The Electronic Frontier Foundation

(Image used under: Fair Use doctrine)

Have you been targetted by a "takedown" letter threatening you if you didn't take down your posted video? The EFF is looking for you.

Were you or someone you know unfairly caught in Viacom's dragnet? If your video was hit with a bogus takedown, contact information@eff.org -- we may be able to help you directly or help find another lawyer who can. In this situation, as in so many others, EFF will work to make sure that copyright claims don't squelch free speech.

Oh no! Our profits!

(Image used under: Creative Commons 2.0 [SRC])

Though the RIAA would like you to believe it, it seems that P2P doesn't actually affect music sales at all. That's kind of embarassing for the RIAA who no longer has any justification for their music property crusade.

Of course, I always said that most people who use P2P to get music wouldn't have bought the CDs in the first place. Therefore, the number of people who download music doesn't necessarily equal the number of CDs that would have been sold.

(Image is in the Public Domain)

Found on Slashdot, this article explains how writing fake reviews about your own book or hotel to boost its rating will become illegal in the UK and perhaps all of Europe.

This practice is very similar to the fake blogs that marketers made in the United States recently.

I don't really know why they had to specifically illegalize this… Wasn't it already fraud?

(Image used under: Fair Use doctrine)

Scot Finnie, a Windows expert who has been following the development of Windows Vista has given Macs a try for the first time.

After living with the Mac for three months and comparing it to my Vista experiences, the choice is crystal clear. I've struggled to sort out my gut feeling about Windows Vista (see "The Trouble with Vista"), but the value and advantage of the Mac and OS X are difficult to miss. While I continue to work with Windows XP and Vista on a number of other machines, I am now recommending the Macintosh for business and home users.

(Image used under: Fair Use doctrine)

In his review, he's quick to point out that 80% of the changes in Vista are good. In fact, it's very good. However, the company has shifted its focus and it shows. Some highlights from his article:

Microsoft stopped focusing on end users and now seemingly makes many decisions based on these two things: 1. Avoiding negative publicity (especially about security and software quality) 2. Making sure the largest enterprise customers are happy the deep focus on milking the installed base for every penny goes against my grain. I fault the DRM stuff quietly baked into Windows Vista in part because it is quietly baked in. The people who gain from this technology aren't the people who are paying for Windows. Microsoft has already made ardent enemies of previously more or less happy Windows users through the use of its previous-generation antipiracy measures, Windows Genuine Advantage, Windows Genuine Advantage Notifications and Windows Product Activation.

(Image used under: Fair Use doctrine)

As law professor Michael Geist explains in a recent editorial, "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."

This is what I've been hearing again and again. Microsoft wants to control your use of their software. If an e-mail service refused e-mails from certain sources, would you use it? If they wouldn't let you check your e-mail from certain places, would you use it? If you had to pay an additional fee for each computer you used for mail, would you use it?

Tech isn't good or bad.

(Image is in the Public Domain)

I found this news on Slashdot today. Basically, a university professor used a powerful free tool that lets him browse the Internet completely anonymously (Tor). Because the utility bypasses university security, they came to him and demanded he stop using it.

From his own description of the event, I found this especially nice, condensed description of why someone would want to use Tor:

Tor can also be useful in e-commerce. For example, Amazon.com knows more about my shopping habits and tastes than my wife does. I appreciate Amazon's ability to make recommendations based on my previous purchases. But in 2000, Amazon admitted experimenting with so-called dynamic pricing, charging different people different prices for the same MP3 player; the prices were presumably based on estimates of what each user would be willing to pay, considering prior purchases. Online merchants could all do that, thanks to traffic analysis. They know who I am when I log on — unless I delete their cookies or use Tor.

Angel Customers & Demon Customers (The book that started it all)
(See online!)

With the proliferation of data about customers on an individual level due to technology such as cookies, web bugs, and RFID (ie Spychips), companies have discovered a more valuable way to manage their assets. Customer profiling.

A new customer management policy has grown popularity in the business world which assigns customers the ominous labels of Angel and Demon.

Angels

This pleasant sounding label belongs to a customer who doesn't comparison shop, buys high-margin items, always picks up "extras" (such as extended warranties and accessories), uses store credit, etc. Basically, anyone who brings the store profit.

Demons

Imagine a point system, where every purchase made was given positive or negative points based on profitability. Now imagine that any interaction you have with a company could be tallied into your profile based on how much time and resources they need to spend on you. Here are some things that might count against you:

• Submitting a rebate
• Using your extended service plan
• Making any purchase without a certain percentage of high margin accessories
• Refusal to buy add-on services (such as a free Internet trial or movies-by-mail)
• Spending an over-average amount of time making the purchase decision
• Refusing to be upsold into a higher-end model
• Complaining about the store to management, to consumer watchdogs, or government agencies

Best Buy, a major electronics retailer, is one of the early adopters of these types of systems

After compiling the results of your score, you may be offered terms of credit, pricing, or specials based on that score. For example, "Special price for our 'Platinum' grade customers only!" (where platinum is another word for "angels"). Another example might be putting better customers in a priority queue for customer service by phone. Though only Best Buy (that I know of) has looked at the angel/demon methodology, there's nothing to stop companies from using the profiles on you they already have to do the same.

(Image used under: Fair Use doctrine)

This should encourage people to post more videos. Of course, it will encourage people to download a video and repost it as their own (as happens already). But it's the thought that counts. Of course, it would be better if they share the revenue from the page ads shown around the video instead of adding a stupid ad to the front of any video you try to play.

Lose data due to negligence and you pay. As it should be.

(Image is in the Public Domain)

Consumer Affairs follows the story of TJ Maxx vs Consumers as they get sued for losing data due to "failing to maintain adequate computer data security of customer credit and debit card data". Well good.