So, here is my question: if I had an antenna and a transcoder at my residence, could someone still act as a Network-based DVR? I'm a bit unclear at which part of their service is considered a public transmission... If I'm providing the content (as in my theory here) and then playing it back for myself, would this still be a no-no in accordance with this ruling? Network-based DVR would still be permitted, right? Or am I misreading/misunderstanding the ruling?

Bingo. In an enterprise, you run these legacy apps inside of Terminal Services or as a XenApp, ThinApp, App-V, etc. And you restrict them from accessing the Internet. Then you can drop a safer, more modern browser on the desktop itself.

For any decent size enterprise, they have so much legacy code that they wouldn't even know where to begin with an overhaul. For at least some businesses, this is the same reason that mainframes are still around. A few years ago I worked for a US telco who ran their main ticketing system off of a mainframe. They wanted to replace it (since the developers were pretty much writing their own paychecks), but they couldn't even quantify how much money it would cost to replace it with a new system (Remedy, if I recall correctly). Countless hours spent trying to figure out how to replace and provide automated circuit testing, cable/pair mappings, billing, dispatch scheduling, etc. Plus, there were so many integrations with various other systems over the decades since it's inception that no one knew how everything worked. The people who did know had long since left (or had been terminated). Not a good situation for anyone to find themselves in...

I feel the exact opposite as you. When I go in to the office, I feel trapped and unable to escape. I generally feel "stuck" until well past time to leave to go home. It feels as though my e-mail follows me home and demands my attention late into the night.

When I work from home, quitting time rolls around and I just shut everything off.

Part of the problem for me is that productivity is so low while at the office. Because of the workplace distractions, it feels as though I get nothing accomplished until somewhere in the area of 3pm or later. By then, I feel as though I still have to get my 8 hours of work in, which puts me working late, even though I've already been in the office all day spinning my wheels. When I work from home, I rarely get bothered by anyone until after lunch, which means I already have over half a day of "real work" accomplished. I can grab some food while listening in on that "emergency" conference call that has absolutely nothing to do with me. Plus I save a 45 minute commute each direction.

If I could lock myself into a quiet room at the office, and people were somehow prohibited from bothering me for stupid stuff that isn't my problem, then I would absolutely be more productive in the office than at home. However, that isn't the case, so the interruptions are frequent and unnecessary, and people are continuously consuming my time for problems that I don't even have anything to do with.

A phone call can also work wonders. If that doesn't do the trick, a quick video chat can sometimes be even better. If that doesn't work out, then you can still meet up for a few pints.

That being said, I understand that there are still certain benefits to handling some situations in person. However, I've never worked in an environment that has required in-person communications multiple times daily. I guess if that is an environment that one finds themselves in, then it means that telecommuting simply isn't an option for them.

Ditto. I have a 1 year old, and I am still more productive from home than when in the office.

I think part of the problem is that the distractions while in the office are more "distracting" than those at home (at least for me). They either pull me away from my desk or create a sufficient enough diversion that I have to break my train of thought. Even a 30 second interruption can take a significant amount of time to recover from, especially since it continues being a topic of conversation long after it has went away (I share an office with a co-worker). Inevitably, there are also the individuals that decide to drop by and hang out for an unwelcome chat for an excessive amount of time - no, I don't care about your weekend, and I'd rather not tell you about mine.

Yes, there are distractions at home also, but those are frequently ones that are mindless and/or menial and do not break my train of thought. Generally, the worst distractions I get at home are the endless conference calls (and work-related phone calls) that seem to have no point other than to waste time.

I think that, in theory, this makes the most sense. However, doesn't corporate personhood mean that corporations would essentially be getting access to government resources free of charge?

Depends on the business. I work for a financial company, and there are regulations that require recording of many customer facing conversations. With the advent of Dodd Frank, it appears that the recording regulations are going to extend to mobile devices. Oddly enough, it is quite difficult to record cell phone conversations in a non-intrusive and reliable manner. Sure, there are spyware applications, but those are designed for consumer use, and aren't particularly workable in the enterprise (especially since most of them require rooted devices, which isn't easy to accommodate in an enterprise environment). We've also looked into recording Skype conversations, and there aren't a lot of reliable solutions for that either. Many of them have to run on the same machine as the client, which makes retrieving the conversations a nightmare.

Plus, things like abbreviated dialing between global offices, least cost routing, TEHO, etc, would cause telephone costs to skyrocket if desk phones were eliminated. Our International rates for our dedicated voice circuits is significantly cheaper than those of cell phones.

So, in our environment, at least, about the only conversation you could have would be replacing desk phones with soft phones. With as many people as we have who have more than 8 lines on their phones, I don't think there is a soft phone client that is reliable enough to replicate the experience.

Even for me personally, I have a much more pleasant experience using speaker phone on my desk phone than trying to use speakers and a mic on my computer. Headsets either way suck. I can't even imagine only using a soft phone or only using my cell phone. Heck, as it is, I generally call people back from my desk phone if they call me on my cell phone. Same thing if I accidentally pick up a call on my soft phone. For those of you who enjoy not having a desk phone, kudos to you! For me, I'm going to hold on to mine as long as I can!

I know this is easier to say than to actually implement, but you could add a "support" menu option or link, and if it's paid software, have the licensing information, including account number, populate to the support page (including the number to call for support if it's paid). If it's the free version, you can provide information there about how to get support, costs, etc.

Then, on your phone system, you can explain quickly how to find the account information, and provide a redirect option for paid support for the free software version.

That way, you don't have to worry about "buried" account or other support numbers.

The ICE seizures were completely ineffective. There were a couple of sites that I accessed that were seized by ICE and both were back up and operating with new domain names (that were easily located via a Google search) within a day. The ones that didn't come back probably were doing something illegitimate and didn't feel that it was in their best interest to return. For sure, the ICE seizures were stupid, and a terrible move by the US. But, I'll take that over the great firewall of China any day.

I also agree that the US can no longer pretend to be a protector of the freedoms of the Internet either. However, I still don't believe that things are going to get any better with the ITU. There must be a reason that countries like Iran and China are pushing so hard for this. Perhaps they believe that they can leverage the ITU in some way to make things easier for themselves to censor their citizens. If these countries are simply seeking independence from IANA, there is nothing stopping them from operating their own DNS servers. They can even still selectively synchronize things from the IANA DNS servers if they choose.

There is nothing stopping other countries from running their own DNS servers and forcing providers to direct DNS queries to them...

Additionally, Amazon has Cisco Nexus switches in colo space in Sao Paulo, Brazil. Not sure which product line it was supporting, but they had lots and lots of them.

It all depends on who you are. At my last company, the local Cisco account team wanted us as a reference account. Our discount from Cisco (before distribution and the partner took their cut) was 59%. Our final discount was 55% or 57% (depending on whether we went through disti or direct from Cisco).

At my current company, our discount from Cisco (again before disti and partner) is 55%. Our price after partner and disti is 47% (yes, our partner is taking a ridiculous cut).

The problem is that most customers don't have any idea what list price is, and so they have no clue whether they are even getting a reasonable price. Sadly, Cisco, along with their partners, do their best to hide this information from their customers.

Source? If Cisco was pitching a solution that was heavy on Nexus, it sounds like they were pitching a different solution than everyone else. If anything, that means that they didn't follow instructions properly, not that they were legitimately that much higher.

Yes, the US has regulations in place that require carriers provide "lawful intercept", which the government can use for pretty much anything whether it's actually lawful or not. But, guess what? This still requires carrier interaction, so the US can't spy on anyone and everyone around the globe just because they "own" the Internet. We can probably still spy on our Allies, assuming those countries ask their carriers to comply with US government regulations.

On the other hand, if Hauwei or ZTE are actually building backdoors (which hasn't actually been proven to my knowledge) in equipment so that the Chinese government can gain access to any traffic, anywhere in the world, regardless of carrier collusion (other than them purchasing the hardware itself), then we are no longer talking about an apples to apples comparison here.

What exactly are they "competing" with? The U.S. blocks DNS for some websites - hardly an effective prevention mechanism. The WATTC will be meeting in Dubai, and the UAE certainly has a long-standing reputation for an open and free Internet, don't they? And, lo and behold, some of the most vocal proponents of changes to the Internet are China and India.

Let's pretend for a moment that the US does relinquish Command and Control of the Internet (because honestly, for the most part "The Internet" is just the root DNS servers and control of IANA and ICANN) - and UAE, India and China get a hand in the pot of controlling it. Do you really think things are going to get better, or do you think they are going to get worse?

Now, if we were talking about Switzerland or Sweden getting control of the Internet, then that would likely be an improvement. But, to my knowledge, the countries who would be likely to improve the Internet climate as a whole are not the ones who have been vocal about an interest in "control" over the Internet.