Technology

Isn’t it time Dell, HP and Nike reviewed their CADNA membership?

by kierenmccarthy on April 8, 2010

You have to wonder how often large corporates review the work done in their name through lobbying organizations, because it is definitely time that big names such as Dell, HP, HSBC, Morgan Stanley, Nike and Wells Fargo consider whether their support of the Coalition Against Domain Name Abuse – CADNA – is starting to undermine their credibility.

CADNA has been pushing wildly inaccurate information, mostly against ICANN, for a few years. But in a recent frivolous piece of nonsense, it has pushed out a press release claiming that new Internet extensions (gTLDs) will cost “brand owners” $746 million. The figure is pulled out from nowhere, doesn’t stand up to even the most basic scrutiny, and is in fact is no more than a press release. It also stands in stark contrast to the serious work that has actually been done on the possible impact of new Internet extensions on trademark owners.

How is it possible that CADNA – which famously held a Washington event on the future of ICANN and then refused to allow anyone from ICANN to attend – is allowed to get away with this kind of nonsense? The answer is that the companies that give the organization is vanishing credibility aren’t aware of what is being peddled in their name.

So who is CADNA? Well, based in Washington, CADNA is just two people – Josh Bourne and Phil Lodico. Josh and Phil were both previously from Register.com and CADNA is an offshoot and the main client of their lobbying company, FairWinds Partners.

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What does a truly democratic Q&A format look like?

by kierenmccarthy on February 8, 2010

Internet thinker and political operator David Weinberger has posed an interesting question: how do we design a question-and-answer format for politicians that is truly democratic?

Weinberger’s blog post was noted by Andrew McLaughlin on his Facebook page – Andrew is the White House Deputy CTO and the man more than any other that could make a democratic Q&A system a reality.

And so I figured I’d have a stab at designing something since this is an area where I have a fair amount of knowledge and experience both as a journalist and as ICANN’s general manager of public participation. Here then is a rundown of a system that I think would broadly work:

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You want iBooks? Apple gives you iBoobs

January 28, 2010

I think Apple really needs to rethink about how it launches products. The Steve Jobs super-secret wham-bam thing is all well and good when something really new comes out – like the iPod with video or the iPhone – but in between the super-hype is just tedious.
I recall a number of jazzed-up keynotes that simply [...]

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Google, eBay, Facebook, Yahoo warn about UK Digital Economy Bill

December 2, 2009

Four online giants have warned the UK government against a provision in the Digital Economy Bill, currently going through Parliament. In particular, clause 17 gives a government minister the right to restructure copyright law without having to go through Parliament.
The government says this helps it to “future proof” the legislation; Google, eBay, Facebook and [...]

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Twitter wins the battle, now journalists and politicians need to win the war

October 13, 2009

Delighted to wake up this morning to find out that people acted on appalling press gagging regarding Trafigura and had used their collective voices to flip things over.

Much of the credit is going to Twitter so it is fitting that Guardian editor Alan Rusbridger twittered himself about the “victory” when Carter-Ruck solicitors backed down [...]

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Google Voice and the rise of locationless people

October 11, 2009

I’ve got a Google Voice number. It’s +1 415 937 1451.
Although that appears to be a San Francisco telephone number, what happens is that I am able to cause that number to redirect to whatever other numbers I want – which means that I am now longer wedded to a telephone number and I don’t [...]

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Tr.im conceeds tiny URL fight to bit.ly

August 10, 2009

If you don’t use Twitter, that headline will look like gibberish, but basically one company that produces very short URLs has given up and publicly conceded defeat to a more popular service.
What’s annoying is that I have been happily using the loser – tr.im – and been enjoying the stats it produces. No more – [...]

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Technobile – amusing myself

August 6, 2009

Purely by accident I just came across a “technobile” column piece that I wrote for the Guardian a few years ago. I have to say I amused myself. Posted below but grabbed from the Guardian site:
Technobile
Concerns grow about internet users who are dangerously addicted to Google. Quick, read it now!
I can’t believe Google gives no [...]

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Twitter success at crucial point

August 6, 2009

So everyone and their dog knows about Twitter. Now the problem is they have started using it – and you can see it through the pretty drastic impact on third-parties the past two weeks or so.
Services you use to make Twitter more manageable keep getting knocked offline. A few months ago Twitter itself was suffering [...]

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A new bigger, pricier Kindle

May 6, 2009

I love my Kindle. It really is a great machine. The Kindle 2 made all the right changes to the original Kindle, which is why I forked out a hefty $359 for it. It contains literally thousands of books – which has completely changed my reading habits (more reading, less lugging around of books). It is glorious and if you are a serious book reader you should invest in it.

Now so sure at the moment though about a new Kindle that Amazon just announced – the Kindle DX. It’s the same as the Kindle 2 but with a much bigger screen – just a little smaller than a magazine. I get the logic straight away – a bigger screen is much, much better for reading on. Particularly if you are reading PDF documents or magazines. It doesn’t matter with books – you want something you can shove in your bag and pull out.

But clearly Amazon has found out that alot of people are using their Kindle to read documents – probably work documents – on a device that doesn’t have a backlit screen and which doesn’t require you booting up a computer. I can see the logic, although I’ve not go into this habit yet.

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