Morning Broadband Bytes1) Get Coffee 2) Read Morning Broadband Bytes 3) Start Day ( old news - 07:01AM Friday Apr 14 2006) • Around the Industry: CNet: Dems more likely to favor iTunes taxes
FCC statistics suggest minuscule market share for BPL
Commentary: Wi-Fi’s potential and the cost of bandwidth
Opinion: The Telcos could revolutionize TV... but they won't
Wal-Mart switches back to Comcast and triple play; Satellite hung out to dry?• SecurityBits: Mozilla plugs Firefox code execution hole
Microsoft's security disclosures come under fire
Browser crashers warm to data fuzzing• TidBytes: Help! Boot Camp has permanently made my Mac a PC!
AOL Accused Of Blocking Critics' Emails
Yahoo's mail network snoozes• More news from around the industry, SecurityBits, and interesting Tidbytes inside!Around The Industry:• CNet: Dems more likely to favor iTunes taxes: A CNET News.com analysis of the states that tax digital downloads, such as those from the iTunes Music Store, shows that nine protax states have legislatures controlled by Democrats. By contrast, five of the protax states have Republican-controlled legislatures. Most states have overlooked taxing digital downloads--iTunes purchases, e-books and movies--so far, but as online media purchases are booming, politicians and tax collectors are eyeing the area as an untapped source of new revenue.• FCC statistics suggest minuscule market share for BPL: The latest FCC statistics on the status of high-speed Internet services indicate a minuscule market share for BPL. The FCC Wireline Competition Bureau report, "High-Speed Services for Internet Access: Status as of June 30, 2005," puts at 4872 the number of business and residential "Power Line and Other" connections that deliver at speeds greater than 200 kbps in at least one direction. The total number of high-speed lines for all technologies is 42,866,469--the vast majority DSL, cable and traditional wireline connections.• Commentary: Wi-Fi’s potential and the cost of bandwidth: Via MuniWireless: "In the recent debate over the US ranking in broadband penetration (OECD’s data), [MuniWireless contributor] Dewayne Hendricks asserts that what we should be aiming for is getting the price per megabit of bandwidth down — to 24 cents. While many of us focus on the latest OECD rankings (where broadband is defined in many countries as 200 Kbps and over), Dewayne thinks we should be looking at how many people have true broadband connections (over 10 Mbps) and how much they pay for true broadband. And then we can rank countries according to just how affordable TRUE broadband is."• Opinion: The Telcos could revolutionize TV... but they won't: Via techDirt: "With Disney suddenly pushing online downloads, perhaps that second huge hurdle just got lowered. If the Disney experiment proves successful, others will quickly follow -- and if the telcos were smart, they'd be banging down doors suggesting a "new" kind of television -- only it would be the model that plenty of techies were suggesting television should adopt years ago. It would save them a ton of money while potentially delivering something a lot more powerful and useful to everyone. Which, of course, is why it probably won't happen."• Wal-Mart switches back to Comcast and triple play; Satellite hung out to dry?: In a move that will suddenly set back the US satellite community, Wal-Mart has decided to go into business selling Comcast services including its full suite of triple play services, cable TV, broadband and telephony. It is unclear if Wal-Mart will continue selling the DirecTV service once the Comcast deal starts to roll. The deal could overnight turn the fortunes of Comcast which has had its subscription numbers frozen at 21.5 million for the past four years, while DirecTV service has risen from 11 million to 14 million over the same time.• DLink network hardware sited as deluging Net clocks with data: Home network hardware supplier D-Link has been accused of harming the net's ability to tell the time accurately. Detective work has found that many D-Link routers, switches and wireless access points are bombarding some net time servers with huge amounts of data. D-Link is now taking action after protests from time server overseers.• China Internet group calls for censorship: China's official Internet industry association is calling on its members to help the government suppress material deemed subversive or immoral. "Unhealthy information" on-line has harmed Chinese children and threatens social stability, the Internet Society of China said in a statement. The 5-year-old group is the government-sanctioned association for Internet service providers and Chinese websites.• Qualcomm, Dept. of Justice resolve Flarion dispute: Qualcomm has reached an agreement with the U.S. Dept. of Justice resolving "gun-jumping" allegations arising from its acquisition of Flarion Technologies earlier this year. The DOJ had asserted that certain provisions of the acquisition effectively gave Qualcomm an inappropriate level of control over Flarion's business, violating the Hart-Scott-Rodino Act. Qualcomm agreed last August to pay $600 million to acquire Flarion, which developed a technology called Flash-OFDM, for use with mobile broadband Internet protocol services.• Benefits of outsourcing "wildly exaggerated": Outsourcung advisory firm TPI has produced research that suggests that the cost savings outsourcers gain from the practice have been wildly exaggerated. The research finds that "widespread market claims that outsourcing can reduce costs by over 60%" are just a bit off. In reality, it reckons that savings net of professional fees, severance pay and governance costs average 15%. It says the best savings firms can hope for are around 39%. • Fox will put TV reruns on the Internet: report: News Corp.'s Fox network has signed a six-year agreement with its 187 affiliated stations that will let it show reruns of its television programs on the Internet. Walt Disney Co.'s ABC television network announcement earlier this week that it will offer some of its most popular shows, including "Desperate Housewives" and "Lost," for free on an advertising-supported Web service.SecurityBits:• Mozilla plugs Firefox code execution hole: Mozilla has released a new version of the Firefox Web browser with what is described as "significant security and stability improvements." Details on the security vulnerabilities being patched were not available April 13 when Firefox 1.5.0.2 was shipped as a high-priority update. However, a source said most serious flaw could allow "remote code execution" attacks. A Mozilla spokesperson said information on the security patches will be publicly released soon.• Microsoft's security disclosures come under fire: Is MS silently fixing security vulnerabilities and deliberately obfuscating details about patches in its monthly security bulletins? A security researcher who has worked closely with the MSRC (Microsoft Security Response Center) in the past is accusing the software maker of "misleading" customers by not clearly spelling out exactly what is being patched in the MS06-015 bulletin released on April 11. That bulletin, rated "critical," contained patches for a remote code execution hole in Windows Explorer.• Browser crashers warm to data fuzzing: Last month, security researcher HD Moore decided to write a simple program that would mangle the code found in web pages and gauge the effect such data would have on the major browsers. The result: hundreds of crashes and the discovery of several dozen flaws. The technique - called packet, or data, fuzzing - is frequently used to find flaws in network apps. Moore and others are now turning the tool on browsers to startling results. In a few weeks, the researcher had found hundreds of ways to crash IE and, to a lesser extent, other browsers.• Symantec aims to be 'the Microsoft it's OK to like': The CEO of Symantec, has reaffirmed his company's commitment to continue acquiring other businesses and has spoken frankly about past acquisitions, a tough year and Symantec's new position within the industry. At the heart is a clear message that Symantec is no longer simply a security company and must now battle with the likes of CA, Microsoft and Oracle whereas once it picked its fights among the antivirus community. "We've not been an antivirus company since 2000," said the CEO.Hardware, Software, and other TidBytes:• Help! Boot Camp has permanently made my Mac a PC!• AOL Accused Of Blocking Critics' Emails• Yahoo's mail network snoozes• Geek Squad Slapped With Restraining Order in Piracy Case• Tivo wins digital damages• Sprint unveils mobile child locator service• Disney-brand DVD players recalled because they blow up (in a family-friendly way, of course)• Vista won't show fancy side to pirates
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New Firefox release working fine