Rep. Ed Markey (D-MA) threw down the gauntlet just moments ago, introducing the Network Neutrality Act of 2006 [full text HERE], which “[offers a] choice between favoring the broadband designs of a small handful of very large companies, and safeguarding the dreams of thousands of inventors, entrepreneurs, and small businesses. This legislation is designed to save the Internet and thwart those who seek to fundamentally and detrimentally alter the Internet as we know it.”

In an unequivocal editorial today, the NY Times put it this way:

Cable and telephone companies that provide Internet service are talking about creating a two-tiered Internet, in which Web sites that pay them large fees would get priority over everything else.

The Times goes on to note that if the cable and telephone companies got their way, “[it] would be a financial windfall for Internet service providers, but a disaster for users, who could find their Web browsing influenced by whichever sites paid their service provider the most money.”

Thus far, nobody who isn’t working for the telephone and cable companies — cough… Mike McCury — those who will benefit at the expensive of ordinary internet users, has provided any legitimate opposition to Network Neutrality. To wit: watch Sean-Paul Kelley’s excellent annotated video of Democrat Charlie Gonzalez’s disingenuous spiel HERE. Gonzalez, as you’ll find out, happens to be the recipient of a generous contribution from guess who…

During last week’s debate on the earlier Markey amendment, calling on the House Energy & Commerce Committee to protect Internet freedom, the more the issue came to light, the more votes neutrality received.

This is that rare bird, a black and white issue, with large companies on one side and the vast majority of America on the other. Politicians will only oppose network neutrality so long as it stays in the darkest corners of debate.

Here’s the updated action list, from Matt Stoller via parachutec:

1. SIGN a Net Neutrality petition to Congress.

2. CALL Congress now. Especially, tell your rrepresentatives in the House to support Markey’s Net Neutrality Act of 2006, but educate your senators on this issue too, as the fight will soon move there.

3. WRITE A LETTER to Congress.

4. MYSPACE: Add “Save the Internet” as a friend.

5. Check out the BLOG RESOURCES about this issue, including “Save the Internet” logo.

6. VISIT the SavetheInternet coalition Web site for more information.

The entire text of Markey’s act is below or on his webpage HERE.

May 2, 2006- Introduction of the Markey Network Neutrality Act of 2006

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to introduce the “Network Neutrality Act of 2006.”

Broadband networks, Mr. Speaker, are the lifeblood of our emerging digital economy. These broadband networks also hold the promise of promoting innovation in various markets and technologies, creating jobs, and furthering education. The world-wide leadership that the U.S. provides in high technology is directly related to the government-driven policies over decades which have ensured that telecommunications networks are open to all lawful uses and all users. The Internet, which is accessible to more and more Americans with every day that goes by on such broadband networks, was also founded upon an open architecture protocol and as a result it has provided low barriers to entry for web-based content, applications, and services.

Recent decisions by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) and court interpretations, however, put these aspects of broadband networks and the Internet in jeopardy. The corrosion of historic policies of nondiscrimination by the imposition of bottlenecks by broadband network owners endanger economic growth, innovation, job creation, and First Amendment freedom of expression on such networks. Broadband network owners should not be able to determine who can and who cannot offer services over broadband networks or over the Internet. The detrimental effect to the digital economy would be quite severe if such conduct were permitted and became widespread.

This network neutrality bill has essentially three parts. The first part articulates overall broadband policy and network neutrality goals for the country, and spells out exactly what network neutrality means and puts it into the statute so that it will possess the force of law. The second part embodies reasonable exceptions to the general rules, such as to route emergency communications or offer consumer protection features, such as spam blocking technology. And the final part of the bill features an expedited complaint process to deal with grievances and violations within thirty days.

The legislation states that a broadband network provider may not block, impair, degrade or discriminate against the ability of any person to use a broadband connection to access the content, applications, and services available on broadband networks, including the Internet. It ensures that broadband network providers operate their networks in a non-discriminatory manner. The bill also ensures that consumers can attach any device to the broadband operator’s network, such as an Internet phone, or wi-fi router, or settop box, or any other innovative gadget invented in the coming years. Moreover, in order to prevent the warping of the World Wide Web into a system of “tiered service,” the legislation will prevent broadband providers from charging new bottleneck fees for enhanced quality of service or the prioritization of bits.

Finally, if a broadband provider chooses to prioritize data of any type, it requires that it do so for all data of that type and not charge a fee for such prioritization. For instance, if a broadband provider wants to prioritize the transmission of bits representing a VOIP phone call for its own VOIP service, it must do so for all VOIP services so as not to put its competitors at an arbitrary disadvantage.

Mr. Speaker, from the beginning of Internet time until August of 2005, the Internet’s nondiscriminatory nature was safeguarded from being compromised by Federal Communications Commission rules that required nondiscriminatory treatment by telecommunications carriers. In other words, no commercial telecommunications carrier could engage in discriminatory conduct regarding Internet traffic and Internet access because it was prohibited by law.

In August of 2005, however, the Federal Communications Commission re-classified broadband access to the Internet in a way which removed such legal protections. And how did the industry respond to this change? Just a few weeks after the FCC removed the Internet’s protections, the Chairman of then-SBC Communications made the following statement in a November 7th Business Week interview: “Now what they [Google, Yahoo, MSN] would like to do is use my pipes free, but I ain’t going to let them do that because we have spent this capital and we have to have a return on it. So there’s going to have to be some mechanism for these people who use these pipes to pay for the portion they’re using. . . .”

In a December 1, 2005 Washington Post article, a BellSouth executive indicated that his company wanted to strike deals to give certain Web sites priority treatment in reaching computer users. The article noted this would “significantly change how the Internet operates” and that the BellSouth executive said “his company should be allowed to charge a rival voice-over-Internet firm so that its service can operate with the same quality as BellSouth’s offering.” Meaning, that if the rival firm did not pay, or was not permitted to pay for competitive reasons, its service presumably would not “operate with the same quality” as BellSouth’s own product.

Finally, on January 6, 2006, the CEO of Verizon, in an address to the Consumer Electronics Show also indicated that Verizon would now be the corporate arbiter of how traffic would be treated when he said the following: “We have to make sure [content providers] don’t sit on our network and chew up our capacity.”

I think these statements should give pause to those who might argue that we shouldn’t do anything to enact strong network neutrality provisions because currently no harm is being done.

Do we really have to wait till these corporate giants divide and conquer the open architecture of the Internet to make that against the law? These telephone company executives are telling us that they intend to discriminate in the prioritization of bits and to discriminate in the offering of “quality of service” functions - for a new fee, a new broadband bottleneck toll - to access high bandwidth customers, we cannot afford to wait until they actually start doing that before we step in to stop it.

Once they start making money by leveraging that bottleneck position in the marketplace, will a future Congress really stare them down and take that revenue stream away?

Mr. Speaker, if we don’t protect the openness of the Internet for entrepreneurial activity, we’re ruining a wonderful model for low barrier entry, innovation, and job creation. Broadband network owners should not be able to determine who can and who cannot offer services over broadband networks or over the Internet. The detrimental effect to the digital economy would be quite severe if such conduct were permitted and became widespread. The deterioration of significant policies of nondiscrimination by the imposition of artificial bottlenecks by broadband network owners imperil economic growth, innovation, job creation, and First Amendment freedom of expression on such networks.

The Network Neutrality Act of 2006 offers Members a clear choice. It is a choice between favoring the broadband designs of a small handful of very large companies, and safeguarding the dreams of thousands of inventors, entrepreneurs, and small businesses. This legislation is designed to save the Internet and thwart those who seek to fundamentally and detrimentally alter the Internet as we know it. Mr. Speaker, I urge Members to support this bill and urge the House to take a decisive stand in favor of network neutrality.

click here to download Quicktime

click here to download Windows file
 

That’s not right………..Sum Ting Wong

Are you harbouring a fugitive……Hu Yu Hai Ding

See me ASAP……….Kum Hia

Stupid Man………….Dum Gai

Small Horse…………Tai Ni Po Ni

Did you go to the beach…….Wai Yu So Tan

I bumped the coffee table…….Ai Bang Mai Ni

I think you need a face lift……..Chin Tu Fat

It’s very dark in here……..Wai So Dim

I thought you were on a diet……Wai Yu Mun Ching

This is a tow away zone……..No Pah King

Our meeting is scheduled for next week…WaiYu Kum Nao

Staying out of sight……….Lei Ying Lo

He’s cleaning his automobile…..Wa Shing Ka

Your body odor is offensive……Yu Stin Ki Pu

WHAT IS A VODCAST?

Most videobloggers have setup a VODCAST using RSS so that their vlog can be easily subscribed to and syndicated/distributed to a wide audience and variety of applications and devices that handle the downloading of video feeds.

VODCASTS are Internet Video On Demand Channels.

This is exactly the same as PODCASTS, which is the buzz word that has been used to describe Internet Radio/Audio Shows and rooted by the popularity of the Apple iPod.

Apple refers to these as VIDEO PODCASTS, so you can also look at the term VODCAST as a shorter version of that… much like ‘BLOG’ is a shortened version of ‘WEB LOG’.

However, Video iPods are only one potential destination of video downloaded via a videoblog’s VODCAST so the use of ‘PODCAST’ can be misleading to people and is inaccurate to the state of this medium and the plethora of other devices not manufactured by Apple.
Most people watch VODCASTS on their computer, some on their TV and some on portable media players or cell phones. But BUZZWORDS usually overpower logic. Regardless, hopefully this explained distinction is helpful. To learn more, visit freevlog.org. ]]> http://blips.megaweblog.com/2006/02/10/vodcast/feed/ http://blips.megaweblog.com/2006/02/08/why-wordpress-in-my-blog-of-choice/ http://blips.megaweblog.com/2006/02/08/why-wordpress-in-my-blog-of-choice/#comments Wed, 08 Feb 2006 18:48:46 +0000 blips Uncategorized http://blips.megaweblog.com/2006/02/08/why-wordpress-in-my-blog-of-choice/  

The more I use Wordpress, the more I love it. It has 2 very important features that Blogger doesn’t yet support.

Number 1, you can set up Wordpress to automatically ping all the RSS and blog feed directories every time you make a post. This is a very powerful feature if you want your blog to get a lot of traffic right away. On top of that, you’ll be quickly developing backlinks to your blog almost automatically.

Think about how long it can take you to build a regular site, get the search engines to index it, get backlinks to improve your listings, and then start getting traffic. A blog like Wordpress can do all that “grunge” work for you automatically.

Number 2, Wordpress allows the use of Categories. Categories are a very powerful way to improve the structure of your site both for human visitors and for the search engines.

Let’s say the topic of your site is Widgets. You could create a Category for black widgets, one for orange widgets, and one for green widgets.

Now when you add posts to your blog, you can choose which of your categories your post belongs to. Now your blog will archive your past posts not only by their month and date, as Blogger does. But also by Category.

So if you have a visitor who is especially interested in green widgets, they can easily find all your posts on green widgets. They don’t have to go through your entire archives to find them. With a blog that has been around for awhile and has hundreds of posts, that would be pretty discouraging. Using Categories makes it very easy.

Categories are also very search engine friendly. When you use Categories in your blog, there is a link on every one of your pages to your categories. Think about this: would you rather be #1 in the search engines for March 2003, or for green widgets, one of the main keywords of your site?

By using the Category feature, you will eventually have hundreds of pages on your site with links to green widgets, black widgets, and orange widgets. All those backlinks to those keywords can result in much higher search engine rankings.

Another neat feature is that you can easily create an RSS feed for each of your categories. Then every time you post to your blog, it could be pinging the Blog/RSS directories for each feed!

Compare that to putting up a new page on a traditional website. Even if the search engines find your new page right away, it might be a month or two before it actually gets indexed and starts drawing traffic. It might be a long time before it enjoys a first page position for its keywords.

It’s almost amazing how easy all this is with a well-structured blog like Wordpress with Categories enabled!

For more tips and ideas on how to make money blogging, be sure to visit my “Why Marketers Should Blog” weblog at (what else) http://www.WhyMarketersShouldBlog.com

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Linda_J_Bruton

The lawsuit pits Blois Olson, the president of PR firm New School Communications and a well-known Democratic political commentator, against Michael Brodkorb, a Republican operative who publishes the blog “Minnesota Democrats Exposed.” 

read more here; WCCO.com ]]> http://blips.megaweblog.com/2006/01/04/minnesota-blogger-being-sued-for-defamation/feed/ http://blips.megaweblog.com/2005/12/11/a-closer-look-at-megaweblogcom/ http://blips.megaweblog.com/2005/12/11/a-closer-look-at-megaweblogcom/#comments Mon, 12 Dec 2005 05:23:34 +0000 blips Uncategorized http://blips.megaweblog.com/2005/12/11/a-closer-look-at-megaweblogcom/ This article was about wordpress.com but it fits megaweblog.com perfect. 

The bare bones explanation is that MEGAWEBLOG.COM offers the a newer, beta version of WordPress that you don’t need to install on your own server.  Instead, you just sign up and immediately get a subdomain on Megaweblog.com (like http://john.megaweblog.com).  You can login and start blogging right away — it’s ease of use is beautiful for the novice blogger.  It supports categories (and subcategories), trackbacks, and all the other trappings that I view as being necessary for any blogging tool.  It has a WYSIWYG interface with a rich text editor, as well as the ability to edit the HTML directly.  It also allows you to upload pictures and then drag and drop them into your posts.  In short, it’s super easy to use, and changing the presentation of your blog takes about two clicks (click on Presentation, and then choose the theme you want).

The shortcomings is you cannot customize the themes yet (you can’t even specify the font color – supposedly changes to this are in the works, as mentioned above it is still in beta).  You also cannot add additional themes or plugins as you can with the full version of WordPress (which requires installation on your on webhost w/a mysql database).

So what you get is a blogging platform that is VERY easy to use, and very slick, but rather limiting for expert bloggers. 

For newbie bloggers, megaweblog.com could be the blogging tool you’ve been waiting for.  And it’s FREE!  If you don’t care about customizing your templates, it sure beats the pants off of Blogger, even in it’s beta form.  More experienced bloggers should check it out, if only to be able to be part of the creation of the next version of WordPress — there is a Forum where you can submit ‘bugs and hugs’ as well as any suggestions of what you think WordPress.com needs to be a more fully functional and customizable blogging tool, and suggestions are often implemented at a rapid rate.

In the not so distant past writers

The blog is personal. It touches something in the audience that is elemental. There is a trust built among readers. People have become cynical of the information found in newspapers and magazines. The blogs of today have made a connection with something that is both instantaneous and entertaining. The writers of today can build a following with their daily ruminations and then sell and publish their first book through print-on-demand technology right from their Web site.

Many weblogs can allow visitors to leave public comments, which can evoke a community discussion or a personal tête-à-tête or they can remain non-interactive. Blogs are heavily interconnected communities with bloggers reading and posing comments on each others blogs, linking to them from their own blog and making reference to them in their writings. This is referred to as the blogosphere. There are many sites available that can track the interconnections between them such as Blog Street.

When these interconnections erupt in a burst of activity based on a particular subject or controversy it is referred to as a blogstorm or blog swarm. Your particular blog can take on many different forms. You can review other sites and provide reviews and ratings and article summaries or you can run your blog like a traditional journal. You can add hyperlinks to the latest news headlines. The world of the blog is ever changing and could use a few good writers to add to the soup. Why not you?

 Start your Mega Blog on a Mega free site; http://megaweblog.com