Roy Mark

House Republicans continued their pushback to proposed new network neutrality rules Oct. 5 with 20 House members sending a letter to Federal Communications Commission Chairman Julius Genachowski insisting that the FCC prove any market failures before approving any new regulations.The letter came hours after the FCC said it plans to vote later this month on […]

The Federal Trade Commission issued new guidelines Oct. 9 that require bloggers receiving cash or an in-kind payment for product reviews to disclose the connections they share with the seller of the product or service. The rules are part of a wider effort by the FTC to redefine disclosure requirements between endorsers and advertisers. The […]

While NASA satellite data clearly shows the Arctic is thinning, researchers from the British Antarctic Survey and the University of Bristol say the “dynamic thinning” of glaciers now reaches all latitudes in Greenland and has intensified on key Antarctic coastlines. Working with millions of NASA satellite measurements, the researchers claim the ice sheets are shrinking […]

NASA’s first laser ranging effort to track a spacecraft beyond low-Earth orbit on a daily basis is producing distance measurements accurate to about 4 inches; by comparison, the microwave stations tracking the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter measure its range to a precision of about 65 feet. The precise laser measuring of the LRO’s location is a […]

Guy Laliberte, the billionaire founder of Cirque du Soleil, arrived at the International Space Station Oct. 1 and-to no one’s surprise-slapped on a clown nose and began yukking it up with crew members of the space station. Laliberte is the seventh paying (reportedly $35 million) space tourist to travel to the station.Laliberte blasted off into […]

Two key chairmen of U.S. House committees Oct. 1 urged Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius to revise or appeal the agency’s controversial “harm standard” that would trigger a personal health record data breach notification.Under the current rules, for companies that secure health information using encryption or destruction, no breach notification is necessary. For […]

MSN released Oct. 1 a beta form of My Health Info, an “online service that helps people manage their health information on the Web,” Microsoft said in a statement. The service “offers people a variety of tools and widgets [with which] to upload, organize and monitor health information stored in their personal Microsoft HealthVault accounts.”HealthVault, […]

Well, back to the drawing board. Verizon Wireless said Sept. 30 it was discontinuing sales for its Verizon Hub, a VOIP home phone that also served as a Web tablet. In January, Verizon Wireless said it was reinventing the standard home phone with the Hub.The Hub retailed for $199 and required a $34.99 monthly fee […]

AT&T acquired Sept. 30 privately held Plusmo, a provider of cross-platform mobile application solutions. AT&T said the deal would bring to the telecom giant an open standards technology that will hopefully simplify mobile application development. Terms of the deal were not disclosed but Plusmo will become a part of AT&T Interactive, and the Plusmo mobile […]

Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, asked the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services Sept. 29 to hold employers accountable by requesting evidence from petitioners that H-1B visa holders actually have a job waiting for them in the United States. Grassley’s comments came after several small Iowa communities were used as nothing more than mail drops in an […]

Depending on the definition of broadband speed, providing universal broadband would cost between $20 billion and $350 billion, according to a preliminary report released Sept. 29 by Federal Communications Commission task force charged with delivering the National Broadband Plan to Congress. The wide-ranging report also noted that its initial findings show actual broadband speeds lag […]

Wearing a large, red clown nose, Guy Laliberte took off early Sept. 30 for the International Space Station in a Russian Soyuz capsule accompanied by cosmonaut Maxim Surayev and American astronaut Jeffrey Williams. When the spacecraft entered orbit minutes after blasting off from the Baikonur launch facility, friends and family of the Cirque du Soleil […]