General

“Justice Department antitrust regulators cleared the way Monday for Cingular Wireless LLC’s $41 billion acquisition of AT&T Wireless Services Inc., a crucial step toward creating the nation’s largest wireless telephone company. The merger still must be approved by the Federal

I had to read the Reuters story twice just to make sure that the “man tax” was for real. Sure enough, “A group of Swedish parliamentarians has proposed levying a “man tax” to cover the social cost of violence against

I’m at the Telecosm conference in Tahoe — a great group of people who are really interested in ideas. This morning Steve Forbes spoke on the cancers of capitalism which include trial lawyers, protectionism, and trade barriers. He also said

I’m at the Telecom 04 conference in Vegas this week. It’s a huge conference with tons of exhibits and technologies on display. A cool one I saw this morning was a DSLAM — DSL access multiplexer — in a fish

PRI hosted an event last Friday where author Virginia Postrel spoke about her new book The Substance of Style. The main thesis is that style is more important to the marketplace than most people realize. The value comes from the

It’s always somewhat precarious to make predictions about political outcomes, but tonight I got some very interesting information. My mother, a liberal who believes in government-sponsored universal health care, says that she thinks Bush will (and should) win. Kerry and

Dick Cheney did a great job last night reminding viewers that the adults are currently in office. John Edwards, on the other hand, was nervous and kept saying “The American People” over and over. For a hilarious take on Edward’s

Nothing all that exciting happened in the debates last night as far as I’m concerned. It was, however, a warning for Bush that he needs to take his opponent a little more seriously. Bush seemed unprepared and petulant last night.

Well, it finally happened. Ah-nold just signed the one bill that has completely annoyed me all session — John Burton’s foie gras bill. The legislation makes the production and sale of foie gras illegal if it’s made through force-feeding ducks.

Just when you thought you were caught up on all the acronyms for unwanted messages, here comes another. Spam is of course unwanted email, Spim is spam over instant messaging, and Spit (yes, that’s right, Spit) is spam over Internet

How about a cell phone to tell you when your breath smells bad? It can also meaure alcohol levels. Here’s the story (scroll down a bit).

Here’s an interesting piece on Déjà Vu in the NYT.

The folks over at the AEI-Brookings Joint Center have released a study arguing that cell phone driving is more dangerous than drunk driving. An argument for restricting cell phone use or legalizing drunk driving? You decide.

This is really amazing. A German who had his lower jaw cut out because of cancer has enjoyed his first meal in nine years — a bratwurst sandwich — after surgeons grew a new jaw bone in his back muscle

After a few weeks on the road (Aspen, Europe, and Black Rock Desert), I’m back in San Francisco. There’s tons to get caught up on, but some of you might consider buying tix to PRI’s upcoming gala event featuring Pulitzer

I’m off to Europe for a much-needed vacation tonight and will be back in about a week. In the meantime, I recommend reading my column on Google, which will appear tomorrow in Tech News World, and also the Tech Liberation

As you know from my previous post (which was the product of various think-tanks folks one night in the sky bar…) I am currently in Aspen at the PFF’s annual tech summit. Today, there was a panel on broadband issues

In the flickering light of a warm Aspen fire (lit by gas, rather than wood, because this is the yuppie capital of the midwest…er, west, or whatever the the Coloradans would prefer to be called. Mark Blafkin, the CEI and

In case you’re not sick of hearing about Google, here’s a song (and some lyrics) about the search giant by USA Today writer Kevin Maney. Hilarious!