The beginning of the end for a united Internet?

stephane.vangelder@indom.com (Stephane Van Gelder) — Sat, 04 Sep 2010 11:30:51 +0200

The Economist is running a fascinating story on the Internet itself. The main pitch is that the Internet was a great global unifier in its early years. But now that governments and law enforcement agencies have caught on to the Internet's power and ability to transcend any boundary, be it physical, geographical or legal, they are increasingly trying to control it. The result is a strong risk of seeing the Internet splintered and as such becoming less effective as a planetary communication tool, with less innovation and less user benefit and choice.

Read the article here, or click on "continue reading" for a glimpse of the article.

Continue reading "The beginning of the end for a united Internet?"

It's clobbering time… again?

stephane.vangelder@indom.com (Stephane Van Gelder) — Thu, 10 Jun 2010 15:59:30 +0200

I naturally keep a close watch on all domain name related topics. One of fun side effects is seeing fan and geek sites scramble for clues about upcoming films or products as soon as a new domain is registered. Media and entertainment companies must have a hell of a time hiding their new projects while at the same time protecting their intellectual property by registered the relevant domains…

I especially love leaks like FantasticFourReborn.com, a domain spotted by fan sites as being registered by Fox, and hence the source of some speculation that the Fantastic Four movie reboot will be entitled "Reborn".

Could be, although it must be said that movie studios are becoming more and more adept at generating buzz around "false positives", i.e. domains that are registered as realistic possibilities just to throw people off the scent. So far, there's no working website behind www.FantasticFourReborn.com. But that could change.

Stephane Van Gelder - General

The beginning of the end for a united Internet?

It's clobbering time… again?