Policy

FTC near decision on Google antitrust inquiry, report says

Google will know by year's end whether it will face legal action over antitrust issues, according to a report.

The New York Times reports that Jon Leibowitz, chairman of the Federal Trade Commission, told reporters after a luncheon at Georgetown University in Washington, D.C., that he hoped to resolve the inquiry into Google's search results and advertising practices within the next few months.

The FTC has been looking into Google's practices for more than a year now, amid claims the company unfairly privileges search results having to do with its products over those involving competitors' offerings. … Read more

Google, Facebook, Amazon lead new tech lobby group

The Internet Association, a lobbying group made up of some of the Web's most powerful companies, has officially launched.

The organization today announced that it's now operating in Washington, D.C. under the leadership of president and CEO Michael Beckerman. First announced earlier this year, the Internet Association is backed by 14 giants of the Web, including Amazon, AOL, Google, Facebook, Yahoo, and others. The companies hope to have their voices heard in Washington, Beckerman says.

"A free and innovative Internet is vital to our nation's economic growth," Beckerman said today in a statement. "… Read more

San Francisco Mayor Ed Lee banks on tech startups

SAN FRANCISCO--"San Francisco is the innovation capital of the world," Mayor Ed Lee proclaimed to more that 3,000 techies gathered here at the TechCrunch Disrupt conference. He was preaching to the choir as he previewed a map showing more than 800 startups located in San Francisco. The map is part of InnovateSF, a month-long series of events in October to promote tech innovation in the city.

Legendary angel investor Ron Conway echoed Lee's cheerleading for San Francisco as a capital of Silicon Valley. "When Pinterest moved to San Francisco (from Palo Alto, Calif.) a … Read more

Cory Booker's plan to 'hack' politics and disrupt democracy

SAN FRANCISCO -- Newark, N.J., Mayor Cory Booker, a rising star in the Democratic Party, came to San Francisco to introduce #waywire, a video news product he co-founded, and to appeal for the use of technology to "disrupt our democracy and hack our politics to better reflect the purpose of our people."

Speaking at TechCrunch Disrupt here, Booker described #waywire as an app for creating, collecting and sharing news video. #waywire is now available in "alpha" and has an iPhone app, and is integrated with social networks such as Facebook and … Read more

AT&T to test Text-to-911 service in Tennessee

Mobile phone users across the country may one day be able to text 911 call centers.

AT&T has been given the go-ahead by the state of Tennessee to kick off a trial of a Text-to-911 service across the state. Using the state's new Emergency Service IP Network (ESInet), the test will let AT&T subscribers send text messages to Tennessee 911 call centers.

Dialing 911 by phone is still the preferred way to get help as quickly and easily as possible. But the trial phase would try to add texting to the 911 system as another … Read more

Gawker writer dons pink tutu in response to Anonymous demand

Let's hope this won't become a regular demand before sources agree to speak with writers, but it did make for quite the sight as the tech world returned from the long Labor Day weekend: Gawker's Adrian Chen published a picture of himself today resplendent in a a pink tutu with a shoe on his head after the shadowy group declared in a note left on the hacker document-sharing site Pastebin the following:

to journalists: no more interviews to anyone till Adrian Chen get featured in the front page of Gawker, a whole day, with a huge picture … Read more

Homeland Security's domain seizures worries Congress

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security is seizing domains and taking down URLs in the name of copyright infringement, but its tactics are worrying certain members of Congress.

In a letter (pdf) sent last week to Attorney General Eric Holder and Secretary Janet Napolitano, three members of the House Judiciary Committee aired their unease.

"We are concerned about your Departments' seizure of domain names under Operation In Our Sites, launched in November 2010," the letter said. "Our concern centers on your Department's methods, and the process given, when seizing the domain names of websites whose … Read more

Why Net neutrality is incompatible with 'Internet freedom'

commentary These two words -- "Internet freedom" -- are ricocheting around cyberspace almost as fast as neutrons and protons bouncing around inside an atom's nucleus. Well, almost as fast.

Both Republicans and Democrats -- and most everyone else -- proclaim to be in favor of Internet freedom. Here's a Fox News article, "The 2012 Political Tug of War for the Internet," that describes the political effort to capture the "Internet Freedom" flag. The article points out that the Republican Party platform has a plank expressly headed, "Protecting Internet Freedom," and … Read more

Memo to Jerry Brown: Sign SB 1161 for all Internet users

commentary California lawmakers have taken an encouraging step to keep government from tinkering with the mechanics of the Internet. As first reported by CNET in June, SB 1161, which passed last week, prohibits the state's Public Utilities Commission from imposing new regulations on "Voice over Internet Protocol and Internet Protocol enabled services," except when specifically authorized by the legislature or by federal authorities.

SB 1161, which is only four pages long, was approved in May by an overwhelming bipartisan majority of the state's Senate. On August 22, it cleared the state Assembly by a margin of … Read more

Amazon looks at book purchases to size up presidential race

Amazon is culling sales data to determine what the election season conversation might be about in each of the 50 U.S. states.

The e-retail giant yesterday launched the Amazon Election Heat Map 2012. The map lists all 50 states, as well as the District of Columbia, and assigns either a red or blue color to each, depending on the number of conservative- or liberal-minded books purchased by citizens. If a state has purchased more liberal books, it'll be shaded blue. States with more conservative book purchases will be shaded red.

Judging by the current map, the U.S. … Read more