Group items tagged

THE MCCAIN NEGATIVE WORDCLOUDWords Not in McCain’s Tech Policy | blog |social network | collaboration | hyperlink | democracy | google | wikipedia | open access | open source | standards | gnu | linux | | BitTorrent | anonymity | facebook | wiki | free speech | games | comcast | media concentration | media | lolcats |

Even if we ignore the cultural, social, and democratic aspects of the Net, even if we consider the Net to be nothing but a way to move content to “consumers” (his word), McCain still gets it wrong. There’s nothing in his policy about encouraging the free flow of ideas. Instead, when McCain thinks about ideas, he thinks about how to increase the walls around them by cracking down on “pirates” and ensuring ” fair rewards to intellectual property” (which, technically speaking, I think isn’t even English). Ideas and culture are, to John McCain, business commodities. He totally misses the dramatic and startling success of the Web in generating new value via open access to ideas and cultural products. The two candidates’ visions of the Internet could not be clearer. We can have a national LAN designed first and foremost to benefit business, and delivered to passive consumers for whom the Net is a type of cable TV. Or, we can have an Internet that is of the people, by the people, for the people. Is it going to be our Internet or theirs?

“Senator McCain’s technology plan doesn’t put Americans first—it is a rehash of tax breaks and giveaways to the big corporations and their lobbyists who advise the McCain campaign. This plan won’t do enough for hardworking Americans who are still waiting for competitive and affordable broadband service at their homes and businesses. It won’t do enough to ensure a free and open Internet that guarantees freedom of speech. It won’t do anything to ensure that we use technology to bring transparency to government and free Washington from the grip of lobbyists and special interests. Senator McCain’s plan would continue George Bush’s neglect of this critical sector and relegate America’s communications infrastructure to second-class status. That’s not acceptable,” said William Kennard, Former Chairman, Federal Communications Commission.

如今，某些媒体上“导演过的新闻”、“和谐过的真相”、“全民幼稚类短信竞猜”、“全民KTV”、“全民性能力下降”等类似信息越来越多。

今天，北京晚报刚刚搞出来一个狗屁不通的评论，还被瞎眼新浪给报道。一位名叫“解青”的“专家”，跳出来定义：“登陆网站”还是“登录网站”？，他说：“无论从词意还是从词性上讲，登入、进入网站，正确的用法应该是“登陆”，若使用“登录”则是说不通的。所以，不能将“登陆”与“登录”混为一谈。”

Apparently, America's president-elect is a Mac user, and a fan of sticking stickers on one's laptop. I dig the pac-man eating the Apple logo. Commenters: let the Apple/Obama fanboy flamewars fly! Our moderators have firehoses at the ready.

Shenyang, literally meaning “the city to the north of Shen River” and capital of the Liaoning province, is touting itself as China’s “next tourist destination.” But whether you are visiting the ancient pagodas of Old City or the official “High-tech Industrial Development Zone” the tourist brochures won’t mention the city’s male and female sex workers who mostly come from poor rural communities in search of talked-up urban opportunities. In partnership with the Ai Zhi Yuan Zhu Center for Health and Education documentary filmmaker Wei Zhang will train male and female sex workers who use the AZYZ center how to maintain a blog and upload short video documentaries to share their experiences, opinions, and troubles in order to promote more understanding of the region’s sex worker population.

昨日下午，董正伟在接受采访时表示：“表面上微软是在维权，但实际上没有经过计算机系统物权所有人同意和司法裁判、行政执法程序，就进入他人计算机系统，这种行为是违法的，与‘黑客’攻击行为没有本质的区别，侵犯了数千万、甚至数亿计算机用户系统信息安全、隐私权等。”

国家版权局的这位负责人指出，微软过去采取全球统一定价，没有考虑发达国家收入水平与发展中国家收入水平的差距。微软在价格政策上，要考虑中国用户对价格的承受能力。

谷歌在中国申请牌照的确并不容易。一方面，它必须符合中国政策、法律的要求，另一方面，它必须满足谷歌在全球范围“不做恶”的种种原则。这就让它起草每一份相关文件，都必须先给总部各个相关部门审阅，然后再交到中国相关监管部门，绝大多数情况下需要进行修改，然后再循环一遍“总部—中国监管部门”的过程。 这个本来已经相当冗长的过程，还有一个重要的阻碍。据说在2005年至2007年间，每隔两周，中国互联网的相关监管部门都会收到大量举报谷歌的搜索结果有违中国国情的资料。这就进一步拖长了获取ICP牌照的进程。 “我们最终能够获得牌照，是因为竞争对手实在找不到我们的问题去举报了”，2007年下半年，一名谷歌高层曾对《环球企业家》如此解释。

Maidan was a group of tech-savvy pro-democracy activists who used the Internet as a tool to support their movement. Maidan in Ukranian means public square and Maidan’s website features the slogal “You CAN chnage the world you live in. And you can do it now. In Ukraine.”

The main activity of Maidan was election monitoring and networking with other pro-democracy organizations around Eastern Europe.

“websites cannot produce an activist organization.”

有一些人，习惯于在网络上强加于人，结果却往往适得其反。据报道，瓮安县曾组成专门的工作组每天对失实信息跟帖澄清，殊不知，互联网并不能辨知哪位网民的信息来源更可靠。放弃自己第一时间的话语权，反而将精力集中在网络封堵或事后补救上，这种对待网络舆情的方式，并不可取。

In an interview last week, Powell asserts that issues like Network Neutrality in Obama’s agenda are “in the weeds,” because “[a] lot of the FCC’s issues aren’t ‘president of the United States’ issues.” Nothing could be further from the truth. Reasonable minds can differ over the right policies to preserve the open Internet, promote next-generation broadband, safeguard online privacy, and create a connected digital democracy. Supporters of Obama (like me) can think he made a mistake in his handling of the FISA telecom immunity legislation (as I do). The absolute worst approach is to label these as insignificant technical matters that the President need not address. That’s been the mindset, with disastrous results, the past eight years. As chair of the Senate Commerce Committee, John McCain was exposed to a wide range of tech policy issues. On the other hand, he admits he’s “computer illiterate.” Ask yourself how you’d feel about working for a corporation where the CEO doesn’t know how to use a computer. No matter how smart, someone who can’t open a web page, type a letter on a word processor, or compose an email message, is going to be fundamentally out of touch with the daily experience of every member of the knowledge economy.

As author Rebecca Fannin pointed out on the Huffington Post, even China was barely mentioned: "Why was China ignored in the panel discussions? First, it's far away. Second, and more importantly, Silicon Valley is in a state of denial."  She thinks that the Silicon Valley patrons of the Fortune Brainstorm are failing to take China seriously, and that this denial will cause them to be "blindsided" by a "truly disruptive force."

"The capitalists aren't really that helpful, generally," he said. It depends on the business model deployed which really depends on the social intentions of the people running the business, and how much they care about long-term social and political repercussions. "We're forgetting that we had to fight to create an open Internet." Venture capitalists, he said, "assume that the Internet just works... that's very irresponsible," and they're not thinking about how specific business decisions impact overall levels of freedom, openness, and inclusion. "We have to do more than just run around chasing deals."

在科学和技术探索过程中，一个又一个英雄涌现出来，有些被人赞颂，有些则始终默默无闻。正是他们的冒险行为为人类科技发展作出了不可磨灭的贡献。如果将“零风险”作为一切科学研究的前提条件，英雄将很难诞生，而我们也不可能取得任何成就。

Although many still doubt this so-called "semantic web" will take off, the first concrete steps have recently been taken. Over the past year, several large data sources, most notably Wikipedia, have been converted into formats that make them easier to combine

然而在惊叹中国富人们短短一周就能捐出数十亿元善款的同时，一些更为深层次的问题也随之浮出：痛定思痛之后，中国商界和政府，能否借这个团结奋进的氛围，切实推进一种更为市场化、更持久的慈善机制建设呢？

Some of you are starting to get in touch with us to send us your list of missing loved ones or friends. We were going to publish this list later, but decided we couldn't wait when we heard this bit of good news: John Bergen of Sichuan Tech and Business College in Dujiangyan has been found, and we've since contacted his friend Peter to let him know.

一个尚没有正式文本出来的OOXML居然成为了国际标准，这个消息今天被“开放文档协会”(OpenDoc Society)提前公布。

11月13日，广州中学生叶泉志成为了第一个发现NEAT小行星的中国人，他历经一个月，对67000张照片的反复对比观察后，找到了一颗未经发现的近地小行星，并得到美国航空航天局(NASA)的确认。

Keso感叹，各大门户网站在此事件中“装聋作哑”。现在看来新浪、搜狐、网易都有羞答答的低调报道。所谓羞答答，是针对于门户网站们通常“唯恐天下不乱”的炒作手段，在这一几乎全民都是受害者的风波中的欲说还休状。但其他媒体、社区、个人blog已经是群起而声讨之。

——说笑而已。以流氓手段对付流氓行为，以“群体暴力”应对“广告恐怖主义”，这样枪林弹雨、弱肉强食的社会并非我所向往。

为了让制度可以有持续性，我们必须用利润来进行激励。而如果企业服务的对象非常贫困，那利润就不大可能产生，那这时我们就需要另一个激励手段，那就是认可(recognition)。企业得到认可就意味着它的知名度提高了，知名度能吸引顾客，更为重要的是，它可以感召优秀的人才前来加盟。这种知名度能够让好的行为得到市场的嘉奖。当企业在市场上无法赢利的情况下，知名度可以是一种替代；而如果可以实现市场利润，则知名度又是额外的激励。 　　我们的挑战就是设计出一个新的制度体系，让利润和知名度这样的市场激励发挥作用，使企业更加倾向于为穷人服务。我把这种想法称为创新型资本主义(creative capitalism)。通过这种途径，政府、企业及非赢利组织可以进行合作，让市场的作用在更大的范围内发挥作用，从而更多的人可以从中赚取利润，或是得到认可，最终改善全球不平等的现象。