decisions – Wetmachine

Black Monday

Harold June 27, 2005 February 24, 2013General, Tales of the Sausage Factory

As I demonstrated last fall when I predicted a Kerry victory, my powers of prognostication are nothing to write home about. OTOH, I suppose this demonstrates the wisdom of the old saw that you ca’t judge an outcome by oral argument.

We lost Brand X by 6-3. Interesting split that put Scalia and Thomas on opposite sides but, as I have observed in the past, telecom issues do not fall into the neat conservative/liberal divisions everyone is so fond of making.

Grokster also went the other way, with the Court not even remanding for trial.

I will have more later when I have read the decisions. Right now I’m trying to sort things out.

Stay tuned . . .

Tales of the Sausage Factory: UPDATE on 3650-3700 MHz

Harold March 1, 2005 February 24, 2013General, Tales of the Sausage Factory

I have been making calls today. The situation is moving in a more favorable direction. The relevant decision makers are getting our emails and see broad popular support for mesh as well as high-power.

Key issues on which decisions have not yet been made and where comments may prove helpful:

1) Allowing low power mobile devices in the band is critical to expanding mesh.

2) Low power mesh requires non-exclusivity and cheap equipment. The Commission should not impose overly conservative interference protection criteria that drive up price. Flexibility has been critical to the success of unlicensed as a networking solution.

3) Mesh devices must be allowed to communicate with each other in a peer-to-peer fashion, rather than requiring mesh devices to communicate with a high power base station.

4) Any system of licensing or registration must be non-exclusive; the Commission must not create a “first in time, first in right” licensing systems.

Remember, things are turning our way, but your comments are still needed to build a record to counter Intel and others. The Proceeding Number is 04-151. You can file comments by going here.

Stay tuned . . .

Tales of the Sausage Factory: It's Not Just About Sitefinder

Harold March 1, 2004 February 24, 2013General, Tales of the Sausage Factory

A year and a half ago, I spoke at an event sponsored by the CATO Institute warning that ICANN was on track for a “magnificent trainwreck.” The trainwreck may well have arrived in the form of Verisign’s lawsuit against ICANN.

word for the day: neuroeconomics

Peg. December 8, 2003 February 24, 2013Wetware and Hard Science

I first heard the term neuroeconomics in a review of Decisions, Uncertainty, and the Brain: The Science of Neuroeconomics by Paul W. Glimcher in the journal Acumen . (Another review can be found at human-nature.com.) My interest piqued by this new (to me) turn of phrase, a-Googling I did go, and turned up neuroeconomics.com, a blog run by Kevin McCabe, who runs the Behavioral and Neuroeconomics laboratory at George Mason University.

Like the pure psychoanalysts who shuddered to find their theories applied to advertising, I find myself discomfited at seeing my own interest in how the brain works specifically applied to matters of money.