Internet Business

Ah, the fun of the electronic age. A few years back we started hearing about tools to remotely disable a car. These were talked about as a security system to recover stolen vehicles, but also as a device to put on leased cars, in case they need to be repossessed. Of course, once you put that technology on the car, what's to stop someone from abusing it?

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Reporter Amy Wallace wrote an article late last year for Wired Magazine about the extremely heated and somewhat controversial debate over child vaccinations. In the course of the article, she quotes people from both sides.

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We often see critics or industry folks make absolute statements like, "copyright infringement is stealing and it's bad." Of course, this is wrong for any number of reasons, but rather than jumping all the way to why such statements are obviously wrong and misleading, why not peel back that onion one layer at a time.

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PC World - Apple is reportedly removing iPhone, iPod, and MacBook screen protectors from its online and retail stores, just a couple of weeks before the iPad hits the stand.

PC World - Users of popular micro-blogging service Twitter have been unable to access the site since just after 3am GMT Wednesday (11pm EDT/8pm PDT Tuesday).

PC World - Several major U.S. Internet companies, including Google and Facebook, need to "step up" and better protect consumer privacy or face tougher penalties from the U.S. Federal Trade Commission, a commissioner said Wednesday.

There's been something of a battle going on in the UK over news aggregators. Obviously, we've all heard about the various threats by companies like News Corp. in the US to sue Google over its Google News product, but a lot of this has already been playing out on a smaller scale in the UK. Last year we wrote about newspapers in the UK threatening aggregators like NewsNow, leading some to start blocking NewsNow crawlers.

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PC World - Complaints to a Japanese Internet watchdog regarding illegal content almost doubled in 2009, led by a surge in reports related to child pornography and illegal drugs.

PC World - Google is working with Intel, Sony, and other partners to develop Google TV, a service aimed at putting the Internet search giant's Web offerings in people's living rooms, the New York Times reported Wednesday.

Reuters - Google Inc is working with Intel Corp and Sony Corp to develop a new class of Internet-enabled televisions and set top boxes, according to a media report.

Just as Davenport Lyons lawyers are being sent for disciplinary action over the firm's practice of sending large numbers of "pay up or we sue" pre-settlement letters, ACS:Law, the shady firm that effectively spun out of Davenport Lyons to do the same thing is ramping up its efforts. This isn't a huge surprise.

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Reuters - Hackers have flooded the Internet with virus-tainted spam that targets Facebook's estimated 400 million users in an effort to steal banking passwords and gather other sensitive information.

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Last year, Zusha Elinson broke the story that, despite Nathan Myhrvold hiding behind the claim that Intellectual Ventures hadn't sued anyone over patent infringement, IV's patents were miraculously showing up in lawsuits being filed by shell companies. Of course, IV and the shell companies have been completely silent over how this all works, so IV can pretend to be totally separate.

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AP - A legal tussle pitting media conglomerate Viacom Inc.

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AP - Seattlepi.com, the online successor to the print version of the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, celebrates its first birthday Thursday with music, free cupcakes and cheap beer.

We take a close look at Xobni for BlackBerry, an uberutility that complements--or replaces--your address book.

Originally posted at The Download Blog

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And here's a lawsuit that's going nowhere fast. Alex points us to the news of a NY accountant, Leo Kehoe, who is suing Craigslist for $1 million because someone insulted him on the site.

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AP - A man fired from a Texas auto dealership used an Internet service to remotely disable ignitions and set off car horns of more than 100 vehicles sold at his old workplace, police said Wednesday.