Anonymous and its associated online criminal organizations continue to face losses. A top Lulzsec leader was arrested in Scotland. Remember, this guy is no “activist.” He stole from people who happened to have Visas or MasterCards. Vigilante action against Anonymous and its online criminal wings continues, as well.
Anonymous is in such trouble, they’re now desperate for allies, begging unions to join their cause. Note that by targeting Paypal, Anonymous threatens the livelihoods of many who depend on income via Paypal simply to stay in business and pay bills.
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Anonymous is starting to lose more than it wins. As I already mentioned on Wednesday, the FBI is racking up names to arrest, and moving on them. Anonymous responded by claiming to have broken into NATO systems. The world responded by trashing Anonymous’s AnonPlus website. Of course, when they’re in jail, that won’t matter much, but it’s fun to see.
Good news: Early polling suggests a slight lead for the referendum to repeal the California Amazon/Internet Sales Tax.
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Twitter has a credibility problem on its hands, all of a sudden. Even as I’m getting blind link spam sent to me every single day on the site, Twitter has singled out a conservative activist group to have its accounts wiped out. Not only was the Empower Texans feed shut down, but every single employee’s personal feed was targeted as well.
Twitter’s response has been non-descriptive, and lacking in any support. Conveniently for Twitter, by blocking the accounts, it’s impossible for any observer to confirm or deny their allegations of Twitter rules violations. I can only conclude, in the absence of evidence, that somebody in Twitter has decided to get political. And that is Twitter’s problem to fix.
Follow FreeMQS for further developments. Update: Actually, don’t. I was misinformed on this one as the story developed last night.
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Wednesday I told you guys to look for two posts of mine. One is still pending, but I at least got my post on the California Amazon tax, and possible referendum shenanigans posted yesterday. At least I’m halfway there.
Beyond self promotion, we still do have other matters, like the pending AT&T/T-Mobile deal. Despite being left out of the Sprint coalition, Free Press is still on the warpath, fighting both the CWA union and the free market. Free Press argues that the deal is bad in part because T-Mobile was supposed to spend more in capital investment, over double AT&T’s planned level. But here’s the problem: he’s effectively double counting. T-Mobile, as an independent network, would have to spend more just to catch up with AT&T. Once the two join forces, they will need to spend less as they will need less spectrum, fewer towers, less backhaul, and everything else that is currently duplicated in markets serviced by both companies now, or serviced now by AT&T with service planned by independent T-Mobile.
Not that Free Press really cares about accuracy. They ran with a Reuters lie about News Corp, and didn’t bother to correct even after Reuters did. No wonder they think we need state-run media. Since they don’t care about the truth, they assume everyone else is as shady as they are.
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Sorry if you’ve been missing Tech at Night this week. Monday I just ran out of time as I had to do a whole bunch of housekeeping*, and tonight I’m running late. So let’s go.
In classic Tech at Night style, let’s talk about the FCC. They took forever to get the ball rolling on Net Neutrality, but it’s coming now and it’s a vehicle for censorship, says Seton Motley. As he says, “As every place we get our news and information continue their rapid migration to the Internet, Net Neutrality will lord larger and larger over the free market – and our free speech. Which is why we must rid ourselves of it as rapidly as possible.”
More fuel for the FCC reform fire: Free State Foundation points out the FCC has known for years of its problems with the intercarrier compensation system, which is how money changes hands when phone calls are carried across different private phone networks. They knew in 2001. That’s a long time coming. Though if they do tackle it now, we need to watch out for the Universal Service Fund becoming an Internet Tax.
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Friday, Friday, Friday. Black Friday? Net Neutrality rules have become one step closer to official as the FCC finally delivered something to the OMB after months of stalling. Verizon, MetroPCS, Virginia AG Ken Cuccinelli, and others ended up unable sue to throw out the illegal power grab until it’s published, so the longer the FCC waited, the longer everyone else had to wait to begin to defeat rules that will harm innovation, investment, and jobs, say Fred Upton and Greg Walden.
It’ll be 90 more days at least before the rules hit the Federal Register and the rush to the courthouse begins.
Meanwhile the FCC’s bad run in the courts continues as it lost another case. Of course, this was actually a Bush-era rule, being thrown out on a technicality. But the Obama FCC continued its defense, and lost.
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I remember when the Digital Millennium Copyright Act passed. It created a boatload of new rules and restrictions on Americans, in the name of tightening copyright online. One of the key provisions of the DMCA is the “safe harbor” rule, which effectively turns ISPs into agents of copyright, by making them honor so-called DMCA takedown notices in exchange for not being held responsible for what’s put by their customers on their public servers.
We were supposed to accept harsh limitations on basic practices like reverse engineering, in order to get what we were told were strong and effective copyright protections. So when I see new copyright criminalization proposed, I have to ask: Did the DMCA fail? Should we repeal it then? Or are we just throwing a bone to the RIAA and MPAA who don’t want to have to bother enforcing their own rights anymore, and get a subsidy from the DoJ to enforce it for them? Come on.
Sure, Some are saying it’s not as bad as it sounded, but if one policy failed, we can’t just keep adding new ones. Repeal and replace, don’t just create an ever-greater web of problems. Or better: just tweak the DMCA instead of adding whole new criminal provisions! Let’s not grow government more than we have to just because big business asks for it. I’m not anti-business, but I’m always wary when big business and big government work together.
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And we truly are back. Friday night was a night off thanks to some maintenance at RedState. It was nice because I could rest on a Friday night… but it’s not so nice now when I have a whopping 20 Firefox windows to sort through tonight. So here we go.
With so many big stories going on, it’s hard to pick which one to start with. So I’ll start with the one that may be under the radar more than the others. The FCC refused to declare the wireless market competitive in its annual report required by the [Correction: OMNIBUS BUDGET RECONCILIATION ACT OF 1993]. This is a ridiculous position to take. Despite obvious, quantifiable proof that prices are lower, service is better, and choices abound, the FCC has refused to admit the market is competitive for ideological reasons. After all, if the FCC finds the market competitive, it can’t give itself permission to regulate further. Just more proof we need FCC reform, joining the long list of existing reasons.
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I’ve been treating Lulzsec, one of the online gangs attacking websites including the CIA’s, as an offshoot of 4chan and Anonymous. So I’m not surprised to find out that Lulzsec and Anonymous are joining up to attack the US Government. It’s like Hamas and Fatah merging; nobody is surprised. But attacking the government? Handcuffs hurt, boys. It’ll be fun when y’all find that out.
It’ll be interesting to see if Lulzsec Exposed has a role in making that happen, too.
Sega was hit recently, but the reason I’m linking to the story is to point out how laughably bad CBS’s photo for the story was. They show a picture of one old Sega platform (Sega CDX) with the logo of an even older Sega platform (Genesis). Ah, the big time press. Fact checked, peer reviewed, rock-solid. Not like us on the Internet in our robes and sandals.
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I like Texas. The state has many great things going for it, including a friendly tax and business climate. However Texas has to keep working to stay on top, so when South Carolina is backing down from its refusal to work with Amazon, and Tennessee has dropped its Amazon tax bill, it’s disappointing and frustrating to see Texas moving forward with punitive taxation against an innovative business that creates jobs in Texas.
So Governor Perry, do the right thing and veto HB 2403. Make Texas an example and strike down this attempt to use government to reverse the free market’s choice of Amazon as a winner in the marketplace.
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