All the hot entertainment acts get to play The White House. It’s the equivalent of a Royal Command Performance.
Telegraph.co.uk video of Mumford and Sons at The White House
So when British Prime Minister Cameron showed up for a tent show on March 14th, President Obama invited the hottest British act – Mumford and Sons.
Continue reading
The media stories have Hollywood corporate fat cats reeling from Wednesday’s shutdown or blackout of more than 12,000 websites like Wikipedia, Reddit and Wired. NJN Network did its small part by wearing black all day.
Continue reading
Mike Masnick founder of TechDirt
TechDirt is one of a kind – editor Mike Masnick works tirelessly writing stories every day to promote freedom of speech and freedom on the internet.
Mike has written articles denouncing censorship, state control around the world including the US Congress attempt through SOPA to shut down the internet as we know it. Continue reading
By Chris Brogan G+ – In both cases, there were tweets or Facebook posts or Google+ updates that hinted that things might be falling apart.
But we rarely notice such posts. We rarely hear them loudly, because they aren’t Siri jokes or cats dressed like astronauts.
Continue reading
Apple iPad still frustrating a year later
Sexy marketing that sells status and ease of use must be the key to fooling consumers with the iPad.
After a year of use, the iPad still can’t remember login names and passwords.
The Wi-Fi reception is so bad that browsing the web is a painful experience. 3G browsing is even worse.
While it looked like Apple could force everyone off Flash for videos and music players, that hasn’t happened.
At first, the iPad was so popular people took it to use all the time. Now it sits on the kitchen table as a Twitter browsing appliance.
A couple of friends who have iPads share the same buyer’s remorse and frustration.
My iPad has become a Twitter surfing device and little else. It seems to handle the short messages on Twitter but fails when you want to click through to a link.
Loading a page on Wi-Fi can take almost a minute with good reception. The reason? Apple cheapened out and put in a low-prioed Wi-Fi chip.
My work-around in Twitter is to start loading the page, then go back to browsing messages while the page loads. Continue reading
Clinton Curtis, innovative connection with fans through web
By Matt Stine, 27 Sound , from TechDirt (corrected Matt’s name)
Ever since Mike introduced the concept of CwF + RtB, he has been confronted time and time again with the argument that this concept can only work for well-known artists with large established fanbases. Continue reading
Bob Lefsetz reminded me last month that you’re better to collect email addresses than $0.99 for your songs.
Trade free music downloads for your fans email address. Most people understand the trade-off and don’t mind.
Lefsetz said if you don’t have 2,500 rabid fans, give them your music in exchange for email addresses. Later you can mail them about the latest release.
A mailing list entry from a fan is worth more than $1000. Continue reading
Things have changed since we started NJN Network in 2007 and we’ve changed with them.
We try to be where you are, which is a lot of places on the Internet.
We used to print and re-print 10 stories a day, many of them came from other sources. You could follow us at this site, through RSS and maybe Facebook.
Today the internet is more efficient at distributing content so we rely on Twitter, Facebook, StumbleUpon, Google and BuzzFeed to spread the news around.
NJN Network has been on your iPhone and Blackberry since February 2010, on the iPad since May and Android since September.
Twitter is the quickest way to get at our content – that’s why we have a Hot Tweets box at the top of the page. It rotates the latest 20 stories. Continue reading
TripAdvisor uses Facebook personal information in webpages (click for larger image)
It shocked me when a friend told me my picture and travel history was on the TripAdvisor web page.
It was chilling and intriguing to look at the map of my mostly business travel from the 1980s and 1990s. Things are a lot quieter around here now.
How did TripAdvisor know where I had been?
Were they data-mining my old credit card records? Was the CIA keeping a file on me?
The truth is somewhat simpler – I gave it to Facebook.
Facebook is now allowing business pages and apps to use our personal information in advertising. This is part of their new efforts to monetize the free site. You do have control over your privacy but there are new places turn off the flow of private data.
Personal information can leak out of Facebook beyond the usual settings in “Privacy.” Continue reading
iPhone 4, sending back private information to the mother ship (picture Apple Computer)
Commentary by Eva Galperin, EFF
Your digital camera may embed metadata into photographs with the camera’s serial number or your location.
Your printer may be incorporating a secret code on every page it prints which could be used to identify the printer and potentially the person who used it.
If Apple puts a particularly creepy patent it has recently applied for into use, you can look forward to a day when your iPhone may record your voice, take a picture of your location, record your heartbeat, and send that information back to the mothership.
This is traitorware: devices that act behind your back to betray your privacy.
Perhaps the most notable example of traitorware was the Sony rootkit. In 2005 Sony BMG produced CD’s which clandestinely installed a rootkit onto PC’s that provided administrative-level access to the users’ computer. The copy-protected music CD’s would surreptitiously install its DRM technology onto PC’s. Continue reading
Future Shop smart phone display in the front entrance now (iPhone picture - Stephen Pate)
The push is on to sell everyone a smartphone with email, internet, picture and video access. Some people will use them for phone calls.
For young and old smartphones are a status symbol. The social pressure in school is enormous as sharing photos and videos is replacing texting as the top activity.
It’s a big business that pays dividends for the phone carriers and retailers like Future Shop and Best Buy. The carriers are kicking back millions of dollars to push these fun but expensive phones.
The cost of the phone is irrelevant. They are being discounted to $99 or nothing. Verizon has built a business on giving you the second phone free. Continue reading