Pumping Up the Power of the IPod

via Wired News: "After nearly three years of almost daily use, my trusty old iPod was starting to give up the ghost. But thanks to a new install-it-yourself battery, it has a new lease on life -- and it's even better than new.

Wired News tested a $40, high-capacity, 2,100 mAh (milliamp hour) replacement iPod battery from Newer Technology. It was easy to install and delivered 22 hours of continuous play -- more than double the play time of the original battery. (The battery tested is for first- and second-generation iPods; Newer also sells one for third-generation iPods.)"

Starting Young: The case for investing in early childhood

via American Prospect Online: Research consistently has shown that providing children with early childhood development and education is important to their long-term success. However, our country has yet to provide universal child care and pre-kindergarten to our nation’s children. Good programs are difficult to come by, and when they are available they take a large bite out of a family’s budget.

Our Magical President

via The Revealer: Believing, it seems, is more important to the President than the substance of his belief. Jesus Christ’s particular teachings -- well, those are good, too. But what really matters is that if you believe you can do something, you can.

What Suskind misses, and what Bush’s more orthodox Christian supporters seem to dodge, is that this is not Christian doctrine by any definition. It is, in fact, a key element of the broad, heterodox movement known as New Age religion.

Anticompetitive Settlement of Intellectual Property Disputes

By Herbert Hovenkamp, Mark Janis, Mark Lemley, via SSRN: "The overwhelming majority of intellectual property lawsuits settle before trial. These settlements involve agreements between the patentee and the accused infringer, parties who are often competitors before the lawsuit. Because these competitors may agree to stop competing, to regulate the price each charges, and to exchange information about products and prices, settlements of intellectual property disputes naturally raise antitrust concerns. In this paper, we suggest a way to reconcile the interests of intellectual property law and antitrust law in evaluating intellectual property settlements."

Web radio gets $1.7 billion boost

via CNET News.com: "The American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers announced Monday that it has reached a $1.7 billion deal with the Radio Music License Committee to let stations legally stream their on-air content over the Internet.

With the deal, the radio group said, its 12,000 member stations gain the right to program ASCAP-regulated music online simultaneously with their on-air signals. The two industry groups labeled the agreement as the largest licensing deal in the history of American radio."

The Claim Construction Project

FedCir.org: This ongoing study analyzes the United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit's jurisprudence of claim construction—the interpretation of patent claim language—in order to (1) describe and assess that court's performance, (2) improve legal-policy discussion surrounding the court's treatment of the issue, and (3) provide litigators and patent scholars additional tools for analysis.

False Alarm: What Lawsuit Crisis?

via Washington Monthlyr: "How the media helps the insurance industry and the GOP promote the myth of America's 'lawsuit crisis.'"

SCO to launch legal Web site

via CNET News.com: "The SCO Group plans to launch a Web site to chronicle its legal battles relating to Unix and Linux, as part of an effort to counterbalance Groklaw.net--which was set up to poke holes in the company's legal claims.

The site, to be called Prosco.net, will feature an archive of legal filings, hearing dates and SCO positions on various matters, spokesman Blake Stowell said Tuesday. The Lindon, Utah-based company plans to launch the site by Nov. 1, he said."

I Feel Safe Now

via The Prospect's Tapped blog:: "In summary: Before the war Iraq's nuclear program was years away from bearing a usable weapon and, thanks to the sanctions regime, getting further away. Then, thanks to diplomacy and threats of force, IAEA inspectors returned to the country. These inspectors informed the U.S. government that its pre-war assessments of Iraq's nuclear program were off-base and that the threat was nowhere near as imminent as the administration had maintained. Nevertheless, the United States invaded, thus precipitating the evacuation of IAEA inspectors who'd been safeguarding the most advanced elements of the Iraqi nuclear program. After the war, the administration failed to provide enough manpower to secure the sites and, displaying its typical disdain for international institutions, wouldn't let the inspectors come back.

As a result, instead of being under lock-and-key, bits and pieces of Saddam Hussein's nuclear program are now off God knows where. The war has totally undermined the security of Iraq's borders, has caused individuals with links to international terrorism to enter Iraq, and has led the individuals in question to acquire some supporters among the local population. In other words, the risk that Iraqi nuclear materials will make their way into the hands of members of a global terrorist network has been enhanced rather than reduced by the invasion that's cost tens of millions of dollars and over 1,000 American lives. Shockingly, America's academic national security experts think we need something more sensible than this farce of a policy."

The madness of George

via Guardian Unlimited: "Bush acted like the proverbial ugly American trying to be understood in a foreign land, cranking up the volume and shrillness to make his points while Kerry sat by serenely. The contrast was impossible to miss as Bush became increasingly unhinged. Even on the road, Bush's desperation is palpable as the rhetoric soars to angrier heights.

Bush is now hemmed in. With poll after poll showing small Kerry leads, he needs to do something to regain the momentum. His campaign's attack ads have kept him in the game but he is not pulling away. Furthermore, he is well below the 50% mark in most key battleground state polls - a mark of political vulnerability.

If he cannot convince people to vote for him, he will have to convince people to vote against Kerry, and to do that he has to attack, attack, attack. And since it takes more skill than Bush possesses to attack without appearing angry, well, he's in a real bind."

Supreme Court Avoids P2P Subpoena Case

The Supreme Court today let stand a December 2003 ruling by the DC Court of Appeals denying the use of DMCA subpoenas to compel ISPs to reveal the identities of users engaged in P2P file sharing.

Novell Issues Statement on New Patents Policy and Open Source Software

via Groklaw: "Novell is announcing today a new patent policy, in which they say they are prepared, if necessary, to use their patent portfolio, 'which covers technologies with significant value and widespread deployment in the IT sector today', to defend against patent attacks on open source products they deliver. "

How the health care system is failing -- and why it's hard to fix

via SFGate.com: "Some 40 years after the enactment of Medicare and Medicaid and more than a decade after the Clinton administration failed in its bid to extend coverage to all Americans, the nation's system of funding health care is on the verge of breaking down."

U.S. Businesses File Four Times More Lawsuits Than Private Citizens And Are Sanctioned Much More Often for Frivolous Sui

via Public Citizen: U.S.Businesses File Four Times More Lawsuits Than Private Citizens And Are Sanctioned Much More Often for Frivolous Suits

But Corporate Americaand Political Allies Bush and Cheney Campaign to Limit Citizens’ Rights to Sue.