Politics

Tue
24
Feb
Dennis Faas's picture

British Politicians Fail To Interact Online

A new report finds that British politicians are not doing enough to harness the two-way communications offered by the Internet. While most use emails and have a website, few have their own personal blogs or social networking pages. The survey, ... carried out by research group the Hansard Society, questioned 168 of the 646 members of the British parliament, selected as a representative sample. Only 8% of those questioned did not have a website. However, the proportion who engaged in other forms of online communication was generally inversely proportional to the level of interactivity involved. ... (view more)

Wed
26
Nov
Dennis Faas's picture

Obama To Take Fireside Chats Online

Barack Obama recently published a YouTube video response to George Bush's weekly Presidential address to the nation. It appears Obama will use the video-sharing site as a regular means of communication once he enters the White House. Each week, ... President Bush, like all holders of office, delivers an official address to the United States public via the radio. The opposition party traditionally delivers an official response, usually with a different speaker each week. Obama delivered the Democratic response in the usual audio format, but his organization also filmed the response, which now ... (view more)

Thu
20
Nov
Dennis Faas's picture

Radical Right-Wing Party's Info Leaked

The identities of 10,000 radical British National Party members were recently published on a specially-designed web page, revealing personal details including profession. The hack, if you can call it that, could incite violence across the pond -- ... the BNP represents an all-white, anti-immigrant platform. News of the publishing led to panic at the British National Party headquarters. According to reports, the web site containing the 10,000 names included a wide variety of members and their professions, ranging from teachers to government officials to police officers. The leak could be ... (view more)

Thu
09
Oct
Dennis Faas's picture

Palin's Yahoo Email Hacker Indicted

Not so long ago, we reported on Sarah Palin's unwise decision to use her Yahoo Mail account for sensitive information. The Tennessee hacker who made Palin look so foolish has been indicted, the Justice Department announced on Wednesday. Knoxville ... resident and college student David Kernell, just 20, faces charges for cracking Palin's Yahoo account back in September. According to the Federal Bureau of Investigation, Kernell was indicted by a grand jury for "intentionally accessing without authorization" the Republican senator's online account. Although Kernell turned himself into authorities, ... (view more)

Wed
27
Aug
Dennis Faas's picture

Pro-Tibet Album Blamed For Chinese iTunes Blocking

Chinese iTunes users are reporting problems with the site, prompting speculation the government may have blocked the service in response to a popular pro-Tibet campaign album. There's no official confirmation that this is the reason -- or indeed ... that the site is being blocked -- but it certainly is likely, given that the problems began on Monday, one day after the Art of Peace Foundation began promoting its release, "Songs of Tibet". The album contains music from the likes of Sting and Alanis Morrisette, plus a 15 minute speech by the Dalai Lama. The publicity drive included the announcement ... (view more)

Thu
01
May
Dennis Faas's picture

OMG! Chatroom Speak Infects Homework

American teachers are increasingly finding Internet chatroom and forum-style abbreviations are showing up in their pupils' assignments. A survey of 700 teenagers found more than one-third say they have used abbreviations such as LOL (Laugh Out Loud) ... in schoolwork. A quarter said they'd even used emoticons, the combinations of punctuation marks which represent different emotions and are traditionally used in online writing to replicate the tone and body language which accompanies spoken language. More than 40% of those surveyed said programs such as Microsoft Word encouraged poor grammar and ... (view more)

Thu
29
Nov
Dennis Faas's picture

Facebook Impacting 2008 Election Coverage?

Like a middle-aged guy shopping for the newest hip-hop CD, it seems ABC News is completely out of its element. In a recent announcement, it will join with Facebook in an attempt to lure the young social community into a Web 2.0 twist on the 2008 ... presidential election. The new application -- which will stand next to "Booze Mail", "LOLcats", and "Simpsons Quotes" on people's app lists -- will be called "U.S. Politics". Although the name sounds like a bad (or 'bird') first year university course, it will be constructed using ABC News editorial content. (Source: news.com ) According to David ... (view more)

Tue
06
Nov
Dennis Faas's picture

Vote Spam for President in 2008

According to some security companies, a spam campaign launched under the name of presidential hopeful Ron Paul glutted inboxes across the country last week. As if we needed one more reason to heavily scrutinize the 2008 candidates. For those who ... like Paul, you can be reassured that his campaign team is not behind the spam emails, which use the same tactics employed by male enhancement products and those pump-and-dump penny stock systems. Regardless of Paul's stance on the scheme, many of his supporters worry that the spam campaign has been designed to hurt his own. That could in fact be true ... (view more)

Thu
01
Nov
Dennis Faas's picture

CyberCrime: Teaching Old Politicians New Tricks

The government doesn't understand cybercrime. For many, that might not be much of a surprise, but the fact alone is enough to prevent any real measures in defending against the rapid growth of malicious activity on the Internet. According to a ... report last week by Toronto, Ontario's International Perspectives research group, the most significant barrier between government bodies and their ability to do something about cybercrime is simply their ignorance on the topic. Alicia Wanless, executive director of International Perspectives, argues, "I think it's difficult for the average person to get ... (view more)

Wed
04
Jul
Dennis Faas's picture

Mr Google Goes to Washington

Google has hired more lobbyists to its staff in an effort to create a strong presence in Washington. "We're seeking to do public policy advocacy in a Googley way," said Andrew McLaughlin, Google's director of public policy and government affairs. ... "We want our users to be part of the effort." (Source: imedinews.ge ) The sudden focus on lobbying strength is a vast change from two years ago. At that time, Google only had one staff lobbyist in Washington, Alan B. Davidson, who now heads Google's Washington office. But when Google co-founder Sergey Brin found it difficult to get meetings with ... (view more)

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