Apple beefs up privacy protections in iOS 7. Here’s one reason: iOS 7 users aren’t just consumers; they are customers — of Apple. And, with its finger on the pulse of the market, Apple knows that customers don’t like being tracked like animals. (Note: I’m no fan of silos, and Apple has one here. But still, this move by Apple is worth noting because it’s in alignment with the human beings using their products, and not with the marketing world. You can’t abuse customers the way you can abuse mere consumers.)
The Trajectory of Television—starting with a big history of the small screen: From surrogate storyteller to high-def streaming infotainment, TV has come a long way, by Lee Hutchison in Ars Technica
How accurate are fitness monitors? by Gretchen Reynolds in the New York Times. …the lesson at the moment for anyone who owns an accelerometer is that the device’s measurements are likely to be imperfect.
Sweden’s data protection Authority bans Google cloud services over privacy concerns, by Simon Davies in The Privacy Surgeon
Court finds NSA surveillance unconstitutional. Administration’s response: keep the ruling secret and carry on, in 57un, an Anonymous site.
Merkley waves Verizon phone, demands NSA chief share grounds for seizing data, by Justin Sink in The Hill.
Not Just the NSA: Politicians Are Data Mining the American Electorate, by John Nicholsin The Nation
TV B-Gone
Top secret clearance holders so numerous they include ‘packers/craters’, by Max Fisher in the Washington Post.
Did Obama just destroy the U.S. Internet industry? by David Kirkpatrick in Techonomy. In a word, no. In two words, it’s complicated. For example, the Patriot Act salted the common ground between the U.S. and the rest of the world, starting a decade ago.
SCOTUS plays Solomon on gene patents, by John Wilbanks.
The five stages of living in a national surveillance state, by Tom Tomorrow
Federal Communications Bar Association (FCBA) Panel on the FCC Incentive Auction Proceeding at T-Mobile NYC on June 5 2013. Via the ISOC-NY list, which says, This was a highly informative event on the Government’s scheme to transfer spectrum from television to wireless communication networks. The panel included, as well as reps from those industries, a consumer advocate and a financial analyst.
This abuse of the Patriot Act must end: President Obama falsely claims Congress authorised all NSA surveillance. In fact, our law was designed to protect liberties, by Jim Sensenbrenner in The Guardian. Sensenbrenner is a Republican congressman and former Chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, and says in this piece, The administration claims authority to sift through details of our private lives because the Patriot Act says that it can. I disagree. I authored the Patriot Act, and this is an abuse of that law.
