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And see my website - http://technewsreview.com.au/ - for daily updates in between postings. ********************************************************** Sponsored by the Singapore Internet Research Centre Nanyang Technological University, Singapore http://www.ntu.edu.sg/sci/sirc/ ********************************************************** nz: Seven NZers arrested in global porn sting - report http://www.nzherald.co.nz/category/story.cfm?c_id=30&objectid=10449065 OECD: Net growth prompts privacy update http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/6254650.stm Internet law - racial discrimination and internet racial hatred in Australia http://www.ibls.com/internet_law_news_portal_view.aspx?s=articles&id=9472F070-1AAF-489E-AC58-A242222F1C59 South Korean chat room bullies face end to their internet anonymity http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/asia/article2005592.ece Apple Greener, Nokia regains lead in electronics ranking (news release) http://www.greenpeace.org/international/news/apple-greener-nokia-first-260607 Forrester: 60 Percent Of Europeans Have Adopted Social Computing (news release) http://www.forrester.com/ER/Press/Release/0,1769,1154,00.html MySpace's Slow Start in China http://businessweek.com/globalbiz/content/jun2007/gb20070625_607135.htm Intel Inside the Third World: Is getting computers to poor kids charity—or big business? http://businessweek.com/globalbiz/content/jun2007/gb20070628_140912.htm The promise of the Information Revolution. Has it been delivered? by Dr Barry Jones http://abc.net.au/news/stories/2007/06/27/1963070.htm Danger: virulent new strain of technolust found in Apple http://observer.guardian.co.uk/business/story/0,,2115552,00.html Who really makes the iPod? http://iht.com/articles/2007/06/28/technology/ipod.php ********************** RESEARCH PAPERS ********************** First Principles of Communications Privacy by Susan Freiwald Under current Fourth Amendment doctrine, parties to a communication enjoy constitutional protection against government surveillance only when they have a reasonable expectation of privacy in those communications. This paper discusses the insufficiency of the reasonable expectation of privacy test in the context of modern communications. Significantly, courts have required that communications media be virtually invulnerable before affording them Fourth Amendment protection. http://stlr.stanford.edu/2007/06/a_first_principles_approach_to.html First, Assume a Monopoly: The Failure of Vertical Foreclosure Theory on the Never-was-Neutral Internet by Douglas A. Hass (Indiana University School of Law-Bloomington; The Skye Group) Abstract: This paper refocuses the net neutrality debate by challenging the application of vertical foreclosure theory to today's non-neutral Internet access and content markets. The paper finds that the current policy fascination with non-existant net neutrality is ill founded. Disclosure and a broader focus on both network and content providers' non-neutral traffic policies would better enable the market to choose technologies and business models dynamically while still providing regulators with a potential enforcement mechanism. http://ssrn.com/abstract=991656 When the Internet Becomes X-Rated: Creating an Ethical Climate for Technology in Catholic Schools by Susan Hanley Kosse (University of Louisville - Louis D. Brandeis School of Law/Catholic Education: A Journal of Inquiry and Practice) Abstract: Pornography is the number-one business on the Internet, yet the very same Internet can be a valuable souce of knowledge for all students. Educators face many challenges in bringing the Internet into the classrooms. This article reviews recent and relevant case law on Internet access in schools, offers guidance about the writing of effective acceptable use policies, and concludes with advice to Catholic school teachers and administrators on creating an ethical climate while fully using available technology. http://ssrn.com/abstract=990786 Regulating Cyberspace: The Emerging Problems and Challenges by Vishnu Konoorayar (Indian Law Institute/Cochin University Law Review) Abstract: Cyberspace has become the new challenge for the law and its machineries in both civil and criminal matters. This is because of various differences between the real space and cyberspace. Territoriality is one of the important considerations upon which the conventional law and its principles are based up on. The cyberspace is totally different in this aspect from the conventional territory based law. This paper analyses these differences and consequential challenges in detail. http://ssrn.com/abstract=994574 Don't Blame Me: It’s the Phone’s Fault! Many Internet and Cell Phone Users Find Devices and Applications Too Complicated or Hardly Worth the Trouble Pew Internet's typology of information and communications technology users tell us a lot about how far along we are -- or aren’t -- in the “information society.” http://www.pewinternet.org/PPF/r/215/report_display.asp THIS TOWN AIN’T BIG ENOUGH FOR THE BOTH OF US--OR IS IT? REFLECTIONS ON COPYRIGHT, THE FIRST AMENDMENT AND GOOGLE’S USE OF OTHERS’ CONTENT Duke L. & Tech. Rev. 0005 Using a variety of technological innovations, Google became a multi-billion dollar content-delivery business without owning or licensing much of the content that it uses. Google’s principal justification for why this strategy does not contravene the intellectual property rights of the copyright owners is the doctrine of fair use. However, over the last several years, some copyright owners began to push back and challenge Google’s strategy. Much of this litigation presents the courts with something of a conundrum. On the one hand, it is beyond dispute that Google’s services have great social utility. By organizing and making accessible an enormous volume of information on the Internet, Google facilitates broad access to a diverse array of material, a core value of the First Amendment. At the same time, Google’s actions do not always fit comfortably within traditional notions of fair use. In this respect, the Google cases present an opportunity to explore the relationship between copyright and the First Amendment; a subject that has received inadequate attention in the courts, and particularly the Supreme Court. How the apparent tension between the marketplace of ideas and the commercial marketplace is resolved may have significant impact on the development of Internet-based services designed to facilitate access to information, and this subject is the focus of this iBrief. http://www.law.duke.edu/journals/dltr/articles/2007dltr0005.html *********** CENSORSHIP *********** cn: China censors online skeletons China’s drive to impose social and political “harmony” on the internet has claimed a new set of victims: undead skeletons. Chinese players of World of Warcraft, a hugely popular online role-playing game, have expressed outrage after their “undead skeleton” characters were suddenly clad in new flesh, apparently in order to comply with a secret government ban on bare bones. The surprise crackdown on the desiccated dead underscores the scope of the internet controls and censorship imposed in China by the cultural commissars of the ruling Communist party. http://www.ft.com/cms/s/efc45d98-264c-11dc-8e18-000b5df10621.html ************************************************ CHILD PROTECTION, FILTERING & CONTENT REGULATION ************************************************ au: Online sting entraps more Skype sex predators At least four more Australians have fallen into traps exposing sex predators using the online communication service Skype. http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2007/06/28/1182624083302.html au: Keeping teenagers safe online How does a parent balance their rights to set boundaries and shield their child from harm against a teenager's increasing right to privacy as they progress through adolescence? With considerable delicacy, according to Louise Newman, professor of psychiatry at the University of Newcastle, and hopefully with much more help from government and the law than is currently on offer. http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2007/06/29/1182624171402.html nz: Teens prey to Skype stalkers International child predators are using the popular internet site Skype to contact impressionable teenagers, engage them in cyber-sex, and "groom" them for offline meetings. http://stuff.co.nz/4112798a11.html nz: Seven NZers arrested in global porn sting - report A global police operation has broken open an internet child porn ring with suspects in 99 countries -- including seven New Zealanders, it was reported today. http://www.nzherald.co.nz/category/story.cfm?c_id=30&objectid=10449065 uk: Teenagers set up mass brawls online Police are monitoring social networking sites such as Facebook and MySpace after claims they used to organise mass brawls http://technology.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/tech_and_web/the_web/article2007863.ece US court says viewing child porn not a crime but saving it is A US court has said that the existence of child pornography images in the cache of a man's computer did not mean that that man had committed a crime under state law. The Court of Appeals in Georgia has reversed the man's conviction. http://out-law.com/page-8186 *************************************** CYBERCRIME, CYBERSECURITY AND PRIVACY *************************************** Lawsuit filed over 'Gaydar' ownership So who owns "Gaydar"? A federal lawsuit filed in Delaware aims to find out. Gaydar, a pop-culture term that refers to the ability of one person to sense if another person is homosexual -- a gay radar -- dates to at least 1994 and an episode of the sitcom "Friends." A British company -- Qsoft Consulting Limited, based in Twickenham, Middlesex -- is claiming it owns the name as part of its gay and lesbian dating Web sites and online digital radio service. http://delawareonline.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070628/BUSINESS/706280367/ Cybercriminals Playing Mind Games With Users Think mind games are only for dating and creepy movies? Think again. According to researchers at McAfee, a new study shows that cybercriminals use psychological games to scam users. In his study, "Mind Games", Dr. James Blascovich, professor of psychology at the University of California, Santa Barbara, focuses on multiple common spam scams and looks at how cybercriminals use fear, greed, and lust to steal personal and financial information. "Scam spam works best by providing recipients with a sense of familiarity and legitimacy, either by creating the illusion that the e-mail is from a friend or colleague, or providing plausible warnings from a respected institution," Dr. Blascovich wrote. "Once the victim opens the e-mail, criminals use two basic motivational processes, approach and avoidance, or a combination of the two, to persuade victims to click on dangerous links, provide personal information, or download risky files." http://informationweek.com/news/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=200001407 International effort on privacy protection is launched The world's most developed economies will co-operate to uphold privacy laws in the face of increasing amounts of cross border data transfer. The member countries of the OECD have agreed the plan. http://out-law.com/page-8182 OECD: Net growth prompts privacy update The world's leading industrialised nations have been forced to update privacy laws made obsolete by the huge volume of data moving around the net. Of particular concern to the 30 OECD states was the increasing amount of personal data flowing between nations. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/6254650.stm OECD governments agree on a framework for privacy law enforcement co-operation Embodied in a new OECD Recommendation, the framework reflects a commitment by governments to improve their domestic frameworks for privacy law enforcement to better enable their authorities to co-operate with foreign authorities, as well as to provide mutual assistance to one another in the enforcement of privacy laws. http://www.oecd.org/document/60/0,3343,en_2649_37441_38771516_1_1_1_37441,00.html Cyber attacks engulf Kremlin's critics on left and right ahead of elections (AP) A political battle is raging in Russian cyberspace. Opposition parties and independent media say murky forces have committed vast resources to hacking and crippling their websites in attacks similar to those that hit tech-savvy Estonia as the Baltic nation sparred with Russia over a Soviet war memorial. http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2007/06/29/1182624125589.html http://www.usatoday.com/tech/news/computersecurity/cyber-attacks-kremlin-critics.htm Attack on Estonia puts cyber security on EU agenda (Reuters) The European Union will address cyber security issues after attacks on the Internet sites of Estonia, EU Information Society commissioner Viviane Reding said on Saturday. http://uk.reuters.com/article/internetNews/idUKL3044463420070630 nz: Unprotected users liable for net banking fraud Hundreds of thousands of people risk losing all the money they have in their bank accounts by logging on to internet banking using computers that do not have up-to-date operating systems, anti-spyware, anti-virus software and firewalls. http://stuff.co.nz/4115385a28.html Internet law - racial discrimination and internet racial hatred in Australia Racial discrimination occurs when somebody is abused because of his or her race or ethnic origin. In Australia, the Racial Discrimination Act 1975 and the Racial Hatred Act of 1995 typify unlawful racially offensive behavior, including those committed by the use of the Internet. The principles and rules of the Racial Discrimination Act (“RDA”) of 1975 were complemented and expanded by the Racial Hatred Act (“RHA’) of 1995. One of the major changes introduced by RHA was the right to complain before the Australian authorities when one becomes victim of racially offensive behavior. Nonetheless, Australian law allows certain types of racially offensive behavior provided that the behavior is done reasonably and in good faith; this exception also applies to communications via the Internet. This article answers the following questions, what are three essential components of the unlawful conduct under the Racial Discrimination Act 1975? What are the exemptions under the Racial Discrimination Act 1975? To whom would an aggrieved person complain? How do the courts in Australia deal with the issue of the dissemination of racially offensive material? http://www.ibls.com/internet_law_news_portal_view.aspx?s=articles&id=9472F070-1AAF-489E-AC58-A242222F1C59 uk: Cyberstalker to spend six months in jail Convicted cyberstalker Felicity Jane Lowde has been sentenced to six months in chokey for her "vicious, vitriolic and vindictive" campaign of harassment against Rachel North, a survivor of the July 2005 London bombings. http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/06/29/cyberstalker_goes_down/ Scamming the e-mail scammers Ever been tempted to respond to that e-mail message offering untold millions from the relatives of a deposed African dictator? For some, replying is a rewarding hobby. Interpol says these e-mail messages - which offer a large reward in exchange for a small advance payment - cajole, threaten and ultimately defraud billions of dollars each year from an increasing number of greedy, naïve and frightened Internet surfers. http://iht.com/articles/2007/07/01/business/scam.php eBay targets Romanian fraudsters eBay has made public the details of a months-long campaign to curb online fraud arising in Romania--an effort that has resulted in several hundred arrests. http://www.zdnetasia.com/news/security/0,39044215,62025518,00.htm http://news.zdnet.co.uk/security/0,1000000189,39287770,00.htm Gartner: Businesses should be wary of iPhone IT departments should be extremely wary of allowing employees to use Apple's mobile handset because it does not contain the necessary functionality to comply with basic corporate security, analysts warned in a research note released on Thursday. The iPhone will be launched in the U.S. on Friday. http://news.zdnet.com/2100-1035_22-6193856.html us: Mover Fails to Prove Jurisdiction in Suit Over Internet Site A New York-based moving company cannot bring a lawsuit in Manhattan federal court against an Iowa resident who operates a Web site the company says defamed it, a 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals has ruled. Finding that Best Van Lines failed to demonstrate personal jurisdiction under New York's "long-arm" statute, the circuit, in what it said was the first appellate decision to consider the issue, upheld a Southern District judge's dismissal of the complaint against the operator of MovingScam.com. http://www.law.com/jsp/article.jsp?id=1183021584799 us: DOJ warns U.S. citizens of phishing attack The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) is alerting e-mail users about a possible phishing attack using messages that claim to be from the DOJ. http://www.infoworld.com/article/07/06/28/DOJ-warns-of-phishing-attack_1.html us: Justice Department Urges Public Not to Respond to Email (news release) The Department of Justice has recently become aware of fraudulent spam e-mail messages claiming to be from DOJ. The Department of Justice did not send these unsolicited email messages — and would not send such messages to the public via email. http://www.ic3.gov/media/2007/070627.htm br: YouTube wins "supermodel sex on the beach" case A Brazilian judge has ruled in favor of YouTube, Globo Comunicações e Participações, and Internet Group do Brasil (iG) this week in a case involving Brazilian model Daniella Cicarelli and a sex video. Cicarelli and her boyfriend, Tato Malzoni, had sued YouTube after a video of the couple having sex on a public beach in Brazil appeared on the site. The pair argued that YouTube was violating their privacy. Judge Gustavo Santini Teodoro ruled that the couple's privacy claims were unfounded and ordered Cicarelli to pay fees to each of the defendants. http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20070627-youtube-wins-privacy-case-against-brazilian-supermodel.html ************************** GOVERNMENT & PUBLIC POLICY ************************** EU laws on recycling electronics come into force Consumers shopping on Sunday for a new electrical appliance or electronic gadget will find something has changed at the check-out. Along with their change and receipt the retailer will give them some information: the arrangements that have been made to dispose of the old equipment so it can be recycled in accordance with European Union legislation. The waste electrical and electronic equipment regulations come into effect on July 1, requiring distributors and producers to make arrangements for disposing of appliances and gadgets – even if sold or made by other companies. http://www.ft.com/cms/s/282d9138-267d-11dc-8e18-000b5df10621.html South Korean chat room bullies face end to their internet anonymity Cyber-bullies who plague internet chat rooms with obscene and insulting comments will be banned under the first national scheme to strip them of their anonymity. People going online will be forced to provide their real names and social security numbers under a new law that makes internet portals responsible for policing message boards and weblogs. http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/asia/article2005592.ece South Korea enforces curbs cyber bullying (AFP) South Korea on Thursday started enforcing a new law aimed at curbing the country's notorious cyber bullying by preventing internet users from hiding behind false IDs. http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2007/06/28/1182624133912.html ACMA and ACCC release joint report on communications infrastructure and services availability (news release) The Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA) and the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) today released a joint report titled Communications Infrastructure and Services Availability in Australia 2006-07. http://www.acma.gov.au/WEB/STANDARD//pc=PC_310394 http://www.accc.gov.au/content/index.phtml/itemId/2332 FTC Issues Staff Report on Broadband Connectivity Competition Policy (news release) The Federal Trade Commission’s Internet Access Task Force today issued a report, “Broadband Connectivity Competition Policy,” which summarizes the Task Force’s findings in the area of broadband Internet connectivity and, in particular, so-called network neutrality regulation. Based on these findings, and FTC staff’s experience with the operation of myriad markets throughout the economy, the report identifies guiding principles that policy makers should consider in evaluating proposed regulations or legislation relating to broadband Internet access and network neutrality. http://ftc.gov/opa/2007/06/broadband.shtm FTC Tells Law Makers Back Off Net Neutrality The U.S. Federal Trade Commission has released its report suggesting that concerns over threats to 'Net Neutrality' are a non-issue and that current anti-trust laws provide adequate protection against abuses of network power. http://www.circleid.com/posts/ftc_law_makers_net_neutrality/ EU telecommunications chief favors European mobile TV standard (Reuters) Viviane Reding, the telecommunications chief of the European Union, said Thursday that she would support the European mobile television broadcasting standard over U.S. and South Korean rivals when the commission decides next month which one to back. http://iht.com/articles/2007/06/28/bloomberg/web-2806eutv.php EU turns to YouTube to create EUtube The European Commission is turning to video-sharing Web site YouTube.com to disseminate information about the workings of the European Union to its citizens, through a new channel on the site called EUtube, it announced Friday. http://www.infoworld.com/article/07/06/29/YouTube-to-create-EUtube_1.html ***************************** INTERNET & NEW TECHNOLOGY USE ***************************** Apple Greener, Nokia regains lead in electronics ranking (news release) The fourth edition of the Greenpeace Guide to Greener Electronics is out now. Apple moves up as a result of Steve Job's "Greener Apple" pledge to phase out PVC and other chemicals from their product line. But Nokia is on top because they've already phased out PVC, and met or exceeded a wide set of benchmarks we've laid down to reduce the amount and toxicity of electronic waste piling up in Asia and Africa. http://www.greenpeace.org/international/news/apple-greener-nokia-first-260607 Greenpeace highlights Apple, Lenovo rise The computer business can give itself a pat on the back this week as it is congratulated in the Greenpeace Guide to Greener Electronics for the work it has done to clean up its act. http://news.zdnet.co.uk/itmanagement/0,1000000308,39287774,00.htm The Tech Lab: Bradley Horowitz Bradley Horowitz, responsible for novel technology development at search giant Yahoo, looks ahead to the "internet of things". Imagine this scenario: I am in a supermarket and I pick up a can of tomatoes and I place it in the shopping trolley. Immediately my mobile phone flashes green to indicate to me that it is a good buy. I go down the aisle and choose a bottle of wine but this time my phone flashes red to suggest I reconsider. This is only possible when we have a universal resolver for every entity in the world. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/6252716.stm Forrester: 60 Percent Of Europeans Have Adopted Social Computing (news release) 60 percent of European online consumers are taking part in Social Computing activities such as reading or writing blogs, listening to podcasts, setting up RSS feeds, reading and writing online customer reviews, or taking part in social networking sites, according to a new report by Forrester Research. However, the survey of more than 7,000 online consumers across the United Kingdom, France, Germany, Italy, Spain, Netherlands, and Sweden found that consumers in those countries are adopting Social Computing at differing rates. The result is a unique Social Computing profile for each nation. http://www.forrester.com/ER/Press/Release/0,1769,1154,00.html British media organizations look to U.S. market and beyond With Americans seemingly developing a taste for news with a Fleet Street twist, British papers are stepping up their efforts to court American readers and advertisers, expanding their coverage of U.S. politics and culture. And the biggest British media organization, the BBC, with a long-established international presence, is making a renewed push to crack the U.S. market, with the Internet playing a key role. http://iht.com/articles/2007/07/01/business/bbc.php MySpace's Slow Start in China The social-networking site's new Chinese version faces tough challenges trying to appeal to local tastes and grab market share from many rivals http://businessweek.com/globalbiz/content/jun2007/gb20070625_607135.htm MySpace to follow rival’s lead MySpace is likely to change its technology strategy to allow other online companies to “plug” their web services directly into its social networking site, according to Chris DeWolfe, one of its founders http://www.ft.com/cms/s/f8b11252-25a7-11dc-b338-000b5df10621.html Internet services throttle user bandwidth ... If you're noticing slowdowns while online, the culprit could be "bandwidth shaping." Most Internet service providers (ISPs) don't like to talk about it, but it's the most recent method to deal with the masses of people who use a lot of bandwidth during peak periods. http://www.usatoday.com/tech/news/techpolicy/2007-06-28-isp-bandwidth-throttle_N.htm http://www.csmonitor.com/2007/0627/p15s01-stct.html Why computers can’t surpass Go and collect US$1 million Ten years ago last month, to the dismay of many chess enthusiasts, the IBM supercomputer program Deep Blue beat the world chess champion Gary Kasparov: the greatest chess mind alive was elbowed aside by raw computing muscle. The quality of Deep Blue’s victory is still debated, but the moment marked a turning point in the relationship between man and machine. The computer is now dominant in almost every board and card game devised by man. Computers can now beat us not only at chess, but also draughts, Othello, Scrabble, three-dimensional noughts and crosses, Monopoly and even bridge and poker (most of the time). In these games, the computer has a blueprint for “perfect play”: it simply runs the board position through a databank, and chooses the best next move, every time. ... Yet there is one game in which the computer is still no match for Man, a game in which a competent teenager can beat the world’s most sophisticated computer program with ease: and that is the ancient Chinese board game Go, the oldest game in the world, and the only one at which man remains the undisputed champion. http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/columnists/ben_macintyre/article2002699.ece Top 10 Search Providers, May 2007 Google maintained a dominant ranking with 56.3 percent share of searches. Yahoo held at 21.5 percent share, Windows Live rounded the top three with an 8.4 percent share of searches. http://clickz.com/showPage.html?page=3626304 au: Top broadband ISPs deny P2P shaping Telstra, Optus and iiNet say they do not know what their users download, nor will they slow their speeds to prevent them from doing so http://computerworld.com.au/index.php/id;1929779828;fp;16;fpid;1 *************** DIGITAL DIVIDE *************** Intel Inside the Third World: Is getting computers to poor kids charity—or big business? Intel wants to bridge the Digital Divide and pioneer a whole new market by filling classrooms in poor countries around the world with low-cost PCs. Priced at about $320 each, the new Classmate laptops on the desks in Malinalco are still too expensive for governments in most developing countries to purchase. http://businessweek.com/globalbiz/content/jun2007/gb20070628_140912.htm No Child Left Offline Famed MIT Media Lab founder Nicholas Negroponte is tireless in his efforts to get computers into the hands of kids around the world http://businessweek.com/globalbiz/content/jun2007/gb20070628_534498.htm ************ FILE SHARING ************ Warner Music and Sony BMG start digital music venture in Russia The two record companies joined with the billionaire Len Blavatnik on Thursday in announcing the creation of a digital music venture in Russia to sell products in one of the world's biggest markets for pirated content. http://iht.com/articles/2007/06/28/technology/sony.php http://uk.reuters.com/article/internetNews/idUKL2713138320070628 ********************************* COMMENT, MICROSOFT & DEVELOPMENTS ********************************* The promise of the Information Revolution. Has it been delivered? by Dr Barry Jones Abstract: The Information Revolution should have been an instrument of personal liberation and an explosion of creativity. Instead, it has been characterised by public policy dominated by managerialism, replacement of ‘public good’ by ‘private benefit’, decline of sustained critical debate, and ‘dumbing down’ of mass media; it is linked with celebrity, substance abuse and retreat into the personal, the rise of fundamentalism and an assault on reason. The Knowledge Revolution ought to have been a countervailing force: in practice it has been the vector of change. I urge you to commit yourselves to enlightened, passionate scepticism, involvement and detachment, reflection, enthusiasm, knowledge and balance – an odd mixture, but an essential one. Speech extracts: Through Google and other powerful search engines we have instant access to what would have seemed like unimaginable richness to earlier generations - but I doubt if the promise has been delivered. ... One negative effect of the technological revolution is that human relationships may increasingly be carried out not face to face but mediated through the web, through mobile telephones and SMS messages. ... The Information and Communication Technology industry in Australia, although all pervasive, is both passive and derivative, with relatively few internationally recognised brand names, contributes significantly to Australia's adverse terms of trade, and has even more so since the Free Trade Agreement with the United States became operative. http://abc.net.au/news/stories/2007/06/27/1963070.htm Danger: virulent new strain of technolust found in Apple A new spectre is haunting the planet - technolust. Psychiatrists define it as the self-indulgent craving for attractive gadgets offering at best only marginal improvements over older devices but inducing fleeting, orgasmic, smug superiority in their possessors. Technolust was thought to afflict only a small minority of the population - generally investment bankers with more money than sense and pony-tailed geeks with neither. But developments in the US have led scientists to fear that the condition is reaching epidemic proportions and affecting people regarded as immune to infection. http://observer.guardian.co.uk/business/story/0,,2115552,00.html Who really makes the iPod? Who makes the Apple iPod? Here's a hint: It is not Apple. The company outsources the entire manufacture of the device to a number of Asian enterprises, among them Asustek, Inventec Appliances and Foxconn. http://iht.com/articles/2007/06/28/technology/ipod.php http://www.nytimes.com/2007/06/28/business/worldbusiness/28scene.html Wikipedia - for your information Covering almost 7.5m pages in more than 250 languages, Wikipedia is by far the biggest encyclopaedia ever written. But is it a vast online fount of human knowledge or an extreme example of 'digital Maoism', as some critics claim? Tim Adams of The Observer meets Jimmy Wales, the man behind the phenomenon, to get to the facts. http://observer.guardian.co.uk/magazine/story/0,,2113739,00.html ******************* TELECOMMUNICATIONS ******************* au: Broadband contracts will push Labor out of debate The Federal Government will sign 10-year contracts before this year's election for its planned high-speed internet network, hindering Labor's ability to promote its alternative plan. http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2007/06/27/1182624036837.html ******* MOBILE ******* Russia finally ready to roll out 3G Russians like their mobile phones, and those who can afford to don't mind spending a bundle on them. http://iht.com/articles/2007/07/01/technology/wireless02.php ***** VoIP ***** uk: Mobile industry group leaps into VoIP debate The Open Mobile Terminal Platform , a mobile-phone industry body which counts Orange, Vodafone, T-Mobile and 3 amongst its membership, has published guidance for network operators and handset manufacturers on provisioning and maintaining VoIP settings on new handsets. http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/06/28/omtp_rules_on_voip/ Dutch VoIP connections pass 2 million mark The Dutch consumer telephony market grew by 0.1 percent during the first quarter of 2007 to 6.017 million connections, as a continued drop in PSTN/ISDN lines was offset by a strong VoIP market. According to Telecompaper's Dutch Fixed Telephony Q1 2007 report, the number of PSTN/ISDN connections fell 7.1 percent in the first quarter to 3.9 million, while Dutch consumer VoIP subscriptions grew by more than 17 percent to 2.1 million. http://telecompaper.com/news/article.aspx?id=173704 +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Check out http://auda.org.au/domain-news/ for the most recent edition of the domain news, including an RSS feed - already online! The domain name news is supported by auDA. For information on subscriptions to the domain name and/or general internet news please contact me. For archives of postings to the list, see http://lists.technewsreview.com.au/pipermail/technewsreview/. Also see http://technewsreview.com.au/ for recent updates. Sources include Quicklinks <http://qlinks.net/> and BNA Internet Law News <http://www.bna.com/ilaw/>. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ (c) David Goldstein 2007 --------- David Goldstein address: 4/3 Abbott Street COOGEE NSW 2034 AUSTRALIA email: Goldstein_David @yahoo.com.au phone: +61 418 228 605 (mobile); +61 2 9665 5773 (home) "Every time you use fossil fuels, you're adding to the problem. Every time you forgo fossil fuels, you're being part of the solution" - Dr Tim Flannery ____________________________________________________________________________________ Yahoo!7 Mail has just got even bigger and better with unlimited storage on all webmail accounts. http://au.docs.yahoo.com/mail/unlimitedstorage.html _______________________________________________ APPLe mailing list [email protected] http://mailman.apnic.net/mailman/listinfo/apple
