J.R.McHale

Image © 2010 j.r.mchale; all rights reserved

An interesting short piece (five paragraphs and an eleven photo slide show) entitled Internet I.R.L. in today’s New York Times magazine about photographer Dave Greer‘s current project photographing where pieces of the internet backbone and related data centers are housed. Tidbit from the article about the One Wilshire building in the above photograph (taken by me from my former loft in downtown Los Angeles): “In 2013, One Wilshire sold for $437.5 million, the highest price per square foot (about $660) ever paid for a downtown Los Angeles office building. Why? Because the Internet. The building is one of the world’s largest data-transfer centers — tenants include network, cloud and information-technology providers — and serves as a major West Coast terminus for trans-Pacific fiber-optic cables.” An excellent reminder that the internet is not some amorphous thing ‘in the cloud’, but based on tangible, physical things, including circuits, switches, servers, cables and other equipment – in many cases, housed in buildings or buried under ground or sea.

From Smoke-Filled Rooms to Computer Algorithms – The Evolution of Collusion – Ariel Ezrachi and Maurice Stucke at The CLS Blue Sky Blog

When Bots Collude – The New Yorker

The FTC is Worried about Algorithmic Transparency, and You Should be Too – PCWorld

Academic Papers:

Artificial Intelligence & Collusion: When Computers Inhibit Competition – Ariel Ezrachi and Maurice Stucke (pdf available at the link; 38 pages)

Antitrust and the Robo-Seller: Competition in the Time of Algorithms – Salil K. Mehra (pdf available at the link; 60 pages)

Recent DOJ Action:

Former E-Commerce Executive Charged with Price Fixing in the Antitrust Division’s First Online Marketplace Prosecution – Department of Justice Press Release. The Topkins DOJ charges: – pdf (5 pages)

Jetpack demonstration at the Calgary Stampede circa 1966; image © 2015 Edward McHale, all rights reserved

. . . And We Are Getting Amazing Things. Recent Tech Developments:

Quantum Computers:

Scientists Achieve Critical Steps to Building First Practical Quantum Computer – Phys.Org

IBM Brings Quantum Computing a Step Closer – Wall Street Journal

What Can We Do with a Quantum Computer? – Institute for Advanced Study.

We’re Entering a Golden Era of Quantum Computing Research – SmarterPlanet

Electromagnetic Space Drives:

New Test Suggests NASA’s ‘Impossible’ EM Drive Will Work In Space – i09

Evaluating NASA’s Futuristic EM Drive – NASASpaceflight.com

Medical Diagnostics:

New Test Can Predict Cancer up to 13 Years Before Disease Develops; People Who Develop Cancer have Shorter Telomeres, the Caps at the End of Chromosomes which Protect the DNA – The Telegraph

Gene Modification:

Chinese Scientists Genetically Modify Human Embryos; Rumours of Germline Modification Prove True and Look Set to Reignite an Ethical Debate – Nature

Full Text of the Chinese Scientists’ Research Paper

Editing Human Embryos: So This Happened – National Geographic

These are the Countries Where it’s ‘Legal’ to Edit Human Embryos (hint: the U.S.A. is one) – Business Insider

Military Tech:

The US Military Is Getting Closer to Creating Self-Guided Bullets – Vice

“We already know that there are two dominant mobile operating systems out there. But the current situation doesn’t really allow anyone to experiment, not without going through the interests and lenses of the two dominant players — Apple and Google. That’s why we need a third mobile OS to break this duopoly and move us towards a more open environment for anyone to innovate, without permission. Especially as mobile phones have begun to democratize and broaden the reach of technology around the world . . . why shouldn’t we then also democratize the mobile operating system?”

We Need to Break the Mobile Duopoly – We Need a 3rd Mobile OS – Peter Levine at Andreessen Horowitz

Twenty Questions for 2015 – Benedict Evans of Andreessen Horowitz

16 Things – also from Andreessen Horowitz

What is Going to Happen – Fred Wilson of Union Square Ventures at AVC with his predictions for 2015

If the Supreme Court Tackles the NSA in 2015, It’ll be one of these Five Cases – ArsTechnica

California’s Online Eraser Law and Other New Developments for 2015 – Internet Law Center Cyber Report

The Blockchain Application Stack – Joel Monegro of Union Square Ventures

There’s a Blockchain for That! The Code that Secures Bitcoin could also Power an Alternate Internet – First, Though, It Has to Work – Scott Rosenberg at Medium

Bitcoin (and Blockchain) – Three Things to Think About This Year – Andreessen Horowitz

“How the Bitcoin Protocol Actually Works.” A lengthy, somewhat technical explanation by writer/scientist/programmer, Michael Nielsen (via Bruce Schneier).

Related: “Bitcoin: Questions, Answers and Analysis of Legal Issues” (pdf) – Congressional Research Service (January 2015)

News Report: The Verge

Text of Bill: Text and legislative history at leginfo.legislature.ca.gov

Explainer: California’s Cellphone ‘Kill Switch’ Law: What You Need to Know at Mashable

Cautionary Note: How Cops and Hackers Could Abuse California’s New Phone Kill-Switch Law at WIRED.

Mary Meeker’s annual Internet Trends slide presentation (164 slides).

• Netflix and Net Neutrality — Ben Thompson at Stratechery:
  

  “This [Comcast-Netflix] deal is in many ways a win-win for Netflix: they are likely paying less for better quality . . . . Currently non-Netflix broadband subscribers are effectively subsidizing Netflix viewers; they use much less capacity, yet pay the same price. This needs to change for the sake of true net neutrality, and if it results in Netflix losing subscribers, so be it. Unfortunately, this agreement and the others that are soon to follow makes such an arrangement unlikely. Comcast and company are getting paid, so they’re happy, and Netflix is disguising their true cost to end users so they are happy as well. It’s non-Netflix users, and, more distressingly, the startups and services that have yet to be created who are ultimately paying the price”
  

• Should We Worry that Netflix is Buying Transit Rights from Comcast? — Tyler Cowen says no, at Marginal Revolution
  

• Inside The Netflix/Comcast Deal and What The Media Is Getting Very Wrong — Dan Rayburn at StreamingMedia.com
  

• Here’s How The Comcast and Netflix Deal Is Structured, With Data & Numbers — Dan Rayburn at StreamingMedia.com
  

• Comcast’s Deal with Netflix Makes Network Neutrality Obsolete — Timothy B. Lee at The Washington Post
  
  

• The Internet is F*cked (but we can fix it) — Nilay Patel at The Verge:
  

  “[T]he entire problem, expressed in four simple ideas: the internet is a utility, there is zero meaningful competition to provide that utility to Americans, all internet providers should be treated equally, and the FCC is doing a miserably ineffective job. The United States should lead the world in broadband deployment and speeds: we should have the lowest prices, the best service, and the most competition. We should have the freest speech and the loudest voices, the best debate and the soundest policy. We are home to the most innovative technology companies in the world, and we should have the broadband networks to match.”
  

• You Won’t Have Broadband Competition Without Regulation — Felix Salmon at Reuters:
  

  “[W]e already have perfectly adequate pipes running into our homes, capable of delivering enough broadband for nearly everybody’s purposes. Creating a massive parallel national network of new pipes (or pCells, or whatever) is, frankly, a waste of money. The economics of wholesale bandwidth are little-understood, but they’re also incredibly effective, and have created a system whereby the amount of bandwidth in the US is more than enough to meet the needs of all its inhabitants. What’s more, as demand increases, the supply of bandwidth quite naturally increases to meet it. What we don’t need is anybody spending hundreds of billions of dollars to build out a brand-new nationwide broadband network. What we do need, on the other hand, is the ability of different companies to provide broadband services to America’s households. And here’s where the real problem lies: the cable companies own the cable pipes, and the regulators refuse to force them to allow anybody else to provide services over those pipes. This is called local loop unbundling, it’s the main reason for low broadband prices in Europe, and of course it’s vehemently opposed by the cable companies.”
  

• America’s 10-Year Experiment in Broadband Investment Has Failed — Brendan Greeley at Bloomberg:
  

• Why Super-Fast Internet Is Coming Super Slowly; The FCC Could Change this Overnight by Focusing on What’s Best for the Economy, Not Just for Those it Regulates. — Andy Kessler at The Wall Street Journal
  
  

• Registration Statement on Form S-1 (Table of Contents) and Amendments No. 1 (containing third quarter financial information), No. 2, No. 3 and No. 4.¹
  

• What’s Twitter Worth? — NYU finance professor, Aswath Damodaran, takes a shot at valuing and pricing Twitter (and explains the value/price distinction) at his Musings on the Market blog.   Also by Damodaran: The Twitter IPO: Thoughts on the IPO End Game.
  

• Plotting The Way To IPO, Twitter’s Product Roadmap Has Become Too Data Driven: TechCrunch

1. Watch for updated and additional SEC filings by Twitter on the SEC’s EDGAR system. ↩

“[I]f Google couldn’t make RSS work, why are so many others interested … . The answer is simple. RSS is the way news is distributed on the Internet. That’s why so many people want to be #1 in this area. News is big business.“

Where The Free Software Movement Went Wrong (And How To Fix It) by Klint Finley at TechCrunch.