockey team owner and certified gazillionaire Ted Leonsis launched SnagFilms.com on Wednesday -- a Web site created to address the bottleneck in distribution for quality documentaries that has left many films unable to reach their potential audience or to provide a viable financial return. The endeavor is also backed by AOL co-founder Steve Case and venture capitalist Miles Gilburne.
At launch, more than 250 films are available for immediate streamed playback, requiring no software downloads, sign-ups or waiting, and an additional 200 films, already under contract, will be added by mid-August. Films from the vaults of PBS, National Geographic, United Nations, Sundance Preserve, IndiePix, Peter Jennings Productions, Arts Alliance America, and many others will be available for viewing.
“There has never been a time when so many high-quality socially relevant documentary films have been made, yet even though tens of thousands of documentaries are submitted to film festivals every year, only a handful find theatrical distribution," Leonsis said. "Through SnagFilms, everyone on the Web can be a theater owner and a film distributor if they just donate their pixels and enable these incredible documentaries to be seen."
In related news, SnagFilms also announced that it has acquired indieWIRE, the leading news, information, and social networking site for the international independent film community. IndieWIRE will continue to operate as a standalone, independent site while also providing content for SnagFilms.com.
Earlier this week, National Public Radio announced that it was pulling the plug on "The Bryant Park Project," the network's weekday morning news program tailored for hip, younger listeners. I have been so busy on Capitol Hil in recent days that I neglected to mention this. I'm a few days late with the shout-out but felt compelled to give the BPP crew some serious props.
The show was a gigantic breath of fresh air and it will be thoroughly missed -- and not just because I appeared as a guest last week and hoped to do so again soon. The last broadcast of the Manhattan-based program, which the New York Times pointed out is tuned into by many at npr.org rather than over the air, is slated for July 25. The newspaper called the show "an expensive failure" with a first-year budget of $2 million plus. The article also points out BPP's robust Web presence -- blogging, online video, etc.
"We are still absorbing the news of our untimely demise. We will still produce new shows for the next two weeks, and we'll keep on blogging and twittering. We may also dip into the Best of the BPP, stuff we're really proud of," a staffer wrote on the BPP's blog. Rob Paterson on the FastForward blog also offered some thoughts on why the axe fell on what I consider a smart, super-fantastic show.
Meanwhile, listeners have flooded the show's blog to register reactions. "This is the worst news ever!" writes one commenter. "I love BPP, it needs more time to grow! I love it as is, though. This is not fair." A few cheered the show's ending, calling it "drivel" and "an embarrassment to NPR." Several asked whether there might be a way to save the BPP. One listener started a Facebook campaign, championed by the blog Radio Sweethearts.
After a year of consultations, the Distributed Computing Industry Association has launched a program to protect peer-to-peer users against the inadvertent sharing of personal or sensitive data. The program, which was launched over the weekend, was conceived by P2P companies and other technology sector participants along with federal regulators.
The guidelines begin with a glossary defining terms, such as "recursive sharing," "sensitive file type," and "user-originated file," as well as protective measures, such as "affirmative step." It then outlines seven steps that are required to be in compliance with the program. Adoption is a voluntary decision to be made by each P2P firm but DCIA CEO Marty Lafferty said he is "confident of wide acceptance." His group will encourage and monitor compliance, he said on his Web site.
George Searle, CEO of the popular but controversial P2P application LimeWire, said is company is "committed to providing a great file-sharing product that people love to use and that provides for their personal safety." His company and others, including Kontiki and Pando Networks, took part in the development of the program.
Although copyright and related laws are not the only obstacle to digital preservation, there is no question that those laws present major challenges, the Library of Congress concluded in a report released Monday by its National Digital Information and Infrastructure Preservation Program in cooperation with partners in Australia, the Netherlands and the United Kingdom. Digital works are ephemeral, and unless preserved soon after creation, they will be lost to future generations, the study said.
The report includes recommendations for legislative reform and other solutions to ensure that libraries, archives and other preservation institutions can manage copyrighted digital information in a manner consistent with national and international laws. Specific recommendations include structuring national copyright laws to provide exceptions for
preservation institutions to proactively preserve at-risk copyrighted material in digital form, subject to measures appropriate to protect the legitimate interests of rights holders.
Recommendations in the U.S.-focused section of the report follow those outlined in by an independent Library of Congress study group in March. Recommendations from the other jurisdictions reflect each country's specific copyright laws. The four organizations worked closely together to develop joint recommendations for how copyright and intellectual property law might better accommodate digital content preservation.
Continue reading Library Of Congress: Digital Preservation Report.
NetChoice policy counsel Braden Cox posted an interesting item on the group's blog about a bill that passed out of the Louisiana legislature last week that was created to deal with social networking and Internet safety. The bill demonstrates what NetChoice believes is a trend toward comprehensive legislation that addresses education, law enforcement and parental empowerment.
In his post, Cox wrote that the bill, now on Gov. Bobby Jindal’s desk, "was well thought through and not a knee-jerk publicity-friendly response." Most early attempts to take on Web safety "showed little understanding of how the social networking sites worked, how individuals interacted, and the realities of the threats of online predators," he said.
Measures that require age and parental verification are "unworkable and ineffective, and would have the unintended consequence of giving parents and kids a false sense of security," Cox wrote. States like Georgia, Iowa, Mississippi, and Illinois have introduced such bills. All were scuttled.
Read his full NetChoice blog post here and for a full listing of Web safety measures that NetChoice supports, click here.
Residents and visitors to the nation’s capital this summer are getting an eyeful of messages about the upcoming switch to digital television. Ads highlighting the Feb. 17, 2009 transition deadline have been placed in 15 Metrobus shelters located in high-traffic areas downtown as part of the National Association of Broadcasters’ campaign to educate Americans about the big change.
The bus shelters are scattered throughout popular neighborhoods, including Capitol Hill, Union Station, Eastern Market, Federal Triangle, Farragut Square and near the White House. The ads will run until early August, NAB said in a Monday press release. NAB has also supplied 2,000 receipts promoting DTVAnswers.com to the Yellow Cab Co., the city’s largest taxicab fleet, so drivers can hand them to passengers.
The District of Columbia has one of the country’s highest percentages of over-the-air households, NAB said. More than 20 percent of residents in the city rely exclusively on free broadcast television. Read more about NAB's DTV initiative here.
(Courtesy: Futureshop.ca via YouTube)
On Friday, Microsoft founder Bill Gates officially transitioned from his day-to-day role at the high-tech company to focus more time on his work with the foundation he started with his wife, Melinda. Gates will remain Microsoft’s chairman and will be involved in select projects based on direction from CEO Steve Ballmer and the leadership team. Watch the hilarious "last day" video [above] from this year's Consumer Electronics Show. I wonder if his real last day was similar...
From Microsoft's Web site:
• Video Tribute: Looking Back, Moving Ahead
• Virtual Pressroom: Video Clips, Images and Press Materials
• Feature: Iconic Albuquerque Photo Re-Created
The Internet's key oversight agency relaxed rules today to permit the introduction of hundreds, perhaps thousands, of new Internet domain names to join ".com," making the first sweeping changes in the network's 25-year-old addressing system. The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers -- ICANN -- unanimously approved the new guidelines on the final day of weeklong meetings in Paris.
ICANN also was considering a separate proposal to permit addresses entirely in non-English languages for the first time, the Associated Press reported. New names won't start appearing for at least several months, and ICANN won't be deciding on specific ones quite yet. The organization still must work out many of the details, including fees for obtaining new names, expected to exceed $100,000 apiece.
For more details, see the full article on CongressDaily's TechCentral.
The high-tech industry in the Washington, D.C. region area added 6,100 jobs for a total of 295,800 workers in 2006, making the capital region the second largest "cybercity" by high-tech employment, behind only the New York metro area, the American Electronics Association said in a new report released Tuesday.
The nation's capital also has the fifth highest concentration of high-tech workers in the nation, according to the most current metropolitan data available. High-tech firms employed 132 of every 1,000 private sector workers in 2006. The jobs are high paying too -- the average tech sector worker in D.C. earned $92,700 (67 percent more than the region’s average private sector wage).
Ninety-five percent of Washington's high-tech industry is in the services sectors, AeA noted. The area ranked first in the nation by employment in computer systems design and related services, with 137,100 workers in 2006. It also ranked first in engineering services, with 44,400 jobs, and 2nd in R&D and testing labs, with 40,200 jobs.
Continue reading Study: Tech Jobs Booming In Washington, D.C. Region.
Guess who's coming to Washington this week? A pair of outside-the-Beltway Internet visionaries: Robert Scoble and Gary Vaynerchuk. The former is a blogger, technical evangelist and author best known for his Scobleizer blog, which became a must-read in the high-tech community during his tenure at Microsoft. The latter has been called "the first wine guru of the Web video era."
While in Washington, Scoble expects to meet with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi; House Subcommittee on Telecommunications and the Internet Chairman Ed Markey, D-Mass.; Rep. Cliff Stearns, R-Fla., Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Okla.; FCC Commissioner Jonathan Adelstein; National Cable and Telecommunications Association President Kyle McSlarrow, and others.
On Wednesday evening, Scoble and Vaynerchuk will booze and schmooze with D.C. politicos and techies at MCCXXII. Capitol Valley Media has been working hard to plan the event with the help of Frank Gruber and the Social Times. RSVP here. Follow Scoble during his journey on his Qik channel, Twitter feed and through his FriendFeed.
Since it appears to be slow news day (at least so far), here are some tech headlines to keep your brains busy. Or you could always flip over to watch breaking news coverage of this guy stuck in a tree.
Yahoo, Google pairing has lawmakers searching for answers
House investigators prepare for hearings on FCC chairman
Homeland security subcommittee clears $31.4 billion FY09 funding bill
Apple's iTunes hits 5 billion mark
Mars lander loses some photos after data glitch
Regulators take aim at infant DNA-testing industry
Surf on over to CongressDaily's TechCentral for a new "Issue of the Week." Here's a taste:
Regardless of which political party takes over the White House next Jan. 20, the new administration will have to move quickly to meet several looming deadlines in 2009 related to critical homeland security programs.
In addition, lawmakers and administration officials say the Homeland Security Department must be ready and vigilant for the upcoming presidential transition, especially since similar events in other countries have been marred by terrorist attacks.
But, without time to waste after the transition, the department will also face a series of imminent requirements under existing laws and regulations in the areas of border security, protecting the nation's seaports and helping states stay on track to begin issuing new secure identity documents.
Specifically, deadlines will quickly materialize in 2009 for the Western Hemisphere Travel Initiative, the US-VISIT foreigner tracking system, the Transportation Worker Identification Credential program and the so-called Real ID law. Read the full "Issue of the Week" here.
It has been almost two years since billionaire entrepreneur Mark Cuban declared that "only a moron would buy YouTube and that Google was crazy for actually going through with it." Since that time, the video sharing site's traffic has skyrocketed but they have noted the difficulty in being able to monetize those eyeballs in a profitable manner.
This week, Cuban wrote on his blog that the YouTube business model "is broken and there is no light at the end of the tunnel." The reason, he explains, is Hulu, a joint venture by NBC, FOX and their cable networks that offers free streaming content. Hulu doesn't serve up more videos that YouTube -- they aren't even close -- but he writes that the site is "laughing at YouTube all the way to [the] bank."
Read Cuban's full post here.
New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo unveiled landmark agreements on Tuesday with Sprint, Time Warner Cable and Verizon Communications to shutter major sources of online child pornography. The announcement comes as many on Capitol Hill are exploring legislative solutions aimed at curbing illegal Web content.
The three major Internet service providers for the first time have agreed to block customers' access to child porn-themed online bulletin boards known as "newsgroups" and will purge their servers of child porn Web sites. That "new standard of responsibility… should serve as a model for the entire industry," Cuomo said.
An investigation by his office uncovered 88 different newsgroups that contained more than 11,000 lewd photos. As part of the probe, Cuomo's staffers developed a new system for flagging online child pornography and digitally matching an image anywhere else it is distributed. The companies will also pay $1.12 million to fund additional efforts to remove child porn from the Internet.
The Senate Judiciary Committee passed a bill last month intended to improve the federal government's response to Internet-based crimes against children and the House approved several bills in the fall. Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, D-Fla., who sponsored one of the measures, lauded Cuomo's announcement. "We need to think of this as a war -- a war we must wage against sex predators, a war for our children," she said.
The Economic Club of Washington risked a journalistic coup on Monday when the organization sat roughly a dozen tech and telecom reporters in the back corner of the Ritz-Carlton ballroom to cover Google CEO Eric Schmidt's luncheon keynote. We weren’t expecting chow nor were we expecting a front row seat but the accommodations afforded by such an esteemed forum were disappointing to many.
Scribes were also barred from asking questions after his speech and were told that the right was reserved for several hundred club members and guests. One of my colleagues muttered: "They're certainly no Detroit Economic Club," which is known for its all-star speakers (and apparently a better relationship with the press).
To add insult to injury, several reporters who approached Schmidt with questions as he left the room were rebuffed. He had a flight back to Silicon Valley and didn't have time for walk-and-talk. Read speech coverage in CongressDaily's PM edition.
What do Aimee Mann, They Might Be Giants, and Wilco have in common? In addition to being several of this writer's favorite bands, they've also all donated tracks to a compilation album, which will be released next month, to benefit a proposed federally mandated "network neutrality" rule for broadband Internet providers.
To be clear, I cannot and will not take sides on the contentious congressional debate, but I will note that the Future of Music Coalition and Thirsty Ear Recordings brought together 15 acts for the "Rock the Net: Musicians for Net Neutrality" compact disc. Look for it on July 29. Regardless of one's stance on the issue, good music is good music, right?
The Media Institute, a nonprofit First Amendment and communications policy think tank, will launch its very own blog on Tuesday at www.mediacompolicy.org. The blog, called "Media & Communications Policy," could be a welcome addition to an already vibrant online community that discusses how the media affect and are affected by technology, commerce and politics.
The blog will feature insight from the organization's experts who have been avid observers and active participants in communications policymaking for more than 25 years. The creators' aim is to offer observations that "will be insightful -- and in no way constrained by the reigning ethos of political correctness," according to an e-mailed announcement.
Intriguing! Too bad the blog's name isn't -- but I'll withhold judgment until I see the finished product.
(ASACP's Joan Irvine & Stormy Daniels / Photo Credit: ASACP)
I thought I'd supplement my reporting of Stormy Daniels' visit to Washington on Thursday with some coverage by Jeff Dufour of the Examiner's "Yeas & Nays" column. He writes:
What does a famous adult-film actress wear at a D.C. press conference? No, whatever you were thinking of, it’s not that. For Wicked Pictures’ Stormy Daniels, who appeared at the National Press Club this morning, the choice was a knee length black business suit, a dark blue shirt and what looked to be an engagement ring on her left ring finger (sorry, guys).
Daniels was in town with the Association of Sites Advocating Child Protection, as they promoted a new “Restricted to Adults” label for use by adult sites, the better to flag themselves for parental-control software.
The association picked a good spokeswoman in Daniels. Apart from being a performer, director and writer of X-rated fare, she has some mainstream exposure, thanks to bit parts in “The 40-Year-Old Virgin” and “Knocked Up.” She’s also lobbied California state legislators in Sacramento on the same issue.
“I do not want children viewing my site or its adult-only content,” she said. “The adult industry does not want their business.” Read his full story here.
Congress is in recess for Memorial Day until next Monday. If you're looking for something to -- shall we say -- spice up what is likely to be a slow week on the tech policy front, we call your attention to a Thursday morning press conference featuring adult film performer/writer Stormy Daniels -- just in time for National Internet Safety Month.
The session at the National Press Club features a joint appearance between the odd couple of Daniels and Joan Irvine of the Association of Sites Advocating Child Protection. The latter group was created more than a decade ago with the goal of eliminating child pornography from the Internet and to help parents prevent children from viewing "age-inappropriate" material online.
The press conference appears to be the latest move in a campaign launched two months ago, in which Daniels -- whose work is produced by an entity called Wicked Pictures -- appears in a public service announcement sponsored by ASACP, promoting a "restricted to adults" label on applicable Web sites and encouraging parents to use filtering software. The PSA can be viewed above.
The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children believes it's important for families to have conversations about serious subjects like safety while doing something positive together -- like cooking. So, just in time for June (National Internet Safety Month), Red Robin Gourmet Burgers has teamed up with the center to produce a cookbook filled with kid-invented recipes and online safety tips.
The book, filled with more than 50 recipes, will be sold for $5 on Red Robin's Web site until Aug. 10 and profits will benefit NCMEC. Joey Yarwick, 12, of San Diego, Calif., was the grand prize winner of Red Robin's contest with his "Au Brie Burger a la Francais" (made with ground sirloin, brie cheese, au gratin potatoes, butter, cream, fresh rosemary, salt and pepper).
Maybe NCMEC should also pair up with the American Heart Association for a handbook to teach kids how to avoid burger-induced heart attacks and how to stay safe online.
(Photo Credit: daxiang stef via Flickr)
From the New Scientist via EurekAlert:
LOL, OMG and TTYL: parents and teachers worry that teenagers' use of these and other forms of online shorthand is harming their language skills. Perhaps they will take comfort from a study suggesting that instant messaging (IM) actually represents “an expansive new linguistic renaissance."
Sali Tagliamonte and Derek Denis at the University of Toronto, Canada, say teenagers risk the disapproval of their elders if they use slang, and the scorn of their friends if they sound too buttoned-up. But instant messaging allows them to deploy a “robust mix” of colloquial and formal language.
In a paper to be published in the spring 2008 issue of American Speech, the researchers argue that far from ruining teenagers’ ability to communicate, IM lets teenagers show off what they can do with language.
Noah Clements writes on the Association for Competitive Technology's blog that the Software Freedom Law Center has taken a page from the Business Software Alliance's playbook by filing four heavily publicized lawsuits on behalf of BusyBox, a set of Unix utilities licensed under the Gnu Public License version 2.
The suits filed last fall and winter against Monsoon Multimedia, Xterasys, High-Gain Antennas, and Verizon, all involved the same claim that the companies (perhaps inadvertently) distributed BusyBox with their products without the source code as required by GPLv2. The suits all seem to have settled the same way -- by promising to release the code, appointing an "open-source compliance officer," and paying an undisclosed sum of money.
If these actions seem familiar, Clements writes, you might be thinking of the BSA, which has been criticized for what some call intimidation tactics to "punish businesses that may be trying to play by the rules." GPL lawsuits are only going to increase, he predicts. The people behind the SFLC recently formed a for-profit law firm so that open-source businesses can sue for violations as well.
Experiencing prolonged chest pains? Maybe you're allergic to your wireless Internet signal -- or at least that's what a group of citizens in Santa Fe is alleging. New Mexico's KOB-TV reports that the group has complained the city is discriminating against them because they will not ban Wi-Fi from public buildings.
Arthur Firstenberg told the station that he is highly sensitive to certain types of electric fields, including wireless Internet and cell phones. "I get chest pain and it doesn't go away right away," he said. Firstenberg and others say public Wi-Fi is a violation of the Americans with Disabilities Act and the city attorney is checking into the situation.
The brand new National Museum of Crime and Punishment hosted a special preview party on Thursday night for those who wanted a sneak peek at its interactive, educational offerings a day before it opened to the public. The event included drinks, hors d'oeuvres, a CSI-style crime lab and high-speed police chase simulators.
The downtown D.C. destination, owned by an Orlando businessman in partnership with "America’s Most Wanted" host John Walsh, spans three floors and more than 28,000 square feet. It presents the history of crime and punishment in America -- from pirates and Wild West outlaws to high-tech white-collar criminals.
Interactive components include a studio with green-screen technology; touch-screen and zip code analysis for learning about community-based crime prevention programs; and a simulated FBI shooting range. The museum charges a whopping $17.95 for adults and $14.95 for kids and is conveniently located near the International Spy Museum ($18 for adults; $15 for kids) and the Newseum ($20 for adults; $13 for kids).
The Center for Democracy and Technology said Monday that the indictment by the U.S. Attorney’s office in Los Angeles of the St. Louis woman at the center of a MySpace suicide case represents "a gross and inappropriate expansion of federal power to regulate speech" over the Internet.
Lori Drew’s alleged deception -- creating a fake MySpace profile of a teenage boy -- to “gather intelligence” about her daughter’s classmate, Megan Meir, 13, turned horribly wrong. Megan took Drew’s messages as cruel and harassing, and ultimately unbearable. Megan committed suicide.
If the allegations are true, Drew could face civil liability for her actions, but the Justice Department, finding nothing appropriate in federal statutes to charge her with, charged her with breaching the MySpace “terms of service” agreement on the grounds that she accessed protected computers without authorization.
In the government’s theory, if someone signs up for an online service and then does not follow the rules of that service, the use of the service is "unauthorized" and thus (according to this indictment) a federal crime under a statute appropriately used to prosecute people who break into a computer system, according to CDT.
If the indictment stands, all that "fine print" of the user agreement is moved from an annoyance to a significant legal risk, the watchdog group said: "If you violate any term, you are committing a federal crime. This could seriously chill the robust interactivity of the Internet."
Technology and consumer advocates planned a unique discussion on Capitol Hill on Monday morning to discuss how federal, state, and local governments use their own version of "scrapbooking" to preserve records. Most of the time, technologies on which they rely are expensive to maintain and could easily be upgraded. Those systems also lack safeguards needed to protect privacy and sensitive data.
Association for Competitive Technology President Jonathan Zuck; Citizens Against Government Waste President Tom Schatz; and Stephen Forte of Telerik were to discuss the real costs of continuing to use legacy systems, both short and long term; the risks of not dealing with the problem, or choosing to simply avoid it; and what governments can do, including a discussion of where interoperability, accessibility, and privacy intersect.
I'm giving a shout-out to 463 Communications twice this week but it's kind of worth it. Sean Garrett, the PR firm's main man in San Fran, posted a really interesting missive on the company blog about present-day high-tech leadership in Silicon Valley.
Garrett writes:
A decade ago, we had industry leaders like John Doerr, John Chambers, Jim Barksdale, Reed Hastings, Craig Barrett and so on who put on the hat of industry steward and talked about the growth of the technology industry and the policy issues that would impact it. They weren't necessarily reserving their big keynote addresses or sit-downs with the Wall Street Journal to discuss Kleiner Perkins portfolio companies or Cisco's growth strategy.
Who is doing this in 2008? With a few exceptions, it's pretty much the same people. That's a good thing when considering how well Doerr, Chambers and Barrett do when evocatively connecting the dots between sound policy and innovation that benefits society at large. But, it's also a bad thing when you consider that a whole lot of companies have grown up and a lot of executives have made their marks since then without a contribution to the policy dialogue.
Read the full 463 blog post here.
Librarian of Congress James Billington on Wednesday named 25 additions to the National Recording Registry as part of its efforts to preserve the nation’s aural history. Each year the institution selects recordings that are "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant" to preserve for all time. Read the press release here.
Some of the selections were:
▪ Harry S. Truman’s 1948 Democratic National Convention speech
▪ 1,000 broadcasts by Ronald Reagan before his presidency
▪ The first trans-Atlantic radio broadcast in 1925
▪ Michael Jackson’s "Thriller"
▪ The "Sounds of Earth" disc that traveled with Voyager through space
▪ Herbie Hancock’s "Headhunters"
▪ One of the few gospel recordings performed by Thomas Dorsey
▪ The first recording of "Call it Stormy Monday, but Tuesday is Just As Bad"
The 320,000-member American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers published a position paper last week to "demystify the basic rights of music creators" amid growing confusion and concern around music copyright issues. The topic has been a recent favorite on Capitol Hill.
The paper helps define a "right" and copyright basics; and explains the meaning of "performing rights." It also asks the gazillion-dollar question: "Are rights still relevant in the digital age?" The document also includes a "Bill of Rights for Songwriters and Composers," which has collected over 6,000 signatures in support to date online.
The document centers around 10 core principles like: "We have the right to be compensated for the use of our creative works, and share in the revenues that they generate." In addition to the flurry of online signatures, a number of prominent musicians have backed the effort, including Lionel Richie, Stacy "Fergie" Ferguson and Justin Timberlake.
If they haven’t already, the group might want to send a copy of the position paper and bill to the 200-plus members of the House who have signed a resolution to fight legislation to nix an exemption granted to AM and FM radio stations that allows them to broadcast music without paying royalties.
A similar effort just began in the Senate. Read more about it CongressDaily's AM edition on Tuesday.
IP Law360.com reports:
Attorneys looking to track down more details on U.S. patents issued this year may have trouble relying on Google Patent Search. The Mountain View, Calif.-based search engine launched its user-friendly beta Web site, www.google.com/patents, in December 2006 to make information on the United States’ seven million patents more accessible, but has not updated the site since Jan. 1. So Googlers, what gives?
Forbes.com published an op-ed Friday written by former Bush administration IP czar Chris Israel. In it, the Institute for Policy Innovation fellow discusses the recent announcement made by Comcast and BitTorrent that they will work together to find a market-based solution to challenges posed by the bandwidth demands of peer-to-peer file sharing.
According to Israel, the news "further demonstrates that an intrusive government 'network neutrality' regime is not necessary, and this provides a more promising future for protecting intellectual property online." In the debate over net neutrality, he writes, the issue of who gets to do what with the network they built has been the main sticking point while stopping the flow of illegal content has played a somewhat secondary role.
Meanwhile, House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers and Rep. Zoe Lofgren, D-Calif., added to the ongoing debate over the topic on Capitol Hill on Thursday by introducing a bill that would require pipeline providers to interconnect on "a reasonable and nondiscriminatory basis" and ensure all legal content, applications and services have an equal opportunity to reach consumers.
Their bill, which approaches net neutrality from an antitrust angle, differs from a measure introduced by Energy and Commerce Telecommunications and the Internet Subcommittee Chairman Edward Markey, D-Mass., which is FCC-focused. Read CongressDaily's latest coverage here.
Winners of the annual Webby Awards were announced this week.
Highlights include:
▪ Webby Person Of The Year - Stephen Colbert, Comedy Central's "Colbert Report." He was honored for using the Internet to interact with fans of his show -- from "Google bombing" to make him the top search result for "greatest living American" to challenging the "truthiness" of Wikipedia.
▪ Webby Film & Video Person of The Year - Filmmaker Michel Gondry. His latest film, "Be Kind Rewind," is a celebration do-it-yourself filmmaking introduced "sweding" to the Internet, inspiring filmmakers to recreate scenes from their favorite films.
▪ Webby Artist Of The Year - Will.I.Am, frontman for the Black Eyed Peas. He was recognized for the songs and Internet videos he created in support of U.S. presidential candidate Barack Obama. His online "Yes We Can" video has been viewed more than 17 million times since its February premiere.
▪ Webby Film & Video - Best Actor: Tim Heidecker and Eric Wareheim, creators of the cult hit timanderic.com. They are poster children for the kind of weirdness that could only take off online.
Other highlights include multiple winnings by NYTimes.com, The Onion, PostSecret, National Geographic, Apple.com, Hometown Baghdad, "You Suck at Photoshop," Flickr, FactCheck.org, BBC, TED.com, ESPN.com, and CondeNet. Read more about the winners here.
My former Technology Daily colleague Brittany Ballenstedt, now with Government Executive magazine, has an interesting story about new survey results released by the Gallup Organization that shows roughly one-third of young adults seriously would consider a career in public service if asked by a parent or the next president of the United States.
When it comes to exploring jobs in the federal government, respondents said they would be most likely to look at government Web sites as their primary source of information. Of millennials, 11 percent said they would use search engines like Google and Yahoo to learn about federal jobs, compared with 6 percent of those older than 30. Read the full story here.
The New York Times ran an interesting story on Tuesday about a George Washington University law professor who has discovered a constitutional flaw in the appointment process over the last eight years for judges who decide patent appeals and disputes. John Duffy's short paper documenting the problem seems poised to undo thousands of patent decisions concerning claims worth billions of dollars.
Since 2000, patent judges have been appointed by a government official without the constitutional power to do so, the paper reports. "I actually ran it by a number of colleagues who teach administrative law and constitutional law," Duffy said, recalling his own astonishment at finding such a chink in the legal armor.
Although a spokesman for the Justice Department would not offer a comment, the agency has already all but conceded that Duffy is right, the article states. Given the opportunity to dispute him in a December appeals court filing, government lawyers said only that they were at work on a legislative solution. Read the full story here.
Susan Crawford points out on her blog that the Yale Information Society Project recently posted its 9.5 Theses for Technology Policy in the Next Administration:
1. Privacy. Protect human dignity, autonomy, and privacy by providing individuals with control over the collection, use, and distribution of their personal information and medical information.
2. Access. Promote high-speed Internet access and increased connectivity for all, through both government and private initiatives, to reduce the digital divide.
3. Network Neutrality. Legislate against unreasonable discrimination by network providers against particular applications or content to maintain the Internet’s role in fostering innovation, economic growth, and democratic communication.
4. Transparency. Preserve accountability and oversight of government functions by strengthening freedom of information and improving electronic access to government deliberations and materials.
5. Innovation. Restore balance to intellectual property rules and explore alternative incentives to better promote innovation, freedom, access to knowledge, and human development.
Read the full list here.
High-tech giant Microsoft on Tuesday announced legal actions against eight software dealers in the United States, Canada, Egypt and the Netherlands that are alleged to have engaged in the illegal sale of unlicensed Microsoft products. The actions came as a result of hundreds of reports to the Microsoft anti-piracy hotline (800) RU-LEGIT (785-3448).
The alleged illegal sales involved the unlawful importation of unlicensed software into North America from multiple dealers overseas. As alleged in the lawsuits, the dealers deceived customers by selling them software without also providing them with the necessary licenses, according to a Microsoft press release.
"We want customers to receive the best possible experience with our products, including the benefits of support and service that come with the purchase of licensed, genuine software," Microsoft attorney Bonnie MacNaughton said. "The unlawful distribution and sale of this software has tangible, negative consequences for the marketplace."
Microsoft announced over the weekend that has withdrawn its offer to acquire Internet giant Yahoo for roughly $5 billion. "After careful consideration, we believe the economics demanded by Yahoo do not make sense for us, and it is in the best interests of Microsoft stockholders, employees and other stakeholders to withdraw our proposal," Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer said in a statement.
"We have a talented team in place and a compelling plan to grow our business through innovative new services and strategic transactions with other business partners," Ballmer said. "While Yahoo would have accelerated our strategy, I am confident that we can continue to move forward toward our goals."
Roy Bostock, chairman of Yahoo issued a response reiterating that "our independent board and our management have been steadfast in our belief that Microsoft's offer undervalued the company and we are pleased that so many of our shareholders joined us in expressing that view." Yahoo CEO Jerry Yang added: "With the distraction of Microsoft's unsolicited proposal now behind us, we will be able to focus all of our energies on executing the most important transition in our history."
Stanford Group analyst Clay Moran believes Yahoo missed a good opportunity and he expected the firm's stock to drop significantly on Monday. "We believe this is good for Microsoft’s stock in the near term not only due to the unwinding of arbitrage positions, but also as it likely represented its best option under the circumstances," he added.
The result of the deal's demise makes Google the big winner, Moran said. The company's two largest competitors remain separate, thus entrenching its dominant position, and Yahoo may be pressured to further pursue a search outsourcing agreement with Google.
(Photo Credit: David Bohrer/White House)
Ninety-nine educators from around the country have been awarded the annual Presidential Award for Excellence in Mathematics and Science Teaching for 2007. The teachers, who each get a certificate and $10,000 educational grant to be used over a three-year period, will be recognized during a ceremony on Friday evening hosted by National Science Foundation Director Arden Bement.
While in Washington this week, the teachers visited the White House and were slated to meet a NASA astronaut as well as members of Congress and the Bush administration to discuss hot topics in math and science teaching. A little bird tells us the group had been promised a snapshot with POTUS himself but he was busy chatting up the New York Giants who stopped by the South Lawn the same day. Instead, the teachers posed for a photo-op with Vice President Dick Cheney.
Click here for the press release and here for a larger Cheney pic.
Update: An administration official pointed out that Bush met with the award winners in 2001, 2004, 2005, 2006 and 2007 and First Lady Laura Bush met with them in 2003 and 2007. Cheney met with the recipients in 2002 and again this year. According to the source, former President Bill Clinton never (or rarely) met with them.
The woman believed to be the so-called "D.C. Madam" was reportedly found dead Thursday in a shed near hear mother's Florida mobile home. The madam, Deborah Jeane Palfrey, was recently convicted on federal charges stemming from operating a prostitution service in the nation's capital with a number of high-profile clients. Her sentencing was scheduled for July 24.
The news prompted me to visit Palfrey's personal Web site where she previously posted a copy of her escort service records (all 46 pounds of them). The site, which was created in February 2007 and is registered to Palfrey's attorney, Montgomery Blair Sibley, is now blank except for a line that eerily reads: "deborahjeanepalfrey.com is off line until further notice."
It is unclear when the site was wiped clean. Deborahjeanepalfrey.com had a traffic rank of 3,463147366,946 on analytics site Alexa.com.
"Securing and Expanding Press Freedom Through New Media" was the topic du jour at a morning briefing on Wednesday hosted by the National Endowment for Democracy. The event preceded World Press Freedom Day, which is observed annually on May 3. This year's theme is "Freedom of Expression, Access, and Empowerment."
Participants included Rep. Adam Schiff, D-Calif.; John Palfrey, executive director of the Berkman Center on Internet and Society at Harvard Law School; Shanthi Kalathil, a consultant at the World Bank's Communication for Governance and Accountability Program; Aboubakr Jamai, a fellow at Harvard University's Kennedy School of Government; and Xiao Qiang of the China Internet Project at the University of California, Berkeley.
By engaging in the new information society, "netizens" are contributing to the free flow of information and participating in the democratic process, which is a vital prerequisite to an open society, the foundation said in a description of the event posted on its Web site. The group pointed out that authoritarian governments are increasing efforts censor content and citizens’ access to information while investing in greater surveillance efforts.
Tech Daily Dose - prime placement, above-the-fold, so to speak. Yippie.
AT&T announced Tuesday that Apple's popular iPhone is now more accessible for Americans who are deaf or have a hearing or speech disability. The telecommunications giant unveiled a new $40 plan to give those customers the choice of unlimited text messaging, Web browsing and easy access to e-mail.
Under the service offering, "users can tap, flick and pinch the innovative multi-touch touch screen for a completely new world of functionality," AT&T Vice President Carlton Hill said in a press release. To qualify, customers must complete an application for eligibility through AT&T’s National Center for Customers with Disabilities, which can be found here.
Some creative (and computer-savvy) minds at the New York Post have unveiled a Web-based "2008 Democratic Fight Night" game that lets a reader toss his or her favorite candidate --- either Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., or Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y. -- into a virtual boxing ring to beat the living daylights out of the rival wannabe nominee.
A colleague who sent me the link pointed out that the game is "not quite Grand Theft Auto, but it still entertains." Well, he's right. It's a hoot. You can check it out here. Now, who will come up with the online game where presumptive Republican nominee Sen. John McCain of Arizona pummels himself? Any takers?
"The Kojo Nnamdi Show" on WAMU (88.5) in Washington will feature a segment Tuesday focused on cracking down on pirated goods. Nnamdi's interest in the issue comes on the heels of an annual report card on intellectual property protection released Friday by the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative (Read CongressDaily's coverage here).
Guests (who will be on the air just after 12 p.m. ET) include: Assistant USTR Stan McCoy and Susan Sell, director of the Institute for Global and International Studies at George Washington University. Click here for more information about Kojo's show and to listen to the webcast.
Internet giant Google has joined the Family Online Safety Institute, an international nonprofit organization dedicated to identifying and promoting best practices, tools, and methods for Web safety. Google Policy Counsel Pablo Chavez was added to the group's board to help steer its strategic direction and initiatives. "Joining FOSI furthers Google's efforts to educate families about ways to use the Internet safely," Chavez said in a press release. Google joins a list of big name high-tech players involved in the effort, including AT&T, British Telecom, Comcast and Verizon.
Andrew Feinberg over at CapitolValley.net has an interesting take on the recently revived discussion on Capitol Hill over "orphan works," copyrighted materials whose owners cannot be found. He takes a look back at the Copyright Term Extension Act of 1998, which drastically extended copyright terms and then boils it down to how the change impacts John Q. Public.
Feinberg writes that one of his favorite television shows, "The Wonder Years," is unavailable on DVD because the nostalgic series featured so much copyrighted material from the 1960s era that obtaining permissions and arranging royalties has proved impossible. Some copyright holders won't give permission but others simply can't be found.
Free-market think tank iGrowthGlobal, which was launched last year by refugees from the Progress and Freedom Foundation, has changed its name to the Technology Policy Institute -- a little more generic, a little less new-agey. The firm, led by former PFF President Thomas Lenard, focuses on the economics of innovation, technological change, and related regulation in the United States and around the world. The group, which is guided by light-touch government and private sector driven policymaking, is also staffed by PFF alums Garland McCoy and Scott Wallsten. Lenard said the name change more accurately reflects the coming year's focus on communications and broadband policy, online privacy, and Internet governance. As part of the rebirth, TPI also launched a sleek, new Web site.
The National Press Club is getting tech-savvy with a Monday afternoon seminar titled "Reporting from Facebook." According to the notice, the session "will start by looking at what online social networks are and examining the differences between several of the most popular sites, including Facebook, MySpace and LinkedIn. From there we will move on to a more in-depth look at Facebook - navigating the site, using it to research stories, using it to identify and contact sources, and using it to connect with your audience."
In Monday's San Jose Mercury News -- some thoughts on free trade from the Computer and Communications Industry Association's Ed Black.
Editorial: U.S. political leaders must recognize importance of free trade
As the leading export industry of the nation, the high-tech sector is a strong supporter of free trade and open markets. That is why the current confrontation between Congress and the Bush administration is so alarming.
We believe the Colombia trade agreement is good for our national security and foreign policy as well as for our economy. More important than the deadlock on this agreement itself is that it illustrates how far the United States has strayed from the path of bipartisan commitment to free trade.
Global trade has been and remains vital to the U.S. economy. The extraordinary economic growth after World War II was, in large part, due to the fact that the United States opened itself up to the world. Thoughtful political leaders of both parties understood trade's importance, and chose to subordinate politics to trade. The challenge was always to mitigate harm to some impacted sectors while expanding trade.
Read the full editorial here.
From the latest National Journal magazine:
Striking blondes have a way of getting attention in D.C. That’s a sure bet for adult-film starlet Stormy Daniels, who will represent the Association of Sites Advocating Child Protection at the National Press Club on May 29. The Los Angeles-based group of porn producers wants to keep adult Internet content away from kids. Online child safety has been a key issue for the Justice Department and has prompted hearings, legislation, and self-regulatory actions by industry, such as ASACP’s own online warning-label program. ASACP, whose inside-the-Beltway exposure has been scarce, has hired the Raben Group to raise its image in the public policy realm.
Check out ASACP's "Restricted to Adults" PSAs here and here.
National Journal Group's long-awaited Web site overhaul is complete and we hope you like the finished product. Here's a screenshot of a demo front page. Click here to visit the real thing and here to read a note to readers.
Cable and Internet giant Comcast and Pando Networks, a provider of managed peer-to-peer content delivery services, said Tuesday that they will lead an industry-wide effort to create a “P2P Bill of Rights and Responsibilities” for file-sharers and Internet service providers. The pair plan to collaborate with industry experts; other ISPs and P2P firms; content providers and others, to guide the popular high-tech platform.
The purpose of the initiative is to clarify what choices and controls consumers should have when using P2P applications as well as what processes and practices ISPs should use to manage P2P applications running on their networks, according to a Comcast press release. Comcast and Pando will also test Pando Network Aware™ P2P technology on Comcast’s fiber-optic network with the purpose of analyzing data flow.
The announcement builds on Comcast’s March 27 announcement to work with BitTorrent and the broader Internet and ISP community to more effectively address issues associated with rich media content and network capacity management. Comcast Chief Technology Officer Tony Werner said he hoped to gather stakeholders this spring and publish the P2P guidelines later this year.
Update: Marvin Ammori, general counsel of Free Press, said the Comcast and Pando have "declared themselves the arbiters of consumers' rights and responsibilities." Their announcement gives little information about the arrangement, "but Comcast's behavior tells us everything we need to know," he said, adding that the firm has been blocking P2P and doesn’t plan to stop.
Scott Cleland at the Precursor blog also weighed in, calling the partnership "a breakthrough agreement" that solves "multiple thorny problems." Read his full post here.
Internet innovator Google has partnered with the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children to provide software tailored to help automate and streamline the technical side of the group's child pornography investigations through advancements in video and image search.
"Criminals are using cutting edge technology to commit their crimes of child sexual exploitation, and in fighting to solve those crimes and keep children safe, we must do the same," NCMEC President Ernie Allen said in a press release. Working in cooperation with federal law enforcers, NCMEC analysts have reviewed more than 13 million child porn images and videos and the Google offering will help expedite searches.
In August 2006, Google joined the Technology Coalition and the Financial Coalition Against Child Pornography, industry initiatives launched by NCMEC and its sister agency, the International Centre for Missing and Exploited Children, to develop solutions that disrupt the ability of predators to use the Internet to exploit children or swap child porn.
Surf on over to CongressDaily's TechCentral for the latest on the pending merger between Sirius Satellite Radio and rival XM. Here's a taste of Monday's "Issue of the Week:"
When Sirius Satellite Radio Chief Executive Officer Mel Karmazin testified last year at congressional hearings on plans to combine his company with rival XM, he made several promises to win over regulators, including assurances that the millions of receivers in homes and cars wouldn’t become obsolete and that low-cost pricing would be available. Karmazin’s message apparently resonated with the Justice Department, which approved the $5 billion transaction on March 24 with no conditions.
Now, as the merger’s fate rests with the Republican-controlled FCC, industry analysts say the government’s review has shifted from whether the combination should win approval to how it should be conditioned.
(Photo Credit: Andrew Noyes)
Friday marked the grand opening at the new Newseum in Washington. It was a massive, day-long affair that drew scores of tourists, locals and, of course, news enthusiasts. I've had a keen interest in the project as it has evolved because of the groundbreaking high-tech components featured inside the museum. This is just a snapshot of what's inside. It's a must-see! [Click here for more photos]
Technology nonprofit One Economy launched its "Bring IT Home America" campaign on Tuesday -- a program geared toward combining the resources of government, business, and the nonprofit sector to extend innovative technologies to those who need them most. Companies like AT&T, Intel, Verizon and Wells Fargo have signed onto the two-year project.
According to the group, 21 percent of people earning less than $30,000 per year have broadband and the applications it makes possible in their homes; three times as many affluent households have high-speed access. One Economy believes in the need to inspire a "profound and urgent national commitment to bring the power of information to all Americans -- regardless of income, race, age, or geography."
By the end of the campaign, One Economy and campaign members will have engaged 5,000 youth to provide technology training in their neighborhoods, brought broadband into the homes of half a million Americans, and reached millions more with the next generation of public-purpose media, the Public Internet Channel, officials said.
West Virginia Gov. Joe Manchin, a champion of the initiative, issued a statement saying broadband access is as important as water and sewer infrastructure for the Mountain State and other rural localities to prosper in the new economy. As a proud West Virginian who grew up with lackluster technology in school and even less at home, I couldn’t agree more.
R.E.M. rocked NBC's "Today Show" on Tuesday morning and chatted with Matt Lauer about their new album, how they have embraced high-tech distribution methods and the state of the American music industry.
Mike Mills on tech: "The technology is out there and the best thing you can do is break down the barriers between yourself and your fans. We streamed it on iLike and we have a Web site -- SupernaturalSuperserious.com -- where you can build your own video out of clips we've provided. It's just a way to remove the middle man and connected directly with the people who like you."
Michael Stipe on the music business: "I think the music is doing great right now, I think the industry is sort of suffering. But musicians continue writing good songs and there are fans out there that support them."
Watch "Today Show" clips here. I can't wait to get my hands on the new album. And yes, this was blogworthy because I love them and it's my birthday week so I'm entitled.
Everyone seems to have March Madness -- even CNBC, which is encouraging viewers to take part in Wall Street's answer to the annual college basketball frenzy. The network has lined up 64 companies, four sectors, and one champion. Winners are selected each night through April 7th at 5 p.m. and 8 p.m. ET by the "Fast Money" traders.
According to CNBC's site:
Hewlett-Packard rolled over 16 seed Western Digital. Then, in a hard fought chip conference battle, 9-seed Intel, squeaked by LCD giant Corning. Microsoft, appeared to be oblivious to taunting from the sidelines by Yahoo's Jerry Yang and they beat IBM. Larry Ellison's Oracle squad sailed by Comcast.
While EMC -- with its mysterious virtualization offense -- won a hard fought one over Verizon. 3 seed Apple stole from Research In Motion's playbook and won as the iPhone maker started to gain business customers. And John Chambers out-coached Michael Dell with Cisco beating Dell.
Meanwhile in live tournament play, AT&T made mincemeat out of Google* with the traders ruling in favor of telephone’s buildout over Google’s online ad sales.
*The producers of Fast Money advanced Google to the next round of competition anyway. Read more here. (Thanks for the tip on this, MB)
Richard Branson is a damned genius. That's why I consciously bypassed conveniently located Reagan-National Airport to fly to Los Angeles on Tuesday evening via Virgin America from Dulles International Airport, which is quite a haul from downtown D.C. I was tired of crisscrossing the country on the big, boring airlines and needed something fresh and new -- and boy, did Branson deliver.
From the time I boarded the plane, I knew I was in for a treat. The "mood lighting" blanketed the cabin in a pinkish-purplish hue and I made my way to my surprisingly comfortable coach seat (It's worth noting that the first class recliners are equipped with a massage feature). The safety video was kitschy and the on-board announcements were casual and friendly.
Now, comes the good part (and the part that makes this blog post a bit relevant for Tech Daily Dose) -- the in-flight technology smorgasbord. Everything a passenger needs for a 5+ hour flight from Washington to California is contained in a nifty little seatback touch-screen monitor/remote control. The system is known as Red, it's still in beta version and it totally rocked my world.
Watch: There are new release movies, music videos, live television, on-demand premium TV and multi-lingual TV offerings. Plus, as an extra special treat for techies: videos from popular blog BoingBoing. I watched "Across the Universe" for $7 because I missed it in theaters. Oh and there's a program guide that lets you set reminders for upcoming TV shows and Google Maps to let you know where you are in the sky.
Listen: The music player boasts an impressive track listing from a variety of genres and artists -- and passengers can create their own playlists that can be revived on future flights. Radio stations include rock, alternative, hip-hop, jazz and many others. If you're a fan of Cantonese or Mandarin pop music, they've got that too.
Continue reading Virgin America's In-Flight Entertainment Extravaganza.
Kara Swisher has an interesting blog post over at All Things Digital that points out that "the Blue states are taking back ground from the Red ones -- at least in cyberspace." In February, for the first time ever, Arianna Huffington's liberal political news and commentary site, the Huffington Post, reportedly surpassed conservative/populist Matt Drudge's Drudge Report.
She cited recent traffic data reports from both comScore and Nielsen Online. Nielsen, for example, said Huffington's traffic has more than tripled since February 2007 when it had about 1.1 million unique visitors. Last month, that number grew to 3.7 million. The same month, Drudge's site had 3.4 million (it had 2.75 million a year ago). Read the full post here.
Oxford University Internet scholar Jonathan Zittrain was in Washington on Thursday to speak at Google's D.C. office (alongside Stanford Law School's Lawrence Lessig who was in town to launch his ChangeCongress movement). I was supposed to attend but had a last-minute conflict.
Zittrain's talk was based around his new book, "The Future of the Internet -- And How To Stop It." His thesis, summed up nicely by the Washington Post's Mike Musgrove, is that "the prevalence of spam and malware may be setting the Web on a path to a kind of appliance-driven lockdown."
Zittrain argues "the threat of faulty code and spyware, among other problems, means that the world is starting to turn to closed systems -- like TiVos, Xboxes and iPhones -- that can't as easily be modified by users or gifted programmers," Musgrove wrote on the Post IT blog.
Andrew Feinberg at CapitolValley.net also wrote about the book, which is sitting on my nightstand begging to be read right after I finish "Patent Failure," a timely tome by James Bessen and Michael Meurer.
From Jim Romenesko at Poynter Online:
----------------------------------------------------
Memo to Orlando Sentinel employees
----------------------------------------------------
Sent: Tuesday, March 18, 2008 10:56 AM
To: OSC DL All Employees
Subject: Orlando Sentinel Digital Edition Launching March 31
On Monday, March 31, the Orlando Sentinel will launch a new digital edition of the newspaper via a new business partner, Pressmart. As a result, the paper will no longer be available in physical form at the Orlando Sentinel offices. On March 31, employees will receive an automated e-mail with a link access the newspaper. This link will also be permanently posted on the home page of SentineLink ...
... The decision to begin offering a digital edition was made in an effort to cut costs while expanding our digital product selection to our customers. In addition, there are significant financial benefits to the Sentinel, including increased ABC-audited circulation, lowered printing and distribution costs, and reduced future archival costs.
Read the full memo here.
There's a special story posted on CongressDaily's TechCentral written by my colleague Shane Harris at National Journal magazine. In it, he conducts an exit interview of sorts with Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff. After weathering congressional criticism, Gulf Coast hurricanes, and a failed bid for immigration reform, Chertoff remains upbeat about DHS, the shape in which he leaves it, and the future of border security.
In Harris's interview, Chertoff warned about national complacency toward terrorism, praised his department's efforts to prepare for the upcoming transition, and questioned whether the Federal Emergency Management Agency should be taking on reconstruction efforts. Click here to read the Q&A.
An international competition to inspire viable, super-efficient vehicles that could help curb the United States dependence on foreign oil and stem the effects of climate change will kick off this week at the New York Auto Show. The Senate passed a resolution supporting the project last Thursday and the House did the same in February.
The winning entrant of the Automotive X Prize must produce a commercially viable vehicle that gets at least 100 miles per gallon fuel efficiency over a series of road trials meant to simulate real world driving conditions. The public unveiling of the multi-million dollar prize purse and title sponsor will take place on Thursday.
"The dual passage of both the House and Senate resolutions demonstrates that our elected officials understand the real issues consumers are facing today and that real solutions will require the American spirit of free enterprise," Automotive X Prize Executive Director Don Foley said. "This high-profile competition is igniting ideas and concepts across the globe to help solve the challenge of energy security and climate change."
The high-priced call girl who effectively ended New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer's political career this week happens to be an aspiring musician and a song featured on her MySpace.com page is getting quite a bit of radio airplay.
Several stations, including the Big Apple's "K-Rock" and Z-100, downloaded Ashley Alexandria Dupre's song "What We Want" and featured it as part of their pop music line up. Eric Johnson of New Jersey's WSJO told Radio-Info.com that "it's not a bad mid-tempo pop song. We’ll spike it in and let the listeners decide."
News of Dupre's ditty is particularly interesting given Spitzer's high-profile crusade against radio "payola." When he was the state's attorney general, his office served subpoenas against record labels in a probe into the illegal compensation of radio stations for playing certain songs.
A tipster tells Tech Daily Dose that Spitzer "can now claim that his anti-payola efforts at getting new artists on the air were successful." "Apparently Spitzer thinks pay-for-play wasn't so bad after all," the snarky source added.
From the Reuters DealZone blog:
Sirius Satellite Radio CEO Mel Karmazin said Wednesday he hoped U.S. regulators would rule by the end of March on the satellite radio company’s proposed merger with rival XM. Speaking at the Bear Stearns 21st Annual Media Conference, Karmazin said he “took heart” about recent comments by FCC Chairman Kevin Martin, who indicated that his agency aimed to rule on the deal by the end of March.
Shares of the satellite radio companies immediately jumped on hopes the deal could actually close soon. XM Chairman Gary Parsons was less specific than Karmazin when he spoke at the Bear Stearns conference. He merely said he was confident the regulatory review was moving forward “in a timely manner.”
Harvard University's Berkman Center for Internet & Society, Google and the Family Online Safety Institute will host an afternoon discussion March 20 featuring Oxford University Web policy expert Jonathan Zittrain. He will preview his new book, "The Future of the Internet - And How To Stop It."
Stanford University law professor Larry Lessig will furnish a response. In February, Lessig flirted with a run for the seat of the late Rep. Tom Lantos, D-Calif., who passed away earlier this year. The special Democratic primary is April 8 and Lessig said he did not think he could win the election with six weeks of campaigning.
The invitation-only event will take place at Google's new Washington, DC headquarters at 1101 New York Ave., NW.
Watching the guerilla tactics of Hollywood paparazzi, as depicted on TMZ.com's star-stalking TV series, must have paid off. Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates was on Capitol Hill on Wednesday and after an hour-long stakeout, I nabbed a few precious moments of his time.
This excerpt from CongressDaily's AM edition is what you get when you hurl yourself into an elevator with the software pioneer (and second wealthiest man on the planet) and his visibly annoyed posse.
After addressing a closed-door Democratic Caucus lunch, Gates told CongressDaily that one of his companies' legislative priorities this year -- overhauling U.S. patent laws -- was "probably too complicated for a hallway conversation." The House passed a patent bill in September and a Senate version awaits floor action. Microsoft is part of the Coalition for Patent Fairness, which has been leading the charge to change the laws. When asked how much Capitol Hill had changed since Gates himself was a congressional page, he said: "A lot less than you think."
Gates was slated to speak to the Northern Virginia Technology Council on Thursday morning. Also, if you want to see excerpts of the House Science and Technology Hearing where Gates testified, click here.
As the net neutrality antics played out on Capitol Hill on Tuesday, Motion Picture Association of America chief Dan Glickman was making news of his own at an entertainment industry conference in Las Vegas. His speech at the ShoWest summit railed against net neutrality efforts, marking the first time he has spoken out on the issue on behalf of major movie studios.
"Government regulation of the Internet would impede our ability to respond to our customers in innovative ways, and it would impair the ability of broadband providers to address the serious and rampant piracy problems occurring over their networks," Glickman said. Read CongressDaily's story here and MPAA's press release here.
Internet billionaire and Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban's worlds are colliding (see "Seinfeld" reference here). The avid Web writer posed an interesting question on his personal blog on Monday: "Should bloggers be allowed in the Mavs locker room?"
"Conceptually it's not a big deal. A blogger, a beat writer, columnists. The medium they use to deliver their content should be irrelevant. No question about it," he writes. "But then there is the question of real world constraints." The area where media conducts interviews after a big game is pretty cramped as it is -- without bloggers in the mix.
Read the rest of his commentary here. It's probably something that sports teams -- major and minor -- have had to wrestle with as the new media writers and traditional scribes compete for space and time.
I just remembered an interesting bit of information -- Nine Inch Nails' latest album, "Ghosts I-IV," has been released under a Creative Commons [attribution non-commercial share alike] license. I heard the news from dinner companions at last week's Radio and Television News Directors Foundation gala but filed it away in my brain and it just rattled loose.
NIN's Web site says "an exciting partnership and experience regarding this release will be announced soon." According to the band: "This music arrived unexpectedly as the result of an experiment… The end result is a wildly varied body of music that we’re able to present to the world in ways the confines of a major record label would never have allowed."
Stupid Spitzer
Huffington Post/Bill Press
Here's one thing I'll never understand: Why do such smart men do such dumb things? Or maybe we should ask: Why don't smart men use their brain instead of some other part of their anatomy? It's a bipartisan malady. Mark Foley and Larry Craig. Gary Hart and Bill Clinton. And now, Eliot Spitzer - caught by a federal sting operation in the middle of a high-class prostitution ring.
Just. Keep. It. In. Your. Pants!
Fire Dog Lake
… As a resident of New York and someone who voted for Mr. Spitzer, I have a question for him: what the HELL were you thinking? You were the Attorney General, for crissakes, the self-righteous bulldog who chased down white collar criminals and prosecuted them. Successfully. You made yourself a whole lot of enemies on Wall Street who would kick up their well-polished heels if you were publicly scandalized. You won the Governor's mansion running on your record at the AG's office. Oh, did I mention the enemies you made on Wall Street?
Republicans Try, Unsuccessfully, To Hits Dems Over Spitzer
Crooks and Liars
Given the humiliating difficulties facing the National Republican Congressional Committee, I guess it’s not too surprising the gang would try to connect Democratic House candidates to Eliot Spitzer’s scandal, but this is just weak.
Left And Right Agree: Eliot Spitzer Must Go
Michelle Malkin
A survey of this morning’s lead editorials in the NY press shows a bipartisan consensus: Eliot Spitzer has to go. Both left and right bristled at Spitzer’s brief, arrogant, remorseless, and dishonest statement yesterday apologizing for his “private matter”–a very public matter of alleged law-breaking, breach of electoral trust, and political self-destruction.
This isn’t about tech policy nor is it particularly relevant to Washington, but it's news about my favorite band, so you'll have to just humor me. The Silicon Alley Insider reports that R.E.M. will debut their latest album on the social music discovery site and popular Facebook application iLike.
The album, "Accelerate," will launch March 24 on iLike but Warner Music Group won't sell the album until April. The Insider says that's significant because while plenty of artists have previewed work via various broadcast outlets (like XM and Sirius), a social network won out in this case. That could signal a significant shift in how music labels view promotions.
Meanwhile, I have go sign up for iLike and mark my calendar for March 24.
Big news from The New York Times:
ALBANY - Gov. Eliot Spitzer has been caught on a federal wiretap arranging to meet with a high-priced prostitute at a Washington hotel last month, according to a person briefed on the federal investigation. The wiretap recording, made during an investigation of a prostitution ring called Emperors Club VIP, captured a man identified as Client 9 on a telephone call confirming plans to have a woman travel from New York to Washington, where he had reserved a room.
The person briefed on the case identified Mr. Spitzer as Client 9. The governor learned that he had been implicated in the prostitution probe when a federal official contacted his staff last Friday, according to the person briefed on the case. The governor informed his top aides Sunday night and this morning of his involvement. He canceled his public events today and scheduled an announcement for this afternoon after inquiries from the Times. Read more.
The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children's CyberTipline, a system for reporting sexual exploitation of children, will celebrate 10 years of operation this week. The program has processed more than 570,000 reports of sex crimes against children over the past decade.
The tipline is staffed 24 hours a day, seven days a week by personnel in NCMEC's Exploited Child Division who analyze and develop the leads, which are then referred to law enforcement for investigation and prosecution.
"In the first 10 months of operation, the CyberTipline received a total of 4,500 reports," NCMEC President Ernie Allen said in a press release. "For the 12 months during 2007, that number exploded to 105,000." The increase in the number of reports of child pornography and online sexual solicitation of children is alarming, he added.
In addition to the reports received by the general public, the tipline also gets leads from U.S. based electronic service providers and each report may involve several dozen or even hundreds of images, NCMEC said. To date, ESPs have reported more than five million images.
The Vatican has updated its list of mortal sins, those grave sins for which believers will go to hell if they have not confessed and received forgiveness. The list, published in the Vatican newspaper, now includes pollution, drug-dealing, social injustice, and genetic/stem cell experiments.
News/satire site 236.com has a few more tech-related ones to add:
Mortal (deadly) sins:
Updating your blog too much
Using capital letters in personal email correspondence
iPhone worship
Venial (minor) sins:
Not updating your blog enough
Using "Wikipedia" or "YouTube" as a verb
Still not sure:
Buying stuff from J. Crew online, wearing it once, then returning it
Talking on cell phones in restaurants
Read the full list here.
The creative minds behind SaveNetRadio.org, a grassroots group formed to fight against recently instituted increases in fees paid to the music industry by Internet radio services, came close to winning a prestigious PR Week award on Thursday night but was beat out by Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co.
A team from Qorvis Communications, who created the campaign last spring for the Digital Music Association, was among several entries in the "crisis or issues management campaign of the year" category. The winners were announced at a ceremony at Tavern on the Green in Manhattan.
SaveNetRadio rallied online radio listeners, artists and independent labels and in a matter of weeks, began working to reach target audiences through online recruitment and branding. The campaign used a combination of traditional and new earned media and Internet social networks.
During a three month period beginning in April 2007, the coalition recruited over 2,000 webcasters, 6,000 artists and over 100,000 "listener activists." More than a million people used SaveNetRadio's Web site to correspond with their congressional representatives. That spurred the introduction of the Internet Radio Equality Act, which garnered 140 cosponsors.
Investor Warren Buffett is the richest man on the planet, Forbes magazine announced on Wednesday. His estimated $62 billion, up $10 billion from a year ago, puts him ahead of Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates, who was the richest for 13 straight years. Maybe he'll have to start moonlighting somewhere to make ends meet.
Gates, who will testify about U.S. innovation and competitiveness on Capitol Hill next week, is now worth $58 billion and is ranked third in the world. He is up $2 billion from a year ago.Mexican telecom tycoon Carlos Slim Helú is the world's second-richest man, with an estimated net worth of $60 billion.
According to the magazine, this was a record-breaking year for young billionaires, with Forbes finding 50 under the age of 40, 25 of whom are new to the list. Sixty-eight percent of these under-age-40 tycoons built their own 10-figure fortunes, including Google co-founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page and Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg.
Read more about this year's wealthiest by clicking here.
Cable news network CNN has expanded its iReport offering to include a standalone Web site (iReport.com). The new beta site is aimed at delivering "uncensored, user-powered news." "CNN built the tools, you take it from there," the front page boasts.
All the stories are user-generated and instant (CNN does not vet or verify their authenticity or accuracy before they post). Content with the "On CNN" stamp have been vetted and used in CNN news coverage.
Since the Web site's launch two weeks ago, the iReport has collected 1,200 contributors. A few examples: One user uploaded photos she took of Kosovo's declaration of independence; another snapped images from a memorial for students slain in a shooting at Southern Illinois University; and another wrote a story about autism in a virtual world.
The guys over at the Capitol Valley blog must have been seriously caffeinated Tuesday because they churned out a ton of content from the Institute for Politics, Democracy and the Internet's summit (On several occasions author Andrew Feinberg was snapping photos like a paparazzo who had just witnessed Britney's emergence from the psych ward).
The blog has a flood of commentary, interviews, audio files and pictures so it's worth a look if you weren’t able to make it to the Politics Online event. Several highlights: Yahoo debuts its new political ad platform; the questioning of Facebook's Adam Conner; and a moment with Internet visionary Tim Wu.
The recently launched blog covers (according to its 'about us' page) "technology and politics and whatever else the editors think will make you laugh, cry, or think during the work day."
Here is CongressDaily's coverage of the conference:
Panelists Say Internet Political Impact Only Likely To Grow
Report: Relatively Small Amount Spent On Web Campaigns
After almost a decade, leaders of the California-based group that administers the Internet-addressing system believe that change will do them good. That change, they say, is transitioning the coordination of technical functions of the Web to the private sector -- and some believe that loosening the reins of government is going to be a chore.
Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers Chairman Peter Dengate Thrush issued a statement last week that the United States "has been and remains a staunch advocate for an Internet that is based on values of freedom, enterprise and crucially coordination -- not control." His comments were read at a National Telecommunications and Information Administration summit on the topic.
Read CongressDaily's "Issue Of The Week" here.
MySpace.com co-founder Tom Anderson, the first one to "friend" anyone who creates an account on the popular social networking platform, sent a mass message to users late Sunday updating everyone on changes to the site's in privacy policy and terms of use.
Here's what landed in my inbox:
From: Tom
Date: Mar 2, 2008 11:57 PM
Subject: Updated Terms of Use and Privacy Policy
My lawyers tell me that I need to let every MySpace user know that MySpace's Terms of Use and Privacy Policy have been updated. Feel free to take a look at them: Terms of Use / Privacy Policy
Don't worry everyone received this message from me, and this doesn't mean we are charging. MySpace is still free!
An international mediator of Web address squabbles reported Wednesday that it presided over a total of 1,805 domain name disputes in 2007, up from 1,658 disputes in 2006. Cases filed with the National Arbitration Forum are heard and decided by independent panelists with specialized domain name, trademark, copyright and/or e-commerce experience.
According to the group, domain names with common extensions like .com, .net, and .org accounted for 1,775 filings and Web addresses with the .us extension accounted for 30 filings. Of the 1,805 disputes, panelists heard 1,391 cases; parties worked together to settle many others, officials said.
"Our dispute resolution program is available to deal quickly with the core problem: a domain name registered and being abused by a party who cannot claim legitimate rights to it," NAF's Kristine Dorrain said. Since the forum began taking cases in 1999, there have been 9,916 domain name complaints filed.
The Newspaper Association of America named the winners of its 2008 Digital Edge Awards this week. The ceremony took place on Monday at the NAA Marketing Conference in Orlando, Fla. The competition drew more than 200 entries from U.S. newspapers of all sizes.
Each entry was judged on strategy, creativity, impact in the local market and adaptability to other markets, according to the NAA. Judges name winners in three groups based on the newspaper's print circulation size. This year's Online Innovator Award went to Dan Shorter for his work at PalmBeachPost.com.
And the winners are (drum-roll please) ...
Best Overall Newspaper Web Site
LJWorld.com, The Lawrence Journal-World/The World Co. (circ. < 75,000)
Knoxnews.com, Knoxville News Sentinel (circ. 75,000 – 250,000)
PolitiFact.com, St. Petersburg Times and Congressional Quarterly (circ. > 250,000)
Best Local Guide or Entertainment Site
Lawrence.com, The World Co. (circ. < 75,000)
Austin360.com, Austin American-Stateman (circ. 75,000 – 250,000)
Vita.mn, Minneapolis Star Tribune (circ. > 250,000)
Read the full list of honorees here.
Television viewers, rejoice. The Hollywood writers' strike, which ended earlier this month, is now officially, totally, completely over and done with. Here's the proof -- a statement from the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers:
"The members of the Writers Guild of America have ratified their new labor agreement. Now that our industry is back in business, our goal is to collaborate with everyone in the industry - writers, directors, actors and stagehands alike - to produce the highest-quality entertainment products without any further interruption."
Read CongressDaily's coverage of the strike's conclusion here.
Surf on over to CongressDaily's TechCentral for these stories and more:
Royalty Fight Between Broadcasters, Music Industry On Tap
A months-long lobbying blitz surrounding the music industry's push to eliminate an exemption granted to over-the-air radio stations, which allows them to broadcast music without paying royalties, ramped up as broadcasters from around the country arrived in Washington for their annual leadership conference.
Martin Says FCC May Move Against Broadband Operators
CAMBRIDGE, Mass. -- FCC Chairman Kevin Martin told a packed hearing that his agency may take action to keep telecom giants from acting as gatekeepers of the Internet.
Stanford Prof Lessig Opts Against Bid For Lantos' Seat
Just days after he revealed he was considering a bid for Congress, Stanford University Law School Professor Lawrence Lessig announced that he would not run for the seat of the late Rep. Tom Lantos, D-Calif.
FTC Passes On Probe Of TV Copyright Warnings
The FTC will not pursue a formal investigation into a complaint lodged last summer by the Computer and Communications Industry Association that alleged professional sports leagues and media giants misrepresent their legal rights through deceptive and threatening statements, CongressDaily has learned.
A massive boycott by eBay sellers will conclude Monday after causing auction listings on the popular Web site to drop by as much as 13 percent since the strike started Feb. 18, according to third-party tracking firms. A company official told USA Today that internal statistics showed the boycott "has had no impact on our listings."
The protest was in opposition to pricing changes, which fluctuate seasonally and sometimes unpredictably, the newspaper reported. EBay announced that the cost to list items will be cut by 25-50 percent, but the commission that eBay charges for completed sales increased, starting last Wednesday. Read the article here.
During the last big boycott in 2005, sellers had little choice but to crawl back to eBay, TheStreet.com reported. Now, however, the marketplace is much broader, and sellers can push their wares on sites like Amazon or Google, the Web site said. That story can be found here.
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is headed to Asia this weekend and Yahoo CEO Jerry Yang wants her to take the message of Internet freedom there with her. A letter from Yang to Rice obtained by CongressDaily urges the U.S. government's top diplomat to help alleviate "the plight of political dissidents who have expressed their views over the Internet in China" and have been jailed. Yahoo took a beating at a high-profile November hearing by the House Foreign Affairs Committee about the company's connection to the imprisonment of a Chinese journalist. Read more in the PM edition.
With tax season looming, Americans have returns and refunds on their minds and scammers are taking advantage of that yet again, computer security firm MessageLabs warned in an e-mail blast on Thursday. This year, authenticity is the scammers' modus operandi as they have concocted fake Web pages that mimic those on IRS.gov.
January saw a spike in this type of spam, when the volume increased to 10 times the normal level and the percentage of IRS-related malware increased to 6 percent, the firm said. If a recipient clicks on a link and completes the form requesting personal and financial information, the site then redirects to the actual IRS Web site, which is unlike similar scams, MessageLabs analyst Paul Wood said.
Microsoft unveiled a set of sweeping changes to its technology and business practices on Thursday to increase the openness of its products and drive greater interoperability, opportunity and choice.
The changes are organized into interoperability principles and corresponding actions: 1) ensuring open connections; 2) promoting data portability; 3) enhancing support for industry standards; and 4) fostering more open engagement with customers and the industry, including open source communities, according to the software giant's Web site.
"These steps represent an important step and significant change in how we share information about our products and technologies," Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer said. For 33 years, the company has shared "a lot of information with hundreds of thousands of partners" but this announcement represents a key expansion "toward even greater transparency," he said.
The Association for Competitive Technology's Jonathan Zuck said the move "will undoubtedly put IBM and the rest of the ECIS [European Committee for Interoperable System] companies back on their heels." ACT is backed by Microsoft and other tech companies.
"Microsoft broadened its commitment to interoperability to include all of its high volume products, leaving these competitors with little if anything left to complain or sue about," Zuck wrote on ACT's blog. "After years of hounding Microsoft in the courts and in front of governments, these competitors are now confronted with the reality that Microsoft has raised the bar on interoperability, and they too might have to measure up."
As tax season looms, an increasing number of people plan to file their federal taxes online, according to The Conference Board. Forty percent plan to file online, up from 34 percent three years ago and more than two-thirds of consumers report having filed online for three years or more, up from less than 55 percent in 2005.
"Given the many online tax filing alternatives and payment options, such as IRS E-file, Free File and direct deposit options, it’s not surprising that every year an increasing number of consumers are filing electronically,” said Conference Board Consumer Research Center Director Lynn Franco. “Once they file online, they tend to stay online.”
The think tank's survey showed that more consumers are comfortable filing their taxes online, compared to other financial transactions. Half are "extremely concerned" when banking or paying bills on the Web while 44 percent express similar concerns when filing taxes online. Read more here.
Long Island University has announced the winners of the George Polk Awards, which recognize media coverage that exposes corporate and government misfeasance, and a popular political blogger is among the honorees. Polk was a CBS reporter who was slain while covering the civil war in Greece in the 1940s.
The Polk Award for legal reporting will go to Joshua Micah Marshall, editor and publisher of Talking Points Memo. His writing "led the news media in coverage of the politically motivated dismissals of United States attorneys across the country," according to a university press release. Marshall and his staff "connected the dots and found a pattern of federal prosecutors being forced from office for failing to do the Bush administration's bidding."
As part of the prize, Marshall will take part in the annual George Polk Seminar on April 16 alongside other winners. The panel will explore the topic: "Strategies – Old and New – for Groundbreaking Journalism." The official awards luncheon will occur the following day. Read more about the award (and winners) here.
Most Internet sex offenders are not adults who target young children by posing as another youth, luring children to meetings, and then abducting or forcibly raping them, according to new a new study by the Crimes Against Children Research Center at the University of New Hampshire.
The bulk of online sex offenders are adults who target teens and seduce victims into sexual relationships. They take time to develop the trust of victims, so the youth see the relationships as romances or sexual adventures, according to the analysis published in the new issue of American Psychologist, the journal of the American Psychological Association.
This topic was front-and-center in the 109th Congress when the House Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations held a series of hearings on Internet-related crime during which members heard testimony from a host of government officials, industry experts and other child advocates.
Youth most vulnerable to online sex offenders have histories of sexual or physical abuse, family problems, and tendencies to take risks both on- and offline, researchers said. The study was based on three surveys -- two involving phone interviews of 3,000 Internet users between the ages of 10 and 17 and one involving 612 interviews with federal, state and local law enforcement officials.
"To prevent these crimes, we need accurate information about their true dynamics," lead author Janis Wolak said in a press release. "The things that we hear and fear and the things that actually occur may not be the same. The newness of the environment makes it hard to see where the danger is."
Steven Hirsch, the self-titled "King of Porn," planned to tell an audience at Yale University on Saturday that responsible companies in the adult industry have gone to great lengths to deter minors from accessing inappropriate content but major search engines have not.
"None of the search engines and portals, but particularly Yahoo and Google, has taken any significant steps in this direction," the co-founder of adult film studio Vivid Entertainment said in a press release previewing his speech.
Hirsch also said encouraged Internet service providers to "more vigorously promote their filtering and age verification programs to their subscribers." ISPs as well as payment systems and adult content producers "all need to be more responsible with regard to allowing X-rated material to be obtained by non-adults," he noted in lecture remarks.
Vivid became one of the most famous adult studios in the world by making a concerted effort to become more accepted by mainstream media and by capitalizing on advances in technology, he said. "We always believed it was important to stay on top of all new technologies," he said.
Jason Kottke muses on his blog about the abundance of Web denizens building "single serving sites," which he defines as sites "comprised of a single page with a dedicated domain name and do only one thing."
Some fun and interesting examples provided by the blogger:
Barack Obama Is Your New Bicycle
Sometimes Red, Sometimes Blue
Is Lost a Repeat?
D-E-F-I-N-I-T-E-L-Y
Are We At War With Iran?
The Abe Vigoda Status Page
Is Paris In Jail Right Now?
Am I Awesome?
The high-tech PR gurus at 463 Communications have hired a new partner for the bicoastal company's San Francisco office. Hani Durzy joins Sean Garrett who has been holding down the fort all by himself on the West Coast as the D.C. operation has grown and grown.
Garrett wrote on his blog that "once we got past Hani's obnoxious Red Sox Nation-isms, we knew that he would be the perfect compliment to our team and a great asset as we grow in the Bay Area." Durzy was most recently eBay's communications director, which prompted this e-mail exchange:
To: Sean Garrett
From: Andrew Noyes
Sent: Mon 11/02/2008 2:09 PM
Subject: Good get!
Did you buy your new colleague on eBay? If so, what was the highest bid? Heh!
From: Sean Garrett
To: Andrew Noyes
Sent: Mon 11/02/2008 5:27 PM
Subject: RE: Good get!
Zing! That is our whole plan. Buy low and sell high.
Former Technology Daily editor Danny Glover? He landed a sweet new gig as executive producer for Eyeblast.tv, an online video Web site with a conservative twist. The site, a project of the Media Research Center, makes him "officially part of the vast right-wing conspiracy" -- or at least that's what he joked in a Monday e-mail.
Eyeblast, which is in the soft-launch phase, lets users post content, rate videos, make comments, create profiles and groups, join groups, send messages, store favorite videos and more. My former boss tells me that an official launch and marketing blitz is a few weeks off.
Not only has Danny been keeping busy with that, he spent the better part of three days at the Conservative Political Action Conference, speaking and networking. GOP bloggers, rejoice. Liberal bloggers condemn. He seems to have found an exciting new venture and we wish him all the best. Although, his rant about "liberal newsrooms" is a bit much.
The 50th annual Grammy Awards aired on CBS on Sunday night, live from Los Angeles. But it looks like someone over at the Recording Academy's Web department was asleep at the switch. About 30 minutes into the show, I visited Grammy.com and was surprised to see the site looking a little empty. The team must've been updating the site to reflect the evening's winners, but next time maybe they should do their tinkering with a page that isn't live.
The Associated Press reports that the Writers Guild of America "moved swiftly Sunday toward a resolution of its three-month-old strike, with guild leaders deciding to recommend the contract to members and ask them to vote on a quick end to the walkout." Membership meetings will be held Tuesday in New York and Los Angeles.
Under the proposed contract, film and TV writers, who previously got nothing for content streamed online, will get a fixed residual payment of $1,200 a year for one-hour shows in the first two years of the new contract. In the third year they would get residuals equal to 2 percent of the revenue received by the program's distributor, according to the Los Angeles Times.
"This is the best deal this guild has bargained for in 30 years," said Patric Verrone, president of the guild's West Coast branch. See the summary of the tentative contract here.
The New York Times' City Room blog reports that Amber Lee Ettinger, star of the hit YouTube music video "I Got a Crush on Obama," didn't vote for the Illinois senator on Tuesday.
According to the paper's Jennifer 8. Lee:
On Tuesday night, City Room ran into Ms. Ettinger at an election-watching party in Greenwich Village and asked how things went at the polls. “I didn’t get a chance to vote today because I’m not registered to vote in New York,” she said. So where is Obama Girl registered to vote? “New Jersey.” Um, but didn’t New Jersey also hold a primary? True. The problem, she explained, was that she was sick in New York City and was unable to get back across the Hudson River to the polls in Jersey City.
From a New America Foundation press release:
The New America Foundation, a nonpartisan ten-year-old think tank headquartered in Washington D.C., announced today the appointment of Dr. Eric Schmidt, the chairman and chief executive of Google, Inc., as the new chairman of New America's Board of Directors.
Dr. Schmidt, who has been a member of the New America board since the policy institute's founding, will succeed James Fallows, the author and national correspondent of the Atlantic. Fallows will remain on New America's board after the transition, which will take place on June 1st; Fallows was New America's founding board chairman.
"New America is a place where first-rate scholars are producing concrete, creative solutions for some of our nation's biggest challenges," said Dr. Schmidt. "I'm proud to be associated with the Foundation and look forward to helping shape its work and future."
Read more here.
The Service Employees International Union and League of Young Voters unveiled a curiously named awareness campaign on Wednesday focused on the dangers associated with escalating debt. The Web-based "Keep It In Your Pants" initiative offers a $5,000 prize to the best student-made public service announcement on the topic.
"Credit card debt can ruin your life, spreading and growing like a disease," said SEIU's Stephen Lerner. The effort is aimed at warning young people of the dangers of "debt disease" and urging them to "protect themselves the same way they would against any other dangerous and contagious social epidemic."
Online video submissions of 30-60 seconds are being accepted at www.KeepItInYourPants.org until March 12. Semifinalists will be announced April 2 and the winner will be announced at a red-carpet event on April 23.
(Photo Credit: Andrew Noyes)
Dell Computer CEO Michael Dell (center) joined a panel of high-tech executives and analysts to unveil a new energy efficiency study in Washington on Wednesday. Read more in CongressDaily's PM Edition.
The big news surrounding Sunday night's Super Bowl -- aside from the Giants upsetting the Patriots 17-14 -- was the surprising display of high-tech advertisements interspersed with the standard beer, babe and car commercials.
There were around 50 ads this year, which cost companies an estimated $2.7 million per 30-second spot. Tech firms that paid big bucks to get a piece of the action included Careerbuilder.com, Cars.com, Dell, E-Trade, Garmin, GoDaddy.com, Sales Genie and T-Mobile.
Here are my top two picks:
Dell Computer Product Red Super Bowl Ad: XPS Laptop Draws Cheers
Add to My Profile | More Videos
eTrade Super Bowl Commercial: Talking Baby Rents a Clown
Add to My Profile | More Videos
The folks over at the Electronic Frontier Foundation grace the cover of the current issue of California Lawyer magazine for their legacy of advocacy work and their current battle against AT&T over its reported role in warrantless government spying. The 3,000-plus word article is worth a read. The entire story can be found here.
Here's an interesting (and controversial) idea from Internet billionaire Mark Cuban: "Whether sold digitally or by CD, the reality of today's music and theatrical release market is such that music from movies would generate more total dollars for everyone if it were given away with the purchase of a movie ticket."
He goes on to write on his Blog Maverick Web site that releasing a major motion picture costs a lot of money and the industry has trouble figuring out what part of the marketing budget actually drives people to theaters.
Cuban's proposal: "One way to entice people to get off the couch and attend more movies is to increase the value to customers. The most cost effective opportunity to increase value is to give away items to theater goers that have a very high perceived value, but a very lost cost of distribution." Read more about his idea here.
My former colleague Drew Clark launched his new Web venture on Thursday -- BroadbandCensus.com -- a site aimed at providing everyday Internet users with the ability to learn about broadband availability, competition, speeds and prices.
"Bell and cable companies have, thus far, generally been unwilling to provide the public with information about which local areas they serve. BroadbandCensus.com hopes that the creation of this new site, and with its easy ability for Internet users to 'take the broadband census,' will change this dynamic," he wrote on his personal site.
His upstart has the financial backing of the Benton Foundation and the Pew Internet and American Life Project has contracted with him to gather information about users' broadband experiences and incorporate those findings into its annual Internet report.
Meanwhile, the FCC and Agriculture Department debuted a new, online resource for those in rural America looking to bring the benefits of broadband services to their communities.
The site provides information about various technology platforms used to provide broadband service; how to access spectrum necessary for delivery of wireless broadband services; government funding for broadband services; and data on broadband deployment.
The American Civil Liberties Union has launched a clever campaign to draw attention to government and private sector data-collection activities that they believe could institute a 24-hour surveillance society.
A new animated video on the group's Web site warns that ordering pizza could be hazardous to your health -- and privacy. In the skit, a man orders a pie on the phone and Pizza Palace instantly knows everything about him -- from his work and home addresses and phone numbers to his travel habits, magazine subscriptions and blood pressure.
The ACLU claims that intelligence initiatives like the now-defunct MATRIX (the Multistate Anti-TeRrorism Information eXchange) and the FBI's Carnivore are destroying citizens' privacy. "They want to track your purchases, your medical records, and even your relationships," the ACLU argues. Makes you wonder how much your Domino's delivery guy really knows -- other than the fact that you like extra cheese and black olives.
The Electronic Frontier Foundation is encouraging its supporters to turn to photo-sharing Web site Flickr to oppose foreign intelligence reform legislation that that would grant telecommunications companies legal protections for helping the Bush administration spy on U.S. citizens without warrants.
"Congress needs to hear from citizens like you!" EFF's Cindy Cohn said on the watchdog group's blog. A quick check on Friday afternoon showed that more than 80 people had posted photo messages on Flickr -- and some images were more creative than others. Kids, pets and activists of all shapes and sizes uploaded pics.
EFF partnered with People for the American Way to launch StoptheSpying.org as a catalyst for action. On the site, the groups are also urging people to send in 60-second digital videos telling their members of Congress to oppose telecom immunity.
A new documentary on government suppression of information has generated some buzz at the Sundance Film Festival in recent days. The aptly titled "Secrecy" was made by Harvard University professors Peter Galison and Robb Moss and has been screened a half-dozen times at the Park City, Utah cinematic carnival.
The festival's online movie guide calls the film "stylistically elegant and provocative" and says the documentary takes audiences "inside the inverted world of government secrecy." Its creators try to answer the questions: When does security erode, rather than enhance, democracy? Can burying too much information actually undermine national security?
"We live in a world where the production of secret knowledge dwarfs the production of open knowledge," the directors note on the movie's Web site. "In a single recent year the U.S. classified about five times the number of pages added to the Library of Congress."
It's no secret that Sundance appreciates the film. It has been nominated for one of festival's top honors -- a grand jury prize.
How do celebrities, executives and politicians wind up with their names used as Web addresses and on Web sites without their consent? How do they get out of that sticky situation? The D.C. Bar Association tackled that topic on Thursday at a lunchtime briefing.
Neil Brown, a prominent lawyer and former member of the Australian House of Representatives, keynoted the event. He was expected to explain how the Uniform Domain Name Dispute Resolution Policy, which took effect in 1999, is used to address the problem.
Brown, who works with the World Intellectual Property Organization, discussed what must be proved by celebrities and others to win a domain name feud. WIPO statistics show the number of complaints filed against cyber-squatters under the UDRP hit a record high in 2007 with 1,824 filings. In 2008, there have already been 108 complaints.
I never looked to the 80s pop band Duran Duran for profound musical inspiration (hit singles included "Girls on Film" and "Hungry Like the Wolf") but now I'm certainly not awarding them any medals of melodic valor.
On the way to work on Wednesday, I heard a radio interview with the British boppers who recently put out a new album called "Red Carpet Massacre." In the XM Satellite Radio spot, they explain that the inspiration for their song "Zoom In" is the popular virtual world Second Life.
Apparently they were somewhat addicted to playing the computer game, which boasts 20 million online members, as they were coming up with songs for the album and that song was the result. Here's an excerpt:
"Now she arrives
In a flaming crash
Like a falling star
Heading straight for the dive
Gonna make some cash
With the avatar"
"We're not alone
In the second life
There are millions like us
Right here
In the stones
In the air too bright
All the new insiders"
Poetic? Prophetic? Pathetic? You decide. All I'll say is that I prefer the single "Falling Down" because it doesn’t hurt my ears.
Heads up! There's another progressive news Web site making waves on the Internets as the race for the White House heats up. Our newsroom received a manila envelope on Tuesday from something called 236.com. The t-shirt enclosed boasted the frontal catchphrase "236: Some of the news/most of the time." On the back: "Tagg Romney is a stupid name." The aforementioned is one of GOP presidential contender Mitt Romney's sons.
Upon further exploration, we found that 236.com is a "co-production between the gigantic, vaguely Death Star-like IAC, and The Huffington Post, a progressive news hub where outraged people go in order to get more outraged before going to have dinner at Nobu."
The site's "corporate overlords" are Arianna Huffington (publisher); Sarah Bernard (president); and Michael Jackson (IAC's head of interactive programming, not the embattled pop star).
One thing is for sure -- the headline writers at 236.com are having fun. A few eye-catching samples: "The Economy's Passed Out, Naked, And Covered With Crap" and "Fred Thompson Wakes Up, Drops Out Of Race, Goes Back To Sleep."
I wonder what the folks over at 463 Communications... or the PR pros at 133 Public Affairs... think of the new numerical kid on the block.
Stanford University law professor Lawrence Lessig announced on his blog last week that after "a productive and valuable conversation" with his publisher, , Random House has agreed to make available "The Future of Ideas" under a Creative Commons license. His 2001 tome can be downloaded here.
The book hit store shelves two weeks after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks and Lessig said he is "glad it now has a chance to flow a bit more freely." The development means that all four of the CC co-founder's books are licensed under the unique content-sharing regime.
Consumer Electronics Association President Gary Shapiro finally got his chance to take on CNN’s Lou Dobbs during a live debate on the cable network on Thursday night. Since many tech policy watchers were at Google's Washington office launch party as the TV drama unfolded, here's a YouTube video of the showdown.
Shapiro previously condemned Dobbs for making "anti-trade comments" and "his refusal to grant equal time to opposing viewpoints." The newsman quipped: "I don’t know why you want to debate me, but fire at will."
Former Homeland Security Department Secretary Tom Ridge told a roomful of lawyers on Friday that despite his prior post within the Bush administration, he has been pulled aside for secondary screening at airport security checkpoints two dozen times.
"You ought to see the expression on the [faces of the] people at TSA when they put me in that plexiglass lane," he said during a morning keynote at an American Bar Association conference. "Some think I'm a plant and that I'm testing their procedures out." Ridge said fellow passengers have stopped to gawk (and laugh) when they see him being detained.
After a 25-year government career, adjusting to life as a public citizen has been difficult, he joked. The morning after Ridge left his DHS job, he recalls waking up to find that his kids took one car, his wife took the other and he had no way to get around. When he asked to borrow his son's vehicle, Ridge was advised: "Watch where you park it and don’t forget to fill it up with gas when you bring it home."
The major movie studios' mouthpiece will move its 150-employee Los Angeles operation later this month to office space in the Sherman Oaks Galleria. Starting Jan. 22, the Motion Picture Association of America can be found in the same complex as Ben & Jerry's, the Cheesecake Factory and Starbucks. Don't worry, there's a 24-Hour Fitness to work off that dessert.
"As the MPAA has evolved into an even more global operation and adopted new approaches to fighting piracy which require new technological capability, we have sought office space that meets different needs," MPAA chief Dan Glickman said. The new location will afford staffers "a larger, freer working environment" and new screening rooms for the panel that classifies and rates movies.
For the past 15 years, the MPAA's L.A. offices have been headquartered in Encino, along with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers. AMPTP will make the move to the new digs along with several components of the Directors Guild of America. A division of Warner Bros. is located in the same complex.
After entering the blogosphere this summer and battling hackers who tried to post movie-copying code, the Library of Congress is now braving the social networking realm of online photo-sharing.
On Wednesday, the government institution announced it is making more than 3,000 photos available on the commercial picture-swap site Flickr. The library spokesman Matt Raymond explained that the Flickr page dedicated to the library's collections will only contain images "for which no copyright restrictions are known to exist."
Raymond is encouraging people to tag, comment and make notes on the photos -- the typical Flickr protocols. "The real magic comes when the power of the Flickr community takes over," he said.
Many library photos are missing key caption information like where the photo was shot and who is in the picture. If Flickr members privy to that kind of information type in messages, the comments "can potentially enhance the quality of the bibliographic records for the images."
As part of the project, Flickr has created a new layout for publicly-held photographic collections called “The Commons.” Flickr states on the page: "Hopefully, this pilot can be used as a model that other cultural institutions would pick up, to share and redistribute the myriad collections held by cultural heritage institutions all over the world." -- Aliya Sternstein
With immigration as a top issue in the 2008 presidential campaign, the Americans for Legal Immigration Political Action Committee launched a Web site on Wednesday to draft controversial CNN anchor Lou Dobbs as a presidential contender.
Dobbs has criticized U.S. firms that send jobs overseas and was challenged to a live, televised debate on the impact of international trade on the U.S. economy by Consumer Electronics Association chief Gary Shapiro last fall.
According to ALIPAC, Dobbs "has earned national recognition for his tough stance on border security and curbing illegal immigration" and has encouraged voters to register as independents. The campaign site is www.LouDobbsforPresident.org.
"Lou Dobbs could run and win because he could easily raise the funds and grassroots support he needs to be a historic and viable candidate quickly," ALIPAC's William Gheen said in a press release. "The public is eager to rebuke the DC status quo and would quickly rally to Dobbs."
(Photo Credit: Andrew Noyes)
Google invited a handful of reporters over to see their new Washington office on Monday afternoon -- a sneak peek before their big housewarming party later in the week. The space, which is smaller and less ornate than the mother ship in Mountain View, Calif., is still a feast for the senses. Between the catered lunches, snacks, videogames, massage chair and music, I don’t know how those people get any work done. Follow the jump for more photos!
Eric Goldman of the High-Tech Law Institute at Santa Clara University has posted his annual cyberlaw recap at InformIT. His #1 topic: "The Power to Tax is the Power to Destroy: Utah Tries to Tax Keyword Advertising Into Oblivion."
Goldman, who authors the Technology & Marketing Law Blog, writes:
"The state of Utah has an unrivaled record of Internet legislative incompetence, but they topped themselves in March when they passed the Utah Trademark Protection Act. This law set up a registry for trademarks and other identifiers and banned third party use of these registered marks as triggers for keyword advertising.
It's been hard to pin down exactly why Utah passed this law. Once the publicity spotlight shone on this law, everyone in Utah involved with the law started finger-pointing, making it difficult to do after-the-fact forensics. As far as I've been able to deduce, Utah hoped to get a little slice of the massive online advertising industry for itself--Utah could charge trademark owners to register their marks and charge online advertisers to check the registry, allowing Utah to tax online advertising even if none of the players (the advertisers, the keyword vendor and the trademark owner) had any relationship with Utah.
We may never know if this law would survive a legal challenge because Utah legislators started backpedaling almost immediately since their actions were publicized. In the end, this particular law is almost certain to fade away quietly--good news, to be sure, but a temporary win at best. The same drivers--greedy and incompetent legislators eyeing a big fat chunk of economic activity--almost ensure that other legislators will try again, making another battle inevitable unless preemptive federal legislation is passed."
Read the rest of his list here.
It's not often that we at the Watergate get to blog about our artsy neighbor, the Kennedy Center, but today is one of those days. I just received a packet of information about a February festival that showcases the richness and diversity of Japan -- and that, of course, includes technology.
Part of the month-long "Japan: Culture + Hyper Culture" extravaganza is an exhibit called "Robotopia Rising," which will highlight the science and culture of Japanese robotics. The display, which runs Feb. 7-17, will let guests get up close and personal with some of the most sophisticated robots in the world.
Kokoro's astonishingly human-like Actroid DER2 will greet visitors throughout the festival with a great range of vocabulary, gestures and facial expressions. Mitsubishi's Wakamaru, which has a vocabulary of 10,000 Japanese words, will also be schmoozing with attendees. Robots created by Honda and Toyota will take part in daily demonstrations -- and one will even play the trumpet for you.
For more information, visit this Web site.
Here's a heads up for Technology Daily subscribers. Throughout this week, the PM Edition is running a series of articles that examine the impact of Microsoft's epic antitrust battle nearly a decade after it began. The retrospective comes as the software company's settlement with the federal government and nine state attorneys general is set to expire. In addition to the articles, the package also features profiles of key players, audio from the landmark trial, a timeline of events, and related video clips. [Click here for more].
Information security provider Entrust e-mailed me its recommendations for Santa's 2007 "Naughty & Nice" list and I thought it might be worth a mention. Some excerpts:
Naughty
U.K. HM Revenue & Customs. More than 25 million records of children were lost in a breach that affected 40 percent of the British population.
Consumers responding to phishing e-mails. Online "phishing" and man-in-the-middle attacks continue to rise in profitability because consumers aren't paying attention to red flags.
TJ Maxx. Forget Santa's naughty list, they're already reaping the horror of their own insecurity in the court system. A lump of coal might be a welcome relief.
Nice
PKI [Public key infrastructure]. The 1990's solution that looked for a problem finally has found more than a dozen and come full circle. This technology is more pervasive than ever with more PK-aware applications on the rise.
Banks that step up security. U.S. Bank, Bank of New Zealand and others are increasing online security, adding things like picture replay, question-and-answer, grid cards and fraud detection solutions.
Smart, safe surfing. Let's hear it for online retailers that use encryption to secure transactions.
European Competition Commissioner Neelie Kroes topped Ethisphere's "100 Most Influential People in Business Ethics." "Not only did Kroes levy record fines across Europe for antitrust cases, but she proved to American titans such as Intel, Apple and Microsoft that European rules should not be taken lightly," the magazine said.
Kroes is making an early case for leading the list again next year "with her plans to 'fight like hell' to stop price-fixing and ensure companies get the message," as well as indications that she plans on raising fines for antitrust violations even higher next year.
Other notables who made the list include Dell Computer Chairman Michael Dell; Computer Associates Senior Vice President Patrick Gnazzo; Hewlett-Packard Chief Ethics & Compliance Officer Jonathan Hoak; and Xerox CEO Anne Mulcahy.
The Boston Red Sox may want to make sure Curt Schilling has a good keyboard wrist rest. Because at the rate he's been blogging lately, the guy might come down with carpal-tunnel syndrome before the season starts.
Schilling, one of the key players on Boston's world championship teams in 2004 and 2007, has been using his 38 Pitches blog as his personal soapbox for a while now. But the presidential race and former Senate Majority Leader George Mitchell's recent report on steroids in baseball has forced him to crank his blogging up a notch.
His sprawling post on Wednesday about steroids clocked in at 3,676 words. He penned another entry earlier this month endorsing Sen. John McCain's presidential bid that went over the 1,000 word limit -- roughly twice the length of the story I'll have in this afternoon's edition of Technology Daily.
As I've mentioned on this blog before, I really don't like the Sox. So I can't say I'll be torn up if Schilling needs to sit out a start or two next season because he blogged too hard for his own good. But I'll advise him nonetheless that it's a dangerous world out there. After all, Detroit Tigers fireballer Joel Zumaya once got so into the "Guitar Hero" videogame that he rocked himself out of the American League Championship Series with a forearm injury.
Blog safely, Curt. And if you plan on writing more about the presidential race, it's Mike Huckabee not Huckaby. -- Michael Martinez
Remember how cool it was when Time magazine's "Person of the Year" was "You?" Remember the cover story that said the World Wide Web in 2006 had become a precious tool for bringing together the contributions of millions of people and making them matter? Gosh, that was nice. We really liked that.
Well, the 2007 "Person of the Year" is Vladimir Putin. The magazine said his final year as Russia's president was his most successful: "At home, he secured his political future. Abroad, he expanded his outsize -- if not always benign -- influence on global affairs."
Not a bad choice, but c'mon, plenty of fun tech-related people made news in the past 12 months. It would have been great to have claimed the cover yet again. Was Vint Cerf a contender? He's been called the "Father of the Internet" and his lengthy tenure as chairman of the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers ended recently.
Runners up were former Vice President Al Gore, author J.K. Rowling, Chinese leader Hu Jintao, and U.S. military commander David Petraeus.
Running behind on your holiday shopping? Got a political junkie in the family? A quick trip to eBay might help you snag that emergency gift you're looking for.
For starters, there are currently more than 230 online auctions pending for Barack Obama-related goodies. You can scoop up some Obama pins on the cheap for about $10. But if you're buying for someone with a more international taste, you might want to consider these Obama-inspired Russian nesting dolls.
And if you've got the cash to spend, you can always throw down for the rights to an Obama domain name. The going price for ProObama.com? A cool grand. But that's not even that pricey, when you think about it. The enterprising vendor who goes by the name "festivusmaximus" is pawning the domain name MittRomneysDog.com for five times that. The seller even included a link to the Time magazine story that inspired the domain name. How Christmassy.
Hillary Clinton fans might be intrigued by this snazzy nutcracker modeled after the former first lady. But if you're part of the "Stop Hillary Clinton (One Million Strong AGAINST Hillary)" Facebook group, this stress-relief squishy toy might be more your speed. These Clinton clay pigeons also have stocking-stuffer potential for the gun-toting conservative types out there.
Here are a few more quirky gift items I found in my eBay travels...
Continue reading Perfect Gifts For The Politico In Your Life.
Google's growing Washington staff started their first week of work at their new headquarters on Monday. Sources tell Tech Daily Dose that it's a big improvement from the team's temporary space on Pennsylvania Avenue. I'd been in the old office a time or two and it seemed nice (but uncharacteristically bland for the colorful Web colossus).
The new address is 1101 New York Ave., NW and Googlers tell me that they plan on doing a media tour of the facility in early 2008. The building looks pretty sleek from the outside but I can't imagine that it stacks up to the Googleplex in Mountain View, Calif.
Here are a few amenities that the mothership offers (ripped straight from Google's Web site) that I'm unrealistically hoping they gave their policy squad in the nation's capital:
▪ Recreation facilities: Workout room with weights and rowing machine, locker rooms, washers and dryers, massage room, assorted video games, Foosball, baby grand piano, pool table, ping pong, roller hockey twice a week in the parking lot.
▪ Google Café - Healthy lunches and dinners for all staff. Stations include "Charlie’s Grill," "Back to Albuquerque," "East Meets West" and "Vegheads." Outdoor seating for sunshine daydreaming.
▪ Snack Rooms - Bins packed with various cereals, gummi bears, M&Ms, toffee, licorice, cashew nuts, yogurt, carrots, fresh fruit and other snacks. Dozens of different drinks including fresh juice, soda and make-your-own cappuccino.
It's Friday afternoon and the Technology Daily staff was in desperate need of a sugar fix. Lo and behold, a bag of holiday cheer appears. AT&T branded cookies! Good work, guys. Follow the jump for another shot of my colleague Michael Martinez chowing down.
I saw this on the 463 Blog and couldn't help but post an excerpt:
Cut to Washington lawyer talking to a Senator at cocktail hour...
Lawyer: "Senator, you know how kids use social networking sites to connect with each other on the Internet?"
Senator: "Yes, I believe my grandkids in college are on SpaceBook. I've heard that there are racy photos of kids up there drinking. I told my daughter that she needs to be watching their Internets..."
Lawyer: "Well, um, excuse me, sir ... my nephew has a page where he used it to get support for an endangered newt. And, from what I understand, my niece gets to communicate with other students her age from all over the world."
Senator: "Exactly, I hear that that there are racy photos of kids drinking and in their bathing suits on that MyFace. It must be the influence of those Europeans, or maybe it's those..."
Read the full post here.
One of the federal government's oldest continuing programs, Job Corps, has for the first time turned to video-sharing site YouTube to provide parents and students with information about what the initiative has to offer.
Job Corps, which was part of President Lyndon Johnson's " War on Poverty," began in 1964. It is currently managed by the Labor Department as a no-cost education and vocational training effort that helps 16-24 year olds secure job opportunities across the country.
Remarks made by Job Corps Director Esther Johnson as well as testimonials by program participants Tiffany Williams and Kelvin McJunkin and alumnus David Bol were uploaded to YouTube last week, officials said. The footage is from a Job Corps summit held in October.
In addition, a public service announcement was sent to radio stations around the country, Johnson said in an e-mail. The outreach effort fulfills a promise she made to "do whatever we could to spread the word and market the wonderful opportunities that Job Corps offers its students."
The Justice Department on Monday unveiled $1.7 million in funds for national, regional, state and local organizations and agencies that assist victims of identity theft and financial fraud. Read more about it in Technology Daily's PM Edition.
Betsy Broder, who oversees the FTC's ID theft efforts, lauded the grant-giving, told us that she met with and is providing guidance to the handful of groups that got the money. Every year, her agency responds to about 250,000 ID theft victims, she said.
Many consumers are "able to respond quickly and effectively themselves to recover from ID theft" but others aren’t as lucky, Broder noted. The grant program "contributes to the resources available for those consumers who need help" to recover from ID theft.
While certain forms of ID theft do not always have a financial impact, resolving issues can be time consuming and stressful for consumers, added Andy Serwin, a partner at Foley & Lardner who focuses on privacy and security matters.
Justice's focus on prevention is important, he said: "While identity theft can result from actions by third-parties, in many cases consumers themselves create conditions that increase their odds of being a victim of identity theft."
Ed Mierzwinski, consumer program director for the U.S. Public Interest Research Group, also weighed in. He said the grants will "provide critical assistance to some of the small organizations helping ID theft victims clear their names."
"In the long run, the solution to identity theft is to hold data collectors – banks, stores and government agencies – accountable so that they protect information better in the first place," Mierzwinski said.
The Justice Department's top antitrust official told a telecommunications policy and regulation conference on Wednesday that the industry is "one that has had some major ups and downs but is certainly one that is not going away."
Assistant Attorney General Thomas Barnett cited the "steady progress" and breakneck innovation that has been made in recent years in the delivery of data, voice and video. He also noted the promise of power companies' foray into the broadband game and mobile players' attempts to offer faster Web access. "It is a very exciting industry," he said.
To illustrate how times have changed, Barnett showed a photo of a "Star Trek" communicator, which he said "seemed like a pretty neat device at the time." Nowadays, that fictional tool doesn’t compare to "your BlackBerry or Razr phone," he said.
Read more coverage of the Practising Law Institute's symposium in Technology Daily's PM Edition.
Some in the blogosphere are abuzz this week over reports that a piece of monitoring software created by the Motion Picture Association of America had been taken offline, presumably due to copyright violations.
The trade group has made available its "University Toolkit," which is in a testing or beta stage, to schools around the country to install on their networks to flag illegal downloading.
SlashDot reports that the software is rooted in a type of operating system that requires those who make a program based on the code to release and license it. The MPAA reportedly refused requests to provide its source code, so a developer sent a takedown notice.
MPAA spokesman Seth Oster told Technology Daily on Tuesday that he believes his group has done nothing to warrant the action, which is a protection built into the Digital Millennium Copyright Act.
"The MPAA has a large target on its back," he said, noting that the group frequently gets complaints about alleged copyright infringement and most don't pan out. "It's not an unusual occurrence at all," Oster said.
Still, if someone raises a potential problem, the MPAA investigates, he said. Officials are doing that now and in the meantime decided to take the toolkit offline as a precautionary measure. "We have no reason to believe [the infringement accusation] has any significance at all," he said.
On Monday, Washington Post gossip column "The Reliable Source" blabbed about a $200 per person weekend fundraiser for New Orleans entertainers sponsored by the Future of Music Coalition.
The "Hope for Home" event was described by the newspaper as "just a casual little backyard shindig with live music by REM's Mike Mills." Mills, whose band is one of my faves, has been involved in the artists-rights group's events before.
The headliner, according to the paper, was blues pianist and singer Al Johnson. The crooner, who lost his own home to Hurricane Katrina, performed "Blueberry Hill," "The Twist" and his own "Carnival Time," a Mardi Gras mainstay.
"Protecting the personal information of customers, clients, and employees is good business," the FTC says. That's why the has unveiled a new online tutorial to alert businesses and other organizations to practical and low- or no-cost ways to keep data secure.
The resource, which is available here, takes a plain-language, interactive approach to securing sensitive information, the FTC said Monday. Although the specifics are different for each firm, the basic principles are the same: "Any business or office that keeps personal information needs to take stock, scale down, lock it, pitch it, and plan ahead."
Two Technology Daily staffers have supremely interesting stories in the latest issue of National Journal magazine (12-01-2007).
GPO Goes Digital
By Aliya Sternstein
The government's 140-year-old printing operation, located just a few blocks from the Capitol, is something of an anachronism. Nowadays, the Government Printing Office's staff relies more on BlackBerrys than black ink. Former U.S. Public Printer Bruce James handed out the GPO's first BlackBerrys during his 2002-07 tenure as part of an effort to transform the agency into a 21st-century electronic enterprise. [Read the full story]
Fancy Footwork at the FCC
By David Hatch
With his Republican Party holding three of the five seats on the Federal Communications Commission, Chairman Kevin Martin has the raw power to impose major changes in telecommunications policy when his GOP colleagues ally with him. But he would rather be known as a consensus builder. [Read the full story]
As readers of this blog and of Technology Daily, you're keenly aware that our business is reporting the ins and outs and ups and downs of the high-tech policy world. Unsurprisingly, part of that job is keeping tabs on the latest techno-toys that hit the market and make life easier (or in some instances harder) for consumers.
So, here's my admission. Brace yourself. Before this week, I had never owned a "smart phone." Sure, my Motorola Razr was kind of smart -- like a toddler who knows his ABCs and basic math before entering preschool -- but not as smart as the iPhones, BlackBerrys and such that everyone but me seemed to be toting around.
Over the Thanksgiving holiday, I took the leap. I bought a Palm. It's new, it's hip, it's slim and it's relatively affordable compared to the rest of the options offered by my wireless provider, which will remain nameless due to our protracted, tumultuous relationship (that I hope is on the mend).
E-mail, Web surfing, scheduling -- all at my fingertips. In the elevator; on the sidewalk; in a meeting; during a cross-town commute; on the elliptical machine at the gym. I have realized in the past couple of days what many have known for some time -- the euphoria of being "connected" wherever and whenever you want.
I consider myself an insanely productive person and this can only add to my efficiency. That said, the obligation of always being reachable might interfere with the non-work components of my life. I guess that's why the device has this novel "off" button. Plus, the tiny cramped keyboard might be murder on my fingers.
But, we'll see how it plays out … and if you e-mail me, you might just get a brief, sloppily typed response as I'm climbing the 200th floor on the stair-stepper at Washington Sports Club.
Lawrence Wasden, the president of the National Association of Attorneys General, has a message for you, Mr. and Ms. Holiday Shopper. "Informed online shopping ensures a secure holiday season," reads his welcome message on the main page of the group's Web site.
In his open letter, Wasden (who is also Idaho's attorney general) outlines nine tips for consumers to ensure a successful buying experience and avoid becoming victims of online scams and identity thieves.
Briefly, they include: (1) Know who you’re dealing with (2) Know what you are buying (3) Don’t e-mail your financial information (4) Pay by credit or charge card (5) Check out the terms of the deal, such as refund policies and delivery dates (6) Keep a paper trail (7) Use anti-virus software and a firewall and update them regularly (8) Check a company’s privacy policy (9) Get satisfaction.
Read his full list of recommendations here.
Cyber Monday statistics are coming in and experts agree that it was a darned good day for e-commerce. According to Nielsen Online, traffic to its Holiday eShopping Index showed a 13 percent increase (32.5 million unique visitors) from Black Friday's totals and a 10 percent increase over Cyber Monday 2006.
The top three fastest growing product categories ranked by week-over-week growth were: consumer electronics (72.5 percent); toys and videogames (72 percent); and books/music/video (63.1 percent), Nielsen said. Top retail sites for Cyber Monday were eBay.com, Amazon.com and Wal-Mart.
Online analytics firm comScore said Cyber Monday saw $733 million in online spending, representing a 21 percent increase over last year and an 84 percent jump from the average daily Web spending totals during the preceding four weeks.
The always outspoken Gigi Sohn, who heads watchdog group Public Knowledge, is taking on Internet billionaire Mark Cuban for not being "a friend on net neutrality." This is largely because "he believes that because bandwidth is so constrained in this country, tiers of Internet traffic are desirable," Sohn blogged on Monday.
While her organization agrees that the U.S. is far behind in broadband speed and value, "we think the answer to the problem lies in promoting competition, not in partitioning the scarce bandwidth already available."
Cuban has been an ally of PK's in the past but his net neutrality analysis, according to Sohn, "leaves out its most critical protection -- ensuring that Internet service providers (ISPs) do not use their market power to favor certain content, applications and services because of a financial or other interest they may have in them."
Sohn said she hopes to have a "robust debate" with the former "Dancing with the Stars" contestant when they both attend the Consumer Electronics Show in January. Read her full post here.
Online retailers must be happy on the heels of Black Friday, the day after Thanksgiving, which is among the busiest of the year for U.S. shoppers. Nielsen Online reports that traffic to sites on its Holiday eShopping Index grew 10 percent this year.
About 21.2 million visitors accessed the sampling of more than 120 e-commerce sites on Friday compared with 19.2 million in 2007. The consumer electronics category was the fastest growing contingent, increasing 235 percent from Nov. 16 to Nov. 23. Computer hardware/software took second place with 121 percent growth.
Web analytics firm comScore said online retail spending was strong on both Thanksgiving Day (up 29 percent to $272 million) and the day after (up 22 percent to $531 million), outpacing the season-to-date growth rate.
Cyber Monday could provide an indication of what lies ahead. Based on seasonal growth rates and historical consumer behavior patterns, comScore said sales could exceed $700 million. That would make it the heaviest online shopping day on record.
I was cleaning out my cluttered inbox, which went astonishingly unchecked for the past five days, and I came across a fun little press release. I thought it might be a good way to ease back into the work week and prepare for the holiday shopping season. Here's an excerpt:
BERKELEY, Calif. -- What holiday gift do you get for the political junkie who has everything and just can't wait for the first Presidential primary ballots to be cast next year? How about an internationally renowned think tank that among other things broke new ground by ranking America's most liberal and conservative cities.
The non-partisan Bay Area Center of Voting Research (BACVR) is doing what no other think tank has ever done before: putting itself up for sale on eBay.
"The Bay Area Center for Voting Research has always been on the cutting-edge of the think tank community," said Phil Reiff, BACVR co-founder. "We democratized the staid world of political research by creating the first Internet-based think tank. Using the eBay auction process to select the next leadership for BACVR is a perfect extension of our innovative approach."
"The winning bidder of the auction will take over ownership of the BACVR think tank and will become an instant political pundit with a prestigious platform," said Jason Alderman BACVR's other co-founder.
Visit the auction page here and read more about the think tank here. Bidding started Nov. 23 and the auction ends Dec. 3. The price tag on Monday morning was $5,000.
The Internet Education Foundation, which runs the GetNetWise Internet safety program, rolled out some exciting new enhancements to the initiative's online toolkit for parents, children and educators on Tuesday morning.
The GetNetWise crew briefed reporters and child safety advocates on its deployment of state-of-the-art distance education training technology aimed at helping families understand their empowerment options to aid in online safety.
Attendees were treated to a demonstration of new "Tools for Families" multimedia training sessions, which feature tutorials on popular Web safety products such as Net Nanny, Safe Eyes, Cyber Patrol and several more.
GetNetWise recognized the "distinct gap between the powerful resources we have in the child safety community and parents who may have a difficult time understanding how they work," Program Director Ali Rodway said.
Foundation Executive Director Tim Lordan, who attended via videoconference, said his group has "grand visions for this technology." Spokeswoman Danielle Yates added that the effort goes "hand-in-hand with the holistic approach" the organization takes when it comes to promoting safe surfing habits.
For a list of GetNetWise's latest webinar offerings, click here. There are five sessions so far but additional briefings featuring Microsoft, America Online and others will be posted in the future.
Well, here's a no-brainer. Internet shopping's primary appeal is the convenience it offers, according to a new study by Nielsen Online. The Web-based survey of nearly 1,000 respondents showed that 81 percent said the ability to shop anytime was why they chose e-commerce during the holiday season.
Saving time was the next most popular reason to shop online, with 77 percent of respondents, followed by the ability to comparison shop and find things easily, with 61 percent and 56 percent, respectively.
Fewer respondents, 46 percent, listed low prices as a reason to shop online rather than in-store, officials said. Even fewer respondents, 24 percent, cited low shipping costs.
Respondents also told Nielsen that their 2007 online holiday spending would compose about the same share of their total holiday budgets as in 2006. Thirty-five percent of respondents, the largest group, reported they will spend 25-50 percent of their holiday budget online.
Bookworms rejoice! Amazon.com unveiled its portable reading device on Monday (just in time for the holiday shopping season), which wirelessly downloads books, magazines and newspapers. Now, instead of curling up in front a roaring fire with your favorite hardback, you can cozy up with a $400 "Kindle."
The Kindle's wireless delivery system uses the same nationwide high-speed data network (EVDO) as advanced cell phones. More than 90,000 books are available for the cutely named gadget. Titles are $9.99, unless marked otherwise, Amazon said in a press release.
The Kindle Store also offers over 300 blogs -- including Slashdot, TechCrunch, BoingBoing, The Onion and The Huffington Post. Blogs are downloaded automatically for as little as $0.99 each. Yeah, they're free the old-fashioned way, but c'mon, every innovation has its price, right?
CEO Jeff Bezos said the top design objective behind the slim thingamajig was "to get out of the way -- so you can enjoy your reading." Kindle is wireless, he pointed out, "so whether you're lying in bed or riding a train, you can think of a book, and have it in less than 60 seconds."
Unfortunately, there doesn’t appear to be an add-on that allows the Kindle to play digital books on tape, which is precisely what I'd need on Wednesday when I fight hours of Thanksgiving holiday traffic from Washington to West Virginia as I head home to see the relatives.
The Federal Communications Bar Association hosted a briefing on Monday about copyright issues at the FCC and the FTC. Panelists covered a number of interesting intellectual property matters brought before the federal agencies -- but concluding remarks at the event turned into a self-promotion-palooza (with a pinch of humor).
Consumer Electronics Association lobbyist Michael Petricone made a push for his organization's annual trade show in Las Vegas in early January where he said high-tech copyright issues will be discussed in detail.
Then, Public Knowledge President Gigi Sohn piped up, urging attendees to take a look at her group's six-point plan for copyright reform. The proposal would fix current laws that the group believes are "out of touch with our technological reality."
Fritz Attaway, who is executive vice president of the Motion Picture Association of America, said he did not have anything to endorse. He paused briefly then exclaimed: "Go see a movie -- and pay for it." One small step to combat film piracy, one giant leap for mankind.
Happy Monday! Lest you thought I was telling a tall tale about tech/telecom hacks and flacks who make beautiful music together as WMD and the Bad Ass Brass Band, here's proof. Enjoy a rousing performance of "Superstition" from last week's show at DC9.
The writers' strike against Hollywood producers over new media royalties has prompted a stunning, brilliant occurrence. Striking cast members and writers of NBC's "30 Rock" and "Saturday Night Live" will perform one-night-only live shows at the Upright Citizens Brigade Theatre in New York City in the coming days.
The entire cast of SNL has been confirmed for the 11:30 p.m. performance this Saturday, according to the New York Observer's Culture Czar blog. The cast of "30 Rock" will take to the stage on Monday at 8 p.m. The sold-out shows will benefit the Writers Guild strike fund.
Update: Gasp! Fans are trolling Craigslist for tickets to the shows...
Telecom hacks and flacks can make beautiful music together -- or at least that's what I'm told about WMD and the Bad Ass Brass Band, a budding Washington-based funk/soul ensemble. The group performed Thursday night at DC9 to rave reviews, but unfortunately a prior engagement kept me from attending.
WMD's core members -- Josh Wein ("W"), a reporter for Communications Daily; Ian Martinez ("M"), a PR whiz for the Telecommunications Industry Association; and Mike Dolan ("D"), also of Communications Daily -- jammed for the charity One Brick, which connects young professionals with volunteer opportunities.
"Come dance the night away to the stirring sounds of a band whose name is so long it wouldn't fit in this box ... but whose groove is so tight it can't be contained," the event invitation read. Full disclosure: W, M and D are all former coworkers of mine.
The band "blew the house away on a stage about the size of an ice shack fishing hole," one audience-member told Tech Daily Dose. "Everyone was dancing and beads were getting thrown out." The fan also noted that Wein "made David Byrne fun again" with his frontman performance of "Psychokiller."
Sounds like a good time. I'm sorry I missed it.
The holiday season creeps up on us earlier and earlier each year, doesn’t it? It seems like department stores start decking their halls the day after Halloween, so here are some shopping tips from the Privacy Rights Clearinghouse. This is just a quick rundown. Read the detailed list here.
▪ When shopping online, make sure that the Web site uses encryption technology before you provide your personal information. Encryption scrambles the information you send, such as your credit card number, in order to prevent computer hackers from obtaining it en route.
▪ The safest way to shop on the Internet is with a credit card. In the event something goes wrong, you are protected under the federal Fair Credit Billing Act. You have the right to dispute charges on your credit card, and you can withhold payments during a creditor investigation.
▪ Be sure to check out a Web site’s privacy policy before providing any personal information online. You can also learn what type of information is gathered by the Web site, and how it is — or is not — shared with others by reading its privacy policy. A link to the privacy policy is often found at the bottom of the site’s home page.
If the National Association of Broadcasters' well-known mouthpiece Dennis Wharton ever tires of his day job, he could always pursue a career on Broadway. The former journalist and fixture on Capitol Hill got his first taste of the stage during a trip to the Big Apple last weekend.
Wharton, who serves as the powerful lobbying group's executive vice president of media relations, told Tech Daily Dose that he and his wife got cheap seats for the acclaimed "25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee," only to be chosen as an on-stage extra.
The affable flack sat in the risers with the ensemble cast of the musical comedy and played along when background characters were needed. Wharton even got a turn at the microphone and successfully spelled "Mexicans." He was eliminated after being presented with a longer, weirder word that he could not recall.
Internet giant Google unveiled its Android Developer Challenge on Monday -- a contest that will give $10 million to developers who build mobile applications for Android™, the first complete, open, and free mobile platform.
The competition is designed to support the developer community and spark innovation on the Android platform by awarding cash prizes for as much as $275,000, Google said in a press release.
"We've built some interesting applications for Android but the best applications are not here yet and that's because they're going to be written by developers," Google co-founder Sergey Brin said.
Andy Rubin, Google's director of mobile platforms, said the race will "stretch [developers'] imaginations and skills to leverage the full capabilities of this new platform and to create something amazing."
Android was announced earlier this month by the Open Handset Alliance, a group of more technology and mobile industry leaders committed to fostering innovation on mobile phones.
This might just beat the heck out of New York City's famed Fashion Week. BoingBoingTV has posted a segment on "Space Style 2007: A Giant Leap for Couture," a space-aged event that took place in Los Angeles recently.
The fashion show, which featured a half-dozen designers, was part of a conference hosted by the California Space Authority and the California Space Education and Workforce Institute. The Japanese Aerospace Exploration Agency also presented items from its own couture competition.
One attendee told BBtv's Xeni Jardin that "flexibility is a must when you're in zero gravity." Another said the core elements of space style are latex, Lycra® and Velcro®. At one point during the show, Jardin asks a fashion critic: "Would scotch help you interpret this?" The answer was yes.
The TorrentFreak blog has posted an interview with a 9-year-old girl who uses the popular file-sharing program LimeWire. Here's an excerpt:
TF. Do you think it's legal or illegal to copy a CD or DVD?
- Some men right, they sell you a DVD at the market but when you get home it doesn't play, that's illegal.
TF. Why is it illegal?
- Duh!! Because they tell you it works and when you get it home it's rubbish and jumps in the middle and its a waste of money!
TF. Do you think you should be paying for stuff off LimeWire? You have to buy CD’s from the shop…
- You have to pay for CD’s because they’re actually on a disc not on the computer. My cousin, right, she uses LimeWire when she doesn’t have any money for CDs.
(Thanks, Consumerist)
As we reported in September, pop singer Prince asked video-sharing site YouTube to remove clips of his recent concerts in London in an attempt to "reclaim his art on the Internet."
Now, BBC reports that the "Little Red Corvette" crooner is threatening legal action against fan-run sites unless they remove photographs of him. Prince Fans United claims the star is trying to "stifle all critical commentary" and he is in "violation of the freedom of speech."
Web Sheriff, the U.K. firm Prince has hired to enforce the ban, told the BBC it was "not an attack on fans." "The dispute, in so far as there is one, is related to the use of photographs and images of Prince, many of which are Prince's copyright," officials said.
The owners of three key fan sites joined forces to fight "what amounts to an injustice to the fan sites and the very fans who have supported Prince's career," they said in a press release. The sites are "fully prepared to defend their position in the proper court of law, as well as fully prosecute any claims to which they are justly entitled."
My favorite coverage of the story on Wednesday came from MSNBC, which ran a banner that read: "Purple Reign of Terror: Prince Suing Fans."
Looking for something to do with your Monday evening in the nation's capital? George Washington University law professor and privacy expert Daniel Solove is hosting a book chat at Borders (18th & L St., NW @ 6:30).
Solove's recent tome, "The Future of Reputation: Gossip, Rumor and Privacy on the Internet" (Yale University Press), tackles privacy issues in the Internet age as well as solutions for balancing new technology, freedom of speech and privacy.
"The Internet is not necessarily a threat to privacy, nor is it a friend to privacy," Solove said. "I think that a new technology exacerbates existing problems and ultimately what matters is what we do, what policies we set and what rules we establish that will govern privacy." (Thanks, Express)
The musicFIRST coalition, which is lobbying for copyright holders to get paid when their music is played on AM and FM radio, sent the National Association of Broadcasters and early holiday gift on Monday.
The alliance, backed by the Recording Industry Association of America and others, mailed NAB President David Rehr an American Heritage College Dictionary "to help the NAB more accurately understand the meaning of a 'tax.'"
NAB officials have repeatedly referred to musicFirst's campaign as a "tax" on local radio. The dictionary sent to Rehr defines tax as "a contribution for the support of a government required of persons, groups, or businesses with the domain of that government."
The controversy over NAB's lingo most recently came to light at a Senate Commerce Committee hearing on the future of radio last month when New Hampshire Republican John Sununu grilled an NAB member about the terminology.
"A performance right is not a tax. It is fair compensation for artists and musicians who, through their voices, their inspiration, and their hearts and souls, bring music to life on the radio. It is compensation earned by artists and musicians that is long overdue," Motown singer Martha Reeves said in a coalition press release.
Update: NAB spokesman Dennis Wharton said the recording industry is trying to "bail out a failing business model." "It is undeniable that free airplay of music on America's hometown radio stations generates millions of dollars in annual revenue for both artists and the foreign-owned record labels," he said.
The organizers of last spring's Tech Policy Summit in Silicon Valley have launched a new Web destination called Tech Policy Central. The site, according to its creators, is a portal for "collaboration and learning so anyone who has a stake in tech policy … can be informed and get involved in the dialogue."
The site features a town hall section for online discussion as well as technology related research, videos and audio, a job bank and more. It's definitely worth checking out. Meanwhile, the next Tech Policy Summit will take place March 26-28 in Hollywood.
FTC Commissioner Jon Leibowitz said on Thursday that he could not give any details on his agency's review of Google's pending buyout of online advertising firm DoubleClick, but noted the staff "is working through this matter as expeditiously as possible given the complexity of the deal."
He spoke at an FTC conference on Internet advertising and behavioral targeting, saying "our analysis of the merger has got to be about competition and potential competition." "It can't be about privacy per se," under the antitrust law known as the Clayton Act.
Regardless of whether the deal goes through, "we have to talk about privacy" in the Internet advertising space, Leibowitz added. He conducted a "focus group" with his 12-year-old daughter and her friends over the weekend to gauge their experiences with targeted marketing.
They told him that some ads that appeared when they were surfing the Web were not appropriate for their age. One ad asked "how long was your last kiss?" and another stated "touch me harder," he said. His 10-year-old, however, was served an ad for Clorox.
Read more about the FTC conference in Technology Daily's PM Edition.
The Direct Marketing Association unveiled findings of a national survey on Thursday that the group said shows providing relevant marketing materials to consumers online is fueling unprecedented Internet growth.
According to DMA President John Greco, "The verdict is in -- consumers have overwhelmingly responded to an open Internet supported by relevant advertising." The results were released in conjunction with an FTC summit on the topic.
The poll found that when given a choice about how Web content should be paid for, 72 percent of Internet users preferred that sites not charge, and instead be funded by ads.
More than 85 percent said they usually visit free sites where the content they use is paid for by advertisers while 10 percent said that the sites they access either charge them a subscription or pay for each download or use.
When respondents were asked whether they were aware that Internet companies were collecting information regarding their Web browsing, 30 percent said they did not know.
Read more about the FTC conference in Technology Daily's PM Edition.
I hadn’t intended to run into any Web celebrities during my time at the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers fall meeting in Los Angeles (with the exception of ICANN Chairman Vint Cerf, of course).
So imagine my surprise when I encountered a stick-thin, mascara-wearing, bleached blonde at a trendy restaurant on Sunset Boulevard. That's right, I'm about 99 percent sure that a friend and I had a run-in with YouTube sensation Chris Crocker. Then again, it could have been Courtney Love.
Crocker, if you'll recall, made headlines earlier this year with his dramatic defense of beleaguered pop singer Britney Spears. Shortly after the Tennessee native's foray into the public eye, there were rumors of him getting his own reality television show. Perhaps that's what brought him to La-La Land?
Oh good, now I can retire.
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In the latest issue of National Journal magazine, William Powers has an interesting column on one of the Internet's most popular news-breakers and noisemakers -- Matt Drudge. Here are a few snippets:
Read the full story here.
The digital music royalty collector SoundExchange is making progress in its negotiations with noncommercial Internet music services like National Public Radio, the group's executive director, John Simson, told Tech Daily Dose.
His comments came Wednesday after a Senate Commerce Committee hearing on the future of radio. The Copyright Royalty Board's controversial rate hike for webcasters was one of several hot topics discussed by witnesses and lawmakers.
Simson said he expects to have a resolution with NPR and other noncommercial song-streamers by the end of the year. Officials from both sides were expected to meet this week to continue their negotiations.
Meanwhile, Jonathan Potter, whose Digital Media Association represents America Online, Pandora, Yahoo and other large webcasters, said he still awaits details on the rate that SoundExchange wants his members to pay.
DiMA and SoundExchange reached a deal in late August to cap the Internet radio "$500 per channel minimum royalty" at $50,000 per service. The groups also agreed that beginning in six months webcasters will provide SoundExchange with a full census of songs performed.
NBC News and MSNBC flipped the switch on their new, merged world headquarters on Monday and the place sure is sleek and shiny. The effort took six months and more than 200 miles of cable. The 8,500-square foot space features 280 high-definition monitors and six high-definition projectors.
"NBC News has always been a world-class news organization, and today we cut the ribbon on a world-class facility to match, located in the media capital of the universe," NBC Universal CEO Jeff Zucker said. "It is, quite literally, the newsroom of the future."
The next phase of the network's facelift includes long-term plans to create a state-of-the-art, high-definition West Coast news center and TV production facility in Los Angeles. That build-out will be modeled after the snazzy 30 Rockefeller Plaza redo. Take a peek at the news operation's new digs here.
Fans of the Colorado Rockies must have expected that scooping up World Series tickets would be difficult. But they may not have thought computer hackers would have much to do with it.
Team officials said Monday that their computerized ticket selling system was whacked by an "external malicious attack," AP reports. Team President Keli McGregor said there were roughly 8.5 million attempts to connect with the system in the first 90 minutes of sales, which forced the organization to shut it down completely. Sales will resume at noon Tuesday.
Red Sox Nation, meanwhile, isn't being forced to break the bank quite as badly as it did for tickets in 2004. The Boston Globe reports the online ticket resellers StubHub.com and AceTicket.com claim prices are down considerably from three years ago, when the Sox snapped their 86-year championship drought.
A StubHub spokesman said the average selling price this year is $1,465, a $300 drop from 2004. That's still a pretty penny. But if you think it's unreasonable, check out how much Hannah Montana tickets are going for these days. -- Michael Martinez
The 463 Blog reports that "in celebration of the Chinese Communist Party's 17th Congress this last week, leaders there apparently decided that preventing people from seeing cats flush toilets would make the choreographed proceedings run all that much smoother." Read more here.
Reprinted from the Oct. 16, 2007 edition of National Journal's Technology Daily
Draft Bill Spurs Talk About Trade-Related Job Aid
By Aliya Sternstein
Draft legislation intended to aid employees left jobless due to international trade has garnered the admiration of the U.S. technology industry but strikes some tech workers as inadequate.
On Friday, Democrats on the House Ways and Means Committee released a discussion draft of a bill that would overhaul the Trade Adjustment Assistance program to, as they say, better meet the needs of those affected by globalization.
The bill would expand coverage to service-sector employees, including workers in the high-tech and telecommunications industries. Today, TAA only offers income support and training to workers who are involved in producing goods. Most programmers and other tech professionals are excluded -- even though some of their jobs also are being moved abroad.
Roger Cochetti, the U.S. policy director of Computing Technology Industry Association, said Tuesday that the bill responds to all the concerns his organization has expressed about assistance for information technology workers in the 21st century.
"The adverse political impact of more open trade in services would be significantly reduced" under the bill, thereby helping the U.S. tech industry grow, he said. And U.S. tech workers would get training to make them more competitive in the job market.
A storm is brewing over at George Washington University's Institute for Politics, Democracy and the Internet's decision to invite telecommunications giant Verizon to engage in a discussion next Friday on broadband deployment.
The think tank got an avalanche of e-mails from folks on its subscription list -- and not all were RSVPs. There were "a number of angry, outraged writers, some of whom question the integrity of IPDI for hosting a big, bad company like Verizon for a discussion about broadband," the group said.
IPDI is answering those complaints individually but also addressed the collective concerns of the e-mails on the blog. The institute said it offers a forum, "open to everyone, regardless of his or her political beliefs, religion, nationality, ethnicity, actions or employer." Last month, IPDI hosted Google and now it's Verizon's turn.
Future events will look at the role of censorship and ways in which the technology community can engage citizens in policy discussions. Excluding Verizon from the conversation would be "anti-intellectual," the group said.
Consumer Electronics Association chief Gary Shapiro has challenged CNN anchor Lou Dobbs to a live debate on the impact of international trade on the U.S. economy. Shapiro wants to go toe-to-toe on Dobbs's program.
CEA launched a free trade initiative earlier this month to push Congress to pass pending free trade agreements. Some see Dobbs as "a chief propagator of unbalanced, ill-informed protectionist sentiments," according to an e-mail from the group.
A recent Zogby poll conducted for CEA indicated that 78 percent of respondents believed a news anchor who speaks out against international trade while his network promotes his show overseas and garners foreign ad revenue can be labeled a "hypocrite."
Oh, man. It's on now. I've seen Dobbs get angry and this could be a biggie. I'm not a betting man, but I know Shapiro is younger, more agile and a really good talker. Then again, Dobbs can steamroll over just about anyone with his heated diatribes.
Will Dobbs accept the challenge? Stay tuned...
If you're in search of cool weekend plans and you happen to be in Washington, head over to the National Mall to ogle at entries in the Solar Decathlon 2007 -- a competition where 20 universities are vying for the most brilliant sun-powered home.
The competition, which ends Saturday, was developed by the Energy Department five years ago and now part of President Bush's 2006 Solar America Initiative. Each team is given $100,000 and two years to design and build their project house.
Shane Berry, a former FBI intellectual property protection official who now heads clothing company Abercrombie & Fitch's brand protection team, told a disheartening tale at the fall meeting of the International Anti-Counterfeiting Coalition on Thursday.
He relayed a story about a recent counterfeiting sting in Thailand that involved the mass production of knock-offs of his designer label. After halting the bootleggers, police officers and local media (invited to cover the crackdown) began gobbling up the goods "like it was Christmas morning," he recalled.
"It was the most defeating moment in my job so far to understand the enormity of the problem," Berry said. "It's not just a resource issue in the U.S. government, it's apathy and ignorance on a global level."
Read more about the conference in Technology Daily's PM Edition.
The House voted 405-2 on Tuesday on legislation to extend the federal moratorium on Internet access taxes by four years but Tech Daily Dose has learned the tally should have been 406-1.
The bill, H.R. 3678, would bar states and localities from imposing such fees until Nov. 1, 2011. The dissenting votes were cast by Democrat Anna Eshoo of California, who authored a bill for a permanent ban, and Republican Michael Turner of Ohio.
A spokesman for Turner confirmed late in the day that his boss supports the bill and accidentally voted "no" on the legislation. "He has to go to the House floor and correct the record," said the staffer, who called the accident "regrettable."
Turner may have been distracted by a particularly busy day on Capitol Hill. He appeared at a midday ceremony to honor an Eagle Scout, whose flag request led to the Architect of the Capitol reversing his policy and deciding to allow "God" on flag certificates.
The American Civil Liberties Union, an outspoken opponent of the Bush administration's agenda to reform the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, recently commissioned a poll from the Mellman Group.
The survey of 1,000 likely 2008 general election voters showed:
- Sixty-one percent of voters favor requiring the government to get a warrant from a court before wiretapping the conversations U.S. citizens have with people in other countries.
- Fifty-one percent “strongly” support the requirement for warrants.
- Thirty-five percent support warrantless wiretaps of Americans’ international conversations.
- Twenty-four percent strongly support warrantless wiretaps.
"We're hoping that Congress will start listening to its constituents and begin to finally hear something beyond the echo chamber of the Beltway," the ACLU wrote in an e-mail to reporters. "This poll makes it pretty clear that Americans care much more about the Constitution than many of their elected officials would believe."
"The Bryant Park Project," National Public Radio's new morning show for a younger, hipper set recently aired what co-host Luke Burbank said was "possibly the worst interview in the history of electronic media."
Since I'm obsessed with BPP these days, I thought I would link to the video of the Q&A with Icelandic band Sigur Ros here. The folks at BPP obviously have a good sense of humor (they blogged about the interview's badness).
Watching it made me feel a little uneasy. We've all had our share of tough interviews. But I think Burbank (who is admittedly a big fan of the band's music) can take comfort that there may be one interview that trumps his.
Yes, that's right everyone. I'm drudging up the ol' Holly Hunter video on ABC News Now. Enjoy!
Comedian and game show host Drew Carey has entered the world of journalism by fronting a series of Internet-based documentaries for the Reason Foundation that examine issues like immigration, eminent domain, drug laws and traffic congestion.
"We need Reason to help fight the stupid drug laws, the stupid immigration laws, and stupid big government in general," Carey said in a Monday press release. The foundation's president, David Nott, hopes the former sitcom star's "unique perspective and creativity [will] enliven the country's policy debates."
The videos can be seen on Reason.tv, a new online community. In the first video called "Gridlock," Carey, who recently became the face of "The Price Is Right," investigates the country's traffic problem. The documentary can be viewed here.
As I mentioned here last week, rock band OK Go was not able to make it to the Public Knowledge awards ceremony honoring its members and several other tech crusaders. But thanks to the power of YouTube, you can watch the band's acceptance speech above.
Nearly 16 percent of American households who use the Internet watch television broadcasts online and the number of entire episodes or shows viewed on the Web has doubled in the past year, the Conference Board said Monday.
Nearly 73 percent of online households use the Internet for entertainment purposes on a daily basis and an additional 15 percent search for entertainment several times a week, the board's study found. Viewers polled cited convenience and avoiding commercials as their top reasons for watching Web video.
Four out of five online viewers said watching shows online has not changed their traditional TV viewing habits, but a small percentage said time spent in front of the television has decreased.
Top methods for viewing broadcasts online are streaming and free downloads, officials said. Consumers also enroll in pay-per-download and subscription services, but the practice is less prevalent. About two-thirds stream online content and more than 40 percent download content for free.
The popularity of watching TV online will have "a huge impact on the way brands and advertisers communicate with viewers," said Shari Morwood of market research firm TNS, which helped prepare the report. "If advertisers can effectively leverage the online video platform, we should see much more interactivity and emotional connection between brands and the online TV viewing audience."
Read more about the report here.
Conservative radio host Rush Limbaugh has turned to the popular eBay auction Web site to sell a letter from Senate Democrats who attacked him for comments he made about "phony soldiers" whom he claims falsified military service.
The letter, signed by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and 40 other lawmakers, was delivered to Clear Channel Communications, Limbaugh's syndication partner, and widely quoted in the media.
Proceeds of the auction will be donated to the Marine Corps Law Enforcement Foundation, a charity that provides financial assistance to the children of fallen Marines and federal law enforcement officers. Limbaugh serves on the board of the organization.
According to the auction page, the winning bidder gets the original letter; the Halliburton briefcase in which it has been stored; a personal letter of thanks from Limbaugh; and a photo of him displaying the letter on stage in Philadelphia on Oct. 11.
On Monday morning, the highest bid was $45,000 after having been put online Friday with a starting price of $100. The auction ends in four days.
The presentation of Thursday night's Public Knowledge IP3 awards was made possible, appropriately enough, by technology. The prizes are given to those who have advanced the public interest in intellectual property, information policy or Internet protocol.
Due to inclement weather, honoree Tim Wu was stranded at the airport in New York City but a quick-thinking partygoer's iPhone saved the day. The Columbia University law professor thanked the crowd for the award via speakerphone.
Members of the band OK Go also could not be present to accept their award but prepared a video that was played for the crowd. The event was held at the historic Sewell-Belmont House on Capitol Hill where guests enjoyed an open bar and seafood hors d' oeuvres.
In other news, PK's Art Brodsky has an interesting blog post about Tuesday night's GOP presidential debate. He writes: "The discussion meandered to and fro on the usual topics -- taxes, trade, immigration, health care. Yet in all of these discussions of 'economic' issues, there is a glaring omission -- the telecommunications/Internet sector of our economy."
Two candidates, former New York City mayor Rudolph Giuliani and Sen. John McCain of Arizona, did get the chance to weigh in on Internet-related issues near the end of the debate. Read this story in Technology Daily's PM Edition to learn more.
From Technology Daily's latest People Column:
Public Knowledge announced the winners of its annual IP3 awards, which are given to individuals who have advanced the public interest in one of three areas: intellectual property, information policy or Internet protocol.
The winners are: activist James Love; Columbia University law professor Tim Wu; Bob Young, the founder of Red Hat Software; and the members of the band OK Go -- Dan Konopka, Damian Kulash, Tim Nordwind and Andy Ross.
Wu was recognized for his work on information policy. He has long been an advocate for a free and open Internet. His book "Who Controls the Internet: Illusions of a Borderless World," written with Jack Goldsmith, looked at the issue on the international level. He is working on a new book about anti-discrimination rules in communications.
Continue reading Tonight: Public Knowledge Honors Wu, OK Go.
A warning to all the competitive runners out there: technology won’t let you cut corners. Roberto Madrazo, a two-time loser in Mexican presidential elections, just found that out the hard way.
Via AP: "After a humiliating defeat in Mexico's presidential election last year, Roberto Madrazo appeared to be back on top: He'd won the men's age-55 category in the Sept. 30 Berlin marathon with a surprising time of 2:41:12.
But Madrazo couldn't leave his reputation for shady dealings in the dust. Race officials said Monday they disqualified him for apparently taking a short cut -- an electronic tracking chip indicates he skipped two checkpoints in the race and would have needed superhuman speed to achieve his win.
According to the chip, Madrazo took only 21 minutes to cover nine miles -- faster than any human can run. "Not even the world record holder can go that fast," race director Mark Milde said."
Photographer Victor Sailer said he didn't need electronic evidence to suspect that Madrazo, who crossed the finish line in a jacket, hat and running pants, tried to pull a fast one:
"It was so obvious to me, if you look at everyone else that's in the picture, everyone's wearing T-shirts and shorts, and the guy's got a jacket on and a hat or whatever," Sailer said. "I looked at it and was like, wait a second."
-- Michael Martinez
A New Jersey hospital suspended more than 20 workers on Wednesday for their role in leaking former "ER" star George Clooney's medical records to the media during his stay there after a recent motorcycle accident.
Employees of the Palisades Medical Center in North Bergen, N.J., were dismissed for a month without pay for violating a federal law on patient confidentiality known as the Health Information Privacy and Portability Act.
"They were severely disciplined," a hospital spokesman told the New York Times. Neither Clooney, nor his riding companion, Sarah Larson, complained about the disclosures of their injuries to reporters. Clooney suffered a rib fracture and Larson suffered multiple foot fractures.
"While I very much believe in a patient’s right to privacy, I would hope that this could be settled without suspending medical workers," Clooney said in a statement. A spokeswoman for the Health Professionals and Allied Employees union, denounced the suspensions as "an overreaction."
Photo Credit: USC
Researchers at the University of Southern California Information Sciences Institute, one of the birthplaces of the Internet, recently completed a census of the more than 2.8 million allocated addresses on the Internet.
Theirs is the first complete effort of its kind in more than two decades, according to a press release. It took some 62 days to send almost 3 billion Internet "pings" from three machines. A detailed account of John Heidemannn and Yuri Pradkin's research can be found here.
About 60 percent of the pings received no response at all and many others got a "do not disturb" or "no information available" response that many network administrators program into their routers and firewalls. Some non-replies were probably also due to firewalls intentionally blocking the pings, officials said.
The researchers produced a complex color-coded map, providing "a novel census view of the visible Internet." The only other Web census was conducted in 1982 when the Internet consisted of 315 allocated addresses, Heidemannn said.
The census can help illustrate the need to move forward with the next-generation Internet, known as IPv6, he said. Some experts predict that Web addresses in the current system could all be allocated as soon as 2010. The work could also improve Web security, he added.
David Hatch, Heather Greenfield and Andrew Noyes from National Journal's Technology Daily recently sat down with the Telecommunications Industry Association to talk about important issues that have arisen on Capitol Hill.
The result is a short video posted on the TIA Network. During the Q&A, the trio weighs in on whether the 110th Congress understands the tech sector; the impact of free trade agreements; how presidential hopefuls are (or aren’t) addressing tech policy; and other titillating topics.
In September, TIA asked us about the patent reform battle raging in Congress. That audio interview can be heard here.
The Electronic Privacy Information Center released its annual privacy and human rights survey on Friday, which examines the state of privacy in over 75 countries around the world. The report outlines legal protections, new challenges, and other important issues relating to privacy.
The study drew special attention to the continued expansion of government surveillance, officials said. Several countries have pursued new data retention schemes, expanded biometric identification requirements, and intensified international data transfers.
The report also found "continuing public opposition to video surveillance, workplace monitoring, and privacy-infringing corporate practices," EPIC said. The latest edition includes new analyses for the Middle East, Latin America and cyberspace as well, the watchdog group said.
The report is available for $75 on Amazon.com.
Back in January 2006, Technology Daily's editor Danny Glover authored a cover story on "The Rise Of Blogs" for National Journal magazine. In this week's hot-off-the-presses edition of the magazine, Bara Vaida, a former senior writer for TD, follows up with another cover story titled "Blogging On." National Journal Editor Charlie Green has given us permission to reprint it here:
By Bara Vaida
In late July, Sen. Richard Durbin, D-Ill., tried a new approach to writing legislation. The 62-year-old majority whip logged on to a computer in his Capitol Hill office and began chatting on the Web about his plan to expand broadband services in rural America.
The standard method for writing a bill would have had Durbin and his aides calling in consumer groups, telecommunications lobbyists and technology experts to hash out the details. Instead, Durbin reached out to the editors of two online political blogs so that he could hear directly from their readers. One was the progressive Open Left, a natural place for the pugnacious liberal to turn. But the other, RedState, caused Durbin some trepidation -- he couldn’t be sure how its conservative subscribers would respond to him.
In a series of evening postings on the two blogs (videotaped by his staff to prove that the senator was indeed doing the typing), Durbin connected with academics, California hip-hop artist Baby D, free-market advocates, rural Internet users, and many others. The conversations yielded more than 500 comments.
The University of California, Berkeley put hundreds of videos of full course lectures and other special events for free on YouTube this week. There are more than 300 hours of videotaped content on the channel.
The videos -- ranging from bioengineering, to peace and conflict studies, to "Physics for Future Presidents," the title of a popular campus course -- are part of the collection, according to a press release.
Berkeley has been a leader in the open-source video movement since 2001 when it launched a site that delivered podcasts and streaming video. YouTube will provide "a public window into university life - academics, events and athletics," said Christina Maslach, the school's vice provost for undergraduate education.
Columbia Law School launched a new Web site last month to educate creators about copyright and contracts, and arm them against "egregious attempts by content owners to take control of artists' creations."
The site, KeepYourCopyrights.org, is the product of the school's Kernochan Center for Law, Media and the Arts and the Program on Law and Technology. The site was unveiled at an event honoring literary agent Morton Janklow, an advocate for authors’ rights long before the advent of digital technology.
Professor Jane Ginsburg worked with fellow copyright professor Tim Wu to design the site as a resource with the latest legal content in language understandable to non-lawyers. The site shows clauses from real contracts and uses pictographs to rate them from an author or creator’s point of view.
PBS' first new primetime series in five years, "Wired Science," debuted on Wednesday night. The one-hour show, hosted by Chris Hardwick and Kamala Lopez, presents Wired magazine's coverage of all things techie in a fast-paced, video format.
The show features in-studio content including interviews, how-to segments and demonstrations as well as reports from field correspondents in locations around the world. The first episode had a report from Estonia on a botnet cyber-attack and a look at surgery performed by a "robo" doc.
Legislation that would regulate "violent entertainment" shown during airline flights made headlines last week. Rep. Heath Shuler, D-N.C., and several others argue that the bill (H.R. 3676) is needed to protect kids from such fare while they are flying.
Adam Thierer of the Progress and Freedom Foundation spoke up about the measure in his latest editorial for the City Journal. He says it would be a mistake to empower federal regulators to become "long-range censors."
He said H.R. 3676 "would spawn a needless and expensive regulatory apparatus, and given the ambiguity surrounding what constitutes 'violent programming,' constitutional challenges would certainly follow, too."
"If we get federal regulators involved in trying to sort these things out, what’s next? Laws for the JumboTron at ballgames and restrictions on TV screens in store windows? We can find ways to fly the friendly skies without unfriendly regulators coming along for the ride," he added.
The iTunes Wi-Fi Music Store, which features Starbucks' new “Now Playing” service went live in more than 600 coffee shops in New York and Seattle this week. The feature lets customers instantly preview, buy and download tunes currently playing overhead.
Since I'm presently sipping my grande drip at a Washington, D.C. Starbucks, I don’t get to experience that magic yet. But what I did notice while standing in line for my caffeine was a stack of "Song of the Day" cards.
Through Nov. 7 at more than 10,000 Starbucks locations, customers can grab a voucher redeemable on iTunes for a free song. Wednesday's track was "Jokerman" by Bob Dylan. The coffee company will give away 1.5 million downloads per day for a total of more than 50 million free songs.
Starbucks' partnership with Apple lets customers use the T-Mobile HotSpot Wi-Fi Network to wirelessly download music onto their iPhone, iPod touch or laptop with no wireless connection fees or HotSpot login required.
Forthcoming "Song of the Day" artists include Joss Stone, Dave Matthews, John Mayer, Annie Lennox, and more. The iTunes Wi-Fi Music Store is coming soon to Starbucks stores in San Francisco, Los Angeles, Chicago and additional markets through late 2008.
Valleywag blogger Paul Boutin spent a half hour speed-dialing Google's new free, telephone directory service [800-GOOG-4110]. The verdict: Its speech-recognition and geo-mapping algorithms outperformed Verizon and AT&T's humans.
According to Boutin, GOOG-411 figured out that "Dover-Foxcroft" was a town in Maine rather than sending him to an operator and it deduced that "H H Brown Shoes" meant a store in nearby Dexter.
The service "let me talk with my mouth full" but "makes an irritatingly un-Googly first impression on callers," he wrote. It answers not with a hello, but with a foreboding "calls recorded for quality" and then plays a randomly-selected voice shouting "GOOG-411!"
Google's technology might be smarter than Sprint's, "but its prerecorded human voice talent makes me want to kill," Boutin said. Plus, on one call, after several seconds of whirring and sputtering, a voice announced: "We're a little swamped right now, but just call back, and we'll try to help you out."
Photo Credit: Win Rosenfeld/BPP
Tech Daily Dose congratulates the amusing and informative gang at "The Bryant Park Project." National Public Radio's new drive-time radio show - blog - podcast launched on Monday after months of preparation and a series of fun downloadable pilot programs.
NPR describes BPP, which is geared toward adults 25-44, as "a morning news show that will change your life, speed up your commute, and jack your test scores 50 points." Hosts Alison Stewart and Luke Burbank "deliver surprising interviews and tasty segments soaked in fully carbonated NPR smarts." So, dig in.
British rock band Radiohead will release its new album online next Wednesday and fans will be able to pay as little or as much as they want for the tracks. "It's up to you," reads a message on the Web page where fans can pre-order the group's seventh album.
The Grammy-winning crooners' "In Rainbows" will be available as a digital download with no set price. The album will be available only from the band and at radiohead.com, its official site, the AP reported.
"This is all anybody is talking about in the music industry today," said Bertis Downs, the longtime manager of R.E.M. "This is the sort of model that people have been talking about doing, but this is the first time an act of this stature has stepped up and done it. . . . They were a band that could go off the grid, and they did it."
Kelly Curtis, who represents Seattle-based Pearl Jam, told the AP he was still trying to process the boldness of Radiohead's leap: "My head is spinning, honestly. It's very cool and very inspiring, really."
Even if everyone who downloads the tracks pays nothing, Radiohead still hopes to make some money. The group's site will also sell a deluxe edition of the album with versions in three formats (CD, vinyl and download) along with eight bonus songs and a hardcover book for about $82.
Radar Magazine has published a scarily fictitious story about Internet search giant Google with this tagline: "Google controls your e-mail, your videos, your calendar, your searches… What if it controlled your life?"
The lengthy tale, which ponders a world in which Google and the Department of Homeland Security merge, is written by Cory Doctorow, a well-known technology journalist and science fiction author who co-edits the popular BoingBoing blog.
An excerpt: "Greg sighed. He knew Google's reach all too well. Recently, the site's search-optimization software had begun using the data to tailor Web searches to individual users. It proved to be a revolutionary tool for advertisers. An authoritarian government would have other purposes in mind."
Radar conjured up some pretty realistic looking photographs that illustrate the imagined new world order. The photos depict airport security and immigration courtesy of Google and Google-sponsored public surveillance cameras.
Unauthorized software on government computers is on the rise. Resisting it is futile but managing it isn't. The latest issue of Government Executive magazine features a column by yours truly that focuses on this "shadow IT" phenomenon.
Here's a snippet from the story:
America Online, eBay, Google, iTunes, MySpace, instant messaging, Yahoo, YouTube. What would life, or work, be like without these and other popular Internet-driven diversions?
Today's workers are tech savvy, and government employees are no exception. They want and use the latest applications. Whether their information technology administrators like it or not, federal workers are using the software to be more productive or, at times, to be entertained.
These un-approved applications don't come from agency IT shops, though; employees are downloading them directly off the Internet. The practice has become so widespread in all kinds of organizations that it now has its own descriptor: shadow IT.
The problem is that shadow IT poses security risks. The applications could have vulnerabilities that provide the holes hackers need to access employee computers and government networks and steal information or install malware.
Read the full article here.
The initiative, inspired by Time magazine's latest person of the year, recognizes the importance of keeping people safe and secure in this tech-fueled age, she said: "It's really an interesting way of looking at the value of human data -- what does the future look like and how does privacy and personal data control factor in?"
Consider this: IDC estimates that by 2010, about 70 percent of the world's digital data will be created by individuals. Meanwhile, 161 billion gigabytes of digital stuff was created globally last year alone. That's like 12 stacks of books that each reach from the Earth to the sun (the fireball in the sky, that is -- not the tech firm's Santa Clara, Calif. headquarters).
"Securing all this information along its lifecycle so it can lead to good business decisions is critical," Dennedy said. Key questions include how the information is stored and how long is it stored. The journey is leading policymakers away from "soil-based decisions," and requires attention from the international community -- not just Capitol Hill, she said.
Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich on Thursday joined the list of politicians who have visited the online fantasy world Second Life. The Georgia Republican talked politics with the virtual audience and even signed a few e-autographs.
According to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Gingrich also got a chance to meet a few of the more eccentric avatars. "…[Upon] arriving in the digital amphitheatre, Gingrich's figure was immediately approached by a lovely young digital lady, who arrived moments before her clothes did."
GamePolitics.com has a short video clip of Gingrich's virtual event. The Click Heard Round The World also reported on Gingrich's remarks. An audio version of his speech is available here.
Update: The Metaverse Mod Squad, which moderated Gingrich's Second Life event, is disputing the Journal-Constitution's account. According to President Twig Tomorrow, Gingrich never encountered a nude avatar.
Tomorrow clarified that one avatar appeared for the event early in a skimpy outfit and complied when an agent requested that she change into something more appropriate. The Metaverse Mod Squad insists that the event was incident-free. -- Michael Martinez
The proliferation of iPods might have triggered a recent surge in crime, according to a new report from the Urban Institute, a Washington, D.C.-based think tank. The FBI recently released statistics showing that violent crime increased in 2005 and 2006.
"The gadgets are not just entertaining and convenient; their high value, visibility, and versatility make them 'criminogenic' -- or 'crime-creating' … And their power to distract users can give thieves an advantage," authors John Roman and Aaron Chalfin suggest.
The pair notes that robberies were up 3.9 percent in 2005 and 6.8 percent in 2006, while theft overall declined by 6 percent and auto theft fell 5 percent. Youth robbery arrests jumped 11 percent in 2005 and 21 percent in 2006 and adult robbery arrests rose only 1 percent in 2005 and 5 percent the following year.
The popularity of iPods among young people may make it a target for juvenile offenders, they wrote, noting that an outbreak of iPod-targeted muggings would be consistent with statistics. Empirical data in that realm are limited, but anecdotal evidence is mounting.
In the first three months of 2005, major felonies rose 18 percent on New York City's subways; but if iPod and cellular phone thefts are excluded, felonies actually decreased by 3 percent. In Washington, in the first four months of 2007, iPod subway robberies accounted for 4 percent of all robberies citywide, compared with under 1 percent in 2005.
Update: Washington's Fox 5/WTTG picked up this story after Tech Daily Dose [watch video]. Meanwhile, the city's Metro Transit Police released a list of tips to keep commuters safe while enjoying music on buses and trains. Read that list here.
Google Deputy General Counsel Nicole Wong took a brief break from her busy trip to Washington on Friday afternoon to meet with a small group of reporters at the Internet search giant's D.C. office.
A day earlier, David Drummond, Google's vice president for corporate development, squared off against Microsoft General Counsel Brad Sherman at a hearing on Google's proposed $3.1 billion bid for the DoubleClick online advertising firm.
With the Senate Judiciary Antitrust Subcommittee showdown still fresh in her mind (and ours), Wong responded to suggestions made by some industry and consumer advocates that the merger should hinge on specific conditions.
"I don't think there should be conditions on this deal [from an antitrust perspective]," she told us over an assortment of Corner Bakery sandwiches and cookies. Google's rivals similarly acquired firms with no strings attached, she pointed out.
Yahoo recently bought ad firm Right Media; America Online acquired the European-based player Adtech AG online and behavioral targeting firm Tacoda; and Microsoft paid $6 billion for the Web ad provider aQuantive.
The National Association of Broadcasters released the first of its digital television transition TV spots this week. The videos were sent to stations nationwide last week in an effort to boost consumer awareness of the Feb. 17, 2009 switchover. After a gentle nudge from yours truly, the spots were put on YouTube too. See above.
Say sayonara to Cinematube.net and Ssupload.com -- two Web sites that allegedly facilitate copyright infringement. The Motion Picture Association of America filed lawsuits against them this week in a California federal court.
It is estimated that Cinematube, believed to be operated out of Georgia, averages more than 24,000 unique users per day who view more than 85,000 pages of content. Ssupload's servers are in Scottsdale, Ariz., and the site averages 55,000 daily visitors who view over 190,000 pages of content, MPAA said.
Cinematube and Ssupload both highlight on their sites the availability of the latest in pirated movies that are frequently still in theatrical release. Both get significant profits via third party advertisers and user donations.
"No matter how you slice it, the sole purpose of these sites is to disseminate and profit from creative content that has been illegally reproduced and distributed," MPAA Executive Vice President John Malcolm said. Both sites were still online Thursday evening.
The only trade association representing Microsoft, Google, DoubleClick, aQuantive and many others in the Internet advertising industry reaffirmed its commitment to consumer privacy and the role that the industry plays in the U.S. economy on Thursday.
The Interactive Advertising Bureau's comments came on the same day a Senate Judiciary Antitrust Subcommittee examined the pending $3.1 billion Google-DoubleClick merger. The plan has spurred complaints from rivals like Microsoft as well as some high-tech watchdogs (See Technology Daily's PM edition for more).
"The interactive advertising industry is proud of its long-term commitment to the protection of consumer privacy and to the fundamental principles of relevancy, transparency and accountability," IAB President Randall Rothenberg said. Web ads are the "principal pillar that supports the delivery of free, rich Internet content, as well as free access to unparalleled products and services."
The 2006 IAB Internet Advertising Revenue Report showed Internet ad revenues reaching nearly $17 billion, a 35 percent increase over the same period from a year before. The surge continued an annual growth rate that has reached as high as 40 percent over the past three years.
Well, I guess we're about a day late and 89 cents short but it has been a busy week. Amazon.com officially opened its eagerly anticipated online music store on Tuesday that offers more than 2 million tracks free from digital rights management (DRM) restrictions.
The Digital Freedom campaign, which is backed by the Consumer Electronics Association, Public Knowledge and others, congratulated the e-commerce site and urged others to follow Amazon's lead. The site will offer individual songs for 89 cents per download, 10 cents lower than Apple's iTunes store.
"Amazon.com’s recognition that giving consumers what they want – digital music – the way they want it … makes good business sense," campaign spokeswoman Maura Corbett said. The move is "a tremendous step forward for artists, consumers, and the music industry itself."
The announcement came on the heels similar decisions by Wal-Mart and music labels EMI and the Universal Music Group.
For those of you keeping score at home, Internet billionaire Mark Cuban put up a 21 on Tuesday night in his “Dancing with the Stars” debut on ABC.
Cuban, who also owns the Dallas Mavericks, foxtrotted himself ahead of several competitors heading into Wednesday's elimination episode. News.com’s Caroline McCarthy has the full rundown on Cuban’s opening dance and the follow-through on his promise to “churn the butter.”
He also vowed to work “the motorboat” into a future routine as a tribute to fellow dancer Jane Seymour’s performance in the movie “Wedding Crashers." We’ll have to wait to find out whether he’ll get another shot at making that happen. -- Michael Martinez
A controversial conservative legal scholar and failed Supreme Court nominee said on Tuesday that the furor over judicial oversight of the federal government's electronic surveillance program is "part of a much broader drive to judicialize everything."
Robert Bork, a former judge on the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia, told a Hudson Institute seminar that "all aspects of life" are being held up for judicial scrutiny "from grade schools to fire departments to police departments to the military."
"We have Harry Reid, the ACLU and MoveOn.org, but we have a lot of less extreme anti-war types too," Bork said. "Now we have something we've never had before -- extensive judicial supervision of various aspects of the war [on terror], including gathering of intelligence."
The Hudson fellow recalled the moment when he was informed of the previously secret warrantless wiretapping program while serving as acting attorney general. A pair of FBI officials briefed him on the initiative and he was asked to sign authorizations for the work. "I did and so did every other attorney general in our history that was asked."
Bork also noted that the extent of the spying during that era was "much broader than anything that takes place now or has been proposed today." Contrary to what many believe, Bork also said he was unaware of any abuses under the program.
BoingBoing reports on Wired co-founder Kevin Kelly's latest creation -- a personal countdown clock that shows him how many days of life he has left. He came up with the Web-based clock to remind himself to make the best use of his remaining 8,500 days.
"I am now 55 years old. Like a lot of people in middle age my late-night thoughts bend to contemplations about how short my remaining time is. Even with increasing longevity there is not enough time to do all that I want," he wrote.
"My hope was that a reckoning of my numbered days would help me account for how I spend each precious 24 hours, and to focus my attention and energy on those few tasks and projects I deem most important to me. Indeed, it might help me decide which ones are most important, which is the harder assignment," he added.
I guess that Kelly believes when you're eligible for Denny's senior menu, you really have to start taking stock of life... and death. Now, that's deep.
The virtual version of Capitol Hill in the popular Second Life online community will host a presentation by former House Speaker Newt Gingrich on Thursday. His speech will coincide with a real-world address the Georgia Republican is delivering in Atlanta.
Gingrich will appear in Second Life in the form of an avatar likeness and his presentation will be streamed in Second Life via a live audio feed, according to a press release. The event is sponsored by American Solutions for Winning the Future, as part of a new wave of citizen collaboration designed to apply real world know-how to public policy solutions.
Digital marketing firm Clear Ink created Capitol Hill in Second Life as a nonpartisan virtual destination for political discussion and education. The venue launched in January with a virtual visit by House Education and Labor Committee Chairman George Miller, D-Calif., and a video stream of the opening of the 110th Congress.
Reprinted from the Sept. 18, 2007 edition of National Journal's Technology Daily
Immigrant Group Wants Changes For Green Cards
By Aliya Sternstein
An alliance representing high-skilled legal immigrants said Tuesday that it is rallying members in an effort to fix a green-card visa system that is inherently designed to create backlogs.
Immigration Voice, a 3,000-member organization that promotes the interests of legal, employed immigrants with pending applications for permanent residency, is urging Congress to make legislative changes that would let high-skilled workers already in the United States stay legally.
"We appeal to Congress" to reform the immigration system by distributing more green cards each year and removing limits on the number of green cards per country of origin, Aman Kapoor, president and founder of Immigration Voice, said on Tuesday.
"The root of the problem" is the per-country limits, he said. "The population of the world is not evenly divided."
Immigration Voice member Jay Pradhan, who moved to the United States in 2000 from India, said that this year, the group's members spent considerable time trying to meet deadlines for federal paperwork because the due dates changed. "The deadlines are short. The paperwork is huge."
Months after a gunman killed 32 people on Virginia Tech's campus, a school shooting at Delaware State University on Friday prompted questions about how best to notify students, staff and faculty when an emergency occurs.
Classes on the Dover campus were canceled after an early morning shooting that left two wounded and a suspect at large. Non-essential personnel were told not to report to work and students living on campus were asked to stay in their dormitories until further notice.
The bulletin was posted in the news section of the university's Web site, right above a press release about the debut of a DSU sociology professor's new book. Several cable news network pundits questioned whether the school had done enough to alert the community.
An internal review of the Virginia Tech massacre released earlier this summer offered some advice. The report recommended that the university improve security, enhance its communications system and better monitor at-risk students.
Technologies suggested for making the improvements included: creating electronic key-card access to some campus buildings, installing electronic banners in classrooms to notify students of critical information, and establishing an electronic location system that would track students and inform others of their whereabouts.
Four days ago I sent an e-mail to the Internal Revenue Service notifying the agency that I had received an authentic-looking tax refund message in my inbox but I believed it to be a phishing scam. I still have not heard back.
Since I'm a techie, I know not to follow the link in the e-mail, but what about countless recipients of similar notifications who are not informed enough to click "delete" or patient enough to wait for a response from IRS.gov?
Perhaps it is time that the agency reviews its mechanisms for responding to reports of possible fraudsters. Follow the jump to view the text of the purported IRS e-mail. And if Uncle Sam does actually owe me $109.30, I certainly would like to know.
For all of you legal eagles out there, the Electronic Discovery Law Blog reports that the ethics committee of the District of Columbia Bar released an opinion on metadata mining.
The panel found that "a lawyer receiving electronic records from an adversary is prohibited from reviewing the records' metadata only when he has actual knowledge that the metadata was inadvertently sent."
In those instances, "the receiving lawyer should not review the metadata before consulting with the sending lawyer to determine whether the metadata includes work product of the sending lawyer or confidences or secrets of that lawyer’s client."
The full text of the ethics opinion can be found here.
The Department of Homeland Security's Data Privacy and Integrity Advisory Committee had a packed agenda on Wednesday morning but that didn't stop Chairman Howard Beales from having a little fun at the beginning of the meeting.
The former director of the FTC's Consumer Protection Bureau told his colleagues and audience members that the "contest for the coolest cell phone ring tone is at lunch." He advised everyone to switch off their mobile devices so they wouldn't give away their favorite polyphonic jingles before the big event.
Obviously, it was just a clever way of telling folks to silence their noisemakers, but that begs the question -- what does his ring-tone sound like? I forgot to ask him during an interview after the morning session. There were too many pressing privacy topics I wanted him to address.
Read more about the meeting in Technology Daily's PM Editon.
Internet watchdog Carl Malamud and a handful of other high-tech watchers wrote to Register of Copyrights Marybeth Peters this week asking her to provide bulk access to the copyright catalog of monographs, documents, and serials on the Internet.
Currently, the information is available through a Copyright Office online application that allows the public to search for individual records -- but no bulk access is available, meaning that the entire database cannot be downloaded.
Alternatively, the Library of Congress's cataloging and distribution service sells a subscription to the current database for $31,500 and makes a retrospective database available for $55,125. The grand total for cost of entry is $86,625 and it comes with copyright restrictions, the group said.
The catalog "is not a product, it is fuel that makes the copyright system work," the letter stated. "Anybody should be able to download the entire database to their desktop, write a better search application, or use this public domain information to research copyright questions."
Continue reading Activists Ask Copyright Czar For Database Access.
Our parent company launched a fantasy political stock market on Monday called the National Journal Political Stock Exchange (NJPSE), which is viewable at the top of the page at nationaljournal.com.
The feature allows players to put their political knowledge to the test by predicting outcomes for a range of political events, including all angles of the highly contested 2008 presidential campaign. The NJPSE is powered by prediction market provider Intrade.
Who will win the major party nominations in 2008? Which party will control the House and the Senate after the 2008 election? What will the president's job approval rating be on Dec. 31, 2007? Take stock of the situation using the publicly available Web tool.
NJPSE's launch "brings the age-old Washington parlor game of predicting political events into the online world,” said NJ President Suzanne Clark.
Emmy censors made their best efforts on Sunday to block expletives uttered by three actors during the award show's live broadcast on Fox, the AP reported. The censoring dance comes as a debate brews over the FCC's "decency" policy. A federal appeals court in June rejected the FCC's rule that fines broadcasters for "fleeting expletives."
The network silenced the show for a few seconds when comedian Ray Romano used an expletive and Sally Field, who took home the award for best actress in a drama series, was "bleeped" after slipping a swear word into her acceptance speech. Actress Katherine Heigl also mouthed an expletive after winning an Emmy for her role on "Grey's Anatomy." Fox cut to another camera in an unsuccessful attempt at avoiding the exclamation.
The Senate Commerce Committee in July approved legislation by Sen. John (Jay) Rockefeller, D-W. Va., that would reaffirm the agency's authority to penalize broadcasters for "fleeting" utterances of profanity during live programming. A companion bill was also introduced in the House later that same month. -- Theresa Poulson
Former Democratic White House hopeful and Vice President Al Gore accepted an Emmy on Sunday night for the groundbreaking cable television and online broadcasting endeavor, Current TV, which he founded in 2005.
The Academy of Television Arts & Sciences' board of governors voted to recognize interactive TV during the popular annual awards show. The winner was chosen by an interactive-media "peer jury."
The network beat out four other contenders -- Major League Baseball, NBC-owned Bravo, DisneyChannel.com and Time Warner's Fantasy Football Television Tracker -- for the unique noncompetitive honor. Current reaches an estimated 50 million homes in the United States and the United Kingdom via satellite TV and various cable systems.
Masi Oka, the star of NBC's "Heroes" introduced MySpace founder Tom Anderson who introduced Gore and Current CEO Joel Hyatt. "We are trying to open up the television medium … to reclaim American democracy," Gore said during his acceptance speech.
He also hinted that there was "more to come" with the fledging Current network next month. So, stay tuned…
It's awards night in Hollywood and the city is abuzz. Washington, DC on the other hand, is slightly less festive. But one charity Web site is letting viewers of the 59th annual Emmys from around the world take home a piece of the red-carpet action – for a price.
For the sixth year in a row, the celebrity-fueled nonprofit Clothes Off Our Backs will put stars' donated Emmy outfits up for bid to the public with proceeds going to benefit children's charities. The organization was started by actors and philanthropists Jane Kaczmarek ("Malcolm In The Middle") and Bradley Whitford ("The West Wing").
Starting Sunday evening, the Web-based aid organization said it would start adding television stars' clothing and accessories to its auction site. Additional items will be added throughout the week.
The Hotline, a widely read and well-respected member of our happy National Journal family, celebrates its 20th birthday this weekend. "Two decades later, the faces have changed (or not), as have many other things. (How many of you got your first Hotline off a fax machine?)," the staff wrote.
"But some things haven't, like our fascination w/the game and its players, our love of the story and our devotion to wisdom, before it's conventional," they said. "The best part about today, is knowing the next 20 years will be even better. "
The popular Patently-O blog reports that Eugene Quinn, known by many as a fierce intellectual property watchdog, has put his Web site on the auction block. Since its founding in 1999, Quinn has developed his IPWatchdog.com site as a valuable resource for demystifying IP.
The Web address is for sale on SitePoint with a minimum price of $10,000 but Patently-O's Dennis Crouch predicts that the bidding may go well higher. Earlier this year, Patents.com was sold by patent attorney Carl Oppedahl for an undisclosed amount.
Attorney General Alberto Gonzales will deliver remarks at his farewell ceremony at the Justice Department on Friday afternoon. The going away party will be packed with Bush administration A-listers like FBI Director Robert Mueller; Solicitor General Paul Clement; and Assistant Attorney General Kenneth Wainstein.
Will there be cake, ice cream and balloons? Will there be a greatest hits reel or a bloopers video? If it's anything like the Comedy Central Roast of Pamela Anderson or Flavor Flav, I'm so there. Plus, I need to thank him for generating so much news for me over the past few years.
A handful of Web addresses -- luckytrump.com, luckytrumpcasino.com, magictrump.com, magictrumpcasino.com, trumpcasinogroup.com -- have been handed over to famous entrepreneur Donald Trump by the World Intellectual Property Organization's Arbitration and Mediation Center.
The real estate mogul, who also hosts NBC's "The Apprentice," has used his surname since 1985 in connection with his business and operates three casino/hotel facilities that have Web sites (www.trumptaj.com, www.trumpcasinos.com, www.trumpplaza.com and www.trumpmarine.com).
The respondents in the case known as "Casinova" and "FBA Partners," which operate out of Gibraltar, the United Kingdom and Ireland, registered the disputed domains in 2004. The arbitration center found that addresses are confusingly similar to Trump's marks and gave them to "The Donald."
Hungry for more? Read about several other settled domain name disputes in Technology Daily's PM Edition.
[Cross-posted from National Journal's Beltway Blogroll]
When Amazon.com announced that Alan Greenspan, the former chairman of the Federal Reserve Board, would post blog entries on the Web site in anticipation of his new book "The Age of Turbulence," many people were intrigued.
But The New York Times reports that after the first blog entry was published, "there was none of the gossip and flair that readers have come to expect from the blogosphere."
In his first entry on Aug. 31, Greenspan blogged about breaking free from the shackles of "Fedspeak," but he spoke nothing after that. "It looks like he's saving the good stuff for those who are willing to pay $35 for his book," the Times wrote. -- Danny Glover
It has been a busy couple of days and I neglected to mention the results of a new poll on the pending merger between satellite radio giants Sirius and XM. The survey results, released by the companies on Monday, showed that the proposed "a la carte" offerings are seen as attractive options.
Seventy-seven percent of respondents said the $6.99 per month package, where listeners choose individual channels they want to receive, would be good for consumers and 72 percent said the $14.99 plan, where consumers could select channels on one service plus popular selections from other, would be good for consumers.
About 70 percent were supportive of the $16.99 “best of both” package, which would feature channels on one service plus the most popular channels on the other and 62 percent approved of the mostly music and separate mostly news, sport and talk packages ($9.99).
More than half of respondents (56 percent) said the proposed "family friendly" packages at $11.99 and $14.99 that exclude adult-themed programming would be a win for consumers.
Dennis Wharton at the National Association of Broadcasters was quick to slam the survey. "Here's what XM and Sirius conveniently did not ask poll participants: Do you like monopolies? Does competition restrain a monopolist's price-gouging?" The poll "signals the lengths to which XM and Sirius will game the system in order to achieve monopoly status," he added.
The 463 Blog points out the ideal timing of the Progress and Freedom Foundation's release of Harvard University professor Lawrence Tribe's recent talk on the First Amendment in the 21st century. Tribe spoke at PFF's summit in Aspen, Colo. last month and the transcript was published on Tuesday, the anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks on the U.S.
In his presentation, Tribe said:
The broad lesson of this discussion of television violence is the centrality of the First Amendment's opposition to having government as big brother regulate who may provide what information content to whom, whether or not for a price. The large problem that this exposes is that especially in a post-9/11 world, where grownups understandably fear for themselves and for their children and worry about the brave new world of online cyber reality that their kids can navigate more fluently than they can, it is enormously tempting to forget or to subordinate the vital principles of constitutional liberty. Even if, after years of litigation and expenditure, the First Amendment prevails, it can be worn down dramatically by having to wage that fight over and over and over.
Read the full transcript here and watch the video here.
Free speech experts and journalists assembled Monday night at American University to discuss "Freedom of the Press in the Post 9-11 World" as part of a series of events at the school to commemorate USA Today's 25th anniversary.
The event featured National Security Archive General Counsel Meredith Fuchs; National Journal's Shane Harris; New York Times reporter Eric Lichtblau; USA Today editor Ken Paulson; and national security authority Suzanne Spaulding.
Discussion topics included terrorism, increased government secrecy, the unpopularity of the Iraq war and attacks on the news media for breaking stories about U.S. intelligence-gathering.
On Thursday, the school will host an invite-only affair honoring recipients of the Al Neuharth Award for Excellence in the Media. Honorees are legendary White House writer Helen Thomas, CBS anchor Bob Schieffer, PBS anchor Jim Lehrer and others.
Read more here.
Popular Internet gossip site, TMZ.com, made its small-screen debut on Monday with the maiden voyage of "TMZ On TV." The syndicated show, airing in Washington on Fox 5/WTTG, is essentially a televised slice of the snarkiest, celeb-crazed spot on the Web.
The show was chock-full of MTV Video Music Awards coverage (Britney Spears' distressing comeback and the behind-the-scenes brawl between rockers Kid Rock and Tommy Lee). No word on whether the program will be digging for dirt in the nation's capital. TMZ's plans for a D.C. spin-off were quietly put on hold earlier this year.
TMZ.com is the Internet's top-ranked entertainment news site, with 9.1 million unique visitors in July, according to comScore Media Metrix.
The Internet Innovation Alliance has launched a blog featuring a trio of top-notch contributors: Clinton Administration telecommunications advisor Larry Irving; Bruce Mehlman, President Bush's former Assistant Secretary of Commerce for Technology Policy; and Laura Spining, previously of the U.S. Telecom Association.
The blog, "Broadband Hub," will provide information about "the debate over Internet funding and our efforts to secure more investment to ensure continued swift access to the Internet," Spining wrote in an inaugural post. "This is not a matter of making fast connections faster, but of guaranteeing that future innovation is not hampered by traffic jams," she said.
The Monday morning quarterbacking surrounding Sunday night's MTV Video Music Awards has focused mainly on pop tart Britney Spears' ill-fated return to the stage, but the annual extravaganza also served as a platform for musicians to tout their albums, brands, labels, etc.
One band, however, used the limelight to publicize a humanitarian cause rather than their own. When the members of Fall Out Boy accepted their moon man statute for "best group," they quickly rattled off the Web address -- www.invisiblechildren.com.
The jarring non sequitur probably caused a number of viewers, including yours truly, to hop online and type in the URL. The site belongs to a relatively new nonprofit aimed at raising awareness about displaced or forgotten kids in northern Uganda.
Invisible Children was created in 2003 by three young filmmakers who were motivated to act after witnessing the 20-year war that has ravaged the region. Fall Out Boy has gotten involved in the effort and has promoted the project during their most recent tour.
Apple's announcement that it would slash the price for its popular iPhone in time for the holiday shopping season prompted an open letter from CEO Steve Jobs on Thursday. The bottom line -- the people have spoken and they are royally ticked off.
Jobs said he received hundreds of e-mails from iPhone customers who were upset about the price cut (from $599 to $399) two months after the device went on sale. Even though the company is "making the right decision to lower the price of iPhone," Jobs said "we need to do a better job taking care of our early iPhone customers."
Now, every iPhone customer who purchased the product from either Apple or AT&T and who is not receiving a rebate or any other consideration will get a $100 store credit toward the purchase of any product at an Apple brick-and-mortar or online store. Details will be released next week.
The Public Campaign Action Fund will begin airing a TV ad (see video above) in the Bluegrass State on Thursday spotlighting Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell's alleged role in an interesting kind of pay-for-play politics.
According to the colorful clip, the Kentucky Republican reportedly scored a several million dollar payback for a firm based in his state to send MP3 players to Afghani tribesmen. No word on what brand of device was shipped but the silhouette in the ad looks pretty familiar.
MacWilliams Kirchner Sanders & Partners produced the spot. The Huffington Post has more on the story.
The House Rules Committee is slated to take up the much-hyped patent reform bill (H.R. 1908) on Thursday afternoon after Technology Daily's deadline. In anticipation of the meeting, the panel released a summary of amendments that have been submitted.
Here's a quick rundown:
Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers, D-Mich., and California Democrat Howard Berman have a manager's amendment that would:
-- Retain interference proceedings for applications filed before the effective date of a claimed invention.
--Clarify the manner in which the president is to give notice of when major patenting authorities adopt a grace period similar to the one provided in the United States.
--Ensure that the jury in a patent case makes the determination of whether willful infringement has occurred.
--Limit the composition of the Patent Trial and Appeal Board by excluding political appointees.
--Adding a clause to ensure the entire bill is not struck down if one part of the act is found unconstitutional or otherwise unenforceable.
--Eliminate the so-called "venue transfer" provision.
Rep. Tammy Baldwin, D-Wis., wants to introduce language that would strike provisions of the bill that expand prior user rights. It also calls for a study on whether prior user rights laws in other countries promote innovation.
The death of former Rep. Jennifer Dunn, R-Wash., who served six terms in the House from 1993-2004, came as a sad shock to the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation.
On its Web site, the group said it was upset by the death of the 66-year-old, who represented a tech-heavy district near Seattle and served as ITIF's co-chair. Dunn "provided extraordinary leadership" to the think tank, officials said, "offering not only her time, energy, and commitment, but also valuable insights and advice."
"In her work with ITIF she always put the interests of the nation first and focused on how the nation and the world could maximize innovation. We will miss her spirit and her leadership," the group said in a statement.
(Images courtesy of Apple)
Apple was the talk of the technology world on Wednesday after introducing its all new itsy-bitsy iPod Nano (with video playback capability); a new iPod classic (80GB or 160GB); widescreen iPod Touch; an iTunes Wi-Fi Music Store; and a new music partnership with premium coffee supplier Starbucks.
Oh, and they slashed the price of the uber trendy iPhone from $599 to $399 to woo holiday shoppers. Read the press releases here. "We’ve clearly got a breakthrough product and we want to make it affordable for even more customers as we enter this holiday season," Apple CEO Steve Jobs said.
The Online Publishers Association has re-launched its Web site to create a more robust destination for research, news and commentary related to online media. The revamped site also boasts a new look and feel, powerful search capability and a new member center, according to a press release.
The trade group's site continues to provide valuable features for agencies, marketers and publishers, officials said. Those materials include: the Internet Activity Index, which for the past four years has measured time spent in “key” Web categories; information on OPA events; summaries of OPA legislative positions; a directory of research organizations and trade associations; and more.
While Technology Daily was on vacation last week, there was quite a bit of news… and I'm not just talking about Attorney General Alberto Gonzales's swan song. Here's an incomplete rundown of items that arrived in my inbox while I was lounging on a Caribbean beach, far, far away from Capitol Hill.
Napster Suit Settled
The National Music Publishers’ Association jointly announced with Bertelsmann a settlement of litigation arising out of claims asserted by certain members of the trade group relating to Bertelsmann’s relationship with Napster in 2000 and 2001.
The litigation was previously certified as a class action, and accordingly the settlement requires court approval, NMPA said. The settlement deal is expected to become final in several months' time. Bertelsmann, which financially backed Napster, admitted no liability in the settlement.
Bertelsmann's settlements set the company back millions of dollars, officials said. The German firm reported a $69.3 million loss in the first six months of 2007, largely attributable to the Napster suit.
Apple's popular iTunes Store is saying sayonara to NBC television shows for the upcoming fall season. The move follows network's decision to not renew its agreement with the digital media provider after Apple declined to pay "more than double the wholesale price for each NBC TV episode," officials said on Friday.
The change would have resulted in the retail price to consumers increasing to $4.99 per episode from the current $1.99, Apple said. ABC, CBS, FOX and the CW, along with more than 50 cable networks, will sell TV shows from their upcoming season on iTunes at the current price.
"We are disappointed to see NBC leave iTunes because we would not agree to their dramatic price increase," Apple Vice President Eddy Cue said in a press release. “We hope they will change their minds and offer their TV shows to the tens of millions of iTunes customers.”
NBC supplied iTunes with three of its 10 best selling TV shows last season, accounting for 30 percent of iTunes TV show sales. Apple’s current deal with NBC ends in December.
The Digital Media Association and digital royalty collector SoundExchange inked a deal Thursday afternoon after months of negotiations that stemmed from the Copyright Royalty Board's Internet radio rate hike.
Technology Daily has learned there are three parts to the agreement, the details of which will be announced later in the day: (1) Per-channel fees will be capped at $50,000 per service. (2) Licensed webcasters will provide a full census of songs to SoundExchange (3) DiMA and SoundExchange will form a committee to meet regularly to evaluate "stream-ripping" and possible technological solutions.
Salon.com's Machinist blog follows up on the weeks-old controversy surrounding FishbowlDC's annual "Hottest Media Types" contest. The author writes about how the election was rigged and how "trying to find the hottest reporter in the nation's capital is like trying to elect a president in Ukraine… Don't expect fairness."
Scruffy arts writer Kriston Capps and his housemate and friend Catherine Andrews, an editor at Washingtonian.com, both took home first place in the "off-air" category. The blog reveals that they "acknowledge that they won only because their online friends… built software bots that voted thousands of times for each of them."
"What's surprising is not that anyone cheated -- online polls are about as trustworthy as Soviet Bloc elections -- but how brazen, and how easy, the cheating was," the blog explains. Read the full post here. Also, Capps responds here.
The New York Times earlier this week ran an obituary for Joybubbles, a.k.a. Joe Engressia. According to the article, he was a pioneer of telephone touch-tone hacking or "phone-phreaking" -- the precursor to today's computer hacking subculture.
Engressia, who was born blind and died at age 58, happened to have perfect pitch and learned how to recreate the touch-tones necessary to move the switches at AT&T in the 1970s. Using this technique, he led a movement of hackers who reveled in tinkering with the telecommunications giant's system.
The obit is a fascinating read. It includes a number of interesting details about Engressia's life, including the fact that in 1988 he chose to "remain 5 forever, and had the toys and teddy bears to prove it."
A 1971 Esquire magazine article called Joybubbles a catalyst uniting disparate phreaks. "Every night he sits like a sightless spider in his little apartment receiving messages from every tendril of its web," the article's author wrote.
Engressia moved to Minneapolis on June 12, 1982, partly because that date’s numerical representation of 6-12 is the same as the city’s area code, the Times reported. There, he lived on Social Security disability payments and part-time jobs "like letting university agriculture researchers use his superb sense of smell to investigate how to control the odor of hog excrement."
Read more about Joybubbles on Wikipedia.
David Oxenford, an attorney for Accuradio, Radio Paradise and other small commercial webcasters, responded late Tuesday to SoundExchange's proposed deal on royalty rates for their streams through 2010.
He said the offer does not represent an agreement with all the small webcasters who were participants in the Copyright Royalty Board proceeding and who are parties to the appeal pending in the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia.
The proposal also "does not address many of the most significant issues raised" by his clients when SoundExchange first made the offer back in May. The plan does not allow the sector to grow -- limiting them to the same $1.25 million dollar revenue threshold that has been in place since 2002. It also imposes a new cap that will further limit the industry's growth, Oxenford told us.
"With these limits, investment in these companies will be eliminated as no one will invest in companies that, when they reach the revenue threshold, will have to pay more in royalties than they make in revenues," he said. Oxenford said his clients hope SoundExchange will continue to negotiate with them to reach a deal that will allow the businesses to grow.
Digital royalty collector SoundExchange began sending formal offers to small commercial webcasters that would allow them to continue streaming through 2010 under essentially the same terms they have enjoyed under the Small Webcaster Settlement Act, Technology Daily has learned.
The offer means that this sub-section of Internet radio providers would be guaranteed the same rates for the next several years that they have received since 1998 for the use of sound recordings owned by SoundExchange members. Sound recordings of non-members would still be subject to new rates.
Although webcasters of all sizes have started paying under the rates codified by the Copyright Royalty Board earlier this year, it had remained unclear to many small players what their obligations would be going forward.
This deal "takes the uncertainty out of the air" for most of their programming, SoundExchange Executive Director John Simson said in a press release, which was expected to go out late Tuesday. As part of the deal, small webcasters (those earning $1.25 million or less in total revenue) would pay royalty fees of 10 or 12 percent of revenue.
Small webcasters have until Sept. 14, 2007 to accept the agreement, officials said. Those who do not sign the paperwork but continue streaming will be responsible for paying the new, higher rates unveiled in March.
"We continue to negotiate with the relevant parties, and are hopeful that we can reach a solution that works for all small commercial webcasters," SoundExchange General Counsel Michael Huppe said. That kind of solution would have to get CRB approval.
Global piracy of recorded music has cost the United States $12.5 billion in economic output and 71,060 jobs annually, the Institute for Policy Innovation said Tuesday. U.S. workers lose $2.7 billion in earnings, including $1.1 billion from workers in the recording industry or “downstream” retail industries, and $1.6 billion by workers in other sectors.
The U.S. government loses at least $422 million in tax revenue, including $291 million in personal income tax and $131 million in lost corporate income and production taxes, the report by economist Stephen Siwek.
The IPI study is the second in a series of intellectual property papers examining the impact of piracy and patent infringement. IPI will publish an analysis of the combined copyright industries (movies, music, software and video games) in a forthcoming paper.
Mitch Bainwol, chairman of the Recording Industry Association of America, said the report "vividly illustrates the serious economic harm caused by the widespread availability of illegal music either via the Internet or on the streets."
Wal-Mart, the world's largest retailer, has decided to offer digital music free from technical restrictions. The chain announced this week that it will make available a new online MP3 music catalog that includes thousands of albums and songs from major record labels like Universal Music Group and EMI without copy-protection software.
The Digital Freedom Campaign, an effort backed by the Consumer Electronics Association, Public Knowledge and others, lauded the move. "In the fight for consumer rights in the digital age, the tide has clearly shifted,” spokeswoman Maura Corbett said.
Wal-Mart gained its mega-store status "by putting their customers first and offering the products they want." Then the company "took that philosophy digital," she said. Corbett said the action could be a precedent-setter and urged other retailers to follow Wal-Mart's lead.
The DRM-free music will be available for $0.94 per track and $9.22 per album -- lower than most offerings from Apple's popular iTunes service. Wal-Mart will continue to provide its existing WMA-format music downloads for $0.88 per track.
The new format will give customers "the ease and flexibility to play music on virtually any device at a great value," said Wal-Mart Senior Director Kevin Swint. Read Wal-Mart's press release here.
The Consumerist blog reported Sunday on an interesting incident involving Internet telephone firm Vonage and a customer who called to cancel his service. "Tony" asked to have his service discontinued after Vonage was unable to explain their contingency plans for handling an interruption.
The customer service representative apparently explained as he typed that he was listing Tony's reason for canceling as: "Customer... lacks... the... courage... to... stay... with... us... due... to... litigation." Vonage is currently duking it out in court with Verizon.
Tony didn’t like being called a coward and fired off a letter to Vonage. Read more about it here.
OpenLeft.com's Matt Stoller interviewed FCC Commissioner Michael Copps on a YouTube video in which the Democrat addressed how AT&T's recent snipping of Pearl Jam concert relates to the "net neutrality" debate.
"I think you're dealing here with a technology that's perhaps the most dynamic and liberating maybe in all of human history with the internet and our challenge is to keep that open and accessible to folks and running in a neutral fashion and to avoid those who may be in control of the distribution of that technology from also controlling the content on it," he told Stoller.
Read more about the Pearl Jam/AT&T controversy here.
Thursday marked the 30th anniversary of the death of rock legend Elvis Presley. In honor of the King of Rock & Roll, video blog Rocketboom featured a few tech-related tidbits including -- (1) the elvislives.net Web site, (2) the Elvis impersonator database, (3) Elvis' gold medallion for bid on eBay, (4) the complete album set of 95 33-inch LPs on eBay, Elvis image in 3 a billion year old rock on eBay (starting bid $20,000), and (6) the Web address Supercalafragilisticexpialaelvis.com (currently priced at $1). Meanwhile, check out my Elvis sighting at last year's Consumer Electronics Show. Long live The King.
The Markos Moulitsas world tour continued this week with a stop at Comedy Central’s “The Colbert Report.” The Daily Kos founder -- or as Stephen Colbert called him, the leader of the “Blog-shtapo” -- hit the show fresh off of an appearance on NBC’s “Meet the Press” and a weekend contribution to The Washington Post’s op-ed page.
In the op-ed, he wrote: "A new day is dawning for the progressive movement. The distrust between Net-roots activists and more traditional progressive players in the party establishment and issue groups has given way to respectful cooperation as we all adjust to new technologies and the promise they hold for institutional change." -- Michael Martinez
William Hacker, co-chair of the National Governors Association health information protection task force, doesn't have to think hard to come up with a come-back for jokes about his last name. "My brother-in-law's name is Hatcher and he's an obstetrician, so I can diffuse the hacker point," he told us.
But the Kentucky public health commissioner has had to think hard about the verb, in his capacity as a government official and advisor to NGA's State Alliance for e-Health.
"In their wisdom, NGA recognized that public health entities have a lot to contribute to a health information exchange" that many others don't generally recognize, he said on Thursday. Public health departments use health data, stripped of personal identifiers, to track all manner of diseases and medical trends.
"We can back-up advisories with firm data, which the physicians don't have," Hacker said. "That reporting piece is done today by fax or telephone or paper. If we can make it electronic or automatic that decreases the burden on the private physician."
E-health improves efficiency both for the sender and the receiver of the digital information, he said. "The quicker we know about it, the quicker we can respond." But until we can assure patients that their sensitive health information is recorded in a secure manner, we will never experience the benefits available to us, Hacker added.
"The truth is the digital world today is probably more protective than a paper chart" because of the embedded audit trails, "but from the public's point of view, that is not the case." Read more about this in Technology Daily's PM Edition. -- Aliya Sternstein
Intellectual property bloggers are commanding a lot more attention these days, especially as Congress considers a massive overhaul to the U.S. patent system and high-profile IP fights play out in courts across the country.
So, here's a new online resource to add to your list -- it's the Maryland IP Law Blog written by Brian Higgins, an attorney with Blank Rome. Higgins has experience counseling clients on the IP aspects of pharmaceuticals, medical devices, Internet-based products and more.
The blog provides news, analyses of case law, summaries of pending litigation, statistical information and miscellaneous commentary relating to IP issues impacting Maryland businesses, individuals, and governments.
His most recent post discusses a survey that asked corporations: "Overall, has your company made money from the patent system?" Pharma and biotech companies responded with a resounding "Yes," he said. Read more here.
Former Secretary of State Madeline Albright said Monday that she is no longer a technophobe. She has a BlackBerry, "which I'm addicted to unfortunately," and regularly users her computer -- but she still has not yet joined the blogosphere, attendees at the Aspen Institute's Forum on Communications and Society heard.
The Clinton Administration's top diplomat appeared at a multi-day event aimed at exploring the new uses and practicalities of emerging versus older media. She said there "needs to be a greater understanding of a lot of the technology that’s available" because "it's very hard to grasp in terms of what its effect is on foreign policy."
The key question is "whether one can get your arms around it enough to make it useful," Albright said of the countless tech tools currently available. "Information is a tool of foreign policy," she added.
Charter Communications Vice Chairman Marc Nathanson, who interviewed Albright on stage, asked whether she thought China was a friend or foe. "Friend," she responded, but said the relationship between the Communist country and the U.S. needs to improve.
A series of YouTube videos that depict pranks being played on fast-food restaurant employees are causing quite a stir. The so-called "fire in the hole" footage shows teenagers tossing purchased drinks back through drive-up windows, startling and in some cases drenching the target.
Pittsburgh's WTAE-TV has surveillance footage of one worker getting showered with hot sauce. The Subway clerk told WPXI-TV that "as soon as it hit my face, my eyes were burning. All is I could think is how could someone do this? I mean, it's just not funny."
Police in several states are investigating similar incidents. Meanwhile, a YouTube search on Thursday turned up a number of clips but some had been taken offline for violating the video-sharing site's terms of use.
(Credit: TimeOut Chicago)
Rock band Pearl Jam reported some shocking news on its Web site on Wednesday that riled up some in the policy world. After concluding their Sunday show at the Lollapalooza festival, the band learned that portions of their performance were missing from a webcast provided by AT&T.
When asked about the missing portions, AT&T informed Lollapalooza that some parts of the show were snipped and that their content monitor had made a mistake in cutting them, according to Pearl Jam's blog.
But the band doesn’t buy AT&T's explanation. During their performance of "Daughter," the following modified lyrics were sung but were cut from the online stream: "George Bush, leave this world alone" and "George Bush find yourself another home."
"This, of course, troubles us as artists but also as citizens concerned with the issue of censorship and the increasingly consolidated control of the media," the band wrote.
It troubled Public Knowledge President Gigi Sohn too. She said the incident was "nothing short of appalling that AT&T should take it upon itself to censor a webcast because it didn’t like the content of lyrics being sung by a band."
"How can we trust a company that promises not to interfere with content on the Internet when it has its corporate finger on the button to cut off political criticisms it doesn’t like?" Sohn said in a statement. She urged the FCC and Congress to take note.
Well, it was only a matter of time. Wildly successful MySpace and wildly successful satirical news outlet The Onion, have partnered to bring new Onion video, audio and articles to the social networking site.
The Onion/MySpace partnership will create a branded "Onion" community allowing fans to view exclusive content through the video hub as well as via the Onion’s new MySpace profile at http://myspace.com/onionnews.
"The news business is like the tobacco business: you want to reach new readers at as young and impressionable an age as possible," Onion's chief Sean Mills said in a press release. "MySpace was, of course, a natural partner in that regard."
The deal also launches The Onion’s first-ever staff blog. "The Wall Street Journal is all well and good, but The Onion News Network represents the best in hard-hitting investigative journalism," said MySpace's Jeff Berman. "Also, we lost a bet."
(Credit: Euphonix.com)
There's something slightly humorous when a museum dedicated to the legacy of American journalism can't meet its deadline. The massive new building on Pennsylvania Avenue was supposed to open Oct. 15, but officials say that won't happen.
Newseum officials told the Washington Post on Tuesday that, because of construction delays, the debut of the $435 million project has been pushed back. A new opening date has not been set.
According to the newspaper, the setbacks are due to "the complexity of the building and the final installation of state-of-the-art electronics that has to be done after the general contractor, Turner Construction, is finished."
The building, at Sixth Street NW, will have seven levels totaling 643,000 square feet, with the tech-heavy museum occupying 250,000 square feet and 70,000 square feet dedicated to exhibits. It will house 14 galleries, 15 theaters, two broadcast studios and 130 interactive touch screens.
I didn’t really even want to be on Facebook, Friendster, MySpace, LinkedIn et al (peer pressure). But now I'm also a member of Pownce, the social-networking and file-sharing service launched by Digg.com founder Kevin Rose.
I received an invitation from a friend and fellow tech policy writer and couldn’t resist the chance to be among the first to test it out. The site, whose catchphrase is "send stuff to your friends," is in its beta phase and is expected to launch publicly in September.
According to Pownce's home page, the new venture is "brought to you by a bunch of geeks who were frustrated trying to send stuff from one cube to another." So, what can you send? Messages, links, files and events.
The interface is clean and simple, which is a delight after being inundated with dizzying, noise-making, content-heavy MySpace pages (you know who you are). The downside is that the page templates are limited and the ability to customize is pretty minimal.
Overall, it makes for an easy profile-building process, but I haven’t really gotten an answer to my big question. "Now what?"
Just when I was beginning to wonder what on earth was going on with National Public Radio's forthcoming morning show aimed at a younger, hipper demographic, the staff of the program, code-named The Bryant Park project, put out a fun behind-the-scenes video.
The 15-minute documentary features compelling footage like a morning meeting (where producer Matt Martinez talks about iPods and pricey soccer shoes), a shot of co-host Alison Stewart eating popcorn and watching TV as well as other tasty tidbits.
NPR's new drive-time joint, geared toward adults 25-44, will premiere in September and they can invite us on any time to talk about the fascinating world of tech policy (hint, hint).
Democrats and Republicans in the House and Senate on Friday appeared entrenched in their differences over updating the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. It was a riotous day on Capitol Hill and I need a stiff drink.
[Cross-posted from National Journal's Beltway Blogroll].
The Daily Kos community is reveling in the political and media spotlight in Chicago for the next few days, but for folks who couldn't make it, Beltway Blogroll is the next best place to be.
Some news and commentary about the event:
-- Netroots Event Becomes Democrats' Other National Convention (The Washington Post)
-- YearlyKos Forum A Magnet For Bloggers, Pols (The Chicago Tribune)
-- 1,500 Bloggers Flex Here (Chicago Sun-Times)
-- Cyberactivists Are A Must-See For Candidates (U.S. News & World Report)
-- Political Pariahs (Time)
-- Blog Convention Hails A Political Revolution (Denver Post)
-- Netroots Activists Carry Political Weight (Seattle Post-Intelligencer)
-- The Vast Left-Wing Establishment (National Review)
-- The New Bosses Congregate At YearlyKos (MoJo Blog, plus more on the Democrats' ground game for 2008 and the Democratic message)
-- YearlyKos Draws Democratic Leaders (The Huffington Post, plus more about the blogosphere's coming of age)
-- Kos Revels In The Limelight (CongressBlog)
-- Kos: 'We Are The Center' (Pajamas Media)
-- Howard Dean Wows The Crowd At Kos (techPresident, plus more here and here)
-- Clinton And The Bloggers (The Caucus, plus more at Americablog and by Marc Ambinder)
-- YearlyKos Does Foreign Policy (The Washington Note)
-- YearlyKos Day 1.5 (TalkLeft)
-- The Press Lives Off Politics, Kossacks Live For It (PressThink)
Grammy-winning soul singer Sam Moore is demanding an apology from COX Radio CEO Bob Neil for an "offensive and arrogant" comment he made earlier in the week on the heels of Moore's testimony on Capitol Hill.
Moore, best known for his hit "Soul Man," told the House Judiciary Courts, the Internet and Intellectual Property Subcommittee on Tuesday that musicians should be paid when their songs are played on AM and FM radio (read Technology Daily's coverage).
A day later, during COX Radio's quarterly earnings call, Neil said: "The reality is a lot of those people would be sitting in a shack somewhere in a small town if it wasn’t for the fact that radio supported their music when it was coming up."
Moore responded, "I've spent nearly six decades touring, performing, and entertaining my fans to support myself and my family. The only folks who have never paid me for my performances are corporate radio."
He added that Neil should publicly apologize "to the thousands of artists like myself, you know -- ‘those people,’ he insulted.”
Update: Neil said late Friday that when he made his remarks, it was in response to a financial analyst's question on the earnings conference call. "I had no idea who had testified at that point, so for anyone to say I'd made racist remarks is just plain wrong."
The blogosphere is buzzing about this, so I thought I'd add to the chatter. The Sun ran a story under the byline of Sir Elton John that quotes the pop star as saying the Internet has ruined music.
Some particularly juicy excerpts from the U.K. tabloid:
"The Internet has stopped people from going out and being with each other, creating stuff. Instead they sit at home and make their own records."
"Hopefully the next movement in music will tear down the Internet. Let’s get out in the streets and march and protest instead of sitting at home and blogging."
"I am such a Luddite when it comes to making music. All I can do is write at the piano."
The story generated biting comments from readers. One wrote: "If we didn't have to pay through the nose for music which often turns out to be very poor then maybe the Internet wouldn't be such a big problem." Another said: "I think its time we closed Elton down for destroying good music… the overrated drama queen pub singer."
CNet's news blog reports a first for the popular recurring summer rock concert Lollapalooza. The festival, which will be held August 3-5 in Chicago, will be webcast live thanks to AT&T.
The online video feed at AT&T's Blue Room Web site will begin at 12:30 p.m. central time on Friday. Included in this year's lineup are Pearl Jam, Ben Harper & the Innocent Criminals, Amy Winehouse, Modest Mouse, Patti Smith, Spoon and Interpol.
The Blue Room was launched in October 2006 to build on the success of several content-driven properties developed by the telecommunications giant in recent years. The site features exclusive gaming, music, sports and pop culture content.
Technology Daily's PM Edition on Tuesday reported on a string of new lawsuits filed by the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers against bars, nightclubs and restaurants that allegedly played content owners' tunes without permission.
Attempts to contact several of the named defendants were unsuccessful by deadline, but late in the afternoon I heard from one pretty startled lounge owner. Abi Eshagi, proprietor of the Ibiza Dinner Club in Seattle did not know about the legal action even though the complaints were filed in courts around the country on Monday.
"I have been paying to two different commercial music service subscriptions -- [an] online service and cable service with music channels," Eshagi said. "I have informed ASCAP of this and I have heard nothing further from them. I don't know how many different times an establishment has to pay for the same copyright use."
The Politico's gossip gal Anne Schroeder reported Tuesday that CNN's blogosphere-watching duo Abbi Tatton and Jacki Schechner have split up. Schechner's contract wasn't renewed and she was out of work as of Friday.
The popular pair, who covered Internet and new media news for the network, appeared routinely on "The Situation Room" and I had the pleasure of working with them both on election night during last November's midterms.
Schechner came to CNN after producing and hosting video news segments for a reality-based video game company in the Big Apple, according to her bio. During the 2000 presidential election cycle, she was the on-camera chat host for Pseudo.com, an interactive Web TV service. She got her start in TV at Miami's WSVN and the NBC station in Hagerstown, Md.
Pssst! Jacki -- we're hiring.
FishbowlDC's annual "Hottest Media Types" contest ended Monday and Bill Press was crowned His Royal Hotness. The nationally syndicated radio show host took home first place in the on-air category. Some speculate that his win was due to voter fraud.
The media and politics blog ran a screen shot of this original post on Bill Press' Web site that instructed readers to game the system in order to boost his poll numbers.
Read about the other winners here. They included writer Kriston Capps; Washingtonian's Catherine Andrews; PR pros Jonathan Shradar and Jade Floyd; and WJLA's Pamela Brown.
The Software and Information Industry Association will host quarterly videocasts with Credit Suisse analyst Jason Maynard, the trade group announced Monday. The series -- geared toward examining the latest trends driving the software industry -- kicks off Friday.
The organization strives "to operate on the cutting edge of technology and at the forefront of the software industry" and Maynard's videocasts are part of that mission, SIIA President Ken Wasch said in a press release. The live programs are free for SIIA members and journalists and $89 for non-members.
Future installments will be Nov. 9, Feb. 19 and May 19. For more information, click here.
Just in case you didn’t mark your calendars, the last Friday in July is System Administrator Appreciation Day. The holiday's Web site proudly proclaims: "If you can read this, thank your sysadmin."
A sysadmin worries about spam, viruses, spyware, but also power outages, fires and floods, the site says. When the e-mail server goes down at 2 a.m. on a Sunday, your sysadmin is paged, wakes up, and goes to work.
"Systems administrators are the unsung heroes of the 21st century, our tireless morlocks who keep the entire universe running," tech blogger Cory Doctorow writes on BoingBoing. "They understand that they’re keeping the infrastructure of the information age alive and functional."
So if you haven’t already done so, give your sysadmin a pat on the back… after he/she stops berating you for not being able to fix the paper jam yourself. And if you're really feeling generous, click here for gift ideas.
Cisco posted this video of Gene Simmons and Paul Stanley from KISS on its corporate blog on Thursday. The legendary rock band entertained the Networkers at Cisco Live! crowd on Wednesday night.
In the clip, the costumed crooners weigh in on the current state of "the connected life," which happens to be the theme of Cisco's new corporate positioning campaign.
"The connected life is finally happening right here, right now. What's happening is in the palm of your hand," Simmons muses. Stanley also marvels at technological advancement but really shows his age when he complains that handheld screens are too small and hard to read.
FishbowlDC's annual "Hottest Media Types" contest is underway. The inside-the-Beltway blog about journalism and politics is asking readers to cast their votes for the most sizzling on- and off-air reporters and PR practitioners.
Some contestants are utilizing social-networking site Facebook to get out the vote while others have written their own self-aggrandizing press releases and campaign blogs.
In a mere 24 hours, more than 63,000 votes had been cast (and cheating charges are also mounting). Voter fraud! Voter fraud!
Cast your own votes here:
Hottest Media Types, Male, On Air
Hottest Media Types, Female, On Air
Hottest Media Types, Male, Off Air
Hottest Media Types, Female, Off Air
Hottest Media Types, PR, Male
Hottest Media Types, PR, Female
There are two folks from our company in the running -- Government Executive's Greg Grant and The Hotline's Amy Dudley -- as well as Congress Daily alum Greta Wodele. And a member of the Tech Daily staff almost won last year's contest (and was ineligible this time around). Go team!
For more hotness, check out The Hill newspaper's annual "50 Most Beautiful People on Capitol Hill."
The Coalition Against Domain Name Abuse launched Tuesday (see Technology Daily's PM Edition for details) with a mission to curb cybersquatting. The Internet Commerce Association's Philip Corwin, who represents domain-name investors and the direct-search industry, said he looked forward to working with the new kid on the block.
ICA wants to help assuage CADNA's "legitimate concerns about trademark infringement" on the Web, he said. Corwin's group supported a restocking fee for domain names ending with the .org suffix, which helped eradicate abusive domain "tasting." His members would welcome steps by ICANN and VeriSign to achieve the same result in the .com sphere.
Corwin went on to say that while ICA believes that such market-based mechanisms are the best approach, his group will carefully review any legislation proposed by the new coalition "to assure that it respects and affirms the rights of domain-name investors and preserves vigorous competition in consumer search models."
Sirius Satellite Radio CEO Mel Karmazin spoke at a packed National Press Club luncheon on Monday to make his case for the company's proposed merger with rival XM. Full coverage of his speech will appear in Technology Daily's PM Edition.
The National Association of Broadcasters, which opposes the consolidation, is "still the 800 pound gorilla in the audio entertainment market," he said. Terrestrial radio boasts 230 million weekly listeners and is capable of reaching "virtually every home and every automobile in America."
Karmazin also spent time talking about what he views as a broad, competitive market in which Sirius and XM compete. He noted that 116 million Americans enjoy iPods and other MP3 players and most new cars are including built-in jacks to accommodate them. In addition, about 72 million people listen to Internet radio each month. By contrast, satellite radio only has 14 million listeners, he said.
"There is every reason to believe that these and other technologies and services will continue to attract even more consumers in the years ahead." The competition brings important benefits to "consumers, programmers and society as a whole," he added.
From New Orleans' NOLA.com: Ticket sales for a Randy Travis concert to be held Sunday in Mandeville, La. abruptly halted this week when the ticketing portal fpr the show was reportedly "hijacked" by a domain name registration firm operating as RegisterFly.com.
Doug Gilford, the pastor at Cornerstone Church, which was organizing the event, called the incident "a travesty" and said he was "praying that God will show his might at this 11th hour for us."
New Jersey-based RegisterFly was stripped of its accreditation by the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers earlier this year for failing to respond to repeated customer complaints. GoDaddy took over the firm's remaining accounts.
(Credit: BoingBoing.net)
Finally, a mobile device that won't get sandy or water-logged at the beach!
Candid comments made by Mitch Glazier, the Recording Industry Association of America's top lobbyist, to Technology Daily ruffled the feathers of the Digital Freedom campaign on Thursday.
The group, backed by the Consumer Electronics Association and Public Knowledge, slammed Glazier's statements about "stream-ripping" and the ongoing debate over Internet radio royalties. He said webcasters should want to work to find a piracy solution before it becomes a bigger problem.
But the Digital Freedom folks said his request amounted to "calling for the implementation of a burdensome, costly, and completely unnecessary technology by webcasters who play and promote the artists the RIAA claims to represent."
"The specific issue at hand is not commercial piracy, but rather fair use of legally recorded music for personal use, which is perfectly legal," said campaign spokeswoman Jennifer Stoltz. What Glazier suggested "is a costly solution without even a hint of a problem" and would be "an imposition on both webcasters and consumers," she added.
For more information, read Glazier's comments in the recent Technology Daily article and the Tech Daily Dose blog post.
MSNBC's "Hardball with Chris Matthews" is asking viewers to submit "the next great viral video" campaign ad. The show is looking for creative entries -- both positive and negative -- aimed at the 2008 presidential candidates. Users can submit them on the show's Web site.
A panel of "all-stars" will weigh the entries on originality, creativity, persuasiveness and accuracy and a winner will be named in August. Judges include CNBC's Donny Deutsch; Democratic strategist Bob Shrum; Ron Christie, former advisor to Dick Cheney; National Journal's Linda Douglass; Washington Post TV critic Tom Shales and others.
Here are two of the most recent entries: entry #1 and entry #2. Okay, not really. But they are genius videos, right?
From the Lowe's Web site: "Mountain retreat, vacation cabin, guesthouse, permanent dwelling --the Katrina Cottage models are designed to take on many roles. Options include Hardie fiber-cement siding, metal 5-V crimp roof, refrigerator and range, and spacious porches."
Yes, that's right, the home improvement giant appears to be selling the small cottages -- designed to replace FEMA trailers after Hurricane Katrina -- online and in their stores. "We had so many requests that the company decided to make them available nationwide," a spokeswoman told the Contra Costa Times.
Katrina Cottage plans can be purchased from Lowe's for $700, with the lowest priced "building kit" starting at $17,000. The cottages come in various styles and sizes. My imaginary plan: Buy one, plunk it down right on the Georgetown waterfront and see who moves me.
Major Internet telephone provider SunRocket went belly-up this week but rival Packet 8 was there to pick up the pieces. Technology Daily's AM Edition reported that the Vienna, Va. firm, which owes millions of dollars to vendors, abruptly folded Monday and some customers who prepaid for service faced losing money.
But Santa Clara, Calif.-based Packet 8 announced Thursday that it had been selected as the replacement VoIP service provider. Under terms of the agreement, Packet8 will waive regular start-up costs for its residential service and will offer a free month of service to SunRocket refugees. Here's the press release.
Tech tools have helped some enterprising Web-heads creatively use the much-talked about phone records kept by Deborah Jeane Palfrey. The so-called "D.C. Madam" posted a copy of her escort service records (all 46 pounds of them) on her personal Web site and it wasn’t long before folks started remixing.
DCPhoneList.com created a searchable index of Palfrey's publicly released list, with entries dating back to 1994. The site permits searches by phone number but warns that the owner of a given number some years ago may not be the same person answering now.
The site said it hopes that "the many eyes of the public will find that which major media have not." Meanwhile, Sen. David Vitter, R-La., admitted earlier this week that he was a client and Palfrey has said other high-profile government officials used her services.
The Consumerist blog converted Palfrey's records into a text file, ran the numbers through a free online reverse number look-up service, sorted them by call volume then extracted all the hotel results. The top five meeting spots in Palfrey's records included the Marriott, Hyatt, Hilton, Holiday Inn, and Ritz-Carlton.
What's next? Will someone use Google's popular map-making capabilities to create a virtual tour of Palfrey's clients' escapades?
It's a clever title for the first post on Sony Electronics' new blog, unveiled by the consumer electronics giant this week. But Rick Clancy, head of corporate communications, said the catchphrase (an old advertising slogan) symbolizes "a unique combination of the whimsical Sony spirit and the candor that I hope to bring to this blog."
While the blog "may not please everyone," Clancy said he hoped to provide perspectives on new products and technologies, industry issues, marketing campaigns, retail strategies and more. He said he will also use the space to clear up misconceptions, debate hot topics, and talk about key trends.
Clancy's not the only one at the company getting in on the blogging game. He pointed out that his counterparts at Sony's U.S. PlayStation division have also recently started a corporate blog.
Internet giant Google is taking a giant leap into the offline world. According to the company's blog, AdWords customers will now have the ability to buy space in 225 newspapers across the United States. The reason? While Web use is growing, Google noted that nearly three out of four adults in the top 50 markets still read a daily or Sunday newspaper.
AdWords started in November 2006 with a test that included 50 newspapers and a small group of advertisers. Since then, the program has grown. Participating newspaper publishers include E.W. Scripps, Hearst Newspapers, Gannett, The New York Times, the Washington Post and others, the firm said in a press release.
"Newspapers are an important source of information and a powerful communication tool," Google CEO Eric Schmidt said. "With Google Print Ads we will bring more advertisers to newspapers which will ultimately benefit readers, publishers and advertisers."
Speaking of Google ad initiatives, take a look at Technology Daily's PM Edition, which has coverage of Wednesday's AEI-Brookings seminar on the company's proposed merger with DoubleClick.
John Simson, who runs digital royalty collector SoundExchange, sent a nasty little letter on Wednesday afternoon to Jonathan Potter, executive director of the Digital Media Association, further fueling a feud between the parties over Internet radio royalties.
Potter put out a press release earlier in the day accusing SoundExchange of "backtracking" on an agreement the two groups had reached (see Technology Daily's PM Edition for details). Simson felt compelled to respond, slamming DiMA for a "pattern of misinformation, mischaracterization and political maneuvering."
Simson said Potter is "intentionally mischaracterizing" SoundExchange's proposal to cap administrative fees for webcasters in exchange for a commitment to work on finding solutions to unauthorized "stream-ripping" and better reporting of what music is played by his member companies.
"It appears that DiMA is really the one 'backtracking' from its commitments" made during closed-door negotiations that took place on Capitol Hill a week ago, Simson said. "Your pattern of failing to deliver is becoming a major obstacle to having productive discussions," he added.
"Rather than do as you’ve promised, you keep running to the press and to the Hill instead of sitting down and negotiating," Simson told Potter. He continued: "If you spent half as much time attempting to construct a business solution to your problems as you do constructing 'spin' for the press and engaging in political maneuvering, then perhaps we would be further along on our negotiations."
Stay tuned as this wonky soap opera continues…
Who is asleep at the controls over at Washingtonpost.com this week? According to blogs Wonkette and PageOneQ, the Web site accidentally ran a story dated July 17, 2007 announcing the death of former President Ronald Reagan. The only problem is that he passed away three years ago. Then, in a story dated July 18, 2007, readers were told that former President Gerald Ford died too… even though he passed away last December. Very strange... Meanwhile, I cannot imagine what rush hour traffic in Washington would be like with two state funerals.
The apparent posting of the final Harry Potter book online before its Saturday release has ruffled the feathers of at least one intellectual property protectionist. The unauthorized distribution of "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows" is "an especially high profile example of copyright theft," but millions of works are illegally downloaded daily, said Patrick Ross, who runs the Copyright Alliance.
Some will say author J.K. Rowling's sales will still be strong, but that is beside the point, Ross said in a statement. "The more popular a work, the more likely it will be pirated, but that does not make the theft any more acceptable," he noted.
For true fans of the book and film series, Ross explains how the Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry would deal with the pre-release piracy problem: "The perpetrators would be found, their House (most likely Slytherin) would be deducted points, and repeat offenders would begin spitting up toads."
Ross may have added incentive to lash out against those who post books online without the author's permission. His mother, JoAnn Ross, happens to be a successful novelist with 95 books under her belt. She is currently writing the second in a trilogy of romance suspense stories.
Dan Glickman, chairman of the Motion Picture Association of America, also chimed in. He said the Harry Potter leak "underscores that robbery of intellectual property extends far beyond the movies, to music, publishing, computer software and other creative outputs that are the foundation of our modern information economy."
Digital royalty collector SoundExchange wants the Digital Media Association to work with the music industry to find ways to put a stop to "stream-ripping," which is essentially Web radio piracy. The group also wants webcasters to be more accurate in reporting how much music is being played.
In exchange, SoundExchange put a cap on the administrative fees Internet radio firms will have to pay through 2010. Both of these issues are examined in Technology Daily's PM Edition. But there is often more detail than one can cram into a 500-word article...
During a Monday afternoon sit-down with the Recording Industry Association of America's Mitch Glazier, the group's executive vice president for government and industry relations said the bottom line is that music labels are simply "trying to be proactive."
RIAA first raised the stream-ripping issue during a roundtable discussion years ago and has been engaging with webcasters ever since. Both the House and Senate versions of the Perform Act last year included an anti-ripping component as an updated condition on compulsory licenses.
Back in 1998, when the parties were negotiating those licenses, webcasters "thought they were able to properly protect the integrity of the signal and prevent the copying of Internet radio streams through sufficient security measures," Glazier said. New technology has changed all that and new measures are needed, he noted.
Some have questioned whether the problem of stream-ripping even exists. To that, Glazier responded: "Why wait until it is a big problem to start addressing it?" There are available technologies in the marketplace to address this issue, he said.
In Tuesday's Politico "Shenanigans" column, Anne Schroeder writes that CleanMyRide.org, a new energy policy Web site from the Campaign for American Progress will launch Thursday.
In conjunction with the initiative, there's reportedly a video circulating of a corn suit-wearing Ben Affleck. According to Schroeder, CAP has gotten several celebrities to don costumes "to gain some attention about cars and clean air and all that green, Prius talk."
"I can pressure Big Oil. I start revolutions. Remember Beta versus VHS? I did that, and I was 8 years old. Remember DivX? I killed that s---. Acid-wash jeans? Dead, ... and you're welcome," Affleck says in the video. There's also apparently a clip of former "Dawson's Creek" star Joshua Jackson threatening to hurt a baby if something isn't done about cleaner cars.
Update: FishbowlDC has some screen shots of the videos featuring Affleck, Jackson, Matt Damon and comedian Sarah Silverman. Looks hilarious!
Meanwhile, The Examiner's "Yeas & Nays" column reports that rising YouTube star "Obama Girl" (whose real name is Amber Lee) stopped by a Monday night party hosted by Arianna Huffington.
Residents of eastern Iowa and northwestern Illinois can once again listen to their National Public Radio affiliate online. Technology Daily reported in mid-June that Rock Island, Ill.-based WVIK shut down its Web stream to protest a March ruling to hike fees paid to music labels.
The station, which was reportedly one of the first public radio casualties of the proposed fee increase, serves hundreds of thousands of citizens in the Quad Cities that flank the Mississippi River.
At a Friday meeting between NPR, the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and digital royalty collector SoundExchange, a payment was offered to cover what the noncommercial entities believed was due by the July 15 deadline. Discussions are ongoing about the amount of the ultimate fee, an NPR spokeswoman said.
Satellite radio giant Sirius made waves with liberal bloggers over the weekend due to the curious christening of its conservative channel as Sirius Patriot. The liberal counterpart is called Sirius Left. Blogger Rick Perlstein called the classification "deeply, deeply offensive."
Sirius "doesn't think you're patriotic," Perlstein said. "This is an obscenity." He then urged his readers to contact Sirius' PR representative for talk radio programming. Other bloggers echoed his call.
Sirius Patriot used to be called Sirius Right but it underwent a name change over a year ago. Taylor Marsh, a blogger who calls herself the "antidote to right wing talk," suggested that Sirius Left be renamed Sirius Liberty.
Sirius Left's home on the Web features a photo of the Statue of Liberty. Sirius Patriot's landing page sports an American flag and an eagle. Sirius honchos have not issued a reaction to the uproar.
Eight years ago this week, Internet visionary Mark Cuban went public with what was then the biggest first day jump in stock price in IPO history (250 percent from its opening price to close at $62.75 per share). The company was Broadcast.com and it made Cuban a billionaire.
The site, which was sold to Yahoo, served audio and video -- live and on demand -- to more than one million unique users per day in 1999, Cuban recalled on his blog. Users were able to experience audio books, full length CDs, full length movies and TV shows (licensed, of course).
There was user-generated content too. It was mostly corporate, since that's who could afford the tools to edit video, but user-generated nonetheless. "Just think if we had put up a discussion forum and called ourself a social network. It's deja vu all over again," Cuban said. Watch the Broadcast.com promotional video here.
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Score another one for the home state of Ben & Jerry's and legendary jam band Phish: Vermont just won the right to host the world premiere of "The Simpsons" movie later this month.
Springfield, Vt., a town of about 9,300, beat out Springfields from 13 other states in an online video competition hosted by USAToday.com. The writers of "The Simpsons" have never identified the exact location of the fictional Springfield, the hometown of Bart, Homer, Lisa, Maggie and Marge.
The video submitted by Vermont's Springfield, which featured Homer chasing a giant donut allover the town, received more than 15,000 votes, edging out submissions from Springfields in Illinois and Oregon. According to USA Today, Vermont Gov. Jim Douglas voted himself and urged his constituents to do the same.
In a statement released Tuesday, Douglas declared that Springfield's win was a victory for the entire state. "It proves there's really nothing a giant donut can’t do," he said. "To all the other Springfields, I say, 'Don’t have a cow, man.'"
Timothy Davlin, the mayor of Illinois' Springfield who earlier this week said that all of his city's competitors could "eat his shorts," congratulated Vermont in a statement of his own. But he still insisted that his Springfield is the "true home of Homer and Marge Simpson.”
"We knew all along that it would be a tough battle against the other cities who claim a relationship with the television program," he said. "But, who can argue that being home to Mel-O-Cream, Springfield High School, the power plant, Evergreen Terrace, and our very own Mr. Burns puts us right at the top." -- Michael Martinez
The National Legal and Policy Center put Google in its crosshairs on Tuesday when it launched a "Top 50" list of full-length movies, cable programs and music concerts available via the Internet giant's video-sharing services -- potentially without the copyright owner's knowledge or permission.
The nonprofit center "promotes a single standard of ethics in public life through research, education and legal action," according to its mission statement. Previous targets have included elected Democratic officials, supporters of liberal causes, and labor unions.
The top 50 list includes the name of the movie or program, the production company, the number of days the content was hosted on Google Video and the number of viewers. All content in the Top 50 list was active as recently as Monday, officials said.
"We hope that our efforts both raise awareness of the issue of video and music piracy and hopefully serve as a resource for copyright owners to check if their content is on the sites without their knowledge or approval,” said NLPC Chairman Ken Boehm.
Attorney General Alberto Gonzales was told about the FBI's abuses of its anti-terrorism powers nearly a week before he told lawmakers that he knew of no wrongdoing, Technology Daily's AM Edition reported Tuesday. The just-released documents show that Gonzales received a copy of an FBI report documenting incidents in which agents obtained personal information they were not entitled to have.
Not surprisingly, the news prompted a chorus of condemnation by privacy groups and lawmakers.
"The FBI can't be trusted to police its own agents. It's time for Congress to provide oversight to protect American citizens," said Electronic Frontier Foundation Staff Attorney Marcia Hofmann. "These chronic privacy problems have long been known within the Justice Department but still were kept secret from those who really needed to know -- members of the American public."
Caroline Fredrickson, director of the American Civil Liberties Union's Washington Legislative Office, said Congress has been "hoodwinked" by Gonzales and "it's time for consequences." Without his false testimony, the USA PATRIOT Act may not have been passed in its current form, she said.
Occasionally, some pretty strange press releases make their way into my inbox. Who knows how I get on these mailing lists. This lukewarm pitch for GillznFinz.com is no exception. Here's a snippet:
Want a website that will entertain and answer any of your fishing desires? Well "A Revolution in the Sport of Fishing" is on the horizon. Regardless of location, type and skill level, GillznFinz.com is your answer. Launching on July 28, 2007 at a soiree in Charleston, SC, GillznFinz.com will be the most comprehensive fishing spot on the web. GillznFinz.com is the world's first interactive website created for fishermen by fishermen.
It's been a slow news day. I actually asked myself, "Where's the tech policy angle?" before hitting delete.
Five movie thieves were arrested over the Independence Day holiday for illegally camcording the box office behemoth "Transformers" in movie theaters across the country, the Motion Picture Association of America announced Monday.
The moviegoers allegedly used camcorders and cellular phone cameras to steal the film, or portions of it, in California, Florida, Georgia, Illinois and New York, then shape-shifted into sports cars and zoomed off (Okay, maybe I made up that last part).
"These arrests serve as a reminder to potential movie thieves that whether you use a camcorder or a cell phone, stealing movies off the silver screen is a crime and you will be arrested and prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law,” said MPAA Chairman Dan Glickman (a.k.a. Optimus Prime).
If convicted, the defendants could face a range of jail sentences and thousands of dollars in fines. Over the holiday weekend, "Transformers" raked in $67.6 million and "Ratatouille" was a distant second with $29 million. "Live Free or Die Hard," "License to Wed" and "Evan Almighty" rounded out the top five.
If you tuned into any of the Live Earth concerts on Saturday, chances are you were told that 2 billion people were watching with you.
According to early reports, the concerts, which former Vice President Al Gore backed to promote awareness about global warming, failed to attract as many television viewers as desired. Nielsen Media Research released estimates that NBC's 3-hour Live Earth special this weekend actually performed behind the network's regular summer Saturday night programming.
But the shows created a much stronger buzz online. As noted in Technology Daily's AM edition, Live Earth made entertainment history by generating more than 9 million Internet streams. And people are still going online to catch the performances.
Clips of the Live Earth shows are dominating the YouTube charts. Currently, five of the 12 most-viewed videos on the popular sharing site feature Live Earth performances. Another video of a holographic Gore speaking to a Live Earth audience has been viewed more than 25,000 times.
The second wind on YouTube has been kinder to some artists than others -- multiple videos capturing the highly-anticipated reunion of Spinal Tap have received tens of thousands of hits, including one video of the band enlisting “every bass player in the known universe” to fight global warming.
-- Michael Martinez
Ever heard of Nebraskan treasures like Fort Robinson State Park, the Stuhr Museum of the Prairie Pioneer, and Carhenge? If not, Sen. Ben Nelson, D-Neb., has the Web page for you. I can't vouch for the parks or museums, but the recreation of Stonehenge from American-made automobiles is supremely cool.
Google's Public Policy Blog reports that the lawmaker, who previously used Google's MyMaps tool to create a virtual tour of his trip to Iraq, launched two new Google-fueled projects to promote tourism in his state -- one featuring state and federal parks and the other highlighting "popular and uniquely Nebraska attractions."
The maps, posted just in time for the summer vacation season, will help visitors "learn about 'the good life' we live in Nebraska," according to Nelson's Web site.
Age-verification technologies have the potential to dramatically affect how people do business and interact socially online. Some lawmakers and law enforcers are pushing such applications as tools to protect children on popular social-networking sites like MySpace.
Others are curious as to whether age verification can be used as part of a regulatory regime if Congress rescinds restrictions on Internet gambling. But the dispute is being shaped by disagreement over how well the technologies work, and it has ensnared companies with considerable influence inside the Beltway and beyond.
Read more of Technology Daily's "Issue of the Week" by our very own Michael Martinez.
C-SPAN's latest installment of its "The Communicators" series will examine how the United States stacks up to the rest of the world when it comes to high-speed Internet access. The show airs Saturdays on C-SPAN at 6:30 p.m. ET and Monday on C-SPAN2 at 8 a.m. and 8 p.m. ET.
Guests include Information Technology & Innovation Foundation President Robert Atkinson and the Progress & Freedom Foundation's Scott Wallsten. Atkinson will talk about the findings from a pair of recent ITIF reports -- one on Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development broadband rankings and one calling for a national broadband policy.
This Saturday's Live Earth concert series may give radio shock jock Howard Stern some competition for his self-proclaimed title as "King of All Media." The festival's 24 hours of music on seven continents will be covered on multiple media platforms.
Live Earth will be transmitted worldwide, from New York, London, Johannesburg, Rio de Janeiro, Shanghai, Tokyo, Sydney, and Hamburg by Intelsat satellite in standard and high-definition across TV, radio, Internet and wireless channels, organizers said.
TV networks NBC, MSNBC, CNBC, Bravo, Sundance, Telemundo and others will be airing portions of the shows. Satellite radio providers Sirius and XM will also provide coverage of the event. Additionally, Live Earth concerts will be streamed live online by MSN and up-to-the-minute news will be reported on the concert's official blog.
The concerts will bring together more than 100 artists and two billion people to trigger a global movement to solve the climate crisis, organizers said. Saturday marks the beginning of a multi-year campaign to drive individuals, corporations and governments to take action to solve global warming. Read more about Live Earth here.
Update: [Thanks to The Gate]: Al Gore has rustled up a last-minute deal to bring Live Earth to Washington, after all. Garth Brooks and Trisha Yearwood will perform at the National Museum of the American Indian. Gore himself is expected to kick off the show.
In the July 7 issue of National Journal magazine, Technology Daily's Andrew Noyes examines the ongoing battle over Internet radio royalties playing out on Capitol Hill, in court and in the court of public opinion.
For those who have followed our extensive coverage of the issue in recent months, the article won't provide much new insight, but the two-page spread definitely puts the feud between webcasters, musicians and record labels in the spotlight for a broader audience of policy junkies.
Subscribers can access the story online here or pick up a copy of the magazine. It's perfect weekend beach reading!
Forrester Research's new report, "How Consumers Use Social Networking Sites," is hot off the presses and analyst Charlene Li gave her blog readers some insight into the paper's findings earlier this week.
The report concludes that social networking sites like MySpace and Facebook have seen tremendous growth over the past two years. Frequent users engage in more activities and have a more positive attitude about these sites, but they are also more interested in profiles from their favorite companies.
Forrester said marketers that are interested in reaching their audiences on those sites should: dispense with traditional Web marketing tactics, encourage "friending" and regularly refresh content. Read more here.
National Public Radio affiliate KCRW read the fine print of digital royalty collector SoundExchange's latest offer to webcasters, who have been protesting a forthcoming rate hike, and uncovered something unsavory.
The Santa Monica, Calif. radio station's weekly music commentary show "On the Beat" points out that under the deal, Internet radio providers would have to agree to cease lobbying on behalf of H.R. 2060, a bill that would reverse the Copyright Royalty Board's March ruling.
Sound Exchange has offered to cap the $500 per channel fee at $2,500 (Read Technology Daily's coverage here). KCRW commentator Celia Hirschman also reports that the SoundExchange proposal only extends for 18 months and points out that webcasters would then be forced to "fight all over again" to cover 2009 and 2010.
As part of the agreement, webcasters would also have to withdraw their legal motion for a stay on the per channel minimum issue, KCRW reported. An appeal and request for emergency stay is currently before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit.
"On the Beat" airs on Wednesday afternoons. Text for the segment, “Cloudy Issues Surround Internet Radio,” is available online here.
Fireworks and food took a backseat to multiple demonstrations of the new Apple iPhone at our Independence Day barbeque on Wednesday. Three partygoers brought along their dearly beloved gadgets and repeatedly wowed the crowd with the device's uber-functionality and utter coolness.
"Look, I can get the real-time weather forecast for Washington tonight and the outlook for a dozen other locations I've pre-programmed." "Check this out -- I can punch in this address and see a Google Earth image of the backyard." "Ooooo, watch this hilarious YouTube video of a cat playing with firecrackers!" "Can you believe how great the resolution is on the photo I just took of the potato salad?"
Techies and non-techies alike were in awe of the sleek design, ease of use and various must-have applications… and the iPhone owners barely even mentioned the components that allow users to make telephone calls and listen to music (the two main purposes of the $600 toy). Summer get-togethers may never be the same but until the iPhone helps clean up after houseguests, it's not a true all-in-one thingamajig.
Technology Daily broke the news in Thursday's PM Edition that royalty collector SoundExchange was planning to extend what it sees as an olive branch to large Internet radio providers who are worried that a forthcoming fee hike could harm their industry.
On Friday, SoundExchange made the offer official in a press release that proposed a cap on minimum fees charged against royalties for sound recordings played by webcasters like America Online, Pandora and Live365. The $2,500 ceiling would apply to regulations (due to take effect July 15) that requires services to pay a $500 minimum fee “per station or channel” regardless of the overall number of stations or channels they stream.
There was plenty of confusion over how the minimum fee set by the Copyright Royalty Board would apply, said John Simson, the group's executive director. "We certainly don’t want anybody to get unduly hurt by the minimum fee, but there is a value to music and a cost to administering the digital royalty program, and we wanted to ensure that everyone was treated fairly – artists, webcasters and record labels," he said.
SoundExchange reached out to the Digital Media Association this week to discuss the offer but DiMA has not formally responded. Simson's organization is also negotiating with small and noncommericial webcasters such as public radio and college stations to provide below-market rates for what they will pay to artists and record labels.
"We are in this together," Simson said. "We want to see artists and labels fairly paid for the music they provide and we want to see Internet radio grow and flourish."
*UPDATE* DiMA responds to SoundExchange
DiMA Executive Director Jonathan Potter said his group would agree to a $2,500 per-service cap for the entire term of the royalty board ruling (through 2010), but not the partial-offer presented to us in writing, which would terminate in 2008.
"Any offer that doesn't cover the full term is simply a stay of execution for Internet radio," he said in a statement. "The looming 2009 billion-dollar threat is destabilizing and inhibits investment and growth." Potter added that he was "disappointed to have to issue this statement" because he would rather negotiate important issues "directly with our counterparts rather than through press releases.”
The Digital Freedom campaign, led by the Consumer Electronics Association, New America Foundation, Public Knowledge and others, is looking to spread its message of protecting consumer rights in the digital age by holding a pre-Independence Day celebration on Thursday night.
The invitation-only event will include music from live bands and is expected to be well attended by policymakers, media and industry representatives. The campaign also announced Thursday that it will offer its first digital rights management-free download on DigitalFreedom.org. The group, which has been routinely criticized by content creators, recently expanded its online presence.
The following bands will be performing at the Digital Freedom showcase: Jonathan Coulton, Baumer and Exit Clov. The question remains: Were the invitations to the Motion Picture Association of America and Recording Industry Association of America lost in the mail?
National Security Archive Director Tom Blanton will appear on "The Colbert Report" on Comedy Central Wednesday night to talk about the CIA's recently publicized "family jewels." It will be "national security discourse like you have never seen it before," an archive spokeswoman said in an e-mail. The humorous news program airs at 11:30 p.m. ET.
The CIA fought to keep the intelligence records -- nicknamed "the family jewels" -- secret for more than three decades but released hundreds of them on Tuesday. The papers show intelligence abuses of the Cold War, including assassination plots against foreign leaders and illegal efforts to spy on Americans.
Blanton's archive made the full 703-page collection available as a searchable PDF document on its Web site. Happy reading!
Reprinted from June 26 PM Edition of National Journal's Technology Daily
Thousands of Internet radio providers that silenced their audio streams Tuesday to draw attention to a recently proposed hike in music royalties got what they wanted -- an outpouring of support from listeners. The online advocacy platform that lets visitors to the grassroots group SaveNetRadio access contact information for their congressmen could barely handle the flood of hits received.
According to a SaveNetRadio spokesman, Web traffic reported by Capitol Advantage's Capwiz program by late morning was "far more" than the back-end service provider had ever experienced in a single day. The firm reportedly was "diverting all the resources they have to handle this traffic," the official said.
Capwiz is considered one of the most robust Web-based advocacy services in Washington and works with about 1,500 organizations. "It's definitely the highest traffic we've seen in a long time for any sort of single issue," said Mark West of Capitol Advantage.
Not surprisingly, digital royalty rights collector SoundExchange had some serious heartburn on Tuesday over the Internet radio "day of silence," during which thousands of webcasters turned off their music streams to protest the Copyright Royalty Board's recent decision to hike fees paid to artists and record labels.
Richard Ades, a spokesman for the organization that supports the board's ruling, told Technology Daily that he listened to some of the special programming being played in between pockets of dead air. "It's pretty amazing that they talk about how much they love music and how important it is to stream music, but you don’t hear them talk about the people who create the music," he said.
On one webcast, Ades heard someone claim that legislation, introduced in the House and Senate to stop the fee increase, is fair to artists. "The bill on the Hill would not only vacate CRB decision but would cut rates by 75 percent from what the old rate was. That’s their idea to fairness to artists? That's an insult," he said.
"If there's no music, then there will be no radio stations. It’s the artists and labels that create the music and there will be no music for them to build their businesses on," Ades said. "Why they don’t want their musicians and recording artists to have a fair share of the pie is mind boggling."
(Source: KCRW)
"This will give Americans a small taste of what could happen if we don't pass legislation or have the parties negotiate a solution. It'll be a bitter pill that the 70 million Internet-radio listeners won't want to swallow."
-- Rep. Jay Inslee, D-Wash., sponsor of the Internet Radio Equality Act
"Jilting consumers by shutting down their businesses for a day does nothing to change the fact that artists and labels should be fairly paid by webcasters who build their businesses on the hard labor of artists."
-- SoundExchange spokesman
For more about the protest, click here. For a partial list of participants compiled by SaveNetRadio, follow the jump.
Internet radio provider Last.fm, which was recently acquired by CBS, will not take part in Tuesday's webcaster "day of silence." Thousands of online music streams will be switched off to protest a recent royalty rate hike.
Last.fm co-founder Felix Miller wrote on the company blog that "it's in no one's interest to let online radio die. But people want to make money from their music. And we want to pay artists for the music we play. It's only fair."
He pointed out that his is a social platform -- not just a radio station -- and unlike many webcasters, "people spend a lot of time using the site without ever switching on the radio." Read his entire post here. Meanwhile, Tech Crunch explains why Last.fm should participate in the protest.
Every four years, National Journal magazine goes behind the scenes of Capitol Hill, to examine often-anonymous but always crucial senior aides and staffers. In this year's "Hill People" issue, we feature more than 330 such profiles.
Staff members from Technology Daily as well as folks from The Almanac of American Politics, the Hotline, CongressDaily and NationalJournal.com helped produce the issue, which was unveiled Monday morning. So, take a break from your trashy romance novels and bring us along when you hit the pool or beach over the July 4 holiday. You won't regret it!
Read more about "Hill People" here.
The cultural obsession with all things tech received several prods in this week's edition of The Onion. The satirical newspapers highlighted the debut of Apple's new iPhone with a rundown of its features. It snidely noted that the highly anticipated gadget includes an "exclusive link to Google Street View so you can watch yourself using your iPhone at all times."
Google got additional treatment in The Onion's weekly installment of "American Voices," which documented the reaction of three pedestrians on the recent report rating the Internet giant's privacy practices as the worst among search firms. One fictional observer quipped, "This news has definitely made me think twice about providing my credit card number along with each search query." -- Theresa Poulson
The Progress and Freedom Foundation unveiled a report Wednesday that surveys the litany of tools and methods available to protect children from content deemed objectionable (See Technology Daily's PM Edition). But a day earlier, the Kaiser Family Foundation released some statistics that shed new light on the topic.
More than 1,000 parents of children ages 2-17 were polled along with a series of six focus groups held with parents across the country. The study found that 65 percent of parents said they "closely" monitor their children's media use, while 18 percent said they "should do more."
Since 1998, the proportion of parents who said they were "very concerned" that their kids are exposed to inappropriate content has dropped, from 67 percent to 51 percent for sexual content; from 62 percent to 46 percent for violence; and from 59 percent to 41 percent for adult language, KFF reported.
According to the report, parents are particularly confident in monitoring their children's online activities. About 73 percent said they know "a lot" about what their kids are doing online. Most parents whose children surf the Web said they check their kid's instant messaging "buddy lists" (87 percent); review their kids' profiles on social networking sites (82 percent); and review what sites they have visited (76 percent).
Continue reading Study: Parental Controls' Successes & Challenges.
The American Association of Independent Music, also known as A2IM, celebrated its second anniversary on Tuesday. The trade group, which represents independent record labels, has made some major strides since its inception.
A2IM established that independent labels collectively account for over 30 percent of the music industry’s Soundscan share. The group has been working to ensure that the sector is treated fairly with that market share in mind, officials said in a press release.
Over the past 36 months, the association has called for fair and uniform change between radio and music labels and consulted with the FCC on a proposed set of universal “rules of engagement” that were formally adopted in early 2007 with major radio companies.
“The music industry finds itself at a crossroads,” A2IM President Rich Bengloff said. “With physical sales diminishing while digital music sales grow both online and in the mobile marketplace, A2IM has become a strong voice for independent labels.”
After more than four years of peer-to-peer applications dominating network bandwidth, HTTP (Web) traffic has outpaced P2P and continues to grow, according to new research from by Ellacoya Networks, which sells broadband service optimization solutions.
The firm surveyed about a million broadband subscribers in North America to find that HTTP accounts for 46 percent of all network traffic -- thanks mainly to streaming audio and video sites. P2P claimed 37 percent and newsgroups held onto 9 percent. Non-HTTP video streaming, gaming and Internet-based telephony were the next widely used applications.
The company's findings revealed that traditional Web page downloads (text and images) represent 45 percent of all Web traffic; streaming video represents 36 percent and streaming audio held onto 5 percent of all HTTP traffic. YouTube alone comprises roughly 20 percent of all HTTP traffic, Ellacoya said.
"The way people use the Internet is changing rapidly -- from browsing to real-time streaming," said Ellacoya's Fred Sammartino in a press release. "We expect to see new applications over the next year that will accelerate this trend."
Michael Moore's next documentary could possibly be on intellectual property laws, blogger Ann Althouse speculated. Technology Daily noted in Tuesday's AM Edition that Althouse observed he may tackle IP after viewing a video of Moore saying he supports free sharing of copyright-protected material.
We wonder how Moore would feel about the recent take-down of a full-length copy of his new documentary on the healthcare industry from the video-sharing site YouTube. AP reported that administrators removed the unauthorized copy of "Sicko" Monday after Lionsgate and distributor Weinstein Co. complained.
Moore had told Reuters on Saturday that he would not prosecute those circulating the bootleg copies after the film surfaced on the Internet over the weekend. He added: "I'm happy for people to see my movie. I'm not a big fan of the copyright laws in this country."
Perhaps someone inside the Beltway could question Moore about it on Wednesday if he attends the Washington screening of the movie, to which he has invited health care industry lobbyists whom he plans to film via webcam. -- Theresa Poulson
Miss America Lauren Nelson has partnered with software security company Symantec Corp. in hopes of alerting children and parents about Internet dangers. Nelson will travel cross-country in a tractor trailer with representatives from the company, highlighting the latest in digital technology.
An official announcement about the campaign will be made Wednesday afternoon on Capitol Hill. Sen. Larry Craig, R-Idaho, and House Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman John Dingell, D-Mich., will receive awards at the event for their efforts in promoting Internet safety.
Tech Daily Dose previously wrote about Nelson when she attended a fundraising gala for the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children; helped "America's Most Wanted" catch online predators; and received training at the Virginia Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force Center. Nelson sure is keeping busy during her reign!
-- Sandra Gonzalez
Internet giant Google launched a public policy blog on Monday, adding to the growing list of tech firms in our wonky little Web neighborhood. Verizon, Cisco and others have begun blogging in the past year or so.
Andrew McLaughlin, the company's director of public policy and government affairs, wrote that his team is "seeking to do public policy advocacy in a Googley way." "We want our users to be part of the effort, to know what we're saying and why, and to help us refine and improve our policy positions and advocacy strategies," he said.
Interestingly, the blog launched with two months worth of posts. Why? The site launched internally in April so "we could limber up our blogging muscles," McLaughlin said. "Now that we've gone public we thought it'd be fun to share our earlier internal posts." It looks like Jamie Brown, Pablo Chavez, Adam Kovacevich, and Richard Whitt will also pitch in.
In the weeks and months ahead, they will weigh in on issues like network neutrality, censorship, innovation regulation, immigration, R&D, national security and trade. The blog has enabled comments too, so the posts "will promote real conversation," McLaughlin said. We'll definitely be adding this site to our bookmarks!
Late afternoon news on a Friday is my favorite (sarcasm noted)… but this item from the Electronic Frontier Foundation is worth blogging. Marcia Hofmann, a staff attorney for the watchdog group, reports that a federal judge has ordered the FBI to process 2,500 pages of records about its abuse of National Security Letters by July 5 and another 2,500 every 30 days thereafter.
The ruling was in response to EFF's Freedom of Information Act request and lawsuit filed earlier this year, Hofmann said. More evidence of abuse was uncovered by the Washington Post this week and EFF urged the court to act. Read the judge's order here; EFF's supplemental memo here; and the Post article here.
Want to know how the 2008 presidential candidates stack up when it comes to their broadband communications policies? Visit the Wireless Communications Association International's virtual Candidate Broadband Forum. The trade group launched the site this week in conjunction with its annual convention in Washington.
"WCA sees an enormous educational opportunity in assembling the most relevant news and opinion on these hot topics, and providing the option to comment," WCA President Andrew Kreig said in a press release. The site will be updated regularly, he said.
Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois must be on the right track with his proposed policies. At least, this "Obama Girl" seems to think so. "You're into border security/let's break this border between you and me/universal health care reform/it makes me warm," she croons.
Personally, nothing gets my engine revved like network neutrality, but we each have our preferences. The pool of other candidates have extensive plans too, which makes us wonder whether anyone will ever sing about their crush on GOP contender Sen. John McCain of Arizona.
-- Sandra Gonzalez
The National Association of Broadcasters' opposition to the proposed merger between satellite radio services Sirius and XM kicked into high gear this week when the group unveiled a new Web site -- www.xmsiriusmonopoly.com -- where individuals can learn more about the $13 billion transaction currently under scrutiny by the FCC and Justice Department.
NAB hung a giant banner from its headquarters in Washington directing passersby to the site. The banner reads: "Do the Math: XM + Sirius = Monopoly." No word yet on whether XM will fight back with its own signage at its office building across town.
From Technology Daily's People column by Senior Writer Heather Greenfield:
John Edwards netted more than expected from an online offer of a secret pie recipe from his mom in exchange for a donation of $6.10 or more in time for his birthday June 10. A YouTube video to go with the campaign featured campaign aides Jonathan Prince and Joe Trippi attempting to bake Edwards his favorite pie for his birthday.
The 2-1/2 minute video has been viewed more than 35,000 times and raised $268,713.75 from 10,568 donors. Elizabeth Edwards appears at the end to say she did not approve of Trippi's burnt pie but that others could successfully make it. Trippi's mom didn't approve of the burning, either. Trippi told Technology Daily that the video didn't exactly help his image, but the recipe offer was a successful fundraiser for the campaign.
I'm not sure how I missed this yesterday, but legendary TV science educator Don Herbert, better known as Mr. Wizard, has died of cancer. He was almost 90 years old. A message alerting fans about Herbert's death was posted on the Mr. Wizard Studios Web site on Tuesday.
"We all feel extremely lucky to have had him in our lives and to have known and worked with Don over the years. We have also been tremendously honored to carry on his legacy," the note said.
Herbert conceived and wrote the "Watch Mr.Wizard" show that first aired on NBC in 1951 and won a Peabody Award for his work. The show was cancelled after more than 500 episodes. In 1983 Herbert developed "Mr. Wizard's World" for cable channel Nickelodeon.
There's no doubt that one of YouTube's most popular videos -- the geyser that errupts after dropping a few Mentos in a two-liter bottle of Diet Coke -- was inspired by Herbert's work. I propose a 21-bottle salute in his honor.
The Patent and Trademark Office and U.S. Chamber of Commerce kicked off an educational tour in Raleigh, N.C. on Wednesday designed to raise awareness of the dangers of counterfeiting and piracy. The initiative also aims to give businesses the resources needed to protect themselves. The tour will include stops in Detroit, Mich., San Antonio, Texas, Seattle, Wash., Portland, Ore., and Burlington, Vt.
"Counterfeiting and piracy have real implications for local economies and consumers. They are threatening jobs, stealing tax revenue, and putting families at risk," Caroline Joiner, executive director of the Chamber's Global Anti-Counterfeiting and Piracy Initiative, said in a press release.
Counterfeiting and piracy cost the U.S. economy more than $250 billion a year and result in the loss of 750,000 jobs, recent statistics show.
Shaggy haired 1980s rock icon Eddie Money is back in the public eye (sort of) and he's taking on Internet piracy. The man whose songs "Take Me Home Tonight" and "Two Tickets to Paradise" once blared on my boom box has joined the fight against illegal file-sharing.
"Music piracy is illegal and extremely detrimental to all of those who make a living creating original musical works," Money said in a press release on Tuesday. His new album, "Wanna Go Back," was released in March. "If you truly like music, don't steal it. Support the industry by downloading your music legally," he said.
SafeMedia Corp., which develops software to thwart peer-to-peer transmissions, sent out the release. Oh, and if you're in the mood to hear some classic Money, click here and here. Thanks YouTube!
Now that online communities are becoming popular vehicles for political campaigns, perhaps a map would help some less technology inclined candidates navigate the Internet. MySpace, Facebook, SecondLife, Wikipedia and other sites are all accounted for. Note the "Gulf of YouTube" and "The Blogipelago."
The creator of the Strange Maps Blog believes the geography is not randomly assigned. Area and position are significant, thus each community’s geographic area represents its estimated size.
The drawing, originally posted at a Web site called xkcd, which is described as "a webcomic of romance, sarcasm, math, and language," is now being sold as a poster. Click here for a larger view of the map.
(Thanks to Ian at TIA for the heads up on this item.)
Republican new media consultant David All, whose company just last week started offering video production as a service to clients, has some tips designed to help candidates use, and keep from misusing, YouTube and other video-sharing sites:
1) Two-camera strategy at all times.
2) Watch the footage. Archive well.
3) Monitor opponent’s channel / organic search results.
4) Prepare known hit responses early / “flood the zone.”
5) Several different campaign YouTube accounts.
Visit All's blog, From The Trenches, for detailed explanations of the tips.
-- Danny Glover (via Beltway Blogroll)
The Huffington Post's list of contributors is getting longer and more diverse. Now they've recruited Robert Atkinson, president of the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation, to blog about technology and economic issues. His first post, titled "Broadband Blues," deals with whether the United States is losing the global race to offer citizens high-speed Internet access. Atkinson writes in detail about varying perspectives on the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development's broadband rankings and related issues. It's worth a read.
In other news, the recently founded Copyright Alliance has snagged Gayle Osterberg, former spokeswoman for the Motion Picture Association of America, to handle the group's PR. Osterberg left MPAA several weeks ago to launch her own shop called 133 Public Affairs.
Tech Daily Dose has been quiet for a few days because I slipped away for a long weekend of R&R -- but I found out pretty quickly that it's hard to leave Washington behind no matter how far you travel from Capitol Hill.
Imagine my surprise when I wound up completely engrossed in a lengthy conversation about ins and outs of the current patent reform debate while gazing out at the white sandy beaches and crystal blue waters of the Riviera Maya.
The stranger with whom I spoke, while sipping first-rate margaritas, will remain nameless but the conversation with this Beltway outsider was captivating because I was exposed to viewpoints I had never heard before in my scores of hearings, briefings and interviews.
It's easy to lose sight of how pertinent policy issues impact those who do not frequent the halls of Congress. It's also enormously gratifying to see that folks who do not deal with this set of issues daily still follow this very important news story… even while on vacation at a secluded tropical destination.
Adam Thierer at the Progress and Freedom Foundation has kicked off a 10-part series of essays that coincide with National Internet Safety Month. His musings on the PFF Blog are condensed from a forthcoming special report "Parental Controls and Online Child Protection: A Survey of Tools and Methods," which will debut June 20.
Part 1: Online Safety Metasites
Part 2: Internet Filters & Monitoring Tools
Part 3: Operating Systems and Web Browser Controls
Part 4: Website Labeling and Metadata Tagging
Part 5: Search Engine Filters and Portals for Kids
Check the PFF Blog for upcoming posts that will focus on the importance of online safety education; a voluntary online code of conduct; social networking safety; online predation and law enforcement efforts; teaching proper online etiquette and informal household media rules.
Dell will reduce the carbon intensity of its global operations by 15 percent by 2012, the company announced Tuesday. Chairman Michael Dell said in comments marking World Environment Day that Dell is asking customers for their ideas in building the "greenest PC on the planet." Dell also requested that its primary suppliers begin reporting greenhouse gas emissions data.
World Environment Day, commemorated each year on June 5, was established by the United Nations General Assembly in 1972. Meanwhile, another computer giant was expected to make an energy-related announcement Tuesday afternoon. -- Winter Casey
Fears concerning the amount of information Google stores on consumers is best "mitigated by markets, not government mandates," according to analysis released Monday by Cord Blomquist of the Competitive Enterprise Institute.
"Google’s Web 2.0 offerings are just that, offerings. No one has been coerced into using Gmail or posting pictures with Picasa. Privacy advocates could immediately protect consumers from data collection dangers by encouraging them to turn on, tune in, and log out. This is getting easier as increasingly savvy users avoid being locked into proprietary services—they don’t travel down any one-way streets," Blomquist said.
"In addition to opting out of services, spreading your Web activity across several search engines is a less costly and more effective privacy strategy than trying to place laws on something as untamable as online information, "added Blomquist. "For those still convinced that the Googleplex has its all-seeing eye is focused on them, there are proxy services and onion routers to run your Web traffic through dozens of servers worldwide, making it nearly impossible to unravel the origin of data."
According to the report, Google is not a monopoly because "big search companies are poised to take it on" and the "assault on Google isn’t limited to search" but "coming from anywhere there’s an online ad dollar to be made."
It is not necessary for the government to intervene to protect consumers from Google, Blomquist argued: "The real solution to increasing online privacy and competition isn’t in expanding government regulation, but making sure that regulation doesn’t stop the next silicon savants from expanding beyond the garage." -- Winter Casey
The Internet Engineering Task Force has given a preliminary green light to a new technology designed to detect and block fake e-mail messages, the U.S. Internet Industry Association reported Monday in its weekly bulletin.
The technology, called DomainKeys Identified Mail, is supported by Yahoo, Cisco Systems, Sendmail and PGP Corporation among others. The draft specification "harnesses the power of cryptographically secure digital signatures to thwart spam," USIIA said.
Read more about the IETF draft standard here.
During a visit to Silicon Valley last week, presidential hopeful Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton announced her high-tech innovation agenda. Unfortunately, when the New York Democrat spoke to 200 industry insiders, the banner behind her read: "New Jobs for Tommorrow." Oops.
(Courtesy: SF Gate Politics Blog)
Duffy Jennings, spokesman for the Silicon Valley Leadership Group, told the San Francisco Gate that the Clinton campaign was responsible for the typo.
