They're at it again, trying to tax the Internet. To quote Pete Seeger, when will they ever learn?
Online shoppers in most states avoid paying sales tax on items purchased over the Internet. You might have noticed that it's one of the few parts of the economy doing well about now. Democrats would like to change all that.
On July 1, given the typically Orwellian name such legislation gets, the Main Street Fairness Act, sponsored by Democrat Rep. William Delahunt from Massachusetts, wants to impose a state sales tax on consumers who shop online.
A bipartisan delegation led by Rep. Paul W. Hodes, (D-N.H.), would maintain the business-friendly status quo. It contains language that says "Congress should not impose any new burdensome or unfair tax collecting requirements on small online businesses, which would ultimately hurt the economy and consumers."
"If you are concerned about rising taxes, this is a vehicle to avoid that," Delahunt said in proposing the tax. That's right, he proposes a tax to avoid more taxes. Don't ask us, we stopped taking seriously anything politicians say years ago.
Read more here.
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The EU? A micromanaging nanny state? No. Where'd anybody ever get that idea?
Having solved all major problems, with no unemployment, rioting, immigration or other issues to deal with, the European Commission has decided to tackle some of the minor ones.
Back in February of 2009 industry observer Corey Doctorow reported that the European Commission "is getting ready to force all mobile phone companies to use a single connector on their chargers, in order to eliminate the mountains of e-waste generated by switching chargers every time you switch phones."
Transformer bricks with esoteric connectors are "the most common form of electronic crap I see on street-vendors' blankets around the world (at least a hundred of them yesterday on Brick Lane in London, and literally thousands and thousands of them in Mumbai's Chor Bazaar), and given that they all put out nearly the same voltage and amperage, it really does seem like pure waste," Doctorow wrote.
Well hallelujah that the most pressing issue of our time, how many phone chargers Corey Doctorow is forced to view on the street, has been solved. No doubt Champagne is being popped in the Doctorow household as we speak.
Read more here.
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Poor Microsoft, getting beat like a rented donkey by Apple on the whole tablet thing -- witnessing yet another of Steve Ballmer's hollow promises to get out there and kick the iPad's butt, our friend Chris Selland referred to Ballmer as 'the Wile E. Coyote of the technology industry.'
A little good news goes a long way in Redmond these days, and it's a good day when you kick Google's butt. Industry observer Christopher Null reports that Microsoft is showing off 'a substantial upgrade to what Google has done' with Street View, with a new technology called Street Slide.
In a nutshell, Null says, 'Street Slide gets rid of single, static shots and replaces them with a smooth panorama. As you move down the street, the landscape 'slides' with you, forming a fluid look at the area that's a little more natural, and a lot easier for the mind to parse since there are no jarring breaks in the photos.'
Read more here.
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We're hearing a lot these days about mobile PBX solutions that make life for small businesses and enterprises -- and, of course, workers on the go -- much easier.
We just received word that ENow, a Microsoft Gold Certified Partner working infrastructure consulting and software to simplify systems management, has released Feature Pack 2 for its Exchange and Mobile Device Management product, Mailscape.
The new version, company officials say, helps companies ensure a smooth migration to Microsoft Exchange Server 2010, "streamlines daily IT tasks associated with e-mail system administration, and provides over 40 new reports, including mobile device usage."
Microsoft's latest messaging platform delivers simpler high availability and disaster recovery options, as well as faster and easier ways for users to communicate, Microsoft officials say, "so that businesses can realize productivity gains; however, the migration process can be costly and time-consuming."
Mailscape's reporting module is designed to provide administrators with statistics to help them plan their migration, clean up their environment, validate that new servers were configured correctly, and build migration batches, according to its creators:
Read more here.
