CITP Blog - Formerly Freedom to Tinker

Year: 2003

  • Verizon Files Briefs in Subpoena Case

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    Verizon has filed another brief (with supporting papers) in its battle with the RIAA, in Verizon’s continuing effort to protect the anonymity of one of its customers, who has been accused of copyright infringement. Verizon’s press release, with copies of the filings, is here. (Thanks to Jim Tyre for the pointer.)

  • Needlepoint Piracy: An Exclusive Interview!

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    Here at Freedom to Tinker, we are relentless in our quest to bring you the finest in pseudo-journalism. And so when Frank Field lifted the lid on needlepoint piracy, our staff sprang into action to bring you an exclusive newsmaker interview with the ultimate insider source on this story, a source who was President of…

  • DRM, and the First Rule of Security Analysis

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    When I teach Information Security, the first lecture is dedicated to the basics of security analysis. And the first rule of security analysis is this: understand your threat model. Experience teaches that if you don’t have a clear threat model – a clear idea of what you are trying to prevent and what technical capabilities…

  • DRM in Cell Phones?

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    Elisa Batista at Wired News reports on the Cellular Telecommunications and Internet Association (CTIA) trade show. Rep. Billy Tauzin gave his perspective in a speech: But Tauzin did offer [CTIA CEO Tom] Wheeler some advice in order to avoid more regulation: Have the industry clean up its act. If it doesn’t want to be hit…

  • DRM and the Regulatory Ratchet

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    Regular readers know that one of my running themes is the harm caused when policy makers don’t engage with technical realities. One of the most striking examples of this has to do with DRM (or copy-restriction) technologies. Independent technical experts agree almost universally that DRM is utterly unable to prevent the leakage of copyrighted material…

  • Online Porn and Bad Science

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    Declan McCullagh reports on yesterday’s House Government Reform Committee hearings on porn and peer-to-peer systems. (I’m sure there is some porn on these systems, as there is in every place where large groups of people gather.) There’s plenty to chew on in the story; Frank Field says it “sounds like a nasty meeting.” But I…

  • Too Late

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    Julian Bigelow, who was chief engineer on the IAS computer (the architectural forerunner of today’s machines) died about three weeks ago at the age of 89. Today I learned where he had lived. For the last seven years I sat at the breakfast table each morning and looked out at the red house behind mine.…

  • Grimmelmann on the Berkeley DRM Conference

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    James Grimmelmann at LawMeme offers a typically insightful and entertaining summary of the recent Berkeley DRM Conference. Here’s my favorite part: And thus, the sixty-four dollar question: Is any of this [DRM technology] really going to work? The question tends to come up about once per panel; most of the panelists do their best to…

  • Reader Replies on Congestion and the Commons

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    Thanks to all of the readers who responded to my query about why the Internet’s congestion control mechanisms aren’t destroyed by selfish noncompliance. Due to the volume of responses, I can’t do all of you credit here, but I’ll do my best to summarize. Jordan Lampe, Grant Henninger, and David Spalding point out that “Internet…

  • Congestion Control and the Tragedy of the Commons

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    I have been puzzling lately over why the Internet’s congestion control mechanisms work. They are a brilliant bit of engineering, but they fail utterly to account for the incentives of the Internet’s users. By any rational analysis, they ought to fail spectacularly, causing the Net to grind to a halt. And yet, for some unfathomable…