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The Internet

Submission + - CATO Institute says Vonage Victim of Patent Abuse

Submitted by jtavares2
jtavares2 writes: Timothy B. Lee, a CATO Institute adjunct scholar, has written an interesting story on Vonage's recent patent woes. He slams the current U.S. patent system and the Federal Circuit's series of rulings in the 1980s which opened the barn doors to software patents. He goes on to talk about potential remedies, including some current cases pending before the Supreme Court.
User Journal

Journal Journal: Internet Routing to Branch Into Space

Journal by rtenalio
The Internet, which has done well to connect distant places and people, is now branching out even further -- into space.

This month, the U.S. military announced a project to test Internet routing on orbiting satellites.
United States

Submission + - Is America going fascist?

Submitted by
Random BedHead Ed
Random BedHead Ed writes: "The Guardian this week has a call to arms, examining the ten steps to fascism and proposing that America is quietly taking virtually all of them. It's not as much of a partisan concern as you might think: many conservative groups have joined forces under a new organization called the American Freedom Agenda, which along with the ACLU and Center for Constitutional Rights has been fighting to put pressure on the federal government to pull the country away from what they see as a slippery slope. From the article: "As Americans turn away quite leisurely, keeping tuned to internet shopping and American Idol, the foundations of democracy are being fatally corroded. Something has changed profoundly that weakens us unprecedentedly: our democratic traditions, independent judiciary and free press do their work today in a context in which we are "at war" in a "long war" — a war without end, on a battlefield described as the globe, in a context that gives the president — without US citizens realising it yet — the power over US citizens of freedom or long solitary incarceration, on his say-so alone.""
Power

Submission + - The Truth about Plug-in Hybrids

Submitted by
FloatsomNJetsom
FloatsomNJetsom writes: "Forget hydrogen — bring an extension cord instead. Popular Mechanics has an exhaustive survey on electric cars, including a special report on plug-in hybrids, such as the (not yet built) GM Volt. From the article: "Garage tinkerers have been turning hybrids into plug-ins for years, but somehow no one paid attention. Other clean-car alternatives (like those below) got all the love. But, really — hydrogen? Maybe, someday. Now, the carmakers say plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs) are coming, if the engineers can get the batteries right. They will. Because it's hard to argue with 100 mpg." Plus, lots of video test drives..."
Music

Submission + - Judge Says RIAA "Disingenuous", Decision S

Submitted by
NewYorkCountryLawyer
NewYorkCountryLawyer writes: "Judge Lee R. West in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, has rejected the arguments made by the RIAA in support of its "reconsideration" motion in Capitol v. Foster as "disingenuous" and "not true", and accused the RIAA of "questionable motives". In the decision (pdf), reaffirming his earlier decision that defendant Debbie Foster's is entitled to be reimbursed for her attorneys fees, the Court, among other things, emphasized the Supreme Court's holding in Fogerty v. Fantasy, Inc. that "because copyright law ultimately serves the purpose of enriching the general public through access to creative works, it is peculiarly important that the boundaries of copyright law be demarcated as clearly as possible. Thus, a defendant seeking to advance meritorious copyright defenses should be encouraged to litigate them to the same extent that plaintiffs are encouraged to litigate meritorious infringement claims." Judge West also noted that he had found the RIAA's claims against the defendant to be "untested and marginal" and its "motives to be questionable in light of the facts of the case"; that the RIAA's primary argument for its motion — that the earlier decision had failed to list the "Fogerty factors" — was belied by unpublished opinions in which the RIAA had itself been involved; that the RIAA's argument that it could have proved a case against Ms. Foster had it not dropped the case was "disingenuous"; and that the RIAA's factual statements about the settlement history of the case were "not true". This is the same case in which an amicus brief had been filed by the ACLU, Public Citizen, EFF, AALL, and ACLU-Oklahoma in support of the attorneys fees motion, the RIAA questioned the reasonableness of Ms. Foster's lawyer's fees and was then ordered to turn over its own attorneys billing records, which ruling it complied with only reluctantly."
Games

Human Head Offices Destroyed, Company Bands Together 49

Posted by Zonk from the warning-games-may-be-flammable dept.
Yesterday, Gamasutra reported the sad news that the offices of Human Head studios were destroyed in a fire. Based out of Madison, Wisconsin, the indie developer recently signed up to do the next Mark Ecko game, riding high on their success with Prey from last year. Today, thankfully, Next Generation has the news that the company has survived more or less intact. "[Office Manager Carol] Smith said, 'I work with an incredible group of guys, and as soon as we got over the shock of oh my gosh, we had a fire--what if we lost data, what if we lost art? ...the next words out of everybody's mouths were, What can we do to help?' An update on Human Head's website confirmed that there were no injuries in the blaze that occurred at 2:30 a.m. on Friday and that the Prey developer 'suffered no significant data loss.'"
Businesses

Submission + - How an Email Rant Jolted a Big HMO

Submitted by Radon360
Radon360 writes: From the WSJ Article:

On a Friday morning last November, Justen Deal, a Kaiser Permanente employee, blasted an email throughout the giant health maintenance organization. His message charged that HealthConnect — the company's ambitious $4 billion project to convert paper files into electronic medical records — was a mess.

Mr. Deal signed the email. Before sending it, he says, he printed out a copy and handed it to his boss. Soon afterward, his office phone was ringing off the hook. IT staffers later arrived to seize his computers, and Mr. Deal was placed on paid leave from his $56,000-a-year job.

Despite Kaiser's efforts to squelch and downplay the incident, the email episode shows that, in the digital age, flicking away whistle-blowers isn't as easy as it once was.

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