An Interview with Ben Edelman

Chuck Talk writes "Orange Crate has an interview with Ben Edelman, a Harvard Law student and PhD candidate in Economics. Ben is noted for his work in studying issues of privacy, spyware, internet content filtering and the global supporters of those actions."

Comments

Re:Yet Another

[Anonymous Coward]

In all fairnness I think you are a bit negative here. I don't think this Ben guy is someone hyping himself for fun and profit. Phd candidate or not.

He has just written some interesting things about spyware in his blog that is based on research and appears to be quite accurate. Since very few folks in academica have done that and since most of the other people writting about this either are industry insiders or AC on some discussion site its natural that he is the guy media calls when they need something about spyware. Combine this with the fact that most of the artciles in mainstream media contains the same information on spyware, ad-ware and those ever evil viruses that anyone with a working brain can comile based on older articles from "tech-sites" I don't think this dude is some poser.
He's just doing some stuff|work|writing|studying on the spyware subject at the right time and place. AFAIK he has never claimed to be THE spyware expert or something.

Re:Yet Another

[pfafrich]

OK so not the best interview, but don't diss Ben so much. As a Ph.D sutudent he has probably spent three years full time research on spyware, has copiled some good resources on funding of spyware, has been an expert witness in a legal case against gator. So does maybe know a bit more on this issue than your average slashdotter.

Re:Yet Another

[cleetus]

I've actually met Ben in a professional capacity at the Berkman Center. He is one of the smartest people I've come across; he has a rare depth of understanding of both the technical and legal sides of the internet (and is able to do it through the fairly objective filter of microeconomics).

Most importantly, he has been an expert witness is several important software cases (see here, last paragraph). Take my subjective opinions above for what they're worth, but people with much at stake trust his opinions. What he thinks matters: judges and lawyers hear his views, not slashdot's.

cleetus

One of the Good Guys

[Dynamoo]

Ben Edelman is one of the good guys in the fight against cruft that installs on your computer without your knowledge. The work he does is both comprehensive and shocking.. if you haven't checked out his site do so now. Particularly, look at some of the videos and documentary evidence at what actually happens, despite the claims otherwise of the scumware publishers themseves.

There are a handful of other people I can think of who've done a similar amount of work. Merijin Bellekom, Patrick Kolla and Andrew Clover spring to mind, although there are others.