Researchers at the University of Washington argue that a recently introduced recreational device poses potentially significant security risks to anyone who uses it. The device, the Nike + iPod, transmits data from running shoes to a receiver plugged into an iPod. The data are used to calculate how far a person has run and how […]

At the fourth annual State of Play/Terra Nova symposium, a panel discussion on the tax implications of real assets in virtual worlds offered attendees a clear message: paying taxes on such assets is just a matter of time. One panelist, Bryan Camp, tax professor at the Texas Tech University School of Law, noted that existing […]

A legal center has filed the first formal action against a Blackboard patent that has caused considerable anxiety in the higher education community. The patent covers certain aspects of learning management systems, and Blackboard has filed an infringement lawsuit against rival Desire2Learn. Many in higher education believe that the patent is too broad, that it […]

The city of Manchester in the United Kingdom announced plans to build a municipal Wi-Fi network that will cover 90 percent of the city and include as many as 2.2 million people. The wireless network is part of the city’s bid to win a government competition for IT funding. In that competition, called the Digital […]

New rules go into effect December 1 requiring organizations that are parties to federal legal cases to be able to provide “electronically stored information” as evidence in those matters. Many courts have begun requiring such evidence, and the new rules clarify that federal courts will also insist on similar procedures. Some observers noted that as […]

The U.S. Education Department has proposed significantly expanding the Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System (IPEDS), creating what it calls Huge IPEDS. In March 2005, the department proposed creating a unit-record database that would track students much more closely than current reporting does, allowing more accurate statistics for graduation and transfer rates among U.S. college students. […]