general internet news - 5 January

[David Goldstein <goldstein_david@yahoo.com.au>]

.uk - Web's inventor gets a knighthood
Sir Tim says his invention was 'just another program'
The inventor of the world wide web, Tim Berners-Lee, has
been awarded a knighthood for his pioneering work.
 http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/3357073.stm

http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/this_britain/story.jsp?story=477114

http://www.dailytelegraph.co.uk/connected/main.jhtml;$sessionid$MAPSEPN3XKWD3QFIQMFSFFWAVCBQ0IV0?xml=/connected/2003/12/31/ecnthon831.xml&sSheet=/connected/2003/12/31/ixconnrite.html

Internet Law Year in Review 2003 By Doug Isenberg/Gigalaw
Summary: Internet law in 2003 was full of surprises, with
Congress passing an anti-spam bill, the courts blessing
pop-up advertising, the music industry losing lawsuits, and
the Supreme Court finally upholding an Internet law. And
those are just a few of the highlights from a year in which
technology and the law saw their biggest clashes yet.
 http://www.gigalaw.com/articles/2003/isenberg-2003-12.html

.us - 'Kill the Haitians' game in the dock
A US federal court is about to decide whether a popular
video game in which the players can kick a prostitute to
death and get extra points for killing Haitians should be
removed from the shelves. Haitian civil rights groups
brought the case to get the game, Grand Theft Auto: Vice
City, taken out of circulation because it instructs players
to "Kill the Haitians".

http://www.guardian.co.uk/usa/story/0,12271,1114990,00.html

Dutch Court Throws Out Kazaa Case
The Dutch Supreme Court upholds a decision saying the
creators of the popular Internet file-sharing program
aren't liable for copyright claims made against them.
 http://www.wired.com/news/digiwood/0,1412,61672,00.html
 http://www.nytimes.com/2003/12/20/technology/20suit.html

http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=internetNews&storyID=4024715

http://media.guardian.co.uk/newmedia/story/0,7496,1110612,00.html

.us - Court Throws Out Net Music Legal Tactics
In a surprise setback for the recording industry, a U.S.
appeals court ruled on Friday that record labels must
abandon their favorite method to track down those who
illegally copy music online.

http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=internetNews&storyID=4024661
 http://zdnet.com.com/2100-1104_2-5129687.html

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A16598-2003Dec19.html

http://www.latimes.com/technology/la-fi-defendants20dec20,1,7869085.story

.us - Is the RIAA out of the ballgame?
On Friday, a Washington, D.C., federal appeals court tossed
out a key part of the industry's legal strategy for
tracking down and suing music swappers. A day earlier,
Holland's supreme court said Kazaa's original owners
weren't liable for copyright infringement by people using
their software. And last week, Canadian regulators said
downloading copyrighted music from peer-to-peer
networks--although not uploading--was legal in that
country.
 http://news.com.com/2010-1027_3-5130307.html

FAQ: How the decision will affect file swappers
 http://news.com.com/2100-1028_3-5130033.html

.us - Court: RIAA lawsuit strategy illegal
 http://news.com.com/2100-1027_3-5129687.html

Net users bypass browser
Most people accessing the Internet do so via media players
and instant-messaging applications, according to new
figures.

http://news.zdnet.co.uk/internet/0,39020369,39118843,00.htm

http://www.silicon.com/networks/webwatch/0,39024667,39117582,00.htm

RealNetworks hits Microsoft on antitrust
The streaming media provider sues Microsoft, accusing the
software giant of illegally using its Windows monopoly to
limit consumer choice in digital media.
 http://zdnet.com.com/2251-1110-5129627.html
 http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/3333077.stm

.kr - Computer games
Could South Korea hold the key to the next generation of
online computer games?

http://www.economist.com/business/displayStory.cfm?story_id=2287063

Porn doctor to keep his job
A DOCTOR convicted of a string of child porn offences has
escaped being struck off the medical register. ... Dr
Catterall appeared before the committee after being found
guilty of downloading indecent images of children.
 http://cambridgenews.co.uk/news/story.asp?StoryID=45143

Online music: Sex, lies and Earth Station 5
THE centre of the Jenin refugee camp in the West Bank still
looks like it has been hit by an earthquake, having been
razed to the ground by the Israeli army last year in a
bloody attempt to stop suicide bombings. So when an outfit
called Earth Station 5 announced itself this year as a new
peer-to-peer file-sharing service headquartered in the
camp, internet downloaders and journalists paid attention.
In the occupied Palestinian territories, says Steve Taylor,
a spokesman, Earth Station 5 is safe from the music and
film industries' campaign to stop people sharing content
for free. When they complain, he told Salon.com, a website,
“we tell them to go fuck off”.

http://www.economist.com/business/displayStory.cfm?story_id=2301336

What the market wants the market gets: pornography by the
tonne
Moral concerns are insignificant and even irrelevant to an
industry that generates such enormous revenues.
 http://smh.com.au/articles/2003/12/30/1072546532229.html

http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2003/12/29/1072546467096.html

The problem with porn
Internet smut is so rife it has deadened our responses so
much that we now find the perverse normal.

http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2003/12/22/1071941676983.html

Fast Forward: Going Deeper than Google
Revamped search software called Grokker could be the future
for finding information.

http://www.fortune.com/fortune/fastforward/0,15704,563090,00.html

Vietnam jails online journalist
A former Vietnamese journalist who used the internet to
criticise the government has been jailed for seven years,
court officials said.
 http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/3358533.stm
 http://www.asiamedia.ucla.edu/article.asp?parentid=5909

http://edition.cnn.com/2003/WORLD/asiapcf/southeast/12/31/vietnam.jail.reut/index.html
 http://www.rsf.org/article.php3?id_article=8916
Sept ans de prison pour le cyberdissident Nguyen Vu Binh
 http://www.rsf.org/article.php3?id_article=8915

.sy - Internet-user held in solitary for seven months for
e-mailing a newsletter.
Abdel Rahman Shagouri was arrested on 23 February 2003, at
a checkpoint near Damascus for sending an e-mail newsletter
from a banned site www.thisissyria.net (Levant News).
Reporters Without Borders has protested against his
detention without trial for the past seven months, in the
first known case of the jailing of a cyberdissident in
Syria.
 http://www.rsf.org/article.php3?id_article=8941
Un Internaute détenu au secret depuis sept mois pour avoir
transféré par e-mail un bulletin d'information
 http://www.rsf.org/article.php3?id_article=8943
Un internauta detenido en secreto desde hace siete meses,
por enviar por e-mail un boletín informativo
 http://www.rsf.org/article.php3?id_article=8947

Vietnam: Protest Trial of Dissident
The international community should protest the trial of a
Vietnamese dissident on spying charges scheduled for
December 31, Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International
said today.

http://web.amnesty.org/library/Index/ENGASA410012004?open&of=ENG-VNM
Vietnam: Los sobrinos del padre Nguyen Van Ly quedarán en
libertad tras celebrase la vista de apelación

http://web.amnesty.org/library/Index/ESLASA410422003?open&of=ESL-VNM
VIÊT-NAM. Les neveux et la nièce du père Nguyen Van Ly sur
le point d?être libérés après un procès un appel

http://web.amnesty.org/library/Index/FRAASA410422003?open&of=FRA-VNM

Spanish Police Arrest 27 in Child Porn Swoop
Spanish police have arrested 27 people suspected of
distributing child pornography over the Internet in one of
their largest crackdowns, they said on Wednesday.
 http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml;?storyID=4007594

Dos hombres serán juzgados en Sevilla por haber distribuido
imágenes pornográficas de menores

http://delitosinformaticos.com/noticias/107182708498911.shtml

Trampa en la Red para cazar a pedófilos

http://delitosinformaticos.com/noticias/107192492487574.shtml

.uk - Paedophile fear over phone photos
A teachers' union has called for a ban on mobile phone
cameras in schools, amid fears that the images could be
used by paedophiles.
 http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/scotland/3342239.stm

Romania tackles rise in cyber-crime
Internet crime could cost more than $200bn, say some
experts. Most of it originates in the US but other like
nations such as Romania are becoming hotbeds for online
scamming, as technology correspondent Clark Boyd reports
from Bucharest.
 http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/3344721.stm

High-tech cops bust internet drugs ring
Police have busted an internet drugs operation estimated to
have made around half a million pounds using
password-protected websites for selling cannabis.

http://www.silicon.com/management/government/0,39024677,39117469,00.htm

Youth in grip of online onanism
In the olden days teenage boys would go down to the local
newsagent after school and take a few furtive peaks at
Playboy or Penthouse. But they would still have the
excitement at the thought of kissing the girl down the
street. Today's young people need not venture out of the
house, as such titillation is far more explicit and just a
click of a mouse button away. The Australia Institute
released a report in March this year entitled Youth and
Pornography in Australia: Evidence on the Extent of
Exposure and Likely Effects. It suggested that among 16 to
17-year-olds, 84 per cent of boys and 60 per cent of girls
have had exposure to net pornography, 38 per cent of boys
but only 2 per cent of girls say they have deliberately
sought out sex sites and just under a quarter of boys and 7
per cent of girls "accidentally" encounter sex sites every
week.

http://theaustralian.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5744,8273239%255E7583,00.html

Plug pulled on live website seen by millions (Jennicam)
On her final day as a pioneering internet celebrity,
Jennifer Ringley got up some time after 7.30am, used her
computer for a while at around 1.15pm, had something to eat
at 6.15pm, and then apparently went out for the evening.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/usa/story/0,12271,1115286,00.html

That Parent-Child Conversation Is Becoming Instant, and
Online
Instant messaging, long a part of teenagers' lives, is
working its way into the broader fabric of the American
family. The technology "has really grown up in the last 18
months," said Michael Gartenberg, vice president and
research director at Jupiter Research. "It's certainly not
just for kids anymore."
 http://www.nytimes.com/2004/01/03/technology/03MESS.html

Won't get fooled again...
Twelve months ago, Pete Townshend faced the world's press
and confessed to accessing child pornography on the net. In
this extraordinary interview, he tells the whole story for
the first time.

http://observer.guardian.co.uk/review/story/0,6903,1113014,00.html

Charges dropped against young Internet-user Liu Di
Reporters Without Borders welcomed the news that charges
have been dropped against young Internet-user Liu Di.
 http://www.rsf.org/article.php3?id_article=8418
La justice abandonne les poursuites contre l'internaute Liu
Di
 http://www.rsf.org/article.php3?id_article=8414

.cn - Crackdown deepens on the Internet
A Chinese court on 20 November dismissed an application for
an appeal hearing by cyberdissident He Depu, sentenced to
eight years in jail on 6 November for having published
articles "inciting subversion". Meanwhile arrests continue.
Kong Youping, a 48-year-old factory worker, was arrested on
13 December for posting political articles and poems on a
foreign website.
 http://www.rsf.org/article.php3?id_article=8851
La répression s'intensifie sur le Net
 http://www.rsf.org/article.php3?id_article=8850

China Detains Another Cyber Activist - HK Group
China has detained a cyber activist for posting
pro-democracy essays and poems on foreign Web sites, the
latest in a string of detentions or convictions of Internet
dissidents, a human rights group said on Saturday.

http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=internetNews&storyID=4026560

.my - Pro-Anwar Ibrahim websites reinstated
Two internet websites run by supporters of jailed ex-deputy
premier Anwar Ibrahim were reinstated after being shut down
by a British-based web server for allegedly carrying
"inflammatory" material.
 http://www.asiamedia.ucla.edu/article.asp?parentid=5785

Asian countries to jointly develop next generation Internet
Japan, China and South Korea will jointly develop the
next-generation Internet technology IPv6, aiming to have
the global standard for the technology set in Asia, the
Nihon Keizai Shimbun has reported.

http://www.zdnet.com.au/newstech/ebusiness/story/0,2000048590,20282254,00.htm

Asia Pacific - IT industry growth seen amid challenges,
issues
THE INFORMATION technology (IT) industry in the Asia
Pacific region is expected to grow although governments
need to address the issues and meet the challenges to
ensure its growth.
 http://www.inq7.net/inf/2003/dec/24/inf_1-1.htm

N. Korea Wants Citizens to Be Tech-Savvy
North Korea's Dear Leader Kim Jong Il, whose sayings are
followed by his people with a religious fervor, has defined
three types of fools in the 21st century: people who smoke,
people who don't appreciate music and people who can't use
a computer.
 http://www.bizreport.com/article.php?art_id=5831

http://www.cnn.com/2003/TECH/internet/12/25/nkorea.computer.craze.ap/index.html

New York and Microsoft File Suits on E-Mail Spam
The attorney general of New York, Eliot Spitzer, filed a
civil lawsuit yesterday against three marketing companies,
accusing them of sending fraudulent e-mail messages, and
said that he would seek penalties so large that they would
drive each company out of business.
 http://www.nytimes.com/2003/12/19/technology/19spam.html

http://news.ft.com/servlet/ContentServer?pagename=FT.com/StoryFT/FullStory&c=StoryFT&cid=1071251650250&p=1057562182635

http://www.prnewswire.com/cgi-bin/stories.pl?ACCT=SVBIZINK3.story&STORY=/www/story/12-18-2003/0002078058&EDATE=THU+Dec+18+2003,+10:00+AM

.us - File Sharers: Don't Crow Yet
The recent court ruling isn't the latest word on digital
copying. Congress will have to weigh in.

http://www.latimes.com/technology/la-ed-piracy3jan03,1,2720365.story

Creator of Linux Defends Its Originality
Linus Torvalds, creator of the popular Linux operating
system, defended his work as not always lovely but original
— and certainly not copied, as SCO Group has asserted.
 http://www.nytimes.com/2003/12/23/technology/23linux.html

SCO opens new front in Linux war
SCO Group has targeted a new group in an effort to profit
from what it says is illegal use of Unix intellectual
property in Linux, but Novell, a former owner of the
operating system, claims it still holds copyrights.

http://www.zdnet.com.au/newstech/os/story/0,2000048630,20282174,00.htm

http://ups.asia.cnet.com/c/as.ch.nt.stories/asia.cnet.com/newstech/systems/0,39001153,39162152,00.htm

Frustrated by UN summit, civil society presents its own
declaration
At a conference yesterday , civil society representatives
presented an 'alternative' declaration to the official
Declaration expected to be approved by the world's
governments tomorrow at the final day of the World Summit
on the Information Society in Geneva.
 http://www.apc.org/english/news/index.shtml?x=15946

13 NASA sites defaced
Thirteen sites belonging to the US National Aeronautics and
Space Administration have been defaced by a Brazilian group
named drwxr, according to a report at the defacement
archive Zone-H.org.

http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2003/12/18/1071337070545.html
 http://boston.internet.com/news/article.php/3290791

.us - Harnessing the Web's political power
Even after Saddam Hussein was captured, all that some
people could talk about was Howard Dean. The elusive piece
of this phenomenon is cultural: the Internet.
 http://www.iht.com/articles/122221.html

.uk - Ofcom directs inquiries to telecoms sector
Ofcom, the new media-to-telecoms regulator, is planning a
review of the telecoms sector which starts next month. It
will be the first comprehensive assessment of the sector
for 13 years.

http://news.ft.com/servlet/ContentServer?pagename=FT.com/StoryFT/FullStory&c=StoryFT&cid=1071251813040&p=1057562182635

.uk -  Testing start for new media watchdog
Mary Whitehouse would not have approved. Today a new
watchdog takes responsibility for holding back the tide of
filth and depravity that she feared would swamp the small
screen if broadcasters were left to their own devices.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk_news/story/0,3604,1113373,00.html

Email hoax targets Bank of England
The Bank of England has warned people to ignore a hoax
e-mail which has gone out in its name urging people to
install security software.
 http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/3357239.stm
 http://www.newscientist.com/news/news.jsp?id=ns99994524

http://www.guardian.co.uk/online/news/0,12597,1114260,00.html

http://news.zdnet.co.uk/business/0,39020645,39118823,00.htm

.au - NOIE tipped for axe
NEW Communications Minister Daryl Williams is tipped to
close the Government's National Office of the Information
Economy (NOIE) in early 2004 and extend a moratorium on new
free-to-air TV licences later in the year.

http://australianit.news.com.au/articles/0,7204,8240036%5e16123%5e%5enbv%5e,00.html

Viagra spam fills mail inboxes
Health-related junk e-mails topped the most common list of
spam subjects in inboxes for 2003, says AOL.
 http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/3362489.stm

An Unrepentant Spammer Vows to Carry On, Within the Law
Alan Ralsky, who has made a successful business of
spamming, is on a hiatus, but says he will soon resume bulk
e-mailing in compliance with a federal antispam law. He
calls the law unfair, but adds, "You would have to be
stupid" to try to violate it.
 http://www.nytimes.com/2003/12/30/technology/30spam.html
 http://www.iht.com/articles/123183.html

.au - International spam MoU mooted
AUSTRALIA has proposed that all national communications
regulators develop a multi-lateral memorandum of
understanding on spam to boost the fight against unwanted
bulk email.

http://australianit.news.com.au/articles/0,7204,8278861%5e16123%5e%5enbv%5e,00.html

E-scams rule the roost in 2003
Regrettably, 2003 proved to be a year in which online
scamming elevated itself to new heights, with
inexperienced, gullible or just plain unfortunate
individuals facing a minefield of potentially expensive
schemes.

http://asia.cnet.com/newstech/security/0,39001150,39163323,00.htm

Information Summit Defers Contentious Issues
Leaders from 176 countries who met for the World Summit on
the Information Society (WSIS) in December decided to
establish a task force to explore setting up a Digital
Solidarity Fund to finance the development of information
and communications technologies (ICTs) in poor countries.
 http://allafrica.com/stories/200401020606.html

The Fantasy and Reality of 2004
Fling dishes or flaming furniture out the window, fire off
celebratory gunfire, jump off chairs, ring bells, beat
drums, clutch silver as the clock strikes midnight or sweep
bad juju out of the house with a kitchen broom -- these are
some of the ways people welcome in the New Year.
 http://www.wired.com/news/culture/0,1284,61726,00.html

>From SAP to Sobig, 2003's high-tech winners and losers
What's the best thing you can say about 2003? At least it
wasn't 2002. Or 2001. Or 2000. Nevertheless, the year had
its fair share of newsmakers -- some winners, some losers
and some who were a blend of both. Here's a look at our
list. We're a "glass is half full" kinda operation, so
we'll start with those who'll wake up on New Year's morning
smelling the sweetest.

http://searchcrm.techtarget.com/originalContent/0,289142,sid11_gci942904,00.html

Is Wireless Security a Lost Cause?
"WPA is better than WEP, but we still have a way to go
before true wireless network security," Robert Moskowitz,
senior technical director of ICSA Labs at TruSecure, told
the E-Commerce Times. "A lot of cryptologists don't like
WPA because it's based on older ciphers."
 http://www.ecommercetimes.com/perl/story/32420.html

New business models for Wi-Fi hotspots: Service offerings,
demand, and key players
Why does there appear to be an imbalance between early
adopters of WiFi and hotspot locations? Which of the
emerging business models have the best chance of success?
How fast are public hotspot service prices declining, and
will consumers buy at these price levels? ForceNine
Consulting has conducted the most comprehensive analysis to
date of public hotspot business models and consumer
behaviors as they relate to this business.

http://www.emendresearch.com/portfolio/wireless.jsp#F9-WiFi-11-03&gen=0&flinkid=-1

China's Wi-Fi security stance ruffling feathers
China's controversial decision to mandate a proprietary
encryption scheme for Wi-Fi systems used within its borders
has industry groups, chip makers, OEMs and even U.S.
government officials scurrying for answers. While China has
a history of going its own way on technological standards,
few attempts have aroused the ire of this spec.
 http://www.commsdesign.com/story/OEG20031219S0017

2003 Review of the Year: Wireless Lans
 http://www.vnunet.com/News/1151749

Interview: Wireless wizards
While the Australian broadband and wireless markets were
singled out by many observers at the start of the year as
areas to watch, the reality is that, so far, neither has
been a big money-spinner for resellers. Security remains a
concern for corporate customers considering wireless
implementations, while confusion reigns among consumers,
and to a lesser extent resellers, when it comes to speeds,
interoperability and simply making wireless gear work
effectively. The broadband market is still controlled
tightly by ISPs and unbundling is still somewhere over the
horizon.
 http://www.arnnet.com.au/index.php?id=187611686

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

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Sources include Quicklinks (www.qlinks.net) and BNA
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=====
David Goldstein
 address: 2/4 Dundas Street
             COOGEE NSW 2034
             AUSTRALIA
 email: Goldstein_David@yahoo.com.au
 phone: +61 418 228 605 - mobile; +61 2 9665 0015 - home

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