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17-03-05, 09:36 PM
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Join Date: May 2001
Location: New England
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Peer-To-Peer News - The Week In Review - March 19th, '05
Quotes Of The Week
"There are a handful of executives out there who are the gatekeepers of what gets made and seen -- or not. I've pitched so many ideas and come away frustrated. So we just decided to do it ourselves." – Daniel Myrick "After 66338 given votes the poll result was overwhelming: 98 % of viewers thought that downloading should be legal, and only 2 % had the opposite view." – Tank Girl "If you can accept a few problems and want to learn computer security, meet hackers and federal agents, and party till the early morning... Defcon is for you.." – Humphrey Cheung "Thank God for computers, because mine tells me I began writing the first draft of Spamalot on Monday December 31st 2001. I downloaded the text of the [Monty Python and the Holy] Grail [movie] from one of the many illicit websites, which thankfully saved me all the bother of typing out the script and I could paste and cut and rewrite as necessary." – Eric Idle "This page is best view without Internet Explorer." – Geoff Johnson iPod Design "Honored" In China – Apple Fans See Red Yet another Chinese Electronics Firm has come out with yet another solid state MP3 player. They’re calling theirs the “Super Shuffle”. Available in half and full gig sizes the USB player/recorder/receiver will ship soon according to the maker LuxPro. Problem is the new unit, which boasts features like FM radio, voice and broadcast recording, bears more than a little resemblance to an Apple iPod Shuffle, itself a riff on previous flash players. This clone of a clone has led some of the more committed of the Apple faithful to sniff at the sheer crassness of it all. The Applesquad are fairly predicting Steve Jobs will sue the Asians out of existence and deservedly so as far as they’re concerned. Perhaps he’ll try, and if Apple had actually invented USB thumb-drive players, brought them up from birth to this great new market they might at least have a moral point, but like the mouse and GUIs - things once associated almost exclusively with the company - Apple did not conceive them. In fact, they were late to the flash player game. However even Sony, which actually did invent the personal player and with it an entirely new industry, dealt with the scores of copycats and competitors by aggressively staying ahead of them technically and aesthetically, producing some 1200 individual models and grabbing decades of record profits for their efforts. So much so they were able buy a movie studio and the world’s largest record company outright. It’s no coincidence then that when Sony allowed those Columbia content guys to hobble their engineers things went badly for them fast. They still haven’t recovered. Just last week the once proud Japanese giant went outside the company - and the country - and for the first time in their corporate history placed a foreigner at the top. It remains to be seen what if anything he can do to save the tottering titan. I’ve Fallen Into An Escher And I Can’t Get Out Personally I find the tension over copying little copy machines that are themselves copies of previous little copy machines ironic in the extreme and so overwhelmingly recursive that anything more than a passing mention might get me arrested by the redundancy squad. To get wound up about these particular new design clones, which it should be noted offer the consumer far more in the way of usable features than the plain vanilla Apple products they supposedly rip off is not merely an exercise in futility but a public admission of one’s peculiar brand of neurosis, like spending one’s days ranting that Bearshare is a copy of Limewire, when neither of them are original. As it happens both file-sharing programs were built on the work of others and like the iPod and the Super Shuffle both were created to support an entire social network built on the recapturing of performances that are themselves derivative, not that most of us seem to mind. Except for the ranting it seems the people have spoken and they’re saying there’s nothing wrong with it. Ultimately anything that drives the content capos bananas is probably A Good Thing for the world at large. Certainly it’s good for consumers. It’ll be a while obviously before the IP obsessive come around to reality – if indeed they ever do – and in the meantime they’ll be a wailin’ and a suein’ and as a result a watchin’ their profits plunge – but there is a better way. They can fight it out with features or choose a future filled with lawyers, at the end of the day it’s their call, but - and this is something that in spite of the obvious does bear mentioning, often - we don’t have to play by their rules and we don’t have to live by their decisions. So careful what you wish for Apple-istas. Getting your favorite technocrats to do anything by judicial fiat instead of customer choice could clone you a quick ticket to erehwon. Enjoy, Jack Say Bone! Movies Downloading Judged Legal In France Par Audionautes On Thursday, the French Court of Appeal of Montpellier released a 22 year old Internet user free of charges after he was sued for copying nearly 500 movies on Internet, burning them on CDs and sharing them with friends. The Court based its decision on the article L-122-5 of the French Intellectual Property Code stating that « authors can’t forbid copies or reproductions that are only intented for the private use of the copyist. » In a similar case in January however, the Discrict Court of Pontoise found another Internet user guilty and condemned him to pay more than 15 000 euros. On the contrary, the French Association of Audionautes helped another defendant who was able to win his case in December in front of the District Court of Chateauroux. There are still more than 50 criminal procedures pending in France. More than 20 of them are being helped by the French Association of Audionautes. The french press release of the Association of Audionautes : http://www.audionautes.net/blog/inde...sateur-de-p2p- relaxe-par-la-cour-dappel-de-montpellier The website of the Association of Audionautes (in french) : http://www.audionautes.net More on the article L-122-5 of the French Intellectual Property (in french) : http://soufron.free.fr/soufron-spip/...?id_article=22 http://www.audionautes.net/blog/inde...egal-in-france ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Anti-P2P Lawmaker Gets Top Senate Spot Declan McCullagh Orrin Hatch, the senator who once said the recording industry should be able to destroy music pirates' PCs, will be in charge of a new Senate panel responsible for writing copyright laws. Hatch, a Utah Republican, on Thursday was formally named chairman of the Senate Intellectual Property subcommittee. It's responsible for overseeing the U.S. Copyright Office and drafting legislation and treaties relating to copyright and patent laws. A few years ago, Hatch was one of the more vocal Washington critics of the Recording Industry Association of America. He urged the RIAA to be more flexible in licensing music to online distributors and even called a federal appeals court decision against Napster "shortsighted from a policy perspective." But when Napster's progeny arose in the form of peer-to-peer networks, Hatch's political views seemed to flip-flop. Instead of defending novel--and disruptive--technologies, Hatch became one of their most vocal political antagonists. Last year, he and Sen. Patrick Leahy of Vermont introduced the "Induce Act," an anti- file-swapping bill that foes said could target products like Apple Computer's iPod. Leahy is the senior Democrat on Hatch's new subcommittee. The Induce Act drew stiff opposition from Internet service providers, the electronics industry, and even some conservative groups that had typically been Hatch's allies. As a result, it was not enacted last year. "They had this on the fast track," said Gigi Sohn, president of advocacy group Public Knowledge. "Then they said, 'OK, let's sit down and try to negotiate.' My sense is that they've learned their lesson: If you try to pass legislation that gives Hollywood control over technology, it's going to fall flat on its face." (Neither Hatch nor Leahy has reintroduced the Induce Act in the new congressional session that began this year.) Hatch had been chairman of the Senate Judiciary panel but could not retain his seat because of term limits. Sen. Arlen Specter, R-Penn., became the current chairman and created the new subcommittee for Hatch to run. In 2003, Hatch gained some unwanted notoriety when he suggested during a hearing that copyright holders should be allowed to remotely destroy the computers of music pirates. "I'm interested in doing that," Hatch said. "That may be the only way you can teach someone about copyright...That would be the ultimate way of making sure" no more copyright is infringed. A day later, Hatch slightly backpedaled from that statement in a brief press release saying: "I do not favor extreme remedies--unless no moderate remedies can be found." Hatch is also an amateur songwriter of music with titles like "Our Gracious Lord" and "Climb Inside His Loving Arms." http://news.zdnet.com/2100-9588_22-5623975.html ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ U.K. Gets Tough On Music Swappers Graeme Wearden The U.K. music industry has compared the fight against illegal online file sharing with curbing drunk driving. The British Phonographic Industry (BPI) is likely to bring further legal action against U.K. citizens accused of sharing copyright-protected files over the Internet. Late last week the BPI won a court ruling that will force six ISPs to name 31 subscribers suspected of illegally sharing music. Speaking on Monday, a BPI spokesman suggested that last Friday's legal success--which followed a similar court action in October 2004--will prove to be just one part of a long-term process of changing people's behavior online through legal action. "In terms of behavioral change, the U.K. government has broadcast the dangers of drunk driving, but people still drunk drive," said the BPI spokesman. The ISPs involved in the case now have 14 days to provide the names sought by the BPI. The individuals named will then be invited to settle the charges, probably by paying a fine of around $3,820 (2,000 pounds). The BPI hopes that the amount of publicity generated by last week's court success will deter Internet users from uploading copyright material to file-swapping networks. But despite the group's tough stance, the spokesman recognized that the BPI is still facing an uphill struggle to convince file- swappers that they are in the wrong. "We're reluctant to say, 'OK, the job's done. Let's spend money on making records,'" the BPI spokesman said. "I suspect that the problem won't go away just because we've launched two rounds of litigation." http://news.com.com/U.K.+gets+tough+...3-5615896.html ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Dutch Internet Cracks Down on File-Sharing Toby Sterling Five major Dutch Internet providers agreed Monday to cooperate in a crackdown on illegal file sharing, saying they will send warnings to clients suspected of swapping copyrighted music, film and software files. The providers said they will forward letters from the Brain Institute, which represents the entertainment industry in the Netherlands, warning clients that sharing copyrighted material is against the law. The decision was a compromise, because the providers refused to reveal customers' names or addresses directly to the Brain Institute. "This is a service, a warning to clients that they are doing things that are against the law," said Maaike Scholten, spokeswoman for providers HetNet and Planet Internet, two of the five Internet providers. Scholten said the companies hope the warnings will dampen illegal file sharing and prevent their customers from ending up in court. In December 2003, the Dutch Supreme Court set an international precedent by ruling that software used to share files was legal. But it didn't rule out that individuals could be prosecuted for using such software to share copyrighted works. The decision left the Brain Institute in a similar position as the American recording industry, which has sued song-swappers for tens of thousands of dollars in damages. The Brain Institute — a popular target of Dutch hackers — was founded in 1998 to fight what the entertainment industry sees as piracy and copyright infringement. It can trace the Internet addresses of computers that are being used to trade files but has no way of finding out who owns them without a court order. Director Tim Kuik said it will use the letters to demand that downloaders pay for songs and other material they have downloaded in the past. "We'll see what happens to them if they don't pay," Kuik said, adding that he expected the institute to eventually sue some users. He declined to say how much money the institute would demand as compensation for illegal downloads. At least one major Dutch provider, XS4ALL, said it would not cooperate with the Brain Institute. "They never even asked us," said spokeswoman Judith van Erven. "I guess they know where we stand." She said XS4ALL, pronounced "Access for All," was "not an enforcement arm of the entertainment industry." http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=stor...rnet&printer=1 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Hollywood Applauds Swedish ISP Raid Steve Gorman THE US film industry has hailed a raid by Swedish police against an internet service provider as a major blow to European piracy of movies and music on the web. The raid was carried out on Thursday at the Stockholm offices of Bahnhof, Sweden's oldest and largest ISP, which US copyright protection experts have considered a haven for high-level internet piracy for years. "This was a very big raid," said John Malcolm, worldwide anti-piracy operations director at the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA), which represents Hollywood's major studios. "The material that was seized contained not only evidence of a piracy organisation operating in Sweden but of online piracy organisations operating throughout all of Europe," he said. Bahnhof, the first major ISP raided by the Swedes without advance notice, was home to some of the biggest and fastest servers in Europe, the MPAA said in a statement. Authorities in Sweden seized four computer servers - one reputed to be the biggest pirate server in Europe - containing enough digital film and music content for up to three and a half years of uninterrupted play, the organisation said. Mr Malcolm said authorities in Scandinavian countries had been reluctant to take such action in the past but recently had been cracking down on piracy. About 20 individuals suspected of internet piracy have been the targets of smaller raids by Swedish authorities during the past month. The servers seized during the operation contained a total of 1,800 digital movie files, 5,000 software application files and 450,000 digital audio files - amounting to 23 terabytes of data. The MPAA says the film industry loses $US3.5 billion ($4.4 billion) a year to videotapes and DVDs sold on the black market, but it has no estimate for how much internet piracy costs the industry. http://australianit.news.com.au/arti...-15319,00.html ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Overwhelming Victory For 'Pirates' In Swedish TV Debate TankGirl Swedish TV organized 15th March a well-advertised and anticipated debate with representatives from both sides of the piracy fence. There was Henrik Pontén, lawyer from the Swedish anti-piracy bureau, movie director Anders Nilsson, artist + small music label executive (in same person) Ayesha Quraishi, Julien Nebbout from the 'Pirate Bureau' (Piratbyrån, the organization that runs the big torrent site Pirate Bay) plus a couple of other keen pirates with some sort of national fame. The debate Here is a brief summary of the debate: The host of the show was in no way a specialist on the field but he remained reasonably neutral and kept the discussion going quite well. The anti-piracy lawyer was much what you would expect from a hired corporate gun: he tried to put weight into legality issues, hide his position as a corporate puppet and create an image that they are not after ‘common Swedes’ but hardcore pirates. He was somewhat on the defense due to the dubious methods used by his organization (using paid infiltrators, filming police raids for propaganda purposes etc.), and when asked had he personally ever made any illegal copies he swallowed a couple of times before claiming full innocence… which didn’t really sound too convincing at all...  Movie director Nilsson wasn’t the best representative for the movie industry: his emotions ran high most of the time, and the only serious item in his agenda seemed to be to force the Swedes to see all new movies in theatres with current ticket prices into indefinite future. Anything else would effectively destroy the Swedish movie industry if we are to believe him. He didn’t put any weight into the money coming from DVD sales – an obvious misrepresentation of facts, which was quickly pointed out in the various online discussions following the debate. Ayesha Quraishi, the artist and label boss, showed open mind regarding different business and distribution models. She wanted to see new possibilities in the evolving technology and overall made a sensible and positive impression. She admitted that as an artist she likes her works to spread to the largest possible audiences - even if she also needs to figure out ways to make money to her label. Piratbyrån’s Julien Nebbout was clearly the most intelligent and sympathetic person in the table. Unfortunately he didn’t get too much time to speak, but he used the available time to make some good points like asking what sense is there to criminalize something that hundreds of thousands of citizens are already doing and that they don't perceive as being criminal. One of the pirates appeared to be somewhat spaced out but the other one (having a reputation under the nickname Jens of Sweden) did a good job at challenging relentlessly the anti-piracy lawyer and his views. After the recent police raids Henrik Pontén has become a well-known and widely hated character in Sweden, and many viewers were probably pleased to see him having to sweat under the perky verbal fire of Jens of Sweden. Besides the usual pro-p2p points the pirate side emphasized the sense of freedom that the younger generation has associated with Internet communications. When young people learn to use Internet as their primary source of music and movies, it becomes a way of life for them, and criminalization can do little to change any of that. They will simply never be similar consumers as what the content industries had before Internet. Poll results and press reactions The viewers had a chance to cast their votes to the following question: "Do you think that downloading films and music from Internet should be legal?" After 66338 given votes the poll result was overwhelming: 98 % of viewers thought that downloading should be legal, and only 2 % had the opposite view. The viewers were also offered a possibility to send SMS message comments to the program but the flow of messages was so intense that the computer handling the messages crashed and no messages got through to the show. Obviously a hot topic enjoying wide public interest in Sweden. The debate was hot enough to cause further waves in the news media. Interestingly the newspapers took if not a clear pro-p2p stance at least a rather critical attitude towards the methods and motives of the anti-piracy organization and the new stricter legislation under works in Sweden. Here’s a freely translated quote from Svenska Dagbladet, one of Sweden’s main newspapers: Quote:
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Skittish Aussies P2P Sites Shutdown Amid Raid Rumours Brad Peczka Australian P2P hubs are closing their doors following the music industry's raid on West Australian ISP People Telecom (formerly Swiftel). Both Music Industry Piracy Investigations (MIPI) and People Telecom have been ordered to appear before the Federal Court this Wednesday, in a case that could decide the future of online file sharing in Australia. Though MIPI has repeatedly stated that it is not interested in individual users, there is no doubt that the court case will be closely watched by file sharers, concerned that their activities might bring them to the attention of the law. MIPI chief Michael Speck says that "MIPI has already laid down several targets for future raids", and already, several West Australian hubs have decided to pull the plug. A popular internet radio station and a BitTorrent community both ceased operations last night. The entry page has been removed and now hosts a sombre notice, which says "Due to the increasing number of raids on P2P sites which seem to be getting closer and closer to home, we've decided to call it a day. This is to protect ourselves, as well as you users." Interestingly, other WA-based P2P communities will continue to operate, albeit behind increased security and scrutiny of members. Both services made use of the WAIX peering network, which provides ISPs based in WA the means to transfer data between each other at reduced cost. Many ISPs added the WAIX network to their free traffic lists, providing users with a way to share large files without impacting upon their quota limits. A similar network called PIPE exists in much of Eastern Australia. Both networks do not support the use of their services for illegal purposes, and have taken steps to prevent such use, but crafty file sharers constantly manage to evade these measures. The raid has had a ripple effect around Australia, with Victorian Torrent site VIXBit stating that "We decided it was time for Vixbit to call it a day." A similar story was heard in Adelaide, where PeeringSA was shutdown when PIPE staff terminated their accounts and removed their servers from hosting facilities at a PIPE data centre. Not everyone is rolling over to MIPI, however. The administrator of one site has vowed to seek legal advice as a result of MIPI's enquiries into the legality of his operations. The voluntary take down of the sites shows how successful MIPI's approach has been. Torrent swappers have long believed that it would be difficult to prosecute them because of the highly distributed nature of the BitTorrent protocol (anyone can put up a tracker and there is no central organisation or network to target.) However, MIPI has shown that it might win its war on piracy through publicity alone: by doing high profile raids on well known businesses, then making audacious claims to the press about what it has found, it is sending shockwaves throughout the internet community. One user suggested that "Australia's isolation, which has protected it in the past, may no longer be a deterrent to law-enforcement authorities." http://whirlpool.net.au/article.cfm/1459 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Whose Patent Is It, Anyway? Howard French UIYANG, China - Each shift, 200 workers, most of them women in smocks and bibs, labor in a factory tucked away in hilly farmland outside this city assembling a single product, one-inch hard drives. As China's emerging industrial centers go, Guiyang is an obscure outpost, bearing little resemblance to the booming factory towns of the east coast. And yet, as much as any other place in China this hard drive assembly may be at the front line of an intense global struggle to dominate high-tech manufacturing. The tiny storage device this factory churns out is the heart of one of the world's hottest consumer electronics items, the mini version of Apple Computer's iPod. Sales to Apple represent a huge triumph for GS Magic Stor, an offshoot of a struggling state-owned carmaker that is so obscure that even in China few are familiar with the name. The problem with this ringing success story, according to a better-established rival, Hitachi Global Storage Technologies, which has factories in China and also supplies miniaturized drives to Apple, is that the Chinese company stole crucial elements of the design. GS Magic Stor denies this charge, which Hitachi has made in a suit filed in Federal District Court in Northern California. In a recent online forum the company's president ridiculed Hitachi's claim, likening it to someone's asking carmakers to pay design rights to the inventors of the horse and buggy. A Hitachi official, who refused to comment further, said that GS Magic Stor could characterize the Hitachi patents however it wished, "but the plain and simple matter is they haven't expired." Hitachi's highly technical complaint specifies several areas where it says its designs were infringed by Magic Stor. Apple, which was not named in Hitachi's suit, would not comment. Even if Hitachi wins the suit, that would do nothing to stop Magic Stor from continuing to produce its miniature hard drives in China, although some analysts say that Apple would be forced for image reasons, if nothing else, to drop Magic Stor as a supplier. For Western companies competing with China as well as those doing business here, the issue goes well beyond the fate of one obscure company or of a single technology, however valuable. In one sector after another, companies warn that China's swift industrial rise is being greased by brazen and increasingly sophisticated theft of intellectual property. The issue of intellectual property theft has been a fixture on the trade agenda between the United States and China for years, with visiting American officials routinely stopping at the famous Silk Market in Beijing to highlight the sale there, like all over China, of cheap knockoffs of toys, clothing, software and DVD's. The Chinese government has recently razed the market, but the counterfeit activity has been moving relentlessly upscale, with General Motors, Cisco, Sony and Pfizer, just to name the most high-profile companies, complaining that their designs or formulas for everything from cars and PlayStations to routers and Viagra, have been violated. "Until recently, when China began putting intellectual property laws in place, for the past 40 years, all patents were owned by the government, and could be shared by any company that was willing to use them," said Paul Gao, a Shanghai-based expert on consumer electronics and automotives at McKinsey & Company. "The Chinese government actually encouraged this, and that has left a deep impression on companies that intellectual property is there for anyone to use it." Experts say the practice of copycat production is also fueled by the fierce competition among Chinese companies and provinces to join the global economy. "With the extreme fragmentation of industry, you see a lot of subscale players that are trying to survive in the market on their own," Mr. Gao added. "They don't have the budget for research and development or the scale to compete. If they pay a licensing fee, they consider they are essentially imposing a death penalty on themselves." Like many people on the receiving end of accusations of intellectual property theft here, GS Magic Stor's president, Zhu Baolin, fiercely denies his company has done anything wrong, and goes so far as to say that the lawsuit is an act of desperation by a foreign enterprise unable to compete with his Chinese company. "We don't blame Hitachi for what they are doing," said Mr. Zhu, a 25-year electronics industry veteran. "We just want Chinese people to know we created our own product, and that we face a lot of pressure. This will happen a lot in the future in the knowledge industry, but we will still work hard to grow." Beyond the case of Hitachi versus Magic Stor, many Chinese legal experts simply deny there is any special problem with theft of intellectual property in China. "It may look like it's a China problem, but it's a worldwide problem, just like piracy on the Internet, and it exists in America as well," said Zhang Ping, a law professor at Beijing University, and one of China's leading experts on intellectual property rights. "There are many problems with fake products, with low levels of technology. These can't be counted as intellectual property violations. They are just cheap fakes." Like many people professionally involved with this issue here, Ms. Zhang denied that China was a leading violator of intellectual property rights, which she acknowledged was still a relatively new concept in China. She also said that the country's efforts at improving enforcement, though steady, would require more time to reach the standards of intellectual property rights in many advanced industrialized countries. Lawyers who represent Western companies embroiled in intellectual property disputes in China, however, point to major loopholes in Chinese law and in the country's trademark and patent system as parts of the problem. Many Chinese patents, for example, are granted without any examination of their originality, making it easy for local companies to claim others' innovations as their own. While foreign experts also point to progress in the country's courts and especially in the richer provinces along the country's east coast, they say that local and provincial governments, eager to bolster their economies, sometimes subsidize patent filings for local companies and provide pointers to them on how to beat foreign claims of infringement. Even the Shanghai government speaks of building a "great wall of patents" to protect local companies. "Once upon a time, the counterfeiters in China ran away when you came after them," said Xiang Wang, a lawyer specializing in intellectual property rights at White & Case in Shanghai. "Today, they don't run away. Indeed, they stay put and they sue us. More and more Chinese companies are taking a so-called legal approach, taking advantage of serious weakness in the Chinese legal system." One of the most problematic areas, experts say, are joint ventures between foreign and Chinese companies, which are legion. When the joint venture dissolves, or sometimes even while it remains active, the Chinese party makes use of the technology or manufacturing processes illegally. A perennially told war story in business circles here involves the foreign factory owner who makes a wrong turn while driving to his plant only to discover an exact copy of his factory on the other side of the mountain. Although this story might be apocryphal, Mr. Wang said he saw cases all the time that are not so different in their details. "We have a client in the power business who found that one of his key employees had quit and joined a competitor, revealing confidential information to him straight away, and filing patents of these materials which were literal copies of the original technology," he said. "When our client warned he would sue over patent infringement, the Chinese company said it was also planning to sue. 'And by the way,' they asked, 'what patent are you talking about? This is our patent now.' " http://www.nytimes.com/2005/03/05/bu...05copycat.html ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Search Giants Hear Voices Jim Hu As the Net phone business starts to take off, can Web portals such as Yahoo be far behind? That's one of the big questions that will be on the minds of Internet and telecom luminaries as they gather Monday in San Jose, Calif., for Voice on the Net, a conference dedicated to promoting and exploring VoIP, the fast-growing technology for delivering voice calls over Internet Protocol. Signs of activity in the space are growing, with America Online planning to enter the crowded VoIP arena later this month with its own phone service. That move has heightened speculation that on the horizon are similar announcements from AOL's biggest Web rivals--Yahoo, Microsoft's MSN and Google. "We are definitely looking at the space closely," Yahoo spokeswoman Terrell Karlsten said. "We're figuring out how to enhance and expand into the voice space by leveraging those properties." Yahoo and MSN have long offered rudimentary phone service using their instant-messaging software and a PC. Now there are signs that all of the major Web portals are exploring whether it makes sense to expand those offerings further. Yahoo has already launched a PC-based voice service in the United Kingdom. Microsoft plans to embed voice calling into its enterprise instant-messaging software. And rumors continue to swirl about whether Google is building the foundation for its own VoIP project, starting in the United Kingdom. Google has not announced plans to offer VoIP service, and declined to comment for this story. While none of the three has yet outlined a VoIP strategy, the technology is proving hard for them to ignore. Millions of people are signing up for cut- rate and free plans that route voice calls over a broadband connection. Dozens of competitors have jumped into the market, offering VoIP plans for as little as $14.95 a month, putting new pressure on traditional phone providers. While that's great for consumers, it remains to be seen whether a VoIP play makes sense for Yahoo, MSN or Google. Yahoo and Microsoft could jeopardize important partnerships with telecom companies if they invest too heavily in voice services. Despite potential risks, all of the portals have begun tentatively checking out VoIP providers to test possibilities, according to sources familiar with the talks. Our first lovely contestant... One company that has attracted attention among the Web giants is Skype, a peer-to-peer VoIP provider based in Europe that lets people make free international calls from their PCs. The appeal in Skype lies in its rapidly growing user base, although the company has not figured out how turn those users into a more powerful and profitable business. Skype's Web site boasts more than 80 million downloads, 5.6 billion minutes served and more than 1 million people using the service at one time. Numbers like that could tempt someone looking for a VoIP foothold to look at partnering with--or purchasing--the company. Skype declined to comment for this story. Kicking the tires of Skype or any other VoIP start-up wouldn't necessarily amount to anything. Companies meet to discuss their options all the time. Few of those talks develop into serious negotiations, and fewer still culminate in a deal. While the portals' interest in VoIP has been piqued, an acquisition or partnership with an existing VoIP company is not imminent, sources said. Still, the portals are looking at VoIP with particular emphasis, believing there's a wealth of untapped potential in these businesses, sources added. Not everyone believes that VoIP would pay off big for the portals. Yahoo and MSN count some of the Baby Bell local phone companies as partners, discouraging big investments in the space. Yahoo recently extended its deal to bundle its services into SBC Communications' DSL customers, and it takes a cut of revenue from customers who sign up. SBC is also testing Microsoft's Internet television technology for possible use in a new broadband TV service slated for limited launch later this year. "I don't see any real serious effort to do it from any of those guys, except possibly as a feature or an application, but not really as a standalone service," said Rob Sanderson, an analyst at American Technology Research. Everyone's doing it VoIP is evolving into a bigger business outside of just chatting over PCs. In the purest sense, the technology lets people talk by converting voice into digital "packets" of information that are then piped through the Internet. Anything sent though the Internet travels as packets of data that eventually become music files, e-mail messages, Web pages and video clips. The hype behind VoIP lies in its savings both to consumers and companies offering it. Customers of Vonage, for example, can pay only $25 a month to make unlimited local and long distance phone calls within the United States and Canada. Cable companies in particular are investing heavily in VoIP, with many of them swapping out traditional circuit-switched voice calls to IP-based services. Last year, Time Warner Cable, which never warmed up to the circuit-switched business, began trialing a VoIP service and has since introduced it to all of its markets. At the end of 2004, Digital Phone, as it's called, had 220,000 customers, while Cablevision reported 273,000. Comcast also plans to join the VoIP fray. Even Baby Bell local phone companies, which are arguably losing customers to VoIP, plan to embrace the trend. The Bells are pouring money into beefing up bandwidth throughout their copper networks in hopes of using the Internet to deliver video into homes. With a broadband connection that can carry more data, the Bells will package their TV services with VoIP. Some Bell executives privately say the transition to IP-based networks could one day make voice a free add-on for people who buy video and broadband Internet access packages. Building blocks Yahoo and MSN already have some form of VoIP in their services. For years the companies have offered voice chatting as a feature in their respective instant-messaging services. IM users click on a button on the chat window that initiates a voice exchange between two people. Both services require people to use a PC microphone and headset. Yahoo and MSN also let people make calls from their PCs to standard phones, although a third-party company provides the software and usually charges a fee for international calls. Yahoo has also launched ways to improve its voice chatting features with British telecom giant BT. The companies last March unveiled a voice service that's similar to its existing IM-based product, but geared toward BT customers. The service uses Yahoo Messenger to place calls from a PC to any traditional phone. Analysts such as America Technology Research's Sanderson think the portals will likely use VoIP as a complement rather than a standalone business. While acquisitions cannot be ruled out, the eventual home for VoIP may not look too different than what's out there today. "When we think about VoIP, most people think about traditional phone and I think it can mean a whole lot more than that," Sanderson said. "They can still get huge leverage and do great services by doing VoIP and not being a telco." http://news.com.com/Search+giants+he...3-5600513.html ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ SanDisk Flashes Biometric Storage Gizmo Dinesh C. Sharma SanDisk on Thursday unveiled a tiny flash memory storage drive that deploys fingerprint identification for security. The portable USB 2.0 device, dubbed Cruzer Profile, is about the size of a pack of gum and will be sold in 512MB and 1GB capacities. It has two LEDs--one for data transfer and the other for authentication of the biometric fingerprint, the company said. The drive gets activated after an embedded sensor reads and authenticates a finger swiped across the device, it said. Fingerprint images will be stored on the drive itself. A version of the drive with 512MB capacity will cost $99.99, while the 1GB version will sell for $199.99. Both models begin shipping next month, the company said. The drives come bundled with software for data file encryption and file backup, and are compatible with Windows XP, Windows 2000, Windows ME, Mac OS 10.1.2+ and Mac OS 9.2.1+. A driver can be downloaded for Windows 98SE support. SanDisk also announced Thursday a 2GB Cruzer Titanium USB 2.0 flash storage drive designed to physically protect data. It is made of titanium alloy for extra sturdiness and resistance to wear and corrosion, the company said. The 2GB Cruzer Titanium is expected to ship next month for $249.99. The 512MB and 1GB versions are already available for $84.99 and $169.99, respectively. Separately, SanDisk introduced an upgrade of xD-Picture Card with 1GB capacity, compatible with Fuji and Olympus cameras. When used with a 5-megapixel digital camera, the card can capture and store about 800 images, the company said. SanDisk said it will start selling the M Series, 1GB card in April for about $139.99. http://news.com.com/SanDisk+flashes+...3-5608589.html ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ The Last Song You'll Never Hear.... Robbie Williams has topped the UK funeral music chart, leaving Mozart trailing in his wake, according to a survey Thursday. Williams' "Angels" was the record most Britons would like played at their funeral, with Mozart's "Requiem" coming in at five in digital broadcaster Music Choice's poll of top 10 British funeral songs. Frank Sinatra's "My Way" was second, just ahead of Monty Python's "Always Look on the Bright Side of Life." The rest of Europe favored a more soft rock approach. Queen's "The Show Must Go On" topped the European chart, with Led Zeppelin's "Stairway to Heaven" and AC/DC's "Highway to Hell" in second and third place. Over 45,000 music fans from across Europe were polled, with 20,000 Britons taking part. http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.j...toryID=7867390 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ As File Sharing Nears High Court, Net Specialists Worry John Markoff As the bitter debate over computer file sharing heads toward the Supreme Court, the pro-technology camp is growing increasingly anxious. Some technologists warn that if the court decides in favor of the music and recording industries after hearing arguments in the MGM v. Grokster case on March 29, the ruling could also stifle a proliferating set of new Internet-based services that have nothing to do with the sharing of copyrighted music and movies at issue in the court case. Some of those innovations were on display here at the Emerging Technologies Conference, attended by about 750 hardware and software designers. The demonstrations included Flickr, a Canadian service that has made it possible for Web loggers and surfers to easily share and catalog millions of digital photographs. And Jeff Bezos, the founder and chief of executive of Amazon.com, demonstrated a set of new features in the company's A9 search engine designed to make it extremely simple for Web users to share searches specially tailored to mine everything from newspapers to yellow pages to catalogs of electronics parts. Software designers from iFabricate, a small company in Emeryville, Calif., displayed a new Web service intended to make it simple for home inventors to share instructions for complex do-it-yourself garage construction projects. Projects can be documented and shared with a mixture of images, text, ingredient lists, computer- animated design files and digital videos. There was also a demonstration of Wikipedia, a volunteer-run online encyclopedia effort that now has generated 1.5 million entries in 200 languages. Innovative online services of those types could be harder to create in the future, if the court rules that technology creators are liable for any misuse of their systems, according to technology proponents here. "It could be a disaster," said the conference's sponsor, Tim O'Reilly, owner of the world's largest independent computer book publishing company, O'Reilly & Associates. In briefs filed before the Supreme Court, the recording and motion picture agencies have argued that the Ninth Circuit Federal Court, in San Francisco, erred last August in finding that the operators of the Grokster and Streamcast file-sharing services were not legally responsible for copyright infringements committed by users of their services. Lawyers for the music and movie industries are attempting to persuade the Supreme Court to modify its decision in the 1984 Sony Betamax decision, which held that the video recorders should not be outlawed, because they could be used for many legitimate purposes besides illegally copying movies. Mr. O'Reilly started the conference four years ago to explore a set of so-called peer-to-peer Internet technologies - which include file sharing. It has since evolved into a meeting place for software and hardware designers interested in harnessing the Internet for various new collaborative services. The court case could hinge in part on the entertainment industry's argument that advanced computing technology now makes it possible for consumer electronics designers to create technology that can distinguish between legal and illegal file copying. The Internet technologists worry that, if the court accepts that reasoning, Hollywood could end up dictating the technical specifications for digital technology in a way that would choke off future innovation. In fact, they point out that peer-to-peer applications are now branching out in all directions from more basic file-sharing origins. "This conference shows that it's no longer about sharing movies and music," said Mitchell D. Kapor, the founder of the Open Source Applications Foundation, a San Francisco-based nonprofit organization that is now developing an electronic mail program and a related set of information-sharing software programs. "The momentum of the technology has moved away from the lawsuit." http://news.com.com/As+file+sharing+...l?tag=nefd.top ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Microsoft Acquires PC Pioneer's Company John Markoff Ray Ozzie, whose popular Lotus Notes software helped demonstrate the power of office PC networks in the early 1990's, has gone to work for the PC software king, Bill Gates of Microsoft. Mr. Ozzie's company, Groove Networks, develops software intended to permit simple collaboration by workers using desktop or portable computers, whether they are in the same office or connected via the Internet. Microsoft said on Thursday that it would acquire Groove and its 200 employees and that Mr. Ozzie would become one of three chief technical officers at Microsoft. Groove, which is privately held and based in Beverly, Mass., was founded in October 1997 by Mr. Ozzie, who previously was the designer of Lotus Notes. Financial terms were not disclosed. Microsoft was already a major investor, along with Intel Capital, a unit of Intel. In 2001, Groove was valued at about $250 million. Mr. Ozzie, who began his career developing minicomputer operating systems, was a pioneer at early software companies including Software Arts, the developer of the first software spreadsheet, VisiCalc. He also helped the Lotus Development Corporation pursue Symphony, a less successful companion to the Lotus 1-2-3 spreadsheet. Later, from a small design company he founded, Iris Associates, Mr. Ozzie led the development of Lotus Notes, a pioneering program intended to permit groups of office workers to share information and tasks easily. Lotus was acquired by I.B.M. in 1995. While other Lotus executives, like Mitchell D. Kapor and Jim Manzi, had sometimes bitter and confrontational relationships with Mr. Gates, Mr. Ozzie had a more collegial relationship with Microsoft, the software company that came to dominate the PC industry in the 1980's. "We all had mixed feelings," said Bob Frankston, who founded Software Arts with Dan Bricklin in 1979, and who later worked at Lotus and Microsoft. "Mitch took it more personally, but Ray was immersed in making things work on Windows." Mr. Frankston said that early on, Mr. Ozzie won the respect of Microsoft executives with his technical achievements. "He impressed Microsoft by pushing the technology farther than what any other mortal could do," Mr. Frankston said. Mr. Ozzie has frequently traced his technology ideas about workgroup computing back to the mid-70's, when he was involved in a pioneering online educational community known as Plato at the University of Illinois. Mr. Ozzie, 49, and Mr. Gates, also 49, define a generation of software developers who exploited the power of the I.B.M. personal computer and saw immense business growth based on the industry that the machine fostered. Mr. Ozzie said he remembered the first time he and Mr. Gates met, when he visited Microsoft in 1981 while Microsoft was preparing its MS-DOS operating system for the soon-to-be-announced I.B.M. PC. The two men discussed how to take advantage of the specific features in the I.B.M. computer, Mr. Ozzie said. On Thursday, during a telephone news conference and in a later interview, neither software executive would give details about how the two companies plan to integrate their products. Groove's product, Virtual Office, overlaps in several ways with Microsoft's SharePoint software collaboration program. Microsoft executives, however, suggested that the Groove software would have an impact on both the next version of Microsoft Office and the next version of the Windows operating system, called Longhorn. "A big part of Longhorn," Mr. Gates said, "will be its peer-to-peer capability, and having Groove help us will be a big part of that." Mr. Ozzie will join Microsoft's two other chief technical officers, David Vaskevitch and Craig Mundie. Separately, on Thursday in Washington, Microsoft's chief counsel, Bradford L. Smith, outlined the corporation's view on patent reform. Microsoft, Mr. Smith noted during a telephone interview, is a leader in patents awarded and faces more patent litigation than almost any other United States company. He said Microsoft was working with other technology firms to push for legislation and changes in international patent and trademark law. "Our patent system is being flooded with new patent applications and an explosion of sometimes abusive litigation," he told the American Enterprise Institute. "Although the roots of our patent system are strong, its long-term health is threatened unless we take this opportunity to reform it. Now is the time to act." http://www.nytimes.com/2005/03/11/te...gy/11soft.html ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Five Years After the Bubble, Have Its Lessons Been Forgotten? Floyd Norris FIVE years later, the great bubble of 2000 does not look so bad. The conventional wisdom now is that it was not all that important, certainly nothing like the great bubbles of 20th-century stock market history, those of the United States in 1929 and Japan in 1989. But there are similarities indicating that it could be a very long time before technology stocks as a group become good long-term investments again. First, look at the differences. In 1929, the world economy entered the Great Depression. In 1990, Japan began a long period of poor economic performance. It was not a depression, but there has yet to be a period of sustained growth there since the end of the bubble. The United States bubble in 2000 was different both in breadth and in economic impact. That bubble did not infect the entire stock market, but instead was concentrated in technology stocks, with a lesser bubble in the largest stocks, the ones that dominated the Standard & Poor's index of 500 stocks. The economic aftermath included only a mild recession and a slow recovery. When the bubble was at its peak, the Federal Reserve chairman, Alan Greenspan, turned aside advice, some of it from this column, that he should do something to restrain the speculation. He offered a confident forecast that if and when the bubble did burst, he would know what to do to minimize the damage. And he seems to have been right, even if some fear that superlow interest rates simply created another bubble, this one in home prices. The image of a bubble bursting is not a perfect one. Any child knows that soap bubbles blown into the air seem to float along, and then suddenly vanish. They do not shrink, and they do not reinflate. But the history of stock market bubbles is different. Charles P. Kindleberger, the M.I.T. economist whose book "Manias, Panics and Crashes" remains the best work on the subject, notes that the path down from a peak is neither sudden nor straight. Instead, investors come back to be disappointed time and again. When all are dismayed, prices can be low enough to prompt another great bull market. But that can take a very long time. How long? Adjusted for inflation, the Dow Jones industrial average was below its 1929 peak in the early 1990's. (That calculation uses the consumer price index, which is by no means a perfect measure of inflation and is not adjusted to reflect dividend payments. But it provides a rough approximation of the purchasing power of a basket of stocks in different eras.) While many American stocks are higher than they were in 2000, the area where the frenzy was greatest remains low. Adjusted for inflation, the Nasdaq 100 is off about 70 percent from its peak. That performance is quite similar to the one turned in by the Dow industrials in the first five years after 1929, and worse than the performance of the Nikkei 225 after 1989. When the stock market fell to its post-bubble lows in late 2002, there was much talk that the lesson was that even if a technology is revolutionizing the world, the profits are more likely to go to those who use the technology than to those who develop it. Now investors are back buying hot technology stocks, and that lesson appears to be forgotten. That is perfectly consistent with the history of previous bubbles. The second five years after a historic high can produce some big gains, but they can also produce losses that wipe out those gains. Technology investing in the next five years may be more exciting than profitable. http://www.nytimes.com/2005/03/11/bu.../11norris.html ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ TV Networks Trying To Keep Up With Public’s Changing Tastes Brian Saxton Morton Morrison and his wife, Sylvia, like watching the networks’ evening news. “I don’t watch the five o’clock news because it’s all local stuff,” Morrison said Wednesday. “I’m more interested in national and international news so I turn on CBS at 6:30 and then I switch around to ABC and NBC to see what they’re doing.” Morrison, 92, and his wife, 91, have been watching the TV networks’ nightly news for as long as they can remember. “I like to know what’s happening in the world and the nightly news wraps everything up after the Middle East and Europe have closed down,” said Morton Morrison. Still, as veteran CBS Evening News newsman Dan Rather signed off Wednesday night after 24 years in the anchor chair, some industry observers say all three nightly network newscasts have reached a critical crossroads. In December, Brian Williams, 45, succeeded 65-year-old Tom Brokaw as anchor of the NBC Nightly News. Faced with increasing competition from cable news channels, such as CNN, as well as the availability of news on the Internet, the three network news shows reportedly have been losing revenues as well as viewers. According to media research figures produced by the New York-based Nielsen group, the CBS Evening News, for example, is watched by an average of 7.48 million viewers each night, compared with 7.55 million at the same time last year. CBS advertising receipts are reportedly 13 percent less than NBC’s. “I think they may have even gone beyond the crossroads,” said Karen Raftery, associate professor of communications at Western Connecticut State University. “We now have several 24-hour news channels as well as the Internet where people can get the news immediately. It’s been a physically losing battle for the evening news programs.” Rather, 73, became the CBS Evening News anchor on March 9, 1981, after veteran CBS news anchor Walter Cronkite retired. Rather decided to quit a year sooner than planned in a bittersweet goodbye clouded by his role in a flawed CBS News report about President Bush’s service in the National Guard. As CBS executives regroup to find a permanent successor, industry watchers say all three networks will have to devise new ways of retrieving viewers and advertisers. Raftery believes networks may have to start bringing in “celebrity hosts,” for example, instead of professional journalists to anchor the news. Amy Mitchell, associate director of the Washington-based Project for Excellence in Journalism, said networks certainly will have to decide whether to continue their present formats and accept smaller profits or make changes. “The fixed time slot (6:30 pm) is a big problem,” said Mitchell. “We live in an era where people want their information according to their own schedule and most people aren’t home at that time.” WestConn English professor John Briggs agreed more people are going to the Internet for their news. “People are naturally curious and are turning to the Internet,” said Briggs. “It’s not just more convenient but I think some people think they’re getting the real story instead of accepting some corporate or government spin that is presented on the nightly news, both locally and nationally.” Briggs said networks will have to start “re-thinking” what represents news reclaim viewers and move away from programs that are “largely empty.” Networks may have a tougher job recruiting younger adults and college students who increasingly turn to cable news and the Internet. For Leah Manz, a 19-year-old WestConn freshman, catching up with the news on the Internet is much easier than turning on the television. “I don’t have the time to watch news on TV,” Manz said. “I’d have to spend watching other stories I don’t care about.” Thomson Babykutty, a 28-year-old computer science major, tries to do both but finds TV networks more constraining. “I like watching the networks when I can because they usually have new ideas and stories,” said Babykutty, “but I also use the Internet because I can do it any time. Television (programming) is more fixed.” http://news.newstimeslive.com/story.php?id=69731 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ TV tunes New Milford Composer Creates Music For Popular Shows Nanci G. Hutson At first glance, the raven perched on the barn's wood beam in Mark Snow's loft studio seems eerily real, its glassy-eyed stare causing visitors to catch their breath. The 58-year-old composer's ethereal music for the science-fiction television classic, "The X-Files,'' has the same startling effect. A gag gift, the bird came with Snow from California when he and his wife Glynn — sister of actress Tyne Daly of TV's "Judging Amy'' and Tim Daly of "Wings" — moved last summer to the Merryall farm property they bought as an East Coast getaway. He perched the stuffed, black crow in his studio, a solitary space separated from the main farmhouse with wide windows that overlook a picturesque expanse. "California turned into a great place to visit, but not a great place to live,'' said Snow, composer for the WB series "Smallville.'' He also is working on music for a new pilot of the 1970s TV series "Kolchak, The Night Stalker.'' He said he plans to write the music for the second "X-Files" film, having written the music for 1998's"Fight the Future." "In the dead of winter, visiting for 10 days is just fine. This is home," he said. Though this isn't the studio where Snow invented the theme "X-Files" fans, called Philes, can instantly hum, or whistle, it has all he needs to create whatever sounds, music or effects he requires for whatever project is on his deadline schedule. He then e-mails the composition to the studio. In the center of the cozy space is a semicircle of electronic keyboards, synthesizers, recorders, mixers and other computerized music gadgetry that would delight any techno-geek. On a stand in front of the equipment is a large screen plasma television where he watches the episodes for which he is writing music. His aim is to always complement the mystery behind the unfolding plots with sounds and instrumentation that underscore and enhance the on-screen action. He met his goal with the famously moody theme for "The X-Files." The haunting melody with its distinctive, whistling background was created with a mix of electronic sound and a recording of Snow's wife Glynn, "an excellent whistler.'' It was a winning combination. "You have to have an instinct for it,'' Snow said of finding the sounds and instrumentation that make music work for a particular television show or film. "It's not something that can be taught.'' On a day-to-day basis, Snow is content to compose new music for television and movies. Some three decades into an industry that can be described as quirky, with artists coming and going, Snow has managed to stay on top. Last week he was awarded the "Golden Note'' from the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers, an achievement bestowed on top composers in film and television. "It's an award for longevity, consistency, for having worked in the industry for 30 years,'' said the trim, goateed composer. "It's a recognition of that body of work, and that's terrific.'' The walls of his studio are filled with accolades attesting to achievements from his childhood in Brooklyn, N.Y. when he chose to learn the oboe. To date, Snow's affinity for avant garde compositions has earned him 16 Emmy nominations. "If I ever win, it's over for me,'' Snow said with a grin. His fans admire his work, with or without awards. New Milford resident Valorie Kolitz, a dedicated Phile, said Snow's music made the show "believable.'' "The music set the tone, and now that music to me means science fiction,'' Kolitz said. "I can actually hum the whole thing. It's completely recognizable. You hear the first couple of notes, and you know what it is.'' The quirky, whistling sound she always attributed to some sort of slide whistle is integral to the effect the music makes on the listener, she said. "It was a very different sound, very extraterrestrial,'' she said. Kolitz and others suggest the music was an integral ingredient to the show's unexpected, nine-year run. Such praise is music to Snow's ears. "I had no idea this would catch on,'' Snow said. The first surprise, though, was when executive producer Chris Carter selected him to be the show's composer. Something about the show's intriguing notion that "the truth is out there,'' had great audience appeal, Snow said. Certainly, it appealed to him as he thought about music that would build anticipation for the show's exploration of the paranormal. Snow remembers with clarity the day actress Gillian Anderson — who played Special Agent Dana Scully to David Duchovny's Special Agent Fox Mulder — and who was known as someone quite particular in her likes and dislikes, was invited to hear the music he first proposed for the show. "I felt an immediate tension because I feared she wouldn't like it,'' Snow remembered. Pleasantly surprised, Anderson liked the dissonant sounds and the way it worked with the story lines. "It's my most popular score," Snow said. "When people think of me, they think of 'The X-Files.'" Born Martin Fulterman, to a professional percussionist and a kindergarten teacher who loved to play the piano, Snow's musical talents were choreographed at an early age. "It was DNA, I suppose,'' said Snow who changed his name when he and his wife moved to California in the early 1970s. Before that, at The Juilliard School of Music, he and four roommates created a band, "The New York Rock 'n' Roll Ensemble," a classic rock group that enjoyed some success touring with the likes of Janis Joplin, Sly and the Family Stone, The Turtles and Led Zeppelin. After a five-year run with the band, Snow said his wife, with her family's Hollywood connections, encouraged him to move to California to see what might materialize. "We had no money, and two kids at the time,'' Snow recalled. "We moved in with my father-in-law (the late actor James Daly) for two weeks, then he gave us $1,000 and said go rent a place. Six months later, I got my first job for a TV series called 'The Rookies.' And then it started to happen, slowly but surely.'' One job led to another, including TV movies and episodes. In the early days, he was writing music for everything from "The Love Boat'' to "Starsky and Hutch.'' He won his first Emmy nomination for a 1984 TV movie about incest called "Something About Amelia." Then in 1993, a producer he once worked with introduced him to Chris Carter for a 20th Century Fox television pilot. "He came to my studio in Santa Monica. He looked around, was very quiet, and said he'd be back in touch," Snow said. He came for a second visit. He invited Snow to try his best. Initially, Snow said, he wrote four different themes, none of which really gelled. There was a musical formula he was trying to emulate, but it didn't seem to work. He asked Carter for some artistic license. Carter agreed, asking only that it be kept simple. "He let me try something completely different,'' Snow said of the mix that included muted voices, saxophone, trumpets, harpsichords and sound effects. The sound worked. "After four episodes, there was such a great response to the show and the music, and everyone took credit for it, and that's fine by me,'' Snow said. In New Milford, Snow is settling into a nice mix between the demands of a thriving music career and a little time to relax. With three adult daughters and four grandsons, Snow likes the days he can turn off the music and spend time frog hunting with his grandchildren, who know nothing of "The X-Files.'' He looks ahead to what's next. "I would really love to do some original, quirky-type thing that's not a war story or a flat out romance," Snow said. "Something on the lines of 'American Beauty,' something off the beaten track, and not an action adventure that just has to be fast and loud. Something where you don't have to be predictable.'' http://news.newstimeslive.com/story.php?id=69617 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ TiVo 4th-Qtr Loss Widens, Subscribers Rise TiVo Inc., a maker of digital video recorders, on Thursday posted a wider fourth-quarter loss on higher costs, although subscriptions to its television recording service grew sharply. The Alviso, California-based company, whose leading position in the DVR market is threatened as cable TV providers offer cheaper boxes, said it expects revenue to grow by more than 35 percent this year and that it plans to trim spending on wooing news customers. TiVo, whose systems let users customize TV viewing by recording shows on a built-in computer hard drive for playback later, said its net loss rose to $33.7 million, or 42 cents a share, from $12.4 million, or 18 cents a share. Analysts expected a loss of 43 cents a share, according to Reuters Estimates, for the period ending Jan. 31. TiVo added some 700,000 subscribers in the quarter, bringing its total to over 3 million. TiVo said revenue derived from its DVR service rose 73 percent to $33.0 million from $19.1 million. Total revenue rose to $59.4 compared with $42.6 million, a year earlier. TiVo which has been the subject of speculation over whether it might be up for sale, said it ended the year with $106.3 million in cash and short-term investments. The company said it expects to add 265,000 to 300,000 subscribers in the fiscal 2006 year, which ends next January, including 200,000 to 225,000 new users via its relationship with satellite provider Directv Group Inc. http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.j...toryID=7870045 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Cable Giant to Offer TiVo Video Recording Saul Hansell Comcast, the nation's largest cable company, said yesterday that it would offer its customers a video recorder service from TiVo, news that helped send TiVo's shares up nearly 75 percent. Investors had soured on TiVo lately, on fears that its pioneering service for digitally recording and playing back television programs was being eclipsed by house brands offered by satellite and cable companies. Negotiations with Comcast broke down last summer, and DirecTV, which has been TiVo's largest source of new customers, has said it is building its own video recorder system. But the Comcast negotiations recently resumed, after a management shake-up at TiVo. Michael Ramsay, the chief executive who had opposed the deal with Comcast, is no longer chief but will stay on as chairman. And Martin Yudkovitz, the president, has resigned, although he remains a consultant to the company. The Comcast deal, completed late Monday, was spearheaded by Tom Rogers, a former executive of NBC Cable, who is now vice chairman of TiVo's board. In an interview yesterday, Mr. Rogers said that the economics of the current deal were better for TiVo than the one it had walked away from last year. "Each side gained a greater appreciation of how working together would be a benefit," he said. At the same time TiVo has to accept being only a software and monthly service provider to Comcast and only one of several video recording options offered by Comcast. Until now, TiVo's service has been available only to customers who purchase its own hardware, which sells for $100 and up. The proposed deal last year would have put TiVo software into Comcast's main video recorder. When that fell apart, Comcast offered its own brand of recorder, based on technology from Motorola, which makes most of its set-top boxes. Comcast is also set to test video recorders from Microsoft and from Digeo, a company controlled by Paul Allen. The new deal calls for TiVo to create software that can be downloaded and run on the Motorola video recording set-top boxes. It would be offered for a higher monthly fee than the generic Comcast version, which would still be available. Currently, Comcast charges about $10 a month for the video recording service. TiVo currently sells a stand-alone service for $13 a month. The TiVo service will not be available to Comcast customers until the second half of next year. All digital video recorders, or DVR's, use a hard drive to let users record programs, even as they watch them, if they choose, so they can pause viewing of a live show. TiVo has some highly regarded software that adds additional sizzle, like automatically recording any programs that feature the viewer's favorite actor. It is also developing software that lets users move recorded programs to laptop computers or hand-held video players for later viewing. Stephen Burke, Comcast's president, said that those extra features would appeal to some of the cable company's customers. "We have been selling DVR's as fast as we can install them, and on a scale of 1 to 10, our customers think they are a 10," Mr. Burke said. "Some customers may think TiVo is an 11." The deal calls for Comcast to pay TiVo an upfront fee to develop the software and a monthly fee for each user. A person involved in the deal said the monthly fee would be somewhat less than the approximately $1 a month that Direct TV now pays for each TiVo subscription. Mr. Rogers and Mr. Burke declined to discuss the terms of the deal. Both said, however, that the total value to TiVo depended heavily on how many Comcast subscribers decided it was worth paying extra for the additional features of TiVo. The deal also calls for Comcast to use interactive advertising technology developed by TiVo for all of its digital customers, whether they use the TiVo software or not. TiVo's technology superimposes an image over commercials that enables viewers to push a button on the remote to request more data on the product. The deal with Comcast, Mr. Rogers said, may also help pave the way for TiVo to strike similar deals with other cable companies. TiVo's shares, which had fallen from $10.30 a year ago to $3.45 last month, jumped yesterday to $6.70, up $2.87. http://www.nytimes.com/2005/03/16/te...gy/16tivo.html ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Netflix Downplays On-Line Movie Delivery Gina Keating Netflix Inc. Chief Executive Reed Hastings on Wednesday downplayed prospects for online delivery of movies, saying licensing snarls with movie studios would hold up consumer adoption long after the technology becomes widely available. Hastings said Netflix, the online DVD rental leader, expects the DVD format to dominate movie distribution for years to come as studios work out business plans for online distribution. "Media formats are led by not what people want but format profitability," he said. As long as movie studios are reaping huge profits -- as much as $15 per DVD -- from DVD sales that totaled more than $14 billion last year, studios have little incentive to adopt online or on demand delivery models that will pay them far less, Hastings said. "We recognized that DVD would dominate for ... 10 to 15 to 20 years," he said. "That won't last forever. Eventually piracy will rise and the movie industry will allow more downloading to people like us." Netflix plans to set aside 1 percent to 2 percent of revenues in the next five years to make way for online delivery on "several platforms," including a pact already signed with TiVo, Hastings said. The company, based in Los Gatos, California, plans to roll out limited online delivery later this year. "We will launch something this year and it will be totally underwhelming," he said. "Our view is that we don't want to end up with the AOL irony," in which the Internet service provider failed to recognize the importance of broadband before it became mainstream. Hastings said Netflix is betting that online delivery of films won't take off "for a couple of years, and that allows us to grow very large on the DVD side." With a target subscriber base of 20 million, Netflix could fend off competition for online download services by what will likely be a wide range of competitors, from Comcast Corp. to Walt Disney Co., while negotiating licensing agreements, he said. Netflix is betting that online download capability will penetrate the market relatively slowly, making it necessary for online rental companies to bridge the technology gap. "Consumers would choose a service that gave them downloading on the movies that were enabled for that and DVDs on the movies that were not," he said. "That would be the differentiator during the transition period." Among the possible projects the company may consider during the transition to online delivery was adding original content, he said. (News from the Reuters Technology Summit will be delivered throughout the day Monday through Wednesday to Reuters terminals and to the Reuters.com Web site, http://reuters.com) http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.j...toryID=7798071 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Clearing Up The HDTV Picture Richard Shim The sharp picture quality that wows you on that expensive HDTV in the electronics store isn't necessarily what you'll see once you get the set into your living room. In some cases, retailers run video into the sets from closed circuit networks. They do that for various reasons, including wanting to demonstrate the sets' capabilities and keep pranksters from turning to racy programming. But the practice may be distorting consumer expectations, leading to disappointing experiences--and product returns. "There is no doubt there are higher return rates on HD sets than analog televisions," said Mike Vitelli, senior vice president of consumer electronics at retail giant Best Buy. The discrepancy in picture quality, however, isn't the only reason customers bring their high-definition TVs back. Some haul their expensive sets home only to get hit by a case of buyers' remorse, Vitelli said. Then there's the issue of video source. "It should almost be illegal to buy an HD set unless you can prove you have HD service," he said. With shipments of flat-panel televisions expected to more than double in North American markets this year compared to last (and similarly rapid growth expected in coming years), Vitelli and other retail and television service executives don't want to kill the golden goose. Still, creating the ideal HD viewing experience for consumers has posed its difficulties. Early on, customer support lines for television set makers, retailers and service operators often shuttled complaining customers back and forth, leaving many wondering if the industry could get its act together to sell to and support HDTV consumers. More recently, retailers and cable companies have been working in tandem to sell HD products to consumers. Comcast, for example, has been working on partnerships with Best Buy and Circuit City to improve training of their salespeople. Best Buy has been running rebates for cable services with the purchase of new televisions. The result has been higher subscription rates for HD service. The 800,000 Comcast subscribers who signed up for HD service started when Comcast began working with retail chains to better educate their salespeople. Still, after spending thousands of dollars on fancy new high-definition televisions, owners commonly don't even watch shows in HD programming, according to Bruce Leichtman, principal analyst at research firm Leichtman Research Group. "Call it cognitive dissonance or ignorance is bliss, but most households, about two-thirds, aren't watching shows in HD even though they think they are," Leichtman said. Vitelli isn't surprised. "I would agree with that guestimate without even seeing (the data behind) it," he said. Ignorant bliss or not, HD television shipments have been soaring. In 2003, 3.7 million digital sets were shipped in North America. That number will more than triple to 14.9 million units by 2005, according to research firm iSuppli. Halfway to high-def Fueling the surging demand is consumers' desire for sharp images that only HD sets can display, as well as immense screen sizes that don't degrade picture quality. Access to high-definition programming and broadcasts is a major selling point for HD sets--without it, consumers aren't really getting the high-definition television they paid for. The high-definition television experience is comprised of an HD set and a service that can display high-definition programming. But consumers can easily confuse either end of that equation--by purchasing a television that can't play HD content or by not using an HD signal. Manufacturers sell enhanced digital televisions, or EDTVs, which are cheaper than HDTVs and represent a growing sector of the television market. Additionally, HD content is not as abundantly available as digital broadcasts. The true high-definition experience includes a television with a built-in HD tuner and HD service from a cable or satellite provider or beamed over- the-air in areas where broadcast stations are making it available. (Web sites such as HDTVpub.com have directories showing which markets or cities have over-the-air broadcasts and rating their quality.) The disconnect between having an HD set and not watching shows in HD, experts say, must be bridged by making it clear that consumers need HD programming--and can conveniently get it. Dave Watson, an executive vice president at cable giant Comcast, said consumers have access to between 9 and 15 HD channels, depending on the market. While that might not seem like many compared to the more than 250 digital cable channels Comcast offers, consumers seem to think it's enough for now. "Consumers have expressed the need for more content but most have said they are satisfied with what is available," Watson said. Consumer confusion Watson added that while they're pleased with the rapid clip of subscriptions--more than 800,000 of Comcast's 1 million HD subscribers signed up in the last 18 months--he knows the market offers plenty more opportunity. While 93 percent of Comcast's 8.6 million digital-cable subscribers have access to HD service, only 12 percent subscribe. Confusion is slowing the adoption. When Comcast asked its customers if you get access by plugging in a cable, "40 percent said they didn't know," Watson said. For cable providers in particular, HD is a main weapon against satellite television companies. "We've been a bit of a follower (to satellite) when it comes to new technologies...such as digital-video recorders and services through set-top boxes," Watson said. "Now we're able to lead in innovation." However, if enough viewers aren't tuning in to that innovation, it won't get too far. Comcast's Watson also attributes the increase in subscriptions to the cable company's effort to increase the availability of its HD service. "We widen our deployment based on the belief that this is a service consumers want," Watson said, "and we accomplished that." http://news.com.com/Clearing+up+the+...3-5609311.html ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Apple Sides With Blu-Ray Disc In Format War Richard Shim Officially entering the debate over which specification will become the next-generation DVD format, Apple Computer has sided with the Blu-ray Disc Association. The association, which includes the likes of Sony, Dell and Hewlett-Packard, on Thursday announced Apple as its latest member following a bimonthly meeting in South Korea hosted by electronics maker Samsung. Apple will lend it expertise in high-definition and DVD authoring to the development of the Blu-ray Disc specification, which is backward-compatible with DVDs and allows for the storage of up to 50GB of data. Current DVDs can hold up to about 8.5GB of information. Blu-ray Disc's ability to store such large amounts of data is one of its key advantages over the HD DVD specification. HD DVD discs hold up to 30GB of data and are also backward-compatible with current DVDs. Proponents of HD DVD say players and discs will be cheaper to make than products based on the Blu-ray Disc spec. The two incompatible formats are the main technologies being considered by electronics and PC makers, as well as entertainment studios, to succeed the highly popular and profitable DVD disc. DVDs spawned a billion dollar industry, and executives are wary of tampering with a hit. However, all signs are pointing to the growing high-definition video market--and high-definition content requires more storage capacity than DVDs can sufficiently support. "Consumers are already creating stunning HD content," Apple's chief executive Steve Jobs said in a release, adding that users are "anxiously awaiting" a way to burn content to high-definition DVDs. Apple will also participate in the promotion and marketing of the Blu-ray Disc format, according to Josh Peterson, director of optical storage at Hewlett-Packard. "We're hoping to tap their marketing and creative genius when it comes to that area," Peterson said. Peterson added that Blu-ray Disc products are still scheduled to come out as early as the end of 2005 and as late as the beginning of next year. The "gating factor" is copy protection, and on that front, a number of proposals are being mulled, including the use of Advanced Access Content System, or AACS, one protection technology that HD DVD is also considering. The Blu-ray Disc Association is also finalizing the list of interactive features it plans to support in the first Blu-ray Disc products. Manufacturers are expected to come out with devices that read and write to DVD, Blu-ray Disc and CD. http://news.com.com/Apple+sides+with...3-5608776.html ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Disney to Release Films for Sony PSP Game Device The home video arm of the Walt Disney Co. on Wednesday said it would release movies in the newly-developed UMD format for Sony Corp.'s PlayStation Portable handheld video game and media device. Buena Vista Home Entertainment said it would release five movies this spring: "National Treasure," "Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl," "Reign of Fire," "Kill Bill Vol. 1" and "Hero." More titles will be announced during the year, it said. The UMD, or Universal Media Disc, holds about three times the capacity of a regular CD. It was developed specifically for Sony's PSP, to be released in North America on March 24. Disney is the first major Hollywood studio other than Sony's own Sony Pictures division to announce UMD support. Lions Gate Entertainment Corp., a smaller independent film studio, is also backing UMD. Disney did not announce pricing for the UMD movies. Sony has said it would charge $20 and up for UMD films. http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.j...toryID=7925628 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Samsung Introduces New MP3 Players Samsung said on Thursday it would use its handset and chip making dominance to win market share in the MP3 music player business and unveiled six new models aimed at helping it triple sales this year. Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd., Asia's most valuable technology company and the world's third-largest mobile phone maker, already has a eight models in the fast growing and profitable MP3 market. The six new players from Samsung, also the world's biggest memory chip maker, should be available in the first half of the year. They range from a 256 megabyte flash memory type to a 30 gigabyte hard disk drive model capable of holding about 7,500 songs. Samsung and big Asian brands Sony Corp. and Creative Technology Ltd., as well as PC heavyweights Dell Inc. and Gateway Inc., have their sights set on Apple's juicy market position. Its popular iPod music player and iTunes music store have a 70 percent share of the global digital music player and music download markets. In the U.S., Apple's market share is 80 percent. "We aim to sell more than 5 million MP3 players this year versus 1.7 million sold last year and will seek various strategic alliances with content providers such as Microsoft to boost sales," said Samsung Electronics vice president Kim Suh-kyum at a press conference. Samsung's new pocket-sized models have color screens and radio tuners. Some have features allowing users to watch music videos or take digital photographs. Sales of MP3 players are set to grow 57 percent this year after more than doubling in 2004, according to market research group iSuppli, which predicts sales will more than double by 2009. Samsung said it was looking to grab a 10 percent share in the United States this year, Kim said. He wouldn't say how much it accounted for in 2004. Shares in Samsung closed down 1.4 percent at 496,000 won on Thursday, versus a 1.3 percent drop in the broader market. http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.j...toryID=7929103 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Amaze your friends Stuff a PC Into A Mac Mini! Jack Why? Why not? How-to ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Apple Faces the Music as IPod Competitors Emerge Sue Zeidler Apple Computer Inc. has a winner despite increasing attacks by iPod wannabes. As Sony Corp., which introduced a new music player this week, and software maker Napster, with a new portable subscription service, crowd into the market, many analysts are nervous an 'iPod killer' will ravage Apple's ability to grow. But others see an exploding market where Apple can win without maintaining the breadth of its lead -- it now has about 70 percent of the digital music player and music download markets. "Less than one percent of the world's population has a digital music player. Apple will have more competition but the overall category will grow fast enough and there should not be any slowdown for Apple," said Rick Doherty, analyst with market research firm Envisioneering Inc. After a bull run that's pushed Apple's stock up nearly sixfold since early 2003, shares of the wildly popular iPod maker have been falling in the past month as competition from other music services like Napster has heated up. Apple's shares are down more than 7 percent this week after Sony Corp. unveiled a new Walkman MP3 player, while in January, Lehman Brothers analyst Harry Blount wrote in a research note that he was "increasingly wary of valuation." Sony, whose Walkman player dominated personal audio for two decades, could give Apple a run for its money and climb into the No. 2 position, but its entry also could further fuel demand across-the-board. "If these new entrants come in and accelerate the growth of the market, there will be no adverse consequence to Apple, even if its market share slips," said Phil Leigh, analyst with Inside Digital Media, who forecasts 100 percent growth rates up to the next four years in digital music sales and in digital music players. "If the market's 10 times the current size and Apple's market share slips to 50 percent, they're still off to a good start," said Leigh. Apple commands between 60 percent and 70 percent of the digital music player market, having sold about 10 million iPods to date. Piper Jaffray forecasts Apple will sell nearly 22 million iPods in 2005, and about 27 million in 2006. Wall Street expects Apple profits to grow 24.8 percent annually over the long-term, according to Reuters Estimates. "The point where we start to get concerned is when the absolute number of iPods starts to slow down, but we're probably a couple of years away," said Gene Munster, senior research analyst with Piper Jaffray. "Two years from now, we're still going to be talking about Apple as the dominator. Yes, there's risk at that point, but its such a green field market for the next few years, they'll have a lot of space to run with it," he said. Munster and others also believe Apple will benefit as consumers get acquainted with its other products once they are hooked on the popular iPods, what some analysts have dubbed the "halo effect." While Apple has sold iPods at healthy profit margins, its download model runs at about break-even, even though Apple has sold more than 300 million downloads to date. Down the road, Leigh expects downloads will be more important to Apple. "Ten years from now, Apple will be making more money out of iTunes than from iPods," said Leigh. "The record labels will be willing to sell at lower prices because the volumes will be so high and the inherent profitability will be higher," he said. http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.j...toryID=7877538 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ How The iPod Ran Circles Around The Walkman Randall Stross "Synergy and Other Lies" would be a good first reading assignment for Sir Howard Stringer, Sony's new chief executive, to be followed by "The Synergy Myth." Then Sir Howard should recognize that the Sony he inherits is constitutionally incapable of making one (electronics) plus one (entertainment) equal three. Both books were written by Harold Geneen, the number cruncher who directed International Telephone and Telegraph during its heyday in the 1960s. He engineered 350 mergers and acquisitions, which brought such names as Hartford, Avis, Sheraton and Madison Square Garden under one roof. Geneen, however, harbored no illusions that ITT's individual components could be coordinated in mutually beneficial ways. Each had to make its numbers wholly on its own. Sir Howard now presides over a company that appears--superficially--to be the polar opposite of an ITT-like conglomeration of unrelated businesses. Sony is accustomed to thinking of itself as consisting of two well-matched halves: electronics and entertainment. At the Consumer Electronics Show earlier this year, Sir Howard observed, "A device without content is nothing but scrap metal," a platitude beneath mention-- unless, perhaps, one were a mite defensive about owning both a widget factory and an entertainment factory. Sir Howard is expected to gently coax the consumer electronics half to stop sulking and to walk over to shake hands with the Hollywood half. And then, step back, everyone, for alchemical magic, convergence, synergy! At first glance, digital music is the field in which Sony's considerable assets seem best suited, with a little rearrangement, for a comeback. On one side, Sony has 50 years of experience in producing portable music players, beginning with transistor radios in the 1950s and extended by its Walkman franchise that has sold more than 340 million players. On the other, it owns one of the world's largest music labels to supply content. Yet in the iPod era, Sony's headstart counts for nothing. It's as if the company were the Sony Graphophone and Wax Record Company. The cassette-playing Walkman, even though it was outrageously successful, did not help Sony prepare for the digital player. The Walkman was nothing but hardware, and surprisingly simple. The first one was built in 1979, when a Sony executive sent a request to the company's tape recorder unit to rig up a portable cassette player that could provide stereo sound but still be light enough for him to take along on international flights. A small team pulled out the recording mechanism and speaker of the company's monaural Pressman, a cassette recorder used by journalists, installed stereo circuitry and added earphones. It was ready in four days. The predigital Walkman evolved over the years into more than an astounding 1,120 models. But its essential nature remained unchanged: It was dumb hardware. When Apple Computer introduced the iPod in November 2001, Steve Jobs described his new player as "the 21st-century Walkman." With 98 years remaining in the century, that was an early call. But he was correct. The iPod in 2001 was a Walkman successor, but smarter, its hard drive easily navigated with well-designed software. In April 2003, however, when the iTunes Music Store opened, the iPod became something else again: part of an ingeniously conceived blend of hardware, software and content that made buying and playing music ridiculously easy. Apple accomplished this feat by relying on its own expertise in the twin fields of hardware and software, but without going into the music business itself. Much earlier than this, Sony had gone Hollywood. Flush with profits generated in no small measure by the Walkman, and taking advantage of the strong Japanese yen, Sony acquired CBS Records for $2 billion in 1988 and Columbia Pictures for $3.4 billion the next year. Neither transaction could be said to have been the outcome of thoughtful internal discussions about strategy. The possibility of marrying hardware and entertainment was a consideration, but a fuzzy one. However dubious the original rationale, the music and movie acquisitions have turned into Sony's brightest, most profitable spot at the moment. It's the portfolio effect you would expect in a classic conglomerate: parts of the business that are doing well cover for those that are not. Of course, the theory assumes that a given unit's difficulties are merely cyclical. But Sir Howard's consumer electronics business, whose DNA only supports premium pricing and lacks the software gene, may not bounce back, ever. Last week, Sony announced a bunch of new Walkmans positioned against the ultralight iPod Shuffle. They reflect the same insular hardware culture that learned the wrong lessons from the earlier success of the Walkman. The game today, however, is not necessarily about spec sheets and weight in grams. At Sony, having both digital players and music in the same corporate family has actually been detrimental to its hardware interests. The music label directed the hardware group to make copying impossible, to the extent that until recently, customers could not enjoy on their Walkmans the music from their own legally bought CDs that they had encoded in MP3 format. Sony Connect, the late-arriving, woefully designed answer to the iTunes Music Store, still lamely insists on using Sony's proprietary compression standard. Apple got away with holding to its own standard only because it got everything else right, and was early to boot. Sony Connect must lag somewhere around 300 million song sales behind Apple, but pretends otherwise. Arguably, Walkman product managers are even more blind to market reality than those at Connect. Today, they are selling the 20GB Network Walkman for $50 more than the comparable iPod, even though it cannot use any music sold on Apple's site or on those of the many competitors that use Microsoft's widely licensed compression standard. A company thrives when it has all that it needs to make a compelling product and is undistracted by fractiousness among divisions that resent being told to make decisions based upon family obligations, not market considerations. Jobs appreciates the advantages of keeping content separate from distribution. At Pixar, he's in the digital movie business, which uses many skill sets that are used over at Apple, too. Yet he has elected to let the two live happy separate existences, without falling for the synergy myth. The reach of a company with the optimal mix of assets can extend in all directions--and right through the front door of its competitors. Last month, Wired magazine reported that 80 percent of Microsoft employees who owned a digital player owned an iPod. Coming as he does from the entertainment side of Sony, a healthy distance from the home of the Walkman, Sir Howard appreciates, no doubt, more than other Sony executives how far behind his company is. http://news.com.com/How+the+iPod+ran...3-5617613.html |
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Join Date: May 2001
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State Of The Art
 Music Buffet: Loading Up for Takeout Wilson Rothman A NAPSTER commercial on TV offers the following comparison. On top, there is a single iPod. The cost to fill it, Napster says, is $10,000. Beneath it are three MP3 players: the Dell Pocket DJ, the Creative Zen Micro and iRiver's new H10. With Napster to Go, the commercial says, you can fill all three with almost any song you can think of and you're out only $15. Next to that, in tiny print, are the words "per month." Ordinarily such a lopsided comparison would make me cringe and conclude that it was aimed at the gullible. But this one made me re-examine my life. Napster to Go is the latest edition of Napster's legal download service. (Although it was previewed to the public last fall, the software allowing small portable music players to work with it has become available only in the last few weeks.) A vast majority of the available tracks - Napster says 1.3 million - can be downloaded by subscribers without paying additional fees. What makes Napster to Go different from other subscription services, like Rhapsody ($10 a month) from Real Networks, is that you can load these tracks onto a compatible player and hit the road. As long as the player reconnects to the PC every month to verify your subscription, it feels just like the more common alternative, the one-time à la carte cost of $1 per track or $10 per album. Of course, the commercial doesn't say you will lose access to music if you stop paying. And Napster's $10,000 reckoning also assumes that everything on an iPod is purchased at the iTunes Music Store. In reality, you could have plenty of MP3's already, from ripping CD's and dredging the Internet. But the commercial raises a good question: Will you rent albums the way you rent TV programming? If it makes financial sense - and if, armed with that knowledge, you can avoid the competing allure of iPod style and the Apple brand - you just might. Since Apple opened its iTunes store at the end of 2003, I've purchased 504 songs - that's 21 albums and 224 loose tracks. That means my music diet, excluding a dwindling number of old-timey CD purchases, comes to roughly $30 a month. Most of my spending has been satisfying: new releases from U2 and Jack Johnson are simply essential, and impulse buys like the Postal Service's "Give Up" and Better Than Ezra's "How Does Your Garden Grow?" have become staples of my week. But many hunches and recommendations got old fast. More frustrating still, there are hundreds of tracks I've just been too cheap to check out. Even though I have a permanent collection of about 7,000 MP3's - compatible with any service and player - $15 a month is still less than what I spend discovering new music. Parents with children ages 10 to 20 know how costly the digital music revolution can be. If you look the other way as they download music using ... let's call them gray-market techniques, your PC becomes irreversibly crippled by spyware. But when you try to encourage them to pay for music instead of stealing it, you quickly discover that even a two-album-a-month allowance adds up. When used to its fullest extent, Napster to Go lays iTunes flat, financially speaking. For the $15 monthly fee, you're allowed unlimited downloads. You can put them on up to three compatible portable players, and log in and listen on up to three PC's. (Napster to Go does charge by the song, however, to burn music to a CD.) Sure, there's an initial investment, and in homes with more than three listeners they'll have to share, but for a low fixed price they can all download as many songs as they want, most of which they will soon forget about anyway. The value proposition is in place. I know I can get tons of music, but can I get tons of good music? There are bands not yet online at all, like the Beatles, Led Zeppelin and AC/ DC. But with Napster to Go there is a new discrepancy: songs you must purchase outright, ones that aren't part of the all-you-can-have subscription deal. I hit Napster thinking that maybe half of the tracks I'd want would be "buy only." To my amazement, it was less than a tenth. Heavies like Paul Simon, Pink Floyd, Prince, Bruce Springsteen and even, yes, Metallica have made their entire catalogs available for subscription download. The subscription service makes sense for Pearl Jam, which has posted over 80 separate live recordings. Sure, some people bought them before, but now even those without Eddie Vedder tattoos will have a chance to check them out. I'm not saying that you won't stub your toe against tracks that don't budge until paid for individually. But between your own music collection and what is available, it's easy to see how to build up your core library. The magic of the subscription plan is that music you don't know is also covered. I got to see if I liked new cuts from the Killers (yep) and Gwen Stefani (nope). Sitting in judgment didn't mean sitting in front of a computer screen, either; I could do it in the driver's seat of my car. The trouble is, that thing next to me wasn't my trusty iPod. A switch to Napster means kissing your iPod, or any prospect of getting one, goodbye. The Napster-compatible players, at the moment, are the ones from Creative, iRiver and Dell that I tested, as well as others from Samsung, Gateway and Audiovox, ranging in price from $180 to $500. What they have in common is a piece of hardware allowing this sort of subscription content to be used under a Microsoft-powered secure-content system. I could easily dismiss the players friendly with Napster to Go, but most of my gripes merely translate into this boilerplate: They're not iPods. More substantial are my complaints with Napster's PC software, which tends to jerk the user around in a very unstable fashion. It takes its sweet time reacting to mouse clicks, and mundane maneuvers make it freeze for minutes. Players often ominously "stop responding" in the middle of something important. It's possible to load the same tracks onto a player twice (an act iTunes most sensibly prohibits). Once you get the hang of the Napster service, a smart move is to use the more stable Windows Media Player 10 as your music manager instead. For the most part, however, the software and the players do their jobs. So let me ask a question that some may consider heresy: How necessary is the iPod? I recently discovered (with some horror) that I could live without TiVo. Time Warner Cable offered a box with better picture quality at a better price - about $9 a month with nothing up front. Compared with TiVo, the new box's interface is medieval dentist painful to use, but I use it and I don't look back. If I could jump from TiVo to Time Warner, a switch from the iPod to the Creative Zen Micro ought to be easy by comparison. Yes, the iPod is a beautiful symbol of how cool I am, but an iPodectomy is scientifically possible. Thankfully, an iPodectomy may not be necessary. Buzz on the Internet and in the industry suggests that Apple may be planning a retaliatory move, an iTunes to go. There are also good odds that Yahoo and Real Networks will soon join the melee. Though it seems like a lopsided deal - paying less than what Target charges for a CD and getting almost any musical wish granted instantly - the record industry is lobbying hard to make subscription services the next phase in the digital revolution. The labels are using them to get the attention of 15- to 25-year-olds, the group most responsible for the sharp decline in CD sales over the last few years (not to mention the rise of illegal file sharing). "We are very pleased to welcome this group into paying for music again," says Adam Klein, executive vice president for strategy and business development at EMI. Mr. Klein also tipped me off to another source of industry optimism: early research has shown that people who pay monthly to sample all music are still likely to pay extra to own some of it outright. At the moment, that makes sense. Pay a nominal fee to taste everything, then spring for the stuff you can't live without. But in a future in which renting music is standard practice, this concept of ownership may become silly. And though you may not be able to switch cable operators, you will be able to switch subscription music plans when a better price or a cooler program comes along. Switching may require a new player, and an afternoon to redownload the content you still want. The remaining question is, who will get your $15 a month? Let the real contest begin. http://www.nytimes.com/2005/03/17/te...ts/17stat.html ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Japanese Giants Launch Web Over Powerline System Three Japanese consumer electronics giants have created a new technology to transport Internet and media signals around the home via the electricity network, Panasonic said on Thursday., Mitsubishi and Matsushita-owned Panasonic have set up the SECA powerline alliance. They have developed a system to transfer 170 Megabits per second of data through the power lines of a home, Panasonic researcher Ingo Chmielewski told journalists at the electronics trade fair CeBIT. He said the technology is already available and introduction depended on government authorization. The speed is three times faster than wireless technology Wi-Fi and is fast enough for high definition television signals. Unlike wireless alternatives, the powerline technology performance is stable throughout the home. SECA will compete with existing technology from the HomePlug alliance of 50 companies, including Japanese group Sharp (6753.T: Quote, Profile, Research) . The two systems are not compatible. HomePlug's current standard is only 14 Mbps but it is thought to be working on a faster version. Sony is also a member of HomePlug, according to the consortium's Web Site and it was unclear if it would be part of both. Sony was not available to comment. Asked why the three companies came up with their own technology and risked yet another format war in the consumer electronics world, Chmielewski said: "We think our technology is better." http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.j...toryID=7866928 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Utility, Commodity: IT To Follow Electricity? Jonathan Schwartz As Silicon Valley emerges from the dot-com bubble, it has become fashionable for high-tech leaders to describe ours as a maturing industry whose slower growth rate is doomed to mirror the increase in gross domestic product. But that's taking the narrow view. If you look beyond raw silicon and software, you'll see a much bigger industry poised to deliver services based on technology that already exists. What stands between the broad industry and continued growth is not technology, but rather a cultural divide in the deployment and consumption of technology--one slowly being bridged. This cultural divide is not unique to IT; we've seen this movie before. If you examine the history of many key technologies, you'll find three distinct stages of evolution: customization, standardization and utilization. Some companies even employed a "chief electricity officer." In her engaging 2003 book, "Empires of Light," historian Jill Jonnes examines the nascent electric-power industry. At first, she found, electricity was customized and costly. Thomas Edison envisioned building an electric dynamo every few blocks in a major city powering his light bulb. (His first plant served one square mile of New York, and 800 light bulbs, and cost the equivalent of $5 million today.) Many showplace homes in the mid-1880s, including the Manhattan mansions of John Pierpont Morgan and William Henry Vanderbilt, had their own electric generators (along with a highly trained engineer on the premises to operate them). Some companies even employed a "chief electricity officer" to manage the role of electricity within the business. (Kodak, one of the first companies to build its own power plants, surprisingly still burns about 700,000 tons of costly coal a year to fire two power plants at its Rochester, N.Y., headquarters.) If that sounds familiar, it's because that's the reality of many data centers in corporate America: They're big, costly, custom-built and run by experts. It took many years to reach the next stage in the electricity market--standardization--where George Westinghouse's establishment of AC power and long-distance transmission helped set standards we still use today. Those standards (voltages, cycles and the like) enabled electricity to be mass-marketed. But it was still a rarity; in 1902, Niagara Falls generated a fifth of all the electricity used in the United States. In 1907, a mere 8 percent of American homes had electricity. That's where we are today in information technology. We've created standards--chips, operating systems, network protocols and such--that have enabled computing to be mass-marketed. But IT currently requires significant expenses and expertise on the part of the user, especially in large corporate data centers. As with electricity, though, we'll need to create mechanisms for defining a unit of computing power and pricing it. It was the third stage--utilization, in which electricity was viewed as a commodity with a transparent price and reliable service quality--that really brought the benefits of electricity to the world. As electricity moved from customized to standardized to utilized, two things happened: Its ubiquity rose, and its cost plummeted. All manner of things driven by electricity, in addition to lights and industrial motors, were created, bringing real value to everyday people. By 1930, even midsize American cities had nearly universal electrification; between 1910 and 1940, commodity electricity helped increase U.S. productivity by 300 percent. Industries never before dreamed of were now driving enormous wealth creation. Ours is a young industry; we're just beginning to look at the utilization stage of technology, where network bandwidth and computing power will be available as a utility, where and when needed. As with electricity, though, we'll need to create mechanisms for defining a unit of computing power and pricing it. We'll need to create reliable and secure delivery mechanisms. We'll have to create the things that turn this commodity into real value for consumers, the way electric irons, washing machines and water heaters did. And as consumers of computing, we'll need to take a fresh look at the role of "technology" in business and our daily lives. What this will enable is the rapid deployment and expansion of valuable services that can be delivered over the network. Take, for instance, Google, which is delivering a wide range of search capabilities that are becoming more valuable as they become more personalized and can be used on any device. Or look at Salesforce.com, which can use commodity bandwidth to deliver the same customer relationship management services much more cheaply than its competitors. And this is just the beginning. For companies that provide the innovative content, network services, products and inherent intelligence to take advantage of ubiquitous and affordable bandwidth, the future is bright. As bright as for those who recognized that the light bulb was not the culmination of an idea, but rather the beginning of a revolution. http://news.com.com/Utility%2C+commo...3-5609406.html ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Addressing The Risks Of Removable Media Magnus Ahlberg explores the data protection threats posed by technological developments in the field of removable media. The rise of the mobile data market has been rapid, lucrative and dangerous. Long gone are the days when you needed identical tape drives and software on both computers. The traditional floppy disk market and local tape markets were superseded by the super-floppy and zip drive. Now even they are disappearing as the mobile data storage market evolves. Thanks to their large capacities, portability, and simplicity, removable media have become one of the most popular types of storage devices around today. You’ve only to go down to one of the big computer shows to be offered a free memory stick as a stand give-away. If you take part in an IT training course, you might be given one with all your computer course notes stored on it. They are so cheap it’s the obvious way to store information, business proposals, accounts, client’s details, marketing plans etc The arrival of the MP3 music player has had a significant impact on the market. While Apple sees music as the only reason for owning an iPod, their competitors have simply created large USB stores with some built in music software. An increasingly number of people now view the MP3 player as both a data and entertainment tool. The danger here is that as an entertainment device it falls below the radar and with storage capacities set to exceed 80GB by the end of 2005, it is a serious threat to data protection. Here are 10 things you might not know about this market: 1. The first Compact Flash Drives began to appear in quantity five years ago and started at 8MB. By 2004, Lexar had released an 8GB device aimed predominately at the professional photo-market. 2. USB Pen Drives are now often hidden inside pens making them very difficult to detect by security teams. 3. Seagate now ships a proper, very small form factor 5GB USB disk drive. It is less than half the size of a Yo-Yo and features a real disk drive spinning at 3600rpm. 4. 4GB USB pen drives are expected to reach capacities of over 8GB by mid 2005. 5. New mobile phones can use memory cards holding in excess of 1GB 6. Research in 2004 suggested that a modern office worker carrying an MP3 device and a mobile phone would be capable of storing over 20GB of data. 7. MP3 and mobile video player company Archos will soon launch a 100GB device. 8. The new 1-inch hard disks are expected to reach 100GB within 12 months. 9. Blocking the USB port would prevent all devices from working and with operating systems like Windows XP, is easy to circumvent. 10. IDC predicts that the sale of very small hard disks will explode from less than 18m in 2004 to over 100m in 2008. Most of those will be in portable devices that could be carried into offices. If this doesn’t scare you then you clearly are not responsible for looking after corporate security. Some facts about corporate data: 1. The average word processing file is 3 pages in length and between 25k and 30k. That means that a 20GB MP3 player could hold over 750,000 documents. 2. The majority of corporate networks do not audit what data a user copies to a local machine or attached device. 3. New compliance legislation means that you must develop a policy for the use of devices or risk being fined by regulators. 4. 99 percent of users who use mobile devices to transfer data use no encryption to protect their contents. Think about how easy it would be to remove your corporate data. During the 1980’s the fear was that people would be able to save the customer or company price lists onto a floppy disk and take it to their next employer. Today, they can not only take that information but also your entire customer database showing purchasing prices and history on a single device. The advent of fast Internet access in the office meant that employees started used the company network to download files. Increasingly, that has meant people pulling down illegal content as well as installing peer-to-peer (P2P) networks on their desktop computer. With P2P installed, they can move files between the office and home on CD, DVD or other removable media. The danger to the corporate network is that file sharing through P2P exposes the organisation’s internal structure. Preventing people bringing devices and media into the office is an extremely difficult task. Look at the physical size of much of this media - it’s easily missed in a pocket, briefcase or handbag. Short of instituting an invasive and very workforce unfriendly search policy, keeping devices out of the company is virtually impossible. The solution then, appears to be one of management. The first step here is to decide on what you can and cannot enforce. Remarkably, few companies actually realise how limited their powers actually are, especially with respect to current privacy and human rights legislation. For example, preventing employees from bringing their MP3 player to work and then using it during lunchtime would require draconian terms of employment that are almost certainly illegal. Companies that have tried similar experiments with regard to camera phones have found it hard to police and enforce. What you can do, however, is ensure that all members of staff are aware that their employment does not allow the connection of non-company devices to their computers or other peripherals. This means banning people from downloading their photos to that nice colour printer. No swapping music with the person who sits next to you if that means connecting to the computer and using it as a transfer point. Administrators need to create security solutions that log the amount of data that a user downloads. It is already acceptable to search an employee’s hard disk for illegal files but few companies do this. Nightly sweeps of hardware to find MP3, WMA, JPG and other file extensions would seem a simple thing. Unfortunately, all of these formats have legitimate work uses and are often used by software packages for saving business files. If you are to allow data to be transferred over removable media then you should consider how to secure it. There are several vendors with encryption solutions in the market. All of them have different advantages but whatever you choose should have a minimum set of features: 1. Works with policy files to allow data to be locked after a given number of password attempts. 2. Has a mechanism that allows data to be encrypted once and then accessed where required without having to install software on the receiving computer. 3. Be backed by an administration program that would allow for the recovery of lost passwords. 4. Will work on a range of devices and removable media. 5. Be simple to use, implement and manage. The latter is all too often overlooked when deploying security solutions. There is a belief that security means complex; it doesn’t. To ensure that people use a solution it must be simple, effective and deal with all situations. If you have to give encrypted files to someone who needs a copy of the software, then it becomes a case of either give them a licence for the software or don’t encrypt. Many people will opt for the latter. Files need to be self contained as an executable where the level of encryption is still high enough to thwart all but the most extensive brute force attack. There are products that fall into this category and they are worth finding and deploying in order to minimise the risks. One possible solution it to ensure that you encrypt everything that is downloaded from a computer onto any removable media. Your corporate data has never been so insecure. The ease with which is can now be removed from the office surpasses anything in history. There are approaches that you can use but they must encompass protection of content and system management simply banning devices will not work. Remember, we are now in a world where almost every month a new piece of regulation over data protection and access appears. If you don’t sort this out now, they regulator will simply fine you extensive amounts of money and you’ll still have the problem. http://www.continuitycentral.com/feature0184.htm ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ A More Business-Friendly BitTorrent Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols Open-source programmer Bram Cohen on Monday released version 4.0 of his popular BitTorrent client for Windows and Linux. BitTorrent is an ad hoc, P2P (peer-to-peer) protocol. Cohen created it to address the problem of transferring popular, large files over the Internet. Instead of using the client-server model of traditional Internet file distribution systems, such as FTP or the Web's HTTP or older P2P systems such as Kazaa, wherein files are shared directly among individual users, BitTorrent took a new approach. BitTorrent works by using a central server, or tracker, to coordinate all the peers sharing a particular file. The tracker, however, may or may not have a master copy of the file. Its job is to simply coordinate the connections—nothing more, nothing less. Instead, systems with a complete copy of the file, also known as seeders, start sharing it with systems that request it. Then, unlike other P2P systems, those systems that have only part of the file begin sharing it with other users requesting the file. The end result is that with multiple users both sending and receiving the file, download speeds tend to be fast without requiring high-bandwidth connections or multiple servers by the file's owner. Technically, BitTorrent works by connecting over TCP ports 6881-6999. A smaller subset of ports can be used. Ten, one per each transfer session, such as 6881-6891, is a typical configuration. However, a BitTorrent client must have outbound access to port 6969 to connect with most trackers. It all sounds more complicated then it really is, as far as end-users are concerned. For a user, all that's required is that the system's firewall or NAT (Network Address Translation) be set to allow BitTorrent access to its TCP ports. Some anti-worm programs, like the one in Norton SystemWorks 2005, must also be set to allow BitTorrent inbound connections. With those factors taken care of, all you need to do is to click on a BitTorrent link, and the download will begin. With BitTorrent, data transfer rates can be achieved that make the downloading of hundreds of megabytes of data, or even gigabytes of data, practical over even slow broadband connections. So, for the end user, BitTorrent is easy. It's another story for network administrators. British P2P analysis firm CacheLogic claims that BitTorrent protocol traffic accounts for an amazing 35 percent of all Internet traffic. According to CacheLogic's studies, BitTorrent traffic accounts for more Internet traffic than any other single protocol, such as http, or e-mail's POP (Post Office Protocol) and SMTP. That same popularity makes BitTorrent a major problem for network administrators. Even though an individual BitTorrent client doesn't use much bandwidth, dozens, hundreds, or even thousands of them are enough to bring strong LANs to their knees. Another problem with BitTorrent is, like other P2P services before it, it's often used to copy and share copyrighted materials. Unlike Napster of old, though, which only transferred songs of a few megabytes, BitTorrent is often used to move the hundreds of megabytes of movies. Read more here about Linux distributor Lindows.com taking commercial advantage of BitTorrent. Together, these problems are bad enough that many institutions, like the University of Florida, ban the use of BitTorrent and other P2P clients. Next Page: Expanding to business use. BitTorrent is much more, though, than just the latest craze for hijacking movies and TV shows. It is also proving useful for delivering the large ISO images of operating systems, applications and major patches. For example, the Linux Mirror Project makes it possible to use BitTorrent to download most popular Linux distributions, including Mandrake, Red Hat's Fedora and Novell/SUSE, at rates that are usually speedier than those provided by FTP or HTTP. This new edition makes it much more attractive for business use. While it now boasts an improved interface and more granular control for the client, by far the most important new feature for administrators is that BitTorrent packets are marked as bulk data. This last feature makes managing BitTorrent traffic a snap. In the past, service providers would need special appliances, like Sandvine Inc.'s Peer to Peer Element 8200 or Allot Communications' enterprise line for network administrators, to manage it. General-purpose traffic management tools, such as Lightspeed Systems Inc.'s Total Traffic Control, can be used to manage BitTorrent traffic. No matter what was used for traffic management, short of stopping BitTorrent entirely by blocking its TCP ports with a firewall, management was necessary. Otherwise, its sheer volume of traffic was likely to slow down networks and make such latency- sensitive applications as VOIP (voice over IP) unusable. Click here to read more about BitTorrent and RSS straining the boundaries of their infrastructure. By marking its traffic as bulk, as does newer versions of FTP, almost any network traffic tool can easily be used to manage BitTorrent's traffic. It's possible to successfully control BitTorrent traffic with the common iproute2 tools, which are available on almost all modern versions of Linux. The new version also performs better on local networks. With earlier versions, network congestion was possible even when BitTorrent traffic was only moving at single-digit Kbps rates. With 4.0, that problem has gone away. Other programs, such as Azureus, a Java-based P2P client, and BitTornado also use the BitTorrent protocol. These tend to have more features than Cohen's original BitTorrent, but this new version's ease of traffic manageability both for the end-user and the network administrator make it the P2P client of choice for professional environments. http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1759,1775055,00.asp ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ How-to Make Your Webcam Into An Infraredcam Jack Turns a cheesy round plastic cam into a cheesy round plastic cam – that sees IR. Instructions and everything. Plus cool (or warm) pics. Scarfed from/dot. http://homepage.ntlworld.com/geoff.johnson2/IR/ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ iTunes Prices Too High Richard Menta Do you know what I think? I think the prices for paid digital music downloads are too high. I have thought this for quite awhile, in fact I said it way back in August of 2001 - long before iTunes appeared and when Napster was a free file sharing service - in an article titled 6 CDs a Year. The driving statistic of that article was that the average music lover only buys six CDs a year. That's a fairly low number, but one that reflects the high cost of music that existed before and after Napster made its appearence. High prices enabled by the record cartel force us to be very choosy over which albums we finally commit to buy. Richard Menta Unfortunately, we as consumers have been complaining about the spotty consistancy of many of the albums we buy. You know, the "two good singles the rest is filler" complaint we have heard for years. The record industry pushes albums over singles because they make them more money. There also has been this "Albums are Art" concept floating around since Sgt. Pepper's first appeared, as if singles were incapable of producing the same. Napster and file trading brought back the single as a preferred medium because we as consumers have more control so quality (and therefore value) is overall much higher. The record industry's fear is that reasonably priced digital downloads will canibalize profitable CD sales. There is no evidence that this would be true, especially since singles have always been used to promote albums, but we're not talking about proof here, we are talking about fear. There is precedent to say there is nothing to fear if the record industry would just look for it. My solution in that article was for the record industry to sell digital downloads at compelling prices that developed a tiered pricing system similar to what the movie industry employs. As I wrote in that article: Put six CDs in a customer's hand and they'll pay $90 and be done for the year. Put 100 high quality MP3 singles in their hand and they might pay an additional $10 a year to expand on - not replace - the six CDs they bought. That's $700 million in additional revenue if we just talk about Napster's 70 million former users. $1.4 Billion if those users decide to download 200 songs, etc. How many people do you know see only a few movies a year in the theater, yet rent regularly at the local video store. At $9 per person to see a movie, the cost forces us to be very selective over which movies we see just like it forces us to be selective on the CDs we buy. On video, $3.00 covers the entire family and so we supplement our movie going experience this way. We haven't stopped going to the theaters. That's because the wide screen experience is superior to the TV experience just as a CD on a stereo is superior to an MP3 playing on the tinny speakers of our computer systems (that is how most of us listen to our MP3s). The end result is this has brought hundreds of millions of additional revenue to the movie industry. Today, the movie industry makes more revenue from video/DVD sales and rentals that from the box office, a box office that has set sales records the last 9 out of 10 years. I quoted $0.10 as a good price for paid downloads. Frankly, a quarter or even $0.35 would work well. Somewhere where a 13-track albums worth of music will cost under $5.00. This price mark is compelling. What does the record industry charge? $0.99 a single of which their cut is anywhere from $0.65 - $0.85 (different sources give different numbers). The problem is, these prices are too high. Thanks to iTunes, digital sales are modestly successful. They certainly are profitable - as in pure profit - for the record labels. I say pure profit because the record industry's costs of supplying digital music online is negligible. In fact, all they are supplying is permission. It is Apple and Napster and all the other services who are converting decades of CD material into digital files to be downloaded so the labels supply no hard product. As for music production costs, 98% of each label's catalog was produced before online services appeared. All of their costs for production and marketing were committed to sell CDs, not downloads. Lower prices will drive more people to these services and further deflect the competition from the free P2P services. It will create this tiered system I envisioned. But the record industry is getting greedy again. They don't want to lower prices. In fact, they are now sending feelers out through the press that they want to raise prices. They are claiming that they introduced prices low to stimulate this market in the first place. In fantasyland this may be true. In the real world it is the consumer's perception of value that drives sales. My personal perception is that prices are too high and need to come down to satisfy my notion of value. I'm sure there are many who feel the same way. But, I say if they want to raise prices let them., but if they do they increase their risk and the paid download industry will probably stagnate with maybe modest gains rather than grow. iTunes will survive, because it makes up two-thirds of the market, but Napster may not. The same may go for other iTunes competitors, competiton that keeps iTunes from becoming a monopoly. They say Steve Jobs was upset at this announcement by record executives. If there is a shake up and iTunes becomes the only major survivor guess who will hold more influence on paid download pricing. Yep, angry Steve himself. That's when he demands both lower prices and a bigger cut for Apple, because he knows lower prices will make him more money. In other words, the market will bring equilibrium to all this. The record industry is an oligopoly in traditional retail, but not online. If Grokster wins its case in the Supreme Court it will bring this equilibrium faster. One more note, Napster has shifted from selling music to renting music. You pay every month infinitum or the music you acquired disappears. This is a business model that the record industry has tried to foist on online commerce since Sony introduced its first Net music service in 2000. Higher download prices may not be applied to rental prices, giving Napster more of an edge against iTunes. Could there be collusion to force the rent-a-song business model at the expense of iTune's buy-a-song-and-own-it forever model? Stay tuned. http://www.mp3newswire.net/stories/5...nesprices.html ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Viacom May Split Into Two Companies AP Frustrated with a languishing stock price, media conglomerate Viacom Inc. announced late Wednesday that it is considering a plan to split into two companies to allow investors to value its businesses separately. A breakup of the New York-based media company, whose properties include CBS, MTV, VH1 and the Paramount movie studio, would also solve the question of who would succeed Sumner Redstone as CEO. The company said it would provide more details on its plans in the second quarter. Confirming a report on The Wall Street Journal's Web site, Viacom said late Wednesday it was exploring a plan that would split the company into two separate entities: One anchored by its fast-growing cable networks such as MTV, led by longtime MTV chief Tom Freston; and another built around the broadcast television businesses that would be run by CBS head Les Moonves. Freston and Moonves have been contending for the top job at Viacom since last June, when chief operating officer Mel Karmazin left in a power struggle and triggered the two-way race. Under the breakup plan being considered, the broadcast television company would also include Viacom's radio businesses, which remain profitable but have fallen out of favor with investors due to poor growth prospects and increasing competition from portable music players like Apple Computer Inc.'s iPods. Viacom's stock has been languishing below $40 since April 2004 as investors remained frustrated that the high-growth businesses like MTV remained tied to slower- growth properties like radio, outdoor advertising and theme parks. Viacom's shares jumped after news of the possible breakup hit the market, ending up $2.71 or 7.9 percent at $37 on the New York Stock Exchange. In after-hours trading the shares gained another $1.70, or 4.6 percent. Last fall Viacom also separated itself from Blockbuster Inc., its video rental unit that had also fallen out of favor with investors due to heavy competition from cheap DVD sales from Wal-Mart Stores and DVD rent-by-mail services. Redstone said in a statement that despite the company's efforts to drive its various businesses for the best possible returns, those businesses ``have inherently different growth characteristics and investment attributes that appeal to different types of investors.'' What's more, ``it has also become clear that this important distinction is likely to continue to limit Viacom's ability to receive full value for its assets and its prospects in the investment community,'' Redstone said. Earlier Wednesday, media analyst Jessica Reif Cohen of Merrill Lynch sent a report on Viacom to investors suggesting essentially what the company announced later in the day -- that the company consider breaking itself up in order to allow the market to value its pieces separately. ``If the stock continues to languish below what we consider to be fair value, we believe Viacom should consider breaking up the company to unlock the underlying value of the company's assets,'' Reif Cohen wrote. Reif Cohen said in an interview later that she was surprised at the company's announcement. ``I did not expect this,'' she said. If the breakup goes through, it would mark the latest move by a media conglomerate to restructure itself and streamline under pressure from investors. Media investor John Malone has been paring down the complex holdings of his company Liberty Media Corp., splitting off its overseas businesses last year and announcing Tuesday that it would spin off its 50 percent stake in Discovery Communications Inc. to shareholders. Rupert Murdoch's News Corp. recently moved its legal base to the United States and is absorbing Fox Entertainment Group Inc., its separately traded U.S. subsidiary. Time Warner Inc. has also trimmed down, selling off numerous businesses including Warner Music Group, which recently announced plans of its own to sell shares to the public. http://www.businessweek.com/ap/finan...=apn_home_down ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Republican Skilled in Art of the Deal Is Elevated to F.C.C. Chairman Stephen LaBaton Kevin J. Martin, a telecommunications lawyer who became known for his pragmatic and independent streak as a Republican member of the Federal Communications Commission, was chosen by President Bush today to become the 26th chairman of the agency. At a time when Michael K. Powell, who is retiring as chairman, came under considerable criticism for his less than adroit handling of difficult policy issues, Mr. Martin's political skills and deal making over the last four years as a practical promoter of deregulation have earned him support from varied and, at times, warring constituencies. Social conservatives like his aggressively hard-line approach to indecency in broadcasting. The Bell companies, once embittered by some adverse rulings, have patched things up. Smaller rivals to the Bells have found Mr. Martin an important ally on some issues. State regulators find him to be a rare Washington friend at a time when their authority is being pre-empted by other federal regulators. And consumer organizations say he will be more accommodating to their concerns than Mr. Powell was. "His strength is that he's appeared sympathetic to people of differing interests," said Gene Kimmelman, a senior official in the Washington office of Consumers Union. "Now we're going to find out who the real Kevin Martin is." Scott Cleland, a regulatory analyst with Precursor Group, said the major change between Mr. Powell and Mr. Martin would be one of style and political skills. "Chairman Martin will be a coalition builder and deal maker," Mr. Cleland said. "He has a nose for votes and a nose for a deal. As a result, those issues that have languished for a long time now have a better chance of getting done." Mr. Martin was also an attractive candidate to the White House because he does not need to be confirmed by the Senate to lead the agency. (Confirmation is required only for appointment as a commissioner, which Mr. Martin already is.) That made him particularly appealing because of the growing prospect that the Senate could soon shut down the nominations process as a result of a growing dispute between Republicans and Democrats over a group of nominations to the Federal judiciary. As a result, other contenders for the job, notably Michael Gallagher, a senior official at the Commerce Department, and Becky Klein, a former Texas utilities regulator, could have faced months of delay in getting through the Senate at a time when the commission is expected to face a thicket of thorny issues. Foremost will be the rewriting of the rules governing the billions of dollars in compensation paid between telephone companies for connecting calls and the reorganization of the programs that provide universal telephone service to millions of customers in rural and underserved areas. The agency is also facing important decisions over how to regulate the new telephone services offered over the Internet. And the commission has yet to respond to a federal appeals court that struck down the effort to relax the rules restricting the size of the nation's largest media companies. The elevation of Mr. Martin, along with the expected departure of a Republican commissioner, Kathleen Q. Abernathy, gives the White House the opportunity to make two appointments to the agency and reshape the composition of the five-member commission. Mr. Martin, a 38-year-old former White House official and North Carolina native who looks half his age, drew Mr. Bush's attention as the deputy counsel to his 2000 presidential campaign. He was part of the team of young lawyers who traveled to Florida in the legal contest following the election that ultimately decided the presidency. He then briefly worked in the White House on telecom and economic policy issues before rejoining the commission in the spring of 2001. (During the Clinton administration, Mr. Martin was an aide to Harold Furchtgott-Roth, the most conservative and deregulatory-minded member of the agency.) Mr. Martin has taken some of the more aggressive approaches in indecency cases, dissenting from a series of opinions in which the agency either found no violation or did not issue what he believed was a significant enough punishment. For those votes, he was strongly endorsed for the job by some conservative organizations that have pushed the agency to come down harder on radio and television broadcasters. "Chairman Martin's leadership record on the indecency issue shows his commitment to serving the public interest," said L. Brent Bozell, president of the Parents Television Council, which has filed more indecency complaints than any other group. Mr. Martin also differed with Mr. Powell on rules governing the size of the nation's largest media conglomerates, forcing Mr. Powell to compromise on some elements of that package - most notably the number of stations that the networks could own - in order for the chairman to find the three votes he needed to attempt to deregulate those rules. (Ultimately, however, Mr. Powell was foiled when a court blocked the agency from imposing the new rules, which are now once again before the commission.) In the politics of the commission, Mr. Martin has distinguished himself for being the Republican foil of Mr. Powell, and the two men have had a chilly relationship. The relationship broke down two years ago, when Mr. Martin voted with the Democrats to largely leave in place rules that are meant to foster local telephone competition by requiring the four regional Bell companies to lease their local networks to their rivals at low prices set by state regulators. But in recent months, Mr. Martin had the political savvy to patch relations with the Bell companies, and Bell executives have said in recent weeks that he was their top choice. http://www.nytimes.com/2005/03/16/po...16cnd-fcc.html ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ From Toyota, a Different Sound System Ben Sisario For the car and music businesses, marketing with music has been a mutually beneficial relationship: automakers stir potential customers' emotions with old classics and next-big-thing songs, and musicians get commercial exposure. Toyota's new Scion line has taken this relationship to the logical next level by founding its own record label. The label, called Scion A/V, has released two recordings so far, one by Dakah, a 60-plus-piece hip-hop orchestra from Los Angeles, and one by Junk Science, a crew from Brooklyn that won a contest on the carmaker's Web site. Both releases have been small runs of CD's and 12-inch vinyl records, paid for by Scion and sold through independent distributors. The company is careful to play down its role as a record label. Scion A/V has no dedicated staff; the project is handled through the carmaker's marketing division and by outside contractors. Scion does not take any profit from the releases, and it allows the artists to own their own master recordings, said Jeri Yoshizu, Scion's manager of sales promotions. The goal, she said, is simply brand extension by association with underground music. "If we did make money, it would not have such a positive effect," she said. "We don't want to cross that line." The risk for Scion, as music companies know all too well, is that it is extremely difficult to predict what new songs people will like. "If they can ensure that the records are credible with their audience, then it really does build their brand," said Garrett Te Slaa, the head of marketing at New Line Records, a Time Warner company. "If not, then it would hurt the brand in the long run." But in a competitive advertising field, a novel, low-cost gimmick has distinct advantages. "It's a little more unique than a keychain," Ms. Yoshizu said. BEN SISARI http://www.nytimes.com/2005/03/14/bu...a/14scion.html ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Can Papers End the Free Ride Online? Katharine Q. Seelye Consumers are willing to spend millions of dollars on the Web when it comes to music services like iTunes and gaming sites like Xbox Live. But when it comes to online news, they are happy to read it but loath to pay for it. Newspaper Web sites have been so popular that at some newspapers, including The New York Times, the number of people who read the paper online now surpasses the number who buy the print edition. This migration of readers is beginning to transform the newspaper industry. Advertising revenue from online sites is booming and, while it accounts for only 2 percent or 3 percent of most newspapers' overall revenues, it is the fastest-growing source of revenue. And newspaper executives are watching anxiously as the number of online readers grows while the number of print readers declines. "For some publishers, it really sticks in the craw that they are giving away their content for free," said Colby Atwood, vice president of Borrell Associates Inc., a media research firm. The giveaway means less support for expensive news-gathering operations and the potential erosion of advertising revenue from the print side, which is much more profitable. "Newspapers are cannibalizing themselves," said Frederick W. Searby, an advertising and publishing analyst at J. P. Morgan. As a result, nearly a decade after newspapers began building and showcasing their Web sites, one of the most vexing questions in newspaper economics endures: should publishers charge for Web news, knowing that they may drive readers away and into the arms of the competition? Of the nation's 1,456 daily newspapers, only one national paper, The Wall Street Journal, which is published by Dow Jones & Company, and about 40 small dailies charge readers to use their Web sites. Other papers charge for either online access to portions of their content or offer online subscribers additional features. The New York Times on the Web, which is owned by The New York Times Company, has been considering charging for years and is expected to make an announcement soon about its plans. In January, The Times's Web site had 1.4 million unique daily visitors. Its daily print circulation averaged 1,124,000 in 2004, down from its peak daily circulation of 1,176,000 in 1993. Executives at The Times have suggested that the paper, which already charges for its crossword puzzle, news alerts and archives online, may start charging for other portions of its content, but would not follow the Journal model, which charges online readers $79 a year for everything. (The Journal charges $39 a year to online readers who also subscribe to the printed newspaper.) "A big part of the motivation for newspapers to charge for their online content is not the revenue it will generate, but the revenue it will save, by slowing the erosion of their print subscriptions," Mr. Atwood said. "We're in the midst of a long and painful transition." Most big papers are watching and waiting as they study the patterns of online readers. Analysts said that the growth in readers was slowing but that readers appeared to be spending more time on the Web sites. "We're always looking at the issue," said Caroline Little, publisher of Washingtonpost.Newsweek Interactive, the online media subsidiary of The Washington Post Company. She said that the online registration process that most papers now require for use of their Web sites, while free, lays the groundwork for charging if papers decide to go that route. "You're getting information from your users and you can target ads to your users, which is more efficient for advertisers," she said. "This has been a dipping of the toe in the water." The Post has no plans to charge now because it would mean too big of a drop-off in readers. "It's just not a strong financial proposition at this point," she said. Executives at other newspaper groups, including the Gannett Company, which publishes USA Today, said they had no plans to start charging either. A report last week from the Online Publishers Association underscored the challenges facing newspapers in selling news. Internet users spent $88 million for general news in 2004, or just 0.4 percent more than they paid in 2003, the report said; by comparison, they spent $414 million on entertainment, up 90 percent. Rob Runett, director of electronic media communications at the Newspaper Association of America, eyed the report ruefully. News, he said, may become an acronym for "Not Ever Willing to Spend." The Tribune Company, which owns The Los Angeles Times, The Chicago Tribune and other papers, has conducted limited experiments in charging for access, some more successful than others. The Los Angeles Times charges $4.95 a month for its Calendar Live section, which covers entertainment and provides listings and restaurant reviews, but traffic to the site has declined and a spokeswoman said the paper was reviewing the decision to charge for it. The Chicago Tribune offers a "subscriber advantage" program, which gives print subscribers free access to archives and bonuses online. "It's an interesting first step to see how people react in trying to differentiate between the two products," said Alison Scholly, general manager of Chicago Tribune Interactive. The difficulty comes in determining what readers will pay for on the Web. Most executives agree that national news can be found in so many places that it would be self-defeating to try to charge for it. But they are finding that readers will pay for sports, if the Web offers more than the printed page. The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel provides in-depth coverage of the Green Bay Packers, along with blogs, fan photos and audio reports, in "Packer Insider" for $34.95 a year. But for the most part, publishers make money on Web sites by selling space to advertisers, and that is a booming business. Mr. Atwood at Borrell said a preliminary analysis of online revenues for about 700 daily newspaper Web sites showed an average increase of 45 percent from 2003 to 2004. But some newspapers want to develop a cadre of paying readers as a second stream of revenue beyond the advertising. Bill Keller, executive editor of The New York Times, said of relying on advertising as the sole revenue stream: "My main concern is that, however we distribute our work, we have to generate the money to pay for it. The advertising model looks appealing now, but do we want our future to depend on that single source of revenue? What happens if advertising goes flat? What happens when somebody develops software to filter out advertising - TiVo for the Web?" At the same time, he said, charging for the Web site could alienate both current readers and potential new readers, particularly in growing markets like China and India, and The Times would be limiting its global reach. Perhaps the biggest obstacle for newspapers is that online readers have been conditioned to expect free news. "Most newspapers believe that if they charged for the Web, the number of users would decline to such an extent that their advertising revenues would decline more than they get from charging users," said Gary B. Pruitt, chairman and chief executive of the McClatchy Company, which publishes The Sacramento Bee, The Star Tribune in Minneapolis and other papers, which do not charge for their Web sites. The Wall Street Journal experiment suggests the contrary. About 700,000 people subscribe to its online edition, with 300,000 of them subscribing to the Web edition only and 400,000 subscribing to both the online and print editions. The print edition has 1.8 million subscribers. "If you have strong value, people will pay for it," said Todd H. Larsen, president of consumer electronic publishing for Dow Jones, which owns The Journal. "There is nothing so magical about the Internet that everything has to be free." The Journal's experience may not translate to other papers. It is primarily a financial paper, and analysts said that it is a business expense for many readers buying it. Moreover, charging online brings its own problems. By limiting readership to subscribers, papers also limit the amount of advertising space they can sell. Earlier this year, Dow Jones spent more than $519 million for MarketWatch, the financial news Web site, largely as a way to attract advertising that it was not getting online. When the paper first charged for its Web site in 1996, daily traffic fell by about two-thirds, said Rich Jaroslovsky, who was the managing editor of The Wall Street Journal Online at the time and is now a managing editor at Bloomberg News. "You have to take the hit some time if you do this," he said of charging for a Web site. "We took the pain because we felt over the longer term, we'd see the gain." Since 1997, The Journal's Web site has grown, although growth has slowed dramatically. Subscriptions jumped 35 percent from the third quarter of 1999 to the third quarter of 2000, for example, but grew by just 2 percent from 2003 to 2004, according to the company. This reflects an industrywide slowdown, said Merrill Brown, the founding editor of MSNBC.com and a media consultant. "There is no question that growth has slowed as the medium has matured," he said. "It's a pretty stagnant business for a variety of reasons," he added. "At a moment when big papers are so financially stressed and their prospects uncertain, they aren't investing at the level they need to grow their alternative distribution platforms." On a smaller scale, another newspaper that charges for its Web site is The Spokesman-Review in Spokane, Wash., which has a print circulation of around 100,000. About 20,000 of those print subscribers also get the paper online for no additional fee; just 545 people pay for the Web edition only, at $7 per month. Ken Sands, the online publisher, who until a month ago was the managing editor of the print edition, said the paper decided to charge for the Web in an effort to save the print edition. "We had the sense that a lot of people had canceled their print subscriptions because they could read the paper for free online," he said. He said that as soon as the paper started charging for the Web, in September, new daily traffic, which had been growing by more than 40 percent a year, stopped cold. He said that traffic was 5 percent lower this January than it was in January a year ago. He added that the print circulation had been steadily declining somewhat anyway, and so he could not blame the Web for that. "Print is going the way it's going, which is down, which is unfortunate because it's the revenue engine that keeps this whole thing going," he said. "The online business model won't ever be able to support the whole news infrastructure." Mr. Jaroslovsky, the former editor of The Wall Street Journal Online, said that some publishers were regretting not having charged for the Web back in the 1990's when it was developing, because doing so now will be a bigger shock to their readers. Also, he said, the stakes are higher. "When we did this, we were at the beginning of an investment curve and the amount of money at stake was not as great," he said. "Today, if you make a wrong decision, there's a chance it will be not only embarrassing, but very costly." http://www.nytimes.com/2005/03/14/bu...a/14paper.html ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Ante Up at Dear Old Princeton: Online Poker Is a Campus Draw Jonathan Cheng For Michael Sandberg, it started a few years ago with nickel-and-dime games among friends. But last fall, he says, it became the source of a six-figure income and an alternative to law school. Mr. Sandberg, 22, of Alexandria, Va., mostly splits his time between Princeton University, where he is a senior and a politics major, and Atlantic City, where he plays high-stakes poker in his black hooded sweatshirt and dark aviator shades. Since September, he says, he has won $120,000, including $30,000 in Atlantic City and $90,000 playing at PartyPoker.com, a popular online casino that says it is "licensed and regulated by the government of Gibraltar." Those claims are backed up by his financial records. Mr. Sandberg's is an extreme example of a gambling revolution on the nation's college campuses. Mr. Sandberg calls it an explosion, one spurred by televised poker championships and a proliferation of Web sites that offer online poker games. Experts say the evidence of gambling's popularity on campus is hard to miss. In December, for example, a sorority at Columbia held its first, 80-player poker tournament with a $10 buy-in, a minimum amount required to play, while the University of North Carolina held its first tournament, a 175-player competition, in October. Both games filled up and had waiting lists. At the University of Pennsylvania, private games are advertised every night in a campus e-mail list. "It's the TV programs that are driving it," said Elizabeth George, chief executive of the North American Training Institute, a nonprofit organization in Duluth, Minn., that specializes in the problems of pathological and underage gambling. "Young people particularly are drawn to it. There are superstars, then there's advertising, plus the Internet. So with all of those elements, put that into a bag and shake it up and what you have is a remarkably dangerous situation." Last year, Elliott Dorsch of Tampa, Fla., another Princeton senior, made $11,000 in two hours playing online blackjack, only to lose most of it in 15 minutes, he said. "I was playing very recklessly," he said. "I was definitely very drunk." Vik Bellapravalu, a Princeton junior from Phoenix, who plays poker with friends on campus, said, "Whatever amount you can think of, it's probably been lost or won." Drastic gains and losses have always been a part of gambling, but access to poker games has never been as easy as the Internet makes it, and undergraduates and students of youth gambling say that interest has never been so high. Members of both groups point to ESPN's frequent broadcasts of the World Series of Poker as a catalyst. The series has made heroes out of everyman champions like Chris Moneymaker, who started playing poker four years ago and won the $2.5 million grand prize in the 2003 series after entering for $40 through an online poker Web site. Mr. Sandberg, from his narrow, atticlike room on the top floor of a Princeton dormitory, can spend up to 10 hours a day playing the game he loves most - Texas Hold'em, a popular version of poker that is simple to learn but hard to master. With his well-worn baseball cap and bristly, blond goatee, Mr. Sandberg doesn't look like a high roller, and his slapdash dorm room, bedecked with poker posters, bears no marks of a conspicuous consumer. Sitting on a folding chair in front of his laptop computer and looking almost bored, he plays three online games at once, each for many hundreds of dollars, while distractedly listening to classic rock and instant-messaging his friends. He speaks in poker parlance as if everyone understands it and can innately calculate the odds of drawing pocket aces (two, face down), while casually sizing up his online opponents and divining what cards they may hold. Thanks to a boom in tournaments and prize money, poker has become a career option for Mr. Sandberg, he says. Though he is graduating in May, he has not applied to graduate school or for any jobs. "I'm playing this game, treating it like a job," he said. He predicts that he could make up to half a million dollars a year, just playing on his computer every day. "Even with the bad runs," he said, "I haven't had a losing month or even too long of a losing session. I think I'm a pretty smart guy, and I'm only going to get better at cards." Last summer, instead of getting a job, Mr. Sandberg set a goal of winning $10,000 at PartyPoker, where, he said, he clicked and bluffed his way to his goal by the time he returned to school in September. "My parents said I should do something useful, and I made $10,000," he said. "I thought that was pretty useful." His bank statement seems to support his claims, with a six-figure balance, large withdrawals for what he says were casino trips and even larger deposits from online winnings. His personal account on PartyPoker.com echoes his bank statement, with matching payments and deposits that are specifically for poker. Mr. Sandberg credits his success to two simple principles: know the odds, and don't play more than you can lose. "It seems simple, but it's one of the biggest flaws of many poker players," he said. His goal is to enter the high-stakes poker tours and compete with his heroes. "I want to get to the point where I'm the best in the world and play against those guys on TV," he said. "I don't want to tell stories about playing with so-and-so once; I want to be doing it all the time." While Mr. Sandberg insists that he is not a compulsive gambler, and he seems to bet large amounts only when the odds are heavily in his favor, some experts fear that college-age gamblers are swallowing the hype of big-stakes poker without coming to grips with the dangers of addiction. "With gambling on TV, there's been lots of glamorization, but not much responsibility," said Keith S. Whyte, executive director of the National Council on Problem Gambling. He called the gambling opportunities "almost ubiquitous" for the college-age crowd. "The administrations don't do a good job of telling students how to get help," he said, "the same way they're sending the 'prevention and responsibility' messages for alcohol, substance abuse and date rape." At the University of Pennsylvania, Dan Kline, the president of the poker society, says that everyone is playing poker. "When we started this thing in 2002, about 10 people joined," said Mr. Kline, a junior. "Now when we have a tournament, we'll get 500 people responding in a half-hour to our e-mail." A free tournament organized by the group last year attracted twice as many people as space would permit. This year's tournament, however, which offered $2,000 in donated prize money, was canceled by uneasy administrators, who had also canceled a fraternity-organized charity poker tournament in November, fearing the legal implications of offering prizes for gambling. Princeton has no explicit rules about gambling on campus, and has not taken steps to address it. "This is something we, the administration, need to sit down and decide if there should be a uniform policy about it," said Hilary Herbold, the associate dean in charge of disciplinary action at the university. She noted the formal policies devised amid concerns about file-sharing of copyrighted music in recent years. Mrs. Herbold said problem gamblers were being dealt with case by case. The administration has broken up regular group games held in Princeton's eating clubs. "What we're really primarily concerned about is the well-being of the students," she said. "Were I to discover that a student was gambling online, I would probably tell them to stop and give them a warning." Mr. Whyte of the National Council on Problem Gambling says he is concerned that college-age gamblers, often susceptible to overwhelming stress and lacking a mature sense of money, are particularly susceptible. "They're not going to lose their house if they don't win," he said. "Mom and Dad can still bail them out. It's just not as realistic a view of money as adults, and it's very hard to reach that age group. By the time they've gotten to college, they've already started gambling." Mr. Sandberg says his parents in Alexandria are aware that he loves playing poker, but don't know that he spends almost every weekend in Atlantic City, or how much he has earned. His mother, he said, "thinks I just don't tell her about the times I lose." He added, "She thinks I'm up and down, but I really do win almost every time I go." Like video games and instant messaging, online poker has had its impact on academics. Mr. Sandberg said that he failed a midterm exam this fall because of his commitment to poker, and that he ranked in the bottom fifth of his class. But, he says, "I'm not too concerned with what my G.P.A. is. You don't have to hand your résumé to the casino when you walk in or anything." And even during final exams in January, Mr. Sandberg's poker hours did not diminish. "It's tough to battle the mind-set of, 'I'm going to graduate, and this poker is pretty regular money,' " he said. "I don't think I can make $120,000 doing anything but poker. I was half-studying for my politics exam today, but I got bored and started playing poker on my computer instead." If the experts are correct, though, Mr. Sandberg might want to focus on that exam. "Gambling is a game of chance," Mr. Whyte said. "Some people can make a living doing it, but even in the long run, most people regress to the mean and wind up with zero or close to it." http://www.nytimes.com/2005/03/14/ed...rtner=homepage ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Internet Radio Contest  Win The Coolest Network Music Player Ever! This month all RP supporters will be automatically entered in our March Listener Support Drawing. We'll be giving away five Roku SoundBridge M500 Network Music Players. We've investigated just about every network player out there, and the Roku Soundbridge is far and away the best one we've tested. It's amazingly easy to set up (via either WiFi or wired Ethernet) and works flawlessly. It'll interface with iTunes, Windows Media Player, and several other programs to access your MP3 library - or it'll play Internet radio stations like RP without involving a computer at all. The sound quality is outstanding - and it looks way cool, too. All March RP supporters (including those of you who send support automatically via recurring payments) will be automatically entered in the drawing. You can also enter by emailing rebecca@radioparadise.com. Deadline for entries is 3/31/05 at midnight PST. The drawing will be held at noon on 4/1/05 (no fooling). http://www.radioparadise.com/ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 'Blair Witch' Creator Takes New Project To Web "Blair Witch Project" director and co- creator Daniel Myrick has come a long way from the spooky woods of Maryland to the sunny bike paths of Venice Beach. On Tuesday Myrick launches "The Strand," a live-action experimental series set on Venice's famous beachfront sidewalk, once again harnessing the Internet to connect him with his audience. A lot has changed since unexpected blockbuster "Blair Witch" introduced the mainstream entertainment industry to the term "viral marketing." "The Strand" is designed for independent online distribution, an approach that wasn't possible in 1999. "There are a handful of executives out there who are the gatekeepers of what gets made and seen -- or not," Myrick said. "I've pitched so many ideas and come away frustrated. So we just decided to do it ourselves." Each webisode uses method-film techniques to capture real people and actors like Katherine Helmond interacting in a world where spontaneous and scripted dialogue seamlessly co-exist. "The webisodic format allows me to do so much exploration of characters and story without constraints on language or topic," Myrick said. The world premiere will be available for free at www.strandvenice.com. Gearhead Pictures, Myrick's production company, is using digital payments technology from BitPass to charge 99 cents for each webisode after that. He also is considering whether to seek sponsors. Myrick said this project demonstrates the future of filmmaking, in which filmmakers can use the Internet for distribution while protecting their content with technology that manages licenses, payments and promotions of the digital content. "Unlike a Fox show that needs 3 million viewers a week or it's canceled, I only need a fraction of that and I can be filming forever," he said. "At Sundance, we were the only ones out there not looking for distribution. You've already got the largest distribution network in the world already on your desktop, and the end-user experience is getting better every day." The official Web site will document the production process and encourage audience interaction, which will be used to shape the series as it progresses, Myrick said. He also intends to post audition videos, chat rooms and character point-of-view cameras. "I know how powerful the Internet can be. I've seen it firsthand," Myrick said. "I think this is the perfect home for 'The Strand,' and I'm excited about its potential." He believes that the entertainment industry is averse to taking risks, a condition that limits innovation and creativity, but that the Internet can provide a viable alternative for filmmakers. Adding a micropayment system rather than rely on advertising gives online ventures an interesting business model as well. "BitPass enables independent production companies like us to make a show 'for the people, by the people,' where production is sponsored by people who watch it, leaving its destiny in the hands of those who care most about its future," Myrick said. BitPass has nearly 2,000 digital content merchants. The company has received venture funding from Worldview Technology Partners, Steamboat Ventures (the venture capital arm of the Walt Disney Co.), RRE Ventures and others. http://edition.cnn.com/2005/TECH/int...eut/index.html ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ End Of The Peer Show? Charles Arthur Is file-sharing really on the wane? And if it is, what's the true cause? If you believe the UK's biggest record labels, in the form of the British Phonographic Industry (BPI), we are already on the road to the Elysian fields where everyone buys their music either legally online or legally in shops, and never duplicates a CD or wanders on to a file-sharing network. Well, they can hope, but it's wise to have something helping things along. On Friday, they won a High Court order that will see six internet service providers forced to hand over the names of 31 people the BPI alleges have been making "large numbers" of songs available through such networks. The previous week, the BPI got 23 out of 26 people it had brought cases against on the same grounds to make out-of-court settlements, paying up to £4,000 (average £2,000) each. So what's the trend in file-sharing use? Interestingly, it does seem to be vaguely downwards, although it's very hard to pin that down to a particular country. And it might be more correct to say that the trend in online music file- sharing is not growing, but stabilising. "File sharing has become firmly established among UK internet users, massively outperforming the legitimate services, as shown by some recent Jupiter consumer survey data," says Mark Mulligan, an analyst at Jupiter Research. "Legal action has to be seen as part of a slow integrated strategy that will, bit by bit, reduce the impact of file sharing. But it's not going to wipe it out. The utopian ideal of a world without illegal file-sharing simply won't happen, in the same way as shoplifting will never wholly disappear from the music retail equation." On the plus side for the BPI, the trend in online music-buying is relentlessly up, to the extent that in the last week of 2004 it outstripped sales of physical CD singles. With the shops open again, online songs sell only about one-tenth of the physical ones. But it's catching up. So is the BPI right to claim, as it has, that this is because its legal threats are taking effect, while online stores such as iTunes and Napster become more prominent in peoples' thinking? I think there are less obvious reasons for the apparent fall in such sharing, and most come bundled with the file-sharing programs themselves. They're the insidious adware programs added to the free programs such as Bearshare, KaZaA, Grokster, iMesh and eDonkey. The reason they're bundled? First, while everyone seems to be getting a free lunch by downloading music without payment, the writers of the adware reckon they can at least rent out the space on the table. Developers of "peer-to-peer" (P2P) software are thus regularly approached by makers of adware who offer money to get their programs included in the finished product, because tens of millions of people use file-sharing programs, no matter what efforts the BPI and its US cousin, the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA), make to sue the users and program writers into retreat. The spyware and adware fighter Ben Edelman did an interesting comparison on what the P2P programs really add to your hard drive, which he wrote up on his blog last week (www.benedelman.org/news/030705-1.html). Although the study was itself sponsored by one of the P2P programs, LimeWire, with the fairly clear agenda of dissing its rivals, the evidence is still stunning. The licence agreements these programs expect you to click "Agree" to run to tens of thousands of words. The reality is that reading these agreements is a superheroic effort that most people won't bother with, as they don't with almost all click-through agreements. And the programs come with some truly frustrating add-ons that will do all the classic adware things - add dozens (even hundreds) of entries to the Windows Registry, add pop-ups to Internet Explorer, and generally slow your computer down while making your online life a misery. I think people have come to recognise this: that it's the adware that comes along for the ride and then takes control when you install a P2P program that really causes havoc, not the program itself. However, generally you can't get the one without the other, although Edelman found that LimeWire limits itself only to nagging the user to upgrade to the paid-for version if they use the free one. I think any downward trend in the use of file-sharing programs is down to that rather than the BPI having struck fear into the hearts of teenagers or parents. For one thing, the lawsuits have progressed in a remarkably low-key fashion. Although three of the first tranche of cases may attract extra publicity by reaching court, it was pretty quiet between October and the announcement. The weakness for the BPI and RIAA is that their argument that every song downloaded (or indeed uploaded) is a lost sale is palpably false, because not everyone is prepared to pay for every song they'll download for free. An interesting discussion has taken place in the past few days on what the best price would be for online music downloads. At the Canadian Music Conference in Toronto, Sandy Pearlman of McGill University (and former producer of The Clash) suggested 5 US cents (plus a 1 per cent tax on new computers). The music business is having none of it. In fact, what the record labels really want is to raise the price of online songs; they're unhappy at the 79p that Apple charges in the UK. They think it's too low. Pearlman argues that dropping the price would lead to exponential growth in downloads, thus recouping any apparent "lost" revenues. And, as online music sells much more "back catalogue" (stuff you can't find in most record shops), all its costs have already been paid. But no; the record labels want to hike the price, and kill the goose that is laying these new golden eggs. From suing its customers to soaking them, you have to agree that it is at least consistent. http://news.independent.co.uk/world/...p?story=620455 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ File-Sharing Is A Lot More Than Stolen Music Andrew Kantor On March 29, the Supreme Court will begin hearing arguments in what's been tagged the "Grokster" case. A full 28 entertainment companies filed suit against several makers of peer-to-peer (P2P) file-sharing software, including one called Grokster, claiming that, because that software can be used for illegal purposes — spreading pirated copies of songs, movies, and software — it should be banned. By that logic, knives, baseball bats, and guns should also be outlawed. Grokster and friends won this suit when it was heard before the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals (in MGM v. Grokster). The court held that the software — like knives, bats, and guns — has substantial noninfringing uses. That's the key phrase, and it ties back to the 1984 "Betamax" decision by the Supreme Court (Sony Corp. v. Universal City Studios). It said that if a tool was "capable of commercially significant noninfringing uses" it was A-OK. (I'm paraphrasing. Justice Stevens was somewhat more detailed.) But now we're back to the Supreme Court, this time with file-sharing instead of VCRs. Central files For a lot of people, the whole concept of file sharing is a vague notion: "People can trade files over the Internet." But there's more to it than that, and besides, the whole concept of P2P is interesting and new. For a long time the only way you got a file on the Internet was to download it from a server, usually run by a company. Someone has the file and "serves" it from their computer so you (and lots of other people) can get a copy — you got the latest copy of Adobe's Acrobat Reader from adobe.com, for example. There are two problems with this. First, it means that the company offering something has to be ready for potentially thousands of people downloading it; the server has to handle requests from all of them. Just like at a big restaurant with a single waiter, that server is going to be overwhelmed; service will suck. The other problem is that by having a centralized system you can become a target of someone who doesn't want you to distribute whatever your distributing for political or legal reasons. Call it the Pearl Harbor model — having all your eggs in one basket invites trouble. That's what killed Napster, one of the original and best-known file-sharing networks. More in a second. Peer-to-peer file sharing is different. It doesn't use central servers to hold files. Instead, every computer on the network can be a server and send or receive files. You can offer anything you want to other people on the Net, and you can download anything of theirs they make available. With P2P you don't have to find an "official" server of some sort. All you need is someone else, somewhere on the Net, who has what you want. Generation gap The rise of P2P came with the rise of the MP3 music format. Before MP3, individual songs were so large that even with high-speed connections it took a long time to send them to one another. It was impractical to share songs. But the MP3 format shrinks files down to a fraction of their original size, and suddenly music sharing was doable. This did not make the Recording Industry Association of America happy, because it meant that people were sharing music, not (they claim) buying it. The first P2P program to hit the public consciousness was Napster. But Napster had a fatal flaw: It required a central server (run by Napster) to keep track of who had what to share. And yes, most of it was music. This meant the RIAA had a clear target, and it made a convincing case — here was the company running a service that was being used to illegally share music. It eventually drove Napster out of business. Peer-to-peer users and programmers were smart, so they created the next generation of P2P software with Napster in their minds. This software that didn't require a central server. Without napster.com, Napster couldn't work. But as long as this new P2P software exists, the networks will exist. So today we have nebulous networks of users who can share their files without being tied to a particular site. And today, file sharing is huge. Despite claims that its is on the way out, it's getting bigger and bigger. Not too long ago I found almost 600 million files — more than 4.5 million gigabytes (that's 4.5 petabytes) — on a single P2P. Holy wow. Working knowledge Most P2P software uses one of three major "networks." Each network has several of clients you can use to access it (kind of the same way both Firefox, Internet Explorer, and Netscape are all clients for viewing the Web). Some clients free, some are supported with ads, and some are commercial software. big guns are the FastTrack network (with clients that include Kazaa and Grokster); the Gnutella network (with clients that include BearShare, Gnucleus, LimeWire, and Morpheus); and the BitTorrent network, which is a somewhat different model (clients include the original BitTorrent, BitTornado, and my favorite, Yet Another BitTorrent Client). FastTrack and Gnutella work in similar ways. When you start your client, it uses various methods to find other users on the network — they’re called nodes. Each of those other nodes, because they’re already connected, has a list of other nodes, which it passes on to your software. In a few seconds you’re connected to dozens of other machines. (It could be hundreds or thousands, but the software sets limits so the network isn’t overwhelmed.) Let’s say you want to search for the Marc Lindsay’s 1970 song “Arizona.” You enter “Arizona” into the software’s search field and choose “Music” or “Audio,” lest you find things like maps of the state. Your client then sends your request to the nodes nearest you. If they don’t have the song, they pass your request on to other nodes, until you’ve searched thousands of machines. Hopefully one or more has the song, which will then show up in your search results list. Tell your software to download it, and one or more of those other nodes will start sending it. (In fact, if more than one computer has it, P2P software can do a “swarm” download, in which it gets different pieces of the same file from different nodes. That means no one node has to supply the whole thing — think of it as spreading the labor.) At the same time that you’re searching and downloading, the files on your machine are available to others. Not, obviously, all your files — your P2P client has a list of which ones you’re willing to share. When you set up the software, you would have told it what you want to make available. So while you’re downloading “Arizona,” you might notice someone else downloading something from your machine. BitTorrent is a little different. Someone who wants to share something first creates another file — a .torrent file — that describes what he’s sharing. (There is special software for this.) He can post that .torrent to his Web site, for example. People who click on that .torrent link will download that file. The big difference is that BitTorrent clients don’t have a search function. You don’t search the network for a file; you have to find a .torrent for it, using sites such as isoHunt, TorrentReactor, and TorrentSpy which are databases of .torrent files out there on the Net. BitTorrent clients connect with your Web browser so clicking on a .torrent link starts the download process. The beauty of BitTorrent is that the people who are downloading something become sources of that file as well. So what starts off as one person sharing (which can eat a lot of his bandwidth) can quickly become a lot of people sharing the same thing. An ad hoc distribution network emerges as long as the .torrent file is out there. Note, too, that I said “the people who are downloading it become sources of that file…” in the present tense. With BitTorrent, you start sharing a file soon after you begin downloading. It works on a tit for tat basis — “Those that provide the most to others get the best treatment in return,” as the site puts it. It encourages you not to “leech” by forcing you to upload to others as you download. Forward, march Whether FastTrack, Gnutella, or BitTorrent, that’s how P2P works: Everybody shares. The RIAA’s nightmare is that one person buys a CD (shelling out $15 for two good songs), then “rips” those songs into MP3 files and makes them available via a P2P network. In theory, 10 people who download 50 Cent’s “Candy Shop” are 10 people who don’t buy his album “The Massacre.” Eventually the guy’s gonna have to sell one of his Escalades to pay one of his mortgages, and the RIAA doesn’t want to see that happen. But without a central server like Napster’s, there’s no convenient target for lawsuits. That’s why the RIAA is going after individual file sharers one at a time. And it’s not just the RIAA. You can download movies via P2P networks as well (a 4 GB DVD of “The Incredibles” can make its way to you via BitTorrent overnight), not to mention software valued in the thousands of dollars. But pirated music, movies, and software is only one reality of file sharing, and yes, it’s out there. But a lot of people use P2P networks for legal reasons — to share large files without taking a big hit on their servers. In fact, the Internet was built on a similar idea — that decentralization means robustness. In fact, a fairly large chunk of what’s out there is completely above board. Folks put their photos on P2P networks. Ad agencies release videos that quickly spread over the Net. Smaller software companies that can’t afford huge bandwidth charges put their products out on P2P networks so users can help distribute them just by leaving their computers connected. Substantial noninfringing uses? You bet. But even though it may seem that there’s a ton of illegal content out there, getting it, as I discovered, is not quite so simple. That story next week. http://www.usatoday.com/tech/columni...-kantor_x.htm# |
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Join Date: May 2001
Location: New England
Posts: 10,017
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August
Defcon 12's Fear and Hacking in Vegas Humphrey Cheung The 12th annual Defcon hacker convention was held at the Alexis Park Hotel in Las Vegas Nevada. For three days, hackers exchanged ideas, presented new and sometimes scary information and partied hard. More than a hundred speakers gave dozens of talks on computer security, hacking and privacy issues. For a mere $80 attendees received access to the talks, contests and the after-hours parties. In this article we will cover some of the more interesting contests and give you an overall feel for the convention so that you can decide whether you want to attend next year. Three download videos are included. The Wall of Sheep is a projector screen that displays captured usernames and passwords. The Wall, which originally was named as the Wall of Shame, is a time-honored tradition at Defcon where a loose knit group of people continuously sniffs the network for any plaintext usernames and passwords on the wired and wireless networks. Since this is a hacker convention, attendees using the Defcon network should protect their logins by using VPN, SSH or other encryption technology. Some attendees apparently didn't get the message. In the first few years, the usernames and passwords were written on paper plates and then taped to the wall. As the number of passwords found grew, a better solution had to be found. A computer security engineer, named "Riverside", wrote the Wall of Sheep software from scratch. He also was one of the original people who started the Wall. The usernames and passwords cycle up and down so people can see all the information gathered since the start of the convention. In addition only the first three characters of the password are shown in order to protect the privacy of the user. Riverside said that some people have been so ignorant in using the wireless at Defcon. He gave several examples of people who had their passwords intercepted, who then tried to change their passwords on the same insecure network, only to have the information intercepted again! Riverside examines all the new attacks at Defcon and then implements a defense at his daytime job. About 200-500 passwords are found every year at Defcon. The typical passwords are email, FTP and other login passwords. This year, someone was dumb enough to email their tax returns in .PDF format at the convention. This traffic was immediately intercepted and the above humorous message was displayed on the projector. Also another person was emailing people asking how to get a fake ID. This was also intercepted and displayed. I have blacked out some identifying information to protect the users' privacy. As Riverside explains, "The Wall has shown people the importance of using encryption, not just at Defcon but in all network traffic. I have had security experts who have attended Black Hat, SANS and other conventions thank me for showing them how vulnerable their traffic was." Spot The Fed Another time-honored tradition at Defcon is the "Spot the Fed" contest. Attendees win shirts for spotting federal agents in the crowd. Most of the time the Feds are very easy to spot as they generally appear healthier and wear a more conservative style of clothing than the normal Defcon attendee. At the beginning of a talk, attendees will point out federal agents in the crowd. The accuser and the accused will both go up on stage. Then the accuser asks questions to determine if the guy really is a Federal agent or not. Some of the questions were, "Do you carry a gun for your job?" and "Do you have a security clearance?" After enough questions are asked and answered, the crowd then shouts whether they think the person is a fed or not. The contest is done very well and usually the questioning is humorous. The feds that are "caught" take everything in stride and everyone has a good laugh. Meet The Fed:Press Panel At this press-only event, a seven-member panel of federal agents, led by Jim Christy Director of the DoD Cyber Crime Institute, fielded questions from reporters. Some of the agencies represented were: FBI, NSA, IRS, DoD, Air Force and Postal Service. The topics centered around privacy issues, child porn cases and identity theft. Privacy And The Patriot Act Privacy is a big concern for people, especially with the hacker community. The feds described laws as a pendulum that swings between safety and privacy. Right now the pendulum has swung towards safety, as demonstrated by the passage of the Patriot Act and other counter-terrorism measures that have been taken in the USA. As time goes on, the Feds say that the pendulum will eventually swing towards privacy. The wiretap provision of the Patriot Act has made law enforcement much easier in certain cases. Before the Patriot Act, law enforcement obtained court orders to tap specific telephone numbers. This worked great as long as the person didn't move or buy another cell phone. In today's technological age, this didn't work too well as officials had to write another court order for a different phone number. After the Patriot Act was passed, law enforcement can now obtain a court order to tap the electronic communications of a person. So if the suspect changes numbers, a new court order is not required. Child Porn Cases Child porn cases have exploded and now constitute about a quarter of all electronic crime cases involving forensics. Agents told us that the computer and the Internet have become great enablers for child pornography. Child pornography has always existed but now it is very easy for suspects to use digital cameras and the Internet to spread the pictures. The volume of information being seized for forensic analysis has mushroomed. It is not uncommon to see multiple terabytes of storage being examined. Agents said that some cases are approaching the petabyte range. Usually is because of emails and email attachments. Only with the development of better search techniques can the evidence be examined, as it is physically impossible to read every single email in many of these massive cases. Identity Theft Cases Identity theft or "Phishing" cases have mushroomed in the last few years. One of the federal agents even admitted to being a victim of identity theft. In the process of moving out of an apartment, he placed a change of address/mail forwarding notice to the Post Office. The bad thing is that after the notice expires some mail can still go to the old address. A loan application was received by the new tenant and things went downhill quickly. The new tenant was able to apply for the loan by using the agent as the cosigner. The agent says that even though he has spent a considerable amount of time trying to erase this mistake from his credit reports, it still comes up from time to time. Recruitment The agents said that they do recruit at Defcon and other security conventions. Recruitment has been way up since 9/11. As an example given by Christy, before 9/11 the NSA was receiving 600 resumes a month, while in the first three months after 9/11 they were receiving in excess of 20000 resumes a month. Interested hackers have often come up to the agents asking how they can use their skills to help protect their country. Bluetooth Vulnerabilities Hackers have found many flaws with Bluetooth devices. As these devices gain in popularity, the public needs to be made aware of vulnerability issues with the various Bluetooth devices such as phones, PDAs and wireless headsets. Three of the most interesting attacks were Bluesnarfing, Bluetracking and Bluebugging. Bluesnarfing is attacking the Bluetooth device, usually a phone, to rip out information. Hackers can obtain phonebooks, calendars and stored SMS messages. Bluetracking is tracking a person's movement by tracking their Bluetooth device. All Bluetooth devices have a unique address, similar to a MAC address on computer network cards. By using special sensors or antennas you can see where a particular Bluetooth device pops up and record a person's movement. Bluebugging involves sending executable commands to the Bluetooth device. With the proper software, you could secretly turn on a phone and make it call you. Why is this important? You have just turned the phone into a listening device that can record without your target knowing it. BlueSniper When the Flexilis team walked in with their BlueSniper Bluetooth sniper, everyone wanted to know what this evil looking contraption could do. It looks like a mutant cross between a sniper rifle and Ghostbusters particle canon, complete with nuclear backpack. Thankfully, it is a very simple device that can do one thing well: find and attack Bluetooth devices from far away. The BlueSniper is a rifle stock with a scope and yagi antenna attached. A cable attaches the antenna to the Bluetooth card, which can be in a PDA or laptop computer. The laptop can be carried in a backpack with the cables connecting into the backpack, giving it the Ghostbusters look. The Flexilis teams demonstrated the gun with some home-brewed Bluetooth scanning software. They pointed the gun down the hallways and out windows. Almost instantly, vulnerable phones with their unique Bluetooth device numbers appeared on the laptop screen. The device is powerful enough to detect devices through building walls. Vendor Area The vendor area had several stores that sold everything from lockpicks to funny shirts. Most everything was available as a cash-only purchase. There are no paper trails here. Irvine Underground was selling all types of lockpicks and lockpicking manuals. They also had a practice lockpick area where attendees could try out their newly purchased picks. Hackers wanting to proclaim their skills to the whole world could buy cool shirts and stickers at the Jinx.com booth. Wi-Fi Shootout Contest Defcon had its second annual Wi-Fi Shootout contest. This contest pits teams against each other in the pursuit of the longest 802.11 link. Teams must be able to send a test message from laptop to laptop out in the searing Nevada desert. P.A.D. was the winning team with an amazing 55.1 mile successful link. This was done with regular Wi-Fi cards and no amplifier. The team said that they could have probably gone a longer distance, but they ran out of road to drive. P.A.D.'s story is an amazing one. The three teenagers are 18 and 19 years old. The two antennas they used were converted satellite dishes and were so big that they had to be hauled in a trailer. They had started building them only 19 days before the contest. At the awards ceremony, they said that the link between the two antennas at eight miles was better than the link between two wireless laptops sitting right next to each other. Tempers Flare Unfortunately I was unable to attend the Electronic Civil Disobedience and the Republican National Convention talk given by a teenager called CrimetheInc (real name unknown). With a talk title like that, you know that sparks may fly, and they did. I cannot report exactly what the speaker said, as the tape has not yet been made available. Hopefully they will appear on the Defcon media archives page soon. According to eyewitnesses who saw the talk, some attendees took offense to what the speaker was saying. At the end of the talk, someone ran up to the stage and tried to assault the speaker. Security grabbed the speaker and placed him in isolation for a few hours. Conclusion As the convention wore on, I could tell that it was taking a toll on attendees. The lobby of the Alexis Park looked like a graveyard of dead hackers, as many were passed out from the talks, drinking and general lack of sleep. For only $80 USD, the Defcon convention is a great event to attend, if you are willing to accept a few problems. First, you may not get into the talk you want because seating is limited. Long lines make attendees wait 30 minutes or more for some of the more popular talks. In many cases, you are waiting in the 100+ degree heat of Las Vegas. Meeting people and making friends is the great thing about Defcon. I was able to meet like-minded and not so like-minded people. Every night there were dozens of parties happening in separate areas of the Alexis Park. Beer and hard liquor flowed freely. If you can accept a few problems and want to learn computer security, meet hackers and federal agents, and party till the early morning... Defcon is for you. http://www.tomshardware.com/business...021/index.html ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ British Band Releases New Album Via Altnet Thomas Mennecke Altnet, apparently the beacon of independent artists, is promoting the British pop band, the "Stereophonics." Altnet has recently become more active in the independent artist arena. Two weeks ago, Altnet announced a new initiative aimed at sharing revenue with independent labels through ad revenue. Considering that major music labels seem uninterested in dealing with P2P companies, the next best alternative is independent music. With relaxed copyright enforcement policies compared to its RIAA counterparts, P2P companies have found dealing with independent labels is significantly easier. To promote their latest work, the entire album or individual tracks will be available for $9.99 or $0.99 cents respectively. The video to their first track is available free to Kazaa users, providing you don’t accidentally download some kind of virus or trojan. "Increasingly, artists and independent labels understand the value of using peer-to-peer as a distribution mechanism to reach millions of fans," states Alan Morris, Executive Vice President of Sharman Networks. "Using peer-to-peer" is an interesting choice of words. Although Altnet does utilize P2P technology, the prices offered are really no better than iTunes, Rhapsody or Napster. http://www.slyck.com/news.php?story=701 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Record Labels' Legal Blitz Hits 31 More Music Pirates Jo Best Music industry body the BPI has launched a fresh wave of legal actions against alleged file-sharers, nearly two weeks after it announced the settlement of cases against 23 file-sharers for average damages of £2,000 each. The High Court has granted the BPI (British Phonographic Industry) an order requiring six ISPs to give up the names and addresses of 31 individuals believed to be serial music peer-to-peer uploaders. The ISPs have 14 days to comply. Once officials have the details of the alleged song- swappers, they will contact them and offer them the opportunity to settle out of court or face court proceedings. BPI general counsel Geoff Taylor said file-sharers come from all walks of life and advised parents to check that their children are not using illegal P2P services. http://management.silicon.com/govern...9128622,00.htm ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Security Flaw in Popular Peer-to-Peer Filesharing Program University Press Release A Cornell University research group has discovered serious vulnerabilities in a widely-used peer-to-peer filesharing program. The weakness in LimeWire, a popular client for the Gnutella filesharing network, would allow an intruder to read any file on a computer running the program, including confidential information such as internal documents, sensitive information and some password files. The problem occurs in both the free and paid versions of the program, in all operating systems for which it is available. As soon as his group noticed the problem, Emin Gun Sirer, Cornell assistant professor of computer science, immediately notified Lime Wire LLC, the company that distributes the software. "Lime Wire responded immediately and had a patch ready within a few hours," Sirer reported, adding that the company needed several days to get the patches out to all of the 36 million people who had downloaded the program. LimeWire automatically posts a notice of the need to install a patch when it is turned on. Patches are available for all versions of the program except those that run on classic versions of the Mac OS, and the company is working on that, Sirer said. The most serious vulnerability affects LimeWire versions 4.1.2 - 4.4.5. It enables intruders to connect to a computer even through a firewall. A second vulnerability affects versions 3.9.6 - 4.6.0, but can be stopped by a firewall. The latest, corrected version of the program is version 4.8.0; on the Mac platform, the latest corrected version is 4.0.10. Both vulnerabilities can be exploited without any special tools, Sirer said, through an ordinary telnet login. Like other Gnutella clients, the LimeWire program is designed to allow users to download music and video files shared through the Gnutella network, and also to allow the user to provide shared files to others. The glitch in the program unfortunately allowed remote users to retrieve other files, not just those in the user's sharing folder. Sirer is a specialist in peer-to-peer systems. He and his graduate student Kevin Walsh discovered the LimeWire problem while working on a new application, called Credence, that is intended to work with LimeWire to give users a way to determine how trustworthy data on the network may be. "Much of the content in peer-to-peer filesharing networks is corrupt, damaged, or mislabeled. Such polluted content makes it difficult for correctly functioning peers to locate desired content," Sirer explains. Credence allows users to share ratings of objects, similar to the ratings on Amazon, but with features that discourage dishonest ratings. The idea has applications to many other types of peer-to-peer networks, such as those in which distributed workers collaborate. "As systems scale bigger and there is more collaboration on the net, we are going to need systems for evaluating the statements made by peers," he explained. "We are just computing the likelihood that what you say is true." Related World Wide Web sites: The following sites provide additional information on this news release. Some might not be part of the Cornell University community, and Cornell has no control over their content or availability. Credence: http://www.cs.cornell.edu/People/egs/credence/ LimeWire: http://www.limewire.com/english/content/home.shtml http://www.newswise.com/articles/view/510473/ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Bug Fixed In Open-Source File-Sharing Software Open-source file-sharing software company LimeWire has been forced to fix its software after a hole was discovered that allowed an intruder to read any file on a user’s hard drive - whether it was made available to share or not. The hole was discovered by researchers at Cornell University in the US. The current version of LimeWire is 4.8.1 and the company has warned all users with versions prior to 4.8 to upgrade. Some users of file-sharing or P2P programs do not configure their software properly and allow intruders or genuine users to access any parts of their PC, instead of just the areas where their intended shared information is located. As well as creating their own privacy problems, such users can make available confidential information such as online banking details. The LimeWire flaw, however, was down to software development problems. According to Download.com, LimeWire has been downloaded 42 million times. http://www.computerweekly.com/articl...earch=&nPage=1 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Nothing to Fear from Peer-to-Peer, Says Cinequest Film Festival Leonard Jacobs Despite the ubiquity of film festivals around the nation and the world, there was something remarkable about the 15th annual Cinequest Film Festival, which ended Sun., March 13, in San Jose, Calif. It was one of the first festivals -- perhaps the only one so far -- to offer commercial-free, DVD-quality downloads of its films to a desktop or laptop computer. At a time when legal questions about peer-to-peer file sharing are before the U.S. Supreme Court and the actors' unions are wrestling with how to stop the illegal piracy of films and television programs -- a problem costing actors money each year -- Cinequest's innovation, courtesy of Kontiki, a file- sharing program, could be expected to raise eyebrows. And raise them it did. After learning of Cinequest's digital- download option, Pamm Fair, the Screen Actors Guild's deputy national executive director for policy and strategic planning, said the union remains "vehemently opposed to any unlawful use of copyrighted materials" and would want to know more about Cinequest's antipiracy efforts before condoning or condemning the innovation. "While peer-to-peer is a format many embrace for a litany of purposes," Fair noted, "whenever this and other technology is used to steal copyrighted materials, we firmly object. Our members are paid by unit sales for DVDs and this practice takes money directly out of their pockets." Ben Hess, Cinequest's director of content acquisition, said the festival used "digital rights management" software tied to Windows Media Player and that "all content is encrypted," thereby preventing illegal peer-to-peer sharing. His comments also came in response to a query regarding an interview with the festival's executive director, Halfdan Hussey, in Wired magazine. In it, Hussey touted Cinequest's digital download capabilities and predicted that in the future "the Internet will be a staging device for direct delivery of indie movies to a user's desktop or home entertainment center." This, he added, would likely "bring new revenue to independent filmmakers and distributors outside of the realm of Hollywood within the next two to four years." The Cinequest Film Festival, Hess said, "respects the jurisdiction of the union and expects producers to observe the terms of their contracts." Once downloaded, "the films can be shared with others, but since films are downloaded with 'time- out' features, it makes them unusable after a certain date -- the date determined by the filmmakers who gave us permission to have the films available for download." In addition, the application employed by the festival this year worked only for PC users: Mac owners could not use the Kontiki-powered system to play the encrypted films. Hess also stated that the festival is keenly aware of SAG's stepped-up antipiracy efforts on behalf of its members. The union recently joined four other labor organizations representing the country's actors, writers, directors, and musicians in complaining of the injury caused by illegal downloads in a 21-page "friend of the court" brief filed in support of film and music companies led by Metro-Goldwyn- Mayer. Last fall, the Supreme Court agreed to hear a lawsuit brought by a fleet of major studios against Grokster Ltd. and StreamCast Networks Inc., two file-sharing services, arguing that the services illegally provide music and films over the Internet. The court's decision, expected later this spring, could force a rewrite of current copyright law. "New technology does mean new revenue streams," concluded SAG spokesperson Ilyanne Kichaven, "and when there is no copyright infringement -- when it's contractually 'covered' -- there's no problem. But we must be vigilant. SAG has been very aggressive in working with other entities to prevent piracy and to find solutions to prevent the illegal use of performers' work. Our goal is to protect performers' rights." http://www.backstage.com/backstage/n..._id=1000844058 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ The Problem With Digital Versions of My Books David Pogue Chris M. writes: I love your book Windows XP Home Edition: The Missing Manual, but 700 pages makes for a very heavy book to lug around! Is there any chance of creating an electronic version, like a PDF, that I could just keep on my laptop for reference? The truth is, I try to avoid making electronic versions because they are instantly, and I mean INSTANTLY, pirated. On the warez (pirated software) Web sites, you can find every book Ive ever released in electronic form. More upsetting, I do offer to release electronic copies of these books to blind readers, who can use screen readers to read the material aloud. But last year, a reader wrote to request a PDF of "Mac OS X: The Missing Manual, claiming to be blind, and THAT book is now floating around the pirated software Web sites, too! Here's one possible solution: check out SafariBooksOnline.com. It's a joint venture of over 15 computer-book publishers, including O'Reilly, Que, Peachpit, Addison- Wesley and Microsoft Press, that have agreed to put all the texts and graphics online, in searchable format. You have to pay for this service, but its not much, and it gives you access to hundreds of books all at once. http://www.nytimes.com/2005/02/04/te...4d0be8&ei=5070 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Marketing Scanning the Media The Rise of "Peer-to-Peer" Pop Culture In the 1990s, the growth of the anime and game software industries was driven by a reduction in the size and weight of computers and the growth of the Internet. Digital technologies such as interactivity, computer graphics, 3D, Internet games gave birth to new ways of expression. The structure of business is changing as well, due to diversification of the media through digital broadcasting, broadband Internet and mobile technology. Distribution costs are falling rapidly. The market is going global. Producers have a direct connection with consumers. The digital transformation is driving the growth of new markets such as e-mail, web sites, mobile networks, ring tones, photo mail, and video mail. It is creating a new cultures, new customs, and new businesses. The popularity of fee-based content such as ring tones, fortune-telling, and games is shaping the popular industry and culture. In the mobile network arena, new venture firms have sprung up to develop contents to fill the mobile network market, These startup firms have created a multitude of web sites and created new markets practically overnight. Even more important is the fact that this digital transformation is tearing down the wall between professionals and amateurs. Digital technology makes it simple for anyone to create and share information. The digital transformation makes the "Everyone is a creator" concept a reality. In the analog age, content was created by a handful of professionals and consumed by the general public. The world was swept up by this "Hollywood Model" of production and distribution. With the digital era's "Peer-to-Peer Model" contents are created collaboratively, through participation, sharing, and exchange. The fact that Japan is holding its own in this race is strategically important for Japan improving its digital contents trade balance. http://www.jmrlsi.co.jp/english/inth...05/08_ptp.html ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Remote Approach Launches PDF Tracking Service Robyn Weisman On Thursday, Toronto-based company Remote Approach announced the launch of its inaugural solution, an online service that provides its clients with the ability to track and administer PDF documents through a variety of distribution channels. "A user uploads the PDF they want to track to Remote Approach, assigning variables like 'distribution channels' and 'groups' to add additional detail to the data captured. From there, they can download and distribute the PDF as desired," said John Bielby, president of Remote Approach Inc. "Every time the PDF is read, it briefly interacts with the reporting repository to record the event. The user has access to live reports and data to see reports on views, distribution by channel or user group, or even download the logs into other systems and applications," Bielby said. According to Bielby, clients of the service already are using it in several ways. Some simply wish to know whether their customers actually read or forward a client's PDFs after downloading them from the client's Web site, while others engaged in peer-to-peer marketing want measurable data on whether their available PDF is being effective, given that traditional Web analysis can't measure such data. "Using our service, [our clients] have been able to gauge the depth of their document penetration through the peer-to-peer networks. They can then use this data and reports to measure the effectiveness of their budget, identify more effective file names and determine timelines for document distribution," Bielby said. Forrester Research principal analyst Bob Markham said that while other applications exist that are similar to Remote Approach's, he is not aware of any other solution that is subscription-based. Bielby said that designing the solution as Web-based was intentional. "We wanted to make sure anyone working with PDF documents would have access to our software and not roll out various versions for Windows, Mac, Linux [and so forth] over years, as some companies have chosen to do," said Bielby, adding that integration with other reporting applications was a key concern for Remote Approach. Ektron integrates document management capabilites into its content management systems. Click here to read more. In addition, Remote Approach took a Web-based services approach because it wanted the cost of entry to be low. "Rather than taking on additional engineering projects and putting the client at risk with questions of whether their program was supported, we ensured that access to not only the reports but the raw data itself is available to our clients. With this method, they can not only use our reporting systems but can export the data to any other applications" that can access the data, Bielby said. Next Page: Skepticism surfaces. For his part, however, Forrester analyst Markham expressed skepticism about what he described as a lack of value for the customers of clients using this service. According to him, clients of Remote Approach risk the possibility that their customers will rebel against what they perceive as intrusiveness if they perceive that they do not benefit on their end. Remote Approach's service "doesn't offer the customer any type of security in the way Adobe [LiveCycle] Policy Server does, [such as] a small logo that indicates this [PDF] is authorized as an official document from the company. Nor does it offer 'active document' capabilities" that could, for example, update a product spec sheet for the end user, Markham noted. In response, Bielby said that within the next few weeks, Remote Approach will be offering its clients the optional feature of including a Remote Approach logo at the top of any tagged PDF. At the same time, Bielby pointed out that the purpose of the service is tracking, reporting and analytics. He added that he does not think customers will find it too intrusive; no more information is being collected in this fashion than when a visitor surfs to a given Web page, because Remote Approach's service uses well-established reporting norms, he said. "If a user is disturbed that when visiting Yahoo [his or her] IP address is recorded and a record of that page view is stored in the server logs, then [he or she] will be similarly unhappy with this service. "It's overdue to provide PDF publishers the tools that Web publishers have had for some time. It will allow document publishers to know what their audiences like and dislike so they can produce more—or less—of it," Bielby said. http://www.pdfzone.com/article2/0,1759,1776477,00.asp ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Legal form of peer to peer can revolutionize online music sales Press Release Looking at the playlist on a friend's computer, picking out your favorite hit and then downloading directly legally - a pipedream? Maybe not: At a business breakfast at CeBIT, Musicload will be presenting a model of how legal peer to peer could work. Who doesn´t envy real music aficionados every now and then for the huge collections of digital music on their PCs? But logging on to their computers and downloading titles is illegal. Musicload is thinking about new ways, however, how private individuals can swap music legally while respecting rights to the titles. "We know how successful illegal swap exchanges can work," says Susanne Peter, Director of Marketing and Sales at T-Online´s Musicload. "Unfortunately, we haven´t had anything like this for sale in the music industry so far. And that is an opportunity which has yet to be taken advantage of - the formation of a real community." How is legal peer to peer supposed to work? First of all, the original idea that Internet swap exchanges are based on still applies - although there are a few differences. For one thing, the holders of rights are involved in the system. Moreover, the providers offering titles guarantee high-quality files. The peer-to-peer model shows how users can link up with each other in the future, recommend music titles and swap them legally. Simple principle Here is one possible peer-to-peer scenario: Customer A enters a music portal as a buyer. He has registered his own music shop there and put together playlists. He then makes these playlists available to customer B, who is able to look at the playlists and their commentaries and recommendations and look for his favorite song titles. The next step is for customer B to download the titles onto his own hard disk directly from provider A´s hard disk. The files transferred are provided with the provider's legally acquired digital rights, which means that no copyrights are violated. Users of this service continue to pay a fee for each song - and the private provider gets a cut, too. He receives bonus points for transferring songs, for example, which he can use to purchase new titles at his favorite music portal. Helping users communicate and promoting the community - while at the same time creating incentives for the legal exchange of music files. This is the concept being presented by Musicload at CeBIT. Musicload from T-Online was launched on October 11, 2003. The portal now figures among the leading providers of legal music downloads. Musicload reached a total of 4,000,000 downloads in 2004. In the meantime, users download around 1,000,000 songs each month. With an offer that comprises almost 450,000 tracks, Musicload is particularly successful in the top ten singles charts. The T-Online platform works with all major record companies as well as independent labels. One track from Musicload costs between 99 cents and 1.59 euros, with album prices starting at 9.95 euros. Award for quality: Musicload is Computer-BILD test winner in a comparison with twelve other providers ( issue 1/2005, "Test: Music Download Offers" ). http://i-newswire.com/pr10160.html ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Share Video Online Kim Komando Digital videos are a great way to share memories, but they consume gobs of storage space, which makes it a challenge to share them. What do you do when your video is too large to fit in e-mail or even fit on a single DVD? The Web provides several storage alternatives. For instance, consider using a photo-sharing Web site. Many let you share video with family and friends in addition to still images. The fees to use these sites vary depending on how much storage space you need. Neptune Mediashare (www.neptune.com) is one example of a service that lets you post video albums. When you sign up, Neptune gives you a Web page where you can share videos. You can password-protect the page if you want to restrict access to only the guests you designate. Neptune's fees range from $59 per year for 150 megabytes of space to $599 for 10 gigabytes. Digital Silo (www.digitalsilo.com) offers a similar service, but it also will convert your tapes and DVDs to digital files, and post them in your space. Invited guests can enter the space and watch the movies. Conversion costs $44.95 per hour of tape. Film is $249 per hour, and DVDs run $34.95 an hour. These are one-time fees. The only other charge is a $9.95 annual membership fee. And you get enough storage for 240 hours of video. Sending videos to other folks, so they can edit or archive the footage, can be a challenge. Most e-mail systems limit attachments to just a few megabytes, which isn't enough storage to send more than a couple of minutes of video at low or medium resolution. Instead, consider setting up your own peer-to-peer (P2P) network on the Internet. Several programs make it easy. Take ShareGear (www.sharegear.com), for instance. This $49.95 Windows program can convert video directly from a digital camcorder. Then, you place the resulting file in the appropriate folder and let others know where to look. They link directly to your PC and download the file or files they need. Grouper (www.grouper.com) and Qnext (www.qnext.com) are two more Windows programs that are free and contain no spyware. You can use them if your video files are already prepared. They allow you, family members and friends to set up shared folders on your respective hard drives. If you don't want to mess with P2P software, you can use a video-sharing site. Streamload (www.streamload.com) and Xdrive (www.xdrive.com) are two worth considering. Using them is simple. You establish an account and download software from Streamload or Xdrive. The software enables you to upload your media files. You tell friends and family how to access the sites. They then can download the files. http://news.enquirer.com/apps/pbcs.d...50337/1003/BIZ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ A Universe Of Options p2pnet.net News Feature We've been running a weekly File Share Top Ten for quite a while now and we recently added a Movies File Share Top Ten. Soon, we'll be launching a monthly Platinum, Gold, Silver and Bronze download awards. The statistics used in these charts are from p2p research company Big Champagne and they appear only in p2pnet. We run them because, as USA TODAY’s Edna Gundersen sums it up, “With infinite capacity and far- flung communication links, the Internet has opened a universe of options to music enthusiasts”. We wanted to show what's really happening as opposed to what the members of the Big Four record label cartel say is happening. "Peer into the depths of cyberspace and a big-bang picture unfolds," says Gundersen. “It's a phenomenon the music business has yet to capitalize on ..." And that's because Big Music’s disingenuous claims to the contrary notwithstanding, the activity is on the p2p networks, and the p2p networks alone. There, hundreds of millions of digital files of all kinds – movies and music included - move around every hour. “While paid downloads skyrocketed to 140.9 million tracks in 2004 from 19.2 million in the last half of 2003 (no earlier figures are available), unauthorized file-sharing dwarfs purchases," says USA TODAY. "Since mid-2003, 19 billion [our emphasis] peer-to-peer transactions have occurred, predominantly current hits. But new sounds and new bands are emerging from Web cabals, a blow to radio and labels used to setting the agenda.” Great big megaphone Gundersen quotes Big Champagne ceo Eric Garland as saying, "We're seeing a clear and consistent pattern of some acts being championed by online communities and later embraced by traditional media outlets. "Nothing works like word of mouth, and online word of mouth is a great big megaphone. Instead of being able to tell two or three friends, you have entire Web rings of like-minded people quick to pass along recommendations." Earlier in the year, the Big Music cartel's IFPI (International Federation of Phonographic Industries) claimed paid-for downloads had risen more than tenfold to over 200 million, the implication being that the 230 sites are selling tracks like hot-cakes. However, there is, to all intents and purposes, only one site. The 200 million (now 300 million) tracks waved by the IFPI are 99.9% iTunes sales, and they've accumulated since the site went up the year before last. Three hundred million seems like a lot, even spread over several years, but in the real world of online music where the p2p networks rule, it amounts to nothing. The number of people logged on simultaneously at any minute of any day grew to nearly 10 million in April 2004, a 30% increase from the same period a year earlier, says an Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) study. And upwards of one billion songs are moving computer-to-computer every month, says p2p research firm Big Champagne. Big Music's RIAA (Recording Industry Association of America) says its sue 'em all campaign is making an appreciable dent in file sharing. However, various academic and other studies prove that far from being intimidated by the RIAA, more and more people are sharing files every day. Big Champagne stats say globally, on average, in February last year, 6,831,366 people were logged onto the p2p networks at any given moment, and that in the US, the figure was 4,039,989. The same figures for February, 2005, show this has risen substantially to 8,524,938 globally, and 6,183,636 for the US. This is changing not only how people get their music fixes, but also from whom they're getting them. As Gundersen points out, John Mayer's rise, “benefited from feverish swapping of mp3 files, the modern equivalent of tape-trading”. His ‘Daughters’ is currently #9 in this week’s p2pnet Rock Top Ten, up from #10 last week. Crucial to luring youth dollars Norah Jones reached Big Champagne's top 10 before she got significant airplay and the O Brother, Where Art Thou? and Garden State soundtracks popped at Champagne months before cracking Billboard, says Gundersen, quoting Garland as saying he’s convinced every known piece of recorded music is available somewhere online, and that growing awareness of the inventory is gradually changing consumer habits. Gundersen also hits THE important nail on the head, perhaps for the first time by a mainstream media outlet: "Unlike iTunes or Napster, enthusiast sites place community above commerce, earning credibility and loyalty that are crucial to luring youth dollars. That's one of the sticky challenges facing an industry that alienated downloaders with steep CD prices and piracy lawsuits.” As Cherry Lane Digital ceo Jim Griffin said recently, the labels, "cling to their pursuit of this notion of control and calling those who do not comply thieves, and in doing so they leave billions on the table that should be divided fairly amongst creators and rights holders." She says the war against file-sharers continues with the March 29 Supreme Court hearing when the entertainment industry will for the third time try to have lower-court decisions that p2p companies are not responsible for what their users do with the applications they sell, overturned. However, this ‘war’ is all in the mind of the entertainment industry. P2p is here to stay. The people, those whom the entertainment inindustry is trying to sue into buying 'product,' have spoken, and loudly. When the various corporate interests finally figure out they're operating in the digital 21st century and not the physical 1970s, the phony war will be over - until the next technological changes such as ultra-high-capacity storage and holographic media, perhaps, again threaten the corporate status quo. Not only niche fans USA TODAY has Big Champagne co-founder Joe Fleischer saying, "Certainly, copyright infringement and piracy are problems. But the very nature of computing is peer-to-peer, and no matter what happens, this type of activity will continue and grow. The lawsuits had an impact and made people aware that risk was involved." What was the result? “Now users are more secretive and 10 or 20 steps ahead (of the security measures)" and the major labels haven't learned how to serve rabid niche fans, who learned to serve themselves, says Fleischer. However, not only niche fans are rabid. Thousands of new people are going online every day meaning for the first time in history, 'we' have a voice 'they' have to listen to. Eventually, the entertainment industry will be forced to acknowledge its customers as active participants rather than mindless cash-cows. Moreover, the companies and governments forget the people they're suing are also the ones who are conceiving, developing, servicing and administering the very systems which keep the wheels turning and the money coming in. Think about it. In the meanwhile, what's really interesting abut the USA TODAYpiece isn't what's being said. It is, after all, nothing new. Look, though, at who's saying it. It's been a long time since a news outlet of USA TODAY's ilk did more than simply parrot entertainment industry puff pieces as if they came from credible sources. http://p2pnet.net/story/4177 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ The File-Sharing Follies Jon Newton With a landmark Supreme Court hearing on online file sharing slated for March 29, Hollywood is stepping up its multimillion-dollar, international PR blitz to keep peer-to-peer networks in the public eye and to characterize men, women and children who share music and other files online as hardened criminals. In the U.S., nearly 10,000 people have been sued. In Sweden the police raided the Stockholm offices of Bahnhof, Sweden's largest ISP. They were acting on behalf of the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA), which is looking for dirt on the sites it wants to shut down. According to Reuters, "U.S. copyright protection experts" -- i.e., the movie studio cartel's lawyers -- have considered Bahnhof a "haven for high-level Internet piracy for years." Six UK ISPs have been ordered to give the Big Music cartel's UK representative, the British Phonographic Industry (BPI), the names and addresses of 31 people said to have uploaded large numbers of music files onto P2P networks. The BPI says it will probably ramp up its attacks on UK file sharers, likening the action to legal fights to curb drunken driving. Backward Thinking International singing star Joni Mitchell once said, "The deal that I got was just atrocious. I mean, it was like slave labor, really -- no points, no budget. And I've never really had a good deal in the business." She also said, "Now, this is all calculated music. It's calculated for sales, it's sonically calculated, it's rudely calculated. I'm ashamed to be a part of the music business . You know, I just think it's a cesspool." Nor is Mitchell by any means alone in her view of the music business, which cynically casts itself as a tough but scrupulously fair entity that has the best interests of its artists and customers at heart. In truth, it's an industry run by venal, narrow-minded, technically ignorant people who have no idea how to treat music fans or the performers who have made them so very, very wealthy. The executives are making a religion out of refusing to accept that they live in the digital 21st century. As Britain's The Economist says, "So far they [the record labels] have been slow to embrace the Internet, which has seemed to them not an opportunity but their nemesis." The Supreme Court battle involves heavy and not-so-heavy interests from all parts of the corporate spectrum, all fighting for consumer dollars. But the most important people involved are the file sharers themselves -- customers whom the entertainment industry and its friends are trying to scare into buying their products. Crooks and Customers The principle of innocent until proven guilty is being mocked by the entertainment industry, which, with the assistance of the mainstream media, presents online file-sharers as crooks. When someone shares a digital music or any other file online, however, it's not a criminal offense. No sales are made and no money changes hands. Not one file sharer has ever seen the inside of a U.S. court, let alone been convicted of anything. Sharing a file with someone doesn't automatically mean the loss of a sale to the entertainment industry, its protestations to the contrary notwithstanding. File sharers are not criminals; they're victims of entertainment industry greed. Victims of Greed The music labels claim there's a thriving alternative to file sharing: corporate online music stores such as iTunes and Napster II. But this business is so tiny that it barely exists. Only an infinitesimal proportion of online music lovers use such sites. And that's because, in their greed, the labels wholesale their MP3 tracks for between 65 and 75 cents each, forcing the retailers to charge around a dollar a track. And the labels want to increase, not decrease, this already extortionate price. So, of course, few are buying. Instead, they get their music from one of the P2P networks, or from a site such as AllofMP3.com, which sells MP3s for pennies instead of dollars. Meanwhile, the true criminals -- the duplicators who use CDs and DVDs as masters for making counterfeit copies for software, music and movies -- count their profits, virtually untouched. http://p2pnet.net/story/4226 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Malaysia Intellectual Property Court Proposed The Government plans to set up a special court to try intellectual property cases, including disputes on patent rights and trademarks, and to deal with the issue of piracy. Domestic Trade and Consumer Affairs Minister Datuk Mohamed Shafie Apdal said the draft proposal for the setting up of the Intellectual Property Court had been submitted to the Attorney-General for study. Speaking to Malaysian journalists covering Deputy Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak's six-day visit here, Mohamed Shafie said disputes involving intellectual property rights and piracy cases were currently heard by ordinary courts in Malaysia. The judges might not have an in-depth knowledge of the technical issues which were sometimes complicated and involved losses worth millions of ringgit, he said. With the special court, the judges would specialise in the field and be able to make fair and accurate decisions, he said after visiting the British patent office here on Thursday. Mohamed Shafie was briefed on the running and management of the office which could help Malaysia open its own patent office back home. He said intellectual property was important in developed states as it involved big businesses and well-known brands with wide international networks. Malaysians, meanwhile, had low awareness on the need to have their products patented and recognised internationally, he said. “Malaysians are not interested in registering their patents, so the producers and country of origin are not getting the benefit from it,” he said. Despite this, patent theft and piracy were no longer a serious problem in Malaysia following strict enforcement by the authorities, he said. Mohamed Shafie also said Malaysia would host a regional conference on intellectual property law enforcement this year in collaboration the World Intellectual Property Organisation. – Bernama http://thestar.com.my/news/story.asp...ation/10396757 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ CompUSA Settles Government's Rebates Complaint The nation's leading computer retailer, CompUSA Inc., has agreed to settle a government complaint charging the company with deceiving consumers who bought computer products but failed to receive promised cash rebates from $15 to $100 each, the Federal Trade Commission said Friday. The regulatory agency ordered Dallas-based CompUSA to overhaul its rebate programs to guarantee consumers will receive payments when they were promised. It also required CompUSA for the next 20 years to ensure all manufacturers of products sold in its stores pay rebates promptly. Retailers often advertise computer equipment for remarkably low prices adjusted for rebates, knowing that only a fraction of consumers apply for such payments. The settlement with CompUSA marked the first time the government held a retailer responsible for rebates offered by its manufacturers, the FTC said. The FTC's settlement made CompUSA responsible for unpaid rebates on behalf of one of its manufacturers, QPS Inc., which went out of business but made CD drives and other products sold in CompUSA stores. FTC lawyer Kerry O'Brien said thousands of customers could be eligible, amounting to rebates totaling hundreds of thousands of dollars. The settlement required rebate payments for any eligible consumers that CompUSA can identify through its records, and for any eligible buyers who contact CompUSA or the FTC through its main telephone number, 877-382-4357, over the next 75 days. ``If you're a retailer and you're advertising someone else's rebates, you can't turn a blind eye to their problems fulfilling those rebates,'' O'Brien said. A spokesman for CompUSA in Dallas, Mark Walker, declined to comment. The FTC said CompUSA falsely represented to customers who bought QPS products that rebates would be paid within six to eight weeks, but it said some customers waited up to six months or never received money. It also accused CompUSA of continuing to advertise QPS rebates despite knowing about these serious delays, up until QPS filed for bankruptcy protection in August 2002. The FTC said CompUSA also inappropriately delayed rebate payments on its own branded products. http://www.siliconvalley.com/mld/sil...l/11113521.htm ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ In brief ILN News Letter Canadian MP Says Extended License Copyright Proposal Delayed Marlene Catteral, a Canadian MP and chair of the Canadian Heritage parliamentary committee has told a university audience that the government has delayed plans to introduce a much-criticized copyright proposal to establish a extended license for educational institutions. The proposal would have created a license for Internet materials that were not publicly available. Catteral speech at http://www.uottawa.ca/copyright/imag...02marlener.mov EU Drops Investigation Of Microsoft Content Guard Investment European Union regulators said today that they are dropping an antitrust review into Microsoft and Time Warner's investment in antipiracy-software company ContentGuard because French technology company Thomson SA was joining the venture. The EC said Thomson's purchase of a one-third stake in ContentGuard would mean no shareholder would have overall control. http://online.wsj.com/article/0,,SB1...379745,00.html Bahrain Frees Three Men Jailed Over Critical Website Bahrain has freed three men detained for running a website critical of the government, but they still face charges over spreading material seen as hostile to the Gulf Arab state's government and royal family. The men were detained two weeks ago on charges of stirring hatred against the government and spreading false news in the U.S.-allied island state. http://uk.news.yahoo.com/050314/80/fe9km.html Australia To Consider Blocking Anonymous Political Postings Roused by last year's furore over anonymous political websites such as www.johnhowardlies.com, the Australian government plans to clamp down on web publishers who refuse to identify a person who authorises their content. Special Minister of State Eric Abetz has said that the move would ensure internet publishers were bound by the same rules as television, radio and print. http://auanonymouspostings.notlong.com/ Creating Code 2.0 Open To All Professor Lawrence Lessig today will put his 1999 book "Code" online today and invite Internet users to help him write an updated version. Contributions can be made at http://codebook.jot.com/ Coverage at http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercu...y/11148136.htm ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 'Creative Commons' Is Rewriting Rules Of Copyright Artists, authors warming up to file-sharing innovation Ariana Eunjung Cha When Chuck D and the Fine Arts Militia released their latest single, "No Meaning No," several months ago, they didn't try to stop people from circulating free copies on the Internet. They encouraged it. They posted the entire song and its vocal, drum and guitar components online and invited everyone to view, copy, mix, remix, sample, imitate, parody and even criticize it. The result has been a flood of derivative work ranging from classical twists on the hip-hop piece to video interpretations of it. The musicians reveled in the instant fan base. They decided to publish their next entire album, due later this spring, the same way, becoming the first major artists to do so. "No Meaning No" was released under an innovative licensing scheme called Creative Commons that some say may be better suited to the electronic age than the hands-off mindset that has made copyright such a bad word among the digerati. More than 10 million other creations -- ranging from the movie "Outfoxed" and songs by the Beastie Boys to the British Broadcasting Corp.'s news footage -- have been distributed using these licenses. The idea even won the support of Hilary Rosen, formerly of the Recording Industry Association of America, and Jack Valenti, the past head of the Motion Picture Association of America, known for their aggressive pursuit of people who share free, unauthorized copies via the Internet. Interest in Creative Commons licenses comes as artists, authors and traditional media companies begin to warm to the idea of the Internet as friend instead of foe and race to capitalize on technologies such as file-sharing and digital copying. Copyright revolution| Apple Computer Inc. gave many reasons to be optimistic. Music lovers, who once scoured the Internet for free and pirated copies of songs, are now showing they're willing to pay for online music. The company says it's selling 1.25 million songs, at 99 cents a track, each day. Rare is the consumer electronics company or music label that isn't experimenting with something similar. Sony BMG, Universal Music Group, EMI and Warner Music Group, for instance, inked deals to distribute songs on a fee-based download service run by Wurld Media, a Saratoga Springs, N.Y., peer-to-peer software company. Many of the innovators who touched off the file-sharing revolution are seeking to win corporate support for their work. Shawn Fanning, who as a teen developed Napster, is working on software that would let copyright holders specify permissions and prices for swapping. Vivendi Universal is a backer. Perhaps the most significant cooperative effort, however, is the set of new licensing schemes under which "No Meaning No" was released -- the brainchild of Stanford University law professor Lawrence Lessig. Lessig argues that the current system of copyright laws provides little flexibility -- either you give up all permissions for use of your work or you withhold everything. He proposed a set of copyright licenses that would allow artists to keep "some rights reserved" rather than "all rights reserved." They could, for instance, choose to allow their works to be enjoyed and copied by others for any purpose, restrict such activity to noncommercial use, or allow use of portions of the work. To that end, Lessig co-founded the nonprofit Creative Commons, whose aim, as he describes it, is to "help artists and authors give others the freedom to build upon their creativity -- without calling a lawyer first." Now the notion of copyright is being reconsidered. "What we're doing is not only good for society but it's good for us and our business because we get our music out," says Brian Hardgroove, co-founder of Fine Arts Militia. Mixing and matching| The way Lessig sees it, art has always been about stealing, recycling and mixing. Vincent Van Gogh and Paul Gauguin were said to borrow from each other's brushwork. The 1990s hit "Clueless" with Alicia Silverstone was a modern adaptation of Jane Austen's "Emma." Technology offers an unprecedented ability to digitize works, copy them, take them apart and put them back together again. But Lessig says he worries that the extension of copyright laws is keeping many works out of the public domain, hampering creativity. When the Constitution was written, copyrights covered 14 years, extendable to 28 years. With the passage of the Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act of 1998, these rights last until an author's death plus 70 years. Lessig's goal with Creative Commons was to create a body of digital work, which he calls "artifacts of culture," for the public domain, accessible to all. In the year since the licenses were unveiled, a steady stream of works beyond popular music and videos has joined the Creative Commons public domain archive: material for more than 500 Massachusetts Institute of Technology classes, audio of every U.S. Supreme Court argument since 1950 from the Public Library of Science, the archives for Flickr's photo-sharing site. Fritz Attaway, Washington general counsel for the Motion Picture Association of America, said work licensed under Creative Commons licenses and those released under traditional copyright restrictions can co-exist. "I think it's helpful to educate consumers that there is a place like Creative Commons where one can access intellectual property that has been freely made available to the general public without compensation and that that should be distinguished from sites that are permitting access to infringing material," he said. Making profits| Still, even the most optimistic say that Creative Commons will be only part of the solution to ending the long-running battle over copyright. Attaway said he doubts the major movie studios or record labels would ever license large quantities of their work for distribution using Creative Commons licenses because they make plenty of money off the current system. Hollywood producers Robert Greenwald and Jim Gilliam are among those challenging such assumptions. They released their movie "Outfoxed" under a Creative Commons license. Their controversial documentary accused Fox News of being a propaganda machine for the Republican Party. Just weeks after it was released in theaters, the producers posted 48 minutes of original interviews from the work online. Gilliam credits the Internet with boosting interest in the movie because it reached a wider audience than it could in theaters alone. He said many of those who viewed parts of the work online ended up ordering a $9.95 DVD. "This isn't necessarily just some altruistic thing," Gilliam said. "You can make money off of this, too." John Buckman, an entrepreneur from Berkeley, has used the Creative Commons licenses as the foundation for his new online record label, Magnatune, where all artists must agree to allow free use of their work for noncommercial purposes. The site features 326 albums by 174 artists in six different genres, including classical and heavy metal. Magnatune makes 50 percent of its money from downloads and 50 percent from licensing fees, he said. Cash-strapped filmmakers can use the songs as they like for free, paying only when they start making money, he said. "As much as musicians are having a hard time making a living, filmmakers and other creative people are having a hard time finding music to use in their works." The start-up is making money, he said -- possibly as much as $2 million this year. http://www.montereyherald.com/mld/mo...s/11149026.htm ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Court Questions Broadcast Flag Challengers John Borland The Washington D.C. Court of Appeals is asking a coalition of library and consumer groups for proof they can legally challenge antipiracy technology imposed by the Federal Communications Commission. The American Library Association, Public Knowledge and others are challenging the FCC's broadcast flag ruling, which would require consumer electronics devices to support code that can block Internet transfers of some video content. Judges said Tuesday that they weren't sure the consumer and library groups had legal "standing"--a measure of how directly affected they or their members will be by the FCC's ruling. The court asked the groups to explain their position further before proceeding with the case. http://news.com.com/2110-1028_3-5618365.html ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Censorship Senator Suggests Targeting Net 'Indecency' Declan McCullagh Congress may be preparing for another round in the Internet "decency" wars. Sen. Ted Stevens, the influential chairman of the Senate Commerce Committee, has indicated that Internet decency regulations could be inserted into legislation that was originally intended to boost fines for off-color radio and TV broadcasts. "We ought to find some way to say, here is a block of channels, whether it's delivered by broadband, by VoIP, by whatever it is, to a home, that is clear of the stuff you don't want your children to see," the Alaska Republican told reporters Friday, according to an audio recording. (VoIP stands for Voice over Internet Protocol.) Stevens didn't describe how broadband or VoIP decency regulation would work, and a spokesman did not respond to a request for comment. Elsewhere in his remarks, the senator said that indecency rules should be extended to cable and satellite, and "we're looking to create tiers, or create a system like the movie business...to let us develop a ratings system." The first round in the Internet decency wars took place nearly a decade ago when the U.S. Congress enacted the Communications Decency Act, which punished the transmission of indecent or "patently offensive" material with up to two years in prison and fines of $250,000. In 1997, the Supreme Court overwhelmingly rejected those portions of the law. But the court's opinion didn't say anything about the constitutionality of a law that would require certain types of Web publishers to rate sexually explicit sites through a mechanism like the Platform for Internet Content Selection, which is built into the Internet Explorer browser. "It looks like Stevens is talking about some sort of ratings system for the Internet," said Marv Johnson, legislative counsel for the American Civil Liberties Union. "But you really can't have the FCC or the federal government be the taste police for the American citizens. It's just not going to work." Stevens' committee is reviewing a decency bill, already approved by the House of Representatives, that would raise the maximum fines for radio and TV broadcasters. In early March, Stevens said he wanted to see those indecency standards extended to cable and satellite. (The Federal Communications Commission has defined indecency to include everything from Howard Stern's broadcasts to certain four-letter words.) Conservative groups have been alarmed by any expansion of the broadcast decency bill, warning that lobbying from cable and satellite providers would reduce the legislation's chances of being enacted. "We would hope that there would be legislation to control the onslaught of the Internet," said Randy Sharp, director of special projects at the American Family Association. "The best approach would be for Sen. Stevens to address this issue in a separate bill. If it's attached, it will get bogged down." One explanation for Stevens' remarks is that he's worried about the trend of movies and TV shows being offered for downloading through the Internet, which places the material outside the purview of the FCC. "I think Stevens is probably laying the groundwork for another assault on speech online," said Adam Thierer, a senior fellow at the free-market Progress and Freedom Foundation. "He's obviously pointing the way to other members of Congress, saying that if they want to control the media, they have to start at cable and satellite first and then target the Internet...This foreshadows the coming debate we'll have over IP-enabled services in the video space." This isn't the first time that Stevens has worried about sexually explicit material on the Internet. Last year, he co-authored a letter to the Federal Trade Commission asking that peer-to-peer networks be investigated because they provide access to pornography. http://news.com.com/Senator+suggests...3-5618332.html ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Wireless Carriers Should Shield Kids from Smut U.S. wireless companies should adopt controls and age verification methods to keep children from getting adults-only content through mobile telephones, the industry's trade group said on Thursday. CTIA, which represents major wireless companies such as Cingular Wireless and Nextel Communications Inc. (NXTL.O: Quote, Profile, Research) , said it is developing guidelines that would also call on carriers to classify content either as available to users of all ages or restricted to those at least 18 years old. "The current timeline aims for adoption of the guidelines and announcement of the industry-wide agreement in the second quarter of 2005, with implementation of the guidelines by the end of 2005," CTIA President Steve Largent said in a letter. CTIA's board of directors is expected to soon consider the guidelines. The plan also would include an education campaign. He was responding to a request by the head of the wireless bureau at the Federal Communications Commission, John Muleta, who called on the industry to address the issue and educate parents about their abilities to control access. About 21 million of 5- to 19-year-olds had wireless phones at the end of 2004, according to industry estimates. Unsolicited e-mail messages are barred on mobile phones, but no laws directly address indecency on them. Many new wireless phones are able to surf the Internet, which has raised concerns about accessing adult content. "The wireless industry has been, and will continue to be, at the forefront of meaningful efforts to inform consumers about the nature of the content available to them on mobile phones, and will put in place the tools to prevent unauthorized access to inappropriate content," Largent said. After rising complaints from parents groups and lawmakers, the FCC has been cracking down on indecent content on broadcast radio and television. Congress is contemplating raising potential fines for broadcast decency infractions. Last month, Muleta sent a letter to CTIA seeking safeguards on wireless phones as well. "We're really glad they're paying attention to it," said FCC spokeswoman Lauren Patrich. http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.j...toryID=7869865 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Propaganda Bush Defends Offering Video ‘News’ Releases Richard W. Stevenson President Bush on Wednesday defended his administration's practice of providing television stations with video news releases that resemble actual news reports, saying that the practice was legal and that it was up to broadcasters to make clear that any of the releases they used on the air were produced by the government. Responding to a question during his news conference in the White House briefing room, Mr. Bush said he expected cabinet agencies to abide by a Justice Department memorandum circulated last week that concluded video news releases were legal as long as they were factual and not intended to advocate the administration's positions. "This has been a longstanding practice of the federal government to use these types of videos," Mr. Bush said. "The Agricultural Department, as I understand it, has been using these videos for a long period of time. The Defense Department, other departments have been doing so. It's important that they be based on the guidelines set out by the Justice Department." Mr. Bush said it would be "helpful if local stations then disclosed to their viewers" that any portions of the releases they used were produced by the government, but he added that, "evidently, in some cases, that's not the case." The New York Times reported on Sunday that at least 20 government agencies have made and distributed hundreds of video news releases in the last four years. Many of them were broadcast on local news programs without any public acknowledgement of the government's role in their production. Pressed on why the government does not require that broadcasters identify the material as being government-produced, Mr. Bush said that "there's a procedure that we're going to follow," and that if there is a "deep concern" about the releases appearing on the air as if they were journalistic reports, then local stations "ought to tell their viewers what they're watching." The administration's use of the video news releases paid for by taxpayers has drawn criticism from some Democrats in Congress, and Democrats are also raising questions about the way in which television stations use them. In a letter sent on Monday to Michael K. Powell, the departing chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, Senator Daniel K. Inouye of Hawaii, the senior Democrat on the Senate Commerce Committee, asked the commission to investigate whether stations were misleading their viewers. "Until now, attention has largely focused on whether certain V.N.R.'s created by the federal government violated the restriction on using appropriated funds for publicity or propaganda," Mr. Inouye said in the letter. "However, equally as serious is growing evidence that certain broadcasters are editing government-created V.N.R.'s to make it appear as if such information is the result of independent news gathering." http://www.nytimes.com/2005/03/17/politics/17video.html ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Study: Cookies In Security Crosshairs Dinesh C. Sharma An increasing number of people are blocking cookies or deleting them to protect their privacy or security, according to a new JupiterResearch study. Nearly 58 percent of online users deleted the small files, which are deposited on computers to track Web site habits, the research firm's 2004 survey found. As many as 39 percent may be deleting cookies from their primary computer every month, according to the study, released on Monday. The market researcher attributes the trend to heightened concern over privacy and security issues among Internet users. Many people are using anti-spyware and firewall applications, it said. "Many of these applications block third-party cookies by default, and many more will regularly delete cookies from consumers’ computers," the report stated. According to a consumer survey quoted by JupiterResearch, 38 percent said they consider cookies invasion of their security and privacy. Lawmakers and consumer lobbies have been considering the impact of cookies, and network security company Netcraft on Monday pointed out the risks to personal information posed by the theft of cookies by attackers using cross-scripting flaws. For online businesses, the trend means that cookies may not be an accurate method of tracking regular visitors to their Web sites. If users block cookies, accurate measurement is compromised and higher number of numbers may be categorized as "anonymous," JupiterResearch said said. "Given the number of sites and applications that depend heavily on cookies for accuracy and functionality, the lack of this data represents significant risk for many companies," analyst Eric Peterson said in a statement. "Because personalization, tracking and targeting solutions require cookies to identify Web visitors over multiple sessions, the accuracy of these solutions has become highly suspect, especially over longer periods of time." http://news.com.com/Study+Cookies+in...3-5618296.html ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Ticket Fixer Takes On Credit Card Disputes Matt Hines First Glen Bolofsky wanted to help people fight parking tickets. Now he's hoping to solve another popular consumer nuisance: billing disputes with credit card companies. Hardly a latter-day Robin Hood, Bolofsky is betting that his latest creation, Disputemycharge.com, could become as popular--and profitable--as his Parkingticket.com business. For a fee, Disputemycharge.com will aid people in resolving disputed credit card charges by communicating directly with merchants. By using the site, Bolofsky says, consumers can avoid the lengthy charge dispute guidelines offered by many credit card issuers, and go directly to merchants for potential refunds. "People need to have an advocate who is experienced on their side," he said. "Even many lawyers don't know all the regulations, and credit card companies aren't anxious to let this kind of info out. Our attorneys and law enforcement officials have the knowledge and background to navigate through the Byzantine process of getting those refunds." Disputemycharge.com, which went live in mid-January, has already proven successful in hundreds of individual appeals. Much like Parkingticket.com, which uses some simple legal know-how to appeal parking violations in a number of U.S. cities, the credit card site's approach is uncomplicated, but apparently works. Using the site, a customer enters the dollar amount of the disputed credit card charge, the name of the merchant involved in the transaction, and the nature of the disagreement. The service then generates a confidential letter that demands that the merchant refund the money in question, and the individual simply mails the document to any involved parties. By highlighting card holder rights that most credit card issuers won't publicize, Bolofsky says the letters have a staggering 95 percent success rate. Blofsky's other creation, Parkingticket.com, claims to have resolved more than $100 million in fines since launching in 2001, and because it typically charges 50 percent of a ticket's original cost to provide its services, the privately held company is turning a profit. Disputemycharge.com demands a flat rate of $9.95 for disputes under $100 and offers a money-back guarantee for $3 more. For disputes over $100, the company uses a sliding scale that it says "escalates minimally." For disputes of $1,000 or more, the company charges a customer 10 percent of the disputed amount with a guarantee, or 7 percent without any promises. Bolofsky said the most frequently disputed charges are related to either recurring services such as gym memberships and cell phone subscription plans, where charges are automatically added to consumers' bills, or for on-the-go payments to companies an individual might not visit frequently in person, such as airlines, car rental companies and hotels. By going directly to merchants to dispute charges, Bolofsky claims his company saves people a significant amount of time and frustration. "People are using the service because they don't like talking to some customer service rep at a credit card company's backend operation and spending 30 minutes on the phone with them," he said. "Our system takes them less than five minutes, and they don't have to listen to any music on hold." The entrepreneur said that most consumers don't know that when they dispute a charge with a credit card company, those companies are just as likely to side with the merchant responsible for the questionable fees. And because many large companies hire specialized personnel and legal departments to fend off paying out refunds, consumers are often left at a distinct disadvantage. "It doesn't matter what industry you're talking about, whether it's Verizon, Hertz or JetBlue, they win more than half the disputes consumers make," Bolofsky said. "The banks like us because their card members are happy, and even merchants like us because they don't want to pay the charge-back fees demanded by most card issuers." http://news.com.com/Ticket+fixer+tak...3-5606393.html ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Music Sharing Faces A New Battle For years now, consumers have repeatedly heard that copying artistic works basically equals stealing directly from the artists. But history may suggest otherwise. One need look no further than the infamous Betamax case, when major Hollywood studios filed suit against Sony, claiming that the ability to tape at home on VCRs was copyright infringement and threatened the economic future of their industry. Nevertheless, Hollywood continues to thrive today despite DVD technology. The precedent set by the Supreme Court's decision in 1984 is an issue that the court will begin hearing in another case that begins March 29, but this time involving the major record labels and peer-to-peer software providers that allow consumers to download and share music files. The Recording Industry Association of America, which is the lobbying arm of major record labels in the United States, claims "P2P" sharing is taking money directly from the artists' pockets. So much so that it's filed a staggering 6,500 lawsuits against P2P users, including people as young as a 12-year-old girl and as old as a 71- year-old grandfather. The RIAA is negotiating settlements for an average of $3,000, so hopefully Britney Spears is getting a fair cut. There are two problems with the RIAA's argument, though. One is the recording industry's repeated attempt to convince the public (and perhaps its artists) that it is "all one family." Neil Portnow, president of the National Academy of Recording Arts & Sciences, has hammered this notion home at the Grammy Awards for the past two years. But the idea of family hardly rings true when the Federal Trade Commission finds that more than 85 percent of the total market is held by just five major labels: Time Warner, Sony, EMI, UMG and BMG. The other, and perhaps more critical, problem is that for many artists, P2P file sharing constitutes both a legal and essential way to distribute their music. Ask Jason Mraz, the acoustic rock artist who says in briefs filed in the Supreme Court case that half of the fans who pay to see him in concert heard about him through illegal downloading. Two lower-court rulings said owners of file-sharing services Grokster and Morpheus are not liable for illegal downloads made through the use of their software. Both the RIAA and the Motion Picture Association of America have stated that file sharing essentially robs artists of proper compensation for their work, but some artists opposing the industry's position make the claim that shutting down the file-sharing services would rob them of something priceless: a chance. After all, if the RIAA had its way, Mraz could soon be performing to an empty arena. http://www.bgnews.com/vnews/display..../4236e7f8ca79d ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Checking Out Spamalot David Pogue Last week, for my 42nd birthday, my wife "kidnapped" me to see "Spamalot," the new Monty Python musical directed by Mike Nichols, in previews. I laughed so hard that I nearly asphyxiated myself, especially in the first act. I got the distinct impression that I was seeing the next "Producers"-style Broadway smash hit before it had even opened. You read it here first. Anyway, you can imagine my amusement to read (in The Times!) that somebody pretty easily cracked the e-mail signup page at montypythonsspamalot.com. There, for an unnamed "reporter from The New York Times" to see, were all 19,000 registered e- mail addresses, ripe for copying and adding to mailing lists. Which, of course, would lead to--spam. Get it? The irony is just too good. Especially because, as urban lore has it, the very term "spam," as applied to junk e-mail, originally came from an old Monty Python skit. (P.S.--You gotta love Eric Idle, the driving authorial force behind "Spamalot." In his show memoir at the Web site, he writes: "Thank God for computers, because mine tells me I began writing the first draft of Spamalot on Monday December 31st 2001. I downloaded the text of the [Monty Python and the Holy] Grail [movie] from one of the many illicit websites, which thankfully saved me all the bother of typing out the script and I could paste and cut and rewrite as necessary." He downloaded his own script!? What would the Author's Guild have to say about THAT?) http://www.nytimes.com/2005/03/17/te...ts/17stat.html ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ A Quest Beyond the Grail Ben Brantley THE meeting of the Broadway chapter of the Monty Python fan club officially came to order - or to be exact, came to disorder - last night at the Shubert Theater with the opening of "Monty Python's Spamalot," a resplendently silly new musical. Favorite routines first created by that surreal British comedy team for the 1975 movie "Monty Python and the Holy Grail" were performed with an attention to detail found among obsessive history buffs who re-enact Civil War battles on weekends. Python songs were sung with the giggly glee of naughty Boy Scouts around a campfire. And festive decorations were provided in the form of medieval cartoon costumes and scenery helpfully described in the show as "very expensive." It seems safe to say that such a good time is being had by so many people (including the cast) at the Shubert Theater that this fitful, eager celebration of inanity will find a large and lucrative audience among those who value the virtues of shrewd idiocy, artful tackiness and wide-eyed impiety. That includes most school-age children as well as grown-ups who feel they are never more themselves than when they are in touch with the nerdy, nose-thumbing 12-year-olds who reside within. "Spamalot," which is directed (improbably enough) by that venerable master of slickness Mike Nichols, is the latest entry in the expanding Broadway genre of scrapbook musical theater. Such ventures, which include flesh-and-blood versions of Disney cartoons and jukebox karaoke shows like "Mamma Mia!," reconstruct elements from much-loved cultural phenomena with wide fan bases. Only rarely do these productions match, much less surpass, the appeal of what inspired them. Generally, they simply serve as colorful aides-mémoire for the pop group, television show or movie to which they pay tribute. Within this category, "Spamalot" ranks high, right up there with (try not to wince, Pythonites) the sweetly moronic "Mamma Mia!," which repackages the disco hits of Abba into a comfy singalong frolic. This means it is possible for theatergoers who are not Python devotees to enjoy themselves at "Spamalot," which has a book and lyrics by Eric Idle (an original Python) and music by John Du Prez and Mr. Idle. It would seem unchivalrous not to share in at least some of the pleasure that is being experienced by a cast that includes Tim Curry, Hank Azaria, David Hyde Pierce and a toothsome devourer of scenery named Sara Ramirez. Still, the uninitiated may be bewildered when laughs arrive even before a scene gets under way. The mere appearance of a figure in a certain costume (say, a headpiece with ram's horns) or the utterance of a single word (i.e., "ni") is enough to provoke anticipatory guffaws among the cognoscenti. Punch lines come to seem almost irrelevant. "Monty Python and the Holy Grail" was the first film feature from a troupe that revolutionized sketch comedy. First seen on British television in 1969 with the series "Monty Python's Flying Circus," this group of Oxbridge-erudite young Brits (John Cleese, Graham Chapman, Terry Jones, Michael Palin and Mr. Idle) and one American soul mate (Terry Gilliam) combined the anarchy of the Marx Brothers with a rarefied British spirit of absurdity and a straight-faced irreverence regarding all sacred cows. "The Holy Grail" stayed true to the formula of the Python television series, channeling the troupe's vision of a disjointed world of colliding sensibilities and cultural references into a retelling of the myth of King Arthur and his Knights of the Round Table. Much of the joy of "The Holy Grail" lies in its imaginative use of its low budget, turning limited locations and homemade props into a comment on the bogusness of cinematic authenticity. And the cast peerlessly delivered its fatuous material with unconditional sincerity. The moviemaker's self-consciousness that infused "The Holy Grail" has been reconceived in theatrical terms for "Spamalot." (Tim Hatley's deliriously artificial sets and costumes bring to mind a collaboration between a cynical Las Vegas resort designer and a stoned class committee for a junior-senior prom.) So the fractured tale of the quest of King Arthur (Mr. Curry) and his ditsy knights for the Holy Grail has been woven into another quest: that of bringing the king and his entourage to the enchanted land called Broadway. This expressed goal makes "Spamalot" a two-tiered operation. On the one hand there is the dutiful acting out of the movie's most famous set pieces (the killer-rabbit scene, the bring-out-your-dead scene, the taunting Frenchman scene, etc.). On the other hand, and (surprisingly) it's the friskier hand, the show spoofs classic song-and- dance extravaganzas, suggesting what the satiric revue "Forbidden Broadway" might be like if it had an $11 million budget. The vignettes lifted straight from the movie have an ersatz quality, in the way of secondhand jokes that are funnier in their original context. Broadway performance demands an exaggeration that doesn't always jibe with the unblinking earnestness of the Python style. (The interpolated song "Always Look on the Bright Side of Life" loses the shock appeal it had when it was first sung, by a chorus of men nailed to crucifixes, in another Python movie, "Life of Brian.") That said, Mr. Azaria (part of the brilliant team of voices behind "The Simpsons" cartoon series) plies his sterling mimetic skills to evoke exactly such fabled figures from the film as the towering Knight of Ni (he wears stilts), the inept warlock known as Tim the Enchanter and the nasty French Taunter who specializes in English-baiting insults. (Mr. Azaria's main role, by the way, is Lancelot, who finds happiness when he discovers his inner Peter Allen.) Mr. Curry, of the "Rocky Horror Picture Show," is the best of the cast at translating classic Python style into a musical-comedy idiom. His stalwart, plummy-voiced Arthur wears a smile as inflexible as armor, and it deflects any suggestion that this manly king is in on the show's jokes. Christopher Sieber - who, like most of the cast, plays an assortment of roles - is delightful as a Sir Galahad who tosses his blond tresses as if he were auditioning for a Clairol commercial. And Mr. Hyde Pierce (famous as the neurotic Niles on the sitcom "Frasier") appears to be having such a fine time that it seems impolite to observe that he is not a natural for this material. Still, in the role of the cowardly Sir Robin, he brings a genial Rex Harrison-style dapperness to a patter number about the importance of including Jews in any Broadway show. The moments when "Spamalot" rises into the ether are those in which it pays homage - à la "The Producers" - to other kinds of Broadway musicals, with bobble-headed nods to the Vegas revue thrown in. The "Knights of the Round Table" number that introduces the swinging pleasure palace called Camelot is a deliciously cheesy, cheesecake-laden floor show, with Arthur morphing into a Rat Pack-style master of ceremonies. (Casey Nicholaw is the choreographer.) But the tastiest satiric juice is provided by Ms. Ramirez, who plays Arthur's buxom but ethereal love interest, the Lady of the Lake. Whether warmly overseeing her (yes) Laker girls as they cheer the knights, mangling a soul ballad "American Idol"-style or working the stage like Liza at Caesars Palace, Ms. Ramirez knows how to send up vintage performance styles until they go into orbit. The evening's high point involves Ms. Ramirez and Mr. Sieber floating on stage in a boat, illuminated by a newly descended chandelier. Music of the night, indeed. But what turns this fanged tribute to "The Phantom of the Opera" into more than a one-joke routine is the song, a cunning deconstruction of the repetitive, voice-taxing Andrew Lloyd Webber method titled "The Song That Goes Like This." "Spamalot" also cheerfully invokes the gleaming anthems of hope from shows like "Man of La Mancha" and the camp, pelvis-pumping chorus of "The Boy From Oz." Do these disparate elements hang together in any truly compelling way? Not really. That "Spamalot" is the best new musical to open on Broadway this season is inarguable, but that's not saying much. The show is amusing, agreeable, forgettable - a better-than-usual embodiment of the musical for theatergoers who just want to be reminded now and then of a few of their favorite things. 'Monty Python's Spamalot' Book and lyrics by Eric Idle; music by John Du Prez and Mr. Idle. Inspired by the film "Monty Python and the Holy Grail." Directed by Mike Nichols; choreography by Casey Nicholaw; sets and costumes by Tim Hatley; lighting by Hugh Vanstone; sound by Acme Sound Partners; hair and wigs by David Brian Brown; special effects by Gregory Meeh; projection design by Elaine J. McCarthy; music director/vocal arrangements, Todd Ellison; orchestrations by Larry Hochman; music arrangements by Glen Kelly; music coordinator, Michael Keller; associate producers, Randi Grossman and Tisch/Avnet Financial. Presented by Boyett Ostar Productions, the Shubert Organization, Arielle Tepper, Stephanie McClelland/Lawrence Horowitz, Elan V. McAllister/Allan S. Gordon, Independent Presenters Network, Roy Furman, GRS Associates, Jam Theatricals, TGA Entertainment and Clear Channel Entertainment. At the Shubert Theater, 225 West 44th Street; (212) 239-6200. Running time: 2 hours, 20 minutes. WITH: David Hyde Pierce (Sir Robin, Guard 1 and Brother Maynard), Tim Curry (King Arthur), Hank Azaria (Sir Lancelot, the French Taunter, Knight of Ni and Tim the Enchanter), Christopher Sieber (Sir Dennis Galahad, the Black Knight and Prince Herbert's Father), Michael McGrath (Mayor, Patsy and Guard 2), Steve Rosen (Dennis's Mother, Sir Bedevere and Concorde), Christian Borle (Historian, Not Dead Fred, French Guard, Minstrel and Prince Herbert) and Sara Ramirez (the Lady of the Lake). http://theater2.nytimes.com/2005/03/...ws/18spam.html ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Who Will Free Fiona Apple? Suddenly on the Internet: A flood of unreleased bootlegs sung by a goddess. What gives? Mark Morford It started with two little songs. Two little, beautifully crafted, wonderfully quirky, secretly bootlegged, commercially unavailable versions of two Fiona Apple songs that very few people have ever heard because, well, they're from a Fiona Apple album called "Extraordinary Machine" that was actually never released anywhere in the world. Never. As in not ever. And you could find those two amazing songs, the title track and one called "Better Version of Me," on many a not-so-secret download site and P2P service for the past year or more, and they were small balm indeed for the legion of Apple fans who were desperate for any taste or sigh or glimpse of the waiflike goddess, any snippet of new tune to come their way like manna, as Apple hasn't released any new work in over five years, since she was knee-high to a weird angry self-immolating 19-year-old diva prodigy. Apple is, in case you forgot, the luscious Grammy-winning songstress who penned "Criminal" and whose second album had a title that was 57 words long (shorthanded as "When the Pawn ...") and who, as this column has long lamented, seemed to vanish from the pop music scene six years back and who I have been long hoping will return to reclaim her position as skinny doe-eyed ruler of the divine female songstress universe and squash the Norahs and the Avrils and the Vanessa Carltons and the Michelle Branches with her astounding breathy smoky jazzy throaty vocal skills and delirious songwriting prowess and soul-healing hip-gyration proficiency. Alas, the wait has been endless. And painful. And barely allayed by the likes of astounding newcomers Rachel Yamagata and Cat Power and Jesse Sykes et al. But still. But here's where it gets funky. "Extraordinary Machine" is an album that Apple finished over two years ago, but which was quickly shelved by the sad corporate drones over at Sony because they didn't "hear a single" and because it doesn't sound exactly like Norah Jones and because they're, well, corporate drones. They dictate cultural tastes based on relatively narrow and often deeply ignorant criteria related to marketing and money and fear of the new and the different. This is what they do. In other words, it was shelved because it's different, unique, a little eccentric, all bells and oompah horns and strings and oddly lovely circuslike arrangements, and you as the co-opted overmarketed oversold listening audience can't really handle anything like that, anything challenging or interesting or distinctive or deeply cool or lacking in prepackaged backbeats that sound just like Kelly Clarkson or maybe "American Idiot," even if it comes from an stupendously talented world-class Grammy-winning artist. Right? Isn't that you? Doesn't matter. This is what they believe. But now, a hot new twist. The rest of "Extraordinary Machine" has, somehow, been leaked onto this fair Internet. All of it. Every song, some at first sounding not all that complete and some reportedly with only tentative titles, but, then again, a DJ at a radio station up in Seattle (the End 107.7) somehow managed to get his hands on the whole album and has apparently been playing almost every track and it's all much more finished and incredible than anyone thought. And fans have been whipping the tracks into high-quality MP3s and splaying them all over the Net, and Rolling Stone and MTV and other media have picked up on the odd story, noting how fans are calling into the station like mad and most everyone loves the songs and protest Web sites like freefiona.com (alongside dedicated fan sites like fionaapple.org) have popped up to try and get some action and yet Sony refuses to actually release the album and the corporate drones remain mum and everyone's wondering just what the hell's going on. Is it the dumbest test-marketing scheme in Sony history? Is it a silly corporate ploy to gauge fan interest two years after the album should have been released? The DJ, apparently, ain't telling where he got his copy, but, so far, he has yet to receive a cease-and-desist from Sony, and, while some ISPs are sending threatening notes to bloggers who post the songs and the RIAA is probably having colon spasms, the songs aren't exactly all that difficult to find. Fans, meanwhile, are gushing. The songs are, by and large, mesmerizing and distinctive and completely wonderful slices of funky art pop, showcasing Apple's trademark languid, off-time verse style and eccentric lyricism and increasingly rich and mellifluous and still quite gorgeous voice that never feels the need to yell or oversing or jump multiple octaves into obnoxious glass-shattering range. As for Apple herself, well, rumor has it she really didn't care all that much about Sony's lameness two years back, really didn't feel a driving need to be slammed back into the soul-mauling pop music spotlight and therefore didn't really push all that hard to have "EM" released. And while she is also reportedly very happy to hear about the current mad fan support regarding the album, according to a brief interview with producer Jon Brion, he says she also knows it ain't all that radio friendly and might not ever make a gazillion dollars and she doesn't really care. Which is, of course, what makes her so goddamn wonderful. All of which simply serves as a potent reminder, an illuminative example of the everpresence of the Big Dance, the all-pervasive push-pull between the free voice and the corporate-controlled one, between the art and the marketing, between the rawly creative and the Wal-Mart floor display, between the Fiona Apple and the profit quotient. And now, that dance has become more heated, more intense and vicious than ever before. The corporations have consolidated power, have turned into ugly profit-driven monoliths hell bent on clinging to their dwindling earnings and archaic business models despite the wild shifts in culture and technology. As meanwhile any Net user worth her blog or encryption software knows multiple means for downloading a nice free copy of the latest astounding Rufus Wainwright album or a fine copy of the brilliant cult hit movie "Donnie Darko," sans money and sans guilt and sans anything resembling serious concern for the well being of SonyViacomDisneyMicrosoft. This, then, is the bottom line. The rules are changing fast. Great songs want to be free. Fiona Apple is singing anew, despite the corporate crackdown and the RIAA sneers, and it's all just more proof positive that you can't really contain or restrain raw human talent, can't kill the need for true creative prowess, and that goddamn flower is gonna crack through that corporate concrete no matter how much weed killer they pour on it. The commercial dictatorship is crumbling. New songs are being sung, in spite of the old rules. Really, really good songs. Sung by a goddess. You want to hear them? All you have to do is click. http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cg...otes031605.DTL Until next week, - js. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Current Week In Review.  Recent WiRs - March 12th, March 5th, February 26th, February 19th, February 12th Jack Spratt's Week In Review is published every Friday. Please submit letters, articles, and press releases in plain text English to jackspratts (at) lycos (dot) com. Include contact info. Submission deadlines are Wednesdays @ 1700 UTC. "The First Amendment rests on the assumption that the widest possible dissemination of information from diverse and antagonistic sources is essential to the welfare of the public." - Hugo Black |
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18-03-05, 05:49 AM
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#4 | |||||
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I took both pills.
Join Date: May 2002
Location: Where 'strange' is a prerequisite.
Posts: 1,165
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besides that without a court order they can't touch me. Privacy laws are considered far more important here than copyright infringement. The first court order for filesharing has (for as far as i know) yet to be signed. Quote:
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Another good example of a monster created by people who try to make themselves feel really really important while they know in advance that it is never gonna work Thanks jack |
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18-03-05, 08:21 AM
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my name is Ranking Fullstop
Join Date: Dec 2001
Location: Promontorium Tremendum
Posts: 4,391
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good stuff, as always, Jack
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