April 13, 2009 (Real-time content mesmerizing, addictive)
"Real-time content and data are almost becoming the new TV. Instead of watching pre-programmed TV, you're watching the activity of the world go by and, in particular, that of the friends you find interesting. It's mesmerising and addictive."
-- Charlene Li, social media analyst with the Altimeter Group
BENTON'S COMMUNICATIONS-RELATED HEADLINES for MONDAY APRIL 13, 2009
Headlines is back, but not yet caught up. Here's today's stories, we'll catch up on last week in the next few days. For this week's media policy events, see http://www.benton.org/calendar/2009-04-12--P1W
INTERNET/BROADBAND
Irving: Oversight Needed for Successful Broadband Grant Program
Should Online Scofflaws Be Denied Web Access?
California's missing online money
Internet payday lenders with ties to Indians dodge California regulators
Real-time updates open frontier for websites
JOURNALISM
Papers Try to Get Out of a Box
Making Old Media New Again
In Boston, Paper's Peril Hits a Nerve
'Hyperlocal' Web Sites Deliver News Without Newspapers
WIRELESS
iPhone changes dynamics of game software industry
Visa turns mobile phones into credit cards
Fall in number of new mobile subscribers
MEDIA OWNERSHIP
Technology and music sectors call a truce
Tribune gets federal subpoena on stock plan
TELEVISION
FCC Guidance on Walk-in DTV Help Centers
Waxman, Boucher Request Information on DTV Converter Box Supply
Public Telecommunications Facilities Program Funds Available
FCC Denies DTV Hardship Waivers
Bright House Networks Files Complaint Against AT&T with FCC
The Art of the TV Slate
DVR Users Waiting to Watch Prime-time Shows
POLICYMAKERS
Adelstein Announces Staff Changes
FCC Seeks Nominations for Communications Security, Reliability, and Interoperability Council
INTERNET/BROADBAND
IRVING: OVERSIGHT NEEDED FOR SUCCESSFUL BROADBAND GRANT PROGRAM
[SOURCE: Broadcasting&Cable, AUTHOR: John Eggerton]
A Q&A with former National telecommunications and Information Administration head Larry Irving. He ran the agency under President Bill Clinton and also was an advisor to Rep Ed Markey (D-MA). Irving is currently co-chairman of the Internet Innovation Alliance. The IIA is a coalition of think tanks, nonprofits and companies focused on universal broadband deployment. On the broadband grant program currently being created at NTIA he says, "If you really care about a national broadband strategy, there will need to be continued review, oversight and responsibility at the NTIA, which has to file quarterly reports on every grant that goes out there."
http://benton.org/node/24237
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SHOULD ONLINE SCOFFLAWS BE DENIED WEB ACCESS?
[SOURCE: New York Times, AUTHOR: Eric Pfanner]
Is Internet access a fundamental human right? Or is it a privilege, carrying with it a responsibility for good behavior? That is the question confronting policy makers as they try to bring Internet access to the masses while seeking to curb illegal copying of digital music, movies and video games. The United States Congress held hearings last week on the growing problem of piracy, which the American entertainment industry says accounts for the loss of $20 billion a year in sales. Several lawmakers vowed to increase scrutiny of international markets where piracy is widespread. But if events in Paris last week are any indication, legislative solutions will not be easy. French lawmakers rejected an antipiracy plan championed by President Nicolas Sarkozy, where the Internet connections of people who ignored repeated warnings to stop using unauthorized file-sharing services would have been severed.
http://benton.org/node/24236
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CALIFORNIA'S MISSING ONLINE MONEY
[SOURCE: Los Angeles Times, AUTHOR: Editorial staff]
[Commentary] There is a widely held misapprehension that the Internet is a tax-free zone. but every book or appliance bought through Amazon.com, every autographed Manny Ramirez jersey or Hannah Montana lunch box bought from a vendor on EBay, carries the same tax obligation as if the item were purchased in a brick-and-mortar shop down the street from the buyer's desktop. It has nothing to do with the Internet Tax Freedom Act, which blocks states and local governments from taxing Web access but doesn't touch sales and use taxes on goods. Californians pay the nation's highest sales taxes, yet by one measure they still don't pay enough. Unless taxpayers come forward on Wednesday in an outpouring of guilt or good citizenship and send the Franchise Tax Board last year's 7.25% sales tax on almost everything they bought over the Internet from out-of-state sellers -- and if the past is any guide, most won't -- California will again be shorted by more than $1 billion in sales taxes owed. That's a significant chunk of the state's budget. Attempts by states to collect taxes that have long been owed but seldom paid can seem like heavy-handed government grabs that hit otherwise law-abiding citizens. But Californians owe it to themselves to be aware of the consequences of their tax laws. What they don't pay out of one pocket may have to be paid out of another, unless we're ready to ask government to do less. But that too can carry costly consequences.
http://benton.org/node/24235
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INTERNET PAYDAY LENDERS WITH TIES TO INDIANS DODGE CALIFORNIA REGULATORS
[SOURCE: Los Angeles Times, AUTHOR: Marc Lifsher]
California business regulators are stumbling in their efforts to find and ban an unlicensed form of high-interest consumer credit: payday loans available on the Internet. For three years, the state Department of Corporations has been trying to force these Internet-only businesses to adhere to the same rules that govern the state-licensed payday loan stores that offer short-term, unsecured loans of up to $300. But many of these Internet lenders -- with no physical presence in the state and run as tribal entities outside of California -- say they are Indian-owned businesses, linked to sovereign Indian nations and immune from state regulation.
http://benton.org/node/24234
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REAL-TIME UPDATES OPEN FRONTIER FOR WEBSITES
[SOURCE: Financial Times, AUTHOR: Chris Nuttall]
Online social networking services are attracting millions of new users seeking faster "real-time" functionality - in a trend that is leaving established players, such as Google and Microsoft, behind. Leading social media sites Facebook, which passed 200 million active users last week, Twitter and FriendFeed have all begun promoting features that enable instantaneous interaction between users. They are being aided by the increasing capabilities and Internet connectivity of mobile devices that allow users to post photos and random thoughts to the web.
http://benton.org/node/24233
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JOURNALISM
PAPERS TRY TO GET OUT OF A BOX
[SOURCE: New York Times, AUTHOR: David Carr]
Faced with an ad market that no longer supplies enough revenue to meet costs, many newspapers are now considering putting up pay walls on their Web sites, long an anathema in Internet culture. Consumers used to roaming freely across the Web in search of news and opinion may soon find themselves being asked to register at news sites and, in some cases, to fork over a credit card number. Last Monday The Associated Press announced at its annual meeting that it would begin tracking how its content and that of its member newspapers was used and seek a share of the revenues generated by it. If an accommodation was not reached, The A.P. and its members would pursue legal remedies, the association said. Beyond the saber rattling (or empty threat, if you remember how poorly hunting down users went for the record industry), The AP said it would build its own search-friendly landing page, a place where links to licensed content from member newspapers (including The New York Times) would be aggregated. One of Europe's largest newspaper publishers has also lent its voice to the call for Internet news aggregators such as Google to pay for using copyright material.
http://benton.org/node/24232
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MAKING OLD MEDIA NEW AGAIN
[SOURCE: Wall Street Journal, AUTHOR: L. Gordon Crovitz]
[Commentary] It's make-or-break time for many newspapers. Denver and Seattle recently lost dailies, the Chicago Tribune and Sun-Times are both in bankruptcy, and owners of the Boston Globe and San Francisco Chronicle threaten closure. Creative destruction is blowing hard through the news industry, as digital technology gives readers access to endless sources of news but undermines the ability of publishers to support news departments. City newspapers are no longer the dominant way people get news or the main way advertisers reach consumers. The recession is accelerating these trends, with advertising so soft even Web-only news operations, which don't have the legacy costs of print, are now struggling to support journalism. As the remaining city newspapers rethink themselves, editors and publishers might consult a road map for how newspapers can live alongside new media that was drawn up more than 50 years ago by Bernard Kilgore, outlined in a new biography by former Journal executive Richard Tofel, "Restless Genius: Barney Kilgore, The Wall Street Journal and the Invention of Modern Journalism."
http://benton.org/node/24231
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IN BOSTON, PAPER'S PERIL HITS NERVE
[SOURCE: New York Times, AUTHOR: Richard Perez-Pena]
When local bloggers rallied last week in an online forum about how to save the embattled Boston Globe, readers offered loads of sympathetic advice and surprisingly little of the "let 'em rot" attitude that has colored so much debate over the future of newspapers. Ever since The New York Times Company threatened 11 days ago to sell or close The Globe unless it accepted deep cost cuts, Boston has been in a state of near shock. Civic leaders and ordinary Bostonians alike — particularly those old enough to remember a pre-Internet age, before free access to news on the Web siphoned away so many of the paper's readers — have spoken out about the central role of The Globe in the life of a region that cares deeply about local culture and local politics and fashions itself as the higher education capital of the nation.
http://benton.org/node/24230
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'HYPERLOCAL' WEB SITES DELIVER NEWS WITHOUT NEWSPAPERS
[SOURCE: New York Times, AUTHOR: Claire Cain Miller, Brad Stone]
If your local newspaper shuts down, what will take the place of its coverage? Perhaps a package of information about your neighborhood, or even your block, assembled by a computer. A number of Web start-up companies are creating so-called hyperlocal news sites that let people zoom in on what is happening closest to them, often without involving traditional journalists. The sites, like EveryBlock, Outside.in, Placeblogger and Patch, collect links to articles and blogs and often supplement them with data from local governments and other sources. They might let a visitor know about an arrest a block away, the sale of a home down the street and reviews of nearby restaurants. Internet companies have been trying to develop such sites for more than a decade, in part as a way to lure local advertisers to the Web. But the notion of customized news has taken on greater urgency as some newspapers, like The Rocky Mountain News and The Seattle Post-Intelligencer, have stopped printing.
http://benton.org/node/24229
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WIRELESS
IPHONE CHANGES DYNAMICS OF GAME SOFTWARE INDUSTRY
[SOURCE: Los Angeles Times, AUTHOR: Alex Pham]
After years of building large, graphics-intensive blockbusters, developers are starting to make shorter, less expensive games for the iPhone and its phone-less sibling, the iPod Touch. In addition to making titles for the iPhones, publishers are studying the thousands of games already available, figuring out what works and applying those lessons to more traditional games.
http://benton.org/node/24228
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VISA TURNS MOBILE PHONES INTO CREDIT CARDS
[SOURCE: Financial Times, AUTHOR: Paul Taylor]
Visa, the electronic payment network, will launch its first commercial mobile phone-based contactless payment system in Malaysia on Thursday. The rollout follows a series of successful trials over the past two years involving mobile phones based on the Near Field Communications (NFC) contactless technology which enables users to pay for goods and services simply by "waving" their handset close to a "reader". Visa already make use of the same technology in its payWave contactless credit or debit cards. In Japan, more than 40 million contactless "osaifu-keitai", or "wallet phones", have been sold since mid-2004. However, these handsets are based on Sony's proprietary FeliCa technology rather than the NFC industry standard which was agreed a few years ago and is expected to become popular throughout the world.
http://benton.org/node/24227
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FALL IN NUMBER OF NEW MOBILE SUBSCRIBERS
[SOURCE: Financial Times, AUTHOR: Paul Taylor]
The number of net new mobile phone subscribers in the world fell sharply in the fourth quarter of 2008 and the growth of mobile data revenues stalled for the first time, providing further evidence of the impact of the global economic downturn on the mobile telecoms sector. The decline in data revenues is particularly worrying for the industry because most network operators, especially those in the more mature developed markets, are counting on expanding revenues from data services such as Internet browsing and multi-media downloads to offset flat or declining revenues from traditional voice traffic. Figures compiled by Informa Telecoms & Media, a London-based telecoms industry consultancy, show that the total of new subscribers to a mobile phone service fell 15 per cent to 162 million in the final quarter of 2008.
http://benton.org/node/24226
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MEDIA OWNERSHIP
TECHNOLOGY AND MUSIC SECTORS CALL A TRUCE
[SOURCE: Financial Times, AUTHOR: Andrew Edgecliffe-Johnson, Tim Bradshaw]
After a decade of discord between the music and technology industries, last week brought some rare notes of harmony. Apple, whose iTunes store dominates the legal digital music market, agreed that labels could charge more for hits than the fixed 99 cents price it had clung to. Then YouTube, the Google-owned site that was once threatened with legal action by labels, struck a deal with Universal to launch Vevo, the biggest attempt since MTV to make music videos a paying proposition. In another sign of optimism, Qtrax, which offers free downloads to users willing to watch advertising, launched in the US, 15 months after its first attempt flopped. The developments show, however, that the music industry has yet to settle on a solution to the double-digit declines in CD sales. Instead, its digital focus is narrowing and changing as audiences group around a few large sites, and labels realize that songs alone may no longer be enough.
http://benton.org/node/24225
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TRIBUNE GETS FEDERAL SUBPOENA ON STOCK PLAN
[SOURCE: Reuters, AUTHOR: Robert MacMillan]
The Department of Labor subpoenaed Tribune Co over an employee stock plan crucial to real estate mogul Sam Zell's buyout of the media company. The subpoena, which the Labor Department issued in March, asks for "an extensive range of documents" related to the newspaper publisher and broadcaster's employee stock ownership plan. The Labor Department's questions relate to the Employee Retirement Income Security Act, a law designed to protect people who participate in employee retirement plans. The filing did not say what kinds of documents the government was seeking or what it planned to do with them. The stock ownership plan was an important piece of Zell's plan to take Tribune private in an $8.2 billion deal that involved $13 billion in debt. Some current and former Tribune employees sued last year over the ESOP, saying that Zell and Tribune have mismanaged the company.
http://benton.org/node/24224
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TELEVISION
FCC GUIDANCE ON WALK-IN DTV HELP CENTERS
[SOURCE: Federal Communications Commission]
On Friday, the Federal Communications Commission issued guidance to television broadcasters about rules adopted March 13 requiring most analog broadcasters to publicize the locations and hours of walk-in DTV help centers located in their market. The centers need to be open from 4 p.m. to 8 p.m. at a minimum on seven days afterward; they must be open every day at least from noon to 8 p.m.; and they must be staffed with at least one person who has been trained to demonstrate and install equipment, including scanning and rescanning for channels and using closed-captioning. The centers also must contain an analog TV, a DTV-to-analog converter box, a VCR or DVR, an antenna that can receive local signals, printed literature and DVD's on how to hook up converter boxes and outlining reception issues, including for people with disabilities, as well as signal coverage maps. The centers must have a computer with high-speed access so consumers can apply for DTV-to-analog converter box coupons online and access other information. There must be a toll-free number so viewers can get info on the center's hours of operation. Stations must air PSA's about the centers and update them within 10 business days of any changes in operation.
http://benton.org/node/24223
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WAXMAN, BOUCHER REQUEST INFORMATION ON DTV CONVERTERS BOX SUPPLY
[SOURCE: House of Representatives Commerce Committee]
House Commerce Committee Chairman Henry Waxman (D-CA) and Communications, Technology, and the Internet Subcommittee Chairman Rick Boucher (D-VA) requested information from manufacturers and retailers of TV converter boxes to determine whether there will be an adequate supply of coupon-eligible converter boxes to meet demand during the transition to digital television.
http://benton.org/node/24222
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PUBLIC TELECOMMUNICATIONS FACILITIES PROGRAM FUNDS AVAILABLE
[SOURCE: National Telecommunications and Information Administration]
The National Telecommunications and Information Administration announced that $18 million has been appropriated for fiscal year 2009 grants for the Public Telecommunications Facilities Program. Funds will be available for applications submitted by the originally announced deadline of December 18, 2008, as well as applications for certain digital television Distributed Transmission System (DTS) projects and replacement translator projects that must be received prior to 5 p.m. Eastern Daylight Time (Closing Time), Monday, May 18, 2009.
http://benton.org/node/24221
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FCC DENIES DTV HARDSHIP WAIVERS
[SOURCE: Broadcasting&Cable, AUTHOR: John Eggerton]
The Federal Communications Commission has denied a hardship waiver for two television stations that wanted to end analog broadcasts on April 16. Nexstar's KARD(TV) West Monroe, LA (Fox) wanted to go on April 16, saying that it is operating at 50% power as it is because a transmission tube failed, resulting in "unstable operation" and a hardship on station personnel who had to travel 50 miles several times a week from the studio to the transmitter site. Mission Broadcasting's KTVE(TV) El Dorado, Ark.(NBC, and in the same market as KARD), said it was at only 40% power and made similar arguments about the staff drain of maintaining the equipment. According to an FCC source, the equipment failure argument did not trump the fact that there would no longer be any analog service in the market, and that the owners "did not offer to provide any kind of enhanced nightlight service or to provide their news to any other station that might be available to keep analog on in the area." The source added that the commission's call center had received "lots of calls" from that area on Feb. 17, when over four hundred stations pulled the plug on analog.
http://benton.org/node/24220
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BRIGHT HOUSE NETWORKS FILES COMPLAINT AGAINST AT&T WITH FCC
[SOURCE: Broadcasting&Cable, AUTHOR: John Eggerton]
Bright House Networks has filed a formal complaint with the Federal Communications Commission about AT&T's marketing, saying that vendors for the telco made false and misleading statements in an effort to leverage the DTV transition into more customers for its U-Verse multichannel video service. Bright House claims that AT&T has been trying to scare customers in several Michigan communities into switching to U-Verse by claiming that BHN will be unable to offer local TV stations after the transition, that it will need to "rewire" homes at a cost of $300-$400, and that BHN customers will need AT&T equipment to get local broadcast stations.
http://benton.org/node/24219
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THE ART OF THE TV SLATE
[SOURCE: TVWeek, AUTHOR: Josef Adalian]
It may be the age of TiVo and Hulu, but the next few weeks will once again underline an important tenet of the broadcast TV economy: Schedules still matter. Even as networks increasingly adapt to the notion that their programming is being absorbed long after its original broadcast, the day and time a show first airs remains critical to its long-term success. Just ask the producers of "Kings": Originally planned for a high-profile Thursday launch, the show's odds of breaking through plummeted the minute NBC moved the series to 8 p.m. Sundays, a slot NBC has struggled with for years. "At the end of the day, your schedule is still the most efficient way to get people to check out a new show," one network veteran said. "Nobody's figured out a better way to introduce a show than to put it behind a hit show." As the networks get ready to once again strut their stuff for Madison Avenue next month at the upfront ad market, programmers will grapple with a slew of complicated—and sometimes competing—factors as they assemble their new lineups.
http://benton.org/node/24218
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DVR USERS WAITING TO WATCH PRIME-TIME SHOWS
[SOURCE: MediaWeek, AUTHOR: Paul Bond]
Here's a stat that might interest NBC and Jay Leno, whose late-night show moves to 10 p.m. in the fall: DVR users watch most of their primetime television not live but after they have been recorded, and much of the time they're watching those recorded shows between 10-11 p.m. TiVo reported Thursday that the 9 p.m. time slot is the one most DVR users, 59% of them, prefer to record rather than watch live. The 8 p.m. slot is second with 58% and 10 p.m. is at 53%. But while DVR users watch a little more TV live at 10 p.m. than they do earlier in primetime, many also are tuning out of that hour entirely because they are watching shows recorded earlier, as opposed to watching whatever happens to be on live during that slot. TiVo said that 30% of DVR users watch a show they have recorded within an hour of the show having aired live.
http://benton.org/node/24217
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POLICYMAKERS
ADELSTEIN ANNOUNCES STAFF CHANGES
[SOURCE: Federal Communications Commission]
Federal Communications Commission member Jonathan Adelstein has named Mark Stone his Legal Advisor for wireline issues and Renée Roland Crittendon his Senior Legal Advisor and Chief of Staff. Stone has worked at the Commission since 1994, most recently as Deputy Managing Director. Mr. Stone's long career at the FCC began as an auditor and staff attorney in the Accounting Safeguards Division of the Wireline Competition Bureau, and he later served as Deputy Chief of the Enforcement Bureau's Telecommunications Consumers Division. Prior to joining the FCC, Mr. Stone worked for the GSA Office of Inspector General. Crittendon has served as Legal Advisor for spectrum, international and public safety issues since June of 2007. She is also handling broadband issues, and issues related to The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act for the Commissioner. Before joining the Commissioner's office, Ms. Crittendon served as Deputy Bureau Chief in the Wireline Competition Bureau. Prior to that, she was Chief of the Wireline Bureau's Competition Policy Division. Prior to becoming Chief, Ms. Crittendon was Acting Deputy and Assistant Chief, and before that, a senior attorney advisor in the Bureau. Ms. Crittendon also served as Associate Division Chief of the Mobility Division of the Wireless Telecommunications Bureau.
http://benton.org/node/24216
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FCC SEEKS NOMINATIONS FOR COMMUNICATIONS SECURITY, RELIABILITY, AND INTEROPERABILITY COUNCIL
[SOURCE: Federal Communications Commission]
The Federal Communications Commission is seeking nominations and expressions of interest for membership on the Communications Security, Reliability, and Interoperability Council. The Council is a Federal Advisory Committee that provides guidance and expertise on the nation's communications infrastructure and public safety communications. Nominations and expressions of interest for membership must be submitted to the FCC no later than May 11, 2009.
http://benton.org/node/24215
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