The 13-page CID includes 39 different requests for documents ranging from those setting forth Google’s policies and procedures for calculating AdWords prices and minimum bids to minutes and agendas from search quality team meetings and records of the “black listing” or “white listing” of specific Web sites. Also requested: Documents that “describe, analyze, or discuss competition for advertisers from Bing and Yahoo” and others concerning the strategy for e-commerce services like Froogle and Google Shopping.

It’s an extraordinarily thorough set of demands and shows the Texas AG to be reviewing not just Google’s ranking of search results and setting of advertising prices, but questioning whether the company favors its own businesses and advertisers in results. Has Google complied with them? That’s not yet clear, though company spokesman Adam Kovacevich says discussions with Abbott’s office continue.

“Since we started Google we have worked hard to do the right thing by our users and our industry, and while there’s always going to be room for improvement, we’re committed to competing fair and square,” he said. “We’re continuing to work with the Texas attorney general’s office to answer their questions and understand any concerns.”

Texas_GOOG_CID –

Yesterday, in a major policy speech in Washington, D.C., Secretary of State Hillary Clinton jumped on the Internet bandwagon again, unveiling a $25 million government investment for entrepreneurs to allow dissidents to thwart “thugs, hackers and censors.”

Since that’s about the amount a third-string social photo-sharing site gets while walking down University Avenue in Palo Alto, Calif., from venture capitalists with bags of money to spend, let me just say the money is, well, underwhelming.

Luckily, Clinton’s speech–the latest chapter of the Obama administration’s “Internet Freedom Agenda”–was much better.

In fact, it was a sobering look at the situation, replete with all its conflicts and compromises, including some related to the State Department of late (hello, WikiLeaks!).

While more of a gimmick, Clinton outlined what she called a “venture capital-style approach” to stopping governments from closing down digital communications platforms.

In Egypt, that has included the whole dang Internet after times got tough and protesters tweeted too much.

Even still, said Clinton, such efforts–however effective now–were ultimately useless.

“Those who clamp down on Internet freedom may be able to hold back the full expression of their people’s yearnings for a while, but not forever,” she said.

Still, even though Facebook and Twitter have been lauded as critical tools in the reform protests in the Mideast, those Luddite strongmen did manage to put up a very good fight in shutting them down.

But Clinton advocated pressing on. Along with the seed funding for firewall-piercing and evading technologies, she also announced the creation of a new coordinator for cyber issues and the fact that the State Department had just begun to tweet in Arabic and Farsi and would soon be doing so in Chinese, Hindi and Russian.

All very nice steps, but the overall arrival of the long-promised global “strategy for cyberspace,” which has gotten bogged down in politics, is still to come.

In fact, a GOP-fueled criticism of the State Department was also released yesterday, designed to muck up Clinton’s speech, about how another $30 million in digital investments was being spent or, more precisely, being spent badly.

Clinton answered critics:

“Some have criticized us for not pouring funding into a single technology–but there is no silver bullet in the struggle against Internet repression. There’s no ‘app’ for that.”

Well, actually, since there is an app that turns your Apple iPhone into a hand massager, there certainly should be.

Speaking of that, Clinton was deft at dealing with the obvious delta between pressing for Internet freedom, even as U.S. government lawyers were whacking away at WikiLeaks–and, by association, Twitter itself.

Clinton noted the release of a mass of classified State Department documents “began with an act of theft,” arguing that this was the real issue.

She went on to further argue:

“I said that the WikiLeaks incident began with a theft, just as if it had been executed by smuggling papers in a briefcase. The fact that WikiLeaks used the Internet is not the reason we criticized its actions. WikiLeaks does not challenge our commitment to Internet freedom.”

Actually, the issue is that the Internet, once it really gets going, doesn’t really want to be controlled by anyone.

Kind of like humanity.

Or as Clinton so correctly noted about the various protests taking place abroad:

“In each case, people protested because of deep frustrations with the political and economic conditions of their lives. They stood and marched and chanted and the authorities tracked and blocked and arrested them. The Internet did not do any of those things; people did.”

In any case, judge for yourself: Here’s the video of the speech at George Washington University from the State Department’s Web site, as well as the full text below:

Thank you all very much and good afternoon. It is a pleasure, once again, to be back on the campus of the George Washington University, a place that I have spent quite a bit of time in all different settings over the last now nearly 20 years. I’d like especially to thank President Knapp and Provost Lerman, because this is a great opportunity for me to address such a significant issue, and one which deserves the attention of citizens, governments, and I know is drawing that attention. And perhaps today in my remarks, we can begin a much more vigorous debate that will respond to the needs that we have been watching in real time on our television sets.

A few minutes after midnight on January 28th, the Internet went dark across Egypt. During the previous four days, hundreds of thousands of Egyptians had marched to demand a new government. And the world, on TVs, laptops, cell phones, and smart phones, had followed every single step. Pictures and videos from Egypt flooded the web. On Facebook and Twitter, journalists posted on-the-spot reports. Protestors coordinated their next moves. And citizens of all stripes shared their hopes and fears about this pivotal moment in the history of their country.

Millions worldwide answered in real time, “You are not alone and we are with you.” Then the government pulled the plug. Cell phone service was cut off, TV satellite signals were jammed, and Internet access was blocked for nearly the entire population. The government did not want the people to communicate with each other and it did not want the press to communicate with the public. It certainly did not want the world to watch.

The events in Egypt recalled another protest movement 18 months earlier in Iran, when thousands marched after disputed elections. Their protestors also used websites to organize. A video taken by cell phone showed a young woman named Neda killed by a member of the paramilitary forces, and within hours, that video was being watched by people everywhere.

The Iranian authorities used technology as well. The Revolutionary Guard stalked members of the Green Movement by tracking their online profiles. And like Egypt, for a time, the government shut down the internet and mobile networks altogether. After the authorities raided homes, attacked university dorms, made mass arrests, tortured and fired shots into crowds, the protests ended.

In Egypt, however, the story ended differently. The protests continued despite the internet shutdown. People organized marches through flyers and word of mouth and used dial-up modems and fax machines to communicate with the world. After five days, the government relented and Egypt came back online. The authorities then sought to use the Internet to control the protests by ordering mobile companies to send out pro-government text messages, and by arresting bloggers and those who organized the protests online. But 18 days after the protests began, the government failed and the president resigned.

What happened in Egypt and what happened in Iran, which this week is once again using violence against protestors seeking basic freedoms, was about a great deal more than the internet. In each case, people protested because of deep frustrations with the political and economic conditions of their lives. They stood and marched and chanted and the authorities tracked and blocked and arrested them. The Internet did not do any of those things; people did. In both of these countries, the ways that citizens and the authorities used the Internet reflected the power of connection technologies on the one hand as an accelerant of political, social, and economic change, and on the other hand as a means to stifle or extinguish that change.

There is a debate currently underway in some circles about whether the Internet is a force for liberation or repression. But I think that debate is largely beside the point. Egypt isn’t inspiring people because they communicated using Twitter. It is inspiring because people came together and persisted in demanding a better future. Iran isn’t awful because the authorities used Facebook to shadow and capture members of the opposition. Iran is awful because it is a government that routinely violates the rights of its people.

So it is our values that cause these actions to inspire or outrage us, our sense of human dignity, the rights that flow from it, and the principles that ground it. And it is these values that ought to drive us to think about the road ahead. Two billion people are now online, nearly a third of humankind. We hail from every corner of the world, live under every form of government, and subscribe to every system of beliefs. And increasingly, we are turning to the Internet to conduct important aspects of our lives.

The Internet has become the public space of the 21st century–the world’s town square, classroom, marketplace, coffeehouse, and nightclub. We all shape and are shaped by what happens there, all 2 billion of us and counting. And that presents a challenge. To maintain an Internet that delivers the greatest possible benefits to the world, we need to have a serious conversation about the principles that will guide us, what rules exist and should not exist and why, what behaviors should be encouraged or discouraged and how.

The goal is not to tell people how to use the Internet any more than we ought to tell people how to use any public square, whether it’s Tahrir Square or Times Square. The value of these spaces derives from the variety of activities people can pursue in them, from holding a rally to selling their vegetables, to having a private conversation. These spaces provide an open platform, and so does the Internet. It does not serve any particular agenda, and it never should. But if people around the world are going come together every day online and have a safe and productive experience, we need a shared vision to guide us.

One year ago, I offered a starting point for that vision by calling for a global commitment to Internet freedom, to protect human rights online as we do offline. The rights of individuals to express their views freely, petition their leaders, worship according to their beliefs–these rights are universal, whether they are exercised in a public square or on an individual blog. The freedoms to assemble and associate also apply in cyberspace. In our time, people are as likely to come together to pursue common interests online as in a church or a labor hall.

Together, the freedoms of expression, assembly, and association online comprise what I’ve called the freedom to connect. The United States supports this freedom for people everywhere, and we have called on other nations to do the same. Because we want people to have the chance to exercise this freedom. We also support expanding the number of people who have access to the Internet. And because the Internet must work evenly and reliably for it to have value, we support the multi-stakeholder system that governs the internet today, which has consistently kept it up and running through all manner of interruptions across networks, borders, and regions.

In the year since my speech, people worldwide have continued to use the Internet to solve shared problems and expose public corruption, from the people in Russia who tracked wildfires online and organized a volunteer firefighting squad, to the children in Syria who used Facebook to reveal abuse by their teachers, to the Internet campaign in China that helps parents find their missing children.

At the same time, the Internet continues to be restrained in a myriad of ways. In China, the government censors content and redirects search requests to error pages. In Burma, independent news sites have been taken down with distributed denial of service attacks. In Cuba, the government is trying to create a national intranet, while not allowing their citizens to access the global internet. In Vietnam, bloggers who criticize the government are arrested and abused. In Iran, the authorities block opposition and media websites, target social media, and steal identifying information about their own people in order to hunt them down.

These actions reflect a landscape that is complex and combustible, and sure to become more so in the coming years as billions of more people connect to the Internet. The choices we make today will determine what the Internet looks like in the future. Businesses have to choose whether and how to enter markets where internet freedom is limited. People have to choose how to act online, what information to share and with whom, which ideas to voice and how to voice them. Governments have to choose to live up to their commitments to protect free expression, assembly, and association.

For the United States, the choice is clear. On the spectrum of Internet freedom, we place ourselves on the side of openness. Now, we recognize that an open Internet comes with challenges. It calls for ground rules to protect against wrongdoing and harm. And Internet freedom raises tensions, like all freedoms do. But we believe the benefits far exceed the costs.

And today, I’d like to discuss several of the challenges we must confront as we seek to protect and defend a free and open Internet. Now, I’m the first to say that neither I nor the United States Government has all the answers. We’re not sure we have all the questions. But we are committed to asking the questions, to helping lead a conversation, and to defending not just universal principles but the interests of our people and our partners.

The first challenge is achieving both liberty and security. Liberty and security are often presented as equal and opposite; the more you have of one, the less you have of the other. In fact, I believe they make it each other possible. Without security, liberty is fragile. Without liberty, security is oppressive. The challenge is finding the proper measure: enough security to enable our freedoms, but not so much or so little as to endanger them.

Finding this proper measure for the Internet is critical because the qualities that make the internet a force for unprecedented progress–its openness, its leveling effect, its reach and speed–also enable wrongdoing on an unprecedented scale. Terrorists and extremist groups use the Internet to recruit members, and plot and carry out attacks. Human traffickers use the Internet to find and lure new victims into modern-day slavery. Child pornographers use the Internet to exploit children. Hackers break into financial institutions, cell phone networks, and personal email accounts.

So we need successful strategies for combating these threats and more without constricting the openness that is the Internet’s greatest attribute. The United States is aggressively tracking and deterring criminals and terrorists online. We are investing in our nation’s cyber-security, both to prevent cyber-incidents and to lessen their impact. We are cooperating with other countries to fight transnational crime in cyberspace. The United States Government invests in helping other nations build their own law enforcement capacity. We have also ratified the Budapest Cybercrime Convention, which sets out the steps countries must take to ensure that the internet is not misused by criminals and terrorists while still protecting the liberties of our own citizens.

In our vigorous effort to prevent attacks or apprehend criminals, we retain a commitment to human rights and fundamental freedoms. The United States is determined to stop terrorism and criminal activity online and offline, and in both spheres we are committed to pursuing these goals in accordance with our laws and values.

Now, others have taken a different approach. Security is often invoked as a justification for harsh crackdowns on freedom. Now, this tactic is not new to the digital age, but it has new resonance as the internet has given governments new capacities for tracking and punishing human rights advocates and political dissidents. Governments that arrest bloggers, pry into the peaceful activities of their citizens, and limit their access to the Internet may claim to be seeking security. In fact, they may even mean it as they define it. But they are taking the wrong path. Those who clamp down on Internet freedom may be able to hold back the full expression of their people’s yearnings for a while, but not forever.

The second challenge is protecting both transparency and confidentiality. The Internet’s strong culture of transparency derives from its power to make information of all kinds available instantly. But in addition to being a public space, the Internet is also a channel for private communications. And for that to continue, there must be protection for confidential communication online. Think of all the ways in which people and organizations rely on confidential communications to do their jobs. Businesses hold confidential conversations when they’re developing new products to stay ahead of their competitors. Journalists keep the details of some sources confidential to protect them from exposure or retribution. And governments also rely on confidential communication online as well as offline. The existence of connection technologies may make it harder to maintain confidentiality, but it does not alter the need for it.

Now, I know that government confidentiality has been a topic of debate during the past few months because of WikiLeaks, but it’s been a false debate in many ways. Fundamentally, the WikiLeaks incident began with an act of theft. Government documents were stolen, just the same as if they had been smuggled out in a briefcase. Some have suggested that this theft was justified because governments have a responsibility to conduct all of our work out in the open in the full view of our citizens. I respectfully disagree. The United States could neither provide for our citizens’ security nor promote the cause of human rights and democracy around the world if we had to make public every step of our efforts. Confidential communication gives our government the opportunity to do work that could not be done otherwise.

Consider our work with former Soviet states to secure loose nuclear material. By keeping the details confidential, we make it less likely that terrorists or criminals will find the nuclear material and steal it for their own purposes. Or consider the content of the documents that WikiLeaks made public. Without commenting on the authenticity of any particular documents, we can observe that many of the cables released by WikiLeaks relate to human rights work carried on around the world. Our diplomats closely collaborate with activists, journalists, and citizens to challenge the misdeeds of oppressive governments. It is dangerous work. By publishing diplomatic cables, WikiLeaks exposed people to even greater risk.

For operations like these, confidentiality is essential, especially in the Internet age when dangerous information can be sent around the world with the click of a keystroke. But of course, governments also have a duty to be transparent. We govern with the consent of the people, and that consent must be informed to be meaningful. So we must be judicious about when we close off our work to the public, and we must review our standards frequently to make sure they are rigorous. In the United States, we have laws designed to ensure that the government makes its work open to the people, and the Obama Administration has also launched an unprecedented initiative to put government data online, to encourage citizen participation, and to generally increase the openness of government.

The U.S. Government’s ability to protect America, to secure the liberties of our people, and to support the rights and freedoms of others around the world depends on maintaining a balance between what’s public and what should and must remain out of the public domain. The scale should and will always be tipped in favor of openness, but tipping the scale over completely serves no one’s interests. Let me be clear. I said that the WikiLeaks incident began with a theft, just as if it had been executed by smuggling papers in a briefcase. The fact that WikiLeaks used the Internet is not the reason we criticized its actions. WikiLeaks does not challenge our commitment to Internet freedom.

And one final word on this matter: There were reports in the days following these leaks that the United States Government intervened to coerce private companies to deny service to WikiLeaks. That is not the case. Now, some politicians and pundits publicly called for companies to disassociate from WikiLeaks, while others criticized them for doing so. Public officials are part of our country’s public debates, but there is a line between expressing views and coercing conduct. Business decisions that private companies may have taken to enforce their own values or policies regarding WikiLeaks were not at the direction of the Obama Administration.

A third challenge is protecting free expression while fostering tolerance and civility. I don’t need to tell this audience that the Internet is home to every kind of speech–false, offensive, incendiary, innovative, truthful, and beautiful.

The multitude of opinions and ideas that crowd the Internet is both a result of its openness and a reflection of our human diversity. Online, everyone has a voice. And the Universal Declaration of Human Rights protects the freedom of expression for all. But what we say has consequences. Hateful or defamatory words can inflame hostilities, deepen divisions, and provoke violence. On the Internet, this power is heightened. Intolerant speech is often amplified and impossible to retract. Of course, the Internet also provides a unique space for people to bridge their differences and build trust and understanding.

Some take the view that, to encourage tolerance, some hateful ideas must be silenced by governments. We believe that efforts to curb the content of speech rarely succeed and often become an excuse to violate freedom of expression. Instead, as it has historically been proven time and time again, the better answer to offensive speech is more speech. People can and should speak out against intolerance and hatred. By exposing ideas to debate, those with merit tend to be strengthened, while weak and false ideas tend to fade away; perhaps not instantly, but eventually.

Now, this approach does not immediately discredit every hateful idea or convince every bigot to reverse his thinking. But we have determined as a society that it is far more effective than any other alternative approach. Deleting writing, blocking content, arresting speakers–these actions suppress words, but they do not touch the underlying ideas. They simply drive people with those ideas to the fringes, where their convictions can deepen, unchallenged.

Last summer, Hannah Rosenthal, the U.S. Special Envoy to Monitor and Combat Anti-Semitism, made a trip to Dachau and Auschwitz with a delegation of American imams and Muslim leaders. Many of them had previously denied the Holocaust, and none of them had ever denounced Holocaust denial. But by visiting the concentration camps, they displayed a willingness to consider a different view. And the trip had a real impact. They prayed together, and they signed messages of peace, and many of those messages in the visitors books were written in Arabic. At the end of the trip, they read a statement that they wrote and signed together condemning without reservation Holocaust denial and all other forms of anti-Semitism.

The marketplace of ideas worked. Now, these leaders had not been arrested for their previous stance or ordered to remain silent. Their mosques were not shut down. The state did not compel them with force. Others appealed to them with facts. And their speech was dealt with through the speech of others.

The United States does restrict certain kinds of speech in accordance with the rule of law and our international obligations. We have rules about libel and slander, defamation, and speech that incites imminent violence. But we enforce these rules transparently, and citizens have the right to appeal how they are applied. And we don’t restrict speech even if the majority of people find it offensive. History, after all, is full of examples of ideas that were banned for reasons that we now see as wrong. People were punished for denying the divine right of kings, or suggesting that people should be treated equally regardless of race, gender, or religion. These restrictions might have reflected the dominant view at the time, and variations on these restrictions are still in force in places around the world.

But when it comes to online speech, the United States has chosen not to depart from our time-tested principles. We urge our people to speak with civility, to recognize the power and reach that their words can have online. We’ve seen in our own country tragic examples of how online bullying can have terrible consequences. Those of us in government should lead by example, in the tone we set and the ideas we champion. But leadership also means empowering people to make their own choices, rather than intervening and taking those choices away. We protect free speech with the force of law, and we appeal to the force of reason to win out over hate.

Now, these three large principles are not always easy to advance at once. They raise tensions, and they pose challenges. But we do not have to choose among them. Liberty and security, transparency and confidentiality, freedom of expression and tolerance–these all make up the foundation of a free, open, and secure society as well as a free, open, and secure internet where universal human rights are respected, and which provides a space for greater progress and prosperity over the long run.

Now, some countries are trying a different approach, abridging rights online and working to erect permanent walls between different activities–economic exchanges, political discussions, religious expressions, and social interactions. They want to keep what they like and suppress what they don’t. But this is no easy task. Search engines connect businesses to new customers, and they also attract users because they deliver and organize news and information. Social networking sites aren’t only places where friends share photos; they also share political views and build support for social causes or reach out to professional contacts to collaborate on new business opportunities.

Walls that divide the Internet, that block political content, or ban broad categories of expression, or allow certain forms of peaceful assembly but prohibit others, or intimidate people from expressing their ideas are far easier to erect than to maintain. Not just because people using human ingenuity find ways around them and through them but because there isn’t an economic Internet and a social Internet and a political Internet; there’s just the Internet. And maintaining barriers that attempt to change this reality entails a variety of costs–moral, political, and economic. Countries may be able to absorb these costs for a time, but we believe they are unsustainable in the long run. There are opportunity costs for trying to be open for business but closed for free expression–costs to a nation’s education system, its political stability, its social mobility, and its economic potential.

When countries curtail Internet freedom, they place limits on their economic future. Their young people don’t have full access to the conversations and debates happening in the world or exposure to the kind of free inquiry that spurs people to question old ways of doing and invent new ones. And barring criticism of officials makes governments more susceptible to corruption, which create economic distortions with long-term effects. Freedom of thought and the level playing field made possible by the rule of law are part of what fuels innovation economies.

So it;s not surprising that the European-American Business Council, a group of more than 70 companies, made a strong public support statement last week for Internet freedom. If you invest in countries with aggressive censorship and surveillance policies, your website could be shut down without warning, your servers hacked by the government, your designs stolen, or your staff threatened with arrest or expulsion for failing to comply with a politically motivated order. The risks to your bottom line and to your integrity will at some point outweigh the potential rewards, especially if there are market opportunities elsewhere.

Now, some have pointed to a few countries, particularly China, that appears to stand out as an exception, a place where Internet censorship is high and economic growth is strong. Clearly, many businesses are willing to endure restrictive internet policies to gain access to those markets, and in the short term, even perhaps in the medium term, those governments may succeed in maintaining a segmented internet. But those restrictions will have long-term costs that threaten one day to become a noose that restrains growth and development.

There are political costs as well. Consider Tunisia, where online economic activity was an important part of the country’s ties with Europe while online censorship was on par with China and Iran, the effort to divide the economic internet from the “everything else” Internet in Tunisia could not be sustained. People, especially young people, found ways to use connection technologies to organize and share grievances, which, as we know, helped fuel a movement that led to revolutionary change. In Syria, too, the government is trying to negotiate a non-negotiable contradiction. Just last week, it lifted a ban on Facebook and YouTube for the first time in three years, and yesterday they convicted a teenage girl of espionage and sentenced her to five years in prison for the political opinions she expressed on her blog.

This, too, is unsustainable. The demand for access to platforms of expression cannot be satisfied when using them lands you in prison. We believe that governments who have erected barriers to Internet freedom, whether they’re technical filters or censorship regimes or attacks on those who exercise their rights to expression and assembly online, will eventually find themselves boxed in. They will face a dictator’s dilemma and will have to choose between letting the walls fall or paying the price to keep them standing, which means both doubling down on a losing hand by resorting to greater oppression and enduring the escalating opportunity cost of missing out on the ideas that have been blocked and people who have been disappeared.

I urge countries everywhere instead to join us in the bet we have made, a bet that an open internet will lead to stronger, more prosperous countries. At its core, it’s an extension of the bet that the United States has been making for more than 200 years, that open societies give rise to the most lasting progress, that the rule of law is the firmest foundation for justice and peace, and that innovation thrives where ideas of all kinds are aired and explored. This is not a bet on computers or mobile phones. It’s a bet on people. We’re confident that together with those partners in government and people around the world who are making the same bet by hewing to universal rights that underpin open societies, we’ll preserve the internet as an open space for all. And that will pay long-term gains for our shared progress and prosperity. The United States will continue to promote an Internet where people’s rights are protected and that it is open to innovation, interoperable all over the world, secure enough to hold people’s trust, and reliable enough to support their work.

In the past year, we have welcomed the emergence of a global coalition of countries, businesses, civil society groups, and digital activists seeking to advance these goals. We have found strong partners in several governments worldwide, and we’ve been encouraged by the work of the Global Network Initiative, which brings together companies, academics, and NGOs to work together to solve the challenges we are facing, like how to handle government requests for censorship or how to decide whether to sell technologies that could be used to violate rights or how to handle privacy issues in the context of cloud computing. We need strong corporate partners that have made principled, meaningful commitments to internet freedom as we work together to advance this common cause.

We realize that in order to be meaningful, online freedoms must carry over into real-world activism. That’s why we are working through our Civil Society 2.0 initiative to connect NGOs and advocates with technology and training that will magnify their impact. We are also committed to continuing our conversation with people everywhere around the world. Last week, you may have heard, we launched Twitter feeds in Arabic and Farsi, adding to the ones we already have in French and Spanish. We’ll start similar ones in Chinese, Russian, and Hindi. This is enabling us to have real-time, two-way conversations with people wherever there is a connection that governments do not block.

Our commitment to internet freedom is a commitment to the rights of people, and we are matching that with our actions. Monitoring and responding to threats to internet freedom has become part of the daily work of our diplomats and development experts. They are working to advance internet freedom on the ground at our embassies and missions around the world. The United States continues to help people in oppressive internet environments get around filters, stay one step ahead of the censors, the hackers, and the thugs who beat them up or imprison them for what they say online.

While the rights we seek to protect and support are clear, the various ways that these rights are violated are increasingly complex. I know some have criticized us for not pouring funding into a single technology, but we believe there is no silver bullet in the struggle against internet repression. There’s no app for that. Start working, those of you out there. And accordingly, we are taking a comprehensive and innovative approach, one that matches our diplomacy with technology, secure distribution networks for tools, and direct support for those on the front lines.

In the last three years, we have awarded more than $20 million in competitive grants through an open process, including interagency evaluation by technical and policy experts to support a burgeoning group of technologists and activists working at the cutting edge of the fight against internet repression. This year, we will award more than $25 million in additional funding. We are taking a venture capital-style approach, supporting a portfolio of technologies, tools, and training, and adapting as more users shift to mobile devices. We have our ear to the ground, talking to digital activists about where they need help, and our diversified approach means we’re able to adapt the range of threats that they face. We support multiple tools, so if repressive governments figure out how to target one, others are available. And we invest in the cutting edge because we know that repressive governments are constantly innovating their methods of oppression and we intend to stay ahead of them.

Likewise, we are leading the push to strengthen cyber security and online innovation, building capacity in developing countries, championing open and interoperable standards and enhancing international cooperation to respond to cyber threats. Deputy Secretary of Defense Lynn gave a speech on this issue just yesterday. All these efforts build on a decade of work to sustain an Internet that is open, secure, and reliable. And in the coming year, the Administration will complete an international strategy for cyberspace, charting the course to continue this work into the future.

This is a foreign policy priority for us, one that will only increase in importance in the coming years. That’s why I’ve created the Office of the Coordinator for Cyber Issues, to enhance our work on cyber security and other issues and facilitate cooperation across the State Department and with other government agencies. I’ve named Christopher Painter, formerly senior director for cyber security at the National Security Council and a leader in the field for 20 years, to head this new office.

The dramatic increase in internet users during the past 10 years has been remarkable to witness. But that was just the opening act. In the next 20 years, nearly 5 billion people will join the network. It is those users who will decide the future.

So we are playing for the long game. Unlike much of what happens online, progress on this front will be measured in years, not seconds. The course we chart today will determine whether those who follow us will get the chance to experience the freedom, security, and prosperity of an open Internet.

As we look ahead, let us remember that Internet freedom isn’t about any one particular activity online. It’s about ensuring that the Internet remains a space where activities of all kinds can take place, from grand, ground-breaking, historic campaigns to the small, ordinary acts that people engage in every day.

We want to keep the Iternet open for the protestor using social media to organize a march in Egypt; the college student emailing her family photos of her semester abroad; the lawyer in Vietnam blogging to expose corruption; the teenager in the United States who is bullied and finds words of support online; for the small business owner in Kenya using mobile banking to manage her profits; the philosopher in China reading academic journals for her dissertation; the scientist in Brazil sharing data in real time with colleagues overseas; and the billions and billions of interactions with the Internet every single day as people communicate with loved ones, follow the news, do their jobs, and participate in the debates shaping their world.

Internet freedom is about defending the space in which all these things occur so that it remains not just for the students here today, but your successors and all who come after you. This is one of the grand challenges of our time. We are engaged in a vigorous effort against those who we have always stood against, who wish to stifle and repress, to come forward with their version of reality and to accept none other. We enlist your help on behalf of this struggle. It’s a struggle for human rights, it’s a struggle for human freedom, and it’s a struggle for human dignity.

Thank you all very much.

By providing us with an easy, intuitive way of viewing and editing documents, tablets are reducing printing demand in the consumer and enterprise markets. And by increasing demand for e-books and digital magazines and newspapers, they’re doing the same thing in the commercial printing market as well. In fact, Morgan Stanley expects a decline of up to two percent in printer supplies revenue in 2011 and a two percent to five percent decline in 2012.

“CIOs in the enterprise space already expect to cut spending on printer supplies in 2011,” the research outfit said in a vast new report on the tablet market. “As the installed base of tablets–a digital document viewer that reduces the need to print both standard black and white documents and expensive color presentations–grows, we expect printed page volumes to shrink. What?’s more, 90% of iPad users already believe they would print less with access to work documents on their tablets.”

Given that, it’s no wonder HP is putting so much effort into the TouchPad. If tablets are reducing printing demand across all market strata, its printing business is clearly going to take a hit. What better way to ease that blow than to sell a tablet of its own?

It’s the latest development in a shareholder lawsuit against HP in which the plaintiffs have alleged that HP’s board of directors let Hurd walk out the door with too much money when he resigned following accusations of sexual harassment by a onetime contractor. They’re seeking an order that would require Hurd to disgorge the payments he received as his severance deal.

The judge, James Ware, ignored Hurd’s argument that he deserves to see documents relating to the matter that so far HP has refused to share, though the ruling doesn’t address whether he’ll ultimately get to see them or not. Hurd had objected to a new investigation, saying he would agree to it only if he were to get copies of the initial demand letter from shareholders that led to the lawsuit, as well as related documents that are under seal in a separate shareholder case on the same issue that’s before the Delaware Court of Chancery. Ware scheduled a hearing on March 20 to hear an update on the investigation.

Hurd resigned from HP in August after accusations about sexual harassment arose from Jodie Fisher, a onetime actress and former HP contractor. He was found not to have violated HP’s sexual harassment policy, but was found to have violated HP’s expense-reporting policy. After leaving HP, he went on to become co-president of Oracle, after Oracle CEO Larry Ellison criticized HP’s board of directors for its handling of the incident.

Word of a new probe comes in response to a shareholder lawsuit in federal court in California claiming that HP paid Hurd too much in severance when he left. In the meantime, both HP and the shareholders suing have asked the judge to put the case on hold until the investigation is complete.

Hurd says he wants to see a copy of the shareholder demand that led to the lawsuit, and will oppose the delay in the case until that happens. HP says that as a subject of the inquiry, Hurd isn’t entitled to see any of the documents in question.

In the Delaware case, Hurd’s lawyers argued that the original letters from Jodie Fisher, a onetime actress and a former HP contractor who accused Hurd of sexual harassment, shouldn’t be made public.

Hurd, you’ll recall, went on to become co-president of Oracle, after Oracle CEO Larry Ellison raked HP’s board over the coals for its handling of the incident. Ellison wasn’t alone, as former General Electric CEO Jack Welch later piled on.

Earlier this week, I motored the Mini down to the Googleplex in Silicon Valley to visit with entrepreneur Shan Sinha.

He headed the start-up DocVerse, which was acquired by the search giant in March for a reported $25 million to $30 million.

Since then, Sinha has been ferreting away on scaling up DocVerse’s product, which allows users of Microsoft Office documents to collaborate in real-time on the Web.

Its new name: Google Cloud Connect.

About 4,000 companies quickly signed up to be early testers in the preview program, and Google said it had thousands of requests to be notified when it becomes available, which will be in a few weeks.

DocVerse was founded in 2008 by Sinha and Alex DeNeui, who both used to work at Microsoft. It raised only $1.3 million in venture funding from Baseline Ventures, Harrison Metal and Naval Ravikant.

Google’s acquisition of it was yet another shot across Microsoft’s software bow, along with a range of mashups of cloud computing and productivity applications.

For example, Google has been pushing its own cloud-based Google Docs to compete against the Office juggernaut.

For its part, Microsoft has committed itself to moving its hugely popular productivity suite–which includes Word, PowerPoint and Excel–into the cloud, in order to protect its software hegemony.

Why? Simultaneous group-editing and collaboration online is the future of Office.

Clearly, the race for productivity applications is in the cloud.

So–along with Cloud Connect –Sinha has been put in charge of deploying a $50 a person package of them, including Sites, Gmail, Docs, Calendar and Video, to millions of business users.

Here is Sinha talking about all of that and more in the video interview I did with him:

Please see this disclosure related to me and Google.

]]> http://allthingsd.com/20110114/docverse-now-google-cloud-connect-head-shan-sinha-talks-about-biz-apps/feed/ 0 http://allthingsd.com/20101208/paypal-releases-funds-to-wikileaks-as-supporters-strike-back/ http://allthingsd.com/20101208/paypal-releases-funds-to-wikileaks-as-supporters-strike-back/#comments Wed, 08 Dec 2010 23:29:45 +0000 Tricia Duryee http://emoney.allthingsd.com/?p=380 PayPal has just released the remaining funds in the account associated with WikiLeaks today, after restricting access to the account last week, according to a PayPal blog post.

The release of funds follows a number of denial-of-service attacks earlier this week that were aimed at the document-leaking site’s providers. Most of the providers are now refusing to work with WikiLeaks after the U.S. government accused it of being in possession of documents that were provided in violation of U.S. law.

Yesterday, WikiLeak’s founder Julian Assange was arrested and denied bail in London. He’s accused of sexual misconduct in Sweden.

While PayPal is releasing the residual funds to WikiLeaks, it is not reinstating the ability for it to receive donations.

PayPal was caught up in a brief media storm this morning, after PayPal’s VP of Platform Osama Bedier gave the impression at LeWeb in Paris that PayPal had cut off access to WikiLeaks because of direct pressure by the U.S. government.

PayPal now wants to set the record straight, and says that it reviewed its policies regarding WikiLeaks after the U.S. Department of State publicized a letter stating that WikiLeaks may be in possession of documents that were provided in violation of U.S. law. The letter was published, and not sent to PayPal directly.

“PayPal was not contacted by any government organization in the U.S. or abroad. We restricted the account based on our Acceptable Use Policy review,” writes PayPal’s General Counsel John Muller. “Ultimately, our difficult decision was based on a belief that the WikiLeaks website was encouraging sources to release classified material, which is likely a violation of law by the source.”

Further, the company disclosed that twice before–in 2008 and 2009–PayPal reviewed and restricted the account associated with WikiLeaks “for reasons unrelated to our Acceptable Use Policy. As soon as proper information was received from the account holder, the restrictions were lifted.”

PayPal has been one of many providers that have been the victim of computer attacks, where servers were inundated with traffic. A spokesperson told us that it mostly affected the company’s blog site, and did not directly affect its payments services.

Other affected companies include MasterCard and Swiss bank PostFinance, The Wall Street Journal reports. No one is yet claiming responsibility for the attacks, but some say they are being organized by the ad hoc “Operation Payback.”

]]> http://allthingsd.com/20101208/paypal-releases-funds-to-wikileaks-as-supporters-strike-back/feed/ 12 http://allthingsd.com/20101201/wikileaks-leaves-amazon-returns-to-sweden/ http://allthingsd.com/20101201/wikileaks-leaves-amazon-returns-to-sweden/#comments Wed, 01 Dec 2010 21:12:39 +0000 Beth Callaghan http://voices.allthingsd.com/?p=33341 WikiLeaks has left its U.S. host, Amazon Web Services, and moved its operations back to Sweden. The whistleblowing site had left Bahnhof, its Swedish host, and sought refuge with Amazon after Sunday’s leak of U.S. State Department documents left it besieged by almost constant DDOS attacks. The site reported another DDOS attack early yesterday, and was down earlier today. Neither WikiLeaks nor Amazon has officially commented on their relationship or why it ended.

]]> http://allthingsd.com/20101201/wikileaks-leaves-amazon-returns-to-sweden/feed/ 0 http://allthingsd.com/20101201/jon-stewart-explains-wikileaks-to-the-rest-of-us/ http://allthingsd.com/20101201/jon-stewart-explains-wikileaks-to-the-rest-of-us/#comments Wed, 01 Dec 2010 13:47:27 +0000 Peter Kafka http://mediamemo.allthingsd.com/?p=26513 What’s really in the most recent batch of WikiLeaks documents? And should we care? Jon Stewart explains, and then dissects the fascination that certain digerati (you know who you are) have with transparency.

Sorry, couldn’t shave down the eight-minute running time, but it’s worth it (boy do I miss the Hulu clip-editing feature). Also, this is NSFW if your workplace isn’t cool with the word “penis.”

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon – Thurs 11p / 10c
The Informant!
www.thedailyshow.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor The Daily Show on Facebook

If you’re looking for a more sober take on WikiLeaks, check out Andy Greenberg’s excellent Forbes cover story and interview with Julian Assange.

]]> http://allthingsd.com/20101201/jon-stewart-explains-wikileaks-to-the-rest-of-us/feed/ 4 http://allthingsd.com/20101123/using-software-to-sift-digital-records/ http://allthingsd.com/20101123/using-software-to-sift-digital-records/#comments Tue, 23 Nov 2010 13:00:52 +0000 Nathan Koppel http://voices.allthingsd.com/?p=33004 Companies in litigation pay lawyers handsome sums to pore over their vast archives of emails, documents and other electronic records. The goal of this sleuthing is to identify which records contain information relevant to a lawsuit.

The process, termed electronic discovery, has grown into one of the costliest, and most nettlesome, aspects of litigation. Large companies expect to spend about $1.3 billion, or 7.1 percent of their litigation spending, on it this year, according to BTI Consulting Group Inc. That is up from 5.2 percent five years ago, said BTI, which surveys lawyers at the 1000 biggest companies.

“In the old days, someone might keep notes on a piece of paper and then throw it away,” said Richard Baer, general counsel of Qwest Communications International Inc. “Now, data is captured, so there is a lot more information to go through.”

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]]> http://allthingsd.com/20101123/using-software-to-sift-digital-records/feed/ 0 http://allthingsd.com/20101117/using-phones-globally/ http://allthingsd.com/20101117/using-phones-globally/#comments Wed, 17 Nov 2010 22:40:27 +0000 Walter S. Mossberg http://mailbox.allthingsd.com/?p=787 Q:

My Motorola Android phone does not work outside of the U.S. Does the Samsung Galaxy have the same problem? Will the forthcoming Verizon iPhone work in Europe?

A:

I combined two reader questions here, because they both touch on a common source of confusion. I presume that the Motorola Android phone that only works in the U.S. is sold by either Verizon or Sprint, because they use network technology that is primarily found in the U.S., and not, say, in Europe. Thus, phone makers like Motorola and Samsung tailor their Verizon and Sprint models to this U.S.-centric technology, called CDMA.

However, both Motorola and Samsung also make Android phones for AT&T and T-Mobile, which use a network technology called GSM that is standard in most of the rest of the world. These models should work outside of the U.S. There are a few “world phones” sold by Verizon and Sprint, which include both network technologies. For instance, Verizon sells two Android phones, the Droid Pro and the Droid 2 Global, which fall into that category.

As for the reported forthcoming Verizon iPhone, I don’t know if it will be limited to CDMA, which would make it essentially a U.S.-only device, or whether it will also be compatible with GSM, which would make it a world phone.

Q:

I live in South Africa, and want to buy the Samsung Tab to make my job easier, but to do that I must be able to work with Microsoft Excel documents. Editing and using dropdown boxes is essential. Can this be done?

A:

The Tab, and other Android devices, can view and edit Excel documents using either a built-in mobile office suite (ThinkFree was pre-installed on the Tab I tested) or one you can obtain through the Android Market, like Quickoffice. You can also use online spreadsheet apps.

However, as with the same or similar apps for the iPad, these are limited compared to using Excel on a PC or Mac, and I cannot say whether they’d have the features and two-way document fidelity you personally might require. I didn’t test editing Excel documents on the Tab.

Q:

I am considering purchasing the iPad but have learned that it does not allow users to create folders in which documents can be stored. This would be incredibly useful for me for business purposes while I travel (i.e., separate client folders with client-specific documents in each). I have heard that Apple’s new operating system upgrade might make this possible, but I haven’t been able to confirm it. Do you happen to know whether that is the case?

A:

The new folder feature coming to the iPad is meant for grouping apps, not documents. Apple’s operating system for its mobile devices, called iOS, doesn’t have a global document folder capability.

However, individual iPad apps, such as the very powerful GoodReader, do allow you to create folders that can hold all manner of documents, and you can name and organize these folders as you wish. But these folders are only accessible from within the app that creates them.

You can find Mossberg’s Mailbox, and my other columns at the All Things Digital website, http://walt.allthingsd.com.

]]> http://allthingsd.com/20101117/using-phones-globally/feed/ 4 http://allthingsd.com/20101117/google-docs-adds-mobile-editing/ http://allthingsd.com/20101117/google-docs-adds-mobile-editing/#comments Wed, 17 Nov 2010 20:06:24 +0000 Voices http://voices.allthingsd.com/?p=32723 Google Docs just got substantially more useful for folks on the move. With a rollout starting today, the cloud-based productivity apps will now allow users to edit the contents of documents and spreadsheets (collaboratively, if they want) from mobile devices (specifically those running Android 2.2 or Apple’s iOS 3.0+).

]]> http://allthingsd.com/20101117/google-docs-adds-mobile-editing/feed/ 0 http://allthingsd.com/20101116/new-nook-brings-a-little-color-to-e-reading/ http://allthingsd.com/20101116/new-nook-brings-a-little-color-to-e-reading/#comments Tue, 16 Nov 2010 22:44:47 +0000 Katherine Boehret http://solution.allthingsd.com/?p=1511 Book lovers nowadays fall into one of two camps: They either eschew e-readers altogether, preferring the look and feel of print books; or they dive wholeheartedly into e-books, instantly downloading and racing through more titles by the handfuls. If you count yourself in the latter category, you’re in luck.

Starting this week, Barnes & Noble will ship its $249 Nook Color (nookcolor.com), a luxury model in the e-reader world currently dominated by the $139 monochrome Amazon.com Kindle. While the original Nook offered a gray-scale reading screen and a thin, color touch strip for browsing the bookstore, this model is one big color touch screen. It connects to the Web using only Wi-Fi and costs $100 more than last year’s comparable Wi-Fi Nook, but a Barnes & Noble spokeswoman said that preorders online and in stores are far exceeding company expectations, with over twice as many as for last year’s Nook.

I’ve been testing the Nook Color over the past week and I like its book-size build and stylish design. Its user interface is inviting and its digital bookstore is redesigned to make shopping for books enjoyable. Nook Color is aimed at people who are primarily focused on reading but crave the iPad’s color and some of its versatility.

Like the Kindle, the Nook Color has a Web browser and some apps but no dedicated email program or way to access an app store. A spokeswoman for Barnes & Noble says a full email program and app store are expected early next year.

The Nook Color is unapologetically focused on reading. It accesses Barnes & Noble’s library of two million downloadable books and over 100 magazines and newspapers (fewer were available during my pre-release testing). The reader has a feature called ArticleView that displays magazine articles in a clear, readable format. You can highlight passages from books and then share them with friends through Facebook, Twitter or a limited, in-book email system. A LendMe feature gives users an easy way to digitally lend their books to friends for 14 days. And for kids, there’s a feature where popular stories are read aloud by people rather than a computer voice.

The Nook Color is more than just a bright, color screen: It’s built on the Android 2.1 operating system—the same mobile OS used to run many smartphones. This gives the device access to a full Web browser for tasks like reading favorite sites or checking Facebook, which I did easily. Early next year Nook Color will upgrade to Android 2.2, allowing it to play Flash videos.

The Nook Color

Eight apps found in a section called Extras come loaded on the device including apps for Pandora Internet Radio, chess and Sudoku. I logged into my Pandora account, quickly retrieved my saved list of stations and played a QuickMix of music. I was able to work on a crossword puzzle or read a book or magazine on the Nook Color while still listening to Rihanna on the music app. Quickoffice software for Word, Excel and PowerPoint comes built into the Nook Color so users can view—but not edit—documents in these programs if they’re loaded onto the device with a MicroSD card. Until the Nook Color’s app store launches early next year, there’s no way to download free or paid apps.

Navigating around the Nook Color is a cinch. A tiny “n” just below the screen returns you to the home screen, which can be customized with photos loaded via a MicroSD card. The Daily Shelf is a dedicated horizontal section at the bottom of the home screen that updates whenever possible with new versions of newspapers (daily), magazines (weekly or monthly, if you subscribe) or books lent to you by friends. Anything on the Daily Shelf can be dragged out onto the home screen, placed anywhere and resized by pinching two fingers out or together. A Quick Nav button displays the Nook Color’s six sections: Library, Shop, Search, Extras, Web and Settings. A helpful “Keep Reading” prompt at the top of the home screen shows the last thing you were reading; selecting it sends you to right where you left off.

Nook Color weighs just under a pound, or twice as much as the Kindle but still a half-pound lighter than Apple’s larger iPad. It felt a bit heavy in my hands as I read from it for a long period of time, but I solved that by leaning it against a desk or pillow.

While reading Stacy Schiff’s “Cleopatra: A Life,” I found a particularly interesting tidbit about first-century B.C. marriage contracts requiring wives to vow not to add love potions to their husbands’ food or drink. I highlighted this passage by tapping once on the screen and dragging highlighter handles around it, and then sent it to friends via email with a built-in shortcut for sharing through email, Facebook or Twitter. I selected another passage and posted it on my Facebook wall for friends to read. All these posts had links to buy books from Barnes & Noble.

I really enjoyed reading magazines on the Nook Color because these appeared much as they do in print. Brightly colored pages appeared one at a time when I held the device vertically, or two pages at a time in horizontal view. Magazines can be bought per issue or via subscriptions; a single current issue of House Beautiful was $4.50 or $1.99 with a subscription. The Quick Nav button works in magazines, too, so you can flick a finger right or left to skip ahead to specific sections or articles.

If you love reading and want to share your books with friends or reading updates with social networks, the Nook Color has you covered. It will also give you a taste of tablet computing with functions like browsing the Web, using some apps and eventually, full emailing. Just remember that Nook Color is laser-focused on e-reading.

A correction was made to this column on 11/17/2010 to reflect that Quickoffice is not owned by Microsoft.

Edited by Walter S. Mossberg

Email mossbergsolution@wsj.com

]]> http://allthingsd.com/20101116/new-nook-brings-a-little-color-to-e-reading/feed/ 0 http://allthingsd.com/20101026/website-for-leaked-data-shines-spotlight-on-wikileaks/ http://allthingsd.com/20101026/website-for-leaked-data-shines-spotlight-on-wikileaks/#comments Tue, 26 Oct 2010 18:07:59 +0000 Jeanne Whalen http://voices.allthingsd.com/?p=31550 WikiLeaks publishes top-secret documents about government and corporate intrigue.

Then there is John Young, who publishes documents about WikiLeaks.

From his apartment on New York City’s Upper West Side, the 70-something architect, computer buff and self-described “cypherpunk” runs a website, http://cryptome.org, that seeks to hold accountable the site that boasts of holding others to account.

Mr. Young said his scrutiny is meant not to undermine WikiLeaks, but to harden it for battle. “Doing what they’re doing,” he said in a telephone interview, “they have to be just as tough as nails. And they can’t get tough by having people praise them. They can only get tough by having people attack them.”

WikiLeaks has posted hundreds of thousands of classified U.S. military documents about the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, with the most recent trove released last weekend. Among the posts on Mr. Young’s site—which covers a broad range of subjects—are internal WikiLeaks emails showing the group debating strategy for attracting funds and supporters. The Cryptome posts have provocative labels such as “wikileaks-fear,” “wikileaks-snitch” and “WL Hate.”

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]]> http://allthingsd.com/20101026/website-for-leaked-data-shines-spotlight-on-wikileaks/feed/ 0 http://allthingsd.com/20101013/microsoft-office-2011-mac-review/ http://allthingsd.com/20101013/microsoft-office-2011-mac-review/#comments Thu, 14 Oct 2010 02:03:34 +0000 Walter S. Mossberg http://ptech.allthingsd.com/?p=1569 A new, faster, better version of Microsoft Office is coming out Oct. 26. But it isn’t for Microsoft’s own Windows operating system. It is for the Macintosh computers made by the software giant’s archrival, Apple. And, among other things, it will bestow upon the Mac a benefit heretofore available only on Windows: Outlook. The popular email, calendar and contacts program is finally arriving on the Mac in a version that looks and works very much like the Windows version.

The advent of a robust, full-featured Outlook for the Mac isn’t all that’s new in Office for Mac 2011, but it’s a big deal, especially for Mac users, or those wishing to switch to the Mac, who work in companies where Outlook is the standard. These folks already have been able to use the Windows version of Outlook on their machines, using special software that lets the Mac run Windows. But now, they can use a native Mac version of the program that can import data directly from Windows Outlook.

I’ve been testing this new version of Mac Office—in fact, I’m writing this column in its new edition of Word—and I like it a lot. While it isn’t an exact clone of Office for Windows, I found in my tests that each of its key components—Word, Excel and PowerPoint—has been significantly improved and made more compatible with its Windows sibling.

So, even Mac Office users who don’t use Outlook will be pleased by the changes. And, while there are some features in the Windows version still missing in the Mac edition, there are also some new Mac-only features. In general, there’s now more parity between the two.

Like the prior Mac version, Office 2008, released nearly three years ago, the new Office 2011 uses the same file formats as the Windows version. It can read and write Office files without any conversion or translation, so a document produced in, say, Word for the Mac, can be read by a user of Windows Word without the latter even knowing it was created on a Mac—and vice versa.

Unlike the 2008 version, the new Mac Office can seamlessly interact with Microsoft’s new stripped-down, free, online version of Office, called Office Web Apps. And it can save to, and open documents from, Microsoft’s free online SkyDrive file repository, or its SharePoint online service for businesses.

The first thing Mac Office users will notice about the new 2011 version is its speed. While the 2008 version was faster than its predecessors, this latest version is dramatically snappier. In my tests, all the components launched much, much faster than their 2008 counterparts, and opened even large documents much more quickly.

A new full screen view in Word shows just a single line of minimal tools.

High Fidelity

Another big plus is fidelity with Windows documents. Because the Windows and Mac operating systems are different, fidelity isn’t perfect, but, in my tests, it was much better in this new version. For instance, some fancy Word layouts and font treatments created in Windows that formerly looked wrong when opened on a Mac now look the same. This is especially noticeable in Excel, where charts and layouts on complex spreadsheets sometimes didn’t carry over. In my tests, I found that many of these incompatibles have been banished.

These fidelity improvements, however, are much better with documents created in the latest Windows version, called Office 2010, and are weaker with those created in older Windows versions. Also, the new Mac version has restored the same macro system present in the Windows version, so automated actions created by power users and companies in Windows documents can now be used in the Mac version.

There still are some things the Windows version does that the Mac version doesn’t. These include pivot charts in Excel, full video editing in PowerPoint, and the new “backstage” feature that presents printing and other options in a large, easier-to-use mode. But there also are some Mac-only features, including the ability to dynamically reorder PowerPoint slides in a 3-D view, plus a new Full Screen view in Word that allows reading and editing documents with no toolbars, or with just a single line of minimal tools.

The radically different Ribbon toolbar that appeared in Windows Office several years ago—a series of tabs organized by function—is also in this new Mac version. But, unlike in the Windows version, the new Mac Office retains the familiar menus and toolbar icons, and the Ribbon can be turned off completely, except in Outlook. However, unlike in the latest Windows version, you can’t add custom tabs to the Ribbon.

Outlook replaces a Microsoft (MSFT) email, contacts and calendar program in Mac Office called Entourage, which itself succeeded an old, very limited version of Outlook for the Mac produced years ago. Many users found Entourage clunky and complicated, and it couldn’t directly import data from Outlook on Windows.

Microsoft strove hard to make the new Outlook look and work like the one on Windows. There still are some Windows Outlook features the Mac version lacks, such as side-by-side calendars and task status reports, but, overall, I found it worked well.

Microsoft strove hard to make the new Outlook look and work very much like the one on Windows.

The Sync Situation

I was able to import a nearly 3-gigabyte Windows Outlook data file with no problems. And I was able to easily and perfectly import all my messages and settings from Apple’s own built-in Mail program and to sync with Apple’s (AAPL) built-in Mac address book. But Microsoft is still working on syncing with Apple’s iCal calendar program, and the Outlook calendar can’t sync with Google Calendar. Also, while the new Mac Outlook can import Windows Outlook data, it can’t export its data to Windows yet. Microsoft says it is also working on that.

In general, Outlook on the Mac proved fast and capable in my tests. It doesn’t work exactly like its Windows counterpart, but Windows users will find it very similar. And it has some Mac-specific features. For instance, its contents can be easily searched by the Mac’s built-in universal search feature, Spotlight, and can be backed up by the Mac’s Time Machine backup system.

Office for Mac 2011 will be available in two versions for average consumers: a $199 Home and Business edition, and a Home and Student version, which costs $119, but lacks Outlook, whereas Entourage was included in the $149 similarly named 2008 package. Prices on both new editions are higher if you want to install them on multiple machines. There is also a $99 special academic edition, mostly aimed at college stores, that includes Outlook, but has no option for multiple installations.

Microsoft’s new Mac Office is by far the best Mac version of the suite I’ve used, and I can recommend it.

Find Walt’s columns and videos at the All Things Digital website, http://walt.allthingsd.com.

Write to Walter S. Mossberg at walt.mossberg@wsj.com

]]> http://allthingsd.com/20101013/microsoft-office-2011-mac-review/feed/ 0 http://allthingsd.com/20101012/no-cut-and-paste-coming-windows-phone-7-until-next-year/ http://allthingsd.com/20101012/no-cut-and-paste-coming-windows-phone-7-until-next-year/#comments Tue, 12 Oct 2010 10:00:20 +0000 John Paczkowski http://digitaldaily.allthingsd.com/?p=50570 Given the bitching outcry over Apple’s (AAPL) decision to exclude cut-and-paste functionality from the first versions of iOS, it’s hard to imagine any company launching a new mobile OS would take a similar tack. Yet that’s exactly what Microsoft has done with Windows Phone 7, which will arrive at market next month without that feature.

Odd, considering Windows Mobile has supported cut and paste for so long that you’d think Microsoft would have to include it in WinPhoSev’s first-generation release.

But no.

Evidently, Microsoft (MSFT) doesn’t feel there’s an immediate need for clipboard operations in WP7–at least at launch. But it does plan to add it in the near future–”by early 2011.”

In the meantime, I imagine the editing of documents in the operating system’s Office Hub is going to be a bit lacking unless you’ve got a photographic memory.

]]> http://allthingsd.com/20101012/no-cut-and-paste-coming-windows-phone-7-until-next-year/feed/ 0 http://allthingsd.com/20100319/google-to-leave-china-by-april-10/ http://allthingsd.com/20100319/google-to-leave-china-by-april-10/#comments Fri, 19 Mar 2010 18:00:09 +0000 John Paczkowski http://digitaldaily.allthingsd.com/?p=36890

]]> http://allthingsd.com/20100319/google-to-leave-china-by-april-10/feed/ 0 http://allthingsd.com/20100319/viacoms-youtube-strategy-replay-the-godfather/ http://allthingsd.com/20100319/viacoms-youtube-strategy-replay-the-godfather/#comments Fri, 19 Mar 2010 15:32:57 +0000 Peter Kafka http://mediamemo.allthingsd.com/?p=17630 Another fun (but admittedly irrelevant) nugget from the YouTube-Viacom documents: Tom Dooley, Viacom’s No. 2, advising CEO Philippe Dauman on the best way to negotiate with Google, via a November 2006 email. Guide to players follows:

I think we should cut off the heads of Adam, Michael (and perhaps Judy) and send them to Eric in a box wrapped in a printed copy of their latest term sheet. With a note that says “Before you respond–Remember our heritage–we are the people that brought you the Godfather.”

Dooley is referring to Adam Cahan, who was then an MTV Networks executive vice president; Michael Wolf, then MTVN’s COO; and Judy McGrath, who remains MTVN’s CEO. (And Google CEO Eric Schmidt, of course).

Yes, Dooley’s joking. I think he’s also confusing Jack Woltz with Luca Brasi, but whatever. He’s an MBA, not a cineaste.

But YouTube was a big deal for Viacom (VIA). Here’s MTV president Van Toffler in October 2006, when told that Google (GOOG) was about to buy YouTube and that MTV was making a last-ditch effort to muck up that deal: “He fuckin better–that’s an epic transaction that could harsh our collective buzz.”

Buzz harshed, Viacom tried negotiating an advertising deal with Google for about six months following the YouTube acquisition. And the breakdown of those talks is what lead to the lawsuit we’re looking at now.

Alas, I can’t find the actual “Godfather” clip on YouTube, which isn’t a surprise. But you can find plenty of homages:

]]> http://allthingsd.com/20100319/viacoms-youtube-strategy-replay-the-godfather/feed/ 0 http://allthingsd.com/20100319/the-numbers-behind-the-worlds-fastest-growing-web-site-youtubes-finances-revealed/ http://allthingsd.com/20100319/the-numbers-behind-the-worlds-fastest-growing-web-site-youtubes-finances-revealed/#comments Fri, 19 Mar 2010 10:30:39 +0000 Peter Kafka http://mediamemo.allthingsd.com/?p=17601 There’s no smoking gun in the YouTube-Viacom papers, but there is some great stuff. Like these documents, which offer an unprecedented look at the finances behind the world’s most successful video site.

I’m not exactly sure why Viacom dug up YouTube’s profit-and-loss statement and balance sheet from its pre-Google days, but I’m glad it did. You can see the entire thing, which covers YouTube’s birth in the spring of 2005 through August 2006, at the bottom of this post.

But these excerpts give you a very good snapshot of what was going on in the company’s early days–hypergrowth, followed, eventually, by revenue (click to enlarge):

Some context: Chad Hurley registered the YouTube domain in February 2005, but the site wasn’t up and running for a few more months. Co-founder Jared Karim uploaded YouTube’s first video, “Me at the zoo,” in late April 2005.

By December 2005, users were uploading 6,000 clips a day, and the site was streaming 2.5 million videos a day. By February 2006, those numbers had jumped to 20,000 and 18 million, respectively. In July 2006, YouTube users uploaded 2.1 million clips and watched three billion of them.

Which explains the skyrocketing Web-hosting bills. But do note the burst of revenue from direct sales in August 2006, which allowed the company to generate a gross profit. A lot of people assumed that YouTube had to find a buyer like Google (GOOG) a few months later because it couldn’t pay its own bandwidth bills. But these numbers suggest that this may not be the case.

Also of note for Web video and Web ad nerds/historians: Check out the detailed breakdown of YouTube’s ad revenue and hosting costs, both real and projected, circa December 2005.

youtube pl

balance sheet

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