The 610 congressional websites have gone from pretty crappy to pretty good in just one year, according to the Congress Online Project: More specifically, the study determined that 50% of congressional office Web sites received a grade of A or B, compared to only 10% of the sites in 2002 …

Sony’s blue-laser video recorder goes on sale in Japan next month: The BDZ-S77 will go on sale in Japan next month. It is based on the Blu-ray optical disc format announced just over a year ago. The nine consumer electronics companies behind it are promoting it as a system for …

Elvis Costello is very deservedly going into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame next Monday. Jon Friedman has an interesting profile in CBS MarketWatch: What separates Costello, who records for Vivendi Universal labels, from the pack is that he has endured so admirably. He has had a real career, …

The NY Times’ “The Music they Made” series continues with profile of B.B. King: B.B. King is tired. The last of the great bluesmen, Mr. King sits slumped in a chair in a Manhattan hotel room. It is early afternoon, and Mr. King, sipping water, is resting before a sold-out …

Greg Beato says Internet devaluing music: Given the music industry’s current woes, it is no wonder so many artists are beating the drums of peace these days. In the same way that aspiring missile-sharers believe that the best way to “liberate” Iraq is to thoroughly destroy it, millions of music …

The NY Times takes note of a convergence of the legal digital music services around the price of $10 per month and 99 cents per download: Has the music industry found the 99-cent solution to its file-sharing woes? “Solution” is far too final a term for this business still very …

Pay by mobile phone in Europe: Four of Europe’s leading mobile phone operators have announced the formation of a mobile payment services association which will provide their customers with a multi-network, commonly branded solution for making payments using their phones. Orange, T-Mobile and Vodafone, along with Spain’s Telefonica Moviles, announced …

Sony had a successful year in 2002 and are now discussing ambitious plans for the future: SONY seems to have learnt one basic lesson of corporate public relations: messages are better received when you are making money. Little more than a year ago, when the company reported losses of ¥43.3 …

As we have been reporting, the RIAA’s website is one of the most targeted sites on the Internet, the RIAA having made many a hacker friend with its policies toward P2P. So you would think that the RIAA would have a phlanx of security experts running its website – um …

Both from the indispensable Brad Hill.