Jerry Brito

I write at TIME.com:

So let’s be clear: Apple did not ban Miller for exposing a security flaw, as many have suggested. He was kicked out for violating his agreement with Apple to respect the rules around the App Store walled garden. And that gets to the heart of what’s really at stake here–the fact that so many dislike the strict control Apple exercises over its platform. …

What we have to remember is that as strict as Apple may be, its approach is not just “not bad” for consumers, it’s creating more choice.

Adult human beings have agency, the ability (even responsibility!) to run their own cost/benefit analyses and choose accordingly. You could go to a state school (or community college) instead of an over-inflated prestige mill. You could pay for a 10-year-old car in cash, instead of a new one on installments. You could try to make it in Minneapolis before living the dream in Williamsburg. You could stare into the face of a no-money-down, adjustable rate 30-year mortgage at the tail end of a housing-price run-up and conclude “Maybe that one’s not for me.” You could even choose to turn down a bad if high-paying job when you’re living below the poverty line. If we indeed live in a “candid world,” let us state bluntly that offloading 100% of the blame for your own mountain of debt on a group of Greedy McBanksters who “forced” you to “play by the rules” is more than a little pathetic.

I write at TIME.com:

At a moment when Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is urging world governments to keep their hands off the Internet, creating a blacklist would send the wrong message. And not just to China or Iran, which already engage in DNS filtering, but to liberal democracies that might want to block information they find naughty. Imagine if the U.K. created a blacklist of American newspapers that its courts found violated celebrities’ privacy? Or what if France blocked American sites it believed contained hate speech? We forget, but those countries don’t have a First Amendment.

The result could be a virtually broken Internet where some sites exist for half the world and not for the other. The alternative is to leave the DNS alone and focus (as the bills also do) on going after the cash flow of rogue websites. As frustrating as it must be for the content owners who are getting ripped off, there are some cures worse than the disease.

Mr. Brito was optimistic about Bitcoins finding consistent users. But as with many online innovations, the early adopters tend to occupy a different, if marginal, niche. “This is a censorship-proof currency that allows transactions to happen,” he said. “Right now what are those sort of transactions? Gambling, buying drugs — that is what is going to jumpstart it.”

My porn. (Via Tate)

Turns any YouTube video into an MP3.

Many have begun trading in CD, DVD, and book collections for digital music, movies, and e-books. But this trend in digital technology is now influencing some to get rid of nearly all of their physical possessions - from photographs to furniture to homes altogether.

HT Evan.

tastingthedistrict:

I’m having trouble finding anything concrete that is being proposed in Title 24, but the food trucks I follow in DC are quite concerned that elements of this bill will cause them to close up shop. Comments on the proposition are due by tomorrow, so visit yesontitle24.com and send a note of support in to Helder

 I love entrepreneurs, I love food trucks,  I love competition, and I love small businesses. And I don’t like the idea of any business being put under due to government regulation. The food trucks in DC are providing interesting, good quality and moderately priced options to DC’s residents and those working in the city, why take those away? 

As a frequent lunch buyer, I’m not at all impressed with the lunch options in my downtown office location, thank heavens the food trucks came along and saved me from a life of Au bon Pain sandwiches and food bars, and poor quality ingredients!

If DC is serious about making the city a vibrant, exciting place to live and work, they should start by making it as easy as possible for people to throw their hats into ring.

“Corporations are bureaucracies and managers are bureaucrats. Their fundamental tendency is toward self-perpetuation. They are, almost by definition, resistant to change.”