Internet – Page 3

CRTC launches public consultation on internet and telephony

July 28, 2010 Doug Groves canada, CRTC, Internet, Obligation to Serve, online rights, public consultation1 Comment

Last Friday, the CRTC launched a new public consultation to get feedback from Canadians on their telephone and internet services. Being cynical about the impact of such a public consultation, especially one with the title Obligation to Serve, would be the easy approach, given some of the CRTC’s past decisions regarding internet services. I’ll try not to be though, and suggest that everyone visit the public page and speak their mind. You can catch the full announcement after the break…

Router exploit leaves millions vulnerable

July 22, 2010July 22, 2010 Doug Groves DNS rebinding, hack, router, security1 Comment

One of the biggest problems with computer security has to do with password protection. Although it took a few years, most users are now smart enough to make sure they have proper password protection both on their computers and their WiFi, but a new variation of an old exploit appears to leave a wide range of consumer grade routers vulnerable to attack The exploit, reported by Ars Technica, and to presented at the Black Hat security conference as “How to Hack Millions of Routers”, is a new take on an…

Evan Ratliff interview

July 16, 2010July 16, 2010 Doug Groves Evan Ratliff, interview, James Donald Gatz, NXNE, NXNEi, Vanish, Wired, Wired Vanish4 Comments

Last year, Evan Ratliff went on the lam as an experiment for Wired magazine. The goal was to remain untraceable for 30 days, while assuming a new persona and maintaining an online and digital lifestyle. The reward for uncovering him was $5000 US. We caught up with Evan after his talk at NXNEi 2010.

There’s a TV for that – Samsung’s Connected TV message

July 12, 2010July 14, 2010 Doug Groves Connected TV, LinkStick, Samsung, Samsung Apps1 Comment

First shown off at CES back in January, it appears that Samsung is ready to make a huge push in the TV market with their web applications on newer model TV sets and Blu Ray players, under the name ‘Samsung Apps‘, not to be confused with the mobile phone Samsung Apps. To sell the point to consumers, they’re making a play on Apple’s “There’s an app for that” iPhone advertising, which, while not the most original approach, will probably resonate with consumers used to the ubiquitous phrase. This is…

Crowd sourced funding and distribution brings Pioneer One TV series to life

June 17, 2010June 17, 2010 Doug Groves bit torrent, crowd sourcing, Kickstarter, P2P, Pioneer One, torrent, VODO, vodo.net4 Comments

It was just yesterday at NXNEi that we were talking with Perry Chen, one of the founders of Kickstarter about how the site has really helped facilitate crowd sourcing funding for creative projects, and how it can really help independent creators off the ground. Even as we were talking to him, a Kickstarter funded TV project called Pioneer One saw the premiere of it’s pilot episode (includes .torrent link), via crowd sourced distribution network VODO.net. Pioneer One, which is political thriller with a science fiction element as it’s jumping off…

NXNE – fairly interactive

June 16, 2010June 16, 2010 Doug Groves Evan Ratliff, Interaxon, Kickstarter, NXNE, NXNE 2010, NXNEi, Perry Chen, Vanished, Ze Frank, zefrank5 Comments

As the inaugural year for NXNE interactive (NXNEi), the annual festival played it fairly small, with the focus being on a number of panels and conferences leading into the much larger music and film component. With a number of fascinating panels, from brain-computer-interfaces by Interaxon to established internet artists such as zefrank and a presentation from Kickstarter, which crowd sources funding for art projects across many disciplines, NXNEi was definitely about establishing online connections, not just in the business sense, but on a more personal and human level. Sometimes it…

Astroturf Bill C-32 groups started by CRIA

June 16, 2010 Doug Groves astroturf, Balanced Copyright For Canada, bill C-32, copyright, CRIA, DMCA, Michael Geist, RIAA1 Comment

There are a number of citizen’s groups that have formed around the new Canadian copyright bill C-32, nicknamed the DMCA for Canada. Most of these groups are real people concerned about changes to Canadian copyright policies in the digital age. Now, via Michael Geist, comes the story of Balanced Copyright for Canada, a group preteneding to be ordinary citizens, but apparently created by the CRIA (Canadian Record Industry Association don’t you know). They’re making use of the same social media tools that grassroots organizations on either side of the argument…

NXNE 2010 kicks into gear

June 15, 2010 Doug Groves Film, Iggy And The Stooges, interactive, Music, North By Northwest, NXNE, NXNE 2010, NXNEi, Toronto2 Comments

It was a different world when Toronto’s NXNE (North By Northwest don’t you know) started out in 1994 as a music festival, based on the model by sister event SXSW (South By Southwest, natch). Even in the early days, NXNE was an ambitious affair with dozens of venues and enough bands, and music lovers, to fill them up. Since then the festival has grown and evolved, adding the film component in 2001, and most recently introducing NXNE interactive. Although nothing so big is expected here, it was at SXSW interactive…

Bill C-32 and digital locks

June 8, 2010 Doug Groves bill C-32, copyright, digital locks, DMCA, DRM, Michael Geist, privacy1 Comment

When the Canadian government put forth it’s new copyright bill last week there were few surprises. The new bill still supports making circumvention of digital locks illegal, thereby negating many of the fair dealing provisions allowed for in the Conservative’s ‘new and improved’ version of bill C-61. Support for freeing up the DRM section of bill C-32 has been growing since it’s announcement. Besides the large swath of consumers opposed to DRM’ed content, groups such as The Canadian Booksellers Association and the Retail Council of Canada are saying “some parts…

Steve Jobs: The Boy Who Cried HTML5

June 6, 2010June 6, 2010 Doug Groves Apple, Chrome, Firefox, HTML 5, IE8, Safari, ua string, user agent, user agent string3 Comments

Ever since the Apple vs. Adobe tiff escalated to open letters and snark, the press has been eagerly gobbling this up as fodder to support the horse they’re backing. I’d say that few have actually stepped back to say that both sides are at least partially to blame. Apple wouldn’t have any ammo to fire at Adobe, if Adobe itself had actually delivered better mobile Flash technology much sooner. In the past it dabbled in Flash Lite, which gave some minor functionality, but it’s not until the past couple of…

New Canadian Copyright bill coming Thursday?

May 31, 2010May 31, 2010 Doug Groves Canadian DMCA, copyright, DRM, Tony Clement2 Comments

According to an article today by Michael Geist, one of Canada’s leading copyfighters, it looks like the replacement for the defunct bill C61 is going to be tabled by the Conservative government as early as Thursday. In Geist’s round up, he points out out that DMCA style anti-circumvention legislation, the most contentious part of C61, will remain intact, though there may be flexibility on time and format shifting. It also looks like the government is aiming to fast track the bill through Parliament. Geist also includes a quote from Industry…

The fastest browser on Earth

May 28, 2010May 28, 2010 drsquid browser, Chrome, Firefox, google, opera, parody, share, video0 comment

Opera, the 5th placed browser, released this funny video yesterday that parodies the Google Chrome speed test videos. Opera’s usage share of web browsers has held steady at approximately 2% since it came out. However, since its release in 2008, Chromes’ share has rapidly grown, at Firefox’s expense. I am sure Opera is hoping that this video will persuade other dissatisfied Firefox users to make the switch to them instead.