Newstand - July 2001
By Sabrina I. Pacifici, Published on July 1, 2001
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Good E-Mail Communications Requires Hard Work, July 31, 2001. The E-Collaboration Research Center (ERC) at Temple's Fox School of Business and Management conducted a study indicating serious flaws in online communication due to the lack of ability to convey the wide range of human emotions generally evident via in-person or even telephone communications.
The New York Times and Napster, July 30, 2001. According to Prof. Anunpam Chander, "In granting a victory to freelance writers, the Supreme Court's June decision in New York Times v. Tasini may also have handed Napster a possible new lease on life.
New York Times (reg. req'd)
Software Called Capable of Copying Any Human Voice, July 31, 2001. ATT Labs has developed a new state-of-the art speech software called Natural Voices. It apparently overcomes the current barrier of a mechanized sounding speech reproduction and offers, after considerable training, a realistic reproduction of the nuances of individual speech.
Jail Time in the Digital Age, July 30, 2001. In this opinion piece by Stanford University professor Lawrence Lessig, he argues in defense of the Russian programmer jailed for a violation of the DCMA, Sec. 1201. Circumvention of copyright protection systems: Something is going terribly wrong with copyright law in America. Mr. Sklyarov himself did not violate any law, and his employer did not violate anyone's copyright. What his program did was to enable the user of an Adobe eBook Reader to disable restrictions that the publisher of a particular electronic book formatted for Adobe's reader might have imposed.
San Diego Newspaper Shuts Down Archives, July 30, 2001. The Union Tribune has made a determination that in light of the Tasini decision, they will block user access to all content on their archives prior to January 1, 2000.
Medical Web Site Explains Lab Tests to Consumers, July 30, 2001. Lab Tests Online (http://www.labtestsonline.org) has launched a new, free site, to provide consumers with news and information, available via drop down search menus, on major medical conditions, their lab related tests, and advice on recommended preventative screening tests for all age groups.
Libraries in Lurch as Microfilm Flaws Surface, July 30, 2001. This article follows in the steps of those before it in taking up the cause of the de-acquisitioning of newspapers, periodicals and other materials in favor of microfiche to save space and to convert deteriorating works to a format which supposedly outlasts print. The argument continues!
OCLC Abandons Proprietary Software for Oracle Standard, Institutes Web Document Archiving Service, July 30, 2001. Barbara Quint reports that OCLC will make a huge change in an effort to remain on the cutting edge of technology for libraries by abandoning the software interface and backend they developed over thirty years ago.
Tracking Bloggers With Blogdex, July 30, 2001. "MIT's Media Lab is experimenting with a tool for indexing the most popular hypertext links across thousands of weblogs and has ambitious plans to turn it into a resource for the mass media. Launched last week, Blogdex is like a search-engine spider that visits about 9,000 weblogs a day looking for hypertext links. It extracts the links and ranks them by popularity. The top 10 are published daily on the Blogdex site."
10 Big Myths About Copyright Explained, July 27, 2001. Author Brad Templeton answers common myths about copyright seen on the net and covers issues related to copyright and USENET/Internet publication.
Online Library in Public Beta Testing, July 26, 2001. ebrary has a beta test site at http://learningnetwork.ebrary.com/ that is offering selected, free copyrighted titles from Random House, McGraw-Hill, Pearson PLC, Taylor & Francis, Cambridge University Press, MIT Press and Yale University Press. Fees are triggered for printing or downloading the titles.
The Humiliation Virus, July 26, 2001. How Sircam can help turn your most private documents into a worldwide joke.
Westlaw Wins Reader's Choice Award, July 26, 2001. In a national survey of Law Office Computing magazine readers, Westlaw - West Group's premier legal research service - took first place in the Online Legal Research category. Westlaw has won Law Office Computing's Readers' Choice Award five consecutive years and six times in the seven-year history of the award.
FindLaw's Career Center Features New Diversity Center, July 26, 2001. "FindLaw recognized that legal professionals of diverse backgrounds have unique career needs," said John Crump, executive director of the National Bar Association. "FindLaw's Diversity Center offers an excellent resource to address these needs by providing a central site full of useful information, links to local and national resources and powerful career tools."
Search Engines and Editorial Integrity, July 24, 2001. The author questions whether "the jig is up for honest search results," in light of the movement toward the rapid growth of paid advertising that accompanies search results, as well as determines the ranking of search results.
Plug.In - Appeals Could Bring Uncle Sam Into Royalty Disputes, July 23, 2001. Although arbitration is planned for the dispute between record labels and Webcasters over the divisive issue of payment for streaming content, years of litigation is inevitable. The parties, the Digital Music Association and the Recording Industry of America, are engaged in various lawsuits over copyright protection of streaming music, which is cached and then played on the users computer.
ATABOK Releases Product That Allows Opened and Read E-Mails to Be Recalled, July 23, 2001. ATABOK VCNMail 2.0, which is compatible with Microsoft Outlook and Louts Notes, allows users to protect, manage and recall files. In addition, users can specify whether their emails can be saved, forwarded, copied or printed.
Almost All E-Mail Users Say Internet, E-Mail Has Made Lives Better, July 23, 2001. According to this recent poll of e-mail users: more than nine in 10 say that both e-mail (97%) and the Internet (96%) have made their lives better. The typical e-mail user is on the Internet seven to eight hours each week, and 37% indicate they use it more than 10 hours per week. Sending and reading e-mail is the most common activity for people when online, much more so than searching for information, paying bills or using Instant Messages (IMs). Nine in 10 say they use e-mail at home, and more than eight in 10 say they use it at work.
Russian Hacker Arrested, July 23, 2001. This commentary/analysis highlights the DCMA, copyright protection and first amendment rights, and useful links to documents related to the case from Adobe, the government and the Electronic Frontier Foundation, as well as various news articles.
The Key to Freedom: Encryption, July 2001. Caspar Bowden is a former UK investment banker and strong proponent of encryption as a means of protecting electronic privacy. In this interview, he discusses user vulnerability on the Web, the RIP Act, and the power of encryption.
New Technologies to Burn CDs Your Way, July 23, 2001. Two, next generation CD drives are available from Sony and Yamaha.
Fast Launches World's Freshest Internet Search Engine, July 23, 2001. From the press release: Upgraded version of FAST's AlltheWeb.com, indexing more than 625 million web pages, is completely refreshed every nine to twelve days.
New York Times (reg. req'd)
Arrest Raises Stakes in Battle Over Copyright, July 23, 2001. The 26 year old Russian programmer detained under the DCMA for decrypting Adobe's e-book software, has become a cause celebre around the world. Not just a copyright case, this case is now championed by various groups as a first amendment issue.
Pop-Up Ads Pose a Measurement Puzzle, July 23, 2001. The pop-up/pop-under ad formula has catapulted X10.com to the rank of the Web's fourth most visited site. This demonstrates how easy it is to skew web stats, and other advertisers are not pleased with negative user reaction to this format.
From a Free Service to a Business That Charges, July 23, 2001. "The imperative for Internet companies to diversify their revenue streams has led to more attempts to get consumers to foot some portion of the bill."
Amazon.com: Was it Only a Mirage? July 23, 2001. Perhaps the most prominent name on the Internet, Amazon.com is in its 17th consecutive quarter without showing a profit. Many industry analysts are predicting the imminent demise of the 6 year old e-commerce king, as it spends down its working capital at an increasingly accelerated rate.
A Victory, Of Sorts, For Spouting Off, July 20, 2001. Anonymous critics, using the Web as a forum to communicate their views, have scored victories for their positions in New Jersey Appellate Court July 11, and in federal court in California in May. This article offers some warnings for those who plan to likewise post negative comments about companies using online message boards.
Free-Lancers Protest at New York Times, July 20, 2001. Protesters from several unions, as well a high profile authors, demanded that the Times initiate bargaining talks with them to determine appropriate compensation for their materials, as they will not accept no payment for electronic publication.
MSNBC.com Weathers Bad Economy, July 19, 2001. Although the site has yet to make a profit, it is arguably the number one online news site, and continues to add newspaper partners.
Revenge of the File-Sharing Masses, July 20, 2001. "By smashing Napster, the music industry has pushed its customers to seek alternatives that won't be so easy to shut down."
New York Times (reg. req'd)
Using the Internet To Cut Telephone Calls Down to Size, July 19, 2001. Is Internet telephony ready for prime time? This article is a good primer on Web based phone calls.
Cracking the Code of Online Censorship, July 19, 2001. Seth Finkelstein is the low profile but nevertheless important Internet guru and founder of the Censorware Project, an anti-filtering advocacy group. He is a pioneer in the movement to decrypt web filtering software, and has played a role in related law suits including the Virginia public library filtering case.
Portals to the Future of Legal Information, July/August 2001. "Law librarian Carol Ebbinghouse highlights established commercial online services ... LexisONE and FindLaw - and the breadth of information, from court opinions, statutes, and dictionaries, to court forms, bar exams, discussion groups and forums, that can be found via portal links."
The Final Word? July 19, 2001. Copyright lawyers say a pair of opinions on authors' rights raise more questions about online works.
FindLaw Introduces Breaking Documents and Weekly Documents, July 18, 2001. From the press release: Breaking Documents and Weekly Documents are the latest editions to FindLaw's expanding library of free legal newsletters. This list includes 17 daily and weekly topic newsletters, 21 daily opinion summaries from federal and state courts, and 14 weekly practice-specific opinion summaries. See http://newsletters.findlaw.com.
Arrest of Russian Programmer Will Test Copyright Law, July 18, 2001. Adobe apparently played a major role in the FBI's investigation and arrest of Russian programmer Dmitry Sklyarov. This is the first case in which an individual will face criminal prosecution under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA).
See also: http://www.usaondca.com/press/html/2001_07_17_sklyarov.html, press release from the US DOJ, United States Attorney, ND California.
A copy of the criminal complaint is at: http://www.usaondca.com/press/assets/applets/2001_07_17_sklyarov.pdf.
Thank G-d for the Internet, July 18, 2001. "In his new book "Next: The Future Just Happened," the author of "Liar's Poker" and "The New New Thing" looks at the emperor-has-no-clothes effect that the Net has on many of the so-called experts in fields like law and finance and how new technologies like TiVo and Replay are undermining entire industries."
California Courts - Self-Help Center
Specifically stating that the site does not provide legal advice, this service does offer free access to a range of resources targeted at individuals without representation. It is sponsored by the California Judicial Council.
Dow Jones Newswires has an enhanced version of its fee-based web site, according to Editor & Publisher. Included are the option to create customized news filters, and enhanced search functionality.
A Library to End All Libraries, July 23 issue, 2001. The Digital Object Identifier is an effort to build an extensive online library comprised of e-books . Backing comes from heavyweights including The McGraw-Hill Companies, professional societies, and tech companies. The objective is to assign aDigital Object Identifier (DOI) to all published material, thus allowing unique identification of materials, and easier retrieval.
Time to Reel in Financial Portals? July 23 issue, 2001. Securities regulators are closely reviewing independent financial portals to determine the need for new regulations to protect consumers from essentially unregistered broker information and services.
West Group Chosen to Publish New York Official Reports, July 18, 2001.
Practising Law Institute, West Group Create Online Continuing Legal Education Alliance, July 16, 2001. "West Group today announced an exclusive co-distribution agreement with Practising Law Institute (PLI) that will make continuing legal education (CLE) programming produced by PLI available online through West LegalEdcenter. The partnership significantly expands West LegalEdcenter's growing library of authoritative, accredited CLE courses, creating the Internet's largest collection of CLE programming and participation tools."
American Lawyer Media, West Group to Provide Online Continuing Legal Education Programming, July 16, 2001. "West Group today announced that West LegalEdcenter™ will provide continuing legal education (CLE) courses produced by the Law Journal Seminars™ and LegalTech® divisions of American Lawyer Media Inc. (ALM), the nation's leading legal journalism and information company."
Stop the Trash Trucks: A Tasini Case Damage-Control Proposal, July 16, 2001. Barbara Quint examines the ramifications to authors, publishers and consumers of removing vast quantities of archival data from database services.
Iceland's Dilemma: Progress v. Privacy, July 15 Issue. DeCode, a U.S. genomics company, has undertaken a controversial project with potentially wide reaching consequences for medical science and personal privacy. The company has an exclusive, 12 year license to develop and administer a huge database composed of all of Iceland's medical record. They may also use the genetic and genealogical information from these records to create new drugs.
New York Times (reg. req'd)
Faking It: the Internet Revolution Has Nothing to Do with Nasdaq, July 15, 2001. This article does not really concern Nasdaq, but rather is a commentary on the impact of the Internet on many facets of our personal and professional lives.
Checking Out E-Books, July 12, 2001. Public libraries around the country have instituted digital book lending programs, but the success of such programs has been hindered by several factors; lack of publicity about the services; the high cost of the e-books, and lackluster interest on the part of patrons.
West Group Delivers Personalization with My Westlaw, July 12, 2001. With My Westlaw, researchers can now select the databases, shortcuts (e.g., quick entry points for Find or KeyCite®) and search tools (e.g., thesaurus, preferred terms) they want - resulting in a faster, more productive research session.
U.S. General Accounting Office (GAO)
Telecommuting: Overview of Potential Barriers Facing Employers. GAO-01-926, July 11. This is a 20 page report, in PDF, that provides information on potential tax, regulatory and liability barriers that employers face when they establish telecommuting programs for their employees.
30 Essential Bookmarks, July 12, 2001. Included in this California oriented list are sites to convert currency, find a great restaurant, locate California state legislation, and information about area road conditions.
New York Times (reg. req'd)
Judge Grants Authors Victory in Fight Over Digital Book Rights, July 13, 2001. Judge Stein of Federal District Court in Manhattan ruled that RosettaBooks could publish digital versions of eight books currently in print by Random House.
Through the Looking Glass to Holographic Data Storage, July 12, 2001. "Two researchers from Canada and Spain have devised a glass-based material that they say may one day safely store huge amounts of data in just such small spaces."
A Quick Way to Search for Images on the Web, July 12, 2001. Google Search Image, currently in beta, allows you to search for more than 150 million images imbedded Web pages.
Ambitious 24-Year-Old Pushes Plan to Buy Salon and Turn It Into a Clearinghouse for Other Publications, July 11, 2001. Will Salon's 37- person editorial staff receive pink slips soon?
American Public Favors New Approaches to Provide Greater Online Protections and Responsiveness, July 11, 2001. According to this new study on governing the Internet: 64% of the public feels government should develop rules to protect Internet users, even if it means some regulation; The public feels industry has a key role to play but 58% indicates it does not want industry self-regulation alone; 70% feels non-profits should have a significant role in making rules for Internet. The full report, in PDF, is at: http://www.markle.org/news/InternetAccountability.pdf.
France Archived Web Content, July 11, 2001. The French government is apparently close to enacting a law to allow the mass collection, indexing and subsequent archiving of data from the French Internet.
How Annoying Can Online Ads Get? July 11, 2001. The ubiquitous X10 "pop-under" ads are raising the hackles of Web users and generating lots of complaints. You may disable the ads using a free app called Pop-Up Killer (http://software.xfx.net).
Americans Accept Personal Responsibility For Privacy Protection, July 10, 2001. A new study undertaken by Harris Interactive, on behalf of the Privacy Leadership Initiative, suggests that businesses must do more to inform and empower consumers.
Internet2: the Once and Future Internet, July 10, 2001. On academia's high-powered Internet2, researchers are redefining what computer networks can do.
Work the Problem, People, July 10, 2001. Researchers work side by side, thousands of miles apart, using Internet2.
Office of the E-envoy - UK Online Strategy
UK Online Strategy, July, 2001. This site provides access to reports from January 2000 through July 2001, from the e-Minister and e-Envoy to the Prime Minister, detailing progress against the action plan set out in the UK Online Annual Report.
Google's Successful Search, July 10, 2001. The search engines remains the media darling, as exemplified by yet another glowing article on their success. They handle 100 million searches daily, and has customers including 130 corporations and web sites. And, Google is "nearly profitable."
American Lawyer Media Launches Extensively Redesigned and Expanded National Law Journal, July 9, 2001. From the press release: The National Law Journal will feature a new "Litigation Week'' section with expanded case digests, as well as additional updates and summaries of verdicts and settlements in key trials throughout the country. "Courthouse,'' a new feature, will provide a national litigation docket that includes new filings, notable upcoming trials, and listings of developments in major class actions and complex litigation.
Wall Street Journal (subscription reqired)
Big Internet Companies Often Censor Their Asian Sites to Please Local Officials, July 9, 2001. Companies such as Yahoo!, MSN and Terra Lycos are voluntarily censoring their content to "appease the governments of the countries in which they are trying to expand." These countries include China, Singapore and Malaysia.
The Extent of Systematic Monitoring of Employee E-Mail and Internet Use, July 9, 2001. Worldwide, there are estimated to be 27 million monitored employees, and in the U.S. the estimate is 14 million (35%). The report provides a wealth of information concerning how specific companies and industries are monitoring their employees, the range of software they are using to do so, the cost of such monitoring, as well as press releases stating monitoring policies.
WestWork's Long Road, July 9, 2001. The goal of West Group's ambitious project, announced in January 2000, is to provide a unified desktop technology that encompasses everything from time billing to legal research. This solution was aimed at the small to mid-sized firm market. However, WestWorks now appears to be on hold, due to market conditions. (Thanks D.C.)
Acrobat Performs New Tricks, July 9, 2001. Acrobat's new version 5.0 (non-discount price of $250) supports third party digital signatures and PKI, allows documents to be made more accessible to disabled users, as well as the ability to add comments to documents that can be viewed via a browser.
New York Times (reg. req'd)
Legal Citations Are On Trial in Innovation v. Tradition, July 8, 2001. "Footnotes are being championed by legal writing specialist Bryan A. Garner, editor of Black's Law Dictionary. But some say the footnote approach undermines respect for the role of precedent and is ruining a superior system of legal citation."
You've Got Maelstrom: Dealing With Too Much E-Mail, July 6, 2001. With e-mails flooding the hard drives of home PCs as well as taxing corporate servers, the task of managing the storage and 'filing' of all this correspondence has become a time consuming burden for many.
HHS Issues First Guidance on New Patient Privacy Protection, July 6, 2001. Statement by Secretary Tommy G. Thompson - "This guidance is an opening step in helping physicians, healthcare providers and health plans understand their obligations to patients under the rule." The guidance is available at http://www.hhs.gov/ocr/hipaa.
Google Zeitgesit, July 7, 2001. The Google Press Center is regularly updating this page that provides charts and graphs indicating the continually changing interests of searchers. They track languages used to search Google, top searches by category, top 5 celebrity searches, top five misspelled queries, top 10 gaining queries, and top 10 declining queries.
USA.net to Charge for E-Mail Service, July 7, 2001. Another free e-mail service is disappearing, as USA.net's 4 million users will not have to pony up $29.99 per year. New users will be charged $49.99 per year.
U.S. Probes Security at Business Privacy Web Site, July 6, 2001. Privacy, where art thou? The U.S. Department of Commerce Safe Harbor web site is under attack, as a significant security breach was discovered. According to a notice posted on the site, "On Thursday, July 5, 2001, the Department of Commerce temporarily removed two features of the safe harbor website- the self-certification form and the safe harbor list- in order to review the security of the information submitted to the Department by U.S. organizations."
Google Takes Web's Pulse, With Surprising Results, July 6, 2001. This is a quirky little article about how people in the news are ranked in terms of how many times search requests are processed for their respective names on Google. Ah, the cult of personality!
Browser Blocks Ads and More, July 6, 2001. On July 6, ActivatorDesk released the first free public beta of its Internet desktop browser software. Its features include allowing users to block ads (including pop-up/pop under