This will be my last post before heading off to the gathering, enjoy!
Previously on RedState: Google as ISP lets us know they oppose Net Neutrality.
So Bradley Manning was convicted on nearly every charge. Let’s hope he gets a serious sentence to go with it.
More Wikileaks: The latest Edward Snowden/Glenn Greenwald report was misleading, so says the House.
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This will bet he only edition of Tech at Night this week. I was out of it Monday night, and this weekend I’m traveling to Denver for SGDQ 2013. I will be there to give live on stream commentary for the Legend of Zelda and Zelda II runs, so watch and donate if you care to.
House Democrats, together with a few libertarians, tried to restrict the NSA, and failed. I’m fine with this.
In other news, Google is accused of Net Neutrality violations for trying to restrict servers on Google Fiber. Heh. If people can run servers on Google Fiber then they’re going to have problems quickly. So this is a very interesting case.
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Here we go. The President, Jay Rockefeller, and the grabbing hands are on the move, using “Internet for the Children” as a pretext to expand spending. We need E-Rate reform along the lines of what Ajit Pai is talking about, not anything that’s just a plain old expansion.
The FTC went easy on this spammer. Texts can cost people 5-10 cents each. They do me. So if this spammer sent 20 million spam texts, he could have costs his victims 1-2 million dollars. And he only got find 60 thousand. Weak.
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Missed Tech on Monday due to a very uncomfortable and annoying, but not particularly threatening health issue. So let’s catch up.
Spying and cybersecurity. Edward Snowden intended to defect all along. And he’s probably now in Russia after serving up anti-American propaganda bait in commmunist China.
Meanwhile, one Lulzsec anarchist is under tough parole terms, we find Bitcoin is increasingly tied to crime, and Wikileaks isn’t going to get off easy backing Assange, Snowden, and Manning. For good reason.
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So, there’s a lot of hype about the Playstation 4 right now. It’s premature to get too hyped up about it though, for a few reasons:
First, Sony (RIAA and MPAA member) has a much worse track record than Microsoft does about skinning the sheep when it comes to the customers. Note that even as one hand Monday was waving the used games bloody shirt, the other hand was announcing mandatory Playstation Plus. Sony did a masterful job Monday playing to the press and the social media, but you know who else did that? Barack Obama, and we know how much of the hype he lived up to.
Second, I’m old enough to remember when Sony fanboys were outraged about Xbox 360’s paid Live account requirements, and how Playstation 3 was allegedly better because you got the full feature set built-in with a free PSN account. Well, sometime along the way, PS3 got the same paid account bonuses Xbox 360 had. Funny that. So what happens if Sony changes their mind again, this time about used games, a year or two down the line?
Third, this is a five year war. Let’s say nothing changes from now. What happens if Microsoft wins the exclusives war because of the used games feature? EA didn’t cancel online passes out of the goodness of their hearts, folks.
Fourth, I’m also old enough to remember how I was told the last generation was supposed to be a war between Microsoft and Sony, when Nintendo’s innovation won the day. Well, now Sony and Microsoft are all about motion controls, while Nintendo’s shipping a tablet and possibly going online with Pokemon. Too early to declare winners or losers. Again, this is a five year war.
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Normally in Tech at Night I try to find the big trends that can be pieced together from all the little stories we see going on. Right now the trend continues to be that Republicans are trying to make American Internet access even better than it already is, while the rest of the world is going in the wrong direction.
Don’t believe me? Europe wants to regulate the Internet even more. Meanwhile, Congressional Republicans are hard at work looking to protect us online from China, and to make sure wireless spectrum is allocated efficiently, rather than set aside for Obama’s preferred vendors.
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Markets work, folks. Americans have way more invested in our wireless than the rest of the world.. As a result, our wireless is the best in the world. This is why the broadband story is never completely told by the pro-regulatory faction: they need to “hide the decline” of socialized wireless.
Also, it’s beginning to look like Rand Paul is running for President (shocker, I know). Despite prominent wealthy California Democrats are, you now, Democrats, the Senator is trying to get support there. I suppose he’s trying to replace his father’s fringe base with left-libertarians. So he even talked to Wired and is cozying up to Silicon Valley industry. Will it translate to votes? Certainly not in the primary and I’m skeptical in the general. But if it works for him, it could be big.
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By my records this is the 382nd edition of Tech at Night. This is however the one that was prepared on my 35th birthday (though sorry, I didn’t get it written until Sunday morning).
If they try to ban 3D printers in the name of gun control, remember that they’re killing children if they do it. 3D printing is an important technology and the fascists must not be allowed to use gun control to gut it. But they will try. Just watch.
Oh look, fugitive at large in New Zealand (and I mean large) Kim Dotcom has become a patent troll. Remember: he’s a convicted felon and fraudster, having stolen money and embezzled money. He ran a large copyright infringement ring, which he now has restarted in New Zealand, having paid off the government through promises of ‘investment’ to avoid being deported despite indictments in the US and convictions in Germany and Hong Kong.
Anyone who buys a ‘patent’ from him should himself be investigated for money laundering.
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Had some work to do Friday night, so this this became Tech at Sunday Morning!
I still don’t see it passing the House after Mike Enzi’s winners and losers talk poisoned the well, but conservative governors want MFA passed for good reason. Ask Scott Walker.
Remember when the T-Mobile/MetroPCS deal flew through the Obama administration without a hitch? I think we now know why: it meant the end of the MetroPCS challenge to Net Neutrality. How convenient.
Stealth recording technology. What could go wrong? Of course, if you don’t like Google Glass, the real thing to do is to let property owners ban it on their own property. Problem solved.
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