Global market for cellphone ring tones is shrinking
NY Times
By Victoria Shannon

After years of double-digit growth rates, the global ring tone market appears to have come to the end of its crescendo, according to a variety of measures.

In some parts of the world, ring tone sales are actually declining, and the former ring tone kings, like Jamba of Germany and Musiwave of France, are refocusing their businesses on other ways to personalize cellphones.

A couple of years ago, there seemed to be no upper limit to the sale — for a couple of euros, or $3 to $4 — of snippets of music that blast out of cellphones. Billboard magazine created a “hot ring tones” chart in 2004 to track their popularity

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/31/business/31ringtone.html?ex=1356757200&en=d527a627a5fd98e4&ei=5090&partner=rssuserland&emc=rss

Record data breaches in 2007, groups say

By MARK JEWELL, AP Business WriterMon Dec 31, 12:17 AM ET
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20071231/ap_on_hi_te/data_breaches

The loss or theft of personal data such as credit card and Social Security numbers soared to unprecedented levels in 2007, and the trend isn’t expected to turn around anytime soon as hackers stay a step ahead of security and laptops disappear with sensitive information.

And while companies, government agencies, schools and other institutions are spending more to protect ever-increasing volumes of data with more sophisticated firewalls and encryption, the investment often is too little too late.

“More of them are experiencing data breaches, and they’re responding to them in a reactive way, rather than proactively looking at the company’s security and seeing where the holes might be,” said Linda Foley, who founded the San Diego-based Identity Theft Resource Center after becoming an identity theft victim herself.

Foley’s group lists more than 79 million records reported compromised in the United States through Dec. 18. That’s a nearly fourfold increase from the nearly 20 million records reported in all of 2006.

Another group, Attrition.org, estimates more than 162 million records compromised through Dec. 21 — both in the U.S. and overseas, unlike the other group’s U.S.-only list. Attrition reported 49 million last year.

“It’s just the nature of business, that moving forward, more companies are going to have more records, so there will be more records compromised each year,” said Attrition’s Brian Martin. “I imagine the total records compromised will steadily climb.”

But the biggest difference between the groups’ record-loss counts is Attrition.org’s estimate that 94 million records were exposed in a theft of credit card data at TJX Cos., the owner of discount stores including T.J. Maxx and Marshalls. The TJX breach accounts for more than half the total records reported lost this year on both groups’ lists.

The Identity Theft Resource Center counts about 46 million — the number of records TJX acknowledged in March were potentially compromised. Attrition’s figure is based on estimates from Visa and MasterCard officials who were deposed in a lawsuit banks filed against TJX.

[snip]

Download Uproar: Record Industry Goes After Personal Use

By Marc Fisher
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, December 30, 2007; M05
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/12/28/AR2007122800693.html

Despite more than 20,000 lawsuits filed against music fans in the years since they started finding free tunes online rather than buying CDs from record companies, the recording industry has utterly failed to halt the decline of the record album or the rise of digital music sharing.

Still, hardly a month goes by without a news release from the industry’s lobby, the Recording Industry Association of America, touting a new wave of letters to college students and others demanding a settlement payment and threatening a legal battle.

Now, in an unusual case in which an Arizona recipient of an RIAA letter has fought back in court rather than write a check to avoid hefty legal fees, the industry is taking its argument against music sharing one step further: In legal documents in its federal case against Jeffrey Howell, a Scottsdale, Ariz., man who kept a collection of about 2,000 music recordings on his personal computer, the industry maintains that it is illegal for someone who has legally purchased a CD to transfer that music into his computer.

The industry’s lawyer in the case, Ira Schwartz, argues in a brief filed earlier this month that the MP3 files Howell made on his computer from legally bought CDs are “unauthorized copies” of copyrighted recordings.

“I couldn’t believe it when I read that,” says Ray Beckerman, a New York lawyer who represents six clients who have been sued by the RIAA. “The basic principle in the law is that you have to distribute actual physical copies to be guilty of violating copyright. But recently, the industry has been going around saying that even a personal copy on your computer is a violation.”

RIAA’s hard-line position seems clear. Its Web site says: “If you make unauthorized copies of copyrighted music recordings, you’re stealing. You’re breaking the law and you could be held legally liable for thousands of dollars in damages.”

They’re not kidding. In October, after a trial in Minnesota — the first time the industry has made its case before a federal jury — Jammie Thomas was ordered to pay $220,000 to the big record companies. That’s $9,250 for each of 24 songs she was accused of sharing online.

Whether customers may copy their CDs onto their computers — an act at the very heart of the digital revolution — has a murky legal foundation, the RIAA argues. The industry’s own Web site says that making a personal copy of a CD that you bought legitimately may not be a legal right, but it “won’t usually raise concerns,” as long as you don’t give away the music or lend it to anyone.

[snip]

CEA: Digital TVs Now In 50 Percent of Homes
The big transition is set in roughly 13 months.
By Swanni
http://www.tvpredictions.com/dtv123007.htm

Washington, D.C. (December 30, 2007) — Digital TVs are now in more than 50 percent of U.S. homes, according to the Consumer Electronics Association.

“I am proud to announce our nation has hit this digital milestone,” CEA CEO Gary Shapiro said in a statement. “With 50% of U.S. homes able to experience the reality of digital television, we have crossed a critical threshold.”

The milestone is significant because all local broadcasters must switch their analog signals to digital on February 17, 2009.

On that date, viewers will need a Digital TV, a digital converter box or a pay TV subscription to watch television.

Still, surveys show that millions of Americans are still unaware of the transition, causing lawmakers to express concern that some will lose their TV signals on the big day. The industry is expected to increase their educational efforts next year.

The CEA reports that the Digital TV transition has certainly helped the industry, with TV manufacturers showing an 11 percent increase in revenue this year.

The industry trade group says revenue should rise 13 percent in 2008, the final year before the transition.

“2008 will continue to demonstrate the growth and success of DTV, with nearly 32 million units forecasted to ship. Consumers are particularly keen to add HDTV to their homes, with High-Definition expected to account for 79% of total DTV shipments in the United States in 2008,” Shapiro said.

[Note: This item comes from friend Steve Huter. DLH]

From: “Steven G. Huter”
Date: December 31, 2007 7:51:15 AM PST
To: Dewayne Hendricks
Subject: Guardian article on the Net

http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2007/dec/03/mondaymediasection.internet

Tell me the future

We asked the godfather of the net to tell us where the technology will take us. He emailed his address book

The Guardian,
Monday December 3 2007

When we asked Vint Cerf, chief evangelist at Google, to guest edit MediaGuardian, we expected him to bring us some luminaries of the web who we don’t often get to hear from. His choices transform an often-asked question (“what’s the future?”), into an insight into the thinking of innovators and pioneers. It’s no coincidence that three of them are founders of some of the biggest web names.

Their specialist fields (from search, to advertising, video streaming to social networking) represent what Cerf believes to be the most exciting areas of development on the web and in the world; notably Steven Huter and Adiel Akplogan, who have pioneered the internet infrastructure in Africa.

Finally, each one has had, and will continue to have, a profound impact on the future of media.

[snip]

[Note: This item comes from friend Esme Vos. This item is a bit old, but I'm in the process of clearing the deck for 2007. Expect to see a lot of items posted in the next couple of days as I sort thru my backlog queue. DLH]

From: isolde100@gmail.com
Date: December 18, 2007 12:57:27 AM PST
To: dewayne@warpspeed.com
Subject: Guardian Unlimited: Personal details of millions of learner drivers lost by contractor in Iowa

——-
Note from esme:

what’s the data doing in the US? yet another blow in the UK for the government – they are constantly losing data
——-

Personal details of millions of learner drivers lost by contractor in Iowa
Ruth Kelly apologises for latest lapse in data security; Missing disc ‘not readily usable by third parties’
Patrick Wintour, political editor
Tuesday December 18 2007
The Guardian
http://www.guardian.co.uk/guardianpolitics/story/0,,2229061,00.html

The government yesterday revealed another disturbing loss of citizens’ data when the transport secretary disclosed that a computer disc had gone missing that contained the records of more than 3 million driving test applicants, including their names, home addresses, email addresses and telephone numbers.

The disc was lost from a “secure store” in Iowa in the US midwest by private firm Pearson Driving Assessments in May, but this was not relayed either to Westminster or to the police.

Ministers yesterday responded by setting up an advice line to help drivers understand the potential significance of the error. Kelly apologised for the latest data embarrassment, but stressed the missing disc did not contain personal bank account, national insurance or credit card numbers.

Whitehall officials argued that most of the data is available in telephone directories. Nevertheless, the loss adds to the challenge the government faces in persuading the public that the benefits of data-sharing in the government outweighs the risks.

Kelly was unhappy that she had only been informed of the loss at the end of last month. It emerged in a trawl of government procedures by the cabinet secretary, Sir Gus O’Donnell, set up in the wake of the loss of 25 million child benefit records by Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs.

An interim report from O’Donnell published yesterday revealed that four government departments – the Treasury, the Department for Work and Pensions, the Ministry of Defence and the Crown Prosecution Service – had felt forced to tighten data handling procedures in the wake of the child benefit fiasco.

A separate interim report specifically into the HMRC loss written by Kieran Poynter, chairman of PricewaterhouseCoopers, and published yesterday by the chancellor, Alistair Darling, criticised HMRC’s complex management structure, saying “roles and responsibilities do not relate to accountability”.

Darling was forced to confirm to MPs that there had been a further breach of HMRC security due to a burglary at a Coventry HMRC store at the weekend. It is the eighth known security breach this year.

He also admitted that a letter from HMRC apologising to families over the loss of child benefit had itself contained too much personal information, some of which was liable to have gone astray.

[snip]

Digital TV Coupon Program Begins On Jan. 1
The feds will begin taking applications for converter coupons.
By Swanni
http://www.tvpredictions.com/dconverter123107.htm

Washington, D.C. (December 31, 2007) — The federal government tomorrow will begin taking applications for $40 coupons for Digital TV converter boxes.

On February 17, 2009, broadcasters will be required by law to switch from analog to digital signals. Viewers then will need a Digital TV, a pay TV subscription or a Digital TV converter box to watch television.

To ease the transition, the federal government has allocated $1.5 billion to issue two $40 converter box coupons to any American who requests them.

The converter boxes, which are expected to cost around $60, will allow old analog TVs to display the new digital signals.

The Los Angeles Times reports that the U.S. Commerce Department will accept coupon applications starting tomorrow via a toll-free hotline (888-DTV-2009) and web site (dtv2009.gov).

“We are open for business Jan. 1,” Bart Forbes, a spokesman for the National Telecommunications and Information Administration, the Commerce Department agency running the program, tells the Times.

The converter boxes are not expected to be available at retail until February so the government will not mail out the coupons until February 17.

Best Buy, Circuit City, Wal-Mart, Target and Sears are all expected to carry the converters.

[Note: This item comes from friend Jim Baller. DLH]

12/27/2007
Japan Eyes 10 Gigs by 2010 as United States Sweats 200 Kbps
by Peter Orne
http://tinyurl.com/24r9vk

In Japan today, the “point of competition” is a gigabit, and by 2010 it will be at 10 gigabits, observed telecommunication lawyer and broadband champion Jim Baller as he kicked off the panel “Broadband Policy Imperatives from the Bottom Up” at the 15th Digital Cities Convention in Washington, DC (December 11-12, 2007).

“The dialogue has begun there about how to get to 100 gigabits per second, and this is all symmetrical. And here in the United States we’re talking about a definition of broadband that is 200 Kbps and some places in the United States can’t get that — or get it at affordable rates. What kind of country are we when we are talking at that level and the world is moving so quickly?”

The national digital divide widens when other countries move ahead and the United States falls behind. But what happens when that disturbing technology trend pairs with a preexisting shift in the world economy? Baller quoted from Ted Fishman’s China, Inc.: How the Rise of the Next Superpower Challenges America and the World:

The far bigger shift, just now picking up steam, is occurring among the products that manufacturers and marketers trade with each other: the infinite number and variety of components that make up everything else that is made, whether it is the hundreds of parts in a washing machine or computer or the hundreds of thousands of parts in an airplane. And then there are the big products themselves: cars, trucks, planes, ships, switching networks for national phone systems, factories, submarines, satellites, and rockets. China is taking on those industries too.

And it’s not just China, Baller noted. It’s India, Indonesia, Bangladesh, Brazil, Russia and every other country that is competing at the low end of the manufacturing scale.

Evaporation of the U.S. manufacturing base means the creation of high-technology jobs is essential to maintaining American competitiveness and standards of living. But what if other advanced countries like Japan are already far ahead in developing the broadband networks that support a robust information-based economy?

The statistics are all too familiar now. The United States used to be first in the broadband rankings. It was fourth by 2001 and had slipped to 10th by 2004. At that time, President Bush issued a strategy promising that broadband would be available to everybody in the United States by 2007. But today, the U.S. is somewhere between 15th and 24th.

“We pay more than four times and get a 10th of the capacity that the Japanese get,” Baller said.
He called for the development of a “national broadband strategy that fosters prompt and affordable and ubiquitous access to both advanced communications networks — fiber — as well as wireless.”

[snip]

[Note: This comment comes from reader Bryan Price. DLH]

From: “Bryan Price”
Date: December 30, 2007 9:51:17 AM PST
To: “Dewayne Hendricks” , steve.goldstein@cox.net
Subject: Re: [Dewayne-Net] re: TSA’s new forbidden item: >2 gm lithium batteries

No, I’m not reading the thing, because I have better things to do right now. I’m not planning a plane trip anytime soon. And yes, that may make me an ass. I was just reporting what I’ve been reading about. Which has been the gamut.

It’s a cluster f–k.

The rules are rushed into place, meaning that any real training won’t be developed until after they are implemented, let alone any training!

Does anybody actually expect that a TSA inquisitor, er, agent is going to be able to tell the difference between lithium metal versus lithium ion? It says lithium, and they’re going to make their decision on that one word alone. And don’t think that you are going to win any arguments with a TSA agent. They can implement any decision they make, right or wrong, and they will not be held accountable for it.

[Note: This comment comes from friend Charles Brown. DLH]

From: Charles Brown
Date: December 30, 2007 6:20:35 PM PST
To: Dewayne Hendricks
Subject: Re: [Dewayne-Net] Congress should reclaim power from the Fed

Very well said by the author and well worth reading, but the proposed solution doesn’t go far enough. Congress is an integral part of the plutocratic nexus, and therefore, part of the problem.

There is an insidious, perhaps even intractable, systemic rot in our Republic that requires Constitutional revision, nothing less.

We could start with public financing of political campaigns, including local judiciary elections. If we ever get that done, there follows tough work which does in fact require another TR or FDR, but it seems we have run out of luck in that department. Our best people don’t go into politics. For starters, that’s a dynamic we must focus on changing.

We first need to accept the fact that we live in a Republic that is corrupt.

Thanks for the link.

Charlie

On Dec 29, 2007, at 12:16 AM, Dewayne Hendricks wrote:

[Note: This item comes from reader Jack Unger. DLH]
From: Jack Unger
Date: December 28, 2007 10:57:45 PM PST
To: Dewayne Hendricks
Subject: Congress should reclaim power from the Fed
MOST of the important public-policy decisions in the country are now being made not in any public forum nor even by elected officials. They are being made in secret by unelected officials — the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System.
While the governors are nominated by the president and appointed by the Senate, that is pretty much where accountability ends, since the governors serve 14-year terms, which is close to the life tenure of federal judges. There is a little more accountability for the board’s chairman and vice chairman, who are nominated by the president from among the board’s members and appointed by the Senate for four-year terms of leadership.
This structure is said to take politics out of the management of the money supply and interest rates. In practice it has only replaced public politics with private politics, and in regard to issues that have the greatest bearing on the country’s prosperity and economic opportunity and equality or inequality. The president and Congress spend most of their time on issues far less relevant to daily life than the issues that have been forfeited to the Federal Reserve….