Transcript of Internet Caucus Panel Discussion.
Re: Administration's new encryption policy.
Date: September 28, 1999.
Weldon statement.

Rep. Curt Weldon: Thank you. Let me see if I can liven things up here in the last couple of minutes of the luncheon. First of all, I apologize for being late. And I thank Bob and the members of the caucus for inviting me here.

...

But the point is that when John Hamre briefed me, and gave me the three key points of this change, there are a lot of unanswered questions. He assured me that in discussions that he had had with people like Bill Gates and Gerstner from IBM that there would be, kind of a, I don't know whether it's a, unstated ability to get access to systems if we needed it. Now, I want to know if that is part of the policy, or is that just something that we are being assured of, that needs to be spoke. Because, if there is some kind of a tacit understanding, I would like to know what it is.

Because that is going to be subjected to future administrations, if it is not written down in a clear policy way. I want to know more about this end use certificate. In fact, sitting on the Cox Committee as I did, I saw the fallacy of our end use certificate that we were supposedly getting for HPCs going into China, which didn't work. So, I would like to know what the policies are. So, I guess what I would say is, I am happy that there seems to be a comming together. In fact, when I first got involved with NSA and DOD and CIS, and why can't you sit down with industry, and work this out. In fact, I called Gerstner, and I said, can't you IBM people, and can't you software people get together and find the middle ground, instead of us having to do legislation.

...

"Consultancy" explained in 7 minutes!

Modify the Slashcode to require Anonymous posters and registered users with low Karma to have their posts/replies approved by any user with a Excellent or greater Karma rating before the posts/replies become visible to anyone with less than Great Karma rating. Also have the following Slashdot moderation process affect the karma of the users who approved the posts.

Just trial it for a couple of months and see the difference it will make.

We have been told that because others in the West - and their advocates are here tonight - carry the fearful burden of a defence which terrorises as much as the threat it counters, we too must carry that burden. We are actually told that New Zealanders cannot decide for themselves how to defend New Zealand, but are obliged to adopt the methods which others use to defend themselves.

Lord Carrington [the Secretary-General of NATO] made a case in Copenhagen recently against the creation of nuclear weapon free zones. He argued that if the people of the United States - as advocated by my friend over there - found themselves bearing the burden alone, they would tire of bearing it. Now that is exactly the point. Genuine agreement[s] about the control of nuclear weapons do not cede the advantage to one side or the other: they enhance security, they do not diminish it. And if such arrangements can be made, and such agreements reached, then those who remain outside those arrangements might well and truly tire of their insecurity. They will reject the logic of the weapon and they will assert their essential humanity. They will look for arms control agreements which are real and verifiable.

DAVID LANGE, Oxford Union debate, 1985

Since the ISPs are complaining about their lack of competence to deal with the coming flood of content...

Once solution is to have all the broadband customers install/use wireless routers that can interconnect as many as possible to a geo-local area ( your local neighbourhood ) virtual private network that shares the bandwidth load for bulk content distribution across multiple customer to ISP connections. If N users wish to fetch the same content, each person only need to download 1/N of the content, using neighbourhood network to swap the different parts. Think of it as a neighbourhood bittorrent.

This could be set up/managed as a web service, with the client P2N2P ( Peer to Neighbourhood to Peer ) software running on each users computer ( or running as a proxy service on the wireless routers ), via managed a multi platform subscription aggregation client such as Miro 2.0 Open internet TV.

The service could operate like this:
1) Via a website or web2.0 interface, people create content "channels" which are a list of URIs ( HTTP/FTP/TORRENT) of content with descriptions, just like podcasts.
2) The service would then fetch the content, on demand and store the content temporarily on its host/distribution site. The host service would do sharing via torrent, so uploading is not done by the Neighbourhood Peers.
3) The service would hold the content and distribute it to P2N2P clients so that the content can be recombined via a local Neighbourhood VPNs.
4) Each piece of content itself be encrypted at the URI source, so the service need not hold the keys, to deal with any concerns over end use privacy issues.
5) The subscription aggregation client could incorporate and distribute advertising as a means of paying for hosting the service.

Monday, July 17, 2006

Network Neutrality : Two question for the great debate. In California there was an outrage when it was disclosed that electricity companies had deliberately idled plants while supplies were tight and then waited for prices to skyrocket on the spot market. If the current Internet network infrastructure provided by the backbone providers and Internet service providers can currently support much higher speeds and data quantities to current customers, then is the act of packet filtering and setting arbitrary low speed and data caps also effectively providing an "idled" service? Is a tiered Internet service, where content providers would be effectively competing on a similar market to the electricity "spot market", a market based entirely on Artificial Scarcity?

Tortious interference

"The patent offices' decision has no preclusive effect on a court, and there are indeed cases where the patent office made a decision in a re-examination supporting a patent and a court later looked at the same exact issue, disagreed with the PTO, and found the patent invalid,"
Dan Ravicher, PUBPATs executive director and founder ( From Groklaw )

1. Microsoft, as a corporate entity would only need to supply a witness with sufficient relevant knowledge and/or duties relating to the patents....
No. If you name an individual for deposition, then the Judge is not going to look to kindly to Microsoft sending substitute, especially if that substitute did not have anything to do with the patent at the time of filing.

2. Scare tactic, unless you're bringing charges
That statement is pretty rich, given the lack of quality of Microsoft's patents is using against TomTom. However, this scare is not against Microsoft the corporation but the individual's being depositioned. Also your assuming that current administration will not change the USPTO perjury prosecution policy. US SEC prosecutions have laps over the last decade, but many more prosecutions for fraud are now proceeding.

Honestly, I'm not all that interested in seeing small fry Microsoft employees being prosecuted for a federal crime, but a few cases against so called "inventors" of obvious patent would do a lot to start cleaning up the massive multi billion dollar fraud perpetuated against the USPTO.

Ideally we need the USPTO to offer up an amnesty against the named inventors. IF any named inventor has been made aware of or "discovered" that there was existing prior art at the time of patent filing or a named invention was obvious ( Including multiple independent implementations before the patent was full disclosed ) THEN any of the inventors named in the patent should be able contact the USPTO and rescind the patent OR risk possible prosecution.

3. Bob the fat32 intern ...
See answer to #1 above.

4. Client attorney privilege is pretty much regarded as sacred,
Only to the lawyer, not to the client. And the lawyers in question represent Microsoft not the individual client being depositioned. The client is not under any legal obligation not to disclose what Microsoft's lawyers said to him, or any correspondence including any written memos or emails. Microsoft's lawyer's apparently love memos.

... ...Profit?
Yes, via Publicity increasing TomTom's public profile leading to more sales.

IANAL but IMHO, TomTom's lawyers should:
1) request to deposition all the individual inventors named in the patents;
2) inform the inventors that they should have independent legal representation, since submitting false claims to the USPTO is perjury, a federal crime in the USA;
3) at the deposition really closely grill each inventor over each patent's prior art and obviousness;
4) then ask the inventors what advice Microsoft's patent department and lawyers gave to the inventors regarding each patent's prior art and obviousness ( Lawyer client confidentiality is not necessarily a two way street );
5) start building a case for the disbarment of any of Microsoft's lawyers who gave any advice or prodding to the inventors to ignore existing prior art and obviousness;
6) re-write many Microsoft's patent claims in technical English ( removing legal patent jargon ) and publish the result;
7) put out a call to the technical community for written and signed statements regarding the obvious nature of the patent claims;
8) fully publicise the outcomes of steps 1-7.

As the natural world meets the digital opportunities are opening up for artists to connect with new audiences across the world. However, with the digitisation of media the lines between use and copy have become blurred. Worldwide,laws regulating the act of copying have failed to keep pace with technology, however a few countries have attempted to pass very bad legislation to address the problem. In 12 days, the New Zealand parliament may pass an amendment to the copyright legislation that will require ISPs in New Zealand to cut off internet connections and take down hosted websites of anyone accused (not convicted) of copyright infringement. This same kind of amendment to copyright legislation has been rejected by the UK because of very complex legal issues wrapped up in enforced disconnection , by Germany because it is completely unreasonable punishment , and the European Parliament because the "cut of Internet access is a disproportionate measure". The Recording industry has proposed the USA and Canada adopt the same sort of legislation. It is now time to act and stop the spread of this abomination. Please, if you value your internet freedom, consider joining thousands of New Zealanders already against this law by "black"ing out your websites and web2.0 pages in protest against this unjust new law that may come into effect on February 28.

When Microsoft sold Xenix to the Santa Cruz Operation ( Not the current SCO Group ), wasn't there a Non-compete clause in the agreement? I thought that Microsoft was not allowed to sell any Unix based operating system - and that would include any NetBSD derivative.

"In place of MusicSentry, the RIAA says it will use Copenhagen-based DtecNet Software ApS. The music industry had worked with DtecNet previously both in the U.S. and overseas, and liked its technology, said RIAA spokesman Jonathan Lamy."

So the RIAA is already paying a foreign company to spy on Americans internet usage in the USA? Isn't that in violation of some state or federal privacy/computer intrusion legislation?

From June 14 2002 Is is about time that the government ...

1) set up a minimum set of expectations, in the design and implementation of internet "accessing" software ; and
2) ensure that all deployments are more securely implemented ; and/or
3) remove inherently unsecure products from the marketplace.