May 30, 2006 | In Technology, Law | No Comments
A court ruling last week in California has established that bloggers and web reporters have the same rights to privacy and confidentiality of sources as any other journalists.
The case was brought forward by Apple Computer in 2004 after blogger, Jason O’Grady, published confidential information about an unreleased Apple product.
When O’Grady refused to tell Apple where he got the information, the company issued a subpoena against his email provider, in an effort to identify the source of the leak. The court has now overturned a previous ruling, however, and asserted that online journalists have the same rights as traditional news media when it comes to not spilling the beans about their sources.
“Today’s decision is a victory for the rights of journalists, whether online or offline, and for the public at large,” said Kurt Opsahl, an attorney with the Electronic Frontier Foundation who argued the appeal for this case. “The court has upheld the strong protections for the free flow of information to the press, and from the press to the public.”
May 28, 2006 | In Technology, Law | No Comments
A committee from the U.S. House of Representatives has given its approval to a piece of legislation that seeks to prevent ISPs from controlling internet traffic and forcing content providers to pay “network access” bribes.
The House Judiciary Committee voted 20-to-13 in favor of the Internet Freedom and Nondiscrimination Act, designed to protect the principle of net neutrality, and keep network providers like AT&T and Verizon from establishing a dictatorship over internet content and web-based services.
The Committee’s Republican chairman, James Sensenbrenner, along with several other Republicans and the majority of Democrats voted in favor of the bill.
It is comforting to see that most representatives of the people are willing to think of the common internet user on issues like this. If startup companies are to offer innovative and competitively priced services over the web, they must be given the freedom to do so without paying bribes to a demanding and self-centered authority.
Such a system would take away freedom from the internet, and freedom is what the internet is all about.
The Internet Freedom and Nondiscrimination Act still has a long way to go before becoming law, but the fact that net neutrality is being seen as an important, mainstream issue is an encouraging sign indeed.
May 24, 2006 | In Business, Technology | No Comments
Internet giant, Google Inc., revealed earlier this week that it is planning to move into a new form of internet media, by launching an online video advertising service.
Internet video has become more and more popular as broadband penetration has increased, and Google is determined to evolve right along with it. This is just one of the Mountain View company’s moves to expand outwards from its text advertising roots, and find more diversified sources of revenue.
Google will not integrate video with its own search results, but rather distribute the ads over its huge network of content-based partner sites.
“There are certain segments of advertisers who need a richer experience, like movie studios that want to show movie trailers,” noted Google project manager, Gokul Rajaram. “It’s more compelling.”
Although video ads aren’t a new invention, broadband is only now reaching levels that make online video accessible to the majority of mainstream consumers. Demand for such advertising will skyrocket in the next two years, according to eMarketer, with revenue expected to hit $225 million this year, and $640 million in 2007.
The new advertising service will use a similar PPC bidding system to the existing Adwords offering, with clicks expected to cost about three times those of text ads. Advertisers will be able to upload commercials of up to 2 minutes in length, and pay whenever visitors click on a play button.
Combining the PPC business model with video advertising could be a truly brilliant move for Google, boosting revenues far beyond previous levels. And the search giant’s plan of using its content partners to distribute ads definitely gives it a unique edge over other video advertising brokers like Yahoo and AOL.
If Google plays their cards right, they could easily duplicate their dominance in PPC search, and rocket to the top of video advertising as well.
Published via TeleClick.ca.
May 20, 2006 | In Business, Technology | No Comments
Internet search giants, Google, MSN, and Yahoo, are beginning to focus more of their efforts on capturing the attention of mobile phone users.
These companies are doing their best to forge partnerships with cell phone carriers, to make their mobile search offerings easily accessible on popular handsets. As internet-ready handsets become cheaper and more advanced, demand for them is expected to increase considerably.
That’s why staking out space on the so called “third screen” is integral to the business models of so many internet search, advertising, and content providers. Getting a piece of the mobile advertising pie will allow the big internet players to further integrate their services with the everyday lives of users.
Published via TeleClick.ca.
May 15, 2006 | In Technology, Politics | No Comments
Chinese internet giant, Baidu.com, is trying to break into the user-edited online reference business with its very own rip off of the Wikipedia project.
The new site, “Baidupedia,” however, enforces a strict moderation process to make sure that nothing gets published that could offend China’s communist government.
Baidupedia’s FAQ page orders users to maintain a positive attitude about the country’s current government, avoid portraying a “negative view of life.”
In short, the Baidu encyclopedia uses the Wikipedia model as a propaganda generator and government ass-kissing machine. I suppose they have a market, since the real Wikipedia has been banned in China since last year, but I don’t think Baidupedia will be very appealing to anyone with an independent brain.
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