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Report: Global Online Population Grew 4% in 2002 to 580 Million

Authored by Mark Hefflinger on February 21, 2003 - 2:45am.
New York -- The global Internet population grew about 4 percent during 2002 to 580 million, with the U.S. accounting for the largest share of this figure with 29 percent of total Internet users, according to a report from Internet audience measurement firm Nielsen/NetRatings. "Nearly 10 million people over the age of 16 gained Internet access in the U.S. between the end of 2001 and the end of 2002, significantly more than in the other 10 markets studied," said Nielsen/NetRatings' Richard Goosey. Other regions surveyed included several countries in Europe as well as Hong Kong, Australia and Brazil. Spain, with an increase of 22 percent in its online population during 2002, and is heralded as "the next great Internet market" in the report.
tags: Internet | Reports | Global | Grew | Population |

The Honest Thief: New File-Sharing Service in Holland

Authored by Mark Hefflinger on February 21, 2003 - 2:45am.
Arnhem, The Netherlands -- PGR, a Dutch Internet services company, on Friday launched "The Honest Thief," a new file-sharing service based in the Netherlands. The Honest Thief is the first Dutch company to take advantage of a recent Dutch appeals court ruling that paved the way for the Netherlands to become the world's first legal haven for file sharing companies. In March 2002, a Dutch court ruled that users of the popular Kazaa file-sharing service, and not the company itself, must be held accountable for any unauthorized trading of copyrighted content within the country. "With our file sharing service and our new software, we hope The Honest Thief will become to file sharing what the Swiss are to banking," said Pieter Plass, founder of The Honest Thief.
tags: File-Sharing | Holland | The Honest Thief |

Survey: 40 Million Americans Have Downloaded Online Music

Authored by Mark Hefflinger on February 21, 2003 - 2:42am.
New York -- Half of all teens and one-fifth of all Americans age 12 and older report having downloaded a music or MP3 file from a file-sharing service, according to the latest data from New York-based market research firm Ipsos-Reid. Nearly ten percent of these report having done so in the last thirty days. This translates into over 40 million file-sharers within the current U.S. population (according to 2000 U.S. Census figures). The survey also found that 25 percent of Americans 12 and older now own a CD burner, a figure that leaps to 60 percent when polling active file-sharers. Twelve percent of those polled said they had burned a CD owned by someone else rather than buy it themselves, with 42 percent of U.S. file-sharers reporting having done this activity. "As Americans become more familiar with the inherent music capabilities included in today's off-the-shelf PC product bundles, they are also experimenting with PC-based music acquisition and management, as well as mixing and burning CDs," said Ipsos director Matt Kleinschmit.
tags: Internet | Downloads | Survey | Americans | Musics |

Group Opposes Penn. Law Making ISPs Block Child Porn Sites from Residents

Authored by Mark Hefflinger on February 21, 2003 - 2:42am.
Washington -- A digital civil liberties group said that it may mount a legal challenge to a recent Pennsylvania law that forces ISPs operating in the state to block a list of 423 child pornography sites determined by the attorney general's office from its residents. The Center for Democracy and Technology (CDT) has called the law unconstitutional because it will unwittingly block other innocent sites, and has asked Pennsylvania attorney general Mike Fisher for details on the process. One problem with the statute was evidenced by a recent study by a Harvard University researcher, which found that in some cases over 900,000 websites may share the same IP address -- meaning that if one offensive site was among them the other 899,999 would be blocked from Pennsylvania users as well. "It would be as if mail delivery for an entire apartment building were stopped because one tenant was accused of wrongdoing, said CDT staff counsel John Morris. "We've worked with Web hosting companies and ISPs to ensure that the illegal and offensive material is taken down and not any legal sites that may share that space," Pennsylvania attorney general's office spokesman Sean Connolly told CNET News.com. http://www.cdt.org/press/030220press.shtml http://www.attorneygeneral.gov/cld/cseuform.cfm
tags: Websites | Child Porn | ISPs | Pennsylvania law | Residents |