Harvard

The Internet thrives on dark energy

Dark energy powers the Internet, at least according Jonathan Zittrain.

Zittrain is the Jack N. and Lillian Berkman visiting professor for entrepreneurial legal studies at Harvard Law School, the chair in Internet governance and regulation at Oxford University, and a founder of the Berkman Center for Internet & Society.

With all those titles, he was the center of attention at a Berkman Center event on the occasion of its 10th anniversary at the Harvard Law School.

The author of the new book The Future of the Internet and How to Stop It, Zittrain is being recruited to return from Oxford … Read more

Harvard researchers: Violent video games OK for kids

Two Harvard researchers have concluded that there's no data to support the notion that violent video games cause the kids who play them to act out violence in real life, contrary to the vast majority of media outlets that would have the public thinking otherwise. The $1.5 million study, which began in 2004, closely examined 1,200 children after bouts with violent games like Grand Theft Auto and not-so-violent titles like The Sims.

Psychologists Lawrence Kutner and Cheryl Olson found that for most kids, playing these games was nothing more than a stress reliever. Sure, some children displayed … Read more

Study: A profile of the U.S. tech entrepreneur

Have you founded a tech company?

Chances are, if you're a U.S. entrepreneur, you're about 39 years old and hold a bachelor's degree, and there's a good chance your company was started in the same state where you received your education, according to a study released Thursday by the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation and researchers from Duke and Harvard universities.

Based on a study of U.S. entrepreneurs who started their companies between 1995 and 2005, the findings show the median age of U.S.-born founders was 39 years old, with only 1 percent … Read more

Buzz Out Loud 706: 'U can't haz Internet,' sez AT&T

AT&T threatens that the Internet is going to run out by 2010, and apparently, it's because everyone's watching Gossip Girl online. Luckily, The CW has caught on to the danger and is pulling Gossip Girl offline so the hordes won't keep watching it on their Web site. Because that would be just plain dangerous. Also, Microsoft, Nintendo, and Sony are all number one! Just ask them! Listen now: Download today's podcast EPISODE 706

PayPal plans to ban unsafe browsers http://www.eweek.com/index2.php?option=content&task=view& amp;id=47667&pop=1&hide_ads=1&page=0&hide_js=1… Read more

Skeletons in the crimson closet: Facebook's latest Harvard scuffle

This post was updated at 6:17 PM PT to correct the title of Aaron Greenspan's book.

Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg never finished his stint as an undergraduate at Harvard, opting instead to move to Palo Alto and eventually become the world's youngest billionaire. But his days in Cambridge, Mass. continue to resurface, as allegations and accusations about Facebook's earliest days grow into ivy-covered drama.

The latest: Whether Facebook can really claim it owns the term "facebook." A former classmate of Zuckerberg's, having run into problems promoting a self-published book that uses the company … Read more

Harvard starts teaching open source

It's about time that United States elite academic institutions finally got around to not only using open-source software, but also teaching it. In the April 2008 edition of Harvard Business Review, Harvard gives its MBA students a taste of the decision facing every company that leverages technology as part of its business (namely, everyone):

Should I embrace or fight open source?

In the case study, "Open Source: Salvation or Suicide," HBR tags along with Evan and Martina ("Marty") Dirweg as Evan tries to persuade Marty that her successful business will become even more so with open source, rather than as a proprietary software/hardware vendor.

Marty's dilemma is palpable, as open-source competitors (who grew up on her company's technology but have now opened it up to the world) start to eat her lunch:

...[Marty] challenged [Evan] to come out with it: What could be wrong with the company's so-far highly successful strategy of jealously guarding its intellectual property? Why should she open the software in Amp Up, as he had so casually suggested on the phone? Why should she invite the open-source community into the company vault, so to speak, and allow it to play with the crown jewels? on open-source software....… Read more

Did a new court development spark Facebook-ConnectU settlement?

Earlier on Monday, reports surfaced that Facebook may be close to a settlement on its longstanding legal dispute with former rival ConnectU, after several years of dismissals, appeals, and general unpleasantry. But a recent court ruling suggests that the timing may not be entirely random: a judge in a U.S. court of appeals ruled that ConnectU was allowed to reinstate its case, reversing Facebook's request for dismissal.

Documents filed last Thursday from ConnectU vs. Zuckerberg et al., which has been handled in a Massachusetts district court, reveal that a senior circuit judge in the court of appeals opted … Read more

Facebook reportedly will settle ConnectU lawsuit

You're likely to be disappointed, those of you who were secretly hoping for an over-the-top, preppies-gone-nasty legal battle between Facebook's founders and the former Harvard classmates who claimed they filched their business plan.

According to Brad Stone of the New York Times, Facebook is reportedly close to settling the lawsuit that the founders of onetime social-networking site ConnectU have been pursuing for several years now.

According to the founders of ConnectU, twins Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss and their business partner Divya Narendra, they hired current Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg as a programmer for ConnectU when they were all … Read more

Harvard student database hacked, posted on BitTorrent

Harvard says about 10,000 of last year's applicants may have had their personal information compromised. At least 6,600 Social Security numbers were exposed. Worse, a compressed 125 M-byte file containing the stolen student data is currently available via BitTorrent, a peer-to-peer network.

In a statement published Monday night Harvard officials said the database containing summaries of GSAS applicant data for entry to the Fall 2007 academic year, summaries of GSAS housing applicant data for the 2007-08 and 2006-07 academic years, and administrator information had been compromised. The server had been taken offline for several days last month … Read more

Harvard joins Open Access publishing movement

From now on, all research published by Harvard Arts and Sciences faculty will be available without a fee and with broad terms of use. It's a controversial decision, since it threatens the exclusive cachet of expensive peer-reviewed journals, and not all researchers are keen on granting complete freedom to cite their hard-earned insights.

Read the full story at Ars Technica: "Harvard's Faculty of Arts and Sciences goes Open Access"