It seems like every time we turn around, somebody else is trying to enact another scheme to make the Internet a little less open, a little less useful, and more of a surveillance tool for people who can't quite make out what the writing on the wall seems to say.

The latest, and possibly most frightening salvo in the as-yet undeclared War On the Internet is something called the PROTECT IP Act (Preventing Real Online Threats to Economic Creativity and Theft of Intellectual Property Act). In a real sense, it's COICA v2.0 in that it still allows the US …

I've been waiting to put together an article about Wikileaks and Cablegate (the gradual release of a quarter-million diplomatic cables written and archived by the United States diplomatic corps). Mostly, everyday life has prevented me from doing so: the holiday season is here once again and, all things being equal, work and cleaning up the apartment with Lyssa have taken priority. I also didn't want to vent my spleen on the Net without having a coherent idea of what I was going to say. Turing knows, enough of that is happening right now and I won't fall prey to it …

Anybody know what's going on? Is this only where I happen to be sourcing from right now or are other people seeing this?

drwho@windbringer ~ $ whois google.com | less

Whois Server Version 2.0

Domain names in the .com and .net domains can now be registered
with many different competing registrars. Go to http://www.internic.net
for detailed information.

Server Name: GOOGLE.COM.ZZZZZ.GET.LAID.AT.WWW.SWINGINGCOMMUNITY.COM
IP Address: 69.41.185.195
Registrar: TUCOWS INC.
Whois Server: whois.tucows.com
Referral URL: http://domainhelp.opensrs.net

Server Name: GOOGLE.COM.ZZZZZ.DOWNLOAD.MOVIE.ONLINE.ZML2 …

Notorious BitTorrent tracker The Pirate Bay somehow came into possession of the net.domain of an organization called the IFPI (International Federation of the Phonographic Industry), which is said to be one of the Net's foremost anti-piracy organizations. The IFPI's been a thorn in the side of Pirate Bay for years, even going so far as to try to get hold of files on the 'tracker held by the Swedish police force, with no success. Supposedly, black hat tricks weren't needed to get hold of the domain (somebody probably sniped the domain the moment its registration expired), and as result …