Compare Declan’s Spam deja vu with the discussion surrounding Charlie Nesson’s post on Pho (Donna, Copyfighter, Bricoleur).

Faced with the inability of the political and legislative spheres to provide an acceptable solutions, both explore the option of taking the matter into their own hands.

While convincing arguments, productive discussions and honest justifications can be made to support those avenues, I’m wondering how slippery is that slope.

Especially when groups are facing an inefficient system that they feel should act or represent them but does not, the motivations to correct the situation can be strong and wonderful. But the higher the stakes, the more desperate the measures.

Frank links to this followup on the Monoculture is bad report presented at a CCIA meeting.

Nice and juicy bit:

« If the monoculture was all Linux, it would be just as bad, » Geer told internetnews .

But the dangers inherent to a monoculture are only exacerbated by a policy of trying to lock in its users into one family of products. And in this sense, Geer admits that Microsoft does become the principle topic of discussion.

« The one place that it’s a policy issue that might be of relevance is when security policy is entangled with competition policy, » he said.

This Forbes article talks about the new WiSIP phone by John Pulver’s company, PulverInnovations (but he’s better known for the Free World Dialup service).

The phone gets coverage by Gizmodo and is noticed by Werblog. It’s basically a WiFi SIP phone, which is cool and new, but not terribly relevant to my life right now.

There is another fun gadget brother to the WiSIP: the Internet Phone Patch which reminds me of what the Geoport could should! have become. But for now, these are expensive toys.

Indeed, the Forbes article is quick to mention that any plans to save money using VoIP devices requires a long term commitment to offset the initial investment. Personally I’m not too worried as pretty much all new technologies are initially perceived as overpriced and without much merit by critics, pundits and other knowledgeable people… What I really like though are the potential applications for VoIP they mention:

When you travel to London and someone calls your home phone in New York, the call gets forwarded to your computer in London, and you can pick up there just as if you were in New York. Also, you can log on to the Internet with your laptop and « call » over FWD to your home phone in New York and check your messages from London. « Basically, you’re using the Internet to create a 3,000-mile extension cord, » Pulver says.

Another neat trick: If your kid is going to college at Stanford, you can create a virtual « extension cord » to the PC in his dorm room. If his pal calls him at home in New York, you can forward the call to his room in California. Junior can also make calls from the PC in his room, and it’s as if they were made from your home phone. « So basically, he doesn’t need to get a phone in his dorm room, » Pulver says.

I really like how this has the potential to bring the communication services closer to the individuals. And who knows what will emerge when people start playing around with those tools to fit their needs and wants?

Despite the criticism of the current offerings, the journalist gets very well that VoIP is more that just a fad allowing 2 geeks to save a few cents by installing software on their PCs:

« For decades, telecom companies have generated billions of dollars simply by connecting phone calls—and now that can be done for free.

And that is a big deal. »

The BBC talks of the discord at the WSIS precomp last week in Geneva.

I must admit I, along with a co-conspirator who shall remain nameless, took advantage of the webcast and repurposed it as some sort of a videoconferencing system… Therefore, some of the finer points of the debates were lost to me (well, that might also have been because the webcast channel was the floor channel, without the translations).

Update: reflecting on the same issues, the Monde Diplomatique has an article titled «Les laissés-pour-compte du cyberespace» on the fracture numérique, where they refer twice to the IUT… Not the best article I’ve read from that publication I must say.

MSNBC’s Philips talks to Web music stores, eyes media role . A couple snipets:

Philips, which globally ranks third behind Japan’s Sony and Matsushita, has chosen not to support Microsoft’s Windows Media Player in its consumer electronics products, a company spokesman said separately.

[Philips spokeperson] also criticised proposed U.S. legislation to set a  »broadcast flag » that would give a handful of technology companies and Hollywood studios control over re-distribution of digital television broadcasts, including movies.

  »We need a technology that works, that is available to everyone, managed in a fair way and not constrained to any particular group, » said Philips.  »There needs to be an open standard […] ».

[via MacMinute]

«Télécommunications, les échecs d’une révolution» dans le Monde diplomatique.

Eclatement de la bulle Internet, affaire Enron, endettement record de France Télécom : les entreprises de télécommunication se traînent désormais aux urgences de l’économie mondiale. La privatisation ayant succédé aux investissements publics, la surcapacité et une concurrence ruineuse, vieux fléaux économiques, hantent désormais la frontière du capitalisme de ce début de siècle. Salariés, particuliers et contribuables ont commencé à en payer le prix.

Un trop rare article en français sur la déréglementation des télécoms.

CNet News:

The report (press release) from the Computer and Communications Industry Association argues that the reliance on a single technology such as the Windows operating system for such an overwhelming majority of computer systems threatens the security of the U.S. economy and critical infrastructure.

Update: the messenger was shot

ITU’s SPU newslog: Canadians are among the world’s leaders in broadband use.

Nearly half (49%) of all regular home Internet use households had a high-speed Internet connection in 2001. For the private sector, 2002 marked the first year in which the majority (58%) of enterprises using the Internet connected using broadband technologies.

Absolute percentage of broadband connected households being 23% and the percentage of broadband subscribers per inhabitant is 10.3%, close enough to the ITU Birth of Broadband figure of 11.2%.

Maybe StatCan excluded poor souls like me who connect through a cable modem at below single-ISDN speed and who’s DHCP lease mysteriously expire every few hours forcing a manual renewal? Yes yes, I’m bitter, especially because it is hard to complain about inadequate connections when you bust your monthly transfer quotas…

I didn’t find the Connectedness series when I was looking for it the other day. Good thing the article provides a handy link to the PDF.