********************************************************** Sponsored by the Singapore Internet Research Centre Nanyang Technological University, Singapore http://www.ntu.edu.sg/sci/sirc/
********************************************************** Don't forget to check out http://auda.org.au/domain-news/ for today's edition of the complete domain news, including an RSS feed - already online! And see my website - http://technewsreview.com.au/ - for daily updates in between postings. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Addiction to internet 'is an illness' http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2008/mar/23/news.internet EU Links New Broadband Target to Economic Prosperity http://www.ecommercetimes.com/story/62218.html Internet jewellers - A boy's best friend: Gentlemen prefer buying diamonds online http://www.economist.com/business/displaystory.cfm?story_id=10881758 Google's Search-Within-Search Draws Scrutiny http://ecommercetimes.com/story/Googles-Search-Within-Search-Draws-Scrutiny-62270.html Latin America's ECommerce Leader http://www.forbes.com/technology/2008/03/21/mitra-entrepreneur-argentina-tech-ebiz-cx_sm_0321mitra.html For the young, TV's passivity is passé next to the Internet http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20080324-report-kids-use-internet-to-enhance-tv-experience.html Internet communities: Break down these walls http://www.economist.com/opinion/displaystory.cfm?story_id=10880516 Online social networks: Everywhere and nowhere http://www.economist.com/business/displaystory.cfm?story_id=10880936 German Jewish Group Takes YouTube to Court http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/0,1518,542842,00.html au: Phone manufacturers' features a turn-off http://www.australianit.news.com.au/story/0,24897,23407023-16123,00.html China Looks Into The Case Of The Mobile Spam http://www.forbes.com/ebusiness/2008/03/24/china-mobile-spam-markets-equity-cx_vk_0324markets04.html CMS Cameron McKenna Technology Annual Review [reg req'd] http://www.law-now.com/law-now/2008/technologyannualreview170308.htm http://technewsreview.com.au/article.php?article=4345 Germany's Top Court Curtails Disputed Data Storage Law http://www.dw-world.de/dw/article/0,2144,3203058,00.html Google loses bid for EU-wide trademark on Gmail name [Bloomberg] http://www.siliconvalley.com/news/ci_8622621 us: A Push to Limit the Tracking of Web Surfers’ Clicks http://iht.com/articles/2008/03/20/technology/adco.php Phorm tracks every Web move in Britain http://iht.com/articles/2008/03/20/technology/adcoside.php Schmidt: Google may share user info with US gov't http://news.zdnet.co.uk/internet/0,1000000097,39369897,00.htm Business in the Hotseat over Net Censorship by Michael Geist http://www.michaelgeist.ca/content/view/2761/159/ Tibet: how can we get at the truth when China bans journalists and blocks the net? by Roy Greenslade http://blogs.guardian.co.uk/greenslade/2008/03/hong_kong_reporters_ordered_fr.html FBI posts fake hyperlinks to snare child porn suspects http://www.news.com/8301-13578_3-9899151-38.html UK outrage at Miss Bimbo website http://technology.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/tech_and_web/the_web/article3613881.ece We'll regulate until we have an open EU market, says Reding http://www.eupolitix.com/EN/News/200803/7739aea5-3c66-4894-b9ff-07bfd6042efc.htm Google proposes using unused U.S. airwaves for wireless Internet services http://iht.com/articles/2008/03/24/technology/google.php ********************** INTERNET USE ********************** Addiction to internet 'is an illness' Tense? Angry? Can't get online? Internet addiction is now a serious public health issue that should be officially recognised as a clinical disorder, according to a leading psychiatrist. Excessive gaming, viewing online pornography, emailing and text messaging have been identified as causes of a compulsive-impulsive disorder by Dr Jerald Block, author of an editorial for the respected American Journal of Psychiatry. http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2008/mar/23/news.internet EU Links New Broadband Target to Economic Prosperity In Europe, broadband Internet access is seen as a ticket to economic freedom and prosperity. That's one of the key ideas behind the European Commission's announcement Wednesday of its intention to increase broadband penetration from the current 20 percent to 30 percent across the bloc by 2010. The EC unveiled this goal in its 13th Progress Report on the Single Telecoms Market. http://www.ecommercetimes.com/story/62218.html Free TV heading way of vinyl The rise of internet television (IPTV) - and in particular, user-generated websites such as YouTube - will soon see free-to-air networks "simply disappear", along the lines of how vinyl records were superceded, according to one of the world's most senior media consultants. http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,23420452-7582,00.html Internet jewellers - A boy's best friend: Gentlemen prefer buying diamonds online “Men are intimidated when they go into a jewellery store to buy their first diamond,” says Diane Irvine, the chief executive of Blue Nile. Creating a website that looks good and makes it easy for men to learn about diamonds before buying has turned Blue Nile into the leading online seller of jewellery, confounding predictions that luxury and e-commerce would never mix. With revenues of $319m in 2007, 70% of which is from sales of engagement rings, it is now the biggest online specialist jeweller, and has a 4% share of the engagement-ring market in America. It is also gaining sales in Britain and Canada, where it has operated for a few years, and last month it opened in 12 new countries including Singapore and Japan. http://www.economist.com/business/displaystory.cfm?story_id=10881758 A New Tool From Google Alarms Sites Retailers and publishers have fought hard to work their way up in the ranking of Google’s search results and refine the search features of their own Web sites to help users once they arrive. Now, Google is taking a greater role in helping users search within particular sites. And some of the same retailers and publishers are not happy about it. http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/24/business/media/24ecom.html http://iht.com/articles/2008/03/24/technology/ecom.php Google's Search-Within-Search Draws Scrutiny Google has quietly unveiled a search-within-a-site feature on its main Web search engine, giving users the ability to refine searches before going to a merchant or publisher's page. The company launched search-within-a-site on March 5 after several days of testing, according to a posting to the official Google blog. http://ecommercetimes.com/story/Googles-Search-Within-Search-Draws-Scrutiny-62270.html Latin America's ECommerce Leader There is a market of 500 million people--about 8.6% of the world's population--that the business media all too often neglects as it serves up story after story about China and India. That would be Latin America. Between 2000 and 2007, the number of Internet users in Latin America grew from 18.1 million to 122.4 million, a compounded annual growth rate of 32% compared with only 12% in North America during the same period. http://www.forbes.com/technology/2008/03/21/mitra-entrepreneur-argentina-tech-ebiz-cx_sm_0321mitra.html For the young, TV's passivity is passé next to the Internet A study conducted by Grunwald Associates on kids' use of social networks found 64 percent of people between the ages of 9 and 17 aren't just glued to the couch while the TV is on -- they're going online at the same time. In fact, the TV is what's driving them to go online while watching their favorite shows, sometimes by offering interactive activities to go along with what they're watching. http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20080324-report-kids-use-internet-to-enhance-tv-experience.html UK online newspaper readers fall after bumper January The UK's leading newspaper websites bumped back to Earth after record visitor numbers in January, with all the five groups that publish officially audited figures posting traffic declines last month. http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2008/mar/20/abcs.digitalmedia uk: Funerals to be shown live on the web Grieving relatives will be able to watch their loved one's funeral via the internet as a crematorium goes hi-tech. Services at Cambridge Crematorium can be webcast so mourners thousands of miles away can feel they are part of the service. http://cambridge-news.co.uk/cn%5Fnews%5Fcambridge/DisplayArticle.asp?ID=300433 ********************** SOCIAL NETWORKING ********************** Internet communities: Break down these walls History suggests that open standards will once again trump “walled gardens” on the internet: “The farther back you can look, the farther forward you are likely to see.” Apply Winston Churchill's aphorism to the internet, and about the farthest back you can look is 1994, when the previously obscure computer network first became known to a wider public. Many people first ventured onto the internet from AOL, CompuServe and Prodigy, which were subscription-based online services that offered e-mail, chatrooms, discussion boards and so on. Having provided their users with access to the internet, however, these venerable digital communities were undermined by it. http://www.economist.com/opinion/displaystory.cfm?story_id=10880516 Online social networks: Everywhere and nowhere Social networking will become a ubiquitous feature of online life. That does not mean it is a business: A large but long-in-the-tooth technology company hoping to become a bigger force in online advertising buys a small start-up in a sector that everybody agrees is the next big thing. A decade ago, this was Microsoft buying Hotmail—the firm that established web-based e-mail as a must-have service for internet users, and promised to drive up page views, and thus advertising inventory, on the software giant's websites. This month it was AOL, a struggling web portal that is part of Time Warner, an old-media giant, buying Bebo, a small but up-and-coming online social network, for $850m. http://www.economist.com/business/displaystory.cfm?story_id=10880936 uk: Plea to ban employers trawling Facebook A powerful coalition of children’s charities is urging ministers to make it illegal for companies to trawl Facebook and other social networking websites for information on prospective recruits. They say that employers and educational establishments are known to be browsing the internet looking for “digital dirt” on young people who have applied for positions. http://technology.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/tech_and_web/article3613896.ece MySpace, Facebook Need To Be Useful To Make Money [Reuters] If people do more things on social networks, and reveal more about their tastes and habits, advertisers can better focus their messages, Web analysis groups suggest. Virtual beer and vampires may no longer be enough to keep members of social networks like Facebook and News Corp's MySpace riveted to their computers. http://www.informationweek.com/news/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=206905467 German Jewish Group Takes YouTube to Court Germany's leading Jewish group has accused Google and YouTube of hosting anti-Semitic content on its globally popular video site. The group alleges the videos incite racial hatred and discrimination. http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/0,1518,542842,00.html Israel-Palestine dispute moves on to Facebook The conflict over land in the Middle East is fought out not only on the ground in Israel and the Palestinian territories. Now the pages of social networking site Facebook have become the latest scene of dispute. http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/mar/20/israelandthepalestinians.facebook ********************** NEW TECHNOLOGIES ********************** Why Old Technologies Are Still Kicking In 1991, Stewart Alsop, the editor of InfoWorld and a thoughtful observer of industry trends, predicted that the last mainframe computer would be unplugged by 1996. Last month, I.B.M. introduced the latest version of its mainframe, the aged yet remarkably resilient warhorse of computing. http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/23/technology/23digi.html http://www.news.com/2100-1008_3-6235344.html au: Phone manufacturers' features a turn-off Mobile phones keep adding whiz-bang features, but research released this week suggests fewer people than makers would like are bothering to use them. http://www.australianit.news.com.au/story/0,24897,23407023-16123,00.html Andrew Keen on New Media: Has the prophet Steve Jobs found the secret of our digital futures? ... The most lucid explanation of life after TV I've ever heard came from a nine-year-old. "After TV," the boy said, "comes bedtime." You may laugh, but life after television may well mean bedtime for the careers of many TV executives. And that's why there is such a frenzied rush to create product that will become the standard – the platform, if you like – for the post-television age. This is the new new-media gold rush. Everyone – from Apple's Steve Jobs to News Corp's Rupert Murdoch to NBC's Jeff Zucker to the BBC's Mark Thompson – is scrambling to ascend this summit first and get their hands on the digital holy grail. http://www.independent.co.uk/news/media/comment/andrew-keen-on-new-media-799783.html Aussie Linux head: Microsoft more open than iPhone The world has been turned upside down for Linux developers, thanks to Microsoft's approach to its mobile platform--today it's the most open functioning platform on the market, says new Linux Australia president Stewart Smith. The star of application-rich mobile phones, Apple's iPhone, has been met with criticism from the open source community and even confusion by major software developers like Adobe. http://www.zdnetasia.com/news/software/0,39044164,62039219,00.htm http://www.zdnet.com.au/news/software/soa/Aussie-Linux-head-Microsoft-more-open-than-iPhone/0,130061733,339287392,00.htm ********************** SPAM ********************** China Looks Into The Case Of The Mobile Spam Beijing vowed to quell mobile phone spam messages on Sunday after seven advertising companies including Nasdaq-traded Focus Media were discovered to have sent commercial messages to practically half of China's population of cell phone users without their consent. http://www.forbes.com/ebusiness/2008/03/24/china-mobile-spam-markets-equity-cx_vk_0324markets04.html Beijing investigates spam attack China is investigating a spam attack after almost half of China's mobile phone users received unwanted text messages from advertisers. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/7311242.stm us: Adult Web site company wins spam case A Renton-based adult Web site operator won a unanimous jury verdict Monday in a case brought by the Federal Trade Commission under U.S. anti-spam law. The jury in U.S. District Court in Seattle said Impulse Media Group Inc. was not responsible for hundreds of unsolicited, sexually explicit commercial e-mails sent by some of its affiliates to bring traffic to its sites. During the trial, the company cited its policies against spam, and said it terminated relationships with affiliates who broke its rules. http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/business/356247_spam25.html ********************** DIGITAL DIVIDE ********************** Intel: Classmate PC appeals beyond kids in developed countries [IDG] Intel Corp.'s Classmate PC isn't just for students in emerging markets anymore. The low-cost laptop will be made available to companies that want to sell it to consumers, an Intel executive said Wednesday. http://computerworld.com/action/article.do?command=viewArticleBasic&articleId=9070018 "Digital Skills Divide" Emerging [news release] A new study from Tufts University shows that while the "digital divide" may be narrowing in terms of access to the Internet, a significant "digital skills divide" is emerging. "Parents' access to childrearing information appears to be on the rise, in large measure because of the Web," said Professor Fred Rothbaum from the Eliot-Pearson Department of Child Development at Tufts University. http://technewsreview.com.au/article.php?article=4346 http://www.newswise.com/articles/view/538960/ 'Digital Skills Divide' Emerging "Parents' access to childrearing information appears to be on the rise, in large measure because of the Web," said Professor Fred Rothbaum from the Eliot-Pearson Department of Child Development at Tufts University. http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/03/080324201319.htm ************************** ONLINE CRIME, SECURITY & LEGAL ************************** CMS Cameron McKenna Technology Annual Review [reg req'd] The CMS Cameron McKenna Technology Annual Review is now available to download. The Technology Annual Review contains short, easy to read articles on topics of interest over the last year, presented on a month-by-month basis. Topics in this year's Review include: selling spam lists, illegal spyware, software copyright, VoIP, the i-Gasm, CD-WOW, the Fresh Prince, E-Commerce defences, data retention, digital downloads, domain name decisions, patent ambushes, the smiley :-), Bluetooth spam, and much, much more. http://www.law-now.com/law-now/2008/technologyannualreview170308.htm http://technewsreview.com.au/article.php?article=4345 Germany's Top Court Curtails Disputed Data Storage Law Germany's constitutional court on Wednesday severely curbed parts of a wide-reaching and highly controversial data collection law that requires telecom companies to store telephone and Internet data for up to six months, dealing a setback to government efforts to fight terrorism. http://www.dw-world.de/dw/article/0,2144,3203058,00.html German court tightens up ISP, phone data retention rules Germany's highest court apparently had memories of Nazi and Stasi abuses in mind when it ruled on a series of surveillance and data privacy cases this year. In the most recent ruling, made today in Karlsruhe, the Constitutional Court found that Germany's recent data retention directive targeting ISPs and telephone companies was problematic; going forward, the data retention will still be mandatory, but the information can only be accessed with a warrant and only for serious crimes. http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20080319-german-court-tightens-up-isp-phone-data-retention-rules.html Google loses bid for EU-wide trademark on Gmail name [Bloomberg] Google lost its bid to get European Union-wide trademark protection for "Gmail," the name of its Web-based e-mail service. The Gmail name is too similar to an existing German trademark, according to a ruling by the EU's trademark agency published on its Web site. http://www.siliconvalley.com/news/ci_8622621 The Web as al-Qaida's safety net With the world focused on the war in Iraq, it is easy to forget about al-Qaida. But al-Qaida has not forgotten about the war. Even before the first U.S. missiles hit Baghdad, the terrorist network and its sympathizers were posting calls for vengeance on Web sites that have taken the anti-American jihad into cyberspace. http://www.vagazette.com/bal-te.journal28mar28,0,3493796.column Anti-Virus Firms Scrambling to Keep Up The sheer volume and complexity of computer viruses being released on the Internet today has the anti-virus industry on the defensive, experts say, underscoring the need for consumers to avoid relying on anti-virus software alone to keep their home computers safe and secure. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/03/19/AR2008031901439.html Infected Australian computers fetch top dollar Hackers are paying top dollar on international blackmarkets for computers from Australia that have been unknowingly hijacked and infected with spyware. A Russian malware distribution site offers $US100 for a haul of 1000 spyware-infected Australian machines, double the price offered for US machines and 30 times more than those from Asia. http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2008/03/20/1205602560478.html http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2008/03/20/1205602560478.html uk: Civil Serf blogger faces disciplinary action A senior civil servant who detailed the inner workings of Government has reportedly been suspended pending an investigation into her conduct. The author of the popular Civil Serf blog is reported to have confessed to a Government investigating team. http://out-law.com/page-8963 uk: Cyber crime stays one step ahead Computer crime is not only exploding in volume but is mutating faster than it can be contained, a new report to be published next week will warn. Some 2.5 million new types of malicious programme have been launched in the past two months alone – more than the previous 15 years put together, according to the latest data from the security firm Trend Micro. The UK now has around 1.25 million "infected" computers. And the average number of PCs across the world sending out spam emails every month shot up to 10 million last year, more than double the 4.2 million in 2006, which was double the 2.1 million in 2005. http://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/analysis-and-features/cyber-crime-stays-one-step-ahead-799395.html ************************** PRIVACY ************************** us: A Push to Limit the Tracking of Web Surfers’ Clicks After reading about how Internet companies like Google, Microsoft and Yahoo collect information about people online and use it for targeted advertising, one New York assemblyman said there ought to be a law. So he drafted a bill, now gathering support in Albany, that would make it a crime — punishable by a fine to be determined — for certain Web companies to use personal information about consumers for advertising without their consent. And because it would be extraordinarily difficult for the companies that collect such data to adhere to stricter rules for people in New York alone, these companies would probably have to adjust their rules everywhere, effectively turning the New York legislation into national law. http://nytimes.com/2008/03/20/business/media/20adco.html http://iht.com/articles/2008/03/20/technology/adco.php Phorm tracks every Web move in Britain As the debate continues over how much data should be gathered by companies like Google and Yahoo about people who surf the Web, one new company is drawing attention and controversy by boasting that it will collect the most complete information of all. http://iht.com/articles/2008/03/20/technology/adcoside.php Schmidt: Google may share user info with US gov't Google chief executive Eric Schmidt has revealed that the US government has made "requests" for the search giant to share information about its users, and that Google would comply if the requests were legal. During his flying visit to Sydney, ZDNet.com.au asked Schmidt whether, if Google was sharing information with the US government, the company would admit to it. http://news.zdnet.co.uk/internet/0,1000000097,39369897,00.htm ********************** FILE SHARING ********************** Billy Bragg: Let us decide how to exploit our own music Sometimes there are words that really reverberate with people. What Thomas Jefferson wrote in the preamble to the U.S. Constitution is one. I think Barack Obama's disquisition on race in America is another. I'm curious to know how the smackdown Billy Bragg delivered to the social-networking moguls is going to be received. If history's any guide, his New York Times op-ed on Saturday called "The Royalty Scam" will fall on deaf ears. Still, it's worth a serious hearing. http://www.news.com/8301-10787_3-9901352-60.html Taking on the Godzilla of video-sharing sites: Dailymotion takes on YouTube In a gray bunker of a building with a graveyard as its neighbor, a freshly hired strike force of Internet executives, programmers and advertising representatives is mounting a grand mission to take on a global behemoth: Google's YouTube. http://iht.com/articles/2008/03/21/business/motion24.php Breaking the Law To Get a Break: Social Site Partners With Music Label That Sued It For many music-oriented Web start-ups, a copyright lawsuit can be a death sentence. But for Imeem, getting sued by one of the biggest record labels played a pivotal role in its success. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/03/20/AR2008032003729.html us: MPAA to Congress: Filtering is in colleges’ best interests The MPAA has a bee in its collective bonnet about collegiate piracy, and the group isn't about to let anything so banal as "facts" get in the way of some cathartic outrage. How else to explain the fact that the group continues to petition members of Congress for special favors that would force colleges to make plans for offering up legal music services to students and for implementing copyright filters after the MPAA's own data shows that schools have little to do with the overall problem? In a new letter this week, the MPAA continued to push its agenda in Congress, arguing that filters aren't just good for the movie business, they're good for the schools. http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20080320-mpaa-to-congress-filtering-is-in-colleges-best-interests.html China releases video website 'blacklist' [Reuters] A Chinese video-sharing website has received an official government warning under new rules to curb pornographic, violent and political content. Industry insiders said the move could scare away future investors in the sector. http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2008/03/21/2196224.htm China publishes 'blacklist' of video Web [Reuters] Chinese authorities ordered 25 video-sharing Web sites to halt operations and issued warnings to dozens of others on Thursday, tightening their grip on online content in a move which could scare away future investment in the sector. Among the Web sites to be warned was Tudou.com, which is backed by a unit of venture capital heavyweight IDG and received an official warning under new rules to curb pornographic, violent and political content. http://www.news.com/2100-1028_3-6235072.html http://www.latimes.com/technology/la-fi-chiweb21mar21,1,2919256.story http://uk.reuters.com/article/technologyNews/idUKL2084401020080320 Madonna to release new album via mobile Madonna, the singer who famously refused to make her music available on iTunes, will become the first artist to release an album via mobile phone prior to its release in store. http://technology.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/tech_and_web/article3575836.ece ********************** CENSORSHIP ********************** Business in the Hotseat over Net Censorship by Michael Geist Michael Geist's weekly technology law column focuses on the growth of Internet censorship and the accompanying pressure on the business community to do something about it. He begins by noting that as the Internet moved into the mainstream in the mid-1990s, John Gilmore, one of the founders of the Electronic Frontier Foundation, coined the phrase "the Internet interprets censorship as damage and routes around it. "Gilmore's comments were a reference to the architecture of the Internet, which was designed to ensure that information was delivered by the most efficient means possible and render attempts to block content nearly impossible. Yet years later, a growing number of countries seem determined to challenge Gilmore's maxim. China is the best known (as evidenced by recent events in Tibet), having implemented both a massive content filtering system that exerts control over external content and demanded that foreign Internet firms establish Chinese-versions of their services that abide by the government's requirements. http://www.michaelgeist.ca/content/view/2761/159/ http://www.thestar.com/sciencetech/article/346695 http://www.circleid.com/posts/832072_business_internet_censorship/ Wikileaks defies 'great firewall of China' Whistleblower website Wikileaks has made 35 censored videos of civil unrest in Tibet available in a bid to get round the "great firewall of China". Wikileaks said that posting the videos was a "response to the Chinese Public Security Bureau's carte-blanche censorship of YouTube, the BBC, CNN, the Guardian and other sites" that had carried sensitive video footage about Tibet. http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2008/mar/19/digitalmedia.tibet China sidesteps internet criticism A senior Chinese government official has said that he welcomes closer international ties to develop the country's burgeoning digital media sector, but also delivered a stark warning to foreigners not to use "internet issues" to meddle in China's "internal affairs". http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2008/mar/20/china.internet YouTube Unplugged As Foreign Governments Block Sensitive Content, Video Site Must Pick Between Bending to Censorship, Doing Business: On Sunday, access to Google Inc.'s YouTube inside China was cut off after the Web site was flooded with graphic images from Tibet, including videos of burning trucks and monks being dragged through the streets by Chinese soldiers. http://online.wsj.com/article/SB120605651500353307.html Tibet: how can we get at the truth when China bans journalists and blocks the net? by Roy Greenslade Journalists are doing their best to report from inside Tibet. But the Chinese authorities are doing their worst to stop them from filing copy or from transmitting film and pictures. Internet access is restricted too. But, as the Daily Telegraph's China correspondent Richard Spencer reports, some bloggers are managing to put up material on the net. For example, EastSouthWestNorth carries video clips - though one has been taken down - plus analysis which calls into question claims by the Chinese authorities that the revolt is merely a "race riot." It also alleges that film purporting to show Tibetans attacking Chinese may in fact be examples of Chinese assaulting Tibetans (it points out that Han Chinese outnumber ethnic Tibetans in Lhasa). http://blogs.guardian.co.uk/greenslade/2008/03/hong_kong_reporters_ordered_fr.html Rusbridger attacks Chinese 'censorship' The Guardian editor, Alan Rusbridger, has accused the Chinese authorities of committing an "act of deliberate and wholly unacceptable censorship" by blocking access to news websites covering the unrest in Tibet. http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2008/mar/17/chinathemedia.theguardian State TV switches to non-stop footage of Chinese under attack China has begun to fight back against criticism of its handling of the Tibetan protests, launching a sustained publicity offensive as well as blocking foreign broadcasters and websites and denying journalists access to areas of unrest. http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/mar/18/tibet.china1 The great firewall of China Imagine living in a country where bird flu is a constant danger, yet you can't look it up on Google. You're diagnosed with HIV AIDS but you can't search for a Facebook support network. You're trying to research a school project on religion but Wikipedia's content on the subject is blocked. You're in the mood for some distraction but can't access YouTube. Even worse, imaging living in a country where trying to find this information online could land you in trouble. This is the everyday reality for people in China, where online censorship is carried out by 30,000 internet police and state-owned internet service providers. And China is far from the only country in which controlling information and opinion in cyberspace is pervasive. http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2008/03/18/1205602389513.html http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2008/03/18/1205602389513.html http://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/news/web/the-great-firewall-of-china/2008/03/18/1205602389513.html ************************************************ CHILD PROTECTION, FILTERING & CONTENT REGULATION ************************************************ FBI posts fake hyperlinks to snare child porn suspects The FBI has recently adopted a novel investigative technique: posting hyperlinks that purport to be illegal videos of minors having sex, and then raiding the homes of anyone willing to click on them. http://www.news.com/8301-13578_3-9899151-38.html UK outrage at Miss Bimbo website A website that encourages girls as young as 9 to embrace plastic surgery and extreme dieting in the search for the perfect figure was condemned as lethal by parents’ groups and healthcare experts yesterday. The Miss Bimbo internet game has attracted prepubescent girls who are told to buy their virtual characters breast enlargement surgery and to keep them “waif thin” with diet pills. http://technology.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/tech_and_web/the_web/article3613881.ece How Australian police broke net pedophile ring Australian police have played a leading role in smashing an international pedophile internet network. More than 22 pedophiles who thought their super encryption code was unbreakable have been arrested in the US, Canada, Europe and Australia. http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2008/03/22/1206206971557.html http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2008/03/22/1206206971557.html au: Fight footage on web Footage of local students involved in a fight as at least 10 schoolmates form a circle to watch was posted on the internet on Saturday. http://bendigo.yourguide.com.au/news/local/general/fight-footage-on-web/1206538.html ph: Fighting online child porn then and now There is visible disgust when Alex Ramos, computer forensics specialist of the Philippine National Police, talks about the rising incidence of online child pornography in the Philippines. http://www.abs-cbnnews.com/storypage.aspx?StoryId=112593 uk: Parents urged to ban computers from their children's bedrooms. Parents will this week be urged to ban computers from their children's bedrooms. A report by TV psychologist Tanya Byron into the damaging impact of video games and the internet will point out that parents have little idea what their youngsters do online. http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/topstories/2008/03/24/parents-urged-to-ban-computers-from-their-children-s-bedrooms-89520-20361030/ uk: Game ratings under more scrutiny Game ratings are under increased scrutiny following the decision to give Manhunt 2 an 18 certificate in the UK. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/7302407.stm us: Cyber bullies could face penalties Responding to the October 2006 suicide of Dardenne Prairie teen Megan Meier, Illinois and Missouri lawmakers have introduced bills aimed at keeping teens safe from cyber bullies. One proposal could put cyber bullies in prison for up to five years. http://www.pantagraph.com/articles/2008/03/24/news/doc47e82cb6a2b78764276707.txt Internet Fuels Child Exploitation The advent of the World Wide Web has provided child predators a new way to connect with children—and with other abusers. With approximately 20 per cent of all Internet pornography involving children, law enforcement agencies are hard-pressed to respond effectively. http://en.epochtimes.com/news/8-3-20/67825.html ************************** GOVERNMENT & PUBLIC POLICY ************************** We'll regulate until we have an open EU market, says Reding Europe’s market in telecommunications is still not fully opened or competitive, information society chief Viviane Reding has said. Speaking at the launch of a progress report on the market in electronic communications on Wednesday, Reding said that she would continue to push through her reforms until the market was opened. http://www.eupolitix.com/EN/News/200803/7739aea5-3c66-4894-b9ff-07bfd6042efc.htm ru: Medvedev saves internet providers from deputies Amendments will be made to the draft law on strategic sectors. A source in the State Duma reports that the newly elected Russian President Dmitry Medvedev has disapproved of the intension to include internet providers into the list of strategic companies. Leonid Reiman, RF Minister of IT and communications, warned earlier that introducing investment restrictions in telecommunications might result in the internet drain away from Russia. http://eng.cnews.ru/news/top/indexEn.shtml?2008/03/17/292434 SARFT Punishes Illegal Chinese Internet Video Service Providers China's State Administration of Radio, Film and Television has published the results of online audio and video service provider checks it has recently completed and it has punished websites that have been involved in illegal operations. http://www.chinatechnews.com/2008/03/21/6527-sarft-punishes-illegal-chinese-internet-video-service-providers/ ********************************* COMMENT, MICROSOFT & DEVELOPMENTS ********************************* Microsoft NZ head warns of OOXML no vote InternetNZ has waded into the divisive OOXML debate urging Standards New Zealand to reject Microsoft's document standard on March 29, the deadline nations have to accept modifications proposed late last month and allow the standard to proceed to publication. http://m-net.net.nz/2254/latest-news/latest-news/microsoft-nz-head-warns-of-ooxml-no-vote-17.php ********************** TELECOMMUNICATIONS ********************** ACMA appoints specialist industry advisor to its spectrum consultation group as a “public interest advocate” [news release] The Australian Communications and Media Authority has appointed Geoff Luther as Specialist Industry Advisor to its new spectrum consultation body, the Radiocommunications Consultative Committee (RCC). The RCC held its first meeting earlier this week. http://www.acma.gov.au/WEB/STANDARD/pc=PC_311018 It's Too Darn Hot: The huge cost of powering—and cooling—data centers has the tech industry scrambling for energy efficiency A 35-minute drive south of Iceland's capital of Reykjavik lies the tiny fishing village of Grindavik. One January day, Kristinn Haflioason steers his car a few minutes out of town to a vast, snow-swept expanse of volcanic rock that juts out into the Atlantic Ocean. He climbs out and launches into an unlikely sales pitch that he hopes will persuade corporations from the U.S. and Europe to locate operations there. "Dozens of companies have expressed interest," he says. http://businessweek.com/magazine/content/08_13/b4077060400752.htm Real World 2.0 In a new book, Here Comes Everybody, author and academic Clay Shirky argues the future is here; it's time to get on with it: "Our principal challenge is not to decide where we want to go, but to stay upright as we go there." In his book, Here Comes Everybody: The Power of Organizing Without Organizations, author and NYU faculty member Clay Shirky describes the profound impact of social technological tools on contemporary culture—from e-mail and blogs to Twitter and wikis. http://businessweek.com/innovate/content/mar2008/id20080321_825786.htm nz: Broadband top telco election issue Telecommunications lobby group Tuanz is promoting broadband internet and telecoms political policy as an election issue this year, as it was in Australia's November poll. http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=5&objectid=10499834 ********************** MOBILE/WIRELESS ********************** Google proposes using unused U.S. airwaves for wireless Internet services Google gave U.S. regulators a proposal Monday seeking permission to use the airwaves between television broadcast channels for mobile broadband services. http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/24/technology/24google-web.html http://iht.com/articles/2008/03/24/technology/google.php Google outlines proposal for 'Wi-Fi on steroids' Google on Monday said it has a plan to have American consumers from Manhattan to rural North Dakota surfing the Web on handheld gadgets at gigabits-per-second speeds by the 2009 holiday season. http://www.news.com/8301-10784_3-9901747-7.html Google revives push to get free airwaves Google Inc.'s wireless strategy could be summed up this way: Why pay for something you can get for nothing? http://www.latimes.com/technology/la-fi-google25mar25,1,5208434.story ********************** VoIP ********************** US court reminds states that VoIP is exempt from service fees Late last year, VoIP provider Vonage sued the state of Nebraska over the Nebraska Public Service Commission's attempts to force it to pay into the state's Universal Service Fund. A federal court has rebuffed the Cornhusker State's attempts, barring the PSC from collecting USF fees from Vonage and, by extension, any other VoIP provider operating within the state. http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20080324-court-reminds-states-that-voip-is-exempt-from-service-fees.html ********************************** ARRESTS/COURT CASES FOR CHILD PORN ********************************** nz: Man jailed for possessing child porn One of the country's worst child porn offenders has been jailed for five years after he was found with thousands of child porn photographs and movies. http://www.nzherald.co.nz/topic/story.cfm?c_id=137&objectid=10499373 nz: Sentence reduction `not justified' for child porn offender A district court judge has been slammed for giving a recidivist child porn sex offender a 2-1/2-year discount on his prison sentence. http://nz.news.yahoo.com/080320/3/4jl6.html +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ (c) David Goldstein 2008 --------- 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 Get the name you always wanted with the new y7mail email address. www.yahoo7.com.au/y7mail _______________________________________________ APPLe mailing list [email protected] http://mailman.apnic.net/mailman/listinfo/apple
