Sunday, March 29, 2009

"Politicians using Twitter: Morons or visionaries?"

“The vacuous utterances Twittered daily from members of Congress make me wonder how they have the time to spend keying in on such banalities and marveling over the narcissism implicit in their belief that anyone cares about their every single thought and reaction to contemporaneous events,”

http://features.csmonitor.com/politics/2009/03/27/politicians-using-twitter-morons-or-visionaries/

Obama trade officials promise thorough review of transparency policies

On Thursday, President Obama’s trade officials met with several civil society groups and promised a thorough review of the USTR policies regarding transparency. The review is expected to be completed within a few months. The process will include a meeting within a month to discuss initial specific proposals for openness and transparency. Citizens and NGOs are encouraged to think about the specific areas where openness and transparency can be enhanced and how.

http://www.keionline.org/blogs/2009/03/20/ustr2review-transparency/

Voter Fraud in Kentucky

KY Election Officials Arrested, Charged With 'Changing Votes at E-Voting Machines'
http://www.bradblog.com/?p=7001

Monday, March 2, 2009

Judge orders defendant to decrypt PGP-protected laptop

A federal judge has ordered a criminal defendant to decrypt his hard drive by typing in his PGP passphrase so prosecutors can view the unencrypted files, a ruling that raises serious concerns about self-incrimination in an electronic age.

http://news.cnet.com/8301-13578_3-10172866-38.html

Tuesday, February 24, 2009

NEWS ROUNDUP (to make up for the lack of recent activity)

I've been sick, and on top of that, really busy with a handful of other projects. So I neglected this blog quite a bit (since no one reads it anyway). But a lot of interesting stuff happened while I wasn't posting.

Here are som headlines and links to check out. No commentary from me this time, I'm just trying to get you up to date quickly. I just pulled these from Slashdot to be lazy.

Network Neutrality Still Lives (Sen. Diane Feinstein Failes)
http://tech.slashdot.org/article.pl?no_d2=1&sid=09/02/14/205246

N.Y. Gov. Aims To Tax Downloads
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=100746980

Bill Would Require ISPs, Wi-Fi Users To Keep Logs
http://yro.slashdot.org/article.pl?no_d2=1&sid=09/02/20/131224

Obama Admin Fights Missing White House Email Lawsuit
http://news.slashdot.org/article.pl?no_d2=1&sid=09/02/22/1254248

Thursday, February 12, 2009

Diane Feinstein Attacks Net Neutrality

Proving once again that democrats are just about as bad as republicans, Sen. Feinstein attempted to put language into the stimulus bill that would kill net neutrality. Even though it initially failed, she apparently about to attempt a redo.

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2009/02/11/feinstein_stimulus_amendment/

Thursday, February 5, 2009

Expect some big changes to the way we do P2P.

According to CNET, "President Obama is continuing to fill the senior ranks of the U.S. Department of Justice with the copyright industry's favorite lawyers" with the selection of Donald Verrilli, from the Verrilli Family, el SeƱor Presidente's latest acquisition.


http://gizmodo.com/5146966/riaa-and-bsas-favorite-lawyers-taking-top-department-of-justice-posts

House Votes to Delay Digital TV Switch to June 12

The U.S. will push back the transition to digital television until June 12 from Feb. 17 after the House approved the delay because many households aren’t ready for the switch.

President Barack Obama will sign the measure postponing the date when major TV stations must stop using traditional analog signals, White House press secretary Robert Gibbs said Jan. 30. More than 6.5 million homes aren’t ready to receive digital signals, the Nielsen Co. said last month.


http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=af_NnHA2O9bI&refer=home

Friday, January 30, 2009

Students Do Not Have Free Speech Rights on the Internet?

A federal court has rejected a former student's First Amendment suit against school officials who punished her for calling them "douchebags" in a LiveJournal post. Right now, the scope of student rights to online speech is anything but clear.

Read The Story

Wednesday, January 28, 2009

House of Representatives Votes NO DELAY for Digital TV Switch

The Senate passed a delay bill unanimously, but the HOR wasn't so kind. They defeated the bill 258-168.

The defeat was a setback for the Obama administration and Hill Democrats, who are concerned that too many Americans are not ready to get digital programming. House Republicans have argued that postponing the date would cause confusion for consumers and cost millions for broadcasters who have planned to make the transition.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/story/2009/01/28/ST2009012802327.html

Cox Communications Proves Network Neutrality is Still an Important Battle to Win

Cox Communications is the next in a long list of companies wanting dictate how you use the internet.

"In February, Cox will begin testing a new method of managing traffic on our high-speed Internet network in our Kansas and Arkansas markets. During the occasional times the network is congested, this new technology automatically ensures that all time-sensitive Internet traffic – such as web pages, voice calls, streaming videos and gaming – moves without delay. Less time-sensitive traffic, such as file uploads, peer-to-peer and Usenet newsgroups, may be delayed momentarily – but only when the local network is congested. Our goal is to ensure that customers continue to experience the consistently fast, reliable Internet service they’ve come to expect from Cox."

http://www.cox.com/policy/congestionmanagement


Thanks for deciding what's "time-sensitive" and what isn't on my behalf, assholes.

Tuesday, January 27, 2009

New Law Will Require Camera Phones to 'Click'

A bill being presented is attempting to make it a law that all cell phone cameras must made a digital "click" sound when taking pictures, in order to stop "predators" from taking pictures of people against their wishes. The law also makes it illegal to include anyway to disable the click.

This law is stupid, of course, as it won't take much for someone to make a third-party app or other such quick hack to disable it.

Or, you know, people will just use cameras that AREN'T attatched to cellphones and therefore don't make clicking sounds. And the photos will be in better quality!

You can read the proposed law here:

http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d111:HR00414:@@@L&summ2=m&

Thursday, January 22, 2009

Staff Finds White House in the Technological Dark Ages

I haven't posted here in forever, which was stupid, since so much has gone on in the political-technology world.

First of all, congrats to the world for Obama's presidency.

Let's not get complacent, and let's try to hold him accountable to us.

Here's a funny article from the Washington Post:

Staff Finds White House in the Technological Dark Ages

If the Obama campaign represented a sleek, new iPhone kind of future, the first day of the Obama administration looked more like the rotary-dial past.

Read the whole article: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/21/AR2009012104249.html