Public Media Policy, Spectrum Policy, and Rethinking Public Interest Obligations for the 21st Century

The New America Foundation's Open Technology Institute released a report with recommendations to reform spectrum policy to better support public media in their efforts to provide quality news, journalism, education, arts, and civic information.

The proposals include:

• Supplementing ill-enforced public interest obligations on commercial broadcasters with spectrum license fees that could support multi-platform public media
• Supplanting one-time spectrum auctions with annual fees to sustain public media
• Requiring spectrum licensees for mobile broadband to adhere to non-discrimination rules for Internet content, applications, and services
• Requiring spectrum licenses for mobile broadband to adhere to universal service requirements
• Increasing the diversity of wireless providers in local communities
• Facilitating community and locally owned wireless broadband infrastructure via unlicensed and opportunistic access to spectrum.