Good morning tech

Can’t miss news.

Industry notes

4Chan founder testifies against Palin email hacker. Christopher “Moot” Poole, founder of the 4chan.org message boards popular with the online hacker community took the stand to testify against the man accused of hacking former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin’s email account, according to The Smoking Gun. Poole, 22, previously turned server logs and other records over to the FBI implicating David Kernel in the Palin hack. According to court records, he was asked to give the court an impromptu lesson on the slang used on the site’s notorious /b/ message board. http://bit.ly/bC2m3e

Analyst: Google blessed wireless exemption because its ‘crazy like a
fox.’ Some industry sources say Google’s seeming policy shift might
also be
part of a longer strategy by the company in service to its long-held
view that the Internet should remain open. “I would say Google’s
strategy is crazy like a fox,” said one industry analyst, who noted the
rough publicity Google has faced over the wireless exemption, including
accusations from net-neutrality diehards that it is “evil.”
http://bit.ly/9vXROZ

Executive notes

Census Bureau returns $1.6 billion from 2010 budget. Commerce Secretary Gary Locke and Census Director Robert Groves announced Tuesday that costs for the 2010 decennial count came in 22 percent below budget forecasts for the first half of the fiscal year. Locke attributed the savings to a lack of breakdowns in the Bureau’s information technology and a higher-than-expected response rate. Groves took over as Census director last year and promised to control widely-reported weaknesses in the system used to manage the Bureau’s field operations. http://bit.ly/aul4p7

Barton, Stearns urge FCC to block VoIP fees. Reps. Joe Barton (R-Texas) and Cliff Stearns (R-Fla.) told the FCC to block states from imposing fees on phone calls made over the Internet, according to a report from TechDailyDose. The letter comes in response to FCC requests by Kansas and Nebraska to collect fees from VoIP providers for their Universal Service Funds. The lawmakers argue imposing such fees would stifle innovation and harm the growth of online voice services. http://bit.ly/d3RIbg

Sunlight Foundation slams White House on transparency. Sunlight Foundation executive director Ellen Miller accused the Obama administration of wavering in its commitment to transparency in a Tuesday blog post on the departure of White House ethics czar Norm Eisen. Miller criticized the appointment of White House counsel to oversee ethics matters and said the administration hasn’t delivered on its promises of transparency. The White House has characterized its new approach as an elevation of ethics issues, noting that incoming Domestic Policy Council member Steven Croley and a team of six lawyers will be charged with enforcing existing policies and leading new initiatives. http://bit.ly/9p2FNT

Said.

“After making some dramatic statements and issuing important
directives, and taking some very positive initial first steps, the White
House has already fallen short on delivery of the things we have been
promised. We’re now more than 18 months into this administration, and
particularly now, we are wondering what is going on.”

-Ellen Miller, executive director of the non-profit Sunlight Foundation on the Obama administration’s commitment to increase government transparency.

Watercooler.

BAILER…Cameras caugt a guy jumping out of the way as his girlfriend gets hit by a baseball, according to Mashable, and now it’s viral. The Mashable verdict: “Sure, we feel bad for the guy, but you can’t abandon your girlfriend on TV and expect to get away with it.” http://bit.ly/dtRt52