How would Bush like to have "observational research" in the Oval Office?

William Safire on postmodern privacy.

The Intrusion Explosion

Legislators and law enforcers will have to fight and win a "war" against online piracy in order for the digital marketplace to have any chance of realizing its full potential. "This war against piracy must be waged on several different fronts, including the commitment of adequate resources to law enforcement, the cooperation of various industry players, and the education of consumers. Only when the war against piracy is effectively waged and won, will businesses and consumers move in significant numbers to the online marketplace. [Copyright piracy] is growing exponentially with billions of unauthorized music downloads per month. Until we can stop the growth of piracy online, it will be difficult to truly create a marketplace that will work for digital online content."

More silliness ... Obviously this guy didn't get the memo about cutting back on the "war" metaphors. These statements are so clearly baseless as to be meaningless. Billions per month, and growing exponentially? So in a few months, we'll have 100 trillion downloads per month? I think not. But who cares, any way? Why doesn't anyone recognize the success stories? The Wall Street Journal has a profitable online subscription service. Lexis-Nexis is popular and has been sustainable over a long period of time. The IEEE has a successful online library. Clearly there are no overwhelming technical challenges to running a successful business selling digital online content.

Decius: This is the first time I've seen Goodlatte act completely clueless on a tech issue.

washingtonpost.com: Rep. Goodlatte Calls For

We need to start thinking in terms of disruptive compliance rather than civil disobedience if we want to be effective on-line. Disruptive compliance has no meaning outside of cyberspace. Disruptive, of course, refers to disruptive technology, a radically new way of doing things; compliance refers back to the Internet and its original intent of constructive free-flow and openness. "

This is a really good article. Of course, cypherpunks don't write code, they sit around and bicker on a mailing list. I've found that getting "hackers" to actually hack is next to impossible. "Oh, you mean I actually have to DO something? Fuck that! I'm busy reading slashdot." Yes Virginia, Television does rot your brain.

The cDc on online activism...

A 5 page article in the April 2002 issue of Harvard Business Review explains it all:

The basic inequality in wealth distribution seen in most societies may have little to do with differences in the backgrounds and talents of their citizens. Instead, the disparity appears to be something akin to a law of economic life that emerges naturally as an organizational feature of a network. Bouchaud and Mezard found that if investment returns grow sufficiently volatile, they can completely overwhelm the natural diffusion of wealth generated by transactions. In such a case, an economy can suddenly reach a tipping point, and wealth, instead of being held by a small minority, will condense into the pockets of a mere handful of super-rich robber barons.

If we are not yet at the End of History, are we at least approaching the End of Economics?

HBS Publishing: Harvard Business Review - April 2002 HBR Abstract : Wealth Happens

"The integration of the Internet in crisis communication alters the role of journalism and undermines the power of communication of official sources. What we can state is a loss of information control by journalists and official sources. As Jim Hall draws the consequences from the Kosovo crisis communication: "One of the roles of journalism in this ocean of information is to help readers negotiate the various impasses that arise around bad and contradictory information, even from reputable sources" (Hall, 2000, p. 393). Journalists are no longer only the gatekeepers of information but they must become guides for global information space."

Crisis Communication and the Internet: Risk and Trust in a Global Media

"The truth is that bridging the digital divide and improving education go hand in hand. Some of the most successful efforts to bridge the divide have occurred through community technology centers, or CTCs. These CTCs offer public Internet access, but perhaps more importantly, they offer learning opportunities--opportunities for people to learn how to use the Internet effectively, augment their reading and job skills, even prep for the U.S. citizenship exam. "

My take on this is that non-profits use the "digital divide" as a justification for funding. Unfortunately it blurs things that shouldn't be blurred. Obviously poor people can benefit from education, access, and services. This does not mean that technology forms a barrier to social mobility. My highschool banned pagers and cellphones because in the early 90's they were associated with drug dealing (and hence the lower class). Its only recently that high schools have accepted the idea that teenagers can use mobile telecom technology for legitimate purposes. Who adopts technologies fast? The people who stand to gain the most from them, irrespective of their social status.

Digital divide still very real - Tech News - CNET.com

"The U.S. is principally a transit and destination country for trafficking in persons. It is estimated that 45,000 to 50,000 people, primarily women and children, are trafficked to the U.S. annually. The U.S. Government is strongly committed to combating trafficking in persons at home and abroad. The Act enhances pre-existing criminal penalties, affords new protections to trafficking victims, and makes available certain benefits and services to victims of severe forms of trafficking; establishes a Cabinet-level federal interagency task force to investigate and prosecute trafficking, and establishes a federal pilot program to provide services to trafficking victims. The U.S. government recognizes the need to sustain and further enhance our efforts in order to achieve the goals and objectives of the Act.
The U.S. Department of State began monitoring trafficking in persons in 1994, when the issue began to be covered in the Department's Annual Country Reports on Human Rights Practices. Originally, coverage focused on trafficking of women and girls for sexual purposes. Our understanding of the problem has broadened over the years, and U.S. embassies worldwide now routinely monitor and report on cases of trafficking in men, women, and children for forced labor in agriculture, domestic service, construction work, and sweatshops, as well as trafficking for commercial sexual exploitation."

The state of slavery in the USA and abroad.

"Internet use is increasing for people regardless of income, education, age, races, ethnicity, or gender."

There will be no "digital divide," just as there is no "television divide." Just FYI...

A Nation Online

"It may seem strange to imagine the blogging community as a force that will shape the information environment almost as powerfully as corporate media. We learn in the history books about Samuel Morse’s invention of the telegraph but not about the thousands of operators who shaped the circulation of messages, about Thomas Paine’s Common Sense but less about the “committees of correspondence” through which citizens copied and redistributed letters across the colonies, about the publication of Harriet Beecher Stowe’s abolitionist blockbuster Uncle Tom’s Cabin but not about the teenagers who used toy printing presses to publish nationally circulated newsletters debating the pros and cons of slavery. In practice, the evolution of most media has been shaped through the interactions between the distributed power of grass-roots participatory media and the concentrated power of corporate/governmental media."

Online diarists rule an Internet strewn with failed dot-coms

Listening to such artists isn’t just about the music: it’s the smart people’s secret handshake.

This is what happens when corporations forget that there is more to what they do then "self interest." They consume themselves.

Looking Grim at the Grammys