By: Neil Stevens (Diary)  |  August 21st at 01:00 AM  | 

Another quick one tonight. Ah, the joys of there being no Internet crushing legislation or regulation under consideration right now. Cue the dramatic music: While it’s true that both Oracle and Google were paying people online to write for their side (not that I was even offered a penny; I’m thinking it’s more because I’m unimportant than that I have some reputation of some sort), | Read More »

By: Neil Stevens (Diary)  |  August 13th at 11:00 PM  | 

Time to defend Google: It’s unfair to attack them for excluding Youtube from its “anti-piracy” penalties, when they’re also excluding every other popular site driven by user-generated content. Twitter, Facebook, Tumblr, and Youtube are four sites that, whether Google-owned or not, need to be indexed and valued to a degree. The point of the penalty is to punish illegitimate sites, not legitimate sites with some | Read More »

By: Neil Stevens (Diary)  |  August 10th at 10:00 PM  | 

So the FTC is on a tear. Google is officially smacked for $22.5 million for hacking though Safari’s privacy protections to sell Safari users’ information to advertisers. Then Facebook got whacked for lying about what privacy protections it was giving users. Some are saying this is bad, as it’s expanding FTC power, but this is really a bad time to make that point. Google brought | Read More »

By: Neil Stevens (Diary)  |  August 9th at 01:30 AM  | 

With the Cybersecurity Act on hold for now, it seems like a slow news week, so a quick one tonight. We’re in a spectrum crunch, and as long as the Obama administration is restricting spectrum allocation, including the critical secondary spectrum market that firms like Verizon and AT&T are trying to operate in, it’s not going to get better. The Obama FCC claims to get | Read More »

By: Neil Stevens (Diary)  |  August 7th at 03:30 AM  | 

We had no Tech at Night on Friday becuase I was at the Gathering in Jacksonville. Hope those who went enjoyed it, and that those who weren’t able to attend can make it next year! So, Harry Reid offered to let Republicans fix Lieberman-Collins. Republicans took him up on that, and he was unhappy. So he tried to ram it through after all. Republicans objected, | Read More »

By: Neil Stevens (Diary)  |  August 2nd at 12:00 AM  | 

Lieberman-Collins is in trouble! There is apparently some misinformation going around. I’ve seen people claiming that gun control is in the bill, when it’s just an amendment possibly to be added, along with an anti-Obamacare amendment going around. Further, The Hill posted and pulled a story saying Harry Reid postponed the Cybersecurity Act. But it looks like I was right to respect Republican attempts to | Read More »

By: Neil Stevens (Diary)  |  July 28th at 12:30 AM  | 

Senate Republicans have decided to take Harry Reid at his word that Republicans will have the opportunity to amend the Lieberman-Collins cybersecurity bill. So, many Republicans voted for advancing the bill, which passed 84-11. And oh boy it needs amending. Who are you going to believe? For it is Barack Obama. Against have been Kay Bailey Hutchison, John McCain, Marco Rubio, Ron Johnson, Heritage, and | Read More »

By: Neil Stevens (Diary)  |  July 26th at 02:15 AM  | 

Right now the top issues are both getting lots of attention in the Senate. One is the cybersecurity bill. It’s been difficult for me to find out much about what’s going on with it, and it turns out there’s a reason. Sources familiar with the situation indicate to me that Harry Reid has been negotiating with Republicans in bad faith. Even Republicans who love to | Read More »

By: Neil Stevens (Diary)  |  July 24th at 02:30 AM  | 

It’s easy to see why there’s sudden, strong opposition to the Marketplace Fairness Act, as yet another Republican governor, Terry Branstad, backs the bill. I again state my opposition to the lousy language backing the bill, including “fairness” and “loophole”. Yes, that language is being driven by marketplace losers, but both sides of this debate are ponying up cash. I favor the bill on its | Read More »

By: Neil Stevens (Diary)  |  July 19th at 03:00 AM  | 

So, the Marketplace Fairness Act. Ben Domenech and Francis Cianfrocca recently went off on it on Coffee and Markets, which is a great series to listen to. Having an opportunity to block out time to listen to it is probably the best part of having a 2.5 hour commute from Arlington to Purcellville (and then 2.5 hours back). I support the bill, and the interstate | Read More »

By: Neil Stevens (Diary)  |  July 12th at 02:30 AM  | 

US attempts to extradite Kim Dotcom have been delayed until 2013. It is unconfirmed whether the delay is related to the need to send a reinforced tanker to New Zealand in order to have a vehicle strong enough carry his weight back to the United States. In the meantime, the hubris (and food) filled man is trying to dictate terms to the US. That won’t | Read More »

By: Neil Stevens (Diary)  |  July 7th at 02:00 AM  | 

Things that are compatible with Google’s values: Prostitutes. Websites for copyright infringement. Illegal drugs. Pornography. Mortgage scams. Spying on people’s wireless networks. Things that are incompatible with Google’s values: legal exercise of Second Amendment rights.

By: Neil Stevens (Diary)  |  July 5th at 12:00 AM  | 

It’s Independence Day, which was very nice for me since I kept on resting and feel just about healthy now. No Tech on Monday thanks to my cold that wiped me out since Sunday. Unfortunately Google decided today was the day to celebrate a song that, while American, was specifically designed to carry political meaning as well as to reply to the Christian and patriotic | Read More »

By: Neil Stevens (Diary)  |  June 30th at 04:00 AM  | 

I hope nobody’s surprised that the Obama administration is stonewalling Darrell Issa from Trans-Pacific Partnership oversight. Because the President would love to get a power grab out of this, I’m thinking. In other House news, the Republican Study Committee is going Tech. Which is good; the less we have to rely on Democrats for good policy outcomes, the better. So I wish luck to Marsha | Read More »

By: Neil Stevens (Diary)  |  June 23rd at 03:57 AM  | 

Texas takes on Google as the state comes after the corporation on antitrust grounds. I’m not sure this is a good idea, any more than it was a good idea for the Clinton administration to go after Microsoft, but it’s probably even dumber for Google to obstruct the investigation.

By: Neil Stevens (Diary)  |  June 21st at 12:30 AM  | 

WCITLeaks having some success, possibly, as WCIT itself starts talking about openness. When even pro-Internet-regulation folks oppose UN or ITU regulation of the Internet, it needs sunshine for public evaluation. Mary Bono Mack’s response is the right one: oppose all government meddling, not just the UN or ITU.

By: Neil Stevens (Diary)  |  June 7th at 02:30 AM  | 

Commerce. “The business of America is business.” Innovation online is growing business, and the most important takeaway you could ever get from Tech at Night is that we need to stay out of its way. BfA seems to agree. And some honest government action on spectrum could be a great start, but we probably won’t start down that road until after January 20, 2013 at | Read More »

By: Neil Stevens (Diary)  |  June 5th at 01:00 AM  | 

Privacy? You want privacy in the digital age? Start by repealing campaign finance laws before you wag your socialist finger at the private sector. Al Qaeda also denied 9/11 involvement at first, but we knew the truth. Also, how can Anonymous deny involvement in an attack when they claim to be unorganized? It’s these slipups that let us know the truth about them: they’re an | Read More »

By: Neil Stevens (Diary)  |  June 2nd at 12:00 AM  | 

It’s funny how certain names come up again and again in this space. There are just certain Republicans who are becoming solid Tech leaders. Marsha Blackburn is one of them, pushing to force Barack Obama to take a stand against the Chinese online. Again, a Republican governor comes out for the sales tax compact, this time Governor Christie. The Marketplace Fairness Act I still say | Read More »

By: Neil Stevens (Diary)  |  May 26th at 04:00 AM  | 

Imagine if we’d banned automobiles because all the old business models that were destroyed by them got government protection. Imagine a government that unfairly killed innovation in order to give well-connected businessmen a leg up on upstart competition. That’s what big media outlets are asking for when they come after Dish Network’s innovative DVR service. And of course, given the Obama administration’s track record of | Read More »