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Specialty plates are not the only means available to drivers for rear-end self-expression. There are also vanity plates – the personalized arrangements of numbers and letters that tell other drivers a little something about you. Five years ago, Bob explored the uniquely American phenomenon and its particular popularity in the Old Dominion.
Currently, all online information - be it a page from EBay or a porn site photo - travels at roughly the same speed. But watchdogs are warning that some data will encounter speed bumps if internet service providers can charge content providers for access to a fast lane. Advocacy groups are outraged, claiming the internet's "network neutrality is crucial to its egalitarian nature and innovative spirit." Medley Global Advisors analyst Christopher Stern tells Brooke what's at stake.
It's estimated to be the third largest industry in Nigeria, grossing hundreds of millions a year, and it may be the most successful confidence game in the world. It's the Nigerian e-mail scam. Victims are often left with no legal recourse, due to corruption in Nigeria and the high price of international investigations. And so they've banded together to take the law into their own hands. Legal Affairs contributor Josh Rosenblum explains to Bob how an online posse was formed.
In the summer of 2003, articles started popping up about a curious recurring phenomenon in New York City. Large crowds, organized via forwarded emails, were congregating in public places to perform absurd acts that were over almost as soon as they began. The so-called "Flash Mobs" were imitated in other cities, and countries. Through it all, the man who hatched the idea remained anonymous. Until now. Flash Mob inventor (and Harper's senior editor) Bill Wasik reveals to Brooke what the stunt was all about.
Iran may not be the safest place for journalists, but that hasn't prevented the growth of online expression there. There are now more than 100,000 Iranian bloggers, and Persian is by one count the blogosphere's third most common language. Outside observers see the thriving blogosphere as a catalyst for political change, but New Republic columnist Joseph Braude disagrees. He tells guest host Xeni Jardin why he thinks the Internet might actually serve to maintain the repressive status quo.
The benevolent search engine-that-could was showered with boos this week, after it agreed to cooperate with Chinese government censors. To many, the move signaled a complete turnaround from the principled stand Google has taken against the U.S. government. But even in that skirmish, legal scholar Tim Wu was less than impressed with Google. He tells Bob how the company made itself vulnerable to government intrusion in the first place.
With Google subpoenas and NSA wiretaps in the news, the struggle begins in earnest for what has long been privacy advocates' Holy Grail: online anonymity. The latest advance in "computer cloaking" was unveiled this month at a hacker convention in Washington, D.C. Brooke speaks with Wired News reporter Quinn Norton about the new technology and the kind of information it is designed to protect.
Picture the scenario: computer users worldwide wake up one Tuesday morning to find their hard drives smoking, victims of a malicious virus designed to wreak the maximum possible havoc. Internet maven Jonathan Zittrain thinks it's not a matter of if, but when. He tells Brooke that unless we act now, a "9/11 moment" for the Internet could result in a Patriot Act-like backlash that would stifle all sorts of e-innovation.
