Views Archive
Terrorism, American Style
An excellent op-ed by Paul Krugman recounts the story of William Krar, a terrorist who was discovered in April 2003 in Texas. (Krar was sentenced to 11 years in May, a point that Krugman forgot to make…)According to Krugman, “In…
Bloomba
Bloomba is a search-based email client that gives you all the power of gmail in a privacy-friendly, ad-free environment. It was recommended to me by my friend VB. He loves it. I’m just pleased that more developers are taking up…
Orrin's Bad Tune
You may know Orrin Hatch as that persnickety, Republican senator from Utah. Oh but this chairperson of the Senate Judiciary Committee is much, much more. He’s the crooner behind albums including Heal Our Land, Freedom’s Light, and Put Your Arms…
24-Year-Old Insider Sells AOL Subscriber List to Spammers
The good news is that the insider got caught! According to this AP news story, a 24-year-old man sold more than 92 million different AOL screen names to a spammer for $52,000. The list was then used for “marketing herbal…
Television Industry Debates Which Viewers Count
Media scholars have long argued that the Nielsen ratings, the standard measurement in the television industry for viewership, do not so much monitor audiences as construct them. None of the technologies or techniques which Nielsen has developed would meet rigorous…
Mind or Microsoft?
CNET reports that “Microsoft has been awarded a patent for using human skin as a power conduit and data bus.” This means that your PDA (in one hand) can send a phone number to the cell phone (in your other…
America Shops for a President
Media watchers have long learned to pay attention to the Lycos 50 and the Technorati’s Top 100 blogs to get a feel for what is interesting the public at the moment. These indexes show us when a particular teen star…
Google Bombs Itself?
Try this now: Go to Google, enter “out of touch management,” and click “I’m Feeling Lucky.” You might be surprised to see whose executive roster shows up. According to two paragraphs buried in a New York Times story today about…
Gmail Philanthropy for the Troops
Since Gmail’s invitation-only beta launch in April, Google’s free e-mail service has become the hottest ticket on the Web, with techies setting up websites to swap (and even sell) the coveted invites. Now, to help support U.S. troops in Afghanistan…
Hollywood Hires Mind Readers
Here’s some creepy news for those of you who think that brain science has been more than a little over-rated: Hollywood is now working with a researcher at Cal Tech who promises them insights into “neuromarketing,” that is, he uses…