Free Republic

The decision by Bay Area Rapid Transit officials to cut off cellphone service Thursday evening – to forestall a planned protest – raises a fundamental question: Do Americans have a basic right to digital free speech or to digitally organized assembly? Because July protests against BART police shootings had turned violent, BART officials took the unusual step to protect public safety, they said. The tactic may have worked: No protests took place Thursday night at BART stations. Temporarily shutting down cell service and beefing up police patrols were "great tool[s] to utilize for this specific purpose," BART police Lt. Andy...

BART officials acknowledged this afternoon that they shut down cell phone and wireless data service in its downtown San Francisco stations to disrupt a planned protest. Their announcement sparked denunciations from civil libertarians and the apparent threat of a cyber-attack on the BART website. A statement posted on the transit agency's website said the communications blackout was ordered in the interest of public safety: "Organizers planning to disrupt BART service on August 11, 2011 stated they would use mobile devices to coordinate their disruptive activities and communicate about the location and number of BART Police," the statement reads. "A civil...

The DOE's Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) today announced a major step toward creating one of the world's fastest scientific networks to accelerate research in fields ranging from advanced energy solutions to particle physics. Known as the Advanced Networking Initiative (ANI), the effort represents a $62 million multi-year investment by the DOE Office of Science in next-generation networking technology. "As science becomes increasingly data-driven and global in scale, it's critical that we create an infrastructure that will enable our scientists to collaborate and compete successfully in the search for solutions to some of the world's biggest challenges in energy,"...

Al Qaeda's online communications disrupted by electronic attack on its sites - NBC News Just a headline for now. More to follow.

ARRL Field Day Overview ARRL Field Day is the single most popular on-the-air event held annually in the US and Canada.  Each year over 35,000 amateurs gather with their clubs, friends or simply by themselves to operate. ARRL Field Day is not a fully adjudicated contest, which explains much of its popularity.  It is a time where many aspects of Amateur Radio come together to highlight our many roles. While some will treat it as a contest, most groups use the opportunity to practice their emergency response capabilities.  It is an excellent opportunity to demonstrate Amateur Radio to local elected community...

The Netherlands on Wednesday became the first country in Europe, and only the second in the world, to enshrine the concept of network neutrality into national law by banning its mobile telephone operators from blocking or charging consumers extra for using Internet-based communications services like Skype or WhatsApp, a free text service. snip Analysts said that the legal restrictions imposed in the Netherlands could shape Europe’s broader, evolving debate over network neutrality, pushing more countries on the Continent to limit operators from acting as self-appointed toll collectors of the mobile Internet. snip “We support network neutrality,” said Sandra de Jong,...

Questions have been raised about the social impact of widespread use of social networking sites (SNS) like Facebook, LinkedIn, MySpace, and Twitter. Do these technologies isolate people and truncate their relationships? Or are there benefits associated with being connected to others in this way? The Pew Research Center’s Internet & American Life Project decided to examine SNS in a survey that explored people’s overall social networks and how use of these technologies is related to trust, tolerance, social support, and community and political engagement. The findings presented here paint a rich and complex picture of the role that digital technology...

Diskeeper Corp developed "ExpressCache," software that enhances operating speed of personal computers (PCs) by using a small-capacity SSD as a cache for HDD, and demonstrated it at Computex Taipei 2011. In the demonstration, operations such as booting Windows 7 and launching applications were compared between a PC equipped with a 500-Gbyte HDD (5,400rpm) and a PC using the same hardware in addition to an 8-Gbyte SSD for a cache (made by SanDisk Corp, connected via mSATA). As a result, the software and the SDD halved the time it takes to perform those operations. ExpressCache is software that monitors the read/write...

WITH a tin can, some copper wire and a few dollars’ worth of nuts, bolts and other hardware, a do-it-yourselfer can build a makeshift directional antenna. A mobile phone, souped-up with such an antenna, can talk to a network tower that is dozens of kilometres beyond its normal range (about 5km, or 3 miles). As Gregory Rehm, the author of an online assembly guide for such things, puts it, homemade antennae are “as cool as the other side of the pillow on a hot night”. Of late, however, such antennae have proved much more than simply cool. According to Jeff...

BEIJING — If anyone wonders whether the Chinese government has tightened its grip on electronic communications since protests began engulfing the Arab world, Shakespeare may prove instructive. A Beijing entrepreneur, discussing restaurant choices with his fiancée over their cellphones last week, quoted Queen Gertrude’s response to Hamlet: “The lady doth protest too much, methinks.” The second time he said the word “protest,” her phone cut off. He spoke English, but another caller, repeating the same phrase on Monday in Chinese over a different phone, was also cut off in midsentence. A host of evidence over the past several weeks shows...

NOBODY calls me anymore — and that’s just fine. With the exception of immediate family members, who mostly phone to discuss medical symptoms and arrange child care, and the Roundabout Theater fund-raising team, which takes a diabolical delight in phoning me every few weeks at precisely the moment I am tucking in my children, people just don’t call. It’s at the point where when the phone does ring — and it’s not my mom, dad, husband or baby sitter — my first thought is: “What’s happened? What’s wrong?” My second thought is: “Isn’t it weird to just call like that?...

China is training 10,000 messenger pigeons to deliver vital military communications in the event of the country's communication systems breaking down. According to the Chinese state media, the pigeons are being trained by a special unit of the People's Liberation Army in the central city of Chengdu. "They will be primarily called upon to conduct special military missions between troops stationed at our borders," said Chen Hong, an air force expert, to China Central Television (CCTV), the state broadcaster. "In modern warfare, the pigeon is indispensable," he added. "There are as many military pigeons as there are soldiers in the...

ENGLEWOOD, Colo. (AP) -- EchoStar Corp. will buy satellite Internet services company Hughes Communications Inc. for about $1.34 billion so it can boost its ability to transport data and video via broadband, the company said Monday. The value is based on Hughes' 22 million outstanding shares. EchoStar, which makes equipment for cable, telecom and satellite TV providers, said the deal is worth $2 billion including debt, which the company said it will refinance.

The FCC has made it official. It has released an order that requires participants in the Emergency Alert System EAS, namely broadcasters, cable operators, and certain satellite providers, to participate in the first-ever national test of EAS. This test will differ starkly from the monthly EAS tests the public is familiar with. In this instance, the White House will actually activate the test as if the President wanted to take over the air waves to address the nation. No specific date for the test was set, although as it stands, a two-month notice will be provided.

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) -- About a half-hour past midnight Friday morning in Egypt, the Internet went dead. Almost simultaneously, the handful of companies that pipe the Internet into and out of Egypt went dark as protesters were gearing up for a fresh round of demonstrations calling for the end of President Hosni Mubarak's nearly 30-year rule, experts said. Egypt has apparently done what many technologists thought was unthinkable for any country with a major Internet economy: It unplugged itself entirely from the Internet to try and silence dissent.

I realize this has been posted several times over the past few days. However, this blog notes the six "principles" today's order covers. And all of us here at FRee Republic know that what is WRITTEN in federal rule means nothing. It's what the FCC's lawyers SAYS it means is all that counts. 1) Transparency. Consumers and innovators have a right to know the basic performance characteristics of their Internet access and how their network is being managed. 2) No Blocking. A right to send and receive lawful traffic. This prohibits blocking of lawful content, apps, services, and the connection...

It's possible that someone could listen to your conversations -- even when you're not on the phone.

My friends oldest daughter Annaka is studying journalism/communications at Texas State and is trying to break into the news/tv media profession. The short video (15 secs) of her below is linked to a program that counts how many times it is viewed. She's auditioning for a public relations job with the Texas Stars hockey team in Austin (she was a cheerleader for them last year) that could be a launching pad into tv and radio. Help me get her a REAL JOB. Please view the video and pass it on to as many people as you can; the person that...

BEIJING: Pakistan is closely collaborating with China to launch a joint space communications satellite next year that will be a milestone in their friendship, the country's envoy here said today. The new satellite called Paksat-1R will bring immense economic benefits to Pakistan, Pakistani Ambassador to China, Masood Khan, said. He made the remarks while addressing an official function here to mark the anniversary of the establishment of the China Great Wall Industry Corporation (CGWIC). The agreement to launch the satellite and set up a joint communications project was reached during Pakistan President Asif Ali Zardari's visit to China in 2008....

The Federal Communications Commission Thursday suspended its weeks-long series of talks with Internet providers on Net neutrality, dealing a blow to efforts to produce a deal that the agency could take to Congress. The decision to cut off negotiations marks a major political setback for Chairman Julius Genachowski, whose office reached out to stakeholders six weeks ago to strike an agreement and avoid a public battle over rules that would treat all users’ Web traffic equally. But the end to industry discussions — which a source close to the FCC talks blamed entirely on news that Google and Verizon separately...