|
January 1, 2001
Happy New Year and thanks for reading! Lawrence (tomalak@tomalak.org)
British Telecom: The future of your life.
Ian Pearson, Futurologist at British Telecom. Let's remember that the telephone was once thought to be useless except for listening to opera. Here's how it might be on a bad day in 2020 if we get it wrong. But don't worry, we are working on getting it right!
NY Times: Advocates of People With Disabilities Take Online Stores to Task.
In the meantime, many e-commerce executives say they have only recently become aware of the needs of the disabled, and have begun to address the situation in a way that will not heap even more economic stress on their companies.
Web Techniques: Routing Around the Web.
One of the summit's topics was how much of the attention paid to P2P focuses on Napster, largely due to the client's notoriety. In O'Reilly's opinion, Napster is simply a part, albeit an important one, of a developing P2P story that's reshaping the Internet, yet again.
NY Times: Days of Plenty Are Over at Free Internet Services.
Mr. Goldstein said the timing of Bluelight's announcement was not coincidental: his company was trying to head off a migration of NetZero's heaviest customers to Bluelight's free service. Bluelight.com, he said, did not want them; nor did it want the heavy users it already had.
January 2, 2001
Inside: It's Lifeboat Time: Five Rules to Keep Internet Media Companies Afloat.
Jason Chervokas and Tom Watson. So here we go again, offering a life raft in the stormy seas of this market meltdown in the form of five rules we believe that successful Internet media companies should cling to in order to make their businesses work.
NY Times: New Age Bidding: Against Computers, Humans Usually Lose.
I'm sitting in a roomful of workstations at I.B.M.'s Thomas J. Watson Research Center in Yorktown Heights, N.Y., participating in an experiment on how well people compete against computers in auctions. Researchers at the IBM Corporation expect transactions like this to become common...
Inside: Attention, Masters of the Media Universe.
Seth Godin. You have a relationship. You understand that every interaction has to benefit both of you, or it will end. To build a monopoly based on consumer attention, you have to stop trying to find customers for your products and start trying to find products for your customers.
Computerworld: Licensing showdown looming.
UCITA proponents will push for adoption of the controversial software licensing law in four or five states in 2001, but they will face opposition from some end-user companies, along with warnings that the measure could significantly increase IT costs.
MSNBC: Facing PC slowdown, Intel hopes consumer devices will boost growth.
Now, Intel is hoping to exploit that recognition with a broader push into consumer products, which will include Internet “appliances” and digital-audio players as well as wireless keyboards, PC cameras and microscopes already on the market. All will carry the Intel brand — on the outside.
Wired News: Geoworks Settles Patent Claim.
Openwave Systems, the combination of Phone.com and Software.com, and mobile device service provider Geoworks Corporation announced last week they would enter into a royalty-free patent cross-license and strategic business partnership.
Fortune: Behind the Silent Nights of Bluelight.com.
The stage was set for a showdown between the two companies nearly one year ago when retail giant Kmart launched a free ISP service to lure customers to Bluelight.com. More than 5 million people took Kmart up on the offer; roughly half are active users of the free service...
IBM developerWorks: The user experience, Part 3.
Meeting this challenge is crucial, because the easier forms are to complete, the more satisfied customers will be. This article offers some guidelines to help you meet the challenge of picking the most appropriate control for each element on a form. Future articles will provide similar guidelines for forms layout and navigation.
January 3, 2001
Business 2.0: The Wal-Mart Future.
Clay Shirky. Business-to-consumer retail Websites were going to be really big. Consumers were going to be dazzled by the combination of lower prices and the ability to purchase products from anywhere. The Web was supposed to be the best retail environment the world had ever seen.
Wired News: Fire Insurance for the Internet.
These cases are but two of many hoaxes and false reports on the Web that can tarnish reputations and/or send stock prices tumbling within minutes of their release. That's why companies are turning to a new breed of highly automated Internet clipping or monitoring services to track what's being said about them.
Wired News: Pirates Beware: We're Watching.
Content companies are slowly coming to realize that digital rights management solutions can't stop the file-trading frenzy that has gripped the Internet. New monitoring applications allow them to attack piracy not at the user level, but by going directly to the service provider.
Financial Times: Yahoo! bans hate propaganda.
Yahoo! on Wednesday agreed to block the sale of Nazi memorabilia on its US auction and shopping sites, in effect capitulating to the jurisdiction of an overseas court over online material. The self-censorship marks a U-turn by Yahoo!, which had opposed on principle a French court ruling...
TechWeb: Yahoo To Reject Hate Items, Charge For Auctions.
Brian Fitzgerald, senior producer for Yahoo! Auctions, said the decision to add a fee was part of a larger ongoing discussion at Yahoo! over whether it should charge for more of the services it now provides at no cost. Fitzgerald said he could not speak for other areas of the company.
FEED Magazine: No Place Like the Future.
This bit of publicist theater feels like nothing so much as a weirdly flawed version of those kitschy fifties industrial films that heralded the "House of Tomorrow" -- magical, futuristic places where hausfraus in pastel dresses prance around praising the inherent liberation of the robotic kitchen.
Wired News: Who Gets to Drive Nissan.com?
The Nissan v. Nissan lawsuit -- picture the acrimonious custody battle of Kramer vs. Kramer, but without the cute kid -- is now in the "discovery" phase, awaiting this month's decision on an appeal over a preliminary injunction issued last March by the U.S. Ninth District Court.
January 4, 2001
ZDNN: Will Web follow Yahoo's charge?
Content, for one, said Jupiter Research's Clibanoff, although he said there are no indications that pure content sites plan to start charging. "Paid content is something Jupiter is paying a lot of attention to," he said. "We're exploring a lot of the opportunities to monetize those deliveries."
NY Times: Rebooted Any Good Books Lately?
When choosing an e-book system, six factors should be considered: battery life, book selection, ease of use, ease of navigation, readability and size. Perhaps surprisingly, the flaws often have less to do with readability and more to do with finding and downloading books.
NY Times: Digital Book Turf Battle Escalates Over Royalties.
Escalating a turf war over the nascent business of selling digital books, the online bookseller Barnesandnoble.com is expanding its role as a digital publisher, setting a new royalty rate intended to attract authors and publishing an original digital book by the best-selling writer Dean Koontz.
Industry Standard: Barnsandnoble.com: Gladiator in the E-Book Arena.
"It's an empirical fact that e-books don't have the same perceived value as hardcover books," says Michael Fragnito, VP of the digital-book group at Barnesandnoble.com. "We have to bring the price down to help build this market."
News.Com: AOL sues over sex-related unsolicited email.
"Legally the lawsuit is important because it establishes liability for an adult Web site--that they are causing spam to be sent or are knowingly in a conspiracy with the spammers. This makes them negligent in their no-spam policy," said Nicholas Graham, an AOL spokesman.
Computerworld: Web hosting firm loses bid for restraining order against anti-spam group.
U.S. District Court judge in Boston yesterday turned down a Web hosting company's request for a temporary restraining order that would have required IP addresses held by the firm to be removed from a blacklist maintained by an antispam organization.
SJ Mercury: AOL raises concerns about opening instant messaging system.
As if unwanted e-mail weren't bad enough, America Online Inc. is raising the specter that messages pitching get-rich-quick schemes and pictures of naked women could become more pervasive if its instant messaging technology is opened to customers outside its network.
Editor & Publisher: Putting Online Newspapers' Archives Up Front.
Jesse, library director at The Indianapolis Star, has created a new Web site that provides readers with free background information about high-profile news stories, issues, and personalities, while hopefully driving traffic to the newspaper's paid archive database.
Adweek: Maytag.com to Feature Interactive Models.
Maytag Appliances has signed its second agreement with e-SIM, an Israel-based simulation technology company. E-SIM, which builds appliance simulations for Internet merchandising, last year developed an interactive model of Maytag's Neptune washer.
Information Week: Nothing Simple About Mobile Commerce.
Edmunds.com Inc., the mega-site for online car buyers, knows all the pros and cons of making its content available to mobile-device users through its Edmunds2Go family of wireless Web sites. To reach the broadest audience, the company had to develop several wireless applications...
January 5, 2001
NY Times: Experts See Online Speech Case as Bellwether.
Yahoo's aboutface "will certainly encourage litigants and governments in other countries to go after American service providers" who transmit content that is protected in the United States but offensive and possibly illegal abroad, warned Barry Steinhardt, associate director of the ACLU.
Marketing Computers: Conflicts of Interest.
Michael Schrage. It may seem odd to say that tomorrow's brand equity may be determined as much by perceived conflicts of interest as by the quality of a company's products and services. But, hey, these are unusual times. After all, how often do "real" companies see their value dive 80 or 90 percent, over nine months?
EE Times: MP3 chip maker Micronas bails out of SDMI.
Micronas Semiconductors Inc., a leading supplier of chips for MP3 players, has told EE Times it is pulling out of the Secure Digital Music Initiative, the latest sign that the industry forum attempting to iron out content control for Internet music may be losing steam.
The Register: 4C retreats in Copy Protection storm.
Under new proposals submitted to 4C by Linux IDE guru Andre Hedrick, users would be able to control the use of CPRM on their machines. Hedrick represents the Linux community interests on the NCITS T.13 committee...
SJ Mercury: Coalition makes concession on anti-piracy technology.
The latest concession from 4C doesn't go far enough to restoring the balance, said EFF co-founder John Gilmore. Intel spokesman Chuck Mulloy said the furor over the 4C copy-protection plan reveals a basic misunderstanding of the technology. It is intended solely for removable storage...
Inside: Wary of a Video Napster, Hollywood Plots a TV Crackdown.
Spooked by what has happened to the music industry, movie and TV executives have vowed an aggressive campaign to prevent a repeat on their turf. And they appear to have won the latest round, despite a pitched battle from consumer electronics companies and retailers...
NY Times: New Focus for Gates Is Consumer Electronics.
Indeed, William H. Gates, the Microsoft co-founder who now calls himself chief software architect, seems focused on an entirely different business as his company prepares to introduce its X-Box video-game system, its first foray into the high-stakes, high-risk consumer electronics business.
Internet World: Deconstructing Walmart.com.
Chris Russel and Mark Hurst. The site has consistent navigation, clean graphics, fast download times, respectable keyword search, and ease of use. I think they need to refine their product categories and work on adding more personalization to the site for a more effective user experience.
January 6, 2001
Business 2.0: Don't Bank on It.
Web-based banks figured their pitch was irresistible: By eliminating physical branches, tellers, and bankers' hours, they could slash costs and offer customers higher interest rates and more convenience. But in reality, customers want human contact, or at least an ATM.
eCompany: Rabble-Rouser: Nowhere to Hide.
It's not surprising that many of the companies that have thrived on the transparency of the Web are fairly new; old-line firms, accustomed to a world in which they could control the flow of data, are still paranoid about releasing information.
I Can't Stop Thinking: Coins of the Realm.
Scott McCloud. And even though I've benefited from this system to a degree -- I no longer see the traditional industries of selling words and pictures as fair ones -- and I no longer plan to just accept them as the law of the land. Especially if there's an alternative.
SF Gate: China building its own Internet.
China is moving ahead with plans to build its "very own information superhighway," a second-generation Internet-like network designed for China's government and industry, the government's Xinhua News Agency said Saturday. New software and hardware are already being developed for the system...
Fast Company: The New Lure of Internet Marketing.
The new marketing tools of choice are affiliate programs, and pay-for-performance deals such as revenue sharing and bounty systems. Welcome to the Kickback Economy: Merchants and media sites are forming alliances that refer customers back and forth -- and are sharing in the spoils.
January 7, 2001
Useit.Com: Mobile Phones: Europe's Next Minitel?
However, what these analysts fail to see is that mobile innovation will come from rejecting mobile phones, not from having lots of them around. On the contrary, a high penetration of mobile phones will likely lead innovation astray, causing companies to miss the bigger opportunities provided by more suitable devices.
NY Times: Hemming in the World Wide Web.
If the Internet is anything, at least according to its prophets, it is a place without boundaries. Real world geography, with tiresome passports and tedious border checkpoints, does not matter. This is not an appealing notion to many of the world's governments, which would much prefer to control the flow of information across their national borders...
SJ Mercury: VeriSign in struggle with China over registration of Web addresses.
There was even talk in the press of blocking access in China to addresses using VeriSign's system, as Beijing does now for Web sites of some foreign media and critics of communist rule. That raised the prospect of China cutting itself off from the rest of cyberspace.
Web Informant: There are no second chances when it comes to eCommerce.
It has to do with the potential level of instant gratification that we were promised by the Internet, and the potential time savings we assume will occur when we go to shop online. When these benefits don't' materialize, we get mad and quickly head for other destinations, if we can.
January 8, 2001
Newsweek: Sony’s Digital Dilemma.
But now Sony has become the first top-tier consumer electronics company to make mainstream devices that play MP3s. It’s an about-face as abrupt as record label BMG’s recent embrace of Napster. When asked to describe Sony Music’s reaction, one person at Sony Electronics said sheepishly, “They were pissed.”
USA Today: Sony exec sees wired future.
Q&A with Howard Stringer, CEO of Sony of America. We now have 300,000 people paying a $10-a-month subscription fee to play EverQuest. We have a Star Wars game waiting in the wings. So you have all these people buying CD-ROMs and paying subscriptions for something that, in a short time, will actually make money the old-fashioned way.
NY Times: More People Went Online to Talk and Send Greetings Than Shop.
They found that noncommercial activities — getting information about the holidays, seeking tips and ideas for celebrating and using e-mail and e- greetings to make contact with family and friends — drowned out the buy, buy, buy drumbeat of online companies.
MSNBC: Don’t bank on e-payments yet.
While I’m focusing on PayPal, I don’t mean to single them out. Their varied competitors may do some things better and some worse; but being one of the oldest and biggest in the e-payment big top, looking at PayPal’s struggles on the high wire can give a good indication of the problems the rest may face.
ZDNN: Egghead says hacker didn't get access to cards.
As previously reported, the Menlo Park, Calif., company handed over its entire database to the credit card industry on Dec. 21, suggesting that it believed the card numbers contained in the database were at risk. Today's statement seems to refute previous suspicions that the data had been stolen.
InfoWorld: Patent infringement case not going Microsoft's way.
A 35-page opinion by a federal judge in Chicago released after the holidays appears to bolster a small research and development company's case that Microsoft's technology may infringe on its patented Web browser technology.
O'Reilly Network: The End of Streaming Media.
Low bandwidth and poor quality continue to limit the successful distribution of audio and video on the Web. There may be a better way, however, to distribute multimedia content online, by scheduling downloads of high-quality content for appointment viewing or listening.
January 9, 2001
US News: Overwhelmed by Tech.
So with the technology industry enduring its first bear market since gadgets became the hot new thing, many companies are scrambling to find out why consumers aren't falling in love with the latest stuff. The answer? Most folks are still trying to figure out how to work the devices they already have.
US News: Words to live by from an apostle of simplicity.
Jeff Hawkins, chairman of Handspring. The first time I used a WAP phone was a couple of years ago. I decided right then and there that it was never going to succeed. There's no way they can make it good. Someone once told me it took them 27 steps to get on the Internet.
Web Reference: Interview with Jeffrey Veen.
This book came from the same place, but without the association of a specific Web site (I've left HotWired). Each chapter is, in essence, a historical look at the problems of the Web, a in-depth deconstructing of the solutions, and a look to the future to see how things may eventually work out.
Computerworld: The Care and Keeping of Online Customers.
Today's Web retailers are increasingly wise to the fickleness of online shoppers. That's why retailers are investing in improved customer-care technologies such as voice over IP, dynamic and searchable lists of frequently asked questions and text chat to get customers the answers they need to buy goods right away.
ZDNN: Analysts: Egghead's inquiry cost millions.
A company with good security and logging capability should have been able to determine the extent of the intrusion within a few days, security specialists said. In this case, that may have saved banks and credit unions millions in what was ultimately an unnecessary effort to cancel the cards.
Industry Standard: Hollywood Prepares to Fight File-Swappers.
In show business lingo, 2001 opened strong: Holiday moviegoers spent near-record amounts at the box office. But the new year's good cheer masks nagging fears among Hollywood executives about a threat to the bottom line that they can neither see nor touch – or even know for certain exists.
Washington Post: Pop-Up Profit For AOL.
In recent months, AOL has transformed the product that first caught on with teenagers as a way to trade quick messages into a money-making enterprise -- raising new questions about whether AOL has a financial incentive to use its current dominant position in instant messaging to unfairly thwart competitors.
InfoWorld: Microsoft, Expedia, and Priceline settle lawsuits.
Under terms of the settlement detailed Tuesday, Expedia will continue to operate its Price Matcher service, which for some time has included flights as well as hotels. Microsoft's Expedia spin-off has also entered into a royalty arrangement with Priceline.
PC World: Descrambling the Hard Drive Copy-Protection Scheme.
It's easy to understand why this plan has caused confusion and concern: It is a tangle of awkward acronyms, base-level technologies, and industry politics. It starts with the NCITS, the industry body that sets the common standards upon which all PCs operate.
January 10, 2001
Wired News: EBay E-mail Makes Users 'Bidder'.
Auction site eBay has apparently decided that users of its service who said no really meant yes. So, in an attempt to "help" its users, the company has informed many of them, by e-mail, that their marketing preferences were automatically being changed.
ZDNN: Privacy snafu enrages eBay customers.
Online privacy group TRUSTe said the eBay changes raise privacy concerns and it plans to grill execs about it in the next few days. This is a change of mind for TRUSTe, one of several groups that eBay briefed on the details before changing people's preferences. TRUSTe at first gave its okay.
Editor & Publisher: What You Can Charge for on the Internet.
Steve Outing. One answer (but not the answer) is to charge for content. Let me preface my remarks by saying that the "free Web" is not going anywhere. But we are headed into a period where online publishers will commonly offer up content for a price, as well as give content away for free.
SJ Mercury: Vision of TV's future still coming into focus.
Dan Gillmor. While it still seems a bit far-fetched to assume that television sets and video recorders are turning into computers, or vice versa, other kinds of connections are making more sense all the time. The future of TV was taking shape at the annual Consumer Electronics Show this weekend...
Business 2.0: Shop — But Don't Drop.
Consider the case of a man who wants to buy a purple sweater for his wife over the Net. Without normalization, the Website on which he types in purple would miss links to information about merchandise deemed violet, lavender, or plum. If he types in sleeveless he might miss vest.
Computerworld: Disney expected to pay Toysmart.com to destroy customer list.
A subsidiary of The Walt Disney Co. is expected to offer defunct online retailer Toysmart.com Inc. $50,000 to destroy its customer list. The offer is being made as part of a bankruptcy court settlement designed to protect consumers' personal information...
New York Post: Court TV Buys Smoking Gun.
One of the classic independent success stories on the Web found a corporate home yesterday. The Smoking Gun, which posts actual court documents, was bought yesterday by Court TV, along with another crime and justice Web site, crimelibrary.com.
SJ Mercury: zBox can accept packages when nobody's home.
zBox, based in San Francisco, has designed a ``smart home delivery device,'' a locked 2-foot by 2-foot by 2.5-foot box -- called a zBox -- that will be installed next to a house to accept and hold packages when no one is around to sign for them.
January 11, 2001
Salon: Fear of a Web planet.
Scott Rosenberg. Carr's proposal may be odious to Net users steeped in the online culture's libertarian individualism, but there's no question that it represents the extreme edge of a much wider cultural distrust of the perceived anarchy of the Internet.
Wired News: Nader Wants Internet Control.
On Tuesday, Nader called for the creation of a "World Consumer Protection Organization..." Nader, at a National Press Club event, said the proposed WCPO would focus on regulation of privacy, e-commerce, intellectual property, antitrust and Internet governance...
News.Com: AOL, Time Warner cleared to cement union.
FCC chairman William Kennard said the approval came with three additional restrictions beyond those already required by the Federal Trade Commission. The conditions apply to three specific areas: Internet access over high-speed cable lines, instant messaging via cable lines, and ownership issues...
ZDNN: Wireless phones to drop the keypads.
Samsung Corp. unveiled a prototype of its combined cellphone and handheld computer at a conference here recently, and the crowd cooed over the shrunken size of the device. But the gadget had shed more than its girth: It was also missing a push-button keypad.
Inside: Senator Orrin Hatch Blasts Record Biz to Delight of Attendees.
In an early morning keynote address on Wednesday, Senator Orrin Hatch blasted the major record groups as ''content gatekeepers'' that have greedily, shortsightedly and perhaps even illegally roadblocked consumers' access to music on the Internet.
The Register: Europe warms to spam ban.
At a public meeting yesterday to discuss the revised Telecommunications Data Protection Directive, attended by all sides of the unsolicited commercial email debate, there was an increased consensus about the need to do something about spam.
TechWeb: Report: Carriers Must Rethink 3G Wireless Apps.
"It has nothing to do with technology. It's about psychology and usage," he said. Many things about the mobile environment, including how people use devices and where they use them, make it unlikely that 3G apps like video streaming will find a paying audience, said Kaufman.
Red Herring: Japan watches display market go flat.
Already, competition is so harsh that the displays are fast becoming commodities, and many companies are struggling to eke out profits from them. Although this is tough for the makers, it is great for consumers, because there is only one way to survive in the business: invent.
Wired News: What Was EBay's E-Mail Motive?
EBay is either a scheming marketing company or an innocent victim of mass paranoia launched by a well-intentioned e-mail it sent to its users. The truth may be out there, but no one seems to agree on what it is -- except that the seminal auction site has committed a serious PR blunder.
January 12, 2001
Argus ACIA: Lessons Learned from the Dot.Com Crash: A Passenger's Story.
In our unique role as conservative consultants to some of the world's most risk-loving new economy clients, we were privileged to see the inner workings of the dot.coms during the high-speed transition from irrational exuberance to outright panic.
InfoWorld: Phony lotteries, domain name extortion may be the latest Internet con.
Don't believe everything you read. And when it comes to the Internet, don't believe anything you read until you're sure it's not another con job. Recent Internet scams reported by readers follow many of the same patterns we've seen before.
Publish: Beware of content staff bloat.
Don’t be fooled. What’s really going on here is that Web companies are realizing online content alone can’t support a massive editorial payroll. Instead, content production teams need to start small, growing gradually as online revenues grow.
InfoWorld: UUNET goes public with ISP peering policy.
Although most large ISPs are now shying away from peering arrangements with smaller players in favor of more lucrative wholesale deals for carrying Internet traffic, UUNET recently made public the criteria it uses when deciding to enter such bartering agreements.
News.Com: FCC critics call IM conditions toothless.
But that interoperability will only become mandatory if AOL implements what the FCC described as "advanced, IM-based high-speed services applications." AOL said Friday it had no plans to launch any such services. In other words, analysts said, the FCC approved the merger without any meaningful requirements regarding instant messaging.
Interactive Week: Philips Electronics Buys Into Collaboration.
Much like content networks like Akamai or Doubleclick, the software is designed to insert content into Web sites. But in this case, the content doesn't depend on who's looking at the site or who runs the Web site, but rather the company selling the products described in the content.
Industry Standard: French Netizens May Get Cheap, Unmetered Access.
The incumbent operator, which has until now rejected the idea of offering ISPs a flat-rate connection to their network, will present the new pricing plan to the French telecom regulator ART in a few days, Industry Minister Christian Pierret told journalists yesterday at an annual press briefing.
January 13, 2001
SF Chronicle: Rights Advocate Starts Stanford Tech Law Center.
Lawrence Lessig, who once headed a similar center at Harvard Law School, will direct the new Center for Internet and Society. The center is starting a law clinic this semester in which six students will take on Internet law cases ranging from freedom of online speech to Native Americans' rights to bandwidth.
Mappa.Mundi Magazine: Fly Through the Web.
HotSauce worked as a plugin to an existing browser so that when a hyperlink to a MCF-enabled website was selected the user was dropped into a first-person perspective view of the Web. It was a videogame view with Web pages floating as brightly colored blocks in an infinite black space...
Web Techniques: Building Web Sites With Depth.
Jakob Nielsen and Marie Tahir. Good stores know that it's not enough for the store to look nice—it must act nice as well, and support the total customer experience, including location, staffing, returns, payments, sales, and so on. E-commerce sites focus far too often on superficial niceties, without investing in their customers' underlying needs.
NY Times: Web a Little Friendlier to Frequent Fliers.
To deal with frequent-flier programs online, you have to steel yourself for the quirks of the airlines the way you brace yourself for delays and awful food when you step through the gate. There are, of course, some instances where the experience is seamless, but too frequently it is flawed.
Internet Week: Means To An End.
Nelson said that Lands' End has a patent pending for technology that helps divine what a shopper is interested in. The technology, developed with help from vendors Sapient and McKinsey & Co., will walk shoppers through several pairs of pictures, with the shopper selecting preferred styles.
January 14, 2001
Online Journalism Review: TV News Websites: The Myth of Convergence.
Unlike struggling dot-coms forced to lavish millions on advertising to establish a Web presence, smiling TV anchors could simply invite viewers to "check out our Web site" for further information. But those who did check it out found few reasons to come back.
Publish: Invisible architecture.
Christopher Locke. Companies don’t have values or voices, only people do. Fortunately, your company has lots of people. How many stories does your building have? Before you can answer, you must understand what a story truly is. To do that, you first have to find your own.
EE Times: In-car PCs eye speed bump as interfaces shift.
Demonstrating new "infotainment" systems here at the North American International Auto Show, several companies said they will employ mouse-like knobs and buttons, rather than voice interfaces, as a means of accessing electronic features.
ZDNN: Microsoft and piracy: Try, try again.
Customers will decide whether that's true later this year, when Microsoft delivers its first release of the new Whistler version of Windows, featuring "product activation," a revised version of anti-piracy technology that was widely criticized in Office.
The Economist: A LAN line.
Companies such as MobileStar and Wayport are installing the necessary equipment in airports, hotel lobbies and sports stadiums. There is even a growing “free-network movement” of sorts, whose members provide free wireless Internet access in their neighbourhoods.
Information Week: Cable & Wireless To Build Advanced Transatlantic Cable.
Cable & Wireless said Friday that it plans to build the world's most advanced transatlantic telecom cable. The cable, known as Apollo, is specifically designed to carry Internet and data traffic and is intended to meet growing demands for communications bandwidth.
January 15, 2001
MSNBC: Rivals of AOL Time Warner face battle with giant, despite curbs.
The requirement that AOL Time Warner eventually open up parts of its instant messaging, cable-TV and interactive television systems to competitors represents a big reversal from a year ago, when some consumer groups feared the deal would be approved without conditions.
Industry Standard: The Rules of Politics.
Lawrence Lessig. Two days after the Supreme Court embarrassed its apologists, the FTC approved the merger of America Online and Time Warner under terms that took cynics by surprise. As cynicism is my brand, and apologetics my profession, it was a particularly bad week for this writer.
Fast Company: She Reads Customers' Minds.
That's Alissa Kozuh's job at Nordstrom.com. Kozuh, 28, who formerly worked on search-related projects for Microsoft, is now the editor of Nordstrom.com, where her most important role is to analyze the words that people put into the site's search engine every month. All 45,000 of them.
NY Times: Group Says It Beat Music Security but Can't Reveal How.
But Edward Felten has been far less forthcoming about a more recent hack, and at a conference last week he explained why: Lawyers have advised him that publicizing the details of his tinkering could violate a 1998 federal law called the Digital Millennium Copyright Act.
LA Times: Modern Operating System, Interface Are Ripe for Change.
Many people are eagerly awaiting these products, and some analysts are hoping they'll deliver a much-needed jolt to the personal computer industry. But other experts think that the modern PC operating system is stuck in a rut, and that a breakthrough in PC interface design will come from some unknown firm.
NY Times: Struggling to Make Good on the Promise of an Internet Revolution.
When the Digital Convergence Corporation introduced a device called the CueCat last summer, it promised to "revolutionize the way people interact with the World Wide Web". But as with many Internet ventures with lofty goals, Digital Convergence has run into a few roadblocks.
TechWeb: France To Tax Computers, Disks, Phones.
Germany is the only other European Union country to have made such a move, introducing a levy on computers at the start of the year, but French manufacturers of audiovisual equipment fear they face much tougher charges which will hit their sales.
NY Times: EMC's Big Bet on Data Storage.
EMC was quick to pitch the study to Wall Street, adding it to analysts' projections that spending on data storage products is drawing even with spending on computers themselves and that it will account for 70 percent of information technology budgets by 2005.
January 16, 2001
Business 2.0: The Invisible Internet.
Clay Shirky. Internet World is more than a trade show; it's the industry's collective unconscious, its zeitgeist check, if you will. And the fall 2000 event said something loud and clear: The days of the Internet as its own business sector are winding down.
Wired News: Fight Rages Over Digital Rights.
Instead of building competing DRM infrastructures, which Felten referred to as the equivalent of perpetual motion machines, he said technology companies should focus on creating convenient ways for consumers to pay for content and develop piracy tracking applications.
FEED Magazine: The Swarm Next Time.
Steven Johnson. This is the first new site launch we've been involved with in more than half a decade, and so it seemed appropriate to use the occasion to look back at our roots, and to speculate a little on the larger movement that Plastic belongs to.
AtNewYork: Automatic Media Extends Cultural Commentary with Plastic.com.
"We're a totally different model from many content sites -- a much smarter model than most of them," said Anuff. "A much better model is to have four people in an office and a distributed network of help. It's almost in totally different businesses than other content sites."
Wired News: Why You Can't Sell What You Buy.
At the Coalition for the Future of Music policy summit, lawyers and technologists locked horns over consumer rights in the new economy -- an economy that's in part being shaped by copyright protection services such as digital rights management. At issue was the future of the first-sale doctrine.
NY Times: Examining the Music Business.
Some 700 technology pioneers, music industry moguls, online entrepreneurs, academics and legislators had come to discuss a music business in an unprecedented state of flux. But this conference stood out by actually doing what many such gatherings do not: it put musicians first.
Editor & Publisher: Media Convergence Faces Tech Barriers.
For all the talk about the challenges of overcoming corporate cultural resistance when newspapers merge their newsrooms with broadcast and online news partners, it turns out the biggest barrier to multimedia convergence remains technology.
Internet Week: States Test Systems For E-Comm Taxation.
Hosted tax-collection systems to be tested next month by a coalition of states and merchants may be a precursor for how Internet sales taxes will ultimately be managed. The tests are part of a multistate effort to take paperwork out of tax administration for merchants and tax authorities.
January 17, 2001
Editor & Publisher: What's Wrong With Today's News Web Sites.
Steve Outing. Over the years that I've been volunteering as an EPpy judge, news sites have grown to be more comprehensive and feature more and better content. But comprehensive, while an admirable trait, is not always enough to get users to make visiting and using a site a habit.
Internet World: Talking to the Web.
The voice-enabled Web appears to be the latest craze to grab hold of the industry’s imagination. If you believe what you hear, all you will need to surf the Web in the coming years is a telephone, a thirst for information, and the sound of your own voice.
USA Today: Speech recognition apps coming of age.
Much as people would like to speak with their machines, to browse the Internet by voice rather than keystroke, recent strides in speech recognition technology hardly provide the ease and spontaneity of a free-flowing dialogue between humans.
Financial Times: Online recruiter wins ban on rival's web links.
The injunction, based on new European laws on database and copyright protection, was obtained by StepStone against OFiR, the Danish media group, which owns companies with online recruitment portals in the UK, Germany, Denmark and France.
Internet World: Testing Tips and Notes on Task Time.
Jakob Nielsen. One of the most important usability metrics is time on task. After all, the entire reason to have interactive systems is to support users in the performance of some task -- to help users get something done.
TechWeb: Anthropologists Look For Missing Link In Wireless.
A team of anthropologists conducted 180 interviews in six countries for a new report on wireless usage from Context-Based Research Group. The study concluded that wireless adoption could benefit from more user education and an emphasis on social utility.
Salon: Turn off the Internet!
Some analysts, bolstered by a study declaring that the Internet is responsible for fully 8 percent of all national electricity consumption, assert that the Net itself is responsible for spiking demand to unprecedented heights. The new economy, it seems, is an energy hog.
Wired News: Infamous Spammer Spammed.
In what some see as a perfect example of the evidence of cosmic retribution, an avalanche of spam has crashed British Internet service provider Pipex's servers, and stopped delivery of e-mail to its million-plus users for the past week.
January 18, 2001
News.Com: AOL Time Warner plans to close Entertaindom.
Entertaindom was Time Warner's first foray into creating a series of Web destinations, or hubs, focusing on specific topics. The hub strategy and the creation of Time Warner Digital Media were the company's attempts to develop Internet businesses in the wake of its defunct Pathfinder site...
The Economist: Stop signs on the web.
It seems likely that 2000 will be remembered as the year when governments started to regulate cyberspace in earnest; and forgot, in the process, that the reason the worldwide network became such an innovative force at all was a healthy mix of self-regulation and no regulation.
Internet World: Interview with David Wetherell.
Even though AltaVista’s doing well in the advertising space, we just think that in order to really ensure strong growth they ought to leverage their position in search licensing to a greater extent. They happen to own 38 patents, many of which we think are fundamental in the search area.
The Register: AltaVista to become only Net search engine.
Search engines have been rapidly filing for patents on whatever bits of their system they can - even Google has a patent pending - but before now it was a case of cold war arsenals. If CMGI really does push this, there will be an almighty stink and if a court decision is ever made...
NY Times: Channel and Web Surfing, With AOLTV.
Apparently, nobody at AOL realized that a program grid that lists shows you can't actually watch is a recipe for frustration. (To the contrary, Carlos Silva, vice president of AOLTV, sees it as a marketing opportunity for AOL's partners to "upsell" you to more expensive cable or satellite packages.)
News.Com: Hotmail spam filters block outgoing e-mail.
In an apparently overzealous attempt to prevent spam, Microsoft's Hotmail has been discarding e-mail sent to and from sites hosted by controversial Internet service providers--even if the sites themselves are not controversial.
NY Times: Web Sites Begin to Self Organize.
The Vines is an example of an emerging class of what are called self-organizing Web sites. Such sites are demonstrating that with a dab or two of well-written code and a bit of careful planning, a site can take a random collection of links or posts and turn them into a sophisticated, adaptive system.
News.Com: Mobile markets fall flat for many consumers.
Part of the answer lies in a combination of industry hype, consumer confusion and cultural differences that change the way people use such technologies from country to country. But the main reason, analysts say, is the simple fact that products on the U.S. market are more difficult to use.
January 19, 2001
NY Times: Free-Speech Advocates Fight Filtering Software in Public Schools.
One month after Congress passed a law pressuring public schools and libraries to install blocking or filtering software on computer terminals to screen out Internet smut, three free-speech powerhouses are gearing up to slay the measure in federal court.
Wired News: ISPs 'RIP' Into British Police.
A stream of "stupid questions" posed by technically callow police officers trying to enforce a controversial law are angering Britain's Internet service providers, who are threatening to move their businesses out of the country if authorities don't wise up soon.
Interactive Week: EU Initiative Funds Filters.
The World Wide Web Safe Surfing Project is part of a initiative launched by the European Union in 1999 to help users surf the Web without encountering illegal or objectionable content. As part of the initiative, the EU is providing funding for several projects exploring different types of filtering technologies.
A List Apart: Survivor! Coping with the web design crisis.
First the dot.com businesses got hit, and many of us shrugged. It's ugly out there, but how bad is it, really? We asked some of our peers how they were coping with the crisis in the web industry. Below, they tell their stories in their own words.
Federal Computer Week: Archives asks for Web freeze frames.
The National Archives and Records Administration is asking all federal agencies to take "a one-time snapshot" of their public Web sites on or before Jan. 20. The snapshots are to be preserved in an electronic records archive that NARA is developing. They eventually are to be made available to researchers.
First Monday: The Unnoticed Presidential Transition.
Ever since George W. Bush was declared President-elect, attention has focused on the transition of power: what people and what policies define the new Administration? But in this first Presidential transition of the Web era, another unnoticed transition is under way: the President's presence on the Web...
Wired News: Library of Congress Goes Digital.
But even as the library completed this monumental task last week, some said its digital strategy still lags. In addition, the project underscores the longstanding concern over whether the library should be geared more toward scholarly pursuits than mainstream interests.
January 20, 2001
O'Reilly Network: The Parable of Umbrellas and Taxicabs.
Clay Shirky. Because these resources need to be provisioned in large chunks when the machines are bought, and because users don't want to spend their time and effort putting spot prices on unused cycles, the markets that form around P2P resources are not likely to be real-time micromarkets but futures macromarkets.
NY Times: The New York Times: Five Years on the Web.
With that in mind, Bernard Gwertzman, editor of The New York Times on the Web, and Martin Nisenholtz, chief executive officer of New York Times Digital, sat down to discuss their five years on the Web, the state of Internet journalism today, and what we can expect in years to come.
Boston Globe: Online news outlets catch their breath.
Still, some analysts suggest the problem is not so much technological as it is psychological, that old media companies are struggling with a new media culture. Nicol believes such traditional habits as the reliance on fixed deadlines and the ''division'' between journalists and ''technologists'' need to be eradicated.
Internet World: Deconstructing Fodors.com.
John Shiple and Louis Rosenfeld. My only gripe is that some of these syndicated areas could be better customized. BedandBreakfast.com will automatically give you listings for B&Bs in Quebec City. But Expedia doesn’t know that you’re heading there, and you’ll have to fumble around their site for the airport code.
Publish: Interact with Customers.
Financial services companies are only beginning to carve out their strategies for the Web, and they are trying to gauge exactly how much and which kinds of content the next generation of investors are looking for.
News.Com: Commentary: Considering Web-based customization strategies.
Offering customized--and profitable--products to consumers has been a dream of manufacturers since long before the dawn of the Internet. Many companies have tried and will continue to try mass customization strategies over the Web with varying degrees of success.
January 21, 2001
SJ Mercury: Singapore's Lee ready to adjust to fast-changing times.
Dan Gillmor. Lee has ruled with the firmest of hands. Now, as the Digital Age emerges, he seems reconciled to some new, technology-driven facts of social and economic life -- such as loosening the governmental grip that many believe helped bring Singapore to its current prominence.
Useit.Com: Usability Metrics.
Although measuring usability can cost four times as much as conducting qualitative studies (which often generate better insight), metrics are sometimes worth the expense. Among other things, metrics can help managers track design progress and support decisions about when to release a product.
O'Reilly Network: Mojo Nation Responds.
Jim McCoy, founder and CEO of Mojo Nation. In situations where available resources are great, the internal incentives encourage multiple peers to work together at a task for optimum speed. In situations where resources are overloaded, clients are given incentives to switch to lesser-used servers.
January 22, 2001
Boston Globe: Apocalypse Not.
The senders are forgotten people, living underground. No one else will tell their stories. The only information the official outlets would like you to have is that the revolution is over. Tech start-ups are dying, dead, or in denial. Every dot-com is looking to sell out, lay off, or close up shop.
John Gilmore: What's Wrong With Copy Protection.
Copy protection pretends that the law and some fancy footwork with industrial cartels can maintain our current economic structures, in the face of a hurricane of positive technological change that is picking them up and sending them whirling like so many autumn leaves.
News.Com: Big Blue touts new Napster-proof music locks.
The advent of Napster and its peers has changed the rules and risks in the online music business. Now IBM and other companies are trying to keep just enough of the Napster model alive to satisfy consumers, while giving copyright holders near-absolute control over the way songs and other media are distributed.
Business Week: There's No Fizz in Pepsi's E-Promotion.
Maybe I missed a key point in the evolution of mass consumer society. Perhaps our consumerism is so over-the-top that people would find it amusing to take an active role in choosing the marketing messages designed to get them to buy sugar water. So, Pepsi is either very cleverly aware or stunningly naive.
NY Times: Rethinking Internet News as a Business Proposition.
The first era of newspaper experiments on the Internet, fueled in part by the fear that the Web would devour profits, is over. A new era of newspaper experiments on the Internet, fueled in part by the fear that the Web will not generate profits, has begun. Where will it lead?
Editor & Publisher: Post-Strike Seattle- The Web Wins.
Looking back, perhaps the only clear winner of the Seattle strike was the Internet. As the newspapers resume normal operations, there are indications that the Web's role during the strike could bring changes in the papers' newsrooms.
MSNBC: Yahoo, Microsoft traffic ‘hijacked’.
The database that includes this information is called a DNS Table. On Saturday, MyDomain.com accidentally released a DNS table to the world that was full of errors, Lau said. The mistakes meant a small fraction of Web surfers trying to visit Yahoo.com were instead sent to an IP address inside MyDomains.com.
Industry Standard: High Court to Review High-Speed Net Rules.
The Supreme Court agreed Monday to review a dispute over the legal status of high-speed Internet traffic running on cable television lines, putting the high court in a position to either accelerate or delay the availability of such broadband offerings across the country.
NY Times: Travel Sites Emulating Merchants.
But those obstacles are falling, online travel analysts and executives say. Not only are airlines becoming more receptive to the idea of selling discounted seats to travel sites; the sites themselves are getting more savvy about how to make consumers bite on offers they might otherwise ignore or miss.
January 23, 2001
Wired: Mission Impossible.
If no one's laughing it's because the board has been unable to reach even an internal consensus on what is right. While the Net continues to grow exponentially, straining the current DNS setup, ICANN has fallen into a quagmire that has critics fearing the great experiment is about to unravel.
Internet World: The Seven Sins of Copy Protection Tools.
Jakob Nielsen and Susan Farrell. Anything that makes computers harder to use should be rejected on the drawing board, because if it ever goes to market, it will be rejected by the users, who already have more complexity than they can deal with on their desktops now.
Business 2.0: IBM's Digital Music Catch-Up.
Regardless of whether or not EMMS garners widespread support, DRM technologies are predicated on the mistaken premise that Napster in its current free state will go away, says Forrester Research Forrester Research analyst Eric Scheirer.
Inside: Pathfinder Redux? Netscape to Be Relaunched as Uber-Portal for AOL Time Warner Media Properties.
While some Time Inc. employees are referring to the plan as the ''RePathfinderization'' of Time Inc.'s Web presence -- a nod to the failed Pathfinder super-site that lumped all of the company's magazines into a single site -- others insist that the similarities are merely of a design nature.
Internet World: FreeDrive Pulls Plug on Free Storage to Battle Pirates.
Barbed wire helped tame the West, but erecting barriers may not be a big help to FreeDrive... A spokeswoman for Driveway.com said abuse by software pirates is just part of a more-general problem: On its own, providing free Web storage space to any and all comers just isn't a sustainable business.
Upside: Bell Labs is on the cusp of something great.
Much has changed since William Shockley and his colleagues invented the first transistor at Bell Laboratories in 1947. Its research and development scientists have been churning out crucial inventions for more than 75 years, and there's no indication that an end is near.
Web Informant: Let the games begin.
A good digital learning game doesn't have to be either completely original or extremely long to be effective. And as our businesses, homes and schools become wired so that broadband connections are available to everyone; the infrastructure to fully realize this new type of learning will be in place.
Industry Standard: FTC Clears DoubleClick.
For more than a year, DoubleClick, the biggest online advertising server company and a major online advertiser, has been cited by privacy advocates as the prime example of why a new federal law is needed to safeguard Internet privacy.
January 24, 2001
Industry Standard: States to Weigh In on Privacy.
A Dec. 11 draft letter written by a special privacy task force established last June by the National Association of Attorneys General urges federal lawmakers not to hobble the state attorneys general by pre-empting state statutes.
News.Com: Music piracy effort faces key test.
Few believe that Secure Digital Music Initiative will be a perfect salve for the online music industry's woes. Regardless, the energy that has been poured into the project for two years needs to resolve quickly into products; otherwise, critics say, the industry must move on.
Wired News: SDMI Needs to Secure New Chief.
The embattled executive director of the sputtering Secure Digital Music Initiative is stepping down. Leonardo Chiariglione made the announcement at an SDMI meeting in Los Angeles and said he would be relinquishing his responsibilities over the next three months...
Salon: Crypto for the people.
Many people have attempted to explain public key encryption for a lay audience -- Levy is one of the few who makes the mathematics comprehensible. From the sorry tale of the Clipper Chip to the saga of Phil Zimmerman's fight to get encryption power to the people, "Crypto" is eminently readable and lucid.
ZDNN: Microsoft fingers technicians for crippling site outages.
In a statement issued late Wednesday, Microsoft explained that a "router configuration error" had caused requests for access to the company’s Web sites to go unanswered. Routers are critical pieces of the Internet that direct data between a company's network and the Internet.
Computerworld: The Web's Master Builders.
Now, Link says information architecture is part of GoTo Auctions' development cycle. "Product management finds a need for a new product. With the help of our customer support staff, I validate that need. We talk to people and ask if they even want this feature—it could be really cool but doesn't meet their needs."
Fortune: Healing the Web.
I wrote about one of the leaders of the cause, Jakob Nielsen, last October, so when Nielsen offered the chance to see what a Web usability test was like (his firm is doing a study of how journalists use corporate Websites and their press sections), I jumped at the offer.
Stickygoo: Establishing a Dedicated Interaction Design/Usability Team.
More and more companies, both small and large, are realizing that spending the time and money to develop a Web site requires resources dedicated to ensuring the site is usable for their target audiences. No one wants to repeat the public failures of companies like boo.com...
News.Com: Netscape.com to become portal for Time Warner content.
AOL Time Warner is taking steps to dramatically refocus its flagging Netscape subsidiary, handing responsibility for Web browser development to another division and preparing to relaunch Netscape.com as a venue for its top editorial content, according to sources familiar with the plans.
January 25, 2001
ZDNN: Web attackers knock out access to Microsoft sites.
The company also noted that Thursday's attack was not related to the technical glitch that crippled its sites late Tuesday and most of Wednesday. Microsoft said that it has asked the FBI to investigate and that the company's Web sites are again fully available.
SF Gate: Copyright law nears final hurdles in Europe.
At a final hearing Wednesday on updating European copyright laws for the digital age, music industry lobbyists will be arguing for last-ditch language to restrict private copying. Industry officials argue that the shape of the final directive, which as been hotly debated for more than three years...
Boston Globe: Pardon my software.
It's so easy to forget. A single copy of the code can be cloned onto an infinite number of PCs with minimal effort and expense. Unless, of course, you're found out, and sued by the software makers. Or by their grim and remorseless agents, represented by the Business Software Alliance.
InfoWorld: UCITA on legislative agenda in four states.
Arizona, Oklahoma, Delaware, and Texas are scheduled to take up the UCITA in their current legislative sessions, and other states are being approached by the National Conference of Commissioners on Uniform State Laws and asked to do the same...
NY Times: Mining the 'Deep Web' With Specialized Drills.
His demonstration illustrated a problem that has long been apparent longtime problem that has to anyone casting about for online news reports: search engines can be pitifully inadequate, partly because they rely on Web-page indexes that were compiled weeks before.
- DaveNet: From July 26, 1997; JIT-SEs
ZDNN: Web war rages over DVD-cracking site.
Many ISPs, especially smaller ones that don't have large legal departments, yank sites immediately after receiving threatening letters from content providers to avoid liability. But Verio is raising the bar for site closures by refusing to buckle under MPAA pressure.
Wired News: Media Makers Content to Interact.
At the National Association of Television Program Executives meeting, TV executives and Web content producers who have been fighting each other for eyeballs are now looking at ways to create content that can be delivered both online and on-screen.
NY Times: Snags in French Wireless Auction.
Another European auction of high-speed wireless phone licenses appeared on the verge of collapse today, after two of four candidates withdrew from the auction in France of licenses for a new generation of Internet-linked cell phones.
LA Times: With AOLTV, It's Lonely at the Set Top.
No doubt over time AOL will move many of its online subscribers to AOLTV and smooth out the wrinkles. History has proved that this is a company that knows how to develop a product that appeals to the masses. But for now, there's little reason for consumers to be pioneers.
January 26, 2001
News.Com: Spam filters may feed Web marketing.
Some popular free Web services are playing both sides of the fence when it comes to protecting consumers from pesky marketers, offering to block junk e-mail while they help advertisers push promotions into customers' in-boxes.
Salon: Down and out in Redmond.
Scott Rosenberg. From its approach to fixing bugs in its software to its treatment of competitors to its stance in federal court during its antitrust trial -- and now, in its handling of its own customers during a massive service failure -- Microsoft presents itself as a monolithic giant that's reluctant to admit failure...
News.Com: Operational excellence deters serious Web outages.
People who want to throw stones at Microsoft should realize that they also live in glass houses. They should go down to their glass house (data or operations center) and make very sure that their operations group is well funded and has implemented a strong operational excellence plan...
Internet World: Web Site Tests Verio's Role as Copyright Police.
Standing by its customer, hosting firm Verio has refused to take down a Web site that the MPPA claims is breaking the law. The situation is testing the role of ISPs as copyright cops in the wired world and demonstrating the limits of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act...
Alan Cooper: The Iteration Trap.
High-tech companies are in a hurry—as well they should be—but many hurt themselves by trying to move products out the door too quickly. I often hear executives repeat homilies like "Ship early, ship often," and "Launch and learn." They assume that there is no penalty for simply slapping something together...
Interactive Week: Hands Off My Web Site.
On the Web, anything is fixable, so long as you have access to the original file. But lately, I've run into a rather annoying something about the Web's "fixability." It has emboldened certain companies to try to cross the line between what, in journalism, is called the separation of church and state.
SJ Mercury: Wireless gold rush: Airwaves auction to raise record $17 billion.
A federal government auction of airwaves that can be used for Internet-connected wireless phone service is breaking all U.S. records, raising about $17 billion, in a sign that the gold rush for communications spectrum shows no signs of abating.
January 27, 2001
Business 2.0: Email Marketing at a Price.
While email marketers currently enjoy the luxury of being able to send millions of promotional messages for free, that ability will likely soon come at a price. However, if paying a premium also means reaching users who are more receptive to their messages, marketers may actually be more than willing to pay.
Internet World: Spam Legislation Likely to Pass This Year.
Similar legislation passed the House last year but got held up in the Senate. It's likely that spam legislation will move rapidly this year, because there are just a few remaining areas of difference to be worked out in the legislation, according to both anti-spam groups and lobbyists...
Web Techniques: Effective Web Writing.
As people have swarmed into this new medium, they've brought all their bad habits from other media—especially from TV and its obsession with moving images. Simple, boring text just doesn't seem to cut it, except as something to keep the animated GIFs from bumping into each other.
InfoWorld: BSA's and Microsoft's scare tactics target small fish in big-city ponds.
How likely are you to find the Business Software Alliance's compliance police at your door one day, warrant in hand to check for pirated software? Your risk may have less to do with the amount of unlicensed software you have and more to do with the size and location of your company.
January 28, 2001
Online Journalism Review: Soul-Searching Time at Online News Units.
As nearly every week brings word of a new round of layoffs and cutbacks in new media, current and former online staffers, executives and industry analysts are surveying the wreckage and wondering whether the reluctant, often testy romance between media companies and the Internet has come to an end.
Online Journalism Review: Dot-com Content Sites Get Creative.
"What investor would invest in content after all the criticism it's taken?" says Michael O'Donnell, president of Salon. As a result, content sites have had to morph into something more. And the year ahead may mark the end of thinking about them exclusively as Web sites.
Wired News: DeCSS Allies Ganging Up.
A federal court decision that restricted a DVD-descrambling program ignores free speech rights and should be overturned, eight different coalitions claim. The groups, representing everyone from cryptographers to journalists, have ganged up to attack the ruling in separate amicus briefs...
News.Com: Radio stations sue to overturn Webcasting fees.
The broadcasters sued in U.S. District Court in Philadelphia Thursday to overturn the decision that record companies are entitled to royalties when a station transmits music programming on a Web site. An arbitration panel will set the exact amount.
January 29, 2001
Financial Times: Disney may cut jobs and abandon Go.com.
Robert Iger, group president, questioned whether the portal was a long-term sustainable model. The concerns about Go.com mark a swift change of heart at Disney, where until a few weeks ago Mr Eisner had said he intended to stand behind the internet investments...
MSNBC: Disney’s Go.com to be shut down.
The Walt Disney Co. said Monday it is pulling the plug on the Go.com portal, laying off 400 workers - 20 percent of the Disney Internet Group - and wrap the unit back into the main company. But Disney said Go.com’s demise will not affect its other sites, including ESPN.com and ABCNews.com.
NY Times: The Spread of News by E-Mail Is Becoming News Itself.
People often pass around news articles via e-mail. Some even do it compulsively, in part because it's so easy: most news sites include an "e- mail this article" link on some or all of their stories. But until last spring, apparently, no site made use of the statistics generated by those e-mail links.
Industry Standard: Napster to Launch Fee-Based Service in Mid-2001.
Sarfeld said a survey of 20,000 Napster users conducted in December by Webnoize showed that a large majority are willing to pay up to $15 a month for the music download service. However, Sarfeld cautioned, this is no indication for what the fee will be. "We are not talking figures yet," he said.
NY Times: Intranets Nurture Companies From the Inside.
When I.B.M. asked employees in its annual survey last year what they considered the best ways to learn about the company, most said their co-workers were among the most credible or useful sources of information. That was pretty much what company officials had expected to hear.
SF Chronicle: Spotlight On Privacy.
But hope is fading fast for those who don't want regulation. Net privacy bills were among the first legislation introduced in the new House of Representatives, and dozens of senators and representatives say they plan to reintroduce bills that Congress didn't get around to last year.
NY Times: DoubleClick Seeking Ways to Protect Users' Anonymity.
Even as some privacy advocates continue to push the company to change its data- collection policies, others formerly critical of DoubleClick acknowledge that the company has made great strides in helping develop industrywide privacy standards.
January 30, 2001
Media Guardian: Prophets of doom at online news profits.
Leaning down from the stage, Rupert Murdoch, the head of News Corporation, made it clear that the honeymoon with online news was over. "I just don't see how you can make money out of it." Since that comment many other media bosses have started to wonder whether they will ever make money online.
NY Times: Disney to Abandon Portal Site.
Mr. Eisner said that online advertising would rebound, but Go was not in a position to benefit. "Seventy percent of the advertising for portals is going to the top three players," he said. "The 10 second-tier portals are left picking up the scraps."
The Register: Search engine veteran poo-poos AltaVista patent claims.
This was too much for Alan Emtage, who created one of the earliest search engines, Archie. In a Business Wire press release, Alan explained that his engine - released first in 1989 - used FTP to crawl public sites and index them for Internet users.
SJ Mercury: Arrogance is muted but technology remains a presence at forum.
Dan Gillmor. There is no New Economy, no Old Economy, says Orit Gadiesh. There is just the economy. Gadiesh, chairman of Bain & Co., has been saying this for some time, including here at the World Economic Forum's annual meeting a year ago. Back in early 2000, her words fell on skeptical ears.
Internet World: New Economy Is Down but Not Out.
Jakob Nielsen. The previous two years, presentations by Internet companies had the old-timers quaking in their boots, so this year many speakers clearly enjoyed the downturn in the new economy. Even so, most executives seemed to have realized the importance of the Internet.
Inside: How the Net Could Nuke TV: Video File-Sharing.
Tom Watson and Jason Chervokas. If you believe the runaway success of Napster's peer-to-peer business has fundamentally altered the media landscape, then the next big quake logically will be in television. Just as Aimster, so may a similar combination of software, hardware, and bandwidth change the way we watch television.
ZDNN: Security patches aren't being applied.
The scenario, repeated daily at sites across the Internet, exposes a common security problem largely unknown to the general public. Although software makers routinely release "fixes" designed to plug holes and reassure worried customers, these antidotes are often ignored by administrators...
Seattle Post-Intelligencer: Even as dot-coms close, others charge ahead with 'telco hotels' here.
But with dot-coms closing, telecommunications companies struggling and electricity costs skyrocketing, some are starting to wonder if the Internet data center boom is past its peak. At least one major developer of Internet data centers is scaling back. Others admit the Seattle market could very well be overbuilt.
January 31, 2001
O'Reilly Network: Legally and Technically, Hollywood Is Assaulting Some Basic Rights.
Q&A with Lawrence Lessig. But now the real danger is that the recording industry has succeeded in its objective, which as Hillary Rosen (president and CEO of the RIAA) said, is to guarantee that no venture capitalist invests money in new modes of distribution unless Hollywood signs off.
Editor & Publisher: Mixing Old and New Media.
Steve Outing. Newspaper publishers may be tempted to focus solely on their print products now that the "threat of the Internet" is gone. That could be a fatal mistake. The modern news organization clearly can no longer afford to focus solely on its legacy platform — whether print, TV, or radio.
Industry Standard: Ahead of His Times.
He is on a mission charted by Arthur Sulzberger Jr., the New York Times Co.'s chairman, who personally offered Oreskes the job. The new Net executive is charged with finding ways to funnel the reporting skills and content that fuel the world's most respected newspaper into a variety of media.
Publish: The Making of MSNBC.com.
Q&A with Merrill Brown and John Nicol. That’s perhaps part of the point we make about convergence–I think technology is part of editorial. It allows us to present stories as interactive, more compelling, more personalized. There’s not a real division, I don’t think, within our company between technology and editorial...
Inside: Revenue-Challenged Salon Cuts Losses As a Break-Even Summer Beckons.
Journalistic kudos did little to protect Salon.com from being hammered by the online advertising downturn last quarter, as the media Web site suffered a 25 percent decline in revenue. But as austerity measures began to kick in, Salon was able to cut (slightly) its steep losses...
Fort Worth Star-Telegram: CNN removing walls between old, new media.
In a few months, or at least by this time next year, CNN Interactive, as we know it, will cease to exist. The reorganization announced Wednesday dictated that all CNN employees be multiskilled reporters who can report for television, write for the Web site and lay down radio tracks.
USA Today: Nortel unveils Web tracking technology.
The Canadian company said Tuesday its new line of "Personal Content" network software will make it easier to customize online services to individual preferences and needs, but some consumer advocates attacked it as a potential invasion of privacy.
Wired News: Nortel Netware Sets Off Alarms.
Nortel Networks said Wednesday that its new technology for Internet service providers would enable them to secretly track customers' online movements, but that they would be unwise to do so.
Computerworld: Judge gives OK for Toysmart to destroy its customer list.
In what should be the final chapter in the demise of the online retailer, Kenner Thursday approved a plan filed earlier this month by the Buena Vista Internet Group. The agreement called for Buena Vista to pay Toysmart $50,000 to destroy the list.
| 