Author: john

Net Neutrality — Private Packets?

GigaOM » Forget Neutrality — Keep Packets Private

Here’s an article which I think clearly explains one of the important values in the Internet Neutrality debate–the need for privacy (or what others might call nondiscrimination) in the bits of information sent across the Internet. While I’m not sure that packet privacy would absolutely require “deep packet inspection,” which from what I understand becomes technically difficult and could possibly be accomplished by including more data in packet addressing information, but the author makes a great point that shouldn’t be lost:

Coping with billing disputes still means retaining data. Under what circumstances might a third party get access to the data derived from content routing? Content routing in one context enables content filtering in another.

This argument on the “need” to retain sensitive traffic information for billing purposes brings an interesting potential twist to the congressional debate over ISP data retention.

Internationalizing iTunes

The insanely great songs Apple wont let you hear. – By Paul Collins – Slate Magazine

This article gets right at what I’ve said a few times before…there’s a lot of great music hiding on other country’s iTunes sites. The broadband era has made it easier than ever to become exposed to great international music (both legally and not). I’ve grown a real (expensive) taste for Japanese music in the last year and a half, partly with help finding good bands on iTunes, and it’s always frustrating to know that it’s just licensing agreements holding Apple back from opening up more artists internationally.

To be fair, there are a lot of international acts starting to show up on iTunes America–partly thanks to the efforts of a licensing company whose name escapes me at the moment. Still, I know of at least a few great (Sony) bands that will never make it on to iTunes, regardless of country. Perhaps Norway is on to something.

Paper as display medium

Xerox Seeks Erasable Form of Paper for Copiers – New York Times

Xerox is attempting to create a product which would allow one to use the same sheet a number of times when making photocopies. Essentially, one could make a copy and then somehow erase the copy to later use the same sheet. The realization driving this advance was very interesting: that paper is becoming a display medium, as opposed to an archival medium. I think this succinctly expresses something the underlying reason why so many people gravitate towards reading on the printed page as opposed to on screen.

Unfortunately, it doesn’t sound as though the product will be able to use plain paper. This has been a hindrance to many copying technologies in the past. For example, the “Diffusion-Transfer-Removal,” or DTR, method of copying (which was quite popular prior to Xerox’s becoming popular) required a chemically coated paper to make a copy. It’s possible that this could become popular on it’s own, but I’m sure if Xerox knows their history, they’ll look more closely at toner technology as opposed to paper.