Daily Digest 7/3/2018 (Rural Communities and Broadband)

Initially, Tim Berners-Lee’s innovation was intended to help scientists share data across a then-obscure platform called the Internet, a version of which the US government had been using since the 1960s. But owing to his decision to release the source code for free—to make the Web an open and democratic platform for all—his brainchild quickly took on a life of its own. Berners-Lee’s life changed irrevocably, too. Berners-Lee, who never directly profited off his invention, has also spent most of his life trying to guard it. He is now embarking on a third act—determined to fight back through both his celebrity status and, notably, his skill as a coder. In particular, Berners-Lee has, for some time, been working on a new software, Solid, to reclaim the Web from corporations and return it to its democratic roots. Sometime this November, he estimates, half the world’s population—close to 4 billion people—will be connected online, sharing everything from résumés to political views to DNA information. As billions more come online, they will feed trillions of additional bits of information into the Web, making it more powerful, more valuable, and potentially more dangerous than ever. “We demonstrated that the Web had failed instead of served humanity, as it was supposed to have done, and failed in many places,” he told me. The increasing centralization of the Web, he says, has “ended up producing—with no deliberate action of the people who designed the platform—a large-scale emergent phenomenon which is anti-human.”

The scramble among mobile carriers to amass airwaves for fifth generation (or 5G) wireless networks is picking up steam — and the frenetic pace will continue, even as industry players promise to begin rolling out 5G networks to consumers as soon as 2019. Regulators are rushing to make more spectrum available for what the industry promises will be super-fast speeds and quick response times perfect for applications like virtual reality and self-driving cars.

• The high-band spectrum: These are airwaves that deliver the key promises of 5G — high speeds, low latency — but with a catch: they can't go that far. That means they’re best suited to dense environments, like cities, where carriers can group small antennas closely together to blanket an area with signal. The Federal Communications Commission plans to auction swathes of these airwaves to carriers later in 2018. 
• Mid-band spectrum: This is where carriers will turn to make up for the coverage gaps in the dense but narrow high-band networks. These airwaves can also handle more traffic at any given time compared to current wireless networks, making it possible to deliver some of what providers have promised with 5G while also covering a wider area than the high-frequency airwaves. With a vote in July, the FCC may formally consider ways to expand how providers can use a section of mid-level spectrum.
• Lower-frequency airwaves: These aren't typically seen as useful for 5G, but as such signals carry far and help with rural coverage, there are still some efforts underfoot to apply them to the race. T-Mobile bought large portions of these airwaves in an auction that concluded in 2017, and says it can use them to bolster a 5G network that also includes higher-frequency airwaves. Others are skeptical. “The channel sizes just aren’t big enough to provide a big 5G benefit as compared to LTE,” said the wireless executive.

[Analysis] I have spent the last two weeks or so doing a deep dive on what, exactly does 5G actually do — with a particular emphasis on the recently released 3GPP standard (Release 15) that everyone is celebrating as the first real industry standard for 5G. My conclusion is that while the Emperor is not naked, that is one Hell of a skimpy thong he’s got on. More precisely, the bunch of different things that people talk about when they say “5G”: millimeter wave spectrum, network slicing, and something called (I am not making this up) “flexible numerology” are real. They represent improvements in existing wireless technology that will enhance overall efficiency and thus add capacity to the network (and also reduce latency). But, as a number of the more serious commentators (such as Dave Burstien over here) have pointed out, we can already do these things using existing LTE (plain old 4G). Given the timetable for development and deployment of new 5G network technology, it will be at least 5 years before we see more than incremental improvement in function and performance. Put another way, it would be like calling the adoption of a new version of Wi-Fi “5G Wi-Fi.”

[Harold Feld]

Charter unveiled Spectrum Mobile, the cable company's mobile wireless service. The new Wi-Fi first mobile service looks to be closely following the Xfinity Mobile model, which was also expected. Spectrum Mobile offers two plans: an unlimited data option for $45/month, or a by-the-gig approach for $14 per gigabyte (GB) of data, per month. Spectrum mobile matches Comcast’s Xfinity Mobile pricing for unlimited, but does charge $2 more per gig than Xfinity’s $12 per gig model, at $14 per GB. Both services rely on Wi-Fi for both voice and data, but revert back to Verizon’s network for coverage where quality Wi-Fi is not available.

Rep Debbie Dingell (D-MI) continued to urge the Federal Communications Commission and the Federal Trade Commission to investigate whether consumers’ viewing and other personal information was improperly shared with Cambridge Analytica. Rep Dingell followed-up with FCC Chairman Ajit Pai and FTC Commissioner Joseph Simmons to stress the importance of protecting consumers privacy amongst news that Cambridge Analytica improperly collected and shared information from set-top cable boxes. In addition to investigating viewing information, Rep Dingell also urged the FTC to investigate Cambridge Analytica’s overall collection of consumers’ data and if they collected data with the help of other knowing or un-knowing data collectors and platforms.    

In a follow-up letter to the FCC, Rep Dingell stated that Chairman Pai’s response “raises more questions than answers. The FCC has clear authority and a responsibility to protect the viewing data of cable and satellite television subscribers. Your punting this matter to the FTC raises questions as to whether the FCC takes serious its obligation to aggressively and effectively protect consumer privacy.” Rep Dingell also sent a separate letter to FTC Chairman Simmons urging an investigation into whether data collectors improperly collected and shared consumer information with the Cambridge Analytica and noted that, “The FTC should also investigate how Cambridge Analytica collected information about Americans in unscrupulous ways and potentially with the aid of other data collectors. Such an investigation should not be limited to the much-discussed personality-test app but to all of Cambridge Analytica’s and others’ tactics, including whether data on Americans was obtained by smart televisions, set-top boxes, streaming services, or other companies in the television ecosystem and whether that supplied data to Cambridge Analytica committed unfair and deceptive practices in their collection, use, and sharing of that data.”

Google said in 2017 it would stop its computers from scanning the inboxes of Gmail users for information to personalize advertisements, saying it wanted users to “remain confident that Google will keep privacy and security paramount.” But the internet giant continues to let hundreds of outside software developers scan the inboxes of millions of Gmail users who signed up for email-based services offering shopping price comparisons, automated travel-itinerary planners or other tools. Google does little to police those developers, who train their computers—and, in some cases, employees—to read their users’ emails. Letting employees read user emails has become “common practice” for companies that collect this type of data, says Thede Loder, the former chief technology officer at eDataSource Inc. He says engineers at eDataSource occasionally reviewed emails when building and improving software algorithms. “Some people might consider that to be a dirty secret,” says Loder. “It’s kind of reality.”

A divided California Supreme Court has ruled that online review site Yelp.com cannot be ordered to remove posts against a San Francisco (CA) law firm that a judge determined were defamatory. The 4-3 ruling came in a closely watched case that internet companies warned could be used to silence online speech. A San Francisco judge determined the posts against attorney Dawn Hassell’s firm were defamatory and ordered Yelp in 2014 to remove them. A second judge and a state appeals court upheld the decision. Yelp.com urged the state Supreme Court to overturn the ruling, saying it could lead to the removal of negative reviews on the popular website.

Gov Phil Murphy (D-NJ) is approving a landmark bill that would create a new fund to bolster local news coverage, to help fill the void created by the steady economic decline of the media industry. Five universities would lead the Civic Information Consortium and with a board of directors decide which local news start-ups it would fund through a grant. Supporters say would be the first endeavor of its kind in the nation. "Despite the good work of many talented journalists across the state, years of runaway media consolidation, layoffs and newsroom closings have left many communities with little to no local news coverage," Free Press Action Fund News Voices Director Mike Rispoli said. "That's not just bad for the journalism industry -- it's harmful to our communities and our democracy." The legislation creating the Civic Information Consortium (S2317) passed the Senate 35-0.

The Federal Communications Commission has identified New York as a problem area, and Brooklyn, with its diverse immigrant communities, is the epicenter of the city’s pirate scene. In 2017, when President Donald Trump appointed Ajit Pai Chairman of the FCC, Pai promised to “take aggressive action” to stamp out pirates. In early May, the Preventing Illegal Radio Abuse Through Enforcement, or pirate, Act was introduced in Congress; it would increase fines from a maximum of a hundred and forty-four thousand dollars to two million dollars. But the stations aren’t going away, said David Goren, who launched the Brooklyn Pirate Radio Sound Map. And he says transmission equipment has only become cheaper and more sophisticated. “The problem, as I see it, is that the technology has gone beyond what the law has been able to do," he said. Between 87.9 and 92.1 FM, Goren counted eleven illegal stations, whose hosts mainly spoke Creole or accented English. Pirates, he said, “offer a kind of programming that their audiences depend on. Spiritual sustenance, news, immigration information, music created at home or in the new home, here.”

Network neutrality may be dead, but questions remain about how seriously the Federal Communications Commission considered comments from the public. "To put it simply, there is evidence in the FCC's files that fraud has occurred and the FCC is telling law enforcement and victims of identity theft that it is not going to help," FCC Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel said in Dec. "Failure to investigate this corrupted record undermines our process for seeking public input in the digital age." While no one thinks a government agency should be lying to the public or that having a public record filled with fake comments from people using stolen identities is a good thing, it doesn't really affect the FCC's obligation in establishing policy.  The Administrative Procedure Act (APA) doesn't require the FCC to consider, respond to or even read every single comment. It's only obligated to respond to substantive points made. Net neutrality supporters argue that the FCC still has an obligation to ensure integrity in the public comment system. And they're disturbed that the agency has not helped in investigating these problems. Harold Feld, a lawyer at the consumer advocacy group Public Knowledge, says the FCC's refusal to cooperate with investigations from congressional Democrats and the New York Attorney General's Office may come back to bite the FCC as it heads to court to defend its repeal of net neutrality. "We're in uncharted waters as far as the APA is concerned," he said. "I think the agency's refusal to respond when problems surfaced is going to hurt the FCC in court."

Since her husband took office, Melania Trump has earned six figures from an unusual deal with a photo agency in which major media organizations have indirectly paid the Trump family despite a requirement that the photos be used only in positive coverage. President Donald Trump's most recent financial disclosure reveals that in 2017 the first lady earned at least $100,000 from Getty Images for the use of any of a series of 187 photos of the first family shot between 2010 and 2016 by Belgian photographer Regine Mahaux. It's not unheard of for celebrities to earn royalties from photos of themselves, but it's very unusual for the wife of a currently serving elected official. More problematic for the many news organizations that have published or broadcast the images, however, is that Getty's licensing agreement stipulates the pictures can be used in "positive stories only."

Federal Communications Commission Chairman Ajit Pai has made two appointments regarding the Broadband Deployment Advisory Committee (BDAC). First, Chairman Pai has appointed BDAC member David Young to serve as Vice Chair of the BDAC. Young represents the National League of Cities on the BDAC and is the Fiber Infrastructure and Right of Way Manager for the City of Lincoln (NE). Young replaces Kelleigh Cole, who left her position as the Director of the Utah Broadband Outreach Center and resigned from the BDAC recently to pursue professional opportunities in the private sector. Cole has served as Vice Chair of the BDAC since April 6, 2017. In addition, the Chairman has appointed Danna Mackenzie, a member of the BDAC’s Removing State and Local Regulatory Barriers working group, to serve on the BDAC as a representative of the Minnesota Office of Broadband Development. Mackenzie will also serve as one of the Vice Chairs of the Harmonization working group (along with David Young).