Category — Internet Research

In this paper, i will argue why what many people argue are power law models of social networks on the internet are usually not really that at all. By critiquing the assumptions built into the data gathering and measurement, combined with the theoretical modeled used, it is easy to see that through considering time in different ways and by fragmenting the data set, that there are much more complex and interesting phenomena involved in these power law situations that is being masked and hidden by the generalization. In the end, separating out the individual phenomena that seem to map to power law situations usually illustrate the the phenomena as a whole is not related to the power law, and that by using the power law to describe the phenomena, we end up losing much of the unique understandings that could make or break the application of technologies in this arena for a variety of purposes.

Free will, not arrogance. Bill Joy had some doubts to voice about Linux. Of course, like so many others he immediately jumps to the wrong conclusion. “The open-source business model hasn't worked very well,” he says.

Open source doesn't need a business model. [Advogato]

actually no software needs a business model, that should be clear from the hisotory of software… likewise with communities, they don't need business models either

AOL Quietly Wins IM Patent. Tony Kontzer in Information Week is reporting that AOL has been awarded an important patent covering much of the technology behind instant-messaging services.

In the latest example of a potentially market-defining patent being granted without fanfare, AOL Time Warner quietly has become the owner of a patent, granted in September by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, that covers much of the technology behind instant-messaging services. Patent No. 6,449,344 appears to be a far-reaching one, with more than 200 claims that give AOL exclusive rights to a “communications system for facilitating locating a user who is connected to a communications network, preferably for the purposes of establishing point-to-point communications.” [Living Without Microsoft]

This patent will be busted, i think there is enough evidence to bust most of it as I type this. We've been debating this for some time on air-l the list of the association of internet researchers, and I'm fairly convinced that most of the claims can be insubstantiated due to prior art

One more reason to be your own ISP.

In the ultimate world of ends (which the end-to-end Net continues fundamentally to be), ISPs become nothing more than storage and pipes. Stupid things, as David Isenberg correctly says.

Because if they're not stupid, they get all smart like Verio and start shutting down whole sites and communities.

Thanks to Rhizome for the link. And to the Reverse Cowgirl for turning us on to Rhizome.

[The Doc Searls Weblog]

now, is the time to rail aainst censorship to your favorite representative. dmca has gone on long enough, more to come