Palladium getting a bad rap?

Wired News: Privacy experts warn that Microsoft's Next Generation Secure Computing Base, also known as Palladium, could enable content providers to enforce draconian copyright protections. But a Microsoft representative says don't believe the hype.

Media deregulation still on course

More on the FCC's plans to ease media ownership rules on June 2, which would pave the way for greater media concentration:

Philadelphia Inquirer: The media have failed to inform the public about the implications of media deregulation, let alone how their own companies stand to benefit, writes Jeff Chester.

CBS.MarketWatch.com: Delay Sought in FCC's Media Vote.

That won't happen. The zealots at the helm of the FCC plan to steamroll this through, regardless of its impact on the public.

Thanks to IWantMedia for the pointer.

Meantime, on a related theme, Paul Krugman in the NY Times:

We don't have censorship in this country; it's still possible to find different points of view. But we do have a system in which the major media companies have strong incentives to present the news in a way that pleases the party in power, and no incentive not to.

A TiVo takeover for Apple?

John Battelle in Business 2.0: TiVo is ripe for a takeover, and Apple's Steve Jobs is "the only man in techland who can stand up to the content companies," he writes. Thanks to IWantMedia for the pointer.

Blair Watch: NYT to hold 'dramatic' staff meeting

The NY Daily News reports today:

The New York Times executive editor Howell Raines plans to enter the lion's den today by holding a town hall meeting where reporters and editors are expected to vent their anger about how he has handled the Jayson Blair scandal.

With an immediate need to stem mounting outrage, Raines scrapped plans yesterday to hold a series of small-group meetings and announced that he, along with managing editor Gerald Boyd and publisher Arthur Sulzberger Jr., would appear before one large gathering.

Several staffers described the newsroom situation as chaotic and suggested that some senior editors needed to be penalized for a catastrophic failure in management that has made all reporters' work suspect.

In a preview of what the power trio may face today, journalists in The Times' Washington bureau met yesterday and voiced frustration at how several warnings about Blair's sloppy reporting were ignored by Raines and Boyd.

Thanks to IWantMedia for the pointer.

Daypop in Google's shadow

Mark Glaser in OJR: Can Daypop Stay Out of Google's Headlights? Wherein Mark interviews the founder of Daypop:

... Daypop lives on in the shadow of the giant. [Google] Most people who use Daypop probably have no idea that it was started and maintained by one man, programmer and game designer Dan Chan. Chan wanted to follow the soap opera of the 2000 U.S. presidential elections while living in Hong Kong, but couldn't find a variety of news sources by searching online. So after moving back to Los Angeles, he took six months to do the coding work for Daypop, launching it in August 2001 as a way to search Weblogs and news. A mention of Daypop in the Wall Street Journal brought his traffic to its current level of about 50,000 page views per day.

Public OK with Bennett's gambling

The Gallup Organization finds: The news media have had a field day with moralist William J. Bennett's recent admission -- and subsequent renunciation -- of high-stakes gambling, pointing to the apparent contradiction between Bennett's behavior and words. But Gallup's annual survey on America's values and beliefs suggests that most Americans may not view Bennett's behavior as inconsistent with his emphasis on moral living. The survey, conducted May 5-7, shortly after Bennett's gambling was first reported in the news, finds 63% of Americans saying gambling is morally acceptable, while just 34% say it is morally wrong.

I'm not sure the news media -- those dens of iniquity -- are suggesting that gambling is morally suspect. They are saying that Bennett's holier-than-thou piety and faux virtuousness smack of hypocrisy.

Meantime, the Gallup Organization has launched improvements to its Tuesday Briefing news service. Sayeth the Gallup folks:

Tuesday Briefing comes with more in-depth content and improved site navigation. The new features include expanded streaming video offerings, improved search functionality -- including an innovative ìdashboardî to ease navigation in the unequalled Gallup Brain archive -- and two new weekly columns offering analysis of Gallup data and findings.

I'll be checking it out.

'Matrix Reloaded' reviewed

Here are some reviews of The Matrix Reloaded:

Joe Baltake (my ol' bud) in The Sacramento Bee: 3 1/2 stars. "What seemed like faux braininess in the first movie comes off as genuine here."

Roger Ebert in the Chicago Sun-Times: 3 1/2 stars. "An immensely skillful sci-fi adventure."

Kenneth Turan in the LA Times: The film packs a visceral visual wallop, but lacks emotional power.

Bruce Newman in the San Jose Merc: 3 stars.

Elvis Mitchell in the New York Times: elegant but dispiriting.

Mike Clark in USA Today: visuals save the day.

Tim Lammers on WNBC.com: mind-blowing visual effects, but story lags.

David Germain in the Associated Press: "possibly the worst sequel to a really good film ever made."

Paul Clinton on CNN.com: visually stunning, but empty.

yupi msn (en espaÒol): Obsesionados por rÈcord de taquilla lanzan "The Matrix Reloaded"

Microsoft's iLoo goes down the tubes

Mike Cassidy in today's San Jose Merc: For two glorious weeks we had the iLoo. Talk about the high-water mark of the Digital Age. Microsoft's Internet-enabled outhouse promised to take us where no man or woman had gone before. But now the dream of the wired toilet is over.

On racy postmodern literature

Susannah Breslin, aka The Reverse Cowgirl, asks: Would you like to become an important part of the exciting future of racy postmodern literature? I bet you would. I know I would.

Today is the kickoff of The You're A Bad Man, Aren't You? Fundraiser. You can read more below.

The Reverse Cowgirl tells more:

Future Tense Books is a wonderful, one-man publishing house in Portland, Oregon, helmed by the unstoppable one-man publishing crew of Kevin Sampsell.

This summer, FTB is publishing a collection of my short stories. The title is You're A Bad Man, Aren't You? The contents feature a baker's dozen worth of my tawdry tales.

What does this have to do with you? Future Tense Books is very great, but it is also very small. To make a nice looking book, The Reverse Cowgirl's Blog is attempting to raise $1,200 for it by the end of this month.

Future Tense Books will be using this money to work with the insanely talented Pete McCracken at Crack Press to print a fiction collection worth of your fondling.

You can read more on The Reverse Cowgirl's Blog here.

Super-DMCA legislation in Tenn.

Tennessee journalist and blogger Bill Hobbs has the latest on the Super-DMCA legislation introduced in Tennessee, which would outlaw any device hooked up to your cable TV network unless it's approved by the cable company. Like a TiVo. Like a DVR. Like a VCR, fer gosh sake.

This is madness.