Articles in “April 2009” from Datamation Blog

By Tom Dunlap

I have a feeling we're overreacting to this Swine Flu outbreak. At the risk of being callous, don't a certain amount of people die from various strains of the flu every year? How many times can I be reminded to wash my hands and not touch my face? And please don't call it a pandemic or compare it to the Spanish Flu of 1918.

While the health experts sort out the details, the Web is full of news and resources on the outbreak. You should also watch out for lots of bogus information.

Twitter posts regarding the outbreak are flying around faster than any virus, with swine-flu-related posts cresting at more than 10,000 an hour Tuesday, according to Mashable.com. With that much chatter, there's bound to be tons of innuendo and rumor. As your doctor, I recommend sticking with established health sites like WebMD.com.

Meanwhile, what does Oprah's boyfriend Dr. Oz have to say about all this? And anyone heard from Dr. Drew? Has a celebrity caught anything lately?

USA Today reported this week that the Web is driving new disease-tracking and prevention tools:

• Kirkland, Wash.-based Veratect, whose CEO says his researchers spotted swine-flu trends earlier this month, is posting updates on Twitter (username: veratect). The posts had about 3,800 "followers" by late Tuesday, CEO Bob Hart says.
• Los Angeles County's health department has created a YouTube channel with swine-flu resources for both health professionals and the general public (youtube.com/lapublichealth).
• Gizmodo.com fastened together a Google Maps "mash-up" that plots new swine-flu cases in real time.

All this information has also brought out some sarcastic comments. A reader with the catchy handle WhorenetBoy commented on the USA Today story thusly: "That's amazing, who would have thought to use the Internet to search for information... "

Now go wash your hands. Again. Please.

There's a new fiction novel, The Boss, based on "true stories of insensitive executives" who "behave badly with no regard for the havoc they wreak."

Sound familiar? It should. According to statistics cited by the book's author, Andrew O'Keeffe (a human resources veteran):

• The Corporate Leadership Council conducted a study and determined that of 23 job factors, the quality of an employee's supervisor had the most influence on whether that worker stayed put or looked elsewhere.
• In a study of 60,000 exit interviews, 80 percent of people who left their jobs did so because they couldn't stand working for their boss.
• Another study concluded that stress from bosses increases the incidence of heart attacks by 64 percent.

Of course, in this economy it may be more difficult for workers to find greener pastures. There may be another option. In an intriguing column on IT Career Planet, Rob England suggests that not enough workers make an intelligent effort to manage their bosses. As England writes:

Managing your manager is as important an activity as the function you are employed for, or managing your personal finances or your household. It should receive the same thought and effort.

Without Management Management, you have no control over the most important influence on your career; your boss. They write your reviews, set your pay, assign you work, decide your moves and leave. Without Management Management you are at the whim of that person. Think about that. It is seldom an attractive prospect (and you are very lucky if it is attractive).

England goes on to lay out three strategic goals and how to achieve them. It's well worth the read if your boss is getting you down, or even if you just want to take more control of your career.

A couple of weeks ago I took my family on vacation to Washington, D.C. It was a great time marred only slightly by a tragic occurrence: On our last day there, my 13-year-old daughter left her cell phone in a cab outside the hotel.

I say "tragic" because, despite owning the phone for two short weeks, my daughter already was deep in the throes of addiction. Naturally it's all about the texting. (In fact, I'm not sure why we just don't recategorize cell phones for people under age 25 or so as "texting machines," which really is what they are.)

So addicted is my daughter that she had the phone in her pocket even though its battery power had run out (she forgot the charger and we hadn't used our vehicle in three days). That was her second-biggest mistake of the trip, exceeded only by her "fashion over comfort" decision to wear new flats as we covered mile after mile on foot in our nation's capital. By our final day she was limping like a prisoner on a forced march. Hence the cab ride.

Then Verizon came to the rescue, or so it cruelly seemed. A week ago Sunday (eight days ago) I got a call on my cell phone from an unfamiliar number. I didn't answer, but looked it up online and discovered it was from a Verizon service center in the D.C. area. I called back and learned some good news: The cab driver who let us off at the hotel had found my daughter's cell phone and dropped it off at a local Verizon store, despite the fact that lemonade I didn't know was in the folded-up stroller I was carrying had spilled onto the floor of his vehicle behind the passenger seat.

I had been all set to put our $5 monthly insurance to good use and replace my daughter's phone. (I was happier about the insurance before I learned there was a $50 deductible, which Verizon always fails to mention when you're asked if you want their coverage for replacing lost, stolen or damaged cell phones. Sorry, if there's a deductible, you tell people.) But now the good people at Verizon were offering to put my daughter's recovered cell phone in the mail on Monday.

That was seven days and 432 times I've been asked, "Dad, when will I get my cell phone?" ago. Over the weekend I called the same number from which I got the initial good news to find out if the phone had been mailed. The nice woman I talked to had no idea. She couldn't even tell me which Verizon store had the phone. I'm giving it two more days (and about 47 of the same, insanity-inducing question) before swallowing the $50 deductible.

There are three lessons here:

1) Get as much information as you can when dealing with a service center, just in case the follow-through is lacking.
2) Check the seat of the cab before the driver pulls away, every time. I always do when traveling on my own, but in this case I knew I had my cell phone and wallet on me. So what could possibly have been in the cab?
3) Always wear comfortable shoes on vacation. If my daughter wasn't in such agony, she could have lost her phone on the Metro instead and I could have saved $12.

I have to wrap this up. I see my daughter's calling me from our home phone. I wonder what she wants.

Is there no end to this romantic melodrama? Microsoft and Yahoo are like a co-dependent couple. Can't live with each other, can't live without each other. The latest chapter, courtesy of internetnews.com:

Microsoft still sees value in a potential partnership with Yahoo even though it is no longer wants to buy it, CEO Steve Ballmer said on Friday.

"I have said many times that we no longer are interested in acquiring Yahoo, but we'd see the potential to create real value by partnering with Yahoo," he said at an industry event in Germany.

"I have said many times that when the time is right I'm sure we will have such discussions and I've said many times I'm not going to tell you when the time is right."

Technology blog All Things Digital reported this month the chief executives of Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT) and Yahoo (NASDAQ: YHOO) had met to discuss potential partnerships between the companies' Internet search and advertising operations. At the time, both companies declined to comment on the report.

There have been so many twists and turns to this tale since Microsoft's buyout proposal last year was rejected by Yahoo that I no longer will bother recounting them. It's on again, it's off again. There's some kind of deal, there's no deal. Get over each other, I say. Go your separate ways and live your lives. It's for the best. Years from now you can rediscover each other on Facebook. But most of all, stop talking about each other! It's driving your friends crazy.

By Tom Dunlap

A writer for the Good Times weekly here in Santa Cruz, California, has penned an impassioned Twitter hater piece, "Twitter Sucks!"

The paper's Alexander Zaitchik is fired up, writing the following:

What was once an easily avoided subculture of needy and annoying online souls is now a growing part of the social and media landscapes, with tentacles reaching into the operations of major corporations, newspapers, networks, and political campaigns. Suddenly, our skies are dark with brightly colored cartoon birds.

... There is evolutionary logic to the Twitter surge.

The progression has been steady, from blogs to RSS feeds to Facebook. But Twitter brings us within sight of an apotheosis of those aspects of American culture that have become all too familiar in recent years: look-at-me adolescent neediness, constant-contact media addiction, bird-like attention-span compression, and vapidity to the point of depravity. When 140 characters is the ascendant standard size for communication and debate, what comes next? Seventy characters? Twenty? The disappearance of words altogether, replaced by smiley-face and cranky-crab emoticons?

Here's what I tell people like Mr. Zaitchik (whom I thank for a well-written, if misguided, piece.) I don't give a tinker's damn about Tweets from Oprah, Ashton Kutcher, Brooke Burke (OK, maybe I would check those, actually), or any other "star."

I don't care that Mary Jo PR Rep has gone out for coffee. I agree that there are too many of those. I'm not a huge fan of the cutesy Twitter language that me and my Tweet-heart use. I also don't think Twitter has transcendental properties. "It's about the triumph of the human spirit," Twitter CEO "Biz" Stone told New York Magazine recently.

But as a working journalist, Twitter rocks, if you know how to tweak it.  Here's how I use it: I'm the managing editor of the newly redesigned SemanticWeb.com. I need to know what the semweb experts are reading, and who's writing what. Those experts are all over map, with many in Europe. On the Semantic Web Twitter Group, these experts alert me to dozens of stories, blogs, columns, upcoming conferences, video clips, etc. Twitter also helps drive a fair amount of traffic to the brilliant content on our WebMediaBrands web sites. (Jupitermedia was recently renamed WebMediaBrands.)

Twitter is a fantastic resource. So whine all you want, Zaitchik. 

A recent survey of companies either using or evaluating Microsoft SharePoint revealed some interesting data about security concerns regarding the risks of data tampering within the wildly popular enterprise collaboration tool.

Conducted by eMedia USA for tech security firm Surety, LLC, the survey found that nearly one-quarter of the 300 IT professionals who responded lacked confidence that their data was being adequately protected when being accessed in SharePoint. Worse, another 10 percent said they had no controls in place to ensure the integrity of electronic records. (Good thing this was an anonymous survey; I'd hate to have to answer to that appalling situation.) Since 46 percent of respondents indicated the value of the data in SharePoint exceeds $10 million, you've got to wonder what they're thinking.

Let's move past the speculative. Nearly one in five respondents (18 percent) reported having a data breach within SharePoint. Not surprisingly (though the report termed it "shocking"), the majority of those breaches (67 percent) came from insiders with access to SharePoint.

That's where those controls might come in handy. You just can't have employees roaming through SharePoint at will. They might work for you, but that doesn't mean they all have good motives or know what they're doing. Of the insider breaches, 22 percent were termed malicious and 44 percent were deemed inadvertent.

Respondents said the biggest consequence of a SharePoint breach (62 percent) would be data loss. But the list of potential negative outcomes is long and includes: financial risk, operational downtime, corporate espionage, intellectual property compromise, reputation risk, access and identity management compromise, compliance with legislation and regulations and litigation risk.

Regarding security measures in place, more than half of the respondents (54 percent) said they use IPsec/SSL encryptions, followed by information rights management (36 percent) and digital signatures (31 percent). But -- and this truly is amazing -- 16 percent have no security measures in place.

Here's the press release announcing the survey results. 

Over the weekend President Obama solidified has status as the first truly tech-savvy Oval Office occupant by naming the nation's first chief technology officer. From internetnews.com:

President Obama today announced his choice for the nation's first chief technology officer, bringing a months-long guessing game to an end with a pick that virtually no one saw coming.

Aneesh Chopra, Virginia's Secretary of Technology, landed the job. In his weekly Internet and radio address, Obama said the new position aims to "promote technological innovation to help achieve our most urgent priorities -- from creating jobs and reducing healthcare costs to keeping our nation secure."

Obama said that Chopra will work closely with White House CIO Vivek Kundra, who oversees the government's technology budget and internal IT policies.

Both positions are creations of the Obama administration, and stand as further evidence of the importance the president places on technology. After running an impressively tech-savvy campaign, Obama has pledged to use the Web to make more government information easily accessible to the public.

If you remember, the Kundra appointment as CIO hit a snag when, during the first week of his new White House job, the the FBI raided the offices Kundra until recently had run as CTO of the District of Columbia. A staff IT security expert and outside consultant were arrested as part of a bribery investigation. Though Kundra was not a target of the investigation, he took a brief leave of absence while the probe continued, returning to his new job not long after.

I wrote at the time that, just to be safe, Obama should find a replacement for Kundra. But that hasn't happened and it appears everyone's just moving forward. I don't know what I have to do to get the president to listen to me. Maybe follow him on Twitter. I just hope everything works out.

In any event, here's some more on the new federal CTO:

Chopra, who previously served as managing director of the hospital consulting Advisory Board Company, is a largely unknown figure in Silicon Valley. Obama was widely expected to pick a top gun in the industry, with figures like Google's Eric Schmidt and Vint Cerf, Microsoft's Bill Gates and Cisco's Padmasree Warrior topping many people's shortlists.

In his four years heading Virginia's technology efforts, Chopra worked extensively on health IT issues, which Obama has repeatedly said ranks as a high priority for his administration.

Chopra also worked to craft public-private partnerships to bring technical expertise from firms like Google (NASDAQ: GOOG) and Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT) inside the walls of government.

Under Chopra's direction, Virginia was one of the first states to partner with Google to implement its site-map protocols across the Web sites of the state's roughly 90 agencies. 

Chopra holds a master's degree in public policy from Harvard and a bachelor's degree in public health from Johns Hopkins.

By Tom Dunlap

Pirates are back in the news, although this time it's not treachery on the high seas. Now it's the four Swedish men who run the controversial file-sharing hub The Pirate Bay.     

In a landmark ruling today, the Stockholm district court convicted the four -- Gottfrid Svartholm Warg, Peter Sunde, Fredrik Neij, and Carl Lundstrom -- of helping millions of users illegally download music, movies, and computer games.

The Associated Press's Louise Nordstrom reported on the trial:

All four received one-year terms and were ordered to pay damages of 30 million kronor ($3.6 million) to entertainment companies, including Warner Bros, Sony Music Entertainment, EMI, and Columbia Pictures.

"We can't pay and we won't pay," Sunde said in a defiant video clip posted on the Internet. Mockingly, he held up a hand-scribbled "I owe U" note to the camera. "This is as close as you will get to having money from us," Sunde said.

With an estimated 22 million users, The Pirate Bay has become the entertainment industry's enemy No. 1 after successful court actions against file-swapping sites such as Grokster and Kazaa.

... Defense lawyers had argued the quartet should be acquitted because The Pirate Bay doesn't host any copyright-protected material. Instead, it provides a forum for its users to download content through so-called torrent files. The technology allows users to transfer parts of a large file from several different users, increasing download speeds.

The court found the defendants guilty of helping users commit copyright violations by providing a Web site with "sophisticated search functions, simple download and storage capabilities, and through the tracker linked to the Web site."

I'm torn on these file-sharing prosecutions. I do think artists should be paid for their work, although for years, lousy bands and movies stars have been gouging us. Who wants to pay $15 for a CD with one good song on it? (Thanks a lot, U2.)

The truth is, you just cannot stop this sort of file-sharing technology, especially in the hands of sharp, young technology enthusiasts who see the Internet as their birthright. So at some point it's futile to try. Movie studios, for instance, are going to have to continue to adapt. They need to try tactics like releasing the DVD of a movie the same day it hits the theaters.

I agree with one of the experts quoted by Nordstrom, and I'll let him have the last word.

File sharing wouldn't go away, [said Andre Rickardsson, a computer expert and former investigator for the Swedish security police], but users would likely turn to more advanced technological tools to hide their activities.

"It's not as if people will turn around and say 'oops, I'll have to stop file sharing now.' Instead the reaction will be 'oops, what can I do to protect myself from getting caught'."

By Tom Dunlap

If Twitter seems to be hotter than just about anything else right now, including Facebook, Miley Cyrus, and the Jonas Brothers COMBINED, that's because it is. Unique visitors to the microblogging phenom skyrocketed in the U.S. in March, according to one tracking site.

ComScore has released its March numbers for the U.S., and it estimates that unique visitors to Twitter.com grew 131 percent between February and March to 9.3 million visitors. Not only did Twitter more than double the number of people that go to its site in a single month, but it accelerated its growth from the 55 percent rate it experienced in February. These numbers do not include international visitors, nor do they include all the usage on desktop and mobile clients, which is significant in Twitter's case.

At the same time, let's be careful out there. A Twitter worm is on the rampage, if you can imagine a worm rampaging. Think Dune, minus Kyle McLaughlin on its back firing an imaginary gun.

The excellent Sean Michael Kerner reported on the worm from our sister site Internetnews.com:

Over the weekend, Twitter became the victim of a cross site scripting attack based worm that spread spam tweets. According to Twitter, nearly 200 accounts were compromised and some 10,000 messages in total were pegged as being worm spam generated.

... In total, there have been four different variants of the worm that hit Twitter over the weekend and now includes Monday. Early Monday Twitter claimed it was successfully fighting the fourth variant.

Worm or no worm, it's a remarkable story. A lot of people still don't get it, but Twitter is invaluable for finding news, commentary, video, etc. It helped greatly in the redesign and relaunch of Semanticweb.com. (Follow me on Twitter here).

Now, if we could slow down on the "Got no sleep last night. Need coffee" tweets, and all the related time-wasters, I'd be a much happy Tweeter. Maybe you could save those pearls of wisdom for your Facebook page? Just a thought.

I invite readers to check out our SemanticWeb site, which just underwent a major redesign and change in its editorial mission. The site was relaunched today.

We started SemanticWeb more than a year ago to cover the latest news and analysis regarding this revolutionary technology. But whereas before we focused almost exclusively our own content, SemanticWeb now also aggregates content from around the Internet about semantic technology, linked data and Web 3.0.

We made the change because we wanted to give readers a one-stop source for the latest news and opinions about the semantic web. The site also has a new, streamlined look as well as new features, including a box showing readers the most popular content and a tool allowing readers to comment on articles. Additional tools and features are planned.

So please drop by and take a look. If you're at all interested in the future of search technology, either as a user or provider of content, we think you'll be impressed.
 

By Tom Dunlap

Besides brilliant content, one of the things we do at WebMediaBrands and Mediabistro.com is host conferences on a variety of topics.

One of our most interesting gatherings this spring is the Web 3.0 Conference in New York, May 19-20. What's Web 3.0? It's a set of technologies, standards, and companies that are driving businesses forward. Web 3.0 is also called the Linked Data Movement or the Semantic Web, which we cover extensively. (We just redesigned SemanticWeb.com.)

To celebrate the upcoming event, Mediabistro is hosting a Web 3.0 Conference launch party April 21 in New York. Some of the conference speakers will be at the party, so if you have questions about what's next on the web, you can ask the experts, including our hosts, conference co-chairs Dan Grigorovici VP, Group Analytics Director, Rapp, and Hank Williams the CEO of Kloudshare.

The party is at Choice Kitchen & Cocktails, 380 Third Avenue. Click here for more information and to RSVP.

For coverage of the Web 3.0 Conference, check Grigorovici's Web3Beat Blog and SemanticWeb.com.

By Tom Dunlap

SANTA CRUZ, Calif. -- In the next war, the first thing they'll hit are the computers, my father-in-law said today.

It wasn't exactly a war zone here this morning, but I did see a lot of shell-shocked Internet soldiers wandering the streets, set adrift by telco pirates who keelhauled a bunch of fiber-optic cables in San Jose and San Carlos early this morning. Land lines, cell phones, and the Internet all went down in Silicon Valley and beyond, leaving tens of thousands scrambling.

As the San Francisco Chronicle reported:

Vandals cut fiber-optic cable lines belonging to AT&T at two locations early today, knocking out phones and access to 911 emergency services to thousands of residential customers and businesses in southern Santa Clara County, in Santa Cruz and San Benito counties and along the Peninsula, authorities said.

Four AT&T fiber-optic cables in an underground vault were severed shortly before 1:30 a.m. along Monterey Highway north of Blossom Hill Road in south San Jose, police Sgt. Ronnie Lopez said. Four more underground cables, at least two of which belong to AT&T, were cut about two hours later along Old County Road near Bing Street in San Carlos, authorities said.

John Britton, spokesman for AT&T, said, "Clearly, we have some vandalism. Someone purposefully and deliberately cut the wires."

Britton said the four cables that were cut in San Jose were about the width of a silver dollar and were encased in tough plastic sheath. ... In both instances, saboteurs had to use a piece of equipment to lift heavy manhole covers and climb down several feet to get to the cables. They would have to have been equipped with heavy-duty cutting equipment to slice through the thick cable coating.

Speculation about who cut the wires was running rampant. Terrorists? Extreme hackers? A union spokeswoman vehemently denied it, but some wondered if it was disgruntled members of the Communications Workers of America, as the Chronicle reported:

The vandalism comes as AT&T is in talks with the [union] for a contract covering more than 80,000 employees, who have been working under their old deal since it expired at 11:59 p.m. Saturday. Union members voted in late March to authorize a strike but have not scheduled one.

The blackout had a huge ripple affect. "Keep Santa Cruz Weird," is a popular slogan in this beach and college town, and there was much weirdness today. Here are some scenes from the Great Communications Blackout of 09.

• Frustrated ATM button punchers, staring blankly at the non-responsive screen. A long line to get into the bank behind them.
• Gasoline seekers counting their change, because the credit card machines didn't work (that was me, actually.)
• People overheard talking to each other at Internet cafes, rather than ignoring each other/staring at their screens.
• A homeless guy in line at the cafe, wondering why his cell phone didn't work, but "nobody calls me anyway."
• "At least there's coffee!" the barrista said.
• Teenage girls on the verge of tears when they realized no one was texting them.
• The highway crowded at 11:30 a.m. as Silicon Valley workers returned home.
• This reporter gassing up with the aforementioned loose change and driving south to first Moss Landing then Monterey in search of a network and a latte.

In all seriousness, it is scary to realize how much suffering a few saboteurs can inflict. In the aftermath of the blackout, I'm sure we'll be hearing from people who couldn't call police or fire. I'm sure businesses lost many thousands of dollars, or worse.

Let's hope this vandalism sparks a huge response and a realization that, in the Internet age, our infrastructure needs massive protection. I'll be at the RSA Conference 2009 in San Francisco later this month, where the sabotage will be a hot topic. Check back then for an update on this story. 

I don't own a netbook and I don't run Linux on any computers. I do, however, follow news about both and try to stay informed. So when I saw this item about how Microsoft, in one year, has virtually pushed Linux out of the netbook OS market by grabbing a 96 percent share, I was so dumbfounded I couldn't write about it. I just couldn't get my head around that fact. It didn't make any sense to me, but there it was, according to market research firm NPD Group.

Thanks to my colleague Carla Schroder over at Linux Today, now I know why I was so confused: It isn't true. Here's what Carla wrote in her blog:

The anti-Linux propaganda du jour, being dutifully parroted by "news" publications everywhere, is that Windows now owns 96% of the netbook market, and that Linux netbooks are returned four times more than windows netbooks. Both are untrue and have been debunked repeatedly. Yet they persist -- why?

I think Microsoft is growing increasingly desperate, and in hard economic times is finding equally desperate publications who will say anything for a few bucks. Which may be a harsh judgment, but I would rather believe that than believe they simply don't care to do even the simplest, most basic fact-checking, or are such hard-core Microsoft fanboys that they are only pretending to be journalists when they are really stringers for Microsoft's marketing department. How else can we explain the same nonsense repeated endlessly, their allergies to saying "Windows" and "malware" in the same sentence, the short shrift given to non-Windows software, the mind-boggling assumption that Windows is computing?

Carla, seriously, tell us how you really feel!

As it is not part of Microsoft's business plan to participate in a genuinely competitive marketplace, expect to see this sort of thing become even more prevalent. If that is possible; I thought the FUD and anti-Linux propaganda had already reached the saturation point, but it looks like I was wrong.

She then cites a Computerworld column by Steven Vaughan-Nichols that helps debunk the 96 percent claim. He writes:

[Microsoft's Brandon] LaBlanc opened [his blog post] by claiming that almost all netbooks sold today are sold with Windows. Well, no, not really. The numbers LaBlanc cites are from NPD's sales survey. NPD focuses on brick-and-mortar U.S. sales, not overall sales. Notice how many Linux systems you see at Best Buy? NPD numbers say a lot more about retail channel sales than it does over-all sales. Besides, as Canonical's director of business development Kenyon wrote, "However here is an interesting fact--when customers are offered choice on equally well-engineered computers around a third will select Ubuntu over XP.

In her blog, Carla goes on to make an impassioned and stirring plea for computer users to rise up and break free of Microsoft's market shackles. Except now I feel like a tool for running Microsoft on a desktop and two laptops. So here is my vow: My next computer will run Linux. I just gotta do some homework first.

You opened my eyes, Carla. I owe you one.

By Tom Dunlap

The Associated Press is right. It's about time they woke up.

On Monday, the venerable news organization decided to finally get tough on Google, Yahoo, and others who "aggregate" AP's content, then make money off those links by putting ads on pages that show those links. AP is also going after the sites that outright steal AP stories.

The New York Times filed this report on the story:

Taking aim at the way news is spread across the Internet, The Associated Press said on Monday that Web sites that used the work of news organizations must obtain permission and share revenue with them, and that it would take legal action against those that did not.

AP executives said they were concerned about a variety of news forums around the Web, including major search engines like Google and Yahoo and aggregators like the Drudge Report that link to news articles, smaller sites that sometimes reproduce articles whole, and companies that sell packaged news feeds.

They said they did not want to stop the appearance of articles around the Web, but to exercise some control over the practice and to profit from it.

Farther down in the article, some key details emerge:

The AP and other wire services have licensing agreements with Google, Yahoo and others, for some of their content to appear on those sites' news pages, while newspapers generally do not. But general Web searches on those sites often turn up wire service material that is not covered by the agreements.

In parts of Europe, newspapers have gone further in trying to block unauthorized use of their work online. In 2007, a Belgian court blocked Google from using articles from some newspapers in that country, and Danish newspapers warned Google away from using their material without first reaching some kind of agreement. Several days ago, the British newspaper industry asked the government to intervene on its behalf to force Google to stop using newspaper articles without paying for them.

Much as I love the Internet, I don't want newspapers to die. I worked at newspapers in the San Francisco Bay Area for many years (starting at the long-dead Peninsula Times Tribune in Palo Alto), and it pains me to see them suffering and my friends getting sacked. We need all their local coverage, their investigative reports, the comics, the letters to the editor, Dear Abby, sports, obits, the whole package. "Where the press is free, and every man is able to read, all is safe," Thomas Jefferson said.

All the newspaper lovers I know are worried. My mother said she'd gladly pay more every day to keep getting the San Francisco Chronicle and all its great stories and columns.

The excessive linking and the full-on co-opting of stories is out of control on the Internet. It's time to get a grip and make sure the reporters doing the hard work are getting the recognition and money they deserve. 

If you want to read a very lively discussion on this, go to this Slashdot page. 

What is it with these downtrodden tech companies that are targets of buyouts insisting they're being undervalued and walking away from negotiations?

That's what Yahoo did last year with Microsoft after Redmond made an acquisition offer well above the search pioneer's stock price. Now Sun Microsystems is playing the same brand of ill-advised hardball with IBM:

The Wall Street Journal is reporting that merger talks between Sun Microsystems (NASDAQ: JAVA) and IBM (NYSE: IBM) have collapsed, placing the potential $7 billion deal in jeopardy.

The WSJ reported that Sun officials felt that IBM's offer of $9.40 a share or less was too low and that IBM had too much leeway to walk away from the deal, which could face substantial antitrust issues in the Unix server and mainframe storage markets.

The two sides could still work out a deal, but the Journal reported that Sun has sent a notice terminating IBM's agreement for exclusive negotiations, while IBM has withdrawn its offer to buy Sun. The two sides apparently remain in touch by phone, however.

On March 18, when the rumor first was reported by the WSJ, I wrote that IBM's offer was way overpriced. The market confirmed this by nearly doubling Sun's (NASDAQ:JAVA) share price to $8.85 by the end of that day. Today, the market is responding in an equally rational fashion. Sun, whichclosed Friday at $8.49, was down the entire day, rallying slightly at Monday's close to end at $6.50, a drop of 23.3%.

So where does this leave Sun. In the same place as Yahoo -- with uncertain prospects at best:

Sun is believed to have no other prospective suitors, as the company reportedly sought bids from other large IT companies after IBM expressed an interest but found no takers.

The Journal reported that Sun's board is split over the proposed deal, with Sun chairman and co-founder Scott McNealy leading the opposition, and CEO Jonathan Schwartz heading the side in favor of the merger.

If this is true, I'd say that McNealy is doing exactly what Yahoo co-founder Jerry Yang was doing in rejecting Microsoft's buyout offer: Letting emotions and misplaced loyalty get in the way of rationality and common sense. Their jobs are to look at the current handwriting on the wall and consider the best interests of today's stockholders. The economy is horrible, Sun continues to lose money, it has no viable turnaround strategy and no other company appears interested in buying it. Clinging to fond memories of the past does no one any good.

By Tom Dunlap

The Twitsphere and the blogosphere are, yes, all a-twitter today with rumors that Google is getting close to snapping up Twitter.

If it comes to pass, it would be the second coup for Twitter co-founders "Biz" Stone (his real first name is Isaac) and Evan Williams. They sold Blogger to Google just five years ago, turning it into possibly the most popular blogging platform on the planet. (Blogger recently repeated as product of the year at Intranet Journal.)

As Reuters reported today:

Google may be in talks to buy Internet start-up Twitter, the free micro-blogging service that allows people to send short text messages to a network of friends, the TechCrunch Web site said late Thursday.

TechCrunch's article by Michael Arrington said the two companies are also considering working together on a Google real-time search engine.

Google would pay for Twitter in cash or stock or a combination of the two, the website reported.

Industry experts say Arrington has a mixed record but was the first to report the rumor that Google would buy video-sharing site YouTube in late 2006.

Stone posted a non-denial blog about the rumors this morning, entitled "Sometimes We Talk." (Makes me think of some 80s song, and I'm dating myself here, "sometimes when we touch, the honesty's too much.")

Meanwhile, Stone was on The Colbert Report last night, but I fell asleep before I could get to it. Don't worry, it's DVR'd. The great Colbert gave Stone a hard time, as reported by Kara Swisher:

When Stone went on about how Twitter planned to be a "strong, profitable, independent company," Colbert was ready with a zinger.

"You and Pets.com."

Hi-jinks aside, the sale would be a massive feather in Google's cap. The Twitter phenomenon is exploding faster than anything I've seen in ages and it's just going to grow in value.

First, why anyone would launch a new product on April 1 is beyond me. You're just asking for trouble. But that's what Research in Motion did yesterday when it unveiled BlackBerry App World, its phone-based store for BlackBerry smartphone users.

I've read several reviews that say App World isn't as intuitive, fun or cool as Apple's App Store for iPhone users. I wouldn't know, as I don't own an iPhone. But I do have a BlackBerry Curve 8330 from Verizon, so I downloaded App World last night after giving up during the day because I was getting error messages. Even late at night, when the initial mad rush of downloads was over, it still took about a half-hour to load onto my BlackBerry. A one-time hassle.

Many of the applications in App World are free, but most cost anywhere from $2.99 to $9.99 (with a handful as high as $59.99) and have to be purchased via a Pay Pal account.

And while the phone store will continue to add applications from partners, I want to focus on what it has now to get a sense of where RIM is going with this.

Here are the basic categories and number of apps in each:

Entertainment -- 16
Games -- 233
Maps & Navigation -- 4
Music & Video -- 10
News & Weather -- 16
Personal Finance & Banking -- 13
Personal Health & Wellness -- 9
Productivity & Utilities -- 99
Professional & Business -- 13
Reference & eBooks -- 65
Social Networking & Sharing -- 20
Sports & Recreation -- 37
Travel -- 25

That's 560 apps right now, with 42% of them being games. I don't get that. The BlackBerry never is going to be the iPhone, and the BlackBerry demographic is different than the iPhone demographic. Why try to compete on the iPhone's turf? I understand responding to the iPhone with the Storm's touch screen, but that's a functional thing. This is different. I don't know, maybe RIM's market research says otherwise. We'll see how it plays out.

And what's the first app listed in the first category (Entertainment): PhoneyFart, which costs $2.99. Are you kidding me? This is pathetic. That'll slay 'em in the board meeting. The rest of the apps in Entertainment look like crap, quite frankly, with the possible exception of Tone Maker ($2.99) from Sonic Boom, which allows you to create your own ringtones.

The games are divided into five sub-categories: Arcade & Action, Card & Casino, Puzzles & Mind Teasers, Sports, and Strategy & Board. Not quite sure why this is in Strategy & Board, but one cool app is Guitar Trainer ($4.99) from MobileTutor.org, which helps musicians learn their way around the fretboard of any stringed instrument. I understand this is a much more limited audience than anyone who can play guitar hero, I'm just saying it has some tangible value beyond mere entertainment.

News & Weather includes news feeds from AP ($2.99) and CBS News, Newsweek, Slate Magazine and The Washington Post (all free).

Personal Finance & Banking features both a free and paid version ($9.99) of Personal Assistant from Pageonce. PA allows you to monitor banking, credit card transactions, cell minutes, air miles, social networks, you Netflix queue and email, all without needing a password.

Personal Health & Wellness has some calorie-counting apps, Stretch on the go ($4.99) from Mobifusion, and something called Woman Mobile ($19.99!) from Mobile Systems Inc., which is a "medical calendar for BlackBerry devices designed to assist women in keeping accurate records of their menstrual cycle." (This may be one of the first references to "menstrual cycles" in a blog for IT professionals. I just want to note that.)

The second-largest App World category, Productivity & Utilities, is divided into five sub-categories: Clocks, Calculators & Utilities, Document Management, On-the-Go Productivity, Personal Organization, and Voice Dictation. The two most expensive apps I saw in App World were in the Document Management sub-category: IdeaMatrix Professional ($59.99) from REXwireless Inc., billed as "note and idea management software," and RSIC BlackBox (also $59.99) from RSIC, a mileage, time and expense-tracking application.

The Social Networking & Sharing category has free apps for MySpace, Facebook, Google Talk, Yahoo Messenger and ICQ.

Sports & Recreation offers free links to a number of professional sports teams' sites, while Travel features a currency converter and guides to several major cities.

Overall, it's not Apple's App Store. But my point earlier was that BlackBerry App World doesn't have to be, nor should it try to be. It if delivers the kind of apps that BlackBerry users want and need, it will be a success.