Throughout the week, countless articles have been released that attack the founder of Facebook for alleged theft of code that helped create the latest social online phenomena. All sorts of dirty laundry have been aired regarding the 23 year old Harvard grad and owner of Facebook.

It’s alleged that Mark essentially stole Facebook and he’s being sued by Tyler Winklevos and his brother Cameron, pals at Harvard. Mark Zuckerberg is now a billionaire (at least on paper) and presumably he’d have to split the pie if the court agrees with the complainant.

While it seemed things couldn’t get any worse for Mark Zuckerberg, it turns out that his company is engaging in questionable if not downright unethical practices with regard to privacy. There was plenty of concern by Facebook users that their private data was being shared and sold without hesitation. Politicians in favor of a telecommunications industry that plays the role of big brother have used social networking sites, particularly face book, as a prime example that people don’t really care about their privacy in this “new world of social networking.”

Well, they’d be wrong on that point and here’s the latest frightening revelation coming out of the Facebook camp. It turns out that they’ve been keeping track of users even after they log out!

Facebook has confirmed findings of a CA security researcher that the social-networking site’s Beacon ad service is more intrusive and stealthy than previously acknowledged, an admission that contradicts statements made previously by Facebook executives and representatives.

If you’ve been a naughty citizen and perusing the naked ladies or cheating on your wife on the side with some hot college coed you met online, there’s a possibility that Facebook knows about it! Maybe it’s time to lead a revolution against these corporate giants that are getting fat off of our personal data. Question is, how do you destroy a multi-billion dollar corporation? Is it as easy as telling people to stop using the site? Will the younger generation wake up to this nasty reality we’re embarking upon?

Time will tell, stay tuned for more exciting gossip on ‘as the Facebook turns.’

The MPAA’s “University Toolkit” –universities have been asked by the MPAA to install spying software in their networks to monitor student behavior.  The measure was taken as the MPAA and RIAA are continuing to crack down on copyright violations of their software. In a humorous twist of irony, due to copyright violations, the MPAA was prevented from using the toolkit.

The GPL (license) that comes with the “open” software includes a provision by which the code must be available upon request and licensed under the same rules that govern the original code. After several attempts to contact the MPAA, the author was forced to resort to the same tactics that the MPAA uses to harass students. A developer of the operating system Ubuntu decided to send a DMCA notice to the MPAA’s ISP and demanded that the material be taken down as infringing.

This was just too funny to pass up. Here’s the original exchange that got picked up by Slashdot (comments for your amusement) and BoingBoing before finding its way here.

The lawsuit alleges that both companies were infringing on patented technology by offering Visual Voicemail service to iPhone customers. According to Apple Insider, Klausner is seeking damages and future royalties estimated at $360 million. The suit was filed in federal court in the Eastern District of Texas. The claim argues that the sale of the iPhone, Visual Voicemail and other visual voice messaging services implemented by AT&T infronge Klausner’s patents.

The patents at issue are 5,572,576 and 5,283,818.
Patent 5,572,577 deals with the method for organizing communications via a Telephone Answering Device

A telephone answering device (TAD) which includes a means of intelligently organizing voice messages, associated entered codes such as personal IDs and home telephone numbers, and information stored in the memory of the TAD. These codes or numbers are decoded by means of the caller entering DTMF signals into the telephone which are recognized, recorded and processed by the TAD. When processed with codes and personal information previously entered into the device’s memory, the TAD displays the identity of the callers for each message, thus providing a menu of choices, i.e., a list of callers.

This enables the user to access messages in a selective manner based on the identity of the caller.The need to listen to the actual voice messages to determine the caller’s identity and the need to listen to the messages sequentially or chronologically is obviated, saving both time and effort. Additionally, because the voice message is also linked to pre-stored additional data in the data base, when hearing a message, one also can view relevant associated information, such as a fax number, etc., that might not have been left in the audio message but might be important. A remote access device is also provided that allows the user to retrieve and display the callers’ identities and select a message to be played back from a remote location.

..and Patent 5,283,818

A telephone answering device (TAD) which includes a means of intelligently organizing voice messages, associated entered codes such as personal IDs and home telephone numbers, and information stored in the memory of the TAD. These codes or numbers are decoded by means of the caller entering DTMF signals into the telephone which are recognized, recorded and processed by the TAD. When processed with codes and personal information previously entered into the device’s memory, the TAD displays the identity of the callers for each message, thus providing a menu of choices, i.e., a list of callers.

This enables the user to access messages in a selective manner based on the identity of the caller. The need to listen to the actual voice messages to determine the caller’s identity and the need to listen to the messages sequentially or chronologically is obviated, saving both time and effort. Additionally, because the voice message is also linked to pre-stored additional data in the data base, when hearing a message, one also can view relevant associated information, such as a fax number, etc., that might not have been left in the audio message but might be important.

Previously, when this issue was litigated, the big boys lost and were forced to purchases licenses. Among the juggernauts that bended previously, included Time Warner’s AOL for special voice mail features and Vonage for it’s Voicemail “Plus” services. With regard to iPhone, Klausner alleges that Apple violated its intellectual property rights byletting its users selectively retrieve voice messages using the iPhone’s inbox display.

“We have litigated this patent successfully on two prior occasions,” said Greg Dovel of Dovel & Luner, counsel for Klausner. “With the signing of each new licensee, we continue to receive further confirmation of the strength of our visual voicemail patents.”

Klausner’s lawyer’s have been busy. On Monday, they also filed claims against Comcast and Cablevision Systems Corp, as well as Ebay’s Skype. They are seeking damages and future royalties estimated at $300 million.

NEW YORK (AP) The lawsuit asserts that the above companies’ VOIP voicemail products and services infringe Klausner Technologies’ U.S. Patent 5,572,576. The patent has already been licensed to various other companies which provide the same visual voice messaging services, including Time Warner’s AOL (TWX:NYSE) for its AOL Voicemail services, Vonage Holdings (VG:NYSE) for its Vonage Voicemail Plus services as well as others, under the Klausner Patents. Cablevision’s Optimum Voicemail, Comcast’s Digital Voice Voicemail and eBay’s Skype Voicemail each violate Klausner’s intellectual property rights by allowing users to selectively retrieve and listen to voice messages via message inbox displays.

When all is said and done, these patented methods are going to net Klausner’ well over a billion dollars. Not a bad racket for Klausner, hopefully it’ll not stifle innovation in this area, though, it sounds like a lot of telecommunications had big ideas in this area of software and hardware development.

“Technology has changed. You can’t go back, there’s no way to go back. And I don’t think there’s a will to go back.”

This is an interesting commentary about the future of Technology. We’ve made so much noise over the issue of the RIAA hunting down college students or even trying to dig their claws into poor people who can’t afford to buy CD’s and end up pirating stuff. It doesn’t look like users are relenting on the issue either. A lot of lawsuits have given the ‘authorities’ the deterrent factor they need, but it isn’t working.

At some point, you just have to recognize that on principle, people don’t see the downloading of movies and songs online as a big deal anymore. You can try to make this stuff illegal, but where is the enforcement mechanism? Think about Marijuana, for an example of an illegal substance that is impossible to regulate. Most people who read about the subject, can agree that Marijuana use is no more dangerous than Alcohol. In fact, when it comes to encouraging accidents and resulting in deaths, alcohol is in a league of its own. What happens when you try to enforce laws that people find arbitrary, obnoxious, or overbearing? Well here’s a nice little photo that I found on Reddit that illustrates the problem:

From the Michael Salamon blog: “Procedurally Enforcing Workflow”

A great reminder for the RIAA/MPAA: You can’t force people to follow directions they deem arbitrary. I bet if that gate spit out $100 bills people would use it! Schneier first published the photo on his Technology and Security blog.

There in lies the rub. In general, if you continue to enforce rules that are complete garbage, people are going to call you on it and your authority diminishes. This happens to governments, law enforcement officers, and it is most certainly the way of the Internet given that there is no way to regulate it through a single central authority. The United States can try and impose its views on the world, but try getting around the jurisdictional problem.

Here’s a hint: you can’t! Check out the latest tech article on the Crunch site, it reminds us all how easy it is to simply lift copyrighted content in the digital age of technology.  It’s very difficult to enforce: “Stealing books with Kindle is trivial“