Author Archives: Dan Gillmor

American telecommunications customers dodged a bullet last week when the House of Representatives postponed a vote on a broadband telecom bill that would have done more harm than good. But moneyed interests will be back to push this terrible legislation … Continue reading →

Dave Winer: Killer apps and blockbuster OSes. I’d like to recommend XP. Can you take out the phone-home features, and just ship a no-nonsense OS that isn’t all about DRM and doesn’t crash and supports modern Internet apps? The answer … Continue reading →

I love new gadgets, as much for what they imply as what they do themselves. The Apple Newton was wasn’t a great PDA, because it didn’t fit into a pocket, but it told us what was coming. That’s my reaction … Continue reading →

Forgive the several days between postings. I’ve been in bed with a not-too-bad case of the flu (or something else that gives me headaches, chills and general malaise), and it’s been hard to concentrate on more than chicken soup and … Continue reading →

JD Lasica: Independents Day. When it comes to Net news, small can be beautiful. This is an excellent look at four independent news-oriented Web sites. I’m a huge fan of Kuro5hin and MetaFilter, and didn’t know much about IWantMedia until … Continue reading →

Don’t know how I missed it, but Jennifer Balderama wrote an excellent piece on “Where Internet promises remain unfulfilled” — and sparked a lively discussion among Doc, Mike and others in the blogging community. Comments

It isn’t just Microsoft that treats people this way. Every big company with significant lock-in potential pulls tricks on customers. I just installed America Online’s Windows software, version 7.0, and found to my astonishment that it had slipped a URL … Continue reading →

Doc Searls: Microlith. Whatever else it’s about, lock-in appears to be, literally, the strategy. I’d always laughed at the analogy of Microsoft as the Borg civilization from Star Trek. It’s getting more realistic all the time. This company is relentless … Continue reading →

Brad Templeton: Origin of the term “spam” to mean net abuse. Much to the chagrin of Hormel Foods, maker of the canned “Shoulder Pork and hAM” luncheon meat, the term “spam” has today come to mean network abuse, particularly junk … Continue reading →

The Register: The Microsoft Secure PC: MS patents a lock-down OS. The patent application seeks to protect “a computerized method for a digital rights management operating system comprising: assuming a trusted identity; executing a trusted application; loading rights-managed data into … Continue reading →