] One of four college students who were accused of trading
] songs online and settled lawsuits in early May with the
] music industry has managed to collect his entire $12,000
] fine on the Internet.
]
] Jesse Jordan, 19, a sophomore this fall at Rensselaer
] Polytechnic Institute in Troy, N.Y., saw his cause picked
] up by the popular Web site Slashdot.org (motto: "News for
] Nerds. Stuff that matters"). Money began pouring in,
] "anywhere from 10 cents to $500. I never expected to
] raise the whole thing. People are very generous," says
] Jordan.
]
] "Where the money comes from doesn't matter," says Matt
] Oppenheim of the Recording Industry Association of
] America. "Have we deterred these people and others from
] engaging in this kind of behavior? Clearly we have."

Oppenheim obviously didn't get the point.

Fined student gets donations to tune of $12K

] The music industry disclosed aggressive plans Wednesday
] for an unprecedented escalation in its fight against
] Internet piracy, threatening to sue hundreds of
] individual computer users who illegally share music files
] online.
]
] The Recording Industry Association of America, citing
] substantial sales declines, said it will begin Thursday
] to search Internet file-sharing networks to identify
] users who offer "substantial" collections of MP3-format
] music files for downloading. It expects to file at least
] several hundred lawsuits seeking financial damages within
] eight to 10 weeks.
]
] Executives for the RIAA, the Washington-based lobbying
] group that represents major labels, would not say how
] many songs on a user's computer will qualify for a
] lawsuit. The new campaign comes just weeks after U.S.
] appeals court rulings requiring Internet providers to
] identify subscribers suspected of illegally sharing music
] and movie files.
]
] The RIAA's president, Carey Sherman, said tens of
] millions of Internet users of popular file-sharing
] software after Thursday will expose themselves to "the
] real risk of having to face the music."
]
] "It's stealing. It's both wrong and illegal," Sherman
] said. Alluding to the court decisions, Sherman said
] Internet users who believe they can hide behind an alias
] online were mistaken. "You are not anonymous," Sherman
] said. "We're going to begin taking names."

SING
Send in the goons...
/SING

Music labels to sue hundreds of music sharers

] Hi ladies, my name is Wo-Hen Nankan. Welcome to my site.
] You can check out my stats on my Asian Avenue Site. I am
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]
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Me so horny, me love him long time.

Hello Ladies...

] Some 11,000 miles above the earth, 28 satellites beam
] down data that enables the targeting of locations with
] once-unthinkable precision. It's a lethal tool in war --
] and a killer app for business. The Global Positioning
] System (GPS) is transforming everything from auto
] insurance to agriculture, from hauling freight to trading
] stocks. Is your business next?

This is a great article about how transformative GPS has become. But the example thread that runs through the article instigates some interesting questions. Are we getting too much data? Are we too accurate? Obviously we've been able to farm the land for thousands of years just fine. At what point does our accuracy start effecting our efficiency? Is it better or worse for us? Let alone all the privacy concerns.

The Sky's the Limit

There are now 16 versions of the star wars kid video, include a Terminator and Matrix version. Enjoy.

All your star wars kid are belong to us

] What. WatchBlog is a multiple-editor weblog broken up
] into three major political affiliations, each with its
] own blog: the Democrats, the Republicans and the Third
] Party (covering everything outside the two major
] parties).

] Why. Let's face it, politics are confusing.
] Sometimes it's difficult to know who to believe, who to
] listen to and who to support. We're here to help. Posting
] on a regular basis are editors representing each major
] party. Stay informed.

Interesting concept.

WatchBlog: 2004 Election News, Opinion and Commentary

] The chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee
] said Tuesday he favors developing new
] technology to remotely destroy the computers of people
] who illegally download music from the Internet.

] "I'm interested," Hatch interrupted. He said damaging
] someone's computer "may be the only way you can teach
] somebody about copyrights."

] Kerr predicted it was "extremely unlikely" for Congress
] to approve a hacking exemption for copyright owners,
] partly because of risks of collateral damage when
] innocent users might be wrongly targeted.
]
] "It wouldn't work," Kerr said. "There's no way of
] limiting the damage."

Not too worried about this.. I can't see this happening. Not only for technical reasons, but straight out legal ones. The court system exists to mediate disputes between parties. Aggrieved parties are not allowed to take actions into their own hands, their only option is to take their dispute into the court system. If they do not, they are commiting a crime themselves. Its the basis of our legal system's existance. If congress passes a law allowing our media masters to destroy our computers, it would be admitting failure of the legal system to tackle these problems and set an extrememly dangerous precident. Granted, it is pretty shocking that this has been suggested as an option at all, by someone who heads the Senate Judiciary Committee.

And then there is the whole collateral damage angle. It dose not have the signifigance of the above, but it will likely be the reason this idea gets aborted before it grows arms. It would give consumers what they need to bring the dispute back into the legal system, only with the upper hand and the ability to address the above in the courts, which the courts would most defintally agree with.

I'm not a lawyer, so my understanding of how the law works in this situation may be completely flawed.. But I am pretty sure that this is not something to worry about much.

Yahoo! News - Hatch Takes Aim at Illegal Downloading

] BILL O'REILLY ENCOUNTERS THE NO-WEENIE ZONE
]
] The Blogosphere is buzzing in response to Bill
] O'Reilly's whiny complaints about the Internet.
] The problem with the Net, according to this Man Of The
] People, is that there aren't enough bosses to
] protect the interests of famous people:
]
] Nearly everyday, there's something written on
] the Internet about me that's flat out untrue. And
] I'm not alone. Nearly every famous person in the
] country's under siege. . . .
]
] The reason these net people get away with all
] kinds of stuff is that they work for no one. They put
] stuff up with no restraints. This, of course, is
] dangerous, but it symbolizes what the Internet is
] becoming.
]
] Well boo-freakin'-hoo. O'Reilly's
] schtick is as a tribune of the people against the
] powerful, but when people start writing about him, well,
] it seems they need to be brought into line, pronto. And
] O'Reilly demonstrates that he's no paragon of
] fairness himself by first ignoring that the particular
] report he's complaining about came from a newspaper
] (the San Francisco Chronicle) and not from "the
] Internet," and then somehow managing to tie bad
] comments about his underperforming radio show to child
] molestation. Excuse me? Does this guy have an editor?
] Because it doesn't show.

Glenn Reynold's take on the O'Reilly remarks.

Glenn Reynolds: Instant punditry on culture, politics, and the law

] OK. I admit. You got me. I am a straight up criminal. I
] am a gangsta.

MarthaSings.com .................................This Site is a Parody

] Cable operators say they may soon be able to offer
] services that would crush their satellite and phone
] competitors following introduction this week of a simple
] device that could free up massive amounts of bandwidth.
]
] These devices, about the size of two cigarette packs,
] could enable cable systems to transmit lots of
] high-definition TV (HDTV), video phone connections, video
] on demand and far faster high-speed Internet connections.
]
] "It allows you to dream, create and do things differently
] than you've ever done," says Comcast Cable President
] Steve Burke.
]
] Operators envision buying millions of these converters
] or similar ones planned by Motorola and others
] and putting them on virtually every TV owned by
] their nearly 72 million customers. Then operators can
] stop transmitting analog signals and go all-digital.
]
] That's a big deal. Analog TV channels consume about 65%
] of the bandwidth on most modern systems and
] operators can squeeze as many as eight digital channels
] into the bandwidth that each analog channel now fills.
]
] That's key for adding HDTV.

Adios analog.

Laughing Boy

Device could change cable