[Cybertel-Ann] 2.28.8 :: Fear Innovation :: Denial of Citizenship Attack :: Pie in the Sky :: Survey Says! 300 kbps :: Pakistan is no longer the best route to YouTube :: 2008 Election Results Announced ::

Thu Feb 28 15:17:02 PST 2008

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             CyberTelecom News  
      Federal Internet Law and Policy
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We obtain better knowledge of a person during one
hour's play and games than by conversing with him for
a whole year – Plato.

WSJ Fears Innovation: Net Neutrality As Internet
Wrecking Ball, Peerflow
Apparently this WSJ opinion writer couldn't actually
argue with Ed Markey's net neutrality bill, so he made
up a straw man:
http://riskman.typepad.com/peerflow/2008/02/wsj-fears-innov.html
More Info: http://www.cybertelecom.org/ci/neutral.htm

Hands Off: Expanding Broadband Access is the “Real
Issue” at the FCC’s Hearing, Hands off the Internet
Today, the Federal Communications Commission held a
hearing on broadband management at Harvard Law School.
The following statement may be attributed to Mike
McCurry and Christopher Wolf, co-chairs of the Hands
Off the Internet coalition (HandsOff.org):
http://handsoff.org/blog/press-releases/hands-off-expanding-broadband-access-is-the-%e2%80%9creal-issue%e2%80%9d-at-the-fcc%e2%80%99s-hearing/
More Info:
http://www.cybertelecom.org/ci/neutralp2p.htm

Comcast Hires People Off The Street To Fill Seats At
FCC Hearing, Techdirt
We pretty much ignored yesterday's FCC hearing
concerning Comcast's traffic shaping activities, as
the whole thing seemed like a bit of grandstanding.
However, it's fairly stunning to find out that Comcast
has admitted to hiring people off the street to fill
seats at the hearing, blocking out many Comcast
critics who were turned away once the room was full.
Comcast claims that they hired the people merely to
act as placeholders for Comcast employees (since,
apparently, Comcast employees are too important to
actually show up on time and wait in line like
everyone else). However, as the picture at that first
link shows many of the "paid" sitters stayed
throughout the event and either slept or cheered on
Comcast.
http://techdirt.com/articles/20080226/144346360.shtml
More Info:
http://www.cybertelecom.org/ci/neutralp2p.htm

NY Attorney General Investigating Comcast - As cable
operator takes a beating before FCC panel
, dslreports
Comcast, under investigation by the FCC for throttling
upstream P2P traffic with forged packets, fielded
questions today at an FCC hearing at Harvard on
traffic shaping. Comcast Executive Vice President
David Cohen, using the stock semantic responses we're
all familiar with by now, took aim at critics by
suggesting that tests showing they forge TCP packets
were "nothing more than a failed experiment." From PC
Magainze:
http://www.dslreports.com/shownews/NY-Attorney-General-Investigating-Comcast-92153
More Info:
http://www.cybertelecom.org/ci/neutralp2p.htm

Comcast Accused of Falsely Taking Hearing Seats, Wash
Post
The organizer of a federal hearing Monday at Harvard
Law School on Comcast's treatment of subscriber
Internet traffic said yesterday that "seat-warmers"
hired by the company prevented other people from
attending.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/02/27/AR2008022703394.html?nav=rss_technology
More Info:
http://www.cybertelecom.org/ci/neutralp2p.htm

FCC Considering Another Neutrality Hearing? - This
time in Stanford after the controversy at Harvard
,
dslreports
Valleywag is claiming (without citing any sources)
that the FCC is considering a second hearing on
network neutrality, after a controversy erupted this
week over the hearing they held on Monday at Harvard.
At that hearing Comcast used stand-ins who prevented
other interested parties from attending -- though
Comcast claims they were using the individuals as seat
holders for Comcast employees. The next meeting could
be held at Stanford, according to the anonymous
mystery source.
http://www.dslreports.com/shownews/FCC-Considering-Another-Neutrality-Hearing-92227
More Info:
http://www.cybertelecom.org/ci/neutralp2p.htm

For the Clueless Among Us: Why Comcast Paying Folks to
Attend FCC Hearing Is Wrong., Tales from the Sausage
Factory
I can't believe I actually need to explain this.
Suppose Comcast made the following offer: If you vote
“no” on a ballot initiative we like (and agree to take
a pocket recording device into the voting booth with
you so we can have pr...
http://www.wetmachine.com/item/1087
More Info:
http://www.cybertelecom.org/ci/neutralp2p.htm

Comcast Manipulating NAACP on Net Neutrality, Open
Left
Interestingly, there's a bit more to the story, and it
involves the cozy relationship between the NAACP and
Comcast.  Corporate funding of civil rights groups has
been a quiet and dank hallmark of liberal politics for
decades.  Most of the time these partnerships are
innocent, but they lead to some coincidentally
problematic situations.  For example, here's what else
was going on in Boston around the FCC the day before
the rent-a-crowd incident.
http://www.openleft.com/showDiary.do?diaryId=4209
More Info:
http://www.cybertelecom.org/ci/neutralp2p.htm

More on Comcast's Denial of Citizenship Attack,
Isen.blog
The Associated Press confirms the basic facts --
Comcast packed the house at the FCC hearing at Harvard
on Monday.
http://isen.com/blog/2008/02/more-on-comcast-denial-of-citizenship.html
More Info:
http://www.cybertelecom.org/ci/neutralp2p.htm

Comcast throws money at ISOC, Isen.blog
Comcast has become a platinum sponsor of the Internet
Society, and it is hosting the next IETF meeting in
Philadelphia, March 9-14. [link]
http://isen.com/blog/2008/02/comcast-throws-money-at-isoc.html
More Info:
http://www.cybertelecom.org/ci/neutralp2p.htm

Subpoena for Comcast from NY State, Peerflow
As I've been predicting since October:
    “We have requested information from the company
via subpoena,” Jeffrey Lerner, a spokesman for
Attorney General Andrew Cuomo, said Tuesday.
http://riskman.typepad.com/peerflow/2008/02/subpoena-for-co.html
More Info:
http://www.cybertelecom.org/ci/neutralp2p.htm

IPv6 Over Satellite: Pie in the Sky?, CircleID
I am writing this from the Satellite 2008 conference
in Washington, D.C. As I make my way through the
exhibits, I see many vendors advertising IP
capabilities in their hardware products or network
services. But when asked about IPv6 support, the
common reply is a not so believable "it is on our
roadmap" followed by a somewhat vague delivery date.
Although IPv6 development has been slow across the
board, it appears to be moving even more slowly in the
satellite world.
http://www.circleid.com/posts/82277_ipv6_over_satellite/
More Info: http://www.cybertelecom.org/dns/ipv6.htm

AT&T Says Cable Operators Not Delivering Advertised
Speed - Actually bought 150 users cable so they could
test the network performance
, dslreports
AT&T's Group President John Stankey spoke at Merrill
Lynch's Communications Forum today in New York, in the
process taking a shot at cable broadband networks
(webcast here). Stankey says that AT&T went into one
of their cities, purchased cable broadband service for
some 150 users (from the speed tiers cited, they
appear to be Comcast connections), and then tested
network performance
http://www.dslreports.com/shownews/ATT-Says-Cable-Operators-Not-Delivering-Advertised-Speed-92217
More Info:
http://www.cybertelecom.org/industry/cable.htm

Google Submarine Cable to Spike Internet Growth?,
Internet News
A new fiber-optic connection under the sea could
increase Internet capacity between the U.S. and Japan.
http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/InternetnewsRealtimeNewsForItManagers/~3/241592499/3730371
More Info:
http://www.cybertelecom.org/industry/google.htm

Burma - Blogger begins second month of detention,
Internet still closely monitored - 28.02.2008,
Reporters Without Boarders
No description
http://www.rsf.org/article.php3?id_article=25946
More Info: http://www.cybertelecom.org/intl/asia.htm

China - Detained cyber-dissident has been on hunger
strike for nearly 80 days - 27.02.2008, Reporters
Without Boarders
No description
http://www.rsf.org/article.php3?id_article=25932
More Info: http://www.cybertelecom.org/intl/china.htm

Pakistan Lifts YouTube Ban... Hopes Internet Stays In
One Piece This Time, Techdirt
When other countries have decided to ban YouTube,
they've done it rather publicly, with a judge or
politician stating very publicly that the site was to
be banned for offensive videos. However, over the
weekend, when Pakistan decided to ban YouTube, it
tried to do so quietly, by simply telling various ISPs
to block the site and hoping people wouldn't notice.
That didn't work so well. As you might have noticed,
thanks to the way some ISPs handle information, not
only did it take out YouTube in Pakistan, but it ended
up knocking it offline throughout much of the world,
generating an awful lot of attention. And now, just
about a day later, Pakistan has decided not to ban
YouTube after all. So for a day's worth of a "quiet"
ban on YouTube, Pakistan helped knock YouTube offline
around the globe, got tons of attention to the fact
that it was banning the site over some mysteriously
"offensive" videos, and then didn't end up banning the
site very long anyway. How effective was that plan?
http://techdirt.com/articles/20080226/091748357.shtml
More Info: http://www.cybertelecom.org/intl/me.htm

RIPE NCC Publishes Case Study of youtube.com Hijack,
CircleID
As you may be aware from recent news reports, traffic
to the youtube.com website was 'hijacked' on a global
scale on Sunday, 24 February 2008. The incident was a
result of the unauthorised announcement of the prefix
208.65.153.0/24 and caused the popular video sharing
website to become unreachable from most, if not all,
of the Internet. The RIPE NCC conducted an analysis
into how this incident was seen and tracked by the
RIPE NCC's Routing Information Service (RIS) and has
published a case study
http://www.circleid.com/posts/822811_ripe_ncc_case_study_youtube_hijack/
More Info: http://www.cybertelecom.org/intl/me.htm

Congress worries that .gov monitoring will spy on
Americans, CNET
Homeland Security's planned expansion of system
analyzing federal government network traffic for
suspicious patterns prompts privacy concerns from
Democrats and Republicans alike.
http://www.news.com/8301-10784_3-9882031-7.html?part=rss&subj=news&tag=2547-1_3-0-20
More Info:
http://www.cybertelecom.org/security/bigbrother.htm

Diebold Accidentally Leaks Results of 2008 Election
Early, Tech Liberation Front
Awesome
http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/techliberation/~3/242168590/043386.php
More Info: http://www.cybertelecom.org/vote/

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