NewsScan Daily, 29 April 2004 ("Above The Fold")

NewsScan Daily, 29 April 2004 ("Above The Fold")
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"ABOVE THE FOLD"
        Patriot Act Rules Muffle Dissent
        Four Spammers Face Criminal Charges
        Apple Whistles a Happy iTune
        Bowie Calls on Bootleggers
        Coffee Can Wait -- Give Me My Net!
        Technology Marches Ahead, Grammar Gets Worse

FEATURES
        Flash Card
        Worth Thinking About: Being Out of Touch

PATRIOT ACT RULES MUFFLE DISSENT
      The secrecy provisions of the USA Patriot Act have prevented the 
American Civil Liberties Union from publicizing a lawsuit it filed three 
weeks ago challenging the FBI's methods of obtaining many business records. 
The ACLU was recently allowed to release a redacted version of the lawsuit 
following extended negotiations with the Justice Department. "It is 
remarkable that a gag provision in the Patriot Act kept the public in the 
dark about the mere fact that a constitutional challenge had been filed in 
court," says ACLU associate legal director Ann Beeson. "President Bush can 
talk about extending the life of the Patriot Act, but the ACLU is gagged 
from discussing details of our challenge to it." The crux of the ACLU's 
case concerns a section of the Act that allows the FBI to request financial 
records, telephone and e-mail logs, and other documents from businesses 
without a warrant or judicial approval. Such requests are known as 
"national security letters," and the FBI has issued scores of such letters 
since late 2001. The ACLU complaint says that using national security 
letters to force Internet service providers to turn over names, screen 
names, e-mail addresses and other customer information without proper 
notice to customers raises questions about the constitutionality of the 
Patriot Act's legal underpinnings. (Washington Post 29 Apr 2004)
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A51423-2004Apr28.html

FOUR SPAMMERS FACE CRIMINAL CHARGES
      Four California men face criminal charges for sending millions of 
junk e-mail messages, becoming the first spammers to be charged under the 
recently enacted federal CAN-SPAM Act. Christopher Chung, Mark Sadek and 
Daniel and James Lin are accused of secretly hijacking proxy servers -- 
systems that relay e-mail from any point on the Internet -- owned by 
unsuspecting businesses such as Ford Motor Co., Unisys and Amoco, and 
government agencies, including the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts 
and the U.S. Army Information Center. The use of proxy servers is a 
favorite trick among spammers to disguise their identity. "This has been a 
problem that's plagued the Net for years, and the fact that corporations 
and government agencies still have open mail servers is scandalous," says 
one security consultant. "Somebody dropped the ball." If convicted, the men 
face up to five years in prison for violating the anti-spam law, as well as 
up to 20 years for mail fraud for distributing an allegedly fraudulent 
weight loss skin patch. The group also sent spam mail hawking male organ 
enlargement pills and Viagra. Terence Berg, the assistant U.S. attorney 
handling the case, warns that this lawsuit is a harbinger of more to come: 
"This is just a start. There will be many more prosecutions like this. The 
government is determined to do something about the flood of spam that is 
polluting the Internet." (Detroit Free Press/SiliconValley.com 29 Apr 2004)
http://www.siliconvalley.com/mld/siliconvalley/8546422.htm

APPLE WHISTLES A HAPPY ITUNE
      Apple Computer says it's sold more than 70 million songs during the 
first year of its iTunes online music service and chief executive Steve 
Jobs says the company's now selling 2.7 million songs a week at 99 cents 
per song. "We feel we have lots of momentum," he notes. Apple has recently 
renegotiated the licensing arrangements with the five major record labels 
to allow iTunes purchasers to share the songs among five personal computers 
instead of three. In addition, the iTunes service is offering several new 
features, including music videos and the ability for users to publish 
"playlists" of favorite music lineups. At the same time, the number of 
times a particular playlist can be burned on a user's CD has been reduced 
from 10 times to seven. Apple says it's considered moving to the 
subscription business model, but has rejected that shift, noting that it 
believes most users would rather own their songs than rent them for a 
limited time. (New York Times 29 Apr 2004)
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/04/29/technology/29apple.html

BOWIE CALLS ON BOOTLEGGERS
      David Bowie has invited fans to bootleg his music -- and he's 
offering prizes for the most creative theft. The musician's Web site 
invites fans to mix classic Bowie songs with material from his latest 
album, "Reality" to create a "mash-up" -- a track superimposing the vocal 
line from one song with the backing tracks from another. The technique has 
long been employed by record producers, but music software has made it 
accessible to thousands of "bedroom DJs" - to the alarm of record companies 
battling to control the distribution of music through the Internet. Bowie, 
57, was quoted in The Times, saying mash-ups were "a great appropriation 
idea waiting to happen." "Being a hybrid maker off and on over the years, 
I'm very comfortable with the idea and have been the subject of quite a few 
pretty good mash-ups myself," he said. (The Australian, 27 Apr 2004, rec'd 
from John Lamp, Deakin University)
http://australianit.news.com.au/articles/0,7204,9402775%5E15306%5E%5Enbv%5E,00.html 


COFFEE CAN WAIT -- GIVE ME MY NET!
      Given the choice between going online or enjoying a morning cup of 
coffee, almost half of workers polled (49%) say they'd forgo the java, 
according to a survey by Websense. But the response signals trouble ahead 
for employers, who fear that productivity is suffering as a result of 
workers' Net addiction. While 51% of employees surveyed said they spent 
only about two hours a week on personal Web surfing, IT managers pegged the 
number at a far higher six-plus hours a week. IT managers also expressed 
concern over network security when employees took their laptops home with 
them. "Some employees take their laptops home and use their own time to 
download a movie. They may access a site where there's spyware or a virus 
and then they bring their laptop back to work and don't realize they've 
exposed people on their network," says Kian Saneii, VP of marketing at 
Websense. (CNet News.com 28 Apr 2004)
http://news.com.com/2100-7355-5201726.html

TECHNOLOGY MARCHES AHEAD, GRAMMAR GETS WORSE
      Text messages, e-mail and the push for faster and more efficient 
communications are taking their toll on grammar, language experts believe. 
Queensland University of Technology sociolinguistics lecturer Jo Carr notes 
that people using e-mail and SMS text messaging are unconcerned about 
grammar and punctuation: "Grammar rules used to be an indication of social 
class and literacy in the past but today's society are doing things 
differently because language today serves the purpose of speed and social 
interaction." Macquarie Dictionary editorial committee member Sue Butler 
says grammar and punctuation are increasingly underused in Australia and 
around the world. "We now do get a failing in standards of punctuation that 
can be disconcerting," she notes. Media such as television advertisements 
and public billboards often sacrifice grammar and punctuation to engage 
audiences in the most efficient, shortest time possible, and correct 
grammar also is a low priority on live radio and television when 
politicians and news presenters make mistakes because they have to think 
and speak faster, says Butler. (The Age 23 Apr 2004, rec'd from John Lamp, 
Deakin University)
http://theage.com.au/articles/2004/04/23/1082616314126.html

*****

FLASH CARD
      "Travel is only glamorous in retrospect." (Paul Theroux)

WORTH THINKING ABOUT: BEING OUT OF TOUCH
      Popular travel writer and novelist Paul Theroux confesses to what for 
him was a desirable side benefit of his recent return to Africa.
      "Out of touch in Africa was where I wanted to be. The wish to 
disappear sends many travelers away. If you are thoroughly sick of being 
kept waiting at home or at work, travel is perfect: let other people wait 
for a change. Travel is a sort of revenge for having been put on hold, 
having to leave messages on answering machines, not knowing your party's 
extension, being kept waiting all your working life.
      "Travel in the African bush can also be a sort of revenge on cellular 
phones and fax machines, on telephones and the daily paper, on the creepier 
aspects of globalization that allow anyone who chooses to get his 
insinuating hands on you. I desired to be unobtainable.
      "I was going to Africa for the best reason -- in a spirit of 
discovery; and for the pettiest -- simply to disappear, to light out, with 
a suggestion of I dare you to try and find me.
      "Home had become a routine, and routines make time pass quickly. I 
was a sitting duck in my predictable routine: people knew when to call me; 
they knew when I would be at my desk. I was in such regular touch it was 
like having a job, a mode of life I hated. I was sick of being called up 
and importuned, asked for favors, hit up for money. You stick around too 
long and people begin to impose their own deadlines on you. 'I need this by 
the twenty-fifth' or 'Please read this by Friday' or 'Try to finish this 
over the weekend' or 'Let's have a conference call on Wednesday.' Call me, 
fax me, e-mail me. You can get me anytime on my cell phone, here's the number.
      "Being available at any time in the totally accessible world seemed 
to me pure horror. It made me want to find a place that was not accessible 
at all: no phones, no fax machines, not even mail delivery, the wonderful 
old world of being out of touch. In other words, gone away."
                     ***
See 
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0618446877/newsscancom/ref=nosim 
for Paul Theroux's "Dark Star Safari: Overland From Cairo To Cape Town" -- 
or look for it in your favorite library. (We donate all revenue from our 
book recommendations to adult literacy programs.)

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