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On The Web

By TIMES STAFF and TIMES WIRES
Published October 4, 2006

BIZ TIDBITS FROM THE INTERNET, BLOGS AND PODCASTS

LimeWire stands firm in file-sharing fight

The recording industry has spent the past several years picking off one peer-to-peer file-sharing company after another: Napster, KaZaa, Grokster and several others have settled lawsuits, been acquired or agreed to stop allowing users to share copyrighted music. But LimeWire is standing firm. In response to the industry's lawsuit against it last month, the company that owns the LimeWire file-sharing software filed a counterclaim last week, accusing members of the Recording Industry Association of America of anticompetitive practices, restraint of trade, tortuous interference and other claims (info.riaalawsuits.us). The countersuit is "encouraging," wrote John Paczkowski, an editor at SiliconValley.com who writes Good Morning Silicon Valley (gmsv.com). Paczkowski called LimeWire's language "heavy-handed," but concluded that it's not off base. "Much more interesting," according to Nate Anderson of ArsTechnica, "is the lengthy section in which LimeWire discusses its decision to 'go straight' " (http://arstechnica.com).

The devil is in the details, and this site will help

Scott toilet paper has always boasted 1,000 sheets per roll, and probably always will. It's as much a part of Scott's brand as "Always Low Prices" is a part of Wal-Mart's. That certainly didn't change with Scott's new, "Now Improved!" version. It still has 1,000 sheets. But missing among the list of improvements was the fact that each sheet is considerably smaller - three-tenths of an inch, to be exact - lopping off 300 inches from each roll. This fact comes by way of mouseprint.org, a Web site dedicated to peering closely at the finest of fine-print caveats. ("Mouseprint" is a term, common in marketing circles, for print so small that only a mouse can read it.) No business is exempt - from the local car dealer that fudges numbers in a newspaper advertisement to make it look as if you could buy a brand new Mazda SUV for $10,090 to the online broker boasting "Online trades for as low as $9.95" - but only, we learn from the mouseprint, for customers with a balance of $1-million or more. "I blame technology," wrote Bob Sullivan of Red Tape Chronicles (redtape.msnbc.com) on MSNBC.com. "Without laser printers capable of rendering print that's half-point size or smaller, mouseprint would be impossible. We'd be stuck with, at worst, cat print or perhaps kitten print."

Advice for online poker players: 'Do not panic'

If you're an online poker player worried about the future in light of Congress passing legislation over the weekend that affects banking transactions, you're not alone. But lawyer Allyn Jaffrey Shulman, writing on www.cardplayer.com, has this advice for online gamblers: "Do not panic." Shulman says the legislation does not criminalize playing online poker, it merely attempts to make it more difficult for players to put their money in a offshore gambling site. Many players use third-party companies, such as the publicly traded British company Neteller, to handle such transactions, and while the bill attempts to block transactions with companies like that, "the government cannot stop its citizens from sending money out of the country for legitimate purposes."

Emeril has 'Bam!' and Steve Jobs has 'boom'

Ever noticed how often Steve Jobs says "boom" in his keynote speeches? A whole lot. To get an idea, go to youtube.com and search on "Steve Jobs" and "boom."

[Last modified October 3, 2006, 23:41:37]