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In a precautionary move against online mischief, broadband ISP and internet portal Excite@Home did away last week with several of its newsgroups. Excite@Home officials say that two concerns spurred the move: one, posting photos online seems to invite copyright violation; and two, the company wants to prevent its users from exchanging child pornography. The company had received no complaints about the particular newsgroups it pulled, calling the decision a preemptive strike. Among the stricken newsgroups was alt.binaries.penthouse, which not only carried racy content but could also have infringed on Penthouse magazine's copyrights. Internet service providers can be held responsible for copyright violations that appear in their pages.
DrKoop.com resurrects DrDrew.com
The Dr. Ruth of Generation Y is back on the web after an eight-month break, this time under the aegis of DrKoop.com. DrDrew.com, the web site named for Dr. Drew Pinsky, host of MTV advice show “Loveline,” has been relaunched and revitalized, with new content added daily. DrDrew.com’s new features include interactive polling on issues tied to sexuality, health, relationships and love, plus upgraded chat and message boards. The site has also added a service called eCrush that lets love-struck teenagers try their luck with the objects of their affection. The monthly “Dr. Drew Internet Show” will feature online celebrity interviews. The site's relaunch comes after drastic cutbacks last fall, when it was put up for sale and most of its staff laid off. Just six people were left to run the site. Despite its troubles, DrDrew.com has managed to retain its 600,000-plus registered users. In October, medical portal DrKoop.com, itself in an unenviable financial situation, acquired DrDrew.com.
Agency.com sponsors dial-a-beer pub trivia
Patrons of 500 British pubs now have the chance to win free beer, using only their cell phones and their wits. In a high-tech update of the good old-fashioned bar trivia game, e-business builder Agency.com has paired up with international beer company Interbrew to establish a text-messaging interactive trivia quiz in the U.K. The quizzes commenced last week. Bar-hopping trivia buffs simply dial a number on their cell phones to receive multiple-choice questions via text messages, then send back their answers. People who get three questions right in a row receive a message containing a code that they can redeem for a free pint of Heineken. Agency.com has applied for a U.S. patent for the technology behind the game.
Datek Online starts charging for accounts
As the economy sags and online trading begins to fall out of vogue, brokerage firm Datek Online will start charging customers new fees and penalties in an attempt to increase revenues. Beginning September 30, the company will begin deducting an inactivity fee of $15 per quarter from accounts that have made less than four trades in any six-month period or have a balance below $5,000. Retirement accounts will be exempt, as will multiple accounts held by a single user, as long as at least one account meets the requirements. Paper trade confirmations will cost $2 each to cover postage and handling starting July 1, though electronic confirmations will remain free. Datek will also charge $25 for liquidations and returned checks and a $75 fee to issue stock certificates. This is all old news to users of some of Datek's competitors; E*Trade already hits up less-active traders for quarterly fees.
French group wants racist site blocked
Can a hate speech web site cut itself off from an entire nation of internet users? The French group International Action for Justice not only thinks so, it wants courts to order a U.S. ISP to block France-based web surfers from a portal that hosts racist web sites. The group wants to prevent all French web users from accessing Front 14, a neo-Nazi portal based in the U.S. Front 14 has links to more than 400 racist web sites. International Action for Justice is pursuing an injunction against General Communication, the company that hosts Front 14. If the injunction is issued, General Communications will have to bar French web users from logging on to the site. Inciting racial hatred is a crime in France and much of Europe, but in the U.S., free speech laws protect the expression of xenophobic and racist beliefs. The issue is not unprecedented. Last year, a Parisian court ordered Yahoo to block French web surfers from Nazi-tinged content, a ruling that Yahoo is still contesting.
Napster loosens up its song filter
Music file-sharing site Napster is easing up on its song filtering efforts. The company has issued a new edition of its software that will let users track down many songs by independent artists that it had been blocking. The major record labels, with the backing of the courts, had ordered Napster to install filters that would prevent the trading of copyrighted songs. Napster’s filters had gotten so effective that few songs were available—even, it turns out, some material from unsigned and independent artists that was not supposed to be blocked. The less-strict filtering software comes out as web surfers are abandoning Napster for other file-swapping services and as Napster use continues its precipitous decline. According to internet consultancy Webnoize, just 360 million files were swapped on Napster last month, a steep drop-off from the 2.79 billion files traded in February. Also, the average Napster user was sharing just 21 files in May, compared to 220 files shared per person in February.
June 25, 2001 © 2001 Media Life
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