Science and Technology

Total recall from a singing head: I’m sure you’ve seen a lot of tech-savvy people smugly showing off that new hunk of entertainment hardware, the iPod personal stereo. Well, I might not have the scratch to get one, but frankly, I don’t want the white-corded wonder. I have my very …

With the critical and political tide (other than Democratic entertainment industry teat-hounds) turning against them – as evidenced by the Sen. Coleman statements and others from key Republicans, editorials from coast to coast, and across-the-board condemnation in the tech, education, and youth communities – the RIAA is busy backpedaling furiously …

The Rolling Stones, holdouts against the great digital music revolution, have joined us in the new millennium. Besides the obvious significance of Stones songs finally being legitimately available in digital file format, this should also inspire other holdouts, most notably the Beatles, to get with the program. Starting today, subscribers …

Keen eyes will have noted I have taken a break from the RIAA-digital music wars for the last couple of weeks because while on vacation I realized just how absofuckinglutely sick of the whole ugly dispiriting mess I had become, and when I got back to work I had no …

Very interesting tale of blogging intrigue and infighting from CNET that I missed on vacation: The conflict centers on something called Really Simple Syndication (RSS), a technology widely used to syndicate blogs and other Web content. The dispute pits Harvard Law School fellow Dave Winer, the blogging pioneer who is …

One year, 1.5 million page views, 19,838 referrers, 13,817 comments, 7162 entries, 311 blogcritics, awards and recommendations aplenty:

Another roundup of the current legal status of file sharing, the RIAA’s Campaign Against Humanity, and advice on how to not get sued: if you have already been subpoenaed, erase copyright infringing files from your computer; if you haven’t, stop file sharing. Hmm, brilliant advice. When I explained the situation …

Is there ANYONE outside of the copyright cartel who thinks the RIAA’s current sue-your-customer’s-pants-off-then-sue-their-butthairs approach to “marketing” is wise, imaginative, conducive to a healthy business atmosphere, or anything other than self-defeating and vengeful? I’m waiting… Newsweek’s Steven Levy doesn’t get the joke either: Cary Sherman, president of the RIAA, and …

An editorial by Thomas Keane Jr. on why CDs and the music industry in general are on their way out – nothing terribly new to Blogcritics readers, but a great line makes it worthwhile: Still, the RIAA fundamentally believes that its customers – largely the young – are pirates; given …

The way this is working is the RIAA – as a very well funded institution with lawyers out the ass – has about zero per unit cost to subpoena all of these file sharers, while for the targets, the cost in real and potential cost in money, time and emotional …