(11 votes, average: 8.64 out of 10)
Loading ...Separating the competitive access issues from the Net Neutrality issues.
Bell throttling wholesale providers of DSL services has further opened up the conversations around Net Neutrality. Michael Geist has written about the mounting call for action on net neutrality from organizations such as the National Union of Public and General Employees (NUPGE) and Council of Canadians. I strongly applaud and join in this call.
The throttling of wholesale traffic by Bell Canada is, however, an issue that is related but distinct. Its link to the net neutrality debate needs to be understood, as well as the ways in which it is quite different.
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(5 votes, average: 8.2 out of 10) Loading ...Canada’s next great prime-time television experience — throttled by Bell
Yesterday morning I read another note about legacy phone and cable companies throttling competing P2P traffic that mentioned the fact that CBC made the show Canada’s Next Great Prime Minister as a DRM-free file via BitTorrent. I decided to download the torrent files (Yes, both encoded versions — I also wanted to become a seed), and later in the evening I pointed my Neuros OSD to the high quality version and watched it with Rina (my wife).
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(3 votes, average: 6.67 out of 10) Loading ...The engineering of a political problem
Most people are not technical people. In fact, many people have a form of mental block where an issue that they would normally engage in becomes “too complex” simply by adding a computer or something technical to the discussion. Politicians and government bureaucrats are regular people this way, nearly turning their brains off as soon as you hit a certain threshold of technical jargon.
People with specific political agendas abuse this. They take what is really a policy question best left for political people to decide in a democratic society, and add in sufficient technical content which encourages political people to give up control over questions of policy. Policy debates around core new technology issues such as “DRM” and “Net Neutrality” are particularly prone to this type of corruption.
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(2 votes, average: 10 out of 10) Loading ...Why it is important to participate in the study by parliament’s Industry Committee
Last week the Standing Committee on Industry, Science and Technology (INDU), a committee of the Canadian house of Commons, adopted a motion to conduct a study into Canadian science and technology. While April 18 is the last day for submissions, I made a draft of my submission available for public review and comment (OpenDocument, PDF, HTML).
I believe it is critically important that our sector, especially those using modern alternative methods of production, distribution and funding, to participate in this study.
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(5 votes, average: 9.2 out of 10) Loading ...Software as a Service: My Own Story
I have a great example of using Software as a Service (SAAS) from my own day-to-day experience. One of the complexities that I have faced in doing consulting work has been the coordination between my desktop PC (which is used for most of my industrial-strength analysis and report writing), my laptop (which I travel with), and my Blackberry (which is with me all the time, much to the chagrin of my partner).
For the last few years, I have been using ISPs and getting my mail via POP services. Using an ISP with a POP service has been prone to breakdowns in getting my mail. For several years, I used Plaxo to synchronize between my desktop and laptop with limited success. Plaxo required me to synchronize my contacts, tasks and notes when I was back at the office through cradling my Blackberry. Normally I made changes to my schedule ‘on the fly’ and would not often get back to my office to do the necessary resynchronization between my Blackberry, desktop and laptop. So managing this whole thing was a real pain! Changes have to be done in real time across my desktop and mobile device to ensure reliable control over my activities.
Recently, I spent some time looking at other solutions: Google calendars, IMAP and other services. None of these approaches really meet the bill for me, particularly with the now-basic requirement to have real-time synchronization with my Blackberry, reliability and extreme ease of operation. None of those solutions offered real-time updates between my three work tools.
Well, I’ve finally found a solution that meets the bill in the coordination between my technologies that I use in my far flung and frenetic advisory work – a hosted exchange server.
Microsoft announced recently that it is launching into hosted exchange server services (reference http://www.microsoft.com/online/exchange-online.mspx). Microsoft Exchange Online is a hosted enterprise messaging solution that provides: “…capabilities to your users with a single sign-on, including e-mail, shared calendaring, and contacts. And it works with Active Directory to ensure that information is synchronized between your local and online directories, allowing your IT department to support a mix of hosted services and on-premise software. Additionally, Exchange Online supports business continuity and disaster recovery with cloud-based antivirus and spam filtering and high data center security standards.”
But the service does not offer a connection to my Blackberry. So after looking at this offering, I did not choose the Microsoft service and elected to go through one of their partners who provide services not only for hosted exchange, but also for BES (Blackberry enterprise server) (http://na.blackberry.com/eng/solutions/types/enterprise/ ).
There are a number of excellent service providers that deliver hosted exchange for a very low price with integration with Blackberry and all the security, backup and support needed. In addition, you can use services from these best-of-breed providers for SharePoint and other software services. Suggested vendors include 123Together, Intermedia and Rogers.
I have been very pleased with this switch from the problematic use of a POP3 and the constant hassle of trying to synchronize, many times unsuccessfully, between my own work and personal technology. One of the really great things is that it is a no-hassle solution at a reasonable price! Basic price is $9.95 per month for 500 MB of storage. For a small additional fee, I get full integration with my Blackberry.
This is a real boom for the SME sector. Individuals or small or medium-sized companies, who are contemplating using an exchange server and setting up a BES server should seriously think about using a hosted Exchange solution. It makes working on the fly economically possible.
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(7 votes, average: 8.43 out of 10) Loading ...An ideal future communications infrastructure, how do we get there, and what is stopping us!
Whenever the discussion of “Net Neutrality” comes up we often get stuck with how the current network is configured, who provides it, and other historical issues. I would like to toss out that history for a moment and offer what I believe to be an ideal, talk about transition issues, as well as some of winners and losers in that transition (and thus who the greatest opponents are)
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(4 votes, average: 8.75 out of 10) Loading ...GNU General Public License considered very strong, still not challenged in court
You sometimes hear people trying to dismiss the GNU General Public License, the most popular of the Free/Libre and Open Source Software (FLOSS) licenses, as being unenforceable. While there is a long list of companies that have been alleged to infringe the license, none of these companies seem to agree this license is unenforceable and opt to settle out of court rather than challenge the license.
The latest case involves Verizone. Verizon distributes BusyBox to its customers in devices that are provided to Verizon by Actiontec Electronics, Inc. In December the Software Freedom Law Center (SFLC) filed a lawsuit on behalf of BusyBox against Verizone alleging infringement of the GPL. Only a few months later they are announcing that the BusyBox Developers Agree To End GPL Lawsuit Against Verizon.
Please remember this fact when you hear people trying to dismiss the GPL as unenforceable. Some very large and successful companies have been accused of infringing the GPL, and they have all opted to comply with the license rather than challenge it. I believe they companies understand how enforceable the GPL is, and recognize they could not win against it in court.
Please also remember these cases when you hear someone claim that FLOSS is “giving away” software. Clearly there are obligations when distributing FLOSS, and that if you don’t live up to these obligations you will be challenged in court. Enforcing the terms of a FLOSS license is easier to enforce than the often partly unenforceable terms of a non-FLOSS EULA, this means you are more likely to get caught than infringing a non-FLOSS EULA. This is because the obligations created by FLOSS licenses largely only create obligations on distributors and fellow software developers, not simple end users of the software.
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(1 votes, average: 7 out of 10) Loading ...Trying to understand parliamentarians’ misunderstanding of core new technology issues
When asked about what the core concepts are for understanding what made “new media” possible, I talk about two things:
- the movement away from communications technology where the network was smart and the terminals were dumb (radio, television, telephone), towards a design where the network is dumb and the terminals are smart (also known as the end to end principle)
- the movement away from communications technologies being expensive and only owned by large media companies, to technology being owned and controlled by private citizens
Combined, these two features enable innovation since any two persons can communicate with each other in any way they want simply by making agreements between those two parsons, and configuring their ’smart terminals’ to communicate in this manner.
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(3 votes, average: 10 out of 10) Loading ...Feeling the Heat
Predictions are that the IT security situation in Canada will worsen
‘Canadian companies are over-confident and lax when it comes to their IT security. Business leaders aren’t taking it seriously and IT leaders aren’t providing best practices’. This is a recent stunning comment from Vito Mabrucco who is responsible for managing IDC’s U.S. based global consulting. In an uncertain world, there is bound to be an unexpected event or failure that will bring it back to ‘top-of-mind’ status for IT and business executives for 2008. I predict a sudden surge in growth managed security services because the security function can now be outsourced. IDC also sees this potential for growth. (Source: http://www.itbusiness.ca/it/client/en/home/News.asp?id=46737&PageMem=2)
Why this hesitancy to evolve security strategy? Why are business leaders not taking security seriously? In Canada, legislation has not yet mandated security as a governance issue, except obliquely through privacy legislation. The same holds true in the US. We have Bill C-198 that has legislated reporting compliance for the private sector and has set the tone for quasi-public organizations in reporting, operational, and financial controls. These rules (except for privacy legislation and some security policies) do not apply to the public sector.
Leaders have not woken up to the fact that their organizations use their systems as the backbone for these reporting and control processes. Any major breaches and damage to their IT operations will taint the integrity of their organizations. Many ill informed executives are building walls around their organizations as an afterthought rather than building security throughout all of their procedures, databases and processing.
Should security be outsourced if not properly done in house or if there is a lack of confidence in IT by senior management? The answer is yes! Boards of Directors, Executives IT leaders and auditors must assess the competence of their teams to be absolutely sure they are effectively managing a rapidly changing landscape of IT security. If they cannot afford or do not have a team that can protect them they need to go outside and hire some real talent to manage their IT security. Managed security service providers are a real answer.
What criteria should be used to select a managed security provider:
- Does the IT security managed services vendor understand your business and all its’ risks?
- Are they ‘on top of their game’ to proactively protect and manage you environment?
- Are they cost effective?
- Can they work with your executives and team?
- Do they have offerings that will fit into all of your environments and be proactive in averting all reasonable treats?
- Do they have a good range of products and services?
- Can they communicate well on what they are doing and what counter measures they are taking?
- Can they lead you and your organization through appropriate transitions and changes to make this effective not just around your systems and process, but embed proper security in all that all you and your organization ode?
- What are their best practices for the security domain?
- How are they evolving on a day-to-day basis to protect the information assets of their client organizations and their vital information assets?
Who are the up and coming managed security providers? The telecommunications carriers are now offering good managed IT security offerings. These are telecommunications companies, like Bell, Telus, Allsteam , SIs, ISPs, ASPs, security software companies like CA, Symantec, HP, IBM, CISCO, the big 4, offshore providers and specialty IT security firms.
IT security is a high stakes game. Zero day threats require immediate action and there must be constant monitoring of the external and internal environments to be sure there are no intrusions. It is now a fact we have to manage our information assets like ‘Fort Knox’. If it is not done properly you could have huge operational, reputation and financial losses.
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(Rate This Article) Loading ...Copyright as part of a debate on eastern vs western censorship?
Last week I was interviewed by a reporter from ZeroPaid, a website started in 2000 dedicated to digital music that very quickly got on the P2P music sharing bandwagon. When interviewed I offer my honest opinions of things, even when I’m sure the audience won’t like it. I expect feedback to that article to be interesting given I don’t believe that unauthorized P2P filesharing should be carved out of copyright.
It is common that people don’t like what I have to say, although different people dislike entirely different things. The fact that everyone seems to see something they like and something they really dislike in what I think and write about copyright suggests that I must be doing something right *smile*
