Hello everyone! I hope people have plants to get out to Charleston this weekend for the third annual Gathering. I will be there, which is why there will be no Tech at Night on Friday.

Having also missed Monday due to Gathering preparations, I have much to cover tonight. I’ll start with a wrap up of everyone’s favorite online terrorist group, Anonymous. I don’t use that term lightly, terrorist. But any group that conspires to put law enforcement lives on the line to push an “activist” agenda is a terrorist group.

Again we find Anonymous’s own insecurity as Syria slammed AnonPlus. That of course does not bode well for Anonymous’s protecting itself from further legal action. Which is not good for when they announce plans to hit Facebook. FrogMarch!

Meanwhile, McAfee says the US Government isn’t all that great at defense online against state actors, so it’s no wonder Mary Bono Mack would like McAfee to elaborate to the House.

Canada and the UK had best watch out, too. “Teampoison,” another terror group has sprung up, this one allying itself with UK rioters. It has made threats against RIM should that company assist UK law enforcement. Many rioters seem to have used Blackberries to coordinate their attacks on the innocent.

The story of the week also seems to be that the FCC only knows how to stall. FCC is stalling on LightSquared, directly hindering wireless competition in America, and is stalling on AT&T’s acquisition of spectrum, thus proving why AT&T must acquire T-Mobile to get the spectrum it needs to compete with Verizon.

Seton Motley also reminds us that the FCC isn’t above lying to get its way, either. So don’t forget this stalling the next time they complain that it’s the market, not themselves, that’s failing.

Verizon is copying AT&T to go after unauthorized tethering. Tethering is the practice of using your phone to give your computer, or anything else, Internet access. It’s a quick way to burn lots of bandwidth, which is why both Verizon and AT&T charge for official services. But getting around that is easy, which is why both firms are now watching for and acting on evidence of people doing so. Turnabout’s fair play, and if you’re going to be clever, expect them to be clever back. The things some people will do to avoid paying for the bandwidth they use…

Free State Foundation proposes a moratorium on discriminatory wireless-only taxes. Sign me up. In fact, make it permanent.

Apple continues to fight patent troll Lodsys. Lodsys is a firm that produces nothing, exploits flaws in the patent process to patent the obvious, and then makes predatory lawsuits to make its profit. Apple is fighting back, as Lodsys is targeting App Store developers. Google talks the talk of being anti-software patent, but it’s Apple that does the heavy lifting against a bad patent.

And now we close the night, and this Gathering week, with a link to Beyond Clause 8′s take on patent trolling. Instead of discussing Lodsys, though, Eric Pender looks at a broader issue I’ve been talking about for a while. I claim that patent cross-licensing is the new interlocking directorate, which was the way corporations bonded together to create competition-limiting trusts before the Sherman Act. Pender suggests the DoJ will look at patents with anti-trust in mind.

I just hope they don’t overstep their legal bounds. We may need legislation to limit patent trusts.

Hello everyone! I hope people have plants to get out to Charleston this weekend for the third annual Gathering. I will be there, which is why there will be no Tech at Night on Friday.

Having also missed Monday due to Gathering preparations, I have much to cover tonight. I’ll start with a wrap up of everyone’s favorite online terrorist group, Anonymous. I don’t use that term lightly, terrorist. But any group that conspires to put law enforcement lives on the line to push an “activist” agenda is a terrorist group.

Again we find Anonymous’s own insecurity as Syria slammed AnonPlus. That of course does not bode well for Anonymous’s protecting itself from further legal action. Which is not good for when they announce plans to hit Facebook. FrogMarch!

Meanwhile, McAfee says the US Government isn’t all that great at defense online against state actors, so it’s no wonder Mary Bono Mack would like McAfee to elaborate to the House.

Canada and the UK had best watch out, too. “Teampoison,” another terror group has sprung up, this one allying itself with UK rioters. It has made threats against RIM should that company assist UK law enforcement. Many rioters seem to have used Blackberries to coordinate their attacks on the innocent.

The story of the week also seems to be that the FCC only knows how to stall. FCC is stalling on LightSquared, directly hindering wireless competition in America, and is stalling on AT&T’s acquisition of spectrum, thus proving why AT&T must acquire T-Mobile to get the spectrum it needs to compete with Verizon.

Seton Motley also reminds us that the FCC isn’t above lying to get its way, either. So don’t forget this stalling the next time they complain that it’s the market, not themselves, that’s failing.

Verizon is copying AT&T to go after unauthorized tethering. Tethering is the practice of using your phone to give your computer, or anything else, Internet access. It’s a quick way to burn lots of bandwidth, which is why both Verizon and AT&T charge for official services. But getting around that is easy, which is why both firms are now watching for and acting on evidence of people doing so. Turnabout’s fair play, and if you’re going to be clever, expect them to be clever back. The things some people will do to avoid paying for the bandwidth they use…

Free State Foundation proposes a moratorium on discriminatory wireless-only taxes. Sign me up. In fact, make it permanent.

Apple continues to fight patent troll Lodsys. Lodsys is a firm that produces nothing, exploits flaws in the patent process to patent the obvious, and then makes predatory lawsuits to make its profit. Apple is fighting back, as Lodsys is targeting App Store developers. Google talks the talk of being anti-software patent, but it’s Apple that does the heavy lifting against a bad patent.

And now we close the night, and this Gathering week, with a link to Beyond Clause 8′s take on patent trolling. Instead of discussing Lodsys, though, Eric Pender looks at a broader issue I’ve been talking about for a while. I claim that patent cross-licensing is the new interlocking directorate, which was the way corporations bonded together to create competition-limiting trusts before the Sherman Act. Pender suggests the DoJ will look at patents with anti-trust in mind.

I just hope they don’t overstep their legal bounds. We may need legislation to limit patent trusts.

I’ve been warning for ages that Universal Service Fund reform was coming, and that it would end up as an Internet tax. Well here we go: Plans are afoot. Oddly enough though, people seem fine with the America’s Broadband Connectivity Plan, which so far seems to be a plan to redirect funding toward greater Internet access. Free State Foundation is fine with the plans so far. IIA supports it. Greg Walden and Lee Terry are saying positive things.

I still worry that a new tax will spring up here somewhere, but if it doesn’t, then maybe we’ll dodge a bullet.

Speaking of bullets though, Dick Durbin’s trying to fire another one at our already shaky economy. Amazon supports it, but only because they want the states off their back. I oppose it. No new taxes. And sorry Charlie (Dickie?), but sales taxes on interstate commerce are most definitely a new tax.

Of course, Amazon’s fight in California still isn’t over. And small businesses are paying the price. So said Patrick May in the Mercury News yesterday:

But for the thousands of affiliates in the state now set adrift by Amazon and Overstock, another major out-of-state player, the law is an unfair and misguided attempt to raise revenues on the backs of struggling mom-and-pop businesses.

Rather than bring in tax dollars, they say, it will instead drive away scores of entrepreneurs California needs to innovate its way out of its economic malaise.

The Amazon Tax in California is worsening our economy. The referendum to repeal it must pass.

Some FCC? I mentioned this week that Senate Republicans were questioning Net Neutrality, and now House Republicans are back at it again, too. This illegal regulation must die.

Another questionable bill is this so-called anti-child pornography bill which mandates ISPs to keep detailed records of your Internet use. The possibilities of abuse for this are tremendous, all for one narrow niche of law enforcement. For once, I hope the Senate kills this bill.

Yet another reason to support the AT&T/T-Mobile deal being spared big government intervention: AT&T just had to sucker punch some unlimited contract holders because of spectrum limitations. Because of government stalling and meddling.

Meanwhile, Sprint continues to do the same as AT&T by using other people’s spectrum,apparently planning a move from Clearwire to LightSquared, because guess what? The spectrum shortage is real.

Remember when Eric Schmidt suggested it was wrong to enforce patents instead of innovating? What a hypocrite, as Google is now buying patents to play the game as well.

iPubSoft’s DRM removal software for electronic books just might test the limits of the DMCA’s exception for interoperability.

Closing note: I am all for Ron Johnson’s proposed regulatory freeze. With all the regulatory overreach going on, from FCC, to EPA, to FTC, and beyond, it’s time we put a stop to the runaway system of unelected, unaccountable power grabs.

I’ve been warning for ages that Universal Service Fund reform was coming, and that it would end up as an Internet tax. Well here we go: Plans are afoot. Oddly enough though, people seem fine with the America’s Broadband Connectivity Plan, which so far seems to be a plan to redirect funding toward greater Internet access. Free State Foundation is fine with the plans so far. IIA supports it. Greg Walden and Lee Terry are saying positive things.

I still worry that a new tax will spring up here somewhere, but if it doesn’t, then maybe we’ll dodge a bullet.

Speaking of bullets though, Dick Durbin’s trying to fire another one at our already shaky economy. Amazon supports it, but only because they want the states off their back. I oppose it. No new taxes. And sorry Charlie (Dickie?), but sales taxes on interstate commerce are most definitely a new tax.

Of course, Amazon’s fight in California still isn’t over. And small businesses are paying the price. So said Patrick May in the Mercury News yesterday:

But for the thousands of affiliates in the state now set adrift by Amazon and Overstock, another major out-of-state player, the law is an unfair and misguided attempt to raise revenues on the backs of struggling mom-and-pop businesses.

Rather than bring in tax dollars, they say, it will instead drive away scores of entrepreneurs California needs to innovate its way out of its economic malaise.

The Amazon Tax in California is worsening our economy. The referendum to repeal it must pass.

Some FCC? I mentioned this week that Senate Republicans were questioning Net Neutrality, and now House Republicans are back at it again, too. This illegal regulation must die.

Another questionable bill is this so-called anti-child pornography bill which mandates ISPs to keep detailed records of your Internet use. The possibilities of abuse for this are tremendous, all for one narrow niche of law enforcement. For once, I hope the Senate kills this bill.

Yet another reason to support the AT&T/T-Mobile deal being spared big government intervention: AT&T just had to sucker punch some unlimited contract holders because of spectrum limitations. Because of government stalling and meddling.

Meanwhile, Sprint continues to do the same as AT&T by using other people’s spectrum,apparently planning a move from Clearwire to LightSquared, because guess what? The spectrum shortage is real.

Remember when Eric Schmidt suggested it was wrong to enforce patents instead of innovating? What a hypocrite, as Google is now buying patents to play the game as well.

iPubSoft’s DRM removal software for electronic books just might test the limits of the DMCA’s exception for interoperability.

Closing note: I am all for Ron Johnson’s proposed regulatory freeze. With all the regulatory overreach going on, from FCC, to EPA, to FTC, and beyond, it’s time we put a stop to the runaway system of unelected, unaccountable power grabs.

Top story: the great Steven Crowder has a new video on Net Neutrality. With all the hype on Twitter leading up to this release, I was looking forward to Crowder’s video release. It’s funny, accurate, and devastating to the left. As usual for Crowder.

Sometimes a patent troll runs into fire. Lodsys, as you may recall, decided to abandon the strategy of targeting deep pockets and went after small-time and single developers. Well, Apple struck back, demanding that Lodsys withdraw threats to iOS developers, and warning that Apple would defend its own rights as a license holder.

There’s some rough language, but Twitter user oceankidbilly sums it up perfectly. Heh.

So I had a bad feeling when I read the FCC’s daily email, which included this announcement:

INQUIRY CONCERNING THE DEPLOYMENT OF ADVANCED TELECOMMUNICATIONS CAPABILITY TO ALL AMERICANS IN A REASONABLE AND TIMELY FASHION, AND POSSIBLE STEPS TO ACCELERATE SUCH DEPLOYMENT PURSUANT TO SECTION 706 OF THE TELECOMMUNICATIONS ACT OF 1996. AS AMENDED BY THE BROADBAND DATA IMPROVEMENT ACT. New Report: More Than 20 Million Americans Denied Access to Jobs & Economic Opportunity Within Broadband Economy. by Seventh Broadband Progress Report and Order on Reconsideration. (Dkt No. 10-159 ). Action by: the Commission. Adopted: 05/20/2011 by Order on Reconsideration. (FCC No. 11-78). WCB

It’s a four part document. When this dropped into my inbox, I knew there was no chance I was going to read this today. I also knew it was probably a big, heaping pile of lies, thanks to that bit about “More Than 20 Million Americans Denied Access.” And fortunately I don’t have to read it. House Republicans already read it, and Greg Walden has already put out a statement explaining why it can’t be true, and it’s only designed to push a socialist agenda. Or, as Walden’s statement puts it, “It is one thing to recognize that some areas of the country—typically rural—are difficult to serve; it is quite another to say that broadband is not being reasonably and timely deployed to all Americans. The former only requires the FCC to consider reform of the Universal Service Fund; the latter is a claimed excuse to impose network neutrality and to further regulate the Internet.”

Of course, even if they do just reconsider USF reform, I’m still opposed to it, and agree with the Free State Foundation’s call to end it. And while Walden clearly doesn’t mean that, mark my words: when the left talks bout Universal Service Fund reform, they’re talking about an Internet tax, period.

Sometimes justice is served. Britain’s courts have been granting “superinjunctions” banning any reporting of certain nasty (but true) things about rich people. Ryan Giggs, soccer star and married father with a formerly squeaky clean image, got such a superinjunction against reporting about his extramarital affair. It got reported on Twitter anyway, and he was ready to sue which is of course ridiculous. The Internet is global and no one country can control it. Naturally Britons aren’t happy with this, and they find ways around it. The Sunday Herald banked on Scottish Law as protection (actual Scottish Law, not the Arlen Specter kind) and teasingly defied the injunction.

But now it’s all over for Giggs. You see, these injunctions have a big, gaping loophole, one that’s previously been exploited in fact. It works like this: You can’t bar the news from covering the doings of Parliament, and you can’t punish a Member of Parliament for violating a superinjunction because of the principle of Parliamentary Privilege. So when John Hemming, Liberal Democrat MP of Birmingham Yardley, named Ryan Giggs on the record in the House of Commons, that was all she wrote. Except for when all reporters were free to report what Hemming said about Giggs!

Big shocker: Old media wants the government to censor New Media as the National Association of Broadcasters has come out in favor of the PROTECT IP bill which purports to give the government the power to impose a national blacklist on the Internet. Maybe they’ll put Ryan Giggs on it. Or maybe the House GOP will shut this nonsense down, learning from Ryan Giggs and his failure to control the Internet, and avoid giving the Government questionably Constitutional power when it won’t achieve its ends anyway.

I’m just saying the name Ryan Giggs again to keep it on the record that he cheated on his wife, betrayed his family, and then went to court to try to keep his image from being tarnished, as it rightfully should be. Because, you know, in America we have the First Amendment and all that.

Apparently Google thinks “jailbreaking” or “rooting” your Android phone is evil. The firm says “Don’t be evil,” after all, and will attempt to bar any Android phones under their users’ control in this way from accessing Android Market video rentals. Remember when Android was supposed to be different from Apple’s iOS and all that? Heh.

Good evening. I’m not seeing anything huge as we pass the middle of the week. But, you never know what will become important, so let’s take a look at what caught my eye so far this week.

Even as Mary Bono Mack seeks to legislate on the news, or at least introduces a bill to make people feel better, Apple explains that the “location tracking” story was a non-story all along, just as I predicted. It was all about making GPS faster, and there was no real privacy issue.

Oh, yes. ICE is from the government, and it’s here to help. That is, if you’re a big copyright holder, but not if you’re a small patent holder.

Not that I think the government ought to be going out and helping patent holders any more than I think the government ought to be helping copyright holders. I wish we’d just let people sue each other over infringements. After all, if software patent trolls can milk millions from Google, then the courts do work for these matters.

FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski says he inherited a mess when it comes to Net Neutrality. I don’t see how that can reasonably be supported by fact. The Internet was doing great before he came along. The Internet does great under a government that governs least.

“Bill Shock,” as worked on by FCC Commissioner Michael Copps’s new chief of staff, is a movement to try to eliminate personal responsibility, and force ISPs to coddle you and track your own Internet use for you. It’s senseless regulation if it comes about. Free State Foundation makes the argument that “Bill Shock” even violates the First Amendment, which is a clever argument. I don’t know how true it is, but it’s interesting.

And to close the night, Seton Motley takes on the common portrayal of the left as working in the “public interest.” Their special interest groups certainly do not act in the public’s interest. They typically seek just to grow government and take control of more of the public’s business.

That’s one of the most boring and least unique Tech at Night titles ever, but I’m going to war with the links I have.

Slade Gorton’s priorities are horribly wrong. I’m sorry, but that’s the way it is. On Tuesday the Greg Walden subcommittee held hearings on “Use of Spectrum with Public Safety.” I’ve already explained why I think the D Block of wireless spectrum needs to be allocated directly to public safety, but Gorton’s argument for putting the D block up to auction is ridiculous. So says Energy and Commerce’s press release:

Gorton testified that auctioning “the D Block to the private sector will reduce the deficit, empower huge investments in new technology and job creation, and will meet the very real needs of our vital public safety sector.”

We already tried auctioning the D block. It did none of the above. And why should we try to reduce the deficit with a one-time payment from the pockets of first responders? That seems all wrong to me.

I know civil defense has a mixed record historically, when it was promoted by some as an alternative to tough-minded deterrence of nuclear war. But the threat of retaliation doesn’t work against jihadis. We need to be prepared to react to attacks better than we did on 9/11.

C-SPAN now has the video of the Free State Foundation and its seminar on FCC reform, featuring Cliff Stearns. Stearns supports major FCC reforms, which I think is a great idea given the body’s recent track record of outrageously illegal regulations and demonstrated lust for power.

Remember when the House voted to repeal Net Neutrality? Nancy Pelosi didn’t show up. Instead Pelosi went to the Free Press state-run media shindig in Boston. Celebrating with the George Soros-funded extremists with the likes of the Glenns Greenwald (who graciously took the time to fly in from Brazil to lecture US residents on how we should nationalize the press in America), Pelosi proved that the hold saying about the San Francisco Democrat is as true as ever.

And yes, they are after a true state-run media in America. Look at this quote from People’s World:

University of Illinois communications professor Robert McChesney, among others, argued that public funding is essential to democratic media.

“Journalism is not a business enterprise, not a private good. It’s a public good,” he said. The “market” will not provide the nation with the media it needs, he said. “If we’re going to have journalism, it’s going to require massive public subsidies.”

McChesney is a founder of Free Press, which organized the conference.

By the way, if you patronize I Can Has Cheezeburger or Fail Blog, you’re patronizing a radical lefty proponent of Net Neutrality and state-run media, Ben Huh, who also went up to Boston.

I didn’t think Google’s lying about Google Apps for Government was such a big deal. But I keep seeing mentions of the story, so I thought I’d give it another mention. Google pretended its software had FISMA security certifications it didn’t have, and the Justice Department caught it, so Microsoft crowed. Google got caught badly here.

It’s no wonder Google continues to shovel money into politics. Mistakes just keep happening at Google, from WiSpy to Buzz to FISMA, and the firm wants to to buy good will to gain some cover.