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Internet companies had a shot to avoid the dreaded R-word — regulation — when they began hatching a plan to help Web users avoid being tracked online. But more than a year later, online advertising giants, tech companies and privacy advocates are not much closer to deploying technology that would allow consumers to flip a digital switch and avoid targeted ads — and the stalemate is prompting growing calls for action from Washington policymakers. The online ad industry initially pledged to regulators to honor so-called Do Not Track signals sent from Web browsers like Microsoft’s Internet Explorer and Google’s Chrome by the end of the year. They made the commitment when the Obama administration revealed its blueprint for online privacy protection last year. But that commitment appears on the verge of falling apart as the industry meets with privacy advocates at a standards-setting meeting in Amsterdam.
‘Do Not Track’ effort is going nowhere fast
Two-thirds of Americans don’t want advertisers tracking them on the Internet, according to researchers at the University of Pennsylvania and the University of California. But that hasn’t slowed the growth of online behavioral advertising, the industry that harvests data about Web habits and uses it to target individual consumers with ads. For advertisers, “data exhaust” – the digital traces you generate while browsing the Web – has monetary value. Often, the information gets collected and sold behind the user’s back.
But what if users could cash in on their own data? Enter Enliken, a start-up that encourages consumers to sell their own data. Enliken’s users voluntarily download software that tracks their online activity. A personal dashboard lets them limit what gets captured and sold to advertisers. Users pick one of several independent charities to receive the proceeds, while Enliken takes a 10-percent cut. The company’s founders hope that, someday, users will be able to earn a wide range of perks – from airline miles to online news subscriptions – in exchange for their information.
What if Web Users Could Sell Their Own Data?
Jennifer Livingston, a local morning anchor in Wisconsin, responded on air directly to a viewer who sent her an e-mail telling her she was an unsuitable role model for young people, especially young girls, because she is overweight.
Livingston’s response, which has gone viral on the Internet with almost 2 million views on YouTube alone, said she had initially dismissed the criticism but then decided to speak up to raise awareness about bullying behavior. “The truth is I am overweight,” said Ms. Livingston, 37, during the morning broadcast on WKBT-TV, a CBS affiliate in Lacrosse. “You could call me fat and yes, even obese on a doctor’s chart. But to the person who wrote me that letter, do you think I don’t know that? That your cruel words are pointing out something that I don’t see?” “You don’t know me,” she continued to say during the next four minutes in what was billed as a broadcast editorial. “You are not a friend of mine. You are not a part of my family, and you have admitted that you don’t watch this show so you know nothing about me but what you see on the outside — and I am much more than a number on a scale.” Livingston, a mother of three, then used her experience to remind viewers that October is “National Anti- Bullying Month,” and that bullying is rampant on the Internet and growing every day in schools and must be stopped.
TV Anchor Takes on Viewer Who Complains About Her Weight Jennifer's Message to her Bully (see the video)
[Commentary] It is bizarre to come back to London after seven years in New York to find the UK struggling to launch 4G high-speed mobile services and European companies lagging behind the US. When I moved homes in 2005, Europe was far ahead of the US in 3G and Nokia, and Research In Motion of Canada were the biggest smartphone makers. Meanwhile, the US agonized over its energy crisis – it depended on the Middle East for oil and faced the need to import liquefied natural gas. Since then, America’s talent for technological innovation has risen to both challenges. It has seized the lead in mobile broadband – Apple’s iPhone, Google’s Android and Microsoft’s Windows Mobile have 65 per cent of the global market, versus 5 per cent in 2005 – and launched 4G services before others. Fracking and horizontal drilling for natural gas, invented in the US, could support its energy needs for 100 years.
Innovation drives America’s reinvention
A growing number of top-ranked U.S. colleges say they are finding objectionable material online that hurts the chances of prospective freshmen. About a quarter of admissions officers at the nation's top 500 colleges have used websites such as Facebook and Google to vet applicants, according to an annual Kaplan Test Prep survey. Of those, more than one-third say they have found something that has hurt a student's chance of admission, up from 12% last year.
Web Profiles Haunt Students
Thousands of teenagers who can't take their cellphones to school have another option, courtesy of a burgeoning industry of sorts in always-enterprising New York City: paying a dollar a day to leave it in a truck that's parked nearby. Students might resent an expense that adds up to as much as $180 a year, but even so, leaving a phone at one of the trucks in the morning and then picking it up at the end of the day has become as routine for city teenagers as getting dressed and riding the morning-rush subway.
NY teens pay valets to store devices
A new Internet law that took effect in the Philippines could lead to imprisonment for common activities like sharing Facebook and Twitter posts, critics say.
The new law, the Cybercrime Prevention Act of 2012, which was signed by President Benigno S. Aquino III on Sept. 12, sets penalties for several computer-related crimes, including child pornography, identity theft, online fraud and illegally accessing computer networks. But critics are concerned about the law’s provisions related to libel, which in the Philippines is a criminal offense that can result in imprisonment. Harry S. Roque, president of Media Defense South East Asia, an advocacy organization, said the law applied the existing legal definition of libel to the online activities of individuals, meaning that if a comment on Facebook or Twitter were deemed libelous, the writer of the item and those who shared it could be prosecuted.
Internet Law in Philippines Takes Effect, Raising Fears
[Commentary] Consumers would normally shake their heads in dismay at news of yet another market-shrinking telecom merger. But T-Mobile USA gobbling up rival MetroPCS is one of those rare examples of a corporate roll in the hay actually being in consumers' best interest — at least for a while.
Short term, a revitalized T-Mobile helps prevent the near-duopoly of Verizon and AT&T from owning the entire wireless market. "Given the power of AT&T and Verizon, it's understandable that T-Mobile has to get creative to compete," said John Bergmayer, senior staff attorney for the advocacy group Public Knowledge. "It's a tough call, but on balance I think that the industry will be better off with a stronger T-Mobile." Longer term, however, all this merger does is set the table for even more consolidation. The most likely scenario: A few years down the road, Sprint and T-Mobile will say they need to merge to compete with the two heavyweights. And a few years after that, Verizon or AT&T will make a play for whatever's left. "It's the way the market is structured," said Linda Sherry, a spokeswoman for Consumer Action. "People tend to go with the big names. If a company is a little smaller, it becomes a takeover target." The marriage of T-Mobile and MetroPCS won't exactly change the wireless landscape. But T-Mobile will be in a better position to serve as a lower-cost alternative to the other guys with its greater market share, particularly in light of the compatibility of its and MetroPCS' next-generation 4G networks.
T-Mobile purchase of MetroPCS is good for consumers, for now
One of the unstated benefits of T-Mobile’s proposed merger with MetroPCS is one that T-Mo’s customers have been clamoring over for years: the iPhone.
T-Mobile is already on a technology trajectory that will make its network compatible with the iPhone 5’s fickle radios. But tying up with MetroPCS will get T-Mobile there a lot faster. The iPhone 5 requires T-Mobile to support two common frequency configurations: 3G in the 1900 MHz PCS band and LTE in the 1700 MHz/2100 MHz Advanced Wireless Service (AWS) band. T-Mobile has neither today, but it will meet the first requirement shortly as it completes the relocation of its HSPA+ network this and early next year. As for LTE, T-Mobile won’t have a commercial network ready until the second half of 2013 and even then it won’t have a sizable LTE footprint until 2014. That’s where MetroPCS comes in.
Can you say MetroPCS iPhone? T-Mobile sure can
Chanute first built a vision, then a network. The fiber network connects schools and other community anchor institutions with gigabit networks. The wireless network serves public safety. Soon, both may serve everyone. The “Hub of southeast Kansas” is a small town where schools have gigabit connections, the City operates a 10Gbps fiber-optic broadband ring, and several local businesses credit the publicly owned utility with giving them the best broadband option available. Chanute has made impressive strides in solving its broadband problems by developing innovative partnerships with local businesses and community anchor institutions. Local businesses are strong supporters of the network. From Ash Grove Cement to MagnaTech, business clients have remained satisfied subscribers. The network continues to encourage economic development and provides connectivity options that attract high bandwidth employers. The network generates $600,000 per year for Chanute’s Electric Utility, 5 percent of which goes to the general fund as a franchising fee each year.
In Kansas, Rural Chanute Built Its Own Gigabit Fiber and Wireless Network