72404771
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SonicSpike writes:
Aiming to appeal to Millennials and libertarian-leaning tech workers, GOP presidential candidate Sen. Rand Paul will visit San Francisco next week for a campaign swing that includes headlining a discussion and conference on “Disrupting Democracy.”
The May 9 event, formally titled “Disrupting Democracy: A New Generation of Voter Engagement,” is being hosted by Lincoln Labs, a GOP-leaning “liberty-focused thought and leadership group,” and Brigade, a tech firm that develops social tools aimed at boosting civic engagement and is chaired by billionaire Facebook and Napster co-founder Sean Parker.
Paul is scheduled to sit down with Brigade CEO Matt Mahan during the conference.
72404293
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SonicSpike writes:
U.S. Senator Rand Paul, a Republican presidential hopeful, on Wednesday introduced a resolution to block new regulations on Internet service providers, saying they would "wrap the Internet in red tape."
The "net neutrality" rules, which are slated to take effect in June, are backed by the Obama administration and were passed by the Democratic majority of the Federal Communications Commission in February. AT&T Inc and wireless and cable trade associations are challenging them in court.
Paul's resolution, if adopted, would allow the Senate to fast-track a vote to establish that Congress disapproves of the FCC's new rules and moves to nullify them.
72397533
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SonicSpike writes:
Sen. Rand Paul today introduced a joint resolution of disapproval under the Congressional Review Act to nullify Internet regulations recently published by the U.S. Federal Communications Commission (FCC). Through the resolution, Sen. Paul will seek a vote in the U.S. Senate against the FCC’s unnecessary and overreaching power grab for control over the Internet.
“This regulation by the FCC is a textbook example of Washington’s desire to regulate anything and everything and will do nothing more than wrap the Internet in red-tape. The Internet has successfully flourished without the heavy hand of government interference. Stated simply, I do not want to see the government regulating the Internet,” Sen. Paul said.
72397455
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SonicSpike writes:
U.S. Senator Rand Paul today attended the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee hearing to question the Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security Jeh Johnson regarding the scope of Fourth Amendment protections for American citizens.
During the hearing, Sen. Paul noted that the transition to encrypted data is a market-driven response to the U.S. government’s bulk collection of the records of millions of Americans, and reiterated his view that law enforcement should instead seek individualized warrants under the Fourth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.
72135349
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SonicSpike writes:
Sens. Rand Paul (R-KY) and Ron Wyden (D-OR), and Rep. Zoe Lofgren (D-CA) introduced bipartisan legislation today to better target serious criminals and curb overzealous prosecutions for non-malicious computer and Internet offenses.
The legislation, inspired by the late Internet innovator and activist Aaron Swartz, who faced up to 35 years in prison for an act of civil disobedience, would reform the quarter-century old Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (CFAA) to better reflect computer and internet activities in the digital age. Numerous and recent instances of heavy-handed prosecutions for non-malicious computer crimes have raised serious questions as to how the law treats violations of terms of service, employer agreements and website notices.
“I am proud to join Sen. Wyden and Rep. Lofgren today in offering this bipartisan and bicameral legislation which will reduce overbroad prosecutions and adjust unfair sentencing practices,” Sen. Paul said.
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SonicSpike writes:
The FCC’s recently concluded “AWS-3 spectrum auction” was extremely important, even if you didn’t hear about it.
Due to the immense success of the recent auction – it amassed $45 billion for the U.S. Treasury, double the predicted total – pundits widely hailed the sale as a success. Yet given the ability for the top bidder – Dish Network – to abuse a flawed government policy and walk away with $3.3 billion in taxpayer-funded corporate cronyism, perhaps it is now time to re-evaluate what really happened and change the way the agency treats “small businesses.”
Dish bought more licenses – 44 percent –than anyone. But it did so through a loophole designed to help small businesses – something Dish clearly is not. “Through sleight of hand and aggressive use of partners and loopholes, Dish turned itself into that very small business, distorting reality and creating an unfair advantage,” the New York Times reported in February.
In short, Dish set up shell companies that qualify under the Federal Communications Commission’s Designated Entity program – designed to help “small businesses, businesses owned by members of minority groups and/or women, and rural telephone companies” – to flood the auction with Dish bids and undercut wireless companies to secure spectrum at a fraction of the cost. In the lead up to the auction, two companies sprouted up – Northstar Wireless and SNR Wireless – which Dish owns 85 percent of
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SonicSpike writes:
The media industry is racing toward an Internet-TV future at a breathtaking pace. But the swift changes, highlighted by efforts from Apple Inc., Dish Network Corp. and others, are giving consumers an array of confusing options and forcing entertainment giants to confront some sober realities.
Not long ago, consumers who wanted to watch “Monday Night Football” on ESPN, “Mad Men” on AMC or “Game of Thrones” on HBO knew what they had to do: shell out for a cable package that typically costs around $90 a month in the U.S. They could catch old seasons of popular shows on Netflix or a similar streaming on-demand service, but live, up-to-date programming lived in the cable bundle.
In the span of a few months, tectonic shifts are remaking a television landscape it took decades to sculpt, opening up a range of other possibilities for “cord cutters” who don’t want traditional pay TV. Apple is working on an Internet-TV service with some 25 channels, which is expected to be priced between $25 to $35 a month, according to people familiar with its plans. It will join Dish Network Corp. and Sony Corp., which are pitching their own online-TV bundles. A host of TV companies, including HBO, NBCUniversal, Nickelodeon’s Noggin and CBS, are in the mix with stand-alone streaming offerings.
But if consumers drop pay TV and sign up for TV services delivered over broadband, will they really get a better deal?
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SonicSpike writes:
YouTube has been using loudness normalisation on their music videos – and they’ve been doing it since December last year. Everything plays at a similar loudness, regardless of how it was mastered. And no-one has noticed.
for example, at the more dynamic end of the spectrum, Mark Ronson & Bruno Mars’ massive hit ”Uptown Funk” measures -12 LUFS (DR 8 on the TT Meter) on CD. Whereas “Love Me Like You Do” by Ellie Goulding is squashed up to -8 LUFS (DR 5) on CD, and later in the playlist, Madonna’s “Living For Love” clocks in at an eye-watering (and heavily distorted) -7 LUFS (DR 4!)
But on YouTube, all of them are being played back at a similar loudness of roughly -13 LUFS.
And that’s HUGE, because YouTube is the single largest online discovery source for music. More kids look for music on YouTube than on iTunes, TV or radio, or anywhere.
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SonicSpike writes:
In an extraordinary admission, Attorney General Eric Holder has told Congress that U.S. drone strikes since 2009 have killed four Americans — three of whom were “not specifically targeted.”
For all the effort that the Obama administration has gone to in asserting that its drones only kill the people that the administration intends to kill, Holder wrote in a letter today to Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) that Samir Khan, 16-year-old Abdulrahman Awlaki and Jude Kenan Mohammad were “not specifically targeted by the United States.” The fourth American to die in a drone strike since 2009 was Abdulrahman’s father Anwar Awlaki, a radical propagandist whom the U.S. killed in Yemen in 2011.
The five-page letter, obtained and published by Charlie Savage of The New York Times, does not explain the circumstances that led to the unintentional killings of Khan, Mohammad and the younger Awlaki. Holder does not apologize for the killings, nor explain whether their deaths resulted from errant targeting, mistaken identity or another circumstance.
But after acknowledging that the administration did “not specifically targe[t]” those three Americans, Holder defended killing Americans the administration believes to be members of al-Qaida without due process, a constitutionally questionable proposition.
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SonicSpike writes:
Congressman Thomas Massie (R-KY) writes in an op-ed:
"As a small inventor and holder of 29 patents, I care deeply about innovation and its role in our economy. Unfortunately, the Innovation Act, which in 2013 passed the House but stalled in the Senate, is back. This bill, which proposes changes to our patent system, would pose a serious threat to the American inventor and extinguish creativity and invention.
In my opinion, the Innovation Act threatens American inventors, particularly individual inventors and those working at small businesses and startups. The bill attempts to “fix” a few isolated abuses of the patent system, but instead it sets forth a comprehensive overhaul of the existing legal framework that compromises the rights of all legitimate inventors.
Perhaps the most troubling aspect of the Innovation Act is the provision that makes it easier for corporations to keep shipping products even if a court finds reason to believe those products contain stolen inventions. When deciding whether to pay a fair license fee to the rightful inventors, or whether to steal a patented idea and risk a lawsuit, it is the threat of lost revenue that keeps the big companies honest."
Read the rest at the link...
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SonicSpike writes:
The United States government has taken a new, though preliminary, step to encourage commercial development of the moon.
According to documents obtained by Reuters, U.S. companies can stake claims to lunar territory through an existing licensing process for space launches.
The Federal Aviation Administration, in a previously undisclosed late-December letter to Bigelow Aerospace, said the agency intends to “leverage the FAA’s existing launch licensing authority to encourage private sector investments in space systems by ensuring that commercial activities can be conducted on a non-interference basis.”
In other words, experts said, Bigelow could set up one of its proposed inflatable habitats on the moon, and expect to have exclusive rights to that territory — as well as related areas that might be tapped for mining, exploration and other activities.
However, the FAA letter noted a concern flagged by the U.S. State Department that “the national regulatory framework, in its present form, is ill-equipped to enable the U.S. government to fulfill its obligations” under a 1967 United Nations treaty, which, in part, governs activities on the moon.
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SonicSpike writes:
Autonomous cars will be commonplace by 2025 and have a near monopoly by 2030, and the sweeping change they bring will eclipse every other innovation our society has experienced.
They will cause unprecedented job loss and a fundamental restructuring of our economy, solve large portions of our environmental problems, prevent tens of thousands of deaths per year, save millions of hours with increased productivity, and create entire new industries that we cannot even imagine from our current vantage point.
Industry experts think that consumers will be slow to purchase autonomous cars – while this may be true, it is a mistake to assume that this will impede the transition. Morgan Stanley’s research shows that cars are driven just 4% of the time,5 which is an astonishing waste considering that the average cost of car ownership is nearly $9,000 per year.6 Next to a house, an automobile is the second most expensive asset that most people will ever buy – it is no surprise that ride sharing services like Uber and car sharing services like Zipcar are quickly gaining popularity as an alternative to car ownership. It is now more economical to use a ride sharing service if you live in a city and drive less than 10,000 miles per year.7 The impact on private car ownership is enormous: a UC-Berkeley study showed that vehicle ownership among car sharing users was cut in half.8 The car purchasers of the future will not be you and me – cars will be purchased and operated by ride sharing and car sharing companies.
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SonicSpike writes:
The investigative arm of the Department of Justice is attempting to short-circuit the legal checks of the Fourth Amendment by requesting a change in the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure. These procedural rules dictate how law enforcement agencies must conduct criminal prosecutions, from investigation to trial. Any deviations from the rules can have serious consequences, including dismissal of a case. The specific rule the FBI is targeting outlines the terms for obtaining a search warrant.
It’s called Federal Rule 41(b), and the requested change would allow law enforcement to obtain a warrant to search electronic data without providing any specific details as long as the target computer location has been hidden through a technical tool like Tor or a virtual private network. It would also allow nonspecific search warrants where computers have been intentionally damaged (such as through botnets, but also through common malware and viruses) and are in five or more separate federal judicial districts. Furthermore, the provision would allow investigators to seize electronically stored information regardless of whether that information is stored inside or outside the court’s jurisdiction.
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SonicSpike writes:
According to a new study from the Progressive Policy Institute, President Obama’s call to regulate the Internet like a public utility would mean a $17 Billion tax hike for Americans.
In Delaware, bills for Comcast, Verizon, Time Warner Cable and other Internet service providers would rise by $8 per year under reclassification, the study found. The average annual cost of service in certain parts of Alaska, meanwhile, would go up by almost $148.
Since Obama and advocates have called for the new Internet rules to apply to wireless service as well as wired broadband, the fees would likely be tacked on to cellphone bills as well.
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SonicSpike writes:
At the heart of this new clock is the element strontium. Inside a small chamber, the strontium atoms are suspended in a lattice of crisscrossing laser beams. Researchers then give them a little ping, like ringing a bell. The strontium vibrates at an incredibly fast frequency. It's a natural atomic metronome ticking out teeny, teeny fractions of a second.
This new clock can keep perfect time for 5 billion years.
"It's about the whole, entire age of the earth," says Jun Ye, the scientist here at JILA who built this clock. "Our aim is that we'll have a clock that, during the entire age of the universe, would not have lost a second."
But this new clock has run into a big problem: This thing we call time doesn't tick at the same rate everywhere in the universe. Or even on our planet.
Right now, on the top of Mount Everest, time is passing just a little bit faster than it is in Death Valley. That's because speed at which time passes depends on the strength of gravity. Einstein himself discovered this dependence as part of his theory of relativity, and it is a very real effect.
The relative nature of time isn't just something seen in the extreme. If you take a clock off the floor, and hang it on the wall, Ye says, "the time will speed up by about one part in 1016."
That is a sliver of a second. But this isn't some effect of gravity on the clock's machinery. Time itself is flowing more quickly on the wall than on the floor. These differences didn't really matter until now. But this new clock is so sensitive, little changes in height throw it way off. Lift it just a couple of centimeters, Ye says, "and you will start to see that difference."
This new clock can sense the pace of time speeding up as it moves inch by inch away from the earth's core.
