Politics and Law

As part of his efforts to advocate for the passage of the so-called "stimulus" bill, President Obama met with a number of chief executives from the technology sector and other industries on Wednesday to discuss the economy.

Tech company leaders present at the meeting included IBM's Sam Palmisano, Google's Eric Schmidt, Applied Materials' Mike Splinter, Motorola's Greg Brown, and Micron's Steve Appleton.

Obama called it a "sober" meeting but said the economic package moving its way through Congress will create more jobs and lay a foundation for long-term growth.

"It will … Read more

WASHINGTON--Is your Internet provider interfering with your network traffic, and perhaps even running afoul of Net neutrality principles? Google and some like-minded folks believe they've come up with what amounts to an early warning system.

The idea behind the so-called Measurement Lab, or M-Lab, is that just about anyone interested in Internet regulation--including consumers, regulators, and content providers--could use more details about their network's performance. Google, the Democratic Party-affiliated New America Foundation, and the PlanetLab Consortium (a university-business consortium devoted to next-generation networks) announced M-Lab on Wednesday.

The launch's timing is probably no coincidence: M-Lab may become … Read more

The national transition to digital television remains on track for a scheduled date of February 17, after the U.S. House of Representatives on Wednesday rejected a proposal to delay the switchover.

The House vote of 258 to 168 failed to meet the two-thirds threshold required to pass the measure under the rules the Democratic leadership put in place for Wednesday's debate. The vote comes just two days after the Senate unanimously approved pushing back the transition to June 12. President Obama's advisers have also advocated delaying the transition.

Republicans opposed the delay, saying pushing back the date … Read more

A correction was made to this story. Read below for details.

WASHINGTON--Government antitrust attorneys said on Wednesday that they continue to receive complaints from hardware makers and other companies about Microsoft's business practices, even as the software giant has stepped up its efforts to cooperate with the state and federal authorities overseeing its antitrust consent decree.

In the more than six years since the department has been enforcing the consent decree, it has received the largest number of complaints from third parties about a particular Windows Vista marketing program run by Microsoft, said Steven Houck, who represents the state … Read more

Updated 4:25 p.m. PST with reaction from tech industry representatives in Washington, D.C.

John Thompson, outgoing chief executive of security company Symantec, is being considered for the post of secretary of the U.S. Department of Commerce, according to a news wire report on Tuesday.

"He (Thompson) is the leading candidate," Reuters quoted an unidentified senior Democratic source as saying. "He is still being vetted."

Thompson, who announced in November that he would step down in April, held several fund-raisers for Obama at his Silicon Valley home.

"John has always kept his … Read more

WASHINGTON--A Senate panel approved major portions of the Democrats' "stimulus" bill on Tuesday over objections from Republicans that debate had been squelched and not even one hearing had been held on the topic.

"The goal of this package is to find ways to stimulate the private sector through public-sector spending," said Committee Chair Daniel Inouye (D-Hawaii). "We have no interest in enlarging the federal bureaucracy."

Yet a failure to act, Inouye said, could result in economic problems for years to come.

The Senate Appropriations Committee voted 21 to 9 to pass the spending package … Read more

Updated at 3 p.m. PST with quotes from White House spokesman Bill Burton.

The Obama administration may be considered tech-savvy, but that didn't do much good Monday when the White House was hit with a daylong "server outage."

Most White House aides, the first lady's office, and other executive offices were without e-mail for the day, The Washington Post reported, after the outage blocked all incoming and outgoing messages beginning around 10 a.m. EST.

As of Tuesday morning, the White House was once again sending its regular slew of e-mails.

Press secretary Robert Gibbs … Read more

Police Blotter is a regular CNET News report on the intersection of technology and the law.

What: Florida man appeals a first-degree murder conviction based on circumstantial evidence, including Google searches related to gunshot wounds.

When: State appeals court rules on January 23, 2009.

Outcome: Appeal denied and conviction upheld.

What happened, according to court documents and other sources: On the evening of August 17, 2002, Justin Barber was shot four times while walking on a deserted beach in Florida. Bullets hit his left hand, his left shoulder, the base of his neck, and his chest. His wife April was … Read more

Overcoming partisan divisions, the Senate on Monday night unanimously voted to delay the digital-television transition until June 12.

Senate Republicans earlier this month blocked a bill to delay the national switch from analog television broadcasting to digital broadcasting, which was originally scheduled for February 17. The so-called DTV Delay Act, though, was brought back to the Senate floor after Democrats and Republicans in the Senate reached a compromise.

The approved bill would allow television stations to switch to digital signals before the June 12 deadline if they are ready, for the vacated spectrum to be allocated to public safety services. … Read more