U.S. Gov. censors web service set up to evade consorship: A web-proxy service set up by the US government’s International Broadcasting Bureau to enable websurfers in Iran to evade censorship is itself massively censoring what they can see. That is the conclusion of an independent new report released from the …
Read More »Culture and Society
BBC: TV On Demand
The BBC is ahead of the curve with “rich” Internet content. They have begun a pilot project that could lead to all of their TV content being available on the Internet on demand: The future of television is almost upon us: the day when we spend our train or bus …
Read More »Microsoft’s Rent Control
As usual I have mixed feelings. Today Microsoft came out with their new DRM, called Janus (who would have thought Microsoft would choose to identify one of its products as two-faced?), which will, in the short run give consumers more flexibility with digital content, specifically enabling “rented” material like music …
Read More »“Designing Bits and Pieces”
Very interesting symposium at MIT’s Media Lab on May 10: On May 10, the MIT Media Laboratory and the Consumer Electronics Association will co-host a symposium at MIT’s Kresge Auditorium, followed by a research open house at the Media Lab. Walt Mossberg, Personal Technology columnist at the Wall Street Journal, …
Read More »Economics Finally Pushing Scout’s to the Internet
We’ve been hearing about how the Internet would revolutionize the way music is found, distributed and promoted for ten years. Until recently that wasn’t the case – at least with the majors – who have just now been dragged kicking and screaming into digital music sales over the Internet, and …
Read More »Future of Music Policy Summit Blog
The Future of Music Policy Summit 2004 is going on right now in DC. Since most of us aren’t there, a great way to keep up with the proceedings is via the blog that CD Baby’s Derek Sivers is keeping. Topics up so far include This Panel Kills Fascists, The …
Read More »Want to Hear the New Super Smart Album? Pick Up the Phone
German band Super Smart have released their new album only on ringtones: Super Smart have turned their backs on vinyl and CDs and instead have decided to just release their album as ringtones. The album, Panda Babies, is published by a German company that focuses on digital music for mobile …
Read More »Concert on Your Keychain
Wow – this takes the instant live recording concept another step farther: Now, minutes after your favorite band sounds its last note on stage, you can load a live recording of the concert onto a cigarette-lighter-sized hard drive hanging off your keychain. Take it home, toss the digital files onto …
Read More »Blah Blah More RIAA Lawsuits Blah Blah
The beat goes on, 477 more: Since January, the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA), employing the “John Doe” litigation method, has sued more than 2,000 people. The RIAA is using this method because the names of the 477 people accused of illegally distributing copyrighted sound recordings on peer-to-peer services …
Read More »Chasing Twisters
Fifth grade science teacher David Thon is joining as an “embedded blogger” as a team of WeatherBug meteorologists take part in a five-day-long tornado chase called WeatherBug Storm Chase 2004. The team will set out in search of storms beginning Monday, May 3 in Oklahoma City: David (top right) was …
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