Internet company CEOs and government officials are apoplectic about the prospect of Internet telephony technology being subjected to government regulation.
Unfortunately, these free-market advocates, including Federal Communications Commission Chairman Michael Powell and New Hampshire Sen. John Sununu, overlook the fact that the Internet--and voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP), in particular--is already subject to myriad government statutes and court decisions.
If all goes well, this summer I'll be building a new house. I've owned a few houses before, some of them built in the 1920s and 30s, and full of all the charm and quirks of an old house, and a couple that were pretty new, with the lack of craftsmanship and imagination that's typical in most new construction in the USA today. But this time I'm building a custom home, just to my specifications, so I can have whatever features I want, limited only by my imagination (and budget). I'd like to integrate some home automation features into the house, and include wiring for future expansion.
Love it. Hate it. Need it. Americans are ambivalent about their cell phones, TV sets and the like. They rely on such everyday technology, but it drives them nuts.
At the top of the list? The cell phone.
An annual Massachusetts Institute of Technology survey, known as the Lemelson-MIT Invention Index, found that among adults asked what invention they hate most but can't live without, 30 percent said the cell phone.
Declared dead just a few years ago, voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP)--or the ability to make phone calls over the Internet--is back, bearing all the markings of a Next Big Thing.
Just a few weeks into 2004, signs of VoIP's quickening pulse are everywhere. Phone carriers are practically tripping over each other to announce aggressive VoIP strategies aimed at both consumers and businesses. Not to be outdone, Time Warner Cable, Cox Communications and Comcast have trumpeted their own forays into the VoIP market.
Sony Corp.'s toddler-shaped robot waddled into a Tokyo recording studio Thursday to dub a voice part for a popular television cartoon show, where the talking, dancing machine makes a cameo appearance.
Surrounded by a pack of photographers, the 58-centimer-tall (23-inch-tall) silver robot with glowing eyes walked slowly up to a microphone, stopped, waved and muttered, "All this attention is making me nervous."
A JAPANESE COMPANY will introduce a machine this spring which it claims will allow you to dream whatever your heart desires.
Takara, said the Nihon Keizai Shimbun, uses smells, sound and light to set your dream going at a specific time of night.
The ¥15,000 device lets people record messages to induce particular dreams, while the unit allows you to also place a picture to look at before you enter the land of nod.
U.S. Sen. John Sununu said he's preparing legislation to keep broadband telephone service providers from being "smothered by state and federal regulators."
The New Hampshire Republican described the proposed law at the Consumer Electronics Show as a "clear, pre-emptive remedy" that directs state utility regulators to take a hands-off regulatory stance on what's called voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP).
The legislation also seeks to make the Federal Communications Commission the main authority over VoIP service providers, the senator said.
Major device manufacturers are planning to incorporate Internet phone calling technology into their modems and cordless phones, another sign of the growing popularity of this cheaper version of telephone calling, executives said on the sidelines of the Consumer Electronics Show.
With the immenant rise of Voice Over IP telephony, large communications corporations are faced with a conundrum of whether or not to proceed to the newer technology and compromise their success. Today Verizon, one of the nation's largest phone companies, has made the move to VoIP with the assistance of another telco giant, Nortel Networks.
The computer server, workhorse of the Internet and corporate world, just got personal. And remarkably user-friendly.
That's a very good thing indeed, because the chore we all loathe and too often neglect is backing up our exploding data store, which is worth so much more to us than our various computers.
Intimidating to the non-geek, the server is normally thought of as a machine that's entrusted to network managers. Nothing we can fathom without stacks of manuals and hours to burn.
