A federal judge just turned Twitter and Facebook into public utilities

In what might be the most hilarious case of unintended consequences in recent memory, today Judge Naomi Reice Buchwald of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York has ruled that President Donald Trump was wrong to have blocked users from his Twitter feed... which inadvertently has officially designated Twitter (and by extension Facebook and YouTube and other social media outlets) to be common carriers like the telephone system!

In a 75-page ruling, Judge Buchwald declared that Twitter was a "designated public forum" on which Trump could not discriminate against selected readers by blocking their accounts. "This case requires us to consider whether a public official may, consistent with the First Amendment, 'block' a person from his Twitter account in response to the political views that person has expressed, and whether the analysis differs because that public official is the President of the United States," Buchwald said in her opinion. "The answer to both questions is no."

So let's tear this down...

If a person is a "public official", that person can not "mute" communication between himself or herself and selected members of the audience based on their political views.  It is effectively giving the President a right to be heard whether he wants to be heard or not.

So when do these same protections get extended to ordinary citizens like Diamond & Silk, who have been chronically banned (and reinstated after considerable public outcry) from Facebook and other social media venues?

The documented cases of those who have seen their Facebook posts, tweets, and YouTube clips purged down the memory hole have have had one outstanding factor overwhelmingly in common: they have pertained to those who hold what are often deemed to be "conservative" beliefs.  Too many have been banned outright or have been "shadow banned": made to look as if they are broadcasting their message out but in fact have had their posts and tweets throttled down or shut down completely by Twitter or Facebook or whoever.  Indeed, I would go so far as to say that it is now an open secret that there is extremely active discrimination being practiced on the part of self-ascribed "liberals" and "progressives" within the tech industry against those who they disagree with.  So much so that some have wondered if there might be RICO charges on the basis of advertising purchased with these companies only to have potential audiences algorithm-ed out of sight and out of mind.

But now thanks to Naomi Reice Buchwald, Twitter and other social media platforms have been officially defined to be "common carriers" like AT&T, Comcast, and a lot of other companies.  In business but also subject to regulation by the government to ensure fair practices and privileges for all.  And if users of Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and Instagram are being censored not because of inappropriate behavior but purely on the basis of ideology, well...

This is gonna be totally fun to watch as it unfolds.  Wouldn't surprise me if Twitter came down on Trump's side if it keeps them and every other social media outfit out of regulatory jurisdiction.

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The case for universal data plans

In what some are calling a devious case of "bait 'n switch", AT&T announced this past week that it was getting rid of unlimited data plans and moving to "metered" plans... and just after Apple moved a buttload of those nice shiny new 3G iPads too!

So if you too are at wits end on communication rates, you are in good company with Molly Wood, who contributes a persuasive essay on CNET News demanding that universal data plans make more sense...

And although some elements of the new data plans will work for some customers, AT&T is moving in the opposite direction it should be going. I'm tired of multiple data plans, artificial caps, and arbitrary monthly usage charges. And I'm tired of paying the same companies multiple times for what is, essentially, the exact same service. That service? Data.

Between multiple cell phones, high-speed Internet connections, and even digital TV subscriptions, most households are now paying for data delivery at least three times over, and frequently paying the same provider twice. This is ridiculous, and it's time for some major consolidation. It's time for a universal data plan. I want to pay once (maybe twice) for data, I want that data to be unlimited, and I want to be able to use it in any fashion I choose.

Mash the above link for plenty more soundness and sanity about how we should fork over coin for precious data. I'll second the good lady's notion. What sayeth y'all?

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"Time telescope" could magnify communications capability

It's a very rare moment when I read something for the first time that goes almost completely over the top of my head. This is one of them: researchers are building a "time telescope" that can compress data into smaller chunks of time, that is then transmitted via fiber optics. Hit the link if you want to feel your brains getting twisted.

Of course, there are going to be some who will say that time is going too fast already, but I digress... :-P

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FCC can enter your home without warrant if you have a wireless router

If your home network uses a wireless router, or if you have a cordless phone or baby monitor or cellphone or anything that emits radio waves, the Federal Communications Commission has asserted it has the power to enter your property WITHOUT a warrant in order to "inspect" said equipment.

That’s the upshot of the rules the agency has followed for years to monitor licensed television and radio stations, and to crack down on pirate radio broadcasters. And the commission maintains the same policy applies to any licensed or unlicensed radio-frequency device.

“Anything using RF energy — we have the right to inspect it to make sure it is not causing interference,” says FCC spokesman David Fiske. That includes devices like Wi-Fi routers that use unlicensed spectrum, Fiske says.

The FCC claims it derives its warrantless search power from the Communications Act of 1934, though the constitutionality of the claim has gone untested in the courts. That’s largely because the FCC had little to do with average citizens for most of the last 75 years, when home transmitters were largely reserved to ham-radio operators and CB-radio aficionados. But in 2009, nearly every household in the United States has multiple devices that use radio waves and fall under the FCC’s purview, making the commission’s claimed authority ripe for a court challenge.

“It is a major stretch beyond case law to assert that authority with respect to a private home, which is at the heart of the Fourth Amendment’s protection against unreasonable search and seizure,” says Electronic Frontier Foundation lawyer Lee Tien. “When it is a private home and when you are talking about an over-powered Wi-Fi antenna — the idea they could just go in is honestly quite bizarre.”

George Washington University professor Orin Kerr, a constitutional law expert, also questions the legalilty of the policy.

“The Supreme Court has said that the government can’t make warrantless entries into homes for administrative inspections,” Kerr said via e-mail, refering to a 1967 Supreme Court ruling that housing inspectors needed warrants to force their way into private residences. The FCC’s online FAQ doesn’t explain how the agency gets around that ruling, Kerr adds.

There's more on the Wired.com story linked above, including how this crazy "right" first came to light.

And if any of our friends from the FCC are reading this, I can only say this:

You can have my Linksys router... when you pry it from my cold, dead fingers!

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Back from STAR TREK

And I'm already working on a full review. But that's not what this blog post is about...

The premiere of the movie tonight turned out to be a fitting occasion for me to take my first steps into the larger world of mobile telecommunications. So this evening, before and after the movie, I was doing my first real Twitter-ing from "out in the field", along with status updates to my Facebook page. Including some photos that I took with the built-in camera on my new phone. I'll admit that I have been a bit intimidated by all the procedure that I had thought was needed to do stuff like this... but it turned out to be as easy as anything! I'll likely be doing lots more of this remote Twittering/blogging in the future.

Anyhoo, while I work on the review, click on my Twitter feed for a taste of the craziness that happened during tonight's premiere of Star Trek!

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Churches that say "Amen!" to Twitter

Not so long ago, for a person to employ a BlackBerry or an iPhone during a worship service was deemed the height of irreverence. But increasingly it's not only grown acceptable, it's becoming encouraged.

Time Magazine has a story about churches that have adopted Twitter - the micro-blogging utility that's become all the rage - as a a tool for edifying, evangelism and Bible study. As one person in the article points out, Twitter makes it possible to actively write and save notes from that day's sermon, without having to ever again misplace what you jot down. As an added benefit, those who are somehow unable to "be there" can keep up along with the rest of the congregation.

Very, very cool. Kevin Bussey also shares some experiences he's had with Twitter on his own blog. And now that I've got a new cellphone that can send text messages, I might have to Twitter from a church myself sometime :-)

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Twitter loses 60% of new users after one month (BUT...)

If you use Twitter, the latest craze on the Intertubes, then it's quite likely that you are going to abandon the service after your first month. That's the finding of a Neilsen report which found that 60% of new Twitterers get tired of it after just one month.

However, I have to wonder how many of these Twitter expatriates eventually come back. Robert Strohmeyer elucidates on that further over at the ABC News website. Strohmeyer's point is that many folks first come to Twitter under the assumption that it's supposed to just chronicle the minutia of daily life, like "I'm cold" or "Going to the bathroom now"... when that's not what Twitter is about at all. And that when they realize how Twitter is actually quite useful as a serious micro-blogging utility, then they have the tendency to drift back.

I can vouch for that. When Twitter first hit the scene, I created an account and then... promptly got bored with it. But as more people began using it, I started taking a serious look at how Twitter could be used to complement my regular blogging.

So I've been back on Twitter for about a month now, and as things stand I'm finding it hard to envision that I'll be making a second exodus from it. Last night it was put to especially hilarious use when I vented my rage at President Obama nearly pre-empting Lost. And lately with the swine flu scare some have taken to using Twitter for comedic effect. Gotta love ingenuity like that :-)

So if you've tried Twitter before and quickly tired of recording the tedium of your waking hours, reconsider how it is that you should be using it, and give it another shot. You might find that it's a lot harder to quit after a second helping.

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