Thursday, December 04, 2003

ABC.  Female medschool applications surpass male. 6:07:56 PM    Comment_ Trackback []

News.com  Skype founder Niklas Zennstrom: News.com ran an article a few months ago talking about how the FBI wants to force VoIP providers to make their networks subject to wiretaps. If it gets adopted, what would this proposal mean for you? ....We cannot do anything because we don't have access to the data stream. The old way of thinking was easy. You'd go to the local telephone company and they'd get a wiretap. That's not a problem because the telephone service owns the infrastructure, provides the service, and operates in one country. The Internet is a bit different. What you would have to do is to go to the Internet service provider. Assume the police can get a court order and conduct the tap. But the Skype conversation is encrypted and they only can hear gibberish. I'm just trying to say in general what the issues are. I don't have a solution. In general it's not as clear cut as it was in old POTS (plain old telephone service) days. My point is that it's not as easy as it was before. 4:03:14 PM    Comment_ Trackback []

Wired.  Viewers can pause the (TV) show and drop out to play games (like steering a human fighter pilot through a Cylon battle), or explore characters and places in depth. 9:36:24 AM    Comment_ Trackback []

WSJ.  AOL to offer a $299 PC and printer combo for those that sign up for a full year of online service.  It really does look like AOL is trying to change the model of the PC industry into something that looks closer to a combination of the game and telephone/cable businesses.  Basically, give away at cost a loaded PC/printer configured to work optimally with AOL.  Charge a monthly fee for services that include connectivity, communication tools, and content.  Make it easier for customers to take advantage of existing premium features and content through preinstalled tool configuration.  Create new upsale opportunities by extending itself into what is normally done in the PC world:  anti-virus software services, firewall software services, PC repair services, and peripheral/software sales (that are optimized to work with the AOL PC).    9:21:37 AM    Comment_ Trackback []