] A federal judge dismissed a lawsuit Tuesday filed by
] VeriSign (Quote, Chart) against the government's ruling
] body, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and
] Numbers - or ICANN.

Judge Dismisses V$'s Antitrust Claim against ICANN

] WASHINGTON (Reuters) - An effort to scale back a
] controversial copyright law gained momentum Wednesday
] when a powerful committee chairman said consumers should
] be allowed to break the digital locks that prevent them
] from copying DVDs and other materials for personal use.

Lawmakers Support Scaling Back DMCA to Respect Fair Use

]
] The federal government is reviving its fight against
] dynamic random access memory (DRAM) maker Rambus (Quote,
] Chart), according to court documents made public
] Thursday.
]
] The U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC) filed an appeal
] in court April 16 that was later made public Thursday
] outlining its case. The FTC has accused the company of
] violating federal antitrust laws by "deliberately
] engaging in a pattern of anti-competitive acts and
] practices that served to deceive an industry-wide
] standard-setting organization, specifically, not
] disclosing that it was in the process of seeking patents
] related to the proposed standards."

Yay.

FTC Appeals Rambus Dismissal

Wow...

Yahoo! News - A Daughter Discovers What Really Happened

] As part of a broad overhaul of U.S. priorities, he said,
] the Pentagon may have to scrap the $71 billion Air Force
] program to buy F/A-22 air-to-air fighters built by
] Lockheed Martin Corp. .
]
] "We may have to cancel this airplane that's going to cost
] between $250 million and $300 million a copy," said
] McCain, floating what could become a major new
] legislative hurdle to a top Air Force priority.

McCain: Scrap F/A-22 to Help Pay for War

] People may have laughed 16 months ago when obese
] teenagers unsuccessfully sued McDonald's, saying its food
] made them fat. But a well-honed army of familiar lawyers
] who waged war against the tobacco companies for decades
] and won megamillion-dollar settlements is preparing a new
] wave of food fights, and no one is laughing.

The New York Times : National : Lawyers Shift Focus From Big Tobacco to Big Food

]
] In a 33-page motion filed on Monday, April 5, 2004, ICANN
] has asked a federal judge in Los Angeles to dismiss
] VeriSign's recent lawsuit filed against the non-profit
] organization. More specifically, the filed motion has
] asked the court to "dismiss VeriSign's first six claims
] for relief with prejudice," which are:

ICANN Explains Why Judge Should Dismiss VeriSign's Lawsuit

] The measure, VoIP Regulatory Freedom Act, also imposes
] some curbs on the Federal Communications Commission's
] ability to extend to VoIP much of the thick quilt of
] rules and requirements that govern the traditional phone
] network. For instance, it bans imposing certain "access
] charge" taxes, but does require the FCC to levy VoIP
] universal service fees that will be redirected to
] provided discounted analog phone service to low-income
] and rural Americans.

This is going to be a mixed bag. The Feds seem concious of
not wanting to kill it under regulation but at the same time
seem not to completely get it...

Feds tell states 'VoIP is ours' - News - ZDNet

] At a summit here this week, delegates from around the
] world gathered to take a preliminary step toward U.N.
] involvement in some of the areas that are bedeviling
] Internet users and governments alike, including spam,
] network security, privacy and the regulation of the
] technical underpinnings that control the sprawling global
] network.

What a mess. For better or worse, the system we're stuck with
is one that requires one entity to sit in an office and hand out
numbers. ICANN, V$, ARIN, etc, serve various pieces of that role
and we have an ad hoc situation that is not really serving anyone's
interests. I don't necessarily think that putting the UN in charge
of it is the right solution but ICANN doesn't seem to be either...

United Nations ponders Net's future | CNET News.com

] WASHINGTON (Reuters) - America Online, America's largest
] Internet provider, says it has seen a
] dramatic decline in the amount of spam e-mail entering
] its network over the past month.

If this is true, why so? Are spammers avoiding aol.com addresses
since AOL started suing spammers?

swisspolitics.org | AOL sees sharp decline in spam e-mail