Slashdot Mirror

Bonker writes: "This article at Salon indicates that scientists in Norway are setting up an experiment to inject massive amounts of C02 into the deep ocean near the Artic circle. They hope that they can prove that C02 can be stored in the ocean rather than in the atmosphere where it contributes to global warming, but the question remains -- can fishies swim in club soda?"

Welcome to Slashback for the evening: Yes, another big security problem with the world's second-most popular web server, a slight revision of the plight of Silicon Valley's homeless, and good news from the Indymedia front.

Remember, Free Software Sinks Ships curtS was one of the many to point out that "MSNBC has an article about a security hole you could throw a cat through." This might be more exciting if it was the first time, but jamie posted about a very similar-sounding flaw a few months ago.

Calling off the dogs of war. An anonymous reader writes: "Slashdot reported that Indymedia had received a court order to hand over the logs and other records pertaining to the IMC's coverage of anti-globalization protests in Quebec City. Now FBI has dropped the case. Here is the press release."

phunhippy points to coverage at Wired as well.

This Old House - gr8dane writes "I was just checking out the Sunday posting on /. about .commers in homeless shelters and Salon is running an update to the same story. The previous post prompted quite a bit of feedback on /. and this update article seems to support those who felt the Sunday article wasn't indicative of the industry as a whole. 'John Sacrosante says he went from six figures to a shelter. His friends say there's something fishy in San Jose.' Quite interesting ... "

DoctorZ writes: "In response to reading the recent article about Zero-Knowledge's withdrawal from Linux development for Freedom. I emailed them discussing my concerns along with everyone else's. Here was their response:

'Hello,

We know....

We understand your disappointment. It is not a easy decision. We are not giving up on Linux. Our entire Freedom Network is Linux based!This decision was taken in response to the number of people purchasing the Linux version as compared to the number purchasing the Windows version. While many of us at Zero-Knowledge are Linux enthusiasts, the number of interested Linux users downloading Freedom simply didn't warrant continued development efforts, and we have chosen instead to apply our development resources in a way that will maximize value to our customers.

Once again, thank you for expressing your concerns.

Regards,

Alan"

Welcome to Slashback for the evening: Yes, another big security problem with the world's second-most popular web server, a slight revision of the plight of Silicon Valley's homeless, and good news from the Indymedia front.

Remember, Free Software Sinks Ships curtS was one of the many to point out that "MSNBC has an article about a security hole you could throw a cat through." This might be more exciting if it was the first time, but jamie posted about a very similar-sounding flaw a few months ago.

Calling off the dogs of war. An anonymous reader writes: "Slashdot reported that Indymedia had received a court order to hand over the logs and other records pertaining to the IMC's coverage of anti-globalization protests in Quebec City. Now FBI has dropped the case. Here is the press release."

phunhippy points to coverage at Wired as well.

This Old House - gr8dane writes "I was just checking out the Sunday posting on /. about .commers in homeless shelters and Salon is running an update to the same story. The previous post prompted quite a bit of feedback on /. and this update article seems to support those who felt the Sunday article wasn't indicative of the industry as a whole. 'John Sacrosante says he went from six figures to a shelter. His friends say there's something fishy in San Jose.' Quite interesting ... "

DoctorZ writes: "In response to reading the recent article about Zero-Knowledge's withdrawal from Linux development for Freedom. I emailed them discussing my concerns along with everyone else's. Here was their response:

'Hello,

We know....

We understand your disappointment. It is not a easy decision. We are not giving up on Linux. Our entire Freedom Network is Linux based!This decision was taken in response to the number of people purchasing the Linux version as compared to the number purchasing the Windows version. While many of us at Zero-Knowledge are Linux enthusiasts, the number of interested Linux users downloading Freedom simply didn't warrant continued development efforts, and we have chosen instead to apply our development resources in a way that will maximize value to our customers.

Once again, thank you for expressing your concerns.

Regards,

Alan"

JerkyBoy writes "Salon.com has an interesting story about using gold for online transactions. One company that provides the service (goldmoney.com) describes itself as "an online payment system that combines the world's oldest money, gold, with Internet technology to provide a safe, easy and inexpensive way for anyone to transact business 24 hours a day. Payments are made electronically using GoldGrams(TM), which are grams of gold that circulate world-wide through the Internet." I wonder if I can configure the MIME types on my Apache server to send golden email attachments?" Hehe - this is basically the same thing as people have been trying to do with creating new online currency.

An anonymous submitter sent in this AP article - Former Dot-Com Workers Crowd Homeless Shelters. This article has inspired huge threads on two mailing lists I subscribe to, people coming out of the woodwork saying that they too were laid off/fired/quit many months ago and haven't been able to find jobs. Is the job market really that bad?

Anarchitect writes "My step-daughter is almost 11 and, though she's only with her mother and me every other weekend, I would like to provide her with (relatively) unfettered 'net access. Since we all know that the CyberPatrols suck, both technically and ethically, what's the best solution for me (as a part-time parent) to keep an eye on her surfing? I'm not interested in blocking her access, only an awareness of what she surfs so that if I find it to be a morally touchy issue, we can discuss it. Any other parents (or equivalents) who have found a good solution for this?" For starters, Salon's article on censorship and kids, The Morality Police, is a must-read.

"She will be using a Mac, so I s'pose Apple's KidSafe is an option, but I'm not really keen on the concept - seems a little too limiting - kinda like going to the library and only having access to the encyclopedias. Any ideas?"

Jamie wanted to add a few comments:

Yes, KidSafe is a whitelist. Basically you'd be allowing access only to a carefully chosen, tiny fraction of the web. It's exactly like going to the library and only being able to look at the reference section.

If that's what you want and that's all your child is ready for, I can't see any problem with this. It's honest because everybody knows what they're getting. When they want out of the sandbox, they'll let you know.

Here are my suggested rules of the road for kids on the internet, basically a 21st century version of "don't take candy from strangers." What do I have wrong, or what did I forget?

For parents:

* Put the family computer in a family room.

* Be prepared for freaky questions about things seen online -- and let kids know they can ask about anything they see.

* Be prepared in case you learn they are looking at things they shouldn't. Not that this will necessarily happen. But if it does, your gut reaction may not be appropriate -- consider what you'll say.

* Along with that annoying "what'd you do in school today?", try the equally annoying "what'd you find on the internet today?"

* If you use spyware to keep track of what your kids are viewing, let them know. If you don't, let them know you trust them! This is a trust step like the first time they ride a bike past the driveway, or spend overnight at a friend's house. It's your judgement when they're ready.

For kids:

* When you chat online, you don't know who's on the other end. Even if you've talked with them for a year, you still don't know!

* A rule: never type your last name or your city. (First name and state are OK.) Or, make up a fake name, that can be "who you are" online!

* A very important safety rule: meeting online strangers may be allowed (but mom or dad will be coming along). If kids promise to ask, parents promise to talk it over.

* When you're looking for something, use the Google search engine. (Among its other benefits, it's the most kid-friendly.) Always start your search with at least three words. Any fewer, and you're probably just wasting your time. Parents can help you learn how to pick three good words.

An anonymous submitter sends in: "Salon is reporting Automatic Media has run out of money, and Feed and Suck will be closing up shop. Sad news, especially for such high profile, established sites. What will you do on Wednesdays without Filler? Plastic will remain open, serving up some user generated content, which is apparently the cheapest way to operate on the net."

An anonymous submitter sends in: "Salon is reporting Automatic Media has run out of money, and Feed and Suck will be closing up shop. Sad news, especially for such high profile, established sites. What will you do on Wednesdays without Filler? Plastic will remain open, serving up some user generated content, which is apparently the cheapest way to operate on the net."

We're living in the era where bands are prepackaged for our convenience, and then the packaging itself is repackaged as a serial documercial and sandwiched between paid ads. The kids whose billions pay for this machine are not only fully aware it's a sham, they embrace the cynicism and still manage to enjoy the show. So I'm guessing nobody will be stunned to learn that, a week ago, the L.A. Times uncovered documents showing that record labels are still buying radio airplay, at some stations, the same quasi-legal way they've been buying it for twenty years. But it's an interesting story, and it's as good a launching point as any for thinking about the next twenty years. ("Payola" is the first of three Slashdot features on music distribution. Parts two and three run tomorrow and Thursday.)

Pink Floyd's The Wall set the standard for amazing stage shows. It was the kind of thing that makes me wish I'd lived in L.A. or New York in 1980 (and been out of grade school, I guess). In February 1980, they played five sold-out L.A. shows, inflatable pig, airplane and all, the epicenter of cool. The double album was number one and would stay there for four months.

But although you can hear "Another Brick in the Wall, Part Two" played on L.A. oldie stations today, at the time, you wouldn't have heard it on any station in the city. Total blackout. The record labels used a network (creatively called The Network) through which they exerted control over which songs got on the air.

But in 1980, The Network was in revolt.

To understand why it even existed, we have to go back to Alan Freed's Rock and Roll Show in 1960. One of the first rock'n'roll DJs, Freed was busted in 1960 for taking $2,500 in bribes to play records. He claimed the money was just a thank-you with no influence, but he still went down. He only paid a small fine, but his career was ruined and he died soon after.

As a result of the scandal, Congress passed a law against "payola" in 1960. We'll get into fine ethical distinctions later, but basically a radio station that secretly takes money to spin a song is guilty of payola.

Note that just coming out and admitting a spin was bought is perfectly legal: if that Limp Bizkit play was paid for, just say so and your station is home-free.

Break the law and you might be fined up to $10,000. Payola is a misdemeanor. Theoretically, someone might spend up to a year in jail, but according to Hit Men , published in 1990, nobody has ever spent a single day behind bars.

There have been convictions, yes. Last year, after the L.A. Times turned up some evidence, Clear Channel Communications paid an $8,000 fine for promoting a Bryan Adams single and billing his label. The bill, by way of comparison, was for $237,000.

Clear Channel did well over $1 billion in revenue last quarter and has almost $50 billion in assets. "During the first quarter of 2001, we acquired 126 radio stations in 36 markets...."

But convictions are few and far between, partly because of the layers created between the labels and the stations. Post-Freed, a niche job was created to, essentially, be the go-between from the labels to the radio stations.

The job title is "independent promoter."

The promoters work for the labels. Each week, they talk to the program directors of radio stations in their region, and try to convince the stations' program directors [PDs] to add the labels' songs to the playlist.

And competition is fierce. There are only about 30 slots that get heavily played on any given station, and most of them carry songs over week-to-week. Ten new songs in a week would be heavy turnover; usually it's much fewer, and all the labels are fighting for those slots.

The question is how the promoters "convince" the program directors. By building a relationship with each PD, based on trust and knowledge of each station's market? Or by bribes, paid in dollars or some other currency?

The Network, a small cabal of promoters working together, became famous in the early 1980s for making or breaking songs, depending on how well they were paid. That's where "Another Brick in the Wall" comes into the story. After years of lean revenue, combined with rising costs in fees paid to the Network, CBS experimented with cutting them off.

And CBS got burned. The hit single from the number-one album in the country, in a market of three million, was blacked out. While the band was playing sold-out shows, not one of the city's four big Top-40 stations would play the 45.

Shortly after Pink Floyd's last show, the promoters were rehired, and within hours the song was back on the radio (top of the charts for weeks). It was pretty clear who owned the air.

How much money was CBS trying to save? Here's a quote from 1983, which I find amusing because the speaker is John Gotti's second-in-command -- a mob underboss who can appreciate a good racket when he sees it:

"That kid in California came in to see me, said ... they give him fifty thousand to a hundred thousand to push a record. The company, they pay you, just to make a record on the air, you know..."

A lot of money. This explains why CBS wanted to try it again, testing the promoters the next year as well. In early 1981, the company's labels boycotted them entirely. In retaliation, The Network targeted "Turn Me Loose," the first single by the new band Loverboy. After breaking into the Billboard charts with a star, it rose quickly, but peaked only at number 37 before falling off the bottom.

The next target was The Who's "You Better You Bet." Its appearance was even more promising, appearing at number 63 with a superstar. But it peaked at 18 and fell off the charts quickly.

CBS was convinced. Its boycott began to crack, and within months it ended.

By 1986 the abuses had grown serious enough to merit an investigative report by NBC. Calling the indie system "The New Payola," they uncovered evidence of The Network bribing DJs with cash and cocaine, and threatening them with violence. Senator Al Gore launched a Senate probe. And the RIAA quickly issued a short statement announcing that they would not tolerate illegal activity, but denying any wrongdoing (and reminding everyone that they had done Live Aid the year before).

In reality, the labels were glad for the coverage. It gave them the chance they needed to take the promoters down a few pegs, saving them all a great deal of money. In a few weeks, all the labels had joined in a boycott. Nobody knows real dollar amounts, but The Network's income, probably measured in the tens of millions, dropped drastically.

And since 1986, things have been different. But are we right back now where we started? The president of RCA Records claimed in 1987 that his industry had paid $50 to $60 million a year to the promoters. Last week's L.A. Times story (go read it) claims it's now a "$100-million-a-year trade."

We've come a long way since Alan Freed and his twenty five hundred bucks.

I talked last week with Woody Houston, a PD for the market leader Top-40 station in my hometown. (Disclosure: the company that owns his station competes with Clear Channel.)

Woody has seen examples of corruption, but nothing like some of the abuses of the 1980s -- maybe because we're not in a big city. He's had promoters offer to pay his way to conferences, but he's turned them down. Company policy is to fire anyone who takes such an offer, even though that's pretty small-time compared to some of what's been documented.

I described the L.A. Times story to him, and asked him to try to clarify where the line gets drawn, ethically:

"If Clear Channel is using those dollars for promotional support -- let's say Interscope wanted to put $2500 behind Smashmouth -- if they're buying T-shirts that have my call letters on the front, I don't see a problem.

"There's a fine line between buying airplay and promotion. If they're taking the thousand dollars that they got for 25 spins and not using it to support the record, that's wrong. If they just give the money away on the air, that's wrong -- that's the ethics of it."

When the system works, it does its job. You may or may not like the results -- Top-40 can't please everybody of course -- but the radio airwaves are a limited public medium that should be accountable to its listeners and advertisers, not the companies that make the product. Radio stations' PDs compete by doing their research, making the judgement calls they get paid to make, and seeing their Arbitron ratings, and advertising rates, rise or fall accordingly.

When it doesn't work, it's -- well -- it's a Wall, a barrier of moneyed inertia between new artists who want to be heard and the audience who wants to hear them.

Music has been an industry for the last hundred years, so we've never known what it might be like to strip out some of those barriers. In the next two installments, I'll throw out some ideas to kick around.

Tomorrow: part two, a look back at music distribution technology of the last 200 years.

(I mentioned Hit Men earlier. Most of my sources for the industry's history come from this 1990 book by Fredric Dannen. Its research is thorough, heavy on names, dates and places; Dannen talked to just about everybody and had a good nose for what was credible. Highly recommended if this subject interests you. He's got another book that looks good, too, with an inside story on the Hong Kong film industry.)

Update, 10:45 AM EDT: Salon ran a story on payola today too, a good one. Deja vu to 1980/81, but this time, Destiny's Child's label is not even trying to boycott the promoters, they're just scaling back how much they're paying them -- even this is considered risky.

revscat writes: "Salon has a nice writeup of the persecution and eventual success of the RIAA vs. commercial MP3 entities. And while alternatives exist, they "may eventually succumb to the might of the RIAA, which is already making noises about targeting software developers, ISPs and individual users of the network with lawsuits." Basic gist: for profit MP3 has consolidated into the hands of the recording industry." Plus ca change, plus c'est la meme chose.

revscat writes: "Salon has a nice writeup of the persecution and eventual success of the RIAA vs. commercial MP3 entities. And while alternatives exist, they "may eventually succumb to the might of the RIAA, which is already making noises about targeting software developers, ISPs and individual users of the network with lawsuits." Basic gist: for profit MP3 has consolidated into the hands of the recording industry." Plus ca change, plus c'est la meme chose.

target writes: "An article from salon reports that the FTC has ruled that amazon and its subsidiary alexa 'probably deceived customers' by passing on to the compaines personal information. Not that they're going to do anything but point it out, of course." Note that this is about different aspects of Amazon's privacy policy than reported in this story a few days ago, where the powers that be decided that removing 'opt-out' choices, among other things, did not deceive customers.

legLess writes: "Salon is carrying a thought-provoking article saying that 'The soft-porn fixation embarrassingly displayed at E3 is dooming the gaming industry to the nerd-geek ghetto.' It says that the gaming industry, in terms of sales and audience, is much closer to porn than Hollywood. Some great quotes ('[GOD] CEO Mike Wilson decided that preeminence should also involve a lot of cleavage and dwarfs'), and interesting thoughts ('Games should be treated as art, but they are becoming more and more like hamburger')."

legLess writes: "Salon is carrying a thought-provoking article saying that 'The soft-porn fixation embarrassingly displayed at E3 is dooming the gaming industry to the nerd-geek ghetto.' It says that the gaming industry, in terms of sales and audience, is much closer to porn than Hollywood. Some great quotes ('[GOD] CEO Mike Wilson decided that preeminence should also involve a lot of cleavage and dwarfs'), and interesting thoughts ('Games should be treated as art, but they are becoming more and more like hamburger')."

The NYTimes had an article this morning about MusicNet, a new venture of Real and the record industry to provide pay-per-listen music to the masses. (Read the AP version if you don't want to register with the Times.) Meanwhile, CNET reports that SDMI adjourned from their most recent meeting without picking any technologies to go forward with - an admission that they are all thoroughly broken, by the team led by Professor Felton, who spoke yesterday at Stanford.

Salon has a nice story of start-up greed and stupidity. It's not the first, and it's not the last, but it's good reading, in a schadenfreude sense. :)

twrayinma writes: "According to this article in Salon, Prof. Felten may have been smarter than we thought yesterday when he "allowed himself to be bullied" by the DMCA wielding RIAA. 2600 and the EFF could use this incident as an example of a big company using DMCA to quash legitimate research, as their court case alleges. Looks like Prof. Felten's fight may not be over yet..." Carl Kaplan's Cyber Law column in the NY Times also discusses the case.

While I'm at it, I should mention that the appeal hearing in the 2600 case will be this Tuesday in New York City. I do not know if a "protest" of any sort is planned; judges aren't supposed to decide cases based on protests anyway. But the case may be of interest to many NY-area readers:

Tuesday May 1 2001
Second Circuit Courthouse
10:00 AM
Courtroom 506
40 Centre St., at Foley Square, Manhattan

Thanks to LXNY for the information.

twrayinma writes: "According to this article in Salon, Prof. Felten may have been smarter than we thought yesterday when he "allowed himself to be bullied" by the DMCA wielding RIAA. 2600 and the EFF could use this incident as an example of a big company using DMCA to quash legitimate research, as their court case alleges. Looks like Prof. Felten's fight may not be over yet..." Carl Kaplan's Cyber Law column in the NY Times also discusses the case.

While I'm at it, I should mention that the appeal hearing in the 2600 case will be this Tuesday in New York City. I do not know if a "protest" of any sort is planned; judges aren't supposed to decide cases based on protests anyway. But the case may be of interest to many NY-area readers:

Tuesday May 1 2001
Second Circuit Courthouse
10:00 AM
Courtroom 506
40 Centre St., at Foley Square, Manhattan

Thanks to LXNY for the information.

The war on drugs is expensive, and, like most wars, deadly. But it looks like it isn't going to go away any time soon. With that as a given, why not let those who want to wage war on drugs do it in an online gaming environment? The cost of setting up the servers for "Drug Czar" would be lots less than the cost of all those street arrests, border interdictions, and air intercept missions in Peru and Colombia. And, best of all, no one would get hurt.

It could be a wonderful game, with shoot-em-up segments, sim-style strategy, morbid scenes of decayed inner-city neighborhoods, jut-jawed cops and Federal agents, droopy-drawered street drug vendors, and plenty of other colorful characters. Add in politicians, TV preachers, Colombian kingpins, middle-aged parents trying to keep their kids on the straight and narrow plus a bunch of furtive teenage drug experimenters, and you'd have roles in this MUD-variant for everyone who is interested in the drug war -- from either side.

Some players' roles would be predetermined. The U.S. government's drug policy chief would obviously get the Drug Czar role. George W. Bush would play the President. Congressmen, Senators, and agency heads could also mirror their real-life selves. A few taxpayers might whine about these officials getting paid to play games, but isn't the drug war nothing but a silly game anyway? And if it must be played, shouldn't it be played in a virtual environment where keeping a non-violent drug offender in prison doesn't cost taxpayers $20,000 or more per year, and lives aren't ruined or lost?

You can even argue that this game would be the most effective anti-drug policy the government could possibly have. If, indeed, video games have the potential to turn young people into killers, then hollow-faced, chronically sick game avatar junkies constantly searching for a high "by any means necessary" should steer plenty of kids onto the straight and narrow.

There are other drug-dealing games out there, but they don't have the scope, power, and visual ingenuity it will take to wean government drug warriors (not to mention people on the lucrative "dark side" of the fight) away from the non-virtual version. "Drug Czar" needs to be truly overwhelming, a game so vast that only the government can afford to produce it and make it freely available to players all over the world.

How much would all this cost to design and set up? $10 million? $20 million? Even a billion dollars would be a trifle compared to the cost of the offline version. And if it was an Open Source project (I'm sure SourceForge would be happy to host it, especially if the government kicked in a little pocket change to help with server maintenance), I'll bet volunteers from all over the world would help with development.

But remember, U.S.government is of the people, by the people, and for the people, so this isn't going to happen unless you write your elected representatives to tell them that you understand how much fun they are having with their war on drugs, and that you don't want want to take that pleasure away from them but would like them to stop playing it in real life and move it onto the Internet, where it would be less dangerous and more fun than the current version -- and probably at least as effective.

MotyaKatz writes: "The last article in the rec.humor.funny newsgroup comes from the editor (aka moderator), Brad Templeton himself. Amazingly, after two years, MasterCard decided that this joke violates their "priceless" trademark and requested its immediate removal. The reply of Mr. Templeton shows the sense of humor only the RHF editor can have!"

Templeton's response was right on target. But I can't help taking a crack at it:

Getting the idea that you should protect your brands on the internet: free.

Hiring firms to search out and police such "violations": $millions.

Getting slammed with negative publicity because you're sending out cease-and-desist letters like a bunch of idiots, which makes your customers think of your stupidity whenever they see your commercial: $millions more.

Learning from your mistakes the first time you make them: priceless.

There are some experiences that money can't buy. For every other mistake you make multiple times, firing the executive responsible is fun too.

n7lyg writes "Salon has an article by Janelle Brown that asks (and answers) the question 'Who is spying on your downloads?' It discusses the use of various P2P tracking tools by RIAA and IFPI and others to monitor file trading on both Napster and Gnutella networks. Freenet seems to be more or less immune to this sort of monitoring at the present time, due to the distributing the files throughout the network. More big brother tactics..."

n7lyg writes "Salon has an article by Janelle Brown that asks (and answers) the question 'Who is spying on your downloads?' It discusses the use of various P2P tracking tools by RIAA and IFPI and others to monitor file trading on both Napster and Gnutella networks. Freenet seems to be more or less immune to this sort of monitoring at the present time, due to the distributing the files throughout the network. More big brother tactics..."

Chanteuse writes "Salon is doing a several-part series on the corporate atmosphere of Wizards of the Coast, leading to it's eventual sellout to Hasbro. It's sad, in a nostalgic sort of way. Part One is up on Salon." Part Two has come out as well - it's a piece that could come from any number of company, but the background of Wizards Of The Coast makes it more interesting. I played Magic religiously up until Fallen Empires, and then drifted in and out - but my favorite era was still Arabian Nights before the umpteen bazillion different cards. But I suppose all things change.

Chanteuse writes "Salon is doing a several-part series on the corporate atmosphere of Wizards of the Coast, leading to it's eventual sellout to Hasbro. It's sad, in a nostalgic sort of way. Part One is up on Salon." Part Two has come out as well - it's a piece that could come from any number of company, but the background of Wizards Of The Coast makes it more interesting. I played Magic religiously up until Fallen Empires, and then drifted in and out - but my favorite era was still Arabian Nights before the umpteen bazillion different cards. But I suppose all things change.

hayfever writes: "Catch the scoop. The Indianapolis Star is reporting here that the US 7th Circuit Court of appeals has overturned the Indianapolis ordinance banning violent video games from arcades (see previous Slashdot article here)." Findlaw has the decision, and there are some really good lines in there: "To shield children right up to the age of 18 from exposure to violent descriptions and images would not only be quixotic, but deforming; it would leave them unequipped to cope with the world as we know it." Update: 03/24 10 AM EST by J : The contrast is striking. The same day, our new Attorney General John Ashcroft released a statement: "Ashcroft on school shootings: Video games are part of the problem." Gun control? He prefers thought control: "We have to exhibit responsibility in other ways, so that the culture inhibits or restrains this impulse."

Judg3 writes: "Salon.Com announced Tuesday that their readers will have a choice: Continue to read for free, dodging new, bigger CNET-style ads, or they pay $30 a year to read Salon's daily news and views, plus bonus content, in a blissfully ad-free environment." Is it worth doing something like that here? I don't read Salon enough to care, but I'd love it if a few bucks removed the ads from CNN. Slashdot's ads aren't really all that obtrusive, most of the time anyway :( If it's something people want, we could certainly consider it.

A nameless reader writes: "Salon has an interesting article on an organization and a company that are teaming up together to try to provide free software programmers with patents to protect free software in general from the corporate grip." The Salon article is about IP.com, a company (surprisingly, with the Patent office's promise to check their database) planning to put patentable ideas online as evidence of first creation, for a much smaller fee than filing a patent. If the idea appeals to you, check out openpatents.org as well -- the idea there being that the right to pool patents is a good incentive not to keep technologies locked up for more than a decade.

A nameless reader writes: "Salon has an interesting article on an organization and a company that are teaming up together to try to provide free software programmers with patents to protect free software in general from the corporate grip." The Salon article is about IP.com, a company (surprisingly, with the Patent office's promise to check their database) planning to put patentable ideas online as evidence of first creation, for a much smaller fee than filing a patent. If the idea appeals to you, check out openpatents.org as well -- the idea there being that the right to pool patents is a good incentive not to keep technologies locked up for more than a decade.

An unnamed reader writes: "From the latest Village Voice: 'You've got mail--and moral conundrums! A former AOL "censor" comes clean about the messy ethical dilemmas spawned by anonymity.'" This is one of the ickiest workplace accounts I've read in a while, but parts of it may make you laugh as well. You know that AOL has people watching the online traffic -- well, this proves that the job is not as glamorous and fulfilling as it sounds, but it does have some odd twists. See also this older Salon story for further insight on AOL acceptable use policies.

Stibanater writes: "The second part of a 2-parter on Salon about DivX seems to hint at MPAA tolerance of DivX as a good distribution format. Granted, this comes from the mouth of a DivX Network's exec, so salt to taste. Still, the tasty part is the insinuation that the MPAA has learned from Napster, and will move to quickly embrace online distribution instead of 'suing it out of existence.' The first part is an explanation of DivX for the layman and a little bit about the DeCSS case." On a related note, Dan Marlin writes: "Looks like the "Internet Archive" http://www.archive.org has decided to add the DivX MPEG-4 format to it's entire movie collection. This is huge in the way of mass acceptance for the DivX ;-). It looks like they are still in the encoding process as most of movies are still only available in MPEG-2. But after scanning the collection the past few days, it looks like they are adding more daily."

Stibanater writes: "The second part of a 2-parter on Salon about DivX seems to hint at MPAA tolerance of DivX as a good distribution format. Granted, this comes from the mouth of a DivX Network's exec, so salt to taste. Still, the tasty part is the insinuation that the MPAA has learned from Napster, and will move to quickly embrace online distribution instead of 'suing it out of existence.' The first part is an explanation of DivX for the layman and a little bit about the DeCSS case." On a related note, Dan Marlin writes: "Looks like the "Internet Archive" http://www.archive.org has decided to add the DivX MPEG-4 format to it's entire movie collection. This is huge in the way of mass acceptance for the DivX ;-). It looks like they are still in the encoding process as most of movies are still only available in MPEG-2. But after scanning the collection the past few days, it looks like they are adding more daily."

Stibanater writes: "The second part of a 2-parter on Salon about DivX seems to hint at MPAA tolerance of DivX as a good distribution format. Granted, this comes from the mouth of a DivX Network's exec, so salt to taste. Still, the tasty part is the insinuation that the MPAA has learned from Napster, and will move to quickly embrace online distribution instead of 'suing it out of existence.' The first part is an explanation of DivX for the layman and a little bit about the DeCSS case." On a related note, Dan Marlin writes: "Looks like the "Internet Archive" http://www.archive.org has decided to add the DivX MPEG-4 format to it's entire movie collection. This is huge in the way of mass acceptance for the DivX ;-). It looks like they are still in the encoding process as most of movies are still only available in MPEG-2. But after scanning the collection the past few days, it looks like they are adding more daily."

A reader unblessed with a name writes: "I'll admit that when Gracenote took over the CDDB compact-disc database, I wasn't too annoyed. Now I am. Napster has just signed an agreement with them to use Gracenote's services, and by extension the community-built CDDB databases, to implement its copyright blocking."

Andrew Leonard writes "Seems to me that Slashdotters might be interested in Salon's cover story today about the tightening job market for programmers. DISCLAIMER: I edited and assigned this story, so I am not an impartial advocate. But I still think it's pretty good." Andrew's right - it is a good story. Things are changing right now - but I'd still rather be a programmer then most other jobs right now.

Andrew Leonard writes "Seems to me that Slashdotters might be interested in Salon's cover story today about the tightening job market for programmers. DISCLAIMER: I edited and assigned this story, so I am not an impartial advocate. But I still think it's pretty good." Andrew's right - it is a good story. Things are changing right now - but I'd still rather be a programmer then most other jobs right now.

abde writes: "Sad news on Space.com -- NASA has canceled the X-33 reusable launch vehicle program due to cost overruns and severe budget cuts. Looks like we are stuck with the aging Space Shuttle ^[?] and NASA has relinquished the quest for cheap space launch capability. But hey, at least rich people get a tax cut (even if they don't want one)..."

One year ago, we ran a story about the effects of Napster on the RIAA's 1999 profits, which Michael gave the great title: "Pirates Steal Negative $1,400,000,000 from Music Industry." It's a year later, the new numbers are out, and the RIAA is lying through their pointy little teeth about them. The AP wire story's second paragraph says "Sales of music compact discs fell by 39% last year," which they would have quickly seen was a blatant lie if they'd bothered to look at the numbers. Fortunately, Slashdot is here to bust up the spin. Keep reading, if you aren't afraid of numbers.

(Update one hour later by J : The story was on the AP wire, e.g. here, so it's not the BBC's fault. It was unfair of me to single out the Beeb when they just happened to be the source the submittor submitted this morning.)

The RIAA's figures were released last week, but the AP story was delayed until Monday, when the story would get the most exposure.

CD sales plummeted last year in the U.S. and record industry officials say the figures prove that Napster, the Internet music-sharing service, has harmed their business.

Sales of music compact discs fell by 39% last year according to the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA).

"Napster hurt record sales," said RIAA president Hilary Rosen.

This article reads like it might have been ghost-written by someone from the record industry. It isn't until paragraph ten that journalistic integrity kicks in enough for the AP to quietly mention what they're actually talking about:

Some experts say [sic] the drop of CD singles as being part of an industry-wide slump, due to economic factors and a weak year musically. (Emphasis mine.)

That's right, CD singles. Unit sales for the singles were down 39%, revenue down 36% (they raised prices, of course).

And CD singles account for how much of the RIAA's profits?

Not quite one percent.

Yes, that's right: they lost 36% of 1% of their profits.

And the news media is reporting it as a 39% loss.

The facts are that their "CD sales" are up this year, even over last year's stunning performance. The RIAA increased the average price of a full-length CD from $13.65 to $14.02, and still managed to sell 3,600,000 more of them.

Total profit increase on this, the core of their business, was 3.1%, or just shy of an extra $400,000,000.

But full-length CDs only account for 92% of the RIAA's revenue. They did have weak performance in the other 8%. CD singles, as already noted, dropped revenue by 36%. But the real casualty percentage-wise was cassingles, which lost over 90% of its revenue from last year.

Gee, why could that be? Maybe because nobody wants them?

In fact, the RIAA's only real money-losing format of any significance was cassettes, which, along with music videos, were the only format actually cut in price. Cassette revenue dropped $436 million.

Wait a minute, what am I saying? "Money-losing"? They aren't losing money on cassettes -- they're just not raking it in this year as fast as last year. And gee, why might that be? Again, because nobody wants them?

And it's not like the RIAA is struggling to get by on slim profits. The big picture is that, in the last nine years, they have tripled their annual income.

But they are desperate to spin this as a loss. The actual fact is that their total revenue is down 1.8% from 1999. Last year, they made $14,584,500,000. This year, they made $14,323,000,000.

But how could they blame Napster if they told the truth? What would they say? "Napster is killing us! Our income is down almost two whole percent! We are only pulling in $14,323,000,000 this year!"

That probably wouldn't fly.

Especially because in the three categories which Napster has precisely zero effect on -- cassettes, vinyl, and music videos -- their combined year-to-year loss was $579.5 million.

That's right. In the digital formats which Napster can trade, they are making more money: $318,500,000 more revenue. In the analog and video formats where Napster is irrelevant, they are making less money: $579,500,000 less revenue.

That's the real story here.

But don't trust the press to report this one fairly. Don't trust the RIAA's press release. Go read the RIAA's numbers yourself.

(Hell, don't even trust those numbers -- they don't add up. I was silly enough to type them into a spreadsheet, and someone over there has some problems doing simple arithmetic. Their 1998 total revenue includes the DVDs twice.)

The RIAA is desperately trying to spin this so that they won't look like greedy bastards for turning down Napster's offer of a billion dollars over the next five years.

If they just took that generous offer, then -- in a year that the AP wire suggests might be an "industry-wide slump, due to economic factors and a weak year musically," and in a year for which Bertlesmann admits "we didn't put that much good stuff out" -- their revenue would only be down $111,000,000 from last year. And that would have been $750,000,000 more than they made in 1998.

But that isn't enough for them.

Why would anyone think the RIAA is greedy? They just want what's coming to them.

(Update one hour later by J : Mea culpa. Three paragraphs up, I originally calculated the numbers as if the billion dollars was all applied in one year; that isn't so. The billion would have been applied equally over the next five years. Actually it probably wouldn't have been applied to year-2000 revenue at all, so it's more of a rhetorical point than anything. Thanks to dachshund for pointing out that it wasn't a lump-sum payment.)

(Update four hours later by J : The AP wire seems to have updated its story, now stating explicitly that it's CD singles, not "CDs," which dropped 39%. I see factually correct versions now at CNN, Salon, Yahoo, and wire.ap.org (search on Napster). The BBC version is still incorrect. In my opinion, the new versions are still misleading. Focusing on a large percentage drop within a subcategory which is a tiny percentage of the whole is a classic example of how to lie with statistics. But compare this to the RIAA's press release, claiming that CD singles had "flat growth in '98 and '99," though 1998 revenue actually dropped 22% -- that's just plain lying.)

One year ago, we ran a story about the effects of Napster on the RIAA's 1999 profits, which Michael gave the great title: "Pirates Steal Negative $1,400,000,000 from Music Industry." It's a year later, the new numbers are out, and the RIAA is lying through their pointy little teeth about them. The AP wire story's second paragraph says "Sales of music compact discs fell by 39% last year," which they would have quickly seen was a blatant lie if they'd bothered to look at the numbers. Fortunately, Slashdot is here to bust up the spin. Keep reading, if you aren't afraid of numbers.

(Update one hour later by J : The story was on the AP wire, e.g. here, so it's not the BBC's fault. It was unfair of me to single out the Beeb when they just happened to be the source the submittor submitted this morning.)

The RIAA's figures were released last week, but the AP story was delayed until Monday, when the story would get the most exposure.

CD sales plummeted last year in the U.S. and record industry officials say the figures prove that Napster, the Internet music-sharing service, has harmed their business.

Sales of music compact discs fell by 39% last year according to the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA).

"Napster hurt record sales," said RIAA president Hilary Rosen.

This article reads like it might have been ghost-written by someone from the record industry. It isn't until paragraph ten that journalistic integrity kicks in enough for the AP to quietly mention what they're actually talking about:

Some experts say [sic] the drop of CD singles as being part of an industry-wide slump, due to economic factors and a weak year musically. (Emphasis mine.)

That's right, CD singles. Unit sales for the singles were down 39%, revenue down 36% (they raised prices, of course).

And CD singles account for how much of the RIAA's profits?

Not quite one percent.

Yes, that's right: they lost 36% of 1% of their profits.

And the news media is reporting it as a 39% loss.

The facts are that their "CD sales" are up this year, even over last year's stunning performance. The RIAA increased the average price of a full-length CD from $13.65 to $14.02, and still managed to sell 3,600,000 more of them.

Total profit increase on this, the core of their business, was 3.1%, or just shy of an extra $400,000,000.

But full-length CDs only account for 92% of the RIAA's revenue. They did have weak performance in the other 8%. CD singles, as already noted, dropped revenue by 36%. But the real casualty percentage-wise was cassingles, which lost over 90% of its revenue from last year.

Gee, why could that be? Maybe because nobody wants them?

In fact, the RIAA's only real money-losing format of any significance was cassettes, which, along with music videos, were the only format actually cut in price. Cassette revenue dropped $436 million.

Wait a minute, what am I saying? "Money-losing"? They aren't losing money on cassettes -- they're just not raking it in this year as fast as last year. And gee, why might that be? Again, because nobody wants them?

And it's not like the RIAA is struggling to get by on slim profits. The big picture is that, in the last nine years, they have tripled their annual income.

But they are desperate to spin this as a loss. The actual fact is that their total revenue is down 1.8% from 1999. Last year, they made $14,584,500,000. This year, they made $14,323,000,000.

But how could they blame Napster if they told the truth? What would they say? "Napster is killing us! Our income is down almost two whole percent! We are only pulling in $14,323,000,000 this year!"

That probably wouldn't fly.

Especially because in the three categories which Napster has precisely zero effect on -- cassettes, vinyl, and music videos -- their combined year-to-year loss was $579.5 million.

That's right. In the digital formats which Napster can trade, they are making more money: $318,500,000 more revenue. In the analog and video formats where Napster is irrelevant, they are making less money: $579,500,000 less revenue.

That's the real story here.

But don't trust the press to report this one fairly. Don't trust the RIAA's press release. Go read the RIAA's numbers yourself.

(Hell, don't even trust those numbers -- they don't add up. I was silly enough to type them into a spreadsheet, and someone over there has some problems doing simple arithmetic. Their 1998 total revenue includes the DVDs twice.)

The RIAA is desperately trying to spin this so that they won't look like greedy bastards for turning down Napster's offer of a billion dollars over the next five years.

If they just took that generous offer, then -- in a year that the AP wire suggests might be an "industry-wide slump, due to economic factors and a weak year musically," and in a year for which Bertlesmann admits "we didn't put that much good stuff out" -- their revenue would only be down $111,000,000 from last year. And that would have been $750,000,000 more than they made in 1998.

But that isn't enough for them.

Why would anyone think the RIAA is greedy? They just want what's coming to them.

(Update one hour later by J : Mea culpa. Three paragraphs up, I originally calculated the numbers as if the billion dollars was all applied in one year; that isn't so. The billion would have been applied equally over the next five years. Actually it probably wouldn't have been applied to year-2000 revenue at all, so it's more of a rhetorical point than anything. Thanks to dachshund for pointing out that it wasn't a lump-sum payment.)

(Update four hours later by J : The AP wire seems to have updated its story, now stating explicitly that it's CD singles, not "CDs," which dropped 39%. I see factually correct versions now at CNN, Salon, Yahoo, and wire.ap.org (search on Napster). The BBC version is still incorrect. In my opinion, the new versions are still misleading. Focusing on a large percentage drop within a subcategory which is a tiny percentage of the whole is a classic example of how to lie with statistics. But compare this to the RIAA's press release, claiming that CD singles had "flat growth in '98 and '99," though 1998 revenue actually dropped 22% -- that's just plain lying.)

z7209 asks: "I'm reading this article on Salon about audio streaming (MS v RealNetworks!), and happened to be asked last week to advise my company to make a recommendation for Webcasting and audio streaming server software. I dutifully researched MS, RealNetworks, QuickTime and other even more propietary software. None of these are great for one reason or another. But it now occurs to me that I don't even know how to implement the above on my favorite OS (nope, not Linux) FreeBSD. Where is OSS streaming server software? Is Icecast.org the answer? Shouldn't we focus on providing an alternative to these ugly propietary systems, esp. for such an important purpose?"

z7209 asks: "I'm reading this article on Salon about audio streaming (MS v RealNetworks!), and happened to be asked last week to advise my company to make a recommendation for Webcasting and audio streaming server software. I dutifully researched MS, RealNetworks, QuickTime and other even more propietary software. None of these are great for one reason or another. But it now occurs to me that I don't even know how to implement the above on my favorite OS (nope, not Linux) FreeBSD. Where is OSS streaming server software? Is Icecast.org the answer? Shouldn't we focus on providing an alternative to these ugly propietary systems, esp. for such an important purpose?"

Coward Anonymous writes: "According to this AP bulletin in Salon, the Belgian police are arresting Napster users. This is a new twist on things, isn't it? Now if only the Belgian police would be so effective at arresting pedophiles..." But don't worry, this only applies to people who have "been warned." How comforting.

Katascope writes "Salon is running an article about targeted advertising on Napster and Gnotella. The worrysome part is the co-opting of P2P search databases to build profiles and advertise using instant messaging" I've always believed that targetted marketing might actually make advertising useful again (Any 24 year old who occasionally watches MTV and doesn't need zit cream knows this). This one is scary because people are sending you IMs based on the tunes in your napster share. Course I don't have IM, and use napster super infrequently, so I guess thats one way to not be annoyed. But frankly if I got junk mail about obscure Who stuff, I'd be happy. Much better then credit cards, viagra, and stock tips. As long as its opt-in. (michael: A number of people have written in with Cringely's comparison of Napster and subways. Good read.)

vattervi writes: "Salon has an interesting article on the the work ethics of sysadmins, heavily citing the book The Hacker Ethic and the Spirit of the Information Age and telling the story of Salon's sysadmin as he plays with the 2.4 kernel."

Sowbug writes: "Perl programmers rejoice! Mason 1.0 was released today, though prerelease versions have been in operation for years at websites like TechWeb, Salon.com, and AvantGo. Congratulations, Jonathan Swartz (principal author of Mason)!" I don't know much about Mason, but it seems like another cool addition to the Cold Fusion/PHP world of embeddable code in Web pages.

Anonymous Coward writes: "Just when you thought things could not get more stpid. Salon is reporting in this story that Pillsbury is sending cease-and-desist letters this week to universities and Sun Microsystems among others ordering engineers to stop holding what the doughboy company considers illegal "bake-offs." A bake-off is slang for testing software against protocols. This article tells the story. Xray crystallographers who use the "shake and bake" software better watch out. They're probably next."

kenf writes "Salon Magazine has an article about folks from the power companies blaming the internet for their power shortage woes." Well, the net does consume a huge percentage of the nations electricity. The article makes a lot of good points. I'm glad I don't live in CA, but how long before it affects the rest of us?

kenf writes "Salon Magazine has an article about folks from the power companies blaming the internet for their power shortage woes." Well, the net does consume a huge percentage of the nations electricity. The article makes a lot of good points. I'm glad I don't live in CA, but how long before it affects the rest of us?

Elvis Maximus writes "Today's Salon has a piece by Janelle Brown on "infiltration," the practice of intruding in campus steam tunnels, abandoned mental hospitals and the like." Some fascinating links here, especially for New York City.

There were several submissions of this piece: "Novelist Caleb Carr (probably most famous for The Alienist ) has written an article on Salon in which he talks about the dangers he believes information technology pose to society. His contention is that the unchecked spread of information technology will allow for increased corporate control over our lives. His proposed solution? Government regulation. (This is something that he has mentioned in interviews before, and it touches on ideas explored in his near-future SF novel Killing Time ). Overall a very interesting and thought-provoking read." I suggest you read the article without any preconceived ideas of whether you'll find it "good" or "bad", just read it and see what you get out of it.

geophile writes: "This article in Salon says that China will be building its own 'very own information superhighway.'" The story basically repeats the optimistic-sounding promises of the Chinese government that the new system will be faster, safer, brighter and fight cavities, too, though it does mention in passing that the Chinese "government routinely blocks Web sites of foreign news organizations and groups it opposes." Speaking practically, how easily can the worldwide dataflow be arrested in a country as populous and geographically diffuse as China?