Media Watch

The prosecution called Robert Alan Soloway the Spam King, alleging he's responsible for sending millions of spam messages and generating hundreds of thosands of dollars in profit since 2003. Soloway pleaded guilty Friday to three of the 40 counts that he was indicted on, with the remaining charges dropped.

The two latest bands to offer their new albums online for free are advancing divergent versions of the business model Radiohead introduced in fall 2007. Where Nine Inch Nails' approach, like Radiohead's before it, draws fans in with free music and then offers additional music for purchase in more extravagant configurations, the Charlatans UK release doesn't seem connected to any such game plan.

A racketeering lawsuit against the Recording Industry Association of America was revived Friday, a month after a federal judge dismissed the case seeking to represent those falsely sued for copyright infringement by the record labels. The lawsuit, filed in Oregon U.S. District Court on behalf of an Oregon woman who was wrongly accused of pilfering music via the Kazaa file-sharing network, seeks to represent thousands of people the woman's attorneys claim have been wrongly targeted by the record labels' lobbying organization. The suit (.pdf) claims that the RIAA and MediaSentry -- the RIAA's private investigative arm that discovers file sharing by looking into peer-to-peer users' public files -- "conspired to develop a massive threat and sham litigation enterprise targeting private citizens across the United States."

Celebrity judges will decide the winner of a video contest sponsored by MoveOn.org and aimed at boosting Obama's chances at gaining the White House. The resulting featurette will be aired nationally. Actors Matt Damon and Ben Affleck are among the deciders, as well as musicians John Legend and Eddie Vedder.

Change beats experience and the two Democratc contenders beat the sole Republican Presidential candidate. This, according to an ABC News/Washington Post poll. It says Obama's lead over McCain is bigger than Clinton's, thus far. Even among independents, change wins over strength by a 9-point margin (47-to-38).

Sprint Nextel Corp and the cell phone industry as a whole is fighting FCC requirements to provide at least 8 hours backup power at all its cell sites, a move that would ensure reliable emergency communications when it's needed most -- which was not the case in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. Sprint Nextel Corp says the requirement would lead to "staggering and irreparable harm" and present a huge economic and bureaucratic burden for the company -- and that costs couldn't be recouped through legal action or passed on to consumers. I did some math. An AP article states there are 210,000 cell sites in the country and upgrades would cost up to $15,000 per site. Assuming there are 100 million cell accounts, then the total upgrade cost would be $3.2 billion or $31.50 per customer. That amounts to only about $2.63 per month per account for the first year, and significantly less thereafter. Hardly "staggering and irreparable harm".

Not everyone is enthused about Apple's iPhone SDK release. Tomothy Lee writes for Tech Dirt tech dirt and he suggests the SDK announcement was a huge disappointment due to its "walled garden" model: - No voip - No data exchange between apps - No multitasking (3rd party apps quit when switching to another) - Apple approval required for apps and can block any - Chilling affect for casual tinkering (how email/web were developed)