Ok lets get something straight. We here at ThirdPipe are FOR a Net Neutrality requirement for carriers. But the current ‘Net Neutrality’ option winding its way thru the halls of the FCC is NOT Net Neutrality. Its nothing but a power grab by the Beltway Bandits to squelch dissent.

Oh but it gets worse. The economics of its do not bode well either —

The study, authored by Charles Davidson and Bret Swanson, forecasts that the nation would hemorrhage 500,000 jobs in a best-case scenario were broadband reclassified as a Title II telecommunications service. That just so happens to be an objective currently under pursuit by members of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) with support from backers of “net neutrality” policy.

The forecasted job losses are likely to make for unpleasant headlines for the FCC at a time when jobs and the economy remain paramount in the minds of most voters and legislators.

“Especially at time when the national economy is attempting to recover from a major and enduring downturn and private sector job creation remains a concern, the destabilizing impacts of the FCC’s proposals place the nation’s economy at even greater risk,” the study reads.

Telecommunications companies have for months now warned that a formal adoption of the FCC’s reclassification proposal could hamper innovation and infrastructure investment, and observers say this study could provide them with fresh ammunition in the fight against reclassification and net neutrality.

“If this Title II regulation looks imminent, we have to re-evaluate whether we put shovels int he ground,” AT&T chief executive Randall Stephenson said earlier this month in an interview with the Wall Street Journal.

From 2003 to 2009, broadband service providers invested, on average, an annual $30 billion for deployment, which created or sustained some 431,000 jobs. Were that level of investment to dip by a conservative 10 percent in the wake of reclassification, 502,000 jobs would disappear and the nation’s GDP would shrink $62 billion. At 30 percent, the study projects the U.S. GDP would drop by $80 billion, for a loss of 602,000 jobs.

Following suit of their Republican colleagues, a growing chorus of senior Democrats have in recent weeks expressed opposition to the FCC’s regulatory rewrite, asking they instead pursue a legislative solution. Cross-chamber whip counts reveal at least 285 legislators disapprove of the measure.

Flush 500k jobs? Sure could. Do the major Telcos have that many jobs? No. But what is not known by many in the beltway crowd is that a large percentage of the Outside Plant work is today done by contract firms. They would be the first to be laid off on the street if the current proposals are adopted. But even at the Telcos there would be follow on layoffs in the management ranks. Why keep an outside plant manager or a facility supervisor if nobody is laying any FIOS cable? They too would be on the street.

The Net Neutrality move is as bad as the DISCLOCE Act in many ways. But to lose a half a million jobs to boot? Somebody get a broom. The FCC needs sweeping out.

The white paper is located here.

Even a casual observer of tech news probably noticed that a big chunk of the Fruit Pad’s early adopters of  had their email addy’s hacked. Many of those were privileged  social elites who Apple has carefully cultivated as users adding a feel of exclusivity  to membership in its product cult.

A group of hackers exploited a hole in an AT&T Web site to get e-mail addresses of about 114,000 iPad users, including what appears to be top officials in government, finance, media, technology, and military.

The leak could have affected all iPad 3G subscribers in the U.S., according to Gawker, which broke the story on Wednesday. Among the iPad users who appeared to have been affected were White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel, journalist Diane Sawyer, New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, movie producer Harvey Weinstein, and New York Times CEO Janet Robinson. (Cnet)

One again, AT&T demonstrates that it is willing to under invest in providing service ,while constantly looking to invest in expanding its footprint. While it’s a demonstration of how truly pathetic AT&T is at secuity, what really amazes me is how Apple remains unscathed. Do you really think Steve Jobs (the world’s biggest control freak) would enter into any arrangement with AT&T where Apple  did not have involvement in the management of the network?  Even if this can be made to stick entirely to AT&T, why did Jobs and Co. select it as the exclusive wireless carrier for a second high volume product when it’s network continues to leave it’s current iPhone users waiting? At the very least BOTH companies need to be taken to task for delivering a flawed product.

I predict that all of the elites who lost a bit of privacy will carry on using Apple’s products while bashing AT&T mightyly. The tech press will pass lots of  “big, bad AT&T gas” whole remaining loyal fruit cult members. I wonder: Has Apple bought off the press or simply brainwashed them? Does any rational person really want a portable “cloud” device / service can’t even lock down an email list? AND…please tell me the .gov types weren’t using these devices for official communications.

Facebook’s disregard for user privacy and so what attitude has users fleeing the site. Even the devoted may be beginning to have doubts about the usefulness of a poorly secured site that shares all with the highest bidder.

According to figures from Google, the largest search engine, global queries for “delete Facebook account” have more than doubled in the past week, reaching a high.

Most of those searches came from the US, where the phrase was in Google’s top ten “hot trends” on Friday. (FT.com)

Troubled? You can just delete your Facebook  account, right? Actually, it’s a little more complicated to completely remove it: (You’ll find step by step directions here)

Facebook makes it pretty easy to deactivate your account which will temporarily hide your information. However, if you want to permanently remove your information, the “permanent delete” option is much harder to find. This article will cover two easy ways to erase your Facebook account so you can Quit Facebook forever. (Wikihow)

Meanwhile Facebook announced new privacy tools to help thwart hackers:

The new security features, unveiled Thursday, include giving members the ability to approve which devices they commonly use to log on to Facebook — a home computer or a mobile phone, for example — through an “Account Settings” page.

“Once you’ve done this, whenever someone logs in to your account from a device not on this list, we’ll ask the person to name the device,” Facebook software engineer Lev Popov said in a blog post. (Yahoo)

Unfortunately Facebook has done nothing to address the issue of the company itself selling user data. That problem is not unique to Facebook, but the silver lining to its arrogance and blunders may be illuminating how common this deplorable business practice is in corporate America.

I pose that question for a couple of reasons. But they are all wrapped around security and the sanctity of your personal information. –

Researchers at VeriSign’s iDefense division tracking the digital underworld say bogus and stolen accounts on the Facebook are now on sale in high volume on the black market. Mark Zuckerberg, a founder of Facebook, the social networking site that says it has sophisticated ways to defeat fake accounts.

During several weeks in February, iDefense tracked an effort to sell log-in data for 1.5 million Facebook accounts on several online criminal marketplaces, including one called Carder.su.

That hacker, who used the screen name “kirllos” and appears to deal only in Facebook accounts, offered to sell bundles of 1,000 accounts with 10 or fewer friends for $25 and with more than 10 friends for $45, says Rick Howard, iDefense’s director of cyber intelligence.

Source

and…

MINNEAPOLIS - Facebook is now sharing your personal profile information with third parties. For now, it’s just a few web sites, like the music site Pandora, and the consumer review site, Yelp.

Facebook is automatically sharing that information, without your consent. If you don’t want to share, you have to opt out.

University of Minnesota law professor and privacy expert Bill McGevern says it’s an important line in the sand. And for Facebook, with 600 million users, the stakes are high.

“Facebook is trying over and over to get this shared so Facebook becomes the center of the web,” said McGevern.

Facebook want to make money by selling user information.

Source

Either legally or otherwise your data is being proffered for sale. Are you sure you know who you are sharing that data with via third parties that you have no relationship with? Do you even know what is being done with the data? You ought to care, as it may mean you losing the next job or promotion. Forty-five Percent of Employers Use Social Networking Sites to Research Job Candidates, CareerBuilder Survey Finds To be blunt about it, if you have a rant on FaceBook about anything you might as well write LOSER on the bottom of your resume.

I have never held a Facebook account as I read the TOS first and found it lacking. Besides these days it is both cheap and easy to setup your own site on the web where YOU have total control of both the content and how it is shared. Consider this post a friendly hint. But you have been forewarned.

Previously we had pointed out that the Telcos can take care of their own. They have a revenue stream (well used to, it is getting a little frayed), that is mostly never ending. The resource is finite but better than what anyone else has. So why do they want to do this to their more lesser mortal peers? —

In the dead of night, just before the latest draft of the Stevens bill came out, a helpful Telco lobbyist inserted a little provision to stack the deck in the case of judicial review. Section 1004 of the Stevens draft now places exclusive jurisdiction for all decisions by the FCC in the D.C. Circuit. This includes not just network neutrality, but media ownership, CALEA, wireless issues, anything.

Why would anyone do that you ask? Because the D.C. Cir. is, without doubt, the most activist court in the land when it comes to pressing its vision of media and telecom policy. More than any other court, the D.C. Cir. can be credited with destroying hope of telecom competition in the United States by perpetually reversing and remanding the FCC’s efforts at rulemaking and enforcement until the FCC finally gave up and effectively deregulated. The D.C. Cir. is also responsible for vacating (eliminating by judicial fiat) the rule preventing cable companies from owning television stations where they have cable systems, and overturning much of the FCC’s cable and broadcast ownership limits. Finally, through the legal doctrine known as “standing”, the D.C. Crcuit has done its best to make it impossible for regular people to challenge FCC decisions or bring individual cases on antitrust grounds.

Source: WetMachine

Why? Well to make it more costly to litigate telecom policy. So if you are a small coop outside to Duluth and are being destroyed by some arcane rule your choice would be under this suggestion having to hire a high priced heavy weight from Georgetown.

There is something else that bothers me about this that has nothing to do with Telecom. Consistency. In the history of this country we have applied the mindset that one tries a case in the jurisdiction of either the defendant or the place where the infraction occurred. Even at appellate, you remand to the closest circuit district from which the original case issued. And NOW we are going to turn this on its ear? The system as envisioned has worked reasonably well, there is no need to change it at this late date.

This provision needs to be removed. Verizon can afford to get on a damn airplane like anybody else.

Following the bosses lead on a previous post. I it is a shame but way too many consumers are not sufficiently savvy in consumer electronics of any kind. Case in point –

SAN LEANDRO — A brand-new 37-inch Sony flat screen television for $100? Great deal — until you take it out of the box and realize you just bought an oven door.

San Leandro police Lt. Pete Ballew called it a variation on the old “rocks in a box” scam, in which a box is presented as containing new, expensive electronics for sale but is actually full of rocks.

On Wednesday San Leandro police pulled over a man who had in his car a box containing what appeared to be an expensive 37-inch flat-screen television, but in actuality was a glass oven door cleverly disguised as a TV. The man is suspected of trying to sell the item for $100 in the parking lot of the San Lorenzo Wal-Mart, 15555 Hesperian Blvd.

“It was very ingenious,” Ballew said. “If you were a bargain hunter, you might think, ‘Wow, this is the deal of the day.’”‰”

Police got an anonymous call Wednesday from someone who raised suspicions about a man who tried to sell him a television out of his beige 1980 Oldsmobile Cutlass in the Wal-Mart parking lot. The witness said the seller told him he had bought the TV for $60 at a flea market.

Flat out its just a variant of the rocks in a box routine. But there are other scams as well. Many not so obvious. One we have discussed here is the subsidized phone CPE market. Thank goodness that is finally showing cracks. Another is channel bundling by the ISPs. But no matter, any of these vehicles are ripping off the consumer.

Oh, I bet that the first complaint to the scam above is — “Where is the remote?”

Linky.

Initial post: Jul 23, 2009 12:16 PM PDT
Jeffrey P. Bezos says:
This is an apology for the way we previously handled illegally sold copies of 1984 and other novels on Kindle. Our “solution” to the problem was stupid, thoughtless, and painfully out of line with our principles. It is wholly self-inflicted, and we deserve the criticism we’ve received. We will use the scar tissue from this painful mistake to help make better decisions going forward, ones that match our mission.

With deep apology to our customers,

Jeff Bezos
Founder & CEO
Amazon.com

With this Amazon issues an apology. Readers how would you rate it? Good, Fair, not worth the electrons?

Here’s my take. Amazon should have ate it. The cost I mean. They should have worked out whatever deal they could with the publisher for the customers to be able to keep the books. Another words Amazon should NOT have inconvenienced the customers and ate the costs. Absurd? Well what if it had been a physical book? You think Amazon would have gone through the pain and shipping costs for something that would not have been successful? Of course not. The fact they had the delete key was the only reason they went that route. Oh and every version of Kindle made in the future should have the remote delete feature removed. Period.

So the apology was NOT ENOUGH!

Linky.

Does it all sound too good to be true? If so, that’s because it probably is. What little information is available about the services is vague, technically inconsistent, and doesn’t match up with public records.

One key player in the network of companies is Mark Petschel. He’s the CEO of Global Verge, the multilevel marketing firm that is recruiting people to sell Zer01’s service, under the Buzzirk brand. Sales associates are paying $70 initially to become part of the program and $40 a month thereafter for back-office support.

Petschel is currently on probation after pleading guilty to securities fraud. According to a bankruptcy filing in the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Eastern District of Missouri, Petschel allegedly promised to invest $168,000 that he collected from several people, but instead spent some of the money on items like jewelry.

Petschel has been on the losing end of three contract disputes, including one in 2002 in which he was ordered to pay $50,000. The Circuit Court of St. Louis County has no record that he’s complied yet with any of the rulings.

If you get approached to sell cellular services where you pay for the privilege then earn credits on ’sales’ to others, be very wary. Its probably a MLM scheme and it might just be the guys above doing it.

More here.

That is its inaction makes it complicit in activities like shilling by not going after sellers who practice such tactics. The case in point –

How can you be sure the price of your latest eBay buy wasn’t shamelessly inflated by some faceless shill bidder? Well, there’s always the ad hoc investigative skills of Australian retiree Philip Cohen.

Cohen recently posted a nearly 8,000-word shill-bidding case study to the online forums at AuctionBytes, as part of a, shall we say, dogged effort to show that eBay does relatively little to stop the underhanded practice. His case study tracks an Aussie eBayer who made 190 bids on 41 items over a 30-day period, and all 41 items were listed by the same seller.

The implication is that the seller and bidder are the same person - or that they’re working in tandem to boost prices on the seller’s auctions. Cohen estimates that on one auction, the bidder in question artificially raised the price of the item by $156.

“This underbidder…stopped his ‘nibble’ bidding at the point when he equaled the maximum proxy bid value of the ultimate buyer,” Cohen writes. “At that point the underbidder would also have understood that only one more incremental bid was required for him to win the item; but he did not make that one more bid. What then is the chance that this underbidder is not a most naïve and blatant shill bidder? Absolutely none!”

Now this is out of Australia. Shilling, whether physical or virtual is against the law. So in a sense eBay if they are not aggressive in their pursuit of such practices becomes an accessory after the fact. There is however and inducement for eBay not to act. To the extent that a buyer is secured eBay’s commission on such a sale increases. That is reward enough on eBay’s part. What eBay’s intended mind frame in the matter would require a full scale investigation. To do that would require the power of the State and sufficient probable cause. Another words its not likely to happen.

Linky.

About this I mean. I doubted that the top tier IT firms would have much to do about pending tax plans. How wrong I was as one of the biggest ones — Microsoft — rattles the tax saber. –

Microsoft Corp. Chief Executive Officer Steven Ballmer said the world’s largest software company would move some employees offshore if Congress enacts President Barack Obama’s plans to impose higher taxes on U.S. companies’ foreign profits.

“It makes U.S. jobs more expensive,” Ballmer said in an interview. “We’re better off taking lots of people and moving them out of the U.S. as opposed to keeping them inside the U.S.”

Obama on May 4 proposed outlawing or restricting about $190 billion in tax breaks for offshore companies over the next decade. Such business groups as the National Foreign Trade Council, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the Business Roundtable have denounced the proposed overhaul.

U.S. tax rules let companies defer paying corporate rates as high as 35 percent on most types of foreign profits as long as that money remains invested overseas. Obama says he wants to end such incentives to keep foreign profits tax-deferred so that companies would invest them in the U.S.

Microsoft reported an overall effective tax rate of 26 percent for 2008 in its last annual report. “Our effective tax rates are less than the statutory tax rate due to foreign earnings taxed at lower rates,” the report said.

Barry Bosworth, an economist in Washington at the Brookings Institution research center, said many software companies such as Microsoft have exploited tax and trade rules in the U.S. and other countries to achieve a low overall tax rate.

No Microsoft won’t go over lock, stock, and barrel but they will shift as much of their labor force as possible to sites other than US. Which means that if MS is thinking it, you can bet the CFO’s of ALL the top IT suppliers have been given the order by the CEO to run the numbers and make a recommendation.

Bottom line. If they up the tax, more jobs will be lost, the recession deepens and tax receipts fall. Obama, good move dude. If you wanted to destroy the economy of the US that is.

Linky.

[Update]: The political blog HotAir give its tongue-in-cheek coveted ‘Louis Renault Award’ to Ballmer for his blatant shock of the implications of being a big Obama contributor. Link.