ICT stuff. Facebook
and the Federal Trade Commission have reached a settlement over consumer
deception charges dating back to 2009. The commission claimed that the social
networking giant made public information it promised to keep private, thanks to
changes in site terms. According to the terms of the deal, user feedback will
be required before the site makes changes to policies for sharing data. Mark
Zuckerberg addressed his company's on-going privacy issues, admitting to
"a bunch of mistakes" and assured users that Facebook is making a
"clear and formal long-term commitment" to privacy tools. (source: The New York Times)
*****
One-shot. Hoop
fans couldn’t have asked for a better Christmas present. The NBA lockout is
finally over and the season opens on Christmas Day. As my buddy Earl puts it,
“there is a Santa.” And if David Stern wants to mitigate the damage to his
legacy caused by the protracted lockout, then he’ll keep the NBA’s original
Christmas Day schedule and open the season where we left off last June: Mavs
vs. Heat.
Actually, I had always wanted a later start to the 2011-2012 season,
being among those who think that a shortened season would help veterans like
Tim Duncan (and, unfortunately, Kobe as well). While it’s highly unlikely, there's nothing more I'd rather see than the greatest power forward ever winning a 5th title. Yet my initial excitement was quickly tempered when I learned
that there would be no hard salary cap in the new CBA. And after reading this article by ESPN’s Brian Windhorst, the excitement turned into
disappointment. See, I’m one of those old school guys who’d rather see
superstars go head-to-head rather than play side-by-side. Needless to say, I was
extremely turned off by LeBron’s decision and was among those who
loathed the Miami Heat. Anyway, the basic premise behind a hard cap is to level
the playing field between small and big market teams by placing a predetermined limit as to how much each team can spend for players' salaries. In other words, it’s
all about parity. Having three superstars team up means you’ll have one elite team (Miami) at the expense of two mediocre ones (Cleveland and Toronto). Given the way
things are going—with persistent rumors of Chris Paul wanting to join Melo and
Amare in NY—it is not inconceivable that in 5 years’ time there will only be 6
competitive teams. Never a good thing for sports where the underlying principle
should always be competition. I really thought the owners would take a tougher
stand on this since I assumed that they would naturally want to protect their
own interests. But at the end of the day, I guess it’s all about the
money. The owners got their 50-50 split of the BRI and that’s all that
mattered, disparity and the possibility of getting screwed a la Cleveland notwithstanding.
Francis Paolo Tiopianco, Entry #1
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