Keeping politicians' hands off the Net & everything else related to technology
I’m listening to the audiobook of Telecosm, George Gilder’s prophetic book about how abundant broadband would revolutionize the planet—which I recommend to everyone. I came across this passage, which reminded me just how good we really have it: Reported to catalog only 16 percent of web pages, the best Internet search engines are foundering under the [...]
I’m not sure how I missed this, but someone just pointed out to me that in late July, the city of Amherst, NY, “failed to approve a game license for [Chuck E. Cheese’s] the kids-themed food and entertainment venue… citing concerns about violent video games and bad behavior by patrons that require police intervention.” That [...]
Over at Twitter, our TLF blogging colleague Jerry Brito asks a smart question about the Federal Communications Commission’s recently-opened investigation of the Apple-Google spat over Apple’s recent decision to reject the Google Voice app from the iPhone App Store. Jerry asks: “Maybe I should know this, but what authority does the FCC have to demand [...]
Like many others, I’ve wondered whether Yahoo! got less than it should have becuase government antitrust regulators prevented Google from bidding up the value of a deal with Yahoo!. Carl Icahn, who owns 5% of Yahoo! seems happy enough while others still wonder if Microsoft got the better end of the deal, BusinessWeek reports. While [...]
The recently proposed Microsoft-Yahoo deal has rekindled the debate over what role, if any, antitrust regulators should play in the high-tech sector. Adam and Berin have argued that decades-old (sometimes centuries-old) antitrust laws simply cannot keep pace with the relentlessly fast-moving digital economy. And Farhad Manjoo of Slate has concluded that antitrust action against tech [...]
Regular readers will know that Adam and I have been waging a lonely defensive action in the war on “Free!” (ad-supported) content and services online, pointing out that restrictions on data collection and use for advertising would ultimately hurt consumers by reducing funding for the sites they love (1, 2, 3, 4). In short, there is no free [...]
Last month, National Review magazine published a review that I penned of Mark Helprin’s new book, Digital Barbarism: A Writer’s Manifesto. Helprin’s book is both a passionate defense of copyright law as well as a mini-autobiography. Helprin is one of the great novelists and essayists of the past half-century, and his book A Soldier of [...]
Just when you thought the FCC’s investigation of the wireless industry couldn’t get any stranger, TechCrunch reports that the Commission has sent letters to AT&T, Apple, and Google inquiring about Apple’s recent decision to reject the Google Voice app from the iPhone App Store (as Berin discussed yesterday). It’s been over two years since the [...]
As you might have noticed, we’re giving the TLF a facelift as we approach our five-year anniversary on August 14. Our own Jerry Brito is leading the charge, with Cord Blomquist and PJ Doland providing backup vocals. Thanks, guys! We’re still ironing out bugs and experimenting with widgets, but we’d welcome your feedback as we [...]
See my new Forbes.com commentary on the Microsoft-Yahoo search partnership: Ballmer appears now to get it. “The more searches, the more you learn,” he says. “Scale drives knowledge, which can turn around and drive innovation and relevance.” Microsoft decided in 2008 to build 20 new data centers at a cost of $1 billion each. This was [...]
January 29, 2012
The Technology Liberation Front is the tech policy blog dedicated to keeping politicians' hands off the 'net and everything else related to technology.
