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Internet Access Severely Curbed in Iran February 10, 2012 
Reports are coming out of Iran that the country is increasingly squeezing Internet access to certain sites, including websites that use the HTTPS protocol. Many tech-savvy users who were able to circumvent restrictions to gain access to an unfettered Internet have found their usual methods are no longer effective.
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The Curious Case of LightSquared vs. GPS February 10, 2012 
Another government venue, another condemnation of LightSquared's planned 4G LTE network. U.S. Department of Transportation Deputy Secretary John Porcari told a congressional hearing on Wednesday that if LightSquared were to be deployed, the Federal Aviation Administration would have to constantly monitor some 40,000 broadcasting sites to make sure they did not affect air safety.
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Huge Pension Fund Grouses Over Facebook's Unbalanced Board February 09, 2012 
The California State Teachers' Retirement System has a gripe about the makeup of Facebook's board of directors: It is too small and too male. In fact, there are no women on the board. "We believe that investors and the company would benefit from a larger, more diverse board," CalSTRS corporate governance director Anne Sheehan wrote to Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg.
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China and Labor: Apple's Not the Only Problem, But Is It the Only Solution? February 09, 2012 
I found CNN's recent report on Foxconn's poor working conditions at a manufacturing plant in China to be astoundingly irritating. Not because they used "Apple" in the headline and focused on the iPad to snag attention. I was irritated because the story, both in print and the video version, totally missed obvious points in order to try to paint Foxconn working conditions as terrible.
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Oracle Opts for Another Day in Court With TomorrowNow February 08, 2012 
Oracle is clearly not prepared to let go of the TomorrowNow case involving corporate theft it suffered at the hands of the service provider, which was acquired by rival SAP in 2005. In a legal filing this week, Oracle rejected the $272 million in court-ordered damages from SAP. A jury found in favor of Oracle in 2010 and awarded the software maker $1.3 billion in damages. The judge slashed the award last fall.
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GPS, Privacy and the Supreme Court February 08, 2012 
Privacy continues to be in the headlines. Companies and governments are garnering and analyzing information that they obtain through means some find questionable in unprecedented ways. Many readers use Google maps and rely on the Google Traffic tool to indicate whether traffic is moving or stalled, but the fact that Google uses Global Positioning System data from wireless devices is often a surprise.
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BTJunkie Scurries Into the Shadows February 06, 2012 
BitTorrent search engine BTJunkie has abruptly shut down its website, giving its users a short and sweet goodbye: "We've decided to voluntarily shut down. We've been fighting for years for your right to communicate, but it's time to move on." It appears likely that the move was a defensive maneuver in response to law enforcement's takedown of the Megaupload site in January.
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Facebook to Investors: You Like What You See? February 04, 2012 
Facebook's finally decided to take a head-first dive into the mountain of cash it's been standing on for years. Following several days of heated rumors and years of speculation about when CEO Mark Zuckerberg was finally going to cash in his chips, the company filed an S-1 statement with the SEC, paving the way for an IPO as early as this May.
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Measure to Ease Video-Rental Privacy Curbs Catches Flack in Senate February 02, 2012 
A change to the 1988 Video Privacy Protection Act recently sailed through the House of Representatives without a hitch. The bill would allow a provider of rental DVDs or videos to get consent to share their customers' title selections, as long as users were provided with an opportunity to withdraw that consent. That smooth ride ended in the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Privacy, Technology and the Law.
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Samsung Galaxy Tab Design-Around Passes Muster With German Court February 02, 2012 
Apple has suffered a setback in its multicountry, extremely complex, and seemingly everlasting patent fight with Samsung. In the latest episode, its request to ban Samsung from selling two devices in Germany -- its Galaxy Tab 10.1N tablet and its Galaxy Nexus smartphone -- was rejected by the Munich Regional Court.
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Twitter CEO's Tweet-Blocking Defense: It's Just Business February 01, 2012 
Twitter is on the defensive over its new tweet-filtering policy, which it considers a progressive, forward-looking approach to complying with local laws around the globe. Speaking at Dive Into Media Monday night, Twitter CEO Dick Costolo characterized the changes as a way to ensure that more people see tweets.
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Google Defends 'Simpler' Privacy Policy in 13-Page Letter to Congress January 31, 2012 
Google has responded to a letter from members of Congress with its own 13-page missive explaining changes to its privacy policy that will take effect on March 1. Among other things, the letter signed by eight legislators stated that "consumers should have the ability to opt out of data collection when they are not comfortable with a company's term of service."
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Apple Fans More Likely to Turn a Blind Eye Than Boycott January 31, 2012 
A sobering account of conditions at Apple's contract factories in China recently appeared in The New York Times. Essentially, the manufacture of those sleek and sexy devices that consumers love so much has been accompanied by 23 deaths and 273 injuries. In a horrific account of one of the deaths, the Times told of Lai Xiadong, who was severely burned and died of his injuries two days later.
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Microsoft's Misunderstood 'Avoid-Ghetto' Tech January 30, 2012 
Earlier this month, Microsoft applied for a patent related to a technology that would highlight areas of high crime and route people around them. Folks seemed to get upset because areas like this tend to struggling due to a lack of revenue, and this would route people who might otherwise shop there to other safer and likely more lucrative areas. While true, I think it comes down to choice.
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Privacy Advocates, Businesses Dig In for EU Lobbying Campaign January 26, 2012 
Both privacy advocates and representatives of businesses that handle consumer data are flocking to Brussels. Why? The EU has proposed a strict set of new data privacy rules that would restrict companies such as Facebook even more than they currently do.
Facebook, et al., have descended on the city in the hope of softening some of the restrictions, while privacy advocates are there to keep the EU on its intended path.
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FOSS' Factious Gender Divide January 26, 2012 
There's no denying that the FOSS community has many virtues, but gender equality doesn't seem to be one of them. Gender-related issues and tensions have plagued the FOSS world for as long as many of us can remember, and the problem has already been picked apart on these pages time, time and time again. Well guess what? It's still a problem.
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