Monday, December 26, 2011


I thought this centered on the fact that IMDB added information to her resume information. In other words, she had paid to create a resume online and IMDB added some personal info they were privy to because they had her credit card info. Sounds like that argument was largely ignored...
Actress Forced to Reveal Name in IMDB Lawsuit
December 25, 2011 by Dissent
Matthew Belloni reports:
The actress suing Hollywood information database IMDb for listing her true age cannot move forward with the case unless she reveals her identity, a federal judge has ruled.
In a sharply-worded decision issued on Friday, U.S. District Court Judge Marsha Pechman found that while the anonymous actress who sued for $1 million fears blacklisting and other retribution in Hollywood if her true identity is known, “the injury she fears is not severe enough to justify permitting her to proceed anonymously,” the ruling states.
Read more on The Hollywood Reporter.


A contract of verbal assurances? Could get interesting. Absent any evidence (emails for example) could the company prove they had any interest in this blog before the lawsuit?
A Dispute Over Who Owns a Twitter Account Goes to Court
… In October 2010, Noah Kravitz, a writer who lives in Oakland, Calif., quit his job at a popular mobile phone site, Phonedog.com, after nearly four years. The site has two parts — an e-commerce wing, which sells phones, and a blog.
While at the company, Mr. Kravitz, 38, began writing on Twitter under the name Phonedog_Noah, and over time, had amassed 17,000 followers. When he left, he said, PhoneDog told him he could keep his Twitter account in exchange for posting occasionally.
The company asked him to “tweet on their behalf from time to time and I said sure, as we were parting on good terms,” Mr. Kravitz said by telephone.
And so he began writing as NoahKravitz, keeping all his followers under that new handle. But eight months after Mr. Kravitz left the company, PhoneDog sued, saying the Twitter list was a customer list, and seeking damages of $2.50 a month per follower for eight months, for a total of $340,000.


Data Mining & Data Analytics: because there's money to be made!
The joys of real-time data analysis for online retailers
There are undoubtedly a number of aspects to the growth in online sales. But after spending some time with a few of the major online retailers last week--including one who might not be considered a "retailer" in the traditional sense, I realized that the online world has a huge competitive advantage in its predilection toward data analysis with actionable near real-time results.
Amazon's suggested items and Apple's accessory push over the holidays are basically "we know this, so we suggest that" approaches toward customer loyalty that have been very successful. But taking advantage of what we know via programmatic interactions between human and browser or mobile phone is being greatly extended into gaming services such as Zynga, which can very specifically target a user with an upsell or offer new item based on the analysis they perform in the course of gameplay.


A rose by any other name is a petunia? Would the average MBA be concerned with revenue or profit? Does a marginal cost of (virtually) zero make up for the lost replacement market? Are they suggesting that after 26 reads the average library book needs replacing? Is there a business opportunity here similar to that in the Music industry?
"The NY Times is running a piece on the tug of war between publishers and libraries for e-book lending. In one corner are the publishers, who claim that unlimited lending of e-books 'without friction is not a sustainable business model for us.' For example, Harper Collins claims in this corporate statement that unlimited lending would lead to a decrease in royalties for both the publisher and the writers. The NYT author further states that 'To keep their overall revenue from taking a hit from lost sales to individuals, publishers need to reintroduce more inconvenience for the borrower or raise the price for the library purchaser.' Their current solution is to limit the number of readings to 26 before a book license must be renewed. In the other corner are the libraries, who are happy that e-books are luring people back to libraries, bringing with them desperately needed additional funding. With e-book sales going extremely well this year and the introduction of more capable e-readers, this debate is likely to get worse before it gets better. The Guardian also has an interesting related piece on the pricing practices of the Big Six publishers."


Handy for making a handout?
dotEPUB is a web tool that lets you convert webpages into ePub documents so you can read them on your favorite device.
You can use dotEPUB as a browser bookmarklet for Chrome, Safari, Firefox or even as a Chrome extension. Simply click on the button and the tool will convert the webpage being viewed to an ePub document. You can also use a widget to install this conversion service on your website, thereby allowing your website visitors to convert your webpage into an ePub document. These documents can easily be transferred or emailed to your tablet or eReader.

(Related) Same goal, but simpler...
With Marker.to, you can highlight important information on any website you are browsing. The highlight version of the webpage can then be shared with anyone using a specific URL created by the service. That URL can be shared on Twitter, Facebook or via email with any friend or colleague. Once installed, a small pen icon will appear right next to your address bar. All you have to do is click on that icon and start highlighting important points from any article. If you want, you can change the color of the highlight as well.
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Change is hard! This video puts the arguments against pushing new technology into the classroom in perspective. Unfortunately, it's not funny...
Technology Integration in the Classroom

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