Template Tools
Shorts: policy
Saturday, 20 December 2008 14:58

June 8 Jackie Calmes in the NY Times reports as important news who is (Larry Summers) and who is not in a meeting with the President. D.C. is like the court of Louis XIV, with everyone watching for signs of who is in favor.    http://bit.ly/XHBFJ

May 24 The French 3 Strikes law HADOPI translated into English and in French

May 18 Qwest COO Tom Richards told the J.P. Morgan conference that broadband is key to retention. Qwest remains focused on using its broadband offering to reduce access line losses. This seemingly innocuous comment calls into doubt what Qwest's VP is saying in D.C., that they wouldn't expand their DSL coverage without a $1600/line subsidy. I'd suggest that Richards believes Qwest has strong incentive to continue their broadband expansion, unless they want to lose even more landlines.

Previous:

Bob Larribeau notes "The situation in Netherlands shows how government policy can stimulate the deployment of fiber. Slovakia shows how competition can do the same."

Thomas Swingler may go to jail for what he said about hacking the cable boxes he sold, although selling modded boxes probably is legal. Kevin Poulsen suggests the conviction was caused by Poulsen allegedly claiming "The modem steals the internet,...[for] free cable internet." The decision to shut down Grokster required "clear expression or other affirmative steps taken to foster infringement.” It would probably be legal for Swingler to sell a journalist like me the same modded box after I had said I wanted to test energy use with different settings. Advice to hackers - shut your mouth.

AT&T is the champion text spammer. They sent millions of unsolicited texts pushing "American Idol",  Matt Richtel reports in the NYT. "Subscribers of AT&T Wireless tend to report getting more text ads than do subscribers of other services," Matt adds.

 

 


Peoples Daily Firms told to be bold in expanding abroad

Last Updated(Beijing Time):2008-12-23 08:07

Chinese enterprises should "become bold" in acquiring stakes in overseas enterprises, especially in the energy and resources sectors, a senior policy advisor has said.

Zheng Xinli, vice-director of the Policy Research Office of the CPC Central Committee, suggested that the government use its $2-trillion foreign exchange reserves to encourage overseas mergers and acquisitions (M&As), especially in sectors of strategic importance.

Economists said the policy advisor's comments, published in Monday's People's Daily, are "very likely to become national policy".

"These are rare opportunities for Chinese enterprises which want to expand overseas," Zheng said in his article. "The financial crisis has resulted in mounting difficulties and shrinking asset values for such enterprises in developed countries."

He said the government should take the opportunity to remove the long-existing energy and resource "development bottleneck".

"We should encourage both State and private enterprises (to invest overseas) and, especially, be active in energy and resource exploration and development."

Dramatic Pricing Forecast to Reshape Photovoltaics Industry
A Photovoltaic Materials, Wafers, Cells and Modules Webinar

Henning Wicht - Senior Director, MEMS Research
Stefan DeHaan - Senior Analyst, Photovoltaics
January 14, 2009
8:30AM PST