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DOMAIN NAMES
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.EU Domain Name a Hit for UK Despite Confusion Over its Meaning (news release)
The newly launched .EU domain name has proved effective for small businesses that use it, whilst only half of Britain's SMEs understand its meaning, according to a study released today. The research, incorporated the answers of more than 2,600 European SMEs across UK, France and Germany.
http://uk.webhostdir.com/news/articles/shownews.asp?id=19211

The Oddest Upsell of All by Bret Fausett
Everyone who follows the domain name industry understands that many registrars sell names at ultra-low margins and the upsell related services, like hosting and email, in order to make their profit. If you look around the registrar ranks, you'll see a healthy variety of add-on services at the point of sale. But I was surprised to see Dotster adding "Public Relations Services," including "Crisis Management," for its domain name customers. The prices are not trivial, but they're fixed, flat rate, which should be attractive to a lot of small businesses that don't typically need PR services.
http://blog.lextext.com/blog/_archives/2007/1/30/2697506.html

NeuStar will operate .tel top-level domain
NeuStar has been chosen to operate the .tel top-level domain by Telnic, which controls the telephony-oriented domain.
http://www.itnews.com.au/newsstory.aspx?CIaNID=45107

Squatters taking over abandoned blogs
The folks at Blogger (a.k.a. Google) finally got back to me after I sent them some questions about how widespread the blogjacking phenomenon is and what blog-hosting sites are doing about it. (For those of you just tuning in, Cyberscenes reported last month that the URLs to at least 3 popular local blogs were leading users to porn, scam, and spyware sites.)
http://www.boston.com/news/local/articles/2007/01/28/squatters_taking_over_abandoned_blogs/

Joystick.com Wins This Week's Domain Sales Race with $65,000 Score at SnapNames
There were no six-figure blockbusters reported this week but there were so many solid five-figure sales they would not all fit on our new Top 20 chart. A sale in that range normally earns a spot on the Big Board but this time out eight domains missed the cut despite hitting the five-figure mark.
http://dnjournal.com/archive/domainsales/2007/domainsales01-30-07.htm

Part.com Snags $100,000 Bid
The domain name Part.com has received a $100,000 bid and is in auction at Sedo.
http://domainnamewire.com/2007/01/29/partcom-snags-100000-bid/

Dotster Celebrates 7th Anniversary with $7 Domain Names (news release)
Throughout the month of February, Dotster is holding weekly sales in honor of hitting the seven-year mark. The celebration kicks off February 2 with Dotster discounts on one-year subscriptions of .COM, .ORG, or .NET domains for only seven dollars.
http://webhostdir.com/news/articles/shownews.asp?id=19210

More Affordable Domain Names from EstDomains (news release)
EstDomains, a US-based domain name registrar, now offers international domains at discount prices during its special offer.
http://press.xtvworld.com/article16620.html

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OTHER INTERNET NEWS
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us: Web giants ask for feds' help on censorship
Google, Yahoo and Microsoft representatives on Tuesday implored the U.S. government to help set ground rules for complying with demands by foreign law enforcement agencies for user records or censorship.
http://news.zdnet.com/2100-9595_22-6154930.html

eu: Is a communications collapse possible in Europe? (RAPID)
The European Commission is seeking feedback on how best to safeguard our electronic networks against disruption from attack or natural hazards. This follows a public presentation of the findings of a study which identifies a range of important issues for ensuring that our future networks are sufficiently protected and resilient. As the services and processes that they support become increasingly interconnected and interdependent, the consequences of the failure of or criminal attack on a single network or sub-system could potentially be propagated more widely and faster than ever before. Protective measures need to be put in place to ensure that critical services and infrastructure are not vulnerable to such failures, and that there can be no 'domino effect' that might otherwise result in a major technological collapse of communications and the many services they support.
http://europa.eu/rapid/pressReleasesAction.do?reference=IP/07/59

Net pioneer predicts overwhelming botnet surge
Internet pioneer Vint Cerf has warned high-powered attendees at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, that the Internet is at serious risk from botnets.
http://news.zdnet.com/2100-1009_22-6154221.html
http://news.com.com/2100-7348_3-6154221.html

uk: OFT can't cope with internet scams
The Office of Fair Trading has admitted that it does not have the technical expertise to deal with internet criminals. Mike Haley, head of the OFT Scambusters team, said on Wednesday that his team's expertise lay in dealing with "real world" trading scams, rather than online fraud.
http://news.zdnet.co.uk/security/0,1000000189,39285627,00.htm

Norwegian authorities investigate Google on privacy issues
The Norwegian Data Inspectorate is overseeing Google as part of a larger investigation of Norwegian search engines. Sesam and Kvasir have already been visited by the institution. The Directorate is concerned about the amount of data stored by the search engines.
http://www.pandia.com/sew/360-google-privacy.html

Google Trademark Spawns Suit, Threats of 'Total Destruction'
Google is mad as hell and isn't going to take it anymore -- that is, from Leo Stoller, an Illinois man who has been demanding settlement payments from the Internet giant in a trademark dispute for using the word "Google."
http://www.law.com/jsp/article.jsp?id=1170077830790

cn: Pirates quick to offer Vista
AS MICROSOFT kicked off the global launch of its long-awaited Windows Vista, the software giant's new operating system also hit the streets of China - in pirated form.
http://australianit.news.com.au/articles/0,7204,21146916%5e16123%5e%5enbv%5e,00.html

Vista's legal fine print raises red flags by Michael Geist
While reviews have focused chiefly on Vista's new functionality, for the past few months the legal and technical communities have dug into Vista's "fine print." Those communities have raised red flags about Vista's legal terms and conditions as well as the technical limitations that have been incorporated into the software at the insistence of the motion picture industry. The net effect of these concerns may constitute the real Vista revolution as they point to an unprecedented loss of consumer control over their own personal computers. In the name of shielding consumers from computer viruses and protecting copyright owners from potential infringement, Vista seemingly wrestles control of the "user experience" from the user.
http://www.thestar.com/Business/article/175801
http://www.michaelgeist.ca/content/view/1640/159/

us: Employers Winning Blog Suits -- So Far
Litigation over employees blogging negatively about their jobs or bosses has been sparse, but most cases so far have come down on the side of the employer.
http://www.law.com/jsp/article.jsp?id=1169719347007

us: Courts Turn to Wikipedia, but Selectively
When a court-appointed special master last year rejected the claim of an Alabama couple that their daughter had suffered seizures after a vaccination, she explained her decision in part by referring to material from articles in Wikipedia, the collaborative online encyclopedia. The reaction from the court above her, the United States Court of Federal Claims, was direct: the materials ?culled from the Internet do not ? at least on their face ? meet? standards of reliability. The court reversed her decision.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/29/technology/29wikipedia.html

Wikipedia: The Free Online Encyclopedia and its Use as Court Source
Wikipedia.org is a free online encyclopedia to which users, I mean average folks, resort every day in this technology era. It is easy, convenient, and fast! But, has Wikipedia reached enough credibility to be used in court proceedings around the world? Well, it seems it has. Wikipedia is being used by the European Court of Human Rights, World Intellectual Property Office- WIPO, the Swiss Federal Council, High Court of England and Wales, United States (U.S.) Federal Courts, just to name a few. Wikipedia has been used as court source since 2003 and its court use increases every year.
http://www.ibls.com/internet_law_news_portal_view.aspx?s=latestnews&id=1668

us: eBay bans auctions of virtual goods
By proactively delisting auctions for property from virtual worlds and online games, eBay may be effectively forcing players who participate in such trades into the hands of giant third-party operations that buy and sell virtual goods.
http://news.com.com/2100-1043_3-6154372.html

us: FTC spanks Sony BMG, porn operator
It's been a good day for the Federal Trade Commission, which has spanked Sony BMG for its surreptitious installation of nasty-ware and an adult Web site that - gasp - was responsible for the sending of x-rated spam.
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/01/31/ftc_settlement/

ug: ICT Law Needed, Says Mulira
ICT requires a law to protect consumers, the ICT minister, Dr. Ham Mulira, has recommended. Mulira said: "Due to dependence on the technologies, more daily chores are being transferred online."
http://allafrica.com/stories/200701291745.html

ng: BetonSports ID Thief Sentenced to 34 Months
A Nigerian convicted of running a sophisticated identity theft ring that stole the personal data of online gamblers registered with BetonSports was sentenced today to 34 months in prison.
http://www.internetnews.com/security/article.php/3655936

us: The Inegalitarian Web
The new Congress is determined to enact a "net neutrality" bill. Nobody yet knows what those two words mean. The new law won't provide any intelligible answer, either. It will, however, put a real drag on new capital investment in faster digital pipes by making it illegal for many big companies to help pay for them, while leaving everyone guessing about the details for years. That last bit is great news for all the telecom lawyers (like the author) who get paid far too much to make sense out of idiotic new laws like this one.
http://www.forbes.com/free_forbes/2007/0212/094.html

Is Net Neutrality A Myth?
Like any complex entity that developed over time, the Internet has its own creation story. And like any creation story, it is grounded in realities and myths. An important new paper argues that one of these myths is playing a powerful role in shaping debate over what's become known as network neutrality--the notion that Internet providers must treat all the data they transport in the same way. ... But in " The Myth of Network Neutrality and What We Should Do About It," Robert Hahn and Robert Litan of the AEI-Brookings Joint Center for Regulatory Studies argue that, contrary to the claims of regulated neutrality proponents, "all bits of information are not treated equally from an economic standpoint." They argue that "the Internet is not end-to-end now and was never designed to be strictly neutral."
http://www.forbes.com/2007/01/23/network-neutrality-debate-oped-cx_ns_0124neutrality.html

The World Economic Forum - Forbes coverage
For most of the year, the only moguls to be found in Davos, Switzerland, are on the ski slopes. But for six days each January, this picturesque resort town is overrun with heads of state, NGO do-gooders, celebrities and CEOs who come to town for the World Economic Forum (Jan. 24-29). Forbes.com's has numerous stories, slide shows, blogs and video blogs including stories on The $100 Computer, Whose Afraid Of Second Life?, Technorati's Davos Dealing, and Google Guys In Davos: Is Google evil? Will newspapers survive? Sergey Brin, Larry Page and Chad Hurley take questions.
http://www.forbes.com/2007/01/23/world-economic-forum-lead-lead-citizen-davos07_cx_ag_0123davos_land.html

au: Watchdog eyes ISP speed claims
THE competition regulator has moved to stop internet providers misleading consumers shopping around for broadband services.
http://australianit.news.com.au/articles/0,7204,21147581%5e16123%5e%5enbv%5e,00.html

pk: Cabinet withholds cyber crime draft bill
The federal cabinet has withheld the proposed cyber crimes draft bill 2006 and instead constituted a four-member committee for proposing amendments taking into account domestic environment and needs, official sources told Business Recorder.
http://www.brecorder.com/index.php?id=523123

us: Alleged porn spammer settles with FTC
An alleged marketer of online porn has agreed to pay a $465,000 penalty to settle spam charges, the U.S. Federal Trade Commission said Tuesday.
http://news.zdnet.com/2100-1009_22-6154911.html
http://news.com.com/2100-7348_3-6154911.html

South Korean duo arrested for 1.6 bln spam e-mails (Reuters)
Two South Korean computer programmers have been arrested on suspicion of sending out 1.6 billion spam e-mail messages in violation of the country's commerce laws, police said.
http://news.com.com/2100-7348_3-6154563.html
http://today.reuters.co.uk/news/articlenews.aspx?type=internetNews&storyID=2007-01-30T135307Z_01_SEO206809_RTRIDST_0_OUKIN-UK-KOREA-SPAM.XML

au: 5 million use Aust eBay
ONE in three Australian adults now use internet auction house eBay to do their shopping, as online spending continues to grow as a preferred method of purchase.
http://australianit.news.com.au/articles/0,7204,21146892%5e16123%5e%5enbv%5e,00.html

Sweden to open embassy in virtual world
Sweden plans to be the first country to open an embassy in popular virtual world Second Life.
http://stuff.co.nz/stuff/3946554a28.html

Australians in virtual world stampede
Telstra and the Australian Broadcasting Corporation will shortly announce that they have established, separately, a presence in the cult virtual world of Second Life.
http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2007/01/30/1169919283914.html

Debate widens over over deploying computers in the developing world
At the World Economic Forum, the annual conclave of world leaders, concerns over a digital divide have taken a back seat to the challenge of climate change this year. Being out of the limelight, however, has not dimmed the debate over the best way to deploy computers in the developing world. The controversy boiled over on Saturday at a meeting where Craig Barrett, chairman of Intel, squared off with Nicholas Negroponte, the former director of the MIT Media Laboratory and head of the nonprofit organization One Laptop Per Child, which is focusing on the 1.2 billion children in the developing world.
http://iht.com/articles/2007/01/28/business/cheap.php
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/29/business/worldbusiness/29cheap.html
http://news.com.com/2100-1041_3-6154110.html

Firefox 2.0: happier browsing, but secure? The jury's still out
Review: It's long past time to bother telling anyone how much better than IE Firefox is. Faster, smaller, more responsive, with tabbed browsing and useful extensions galore. It's also lot more secure than IE, partly because it's open source, and particularly because it's not integrated with the underlying OS.
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/01/30/firefox_makes_steady_progress/

GOOGLE ?BER ALLES: The Ad Machine
Google effectively owns the market for Internet advertising. Now the company wants to further expand by entering foreign and local markets.
http://www.spiegel.de/international/spiegel/0,1518,462937,00.html

Search engine takes on web bombers
Google has moved to put an end to the work of pranksters who manipulate the search engine.
http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2007/01/30/1169919369737.html

Google set to shake up business software market
Google's enterprise product, which will include e-mail, calendar, word processing, spreadsheet, instant messaging, and voice-over-Internet programs, is expected to come soon.
http://iht.com/articles/2007/01/30/business/google.php

How HP has overtaken the bigger boys of computing
Dell may be losing its grip on the personal computer market, and Hewlett-Packard is taking over. What's even more surprising is that HP is now the world's largest IT company.
http://technology.guardian.co.uk/weekly/story/0,,1997643,00.html

au: DPP to challenge child porn sentences
The ACT's Director of Public Prosecutions will challenge two sentences imposed on Canberra residents found in possession of child pornography.
http://au.news.yahoo.com/070130/21/128re.html

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Sources include Quicklinks <http://qlinks.net/> and BNA Internet Law News <http://www.bna.com/ilaw/>.

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(c) David Goldstein 2007
 
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David Goldstein
 address: 4/3 Abbott Street
           COOGEE NSW 2034
           AUSTRALIA
 email: Goldstein_David &#167;yahoo.com.au
 phone: +61 418 228 605 (mobile); +61 2 9665 5773 (home)

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