In 1996, a physicist named Alan Sokol published an article in Social Text, a cultural studies journal.  It was called “Transgressing the Boundaries: Toward a Transformative Hermeneutics of Quantum Gravity,” and as the name suggests, it’s pretty impenetrable.  You can check it out here.  Soon after it came out, he published an article in the […]

Google CEO Eric Schmidt created buzz (and some shock and criticism) when he suggested in a recent Wall Street Journal interview that, in the not too distant future, “every young person…will be entitled automatically to change his or her name on reaching adulthood in order to disown youthful hijinks stored on their friends’ social media […]

There’s some movement in the U.S. network neutrality debates under a rather dry heading: “Further Inquiry Into Two Under-Developed Issues in the Open Internet Proceeding.” So far: a couple weeks ago Google and Verizon announced a “legislative framework proposal” to “preserve the open Internet and the vibrant and innovative markets it supports, to protect consumers, […]

This week there’s an online symposium at Concurring Opinions about the Future of the Internet — And How to Stop It. I’ll be blogging there; in the meantime here’s my opening entry.

Last week the U.S. Federal Trade Commission announced a settlement with Reverb Communications, a firm that describes its business as a: … full service videogame agency that provides public relations, marketing, and sales services through one integrated campaign to the interactive entertainment and music industry.  Using precise messaging and calculated marketing campaigns, we are able […]

In March, a panel of the Federal Circuit affirmed a Texas district court ruling requiring EchoStar to remotely disable the DVRs of innocent customers as part of its damages for infringing on TiVo’s DVR patents.  At the time, Elisabeth and JZ predicted that we would see an increasing number of similar cases as companies — […]

I’ve been trying to figure out what the Google/Verizon announcement means.  It’s not easy to do, in large part because the announcement doesn’t precisely announce anything.  It’s titled a “legislative framework proposal.”  That is, on its own terms it’s not an agreement between two companies — neither is bound to do anything by it, which […]

Game on. A featureless update released recently by TI blocks a hack that allowed owners to write their own programs for the company’s Nspire calculator. It’s not immediately obvious what rationale TI used to justify the block. It isn’t under pressure to protect the commercial interests of a partner service provider. And worst case, a […]

It’s hard to know what to make of the Google/Verizon deal since until earlier today both companies have denied that there is one. And it’s hard to argue about net neutrality because it means so many different things to different people. I’ve got lots of reading to do to catch up on the newly released […]

“Why did you walk around all day with rubber balls in your hands?” Orr sniggered again. “I did it to protect my good reputation in case anyone ever caught me walking around with crab apples in my cheeks. With rubber balls in my hands I could deny there were crab apples in my cheeks. Every […]