CNET reports that Amazon has halted plans to sell wine online. The reason: too many inconsistent state laws. Per the article:
Since the Supreme Court ruled in May 2005 that states must grant the same shipping rights to out-of-state and in-state wineries, winery-to-consumer shipping has become legal in 35 states, according to wine advocacy group Free the Grapes. But state laws governing direct wine shipping vary greatly, creating an onerous task in managing compliance.
Amazon has become a great marketplace for countless products–it’s a shame to see wine makers shut out from this market due to regulatory barriers to e-commerce.
Just read this AP article that reported on a Tuesday hearing of the Ohio Supreme Court about an Ohio “harmful to minors” law. According to the article, the statute makes it illegal to distribute harmful material to minors through “direct communications by people who know or have reason to believe the recipient is a minor.”
The case is in the 6th Circuit Court of Appeals, which has asked the Ohio Supreme Court to interpret “mass distribution” and “personally directed devices.” Per the law:
2) A person remotely transmitting information by means of a method of mass distribution does not directly sell, [etc.] … if either of the following applies:
(a) The person has inadequate information to know or have reason to believe that a particular recipient of the information or offer is a juvenile.
(b) The method of mass distribution does not provide the person the ability to prevent a particular recipient from receiving the information.
In the hearing (see the video) Justice Robert Cupp coins this beauty of a statement: “It’s not really the statute that’s confusing here, it’s the technologies.” Judge say what?
Isn’t the whole point of a statute to be applied to factual situations? Anything can make sense in the abstract (even law!). But applied to everyday life, the simplistic becomes complex — and can have unintended consequences. Continue reading →
Two recent trends evidence the importance of targeted Internet advertising–more money going toward Internet ads, and fewer people that click on display banner ads.
First, the good news is that Internet advertising is rebounding (or at least seeing a reversal in the the decline of ad $). Tough economic times has decreased ad dollars among all marketing mediums. But online ads will be the first to see new demand from marketers. And some online companies are weathering the bad economy just fine. Google’s ad revenue rose 7 percent in the third quarter.
Compare with McClatchy (the U.S.’s 3rd largest newspaper company), where according to the AP article print advertising plunged 32 percent in the third quarter, but its online ad sales increased 3 percent.
So ad dollars are increasing. Where will money be spent? On targeted ads.
comScore released a study earlier this month that showed most people don’t click on display advertisements. As someone who never does either, I don’t find this surprising. According to comScore:
“The act of clicking on a display ad is experiencing rapid attrition in the current digital marketplace,” said Linda Anderson, comScore VP of marketing solutions and author of the study. “Today, marketers who attempt to optimize their advertising campaigns solely around the click are assigning no value to the 84 percent of Internet users who don’t click on an ad.”
This is huge. Online companies rely on advertisements to pay the bills and will need to better target ads to their users if they want to stay in business.
If we want to see the next generation of online content and services, then we need to stay vigilant to convince members of Congress (Boucher) and the FTC not to impose more restrictions on interest-based advertising, such as opt-in requirements.
Sometimes legislators vote along political party interests, sometimes in their self interest, and as we saw in Maine–sometimes legislators will have the constitutional interests of free speech and the commerce clause in mind.
I traveled with my NetChoice colleague Steve DelBianco to Augusta last week to testify at a joint judiciary committee hearing of the Maine legislature. Our mission: persuade the committee members to repeal the Predatory Marketing Act, which became law just two months ago–and a law so bad that it ranked #1 on NetChoice’s iAWFUL top ten list of worst legislation.
This law’s potentially sweeping (negative) impact is a big deal. So big that the Maine legislature met out-of-session to re-consider it. It dedicated a webpage to the hearing and received over 30 comments from various interests — including comments from NetChoice.
The law seriously restricts the exchange of information between Web 2.0 services and their users by making it unlawful to knowingly collect or receive health-related or personal information for marketing purposes from a minor, without first obtaining verifiable parental consent. In effect, the law restricts advertising that is most relevant to user interests.
We arrived confident but with a “tail between our legs” feeling — after all, we had just sued the state of Maine and agreed to a court order that said very favorable words about our chances to win on the merits. In the court case, NetChoice was joined by Reed Elsevier, the Maine Independent Colleges Association, and the Maine Press Association in calling for an injunction against the law, arguing that it tramples First Amendment rights while wreaking havoc with interstate commerce.
So here we were, with but a day or two to show how the existing law broadly harms a number of online services. Continue reading →
Here in Washington, DC we’re finally experiencing a changing of the seasons. The summer heat is retreating as cool , autumn air invades. It’s a changing of the guard–just like what’s happening to ICANN with today’s expiration of its oversight by the U.S. government. Only its a spring-like blossoming for ICANN.
The Department of Commerce has allowed the JPA to expire, thus completing the transition of DNS management to ICANN. There were many skeptics that wanted to give ICANN more time to develop permanent mechanisms for true accountability. Others were concerned about the threat of capture, especially on hearing proposals from the United Nations and European Commission to assume control over a newly-independent ICANN.
Over at the NetChoice blog, Steve DelBianco says that we should be pleasantly surprised to see the new Affirmation of Commitments unveiled by ICANN today, because it does much to address both of those concerns. It creates review mechanisms for accountability, new domains, and domains in non-Latin characters (IDNs).
These new “review teams” could bring to ICANN something similar to the ‘official review’ we have for football and tennis. For close, controversial decisions, this framework could help ICANN to correct a bad call and get back on-track. I can see a couple of areas where these new review teams can have an impact right away:
I’m glad to see that the security review team has a forward-looking focus on making sure the DNS stays up 24-7, around the world, even under increasing security threats and a major expansion of top-level domains.
The review team for competition and consumer choice might finally get ICANN to get its registrars to fulfill the role they were designed for: to offer consumers a choice of all top level domains—not just the ones that a registrar prefers to sell.
So it seems more like a Spring-like flowering than a Fall dropping of the leaves. ICANN gets independence, plus there’s a balanced framework that brings all governments into the oversight process alongside private sector stakeholders, with a sharpened focus on security and serving global internet users.
TLF readers are undoubtedly familiar with the concept of regulatory capture. It’s a form of government failure, when a regulatory agency becomes overly influenced by the special interests of those (often large companies) it oversees. Over at the NetChoice blog, my colleague Steve DelBianco talks about a different form of capture that’s equally bad–government capture of private sector management of the Internet’s addressing system. He asserts:
Before the US Government abdicates its oversight of the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) it should take a long, hard look at the mounting efforts by world governments to assume greater power over the Internet’s addressing system. If those efforts meet no further resistance, the once-theoretical threat of “capture” could become a reality.
So what? In place of U.S. oversight, there are those that wish to create an international government bureaucracy to run ICANN:
In place of U.S. Government management, the [European] Commission recommends the creation of a multi-governmental tribunal with authority over ICANN. The European Commission posits that this new bureaucratic structure would not involve itself in “day-to-day” activities, but the distinction between “day-to-day” and other activities is utterly meaningless from a policy standpoint. Also, given the activism of the countries involved in such an effort, it would be ludicrous to expect such an entity to use its newfound power sparingly.
Steve’s post has a lot of background and explains things in detail, but I’ll share his ultimate conclusion: our Commerce Dept. should be working with ICANN to retain the protective aspects of the JPA while ICANN develops permanent mechanisms to prevent external capture. It better hurry…it has only until the end of September to do something!
Back in June, NetChoice introduced the iAWFUL (the Internet Advocates’ Watchlist for Ugly Laws) list as part of a broader effort to push back against America’s worst Internet legislation. Two months have passed, and while many of the bills in the top 10 have changed, they remain every bit as AWFUL.
Earlier today NetChoice unveiled the first major update of iAWFUL, which lists the 10 worst Internet bills/laws in America. The updated list includes five new items, with new laws in the top 2 slots.
It’s worth mentioning a few that fell off the list, in large part thanks to the pressure that Internet advocates exerted through iAWFUL:
#2 on the June iAWFUL list was a California bill that would have forced unworkable technical restrictions on the posting of photos to social networking pages. The bill’s sponsor responded by working with Internet advocates to fix problems with the measure.
#3 on the June iAWFUL list was a bill in Connecticut that would have required sales tax collection by out-of-state businesses that pay commissions to in-state affiliates. The Governor heard our concerns about the impact on in-state publishers and school charities, and has thus far kept this measure off the table in budget negotiations.
#5 on the June iAWFUL list was a Connecticut bill to let police conduct searches of homes where goods were being stored by online dealers – without having to obtain a search warrant. Thanks to iAWFUL publicity, this bill stalled in the House.
This is what iAWFUL is all about: creating positive change through informed advocacy.
Now for the bad news. For every measure that fell off the iAWFUL list, we found a truly AWFUL replacement. Continue reading →
An Illinois bill to ban convicted sex predators from social networking sites (HB 1314) is now law. Gov. Pat Quinn signed the bill yesterday. Even if predation on social networking sites is very rare, we certainly prefer to see efforts that target bad actors instead of tech mandates or age verification requirements. Given the broad definition of “social networking website” in the law, the ban might apply to many types of Internet sites.
Definition:
“Social networking website” means an Internet website containing profile web pages of the members of the website that include the names or nicknames of such members, photographs placed on the profile web pages by such members, or any other personal or personally identifying information about such members and links to other profile web pages on social networking websites of friends or associates of such members that can be accessed by other members or visitors to the website. A social networking website provides members of or visitors to such website the ability to leave messages or comments on the profile web page that are visible to all or some visitors to the profile web page and may also include a form of electronic mail for members of the social networking website.
This video from a puppet maker in Australia has an interesting take on the fear-mongering that often drives public policy for Internet safety. The video does a good job of putting into perspective the real risk to kids of online predation.
For instance, we often hear the scary statistic that “1 in 5 children are sexually solicited online.” This was based on data originally released by the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC). It’s since been updated to 1 in 7, which still sounds bad, but not so bad in perspective — what does solicitation mean, and by whom? Well, “solicitation” is broadly defined to mean “unwanted contact.” In the study, it encompasses any unwanted discussion of a sexual nature. But the real perspective comes from learning 90% of this unwanted contact comes from other peers or young adults! So, it’s rarely the creepy perverted middle-age man in a wife beater t-shirt — even though the messaging from many policymakers focuses almost entirely on this scenario.
Yesterday was a big day for any business, nonprofit organization, or fundraiser that relies on affiliate advertising that depend upon Internet advertising for important revenue and fundraising efforts: Governor Schwarzenegger vetoed the nexus tax and calls up Overstock.com to invite to reinstate their affiliates in California.
As we’ve written previously, all sorts of organizations depend on Internet advertising. Online companies are experimenting with new ways to deliver products, services, and content, and business of all kinds are going online to reach consumers and advertise to receptive audiences. The Gov’s veto sends a strong message that this growing business model is welcome in California.
It is important to note that the proposed budget legislation was indeed a tax increase. Contrary to the statements of nexus tax proponents, in no event would new money flow into California. Any incremental sales tax collected from online sellers just moves from the California purchaser to the state treasury, at a time when households are being squeezed by a struggling economy. The result: fewer advertising dollars would flow to California publishers and websites who employ and serve California’s residents today.
And this is one tax increase that would have serious unintended consequences. An affiliate advertising tax would harm California businesses, nonprofit organizations, and even public schools that depend upon Internet advertising for important revenue and fundraising efforts.
The Technology Liberation Front is the tech policy blog dedicated to keeping politicians' hands off the 'net and everything else related to technology. Learn more about TLF →
Sometimes legislators vote along political party interests, sometimes in their self interest, and as we saw in Maine–sometimes legislators will have the constitutional interests of free speech and the commerce clause in mind.
Here in Washington, DC we’re finally experiencing a changing of the seasons. The summer heat is retreating as cool , autumn air invades. It’s a changing of the guard–just like what’s happening to ICANN with today’s expiration of its oversight by the U.S. government. Only its a spring-like blossoming for ICANN.
Back in June, 
The Technology Liberation Front is the tech policy blog dedicated to keeping politicians' hands off the 'net and everything else related to technology.