You’re probably aware that Google keeps tabs on what you’re up to on its devices, apps, and services—but you might not realize just how far its tracking reach extends, into the places you go, the purchases you make, and much more. It’s an extensive set of data, but you can take more control over what Google collects about you and how long the company keeps it. Here’s how.
@daiwaka: Prime Leverage: How Amazon Wields Power in the Technology World
Elastic, a software start-up in Amsterdam, was rapidly building its business and had grown to 100 employees. Then Amazon came along.
In October 2015, Amazon’s cloud computing arm announced it was copying Elastic’s free software tool, which people use to search and analyze data, and would sell it as a paid service. Amazon went ahead even though Elastic’s product, called ElasticSearch, was already available on Amazon.
Within a year, Amazon was generating more money from what Elastic had built than the start-up, by making it easy for people to use the tool with its other offerings. So Elastic added premium features last year and limited what companies like Amazon could do with them. Amazon duplicated many of those features anyway and provided them free.
In September, Elastic fired back. It sued Amazon in federal court in California for violating its trademark because Amazon had called its product by the exact same name: ElasticSearch. Amazon “misleads consumers,” the start-up said in its complaint. Amazon denied it had done anything wrong. The case is pending.
Not since the mid-1990s, when Microsoft dominated the personal computer industry with Windows, has a technology platform instilled such fear in competitors as Amazon is now doing with its cloud computing arm. Its feud with Elastic illustrates how it brandishes power in that technical world.
Case Act Myths And Facts: EFF FUD Campaign — Artist Rights Watch
ARW readers will remember the Google Shill List. The Shill List was part of a brilliant strategy deployed by Oracle in their copyright infringement case against Google (still going on, see my Hypebot post on the case that is now going to get review by the U.S. Supreme Court before Lessig buddy Justice Kagan). The […]
Case Act Myths And Facts: EFF FUD Campaign — Artist Rights Watch
Make the Spambots the Issue: A Quick Demo of How to Hijack Google-Funded Spambots — The Trichordist
A “Theodore Kaczynski” from Lincoln Montana signs a Google-funded astroturf petition over and over again. Google-funded and affiliated astroturfs have mounted a spambot campaign targeting Senators to vote against the CASE Act. The CASE Act (voluntary small claims copyright court) passed the house 410-6. Google and their allies are worried because independent artists and creators […]
Make the Spambots the Issue: A Quick Demo of How to Hijack Google-Funded Spambots — The Trichordist
@cloudflare CEO Calls for a Decider–When That Decider Is Cloudflare Employees — Music Technology Policy
Diogenes searched the world for an honest man, and Cloudflare is searching the world for a decider in chief to tell them what to do. But as we know from Cloudflare’s IPO, Cloudflare need only look within because the insiders have structured the company’s governance so there is clear responsibility–and it’s with Cloudflare employees. The […]
@cloudflare CEO Calls for a Decider–When That Decider Is Cloudflare Employees — Music Technology Policy
Must Read: @ranaforoohar: Fact-checking Facebook’s fantasies — Artist Rights Watch
Criticising Big Tech can feel redundant at a time when many chief executives in Silicon Valley are doing such a good job of making the public sceptical about their business models and their executive competence all by themselves. Even so, Mark Zuckerberg’s speech at Georgetown University and his testimony on Capitol Hill last week are worthy of […]
Must Read: @ranaforoohar: Fact-checking Facebook’s fantasies — Artist Rights Watch
Why Worry About Political Ad Pinocchios With @Jack Dorsey’s Twitter BotNet Apps? — Music Technology Policy
Cancelling political ads that tread on (or even trample…or even incinerate) someone’s truth are all the rage. Having skimmed the cream from political ad revenue, Twitter has announced it is banning political ads to great fanfare–after the cow escaped from the barn. (What this “ban” actually means in practice remains to be seen.) Twitter CEO […]
Why Worry About Political Ad Pinocchios With @Jack Dorsey’s Twitter BotNet Apps? — Music Technology Policy
@terry5mag: Purged: How a failed economic theory still rules the digital music marketplace — Artist Rights Watch
[Must read takedown of the “long tail” (aka utter shite) by the erudite Terry Matthews] Unless you spent a lot of time listening to early ’00s techno-utopian babble, the Theory of the Long Tail probably means nothing to you. Yet if you live in the US or Europe and you run a digital music label, […]
@terry5mag: Purged: How a failed economic theory still rules the digital music marketplace — Artist Rights Watch
@ranaforoohar: Big Tech has moved from offering utopia to selling dystopia — Artist Rights Watch
The tide has finally turned against Big Tech. Last week, Twitter banned political advertising; EU antitrust chief Margrethe Vestager said she was considering much tougher monopoly standards; the city of Toronto pushed back on Google’s Sidewalk project; Australia sued the search giant over alleged misuse of location data; and US presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren called out Facebook’s political lobbying as she […]
@ranaforoohar: Big Tech has moved from offering utopia to selling dystopia — Artist Rights Watch
Content Piracy as Hybrid Warfare — Hugh Stephens Blog
War, unfortunately, is as old as history. Usually violent, involving the use of force to compel or resist, in recent years the nature of warfare has begun to change. While physical force is still part of the military’s repertoire, today we are moving into an era of so-called “hybrid warfare” or “grey zone” strategies. There […]
Content Piracy as Hybrid Warfare — Hugh Stephens Blog
The FAANG Project 