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INDIE-ROCK REVOLUTION, FUELED BY NET NEUTRALITY
[SOURCE: The Hill, AUTHOR: Jenny Toomey and Michael Bracy]
[Commentary] Over the past several years, the independent music community has flourished. It now represents over 80 percent of music released in this country and nearly 30 percent of the overall music marketplace. That’s no surprise to those who have been living at the intersection of music and technology. While many argue the Internet has had a negative impact on traditional record sales, it has also helped artists to tear down the walls between themselves and their fans and created the foundation for an unparalleled musician-powered renaissance. If this transformation continues, musicians may leave behind the long-standing imbalance that requires them to sign away their copyrights as a condition of gaining a major-label contract. If they do so, artists’ gratitude should flow to the principle of network neutrality. For musicians, net neutrality means they should have the unfettered ability to make their work available to potential fans without undue interference from corporate gatekeepers. Similarly, music fans should have the ability to access this music via a range of legitimate business models. Net neutrality also ensures the continued innovation that has spurred the growth of the indie sector, the transition to a legitimate digital economy and, more widely, consumer adaptation of broadband services. To understand the importance of net neutrality for artists, look at the lack of a similar principle in modern commercial radio. When informally polled as to why they sign away their copyrights to major labels, most artists explain that they need to be on a major label in order to have a shot at commercial radio airplay. And, sadly, these artists have a point.
http://www.thehill.com/thehill/export/TheHill/Comment/OpEd/061306_oped1....

NET NEUTRALITY DEBATE TURNS IDEOLOGICAL
[SOURCE: Human Events, AUTHOR: Matt Kibbe]
[Commentary] High-tech giant Google, locking arms with MoveOn.org and a host of high-tech lobbyists, is pressing Congress to pass "net neutrality" mandates purportedly needed to protect the open nature of the Internet, where all consumers, content providers, and application providers can interact. In reality, there is nothing neutral about this effort. It is a clear push to grant the federal government sweeping new controls over the Internet while providing big content companies like Google access to broadband providers at regulated rates.
http://www.humaneventsonline.com/article.php?id=15519

* Not So Neutral
People on both sides of the "Net neutrality" debate have turned to the Web to get out their messages, with more than a dozen online videos sounding off on the issue.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB115024485451779546.html?mod=todays_us_ma...
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CBS AFFILS: RETRACT TRACE FINE
[SOURCE: Broadcasting&Cable, AUTHOR: John Eggerton]
In a supplement, filed Tuesday, to their earlier challenge of the multimillion-dollar FCC fine, CBS television stations argue that there were "no true complaints from actual viewers following the [December 2004] broadcast"--they instead say the complaints came after the complainants saw a clip on the Internet. The stations also argue and that the complaints were not filed from the markets where the stations aired the show. Almost all the indecency complaints were filed through the Web sites of the Parent's Television Council and the American Family Association. “Everything the PTC has said is accurate," said PTC President Brent Bozell. "Every complaint filed comes from a United States citizen who, last I heard, still had the constitutional privilege to petition his government. Rather than these stupid maneuvers, CBS and Viacom should spend time pondering why it’s wrong to broadcast scenes of teenage orgies in front of millions of children." The FCC said at the same time it proposed the fines against the show March 15--for a brief scene of a teen sex party--that it was also now only going to accept complaints against a station if they came from its market.
http://www.broadcastingcable.com/article/CA6343514?display=Breaking+News

* CBS Stations: Indecency Complaints Invalid
http://www.mediaweek.com/mw/news/recent_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=10026...

HIDING IN PLAN SIGHT, GOOGLE SEEKS AN EXPANSION OF POWER
[SOURCE: New York Times, AUTHOR: John Markoff & Saul Hansell]
On the banks of the windswept Columbia River, Google is working on a secret weapon in its quest to dominate the next generation of Internet computing. But it is hard to keep a secret when it is a computing center as big as two football fields, with twin cooling plants protruding four stories into the sky. The complex, sprawling like an information-age factory, heralds a substantial expansion of a worldwide computing network handling billions of search queries a day and a growing repertory of other Internet services. And odd as it may seem, the barren desert land surrounding the Columbia along the Oregon-Washington border -- at the intersection of cheap electricity and readily accessible data networking -- is the backdrop for a multibillion-dollar face-off among Google, Microsoft and Yahoo that will determine dominance in the online world in the years ahead. Microsoft and Yahoo have announced that they are building big data centers upstream in Wenatchee and Quincy, Wash., 130 miles to the north. But it is a race in which they are playing catch-up. Google remains far ahead in the global data-center race, and the scale of its complex here is evidence of its extraordinary ambition. Even before the Oregon center comes online, Google has lashed together a global network of computers — known in the industry as the Googleplex — that is a singular achievement. "Google has constructed the biggest computer in the world, and it's a hidden asset," said Danny Hillis, a supercomputing pioneer and a founder of Applied Minds, a technology consulting firm, referring to the Googleplex.
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/14/technology/14search.html
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