June 10, 2009
BENTON'S COMMUNICATIONS-RELATED HEADLINES for WEDNESDAY JUNE 10, 2009
The New America Foundation launches the Open Technology Initiative tonight. See http://benton.org/calendar/2009-06-07--P1W
NATIONAL BROADBAND PLAN COMMENTS
Broadband Should Be Treated As 'Essential Utility'
MDC: Internet is Tool to Ensure the Fundamental Rights of All to Communicate
Be Bold With Broadband Plan, Wired Readers Tell FCC
ALA: Libraries Key to National Broadband
CDT Tells FCC To Include Openness, Privacy in Broadband Plan
NECA: Ubiquitous nationwide fiber to the home
AFBF: Broadband Internet Critical for Rural America
FirstMile.US Comments on National Broadband Plan
FPF Files Comments to FCC on National Broadband Plan
Cox: Reduce Broadband-Unserved Total By Half By 2012
THE STIMULUS
Satellite, Broadband over Power Lines and Microwave Technologies Contend for Stimulus Funds
TELECOM
Nation's Utility Consumer Advocates: Consumers Need a Break on Universal Service Charges
Smartphone Rises Fast From Gadget to Necessity
AGENDA
Confirmation Hearing Set For FCC Chairman, Commissioner June 16
News from World Copyright Summit
MORE NEWS FROM CONGRESS
House Passes Webcaster Legislation
US Lawmakers Plan Ban On New State, Local Cell-Phone Taxes
FCC Spent $150,000 Evaluating One Verizon Pricing Bid
MEDIA OWNERSHIP
New York Times does not plan to close Boston Globe
As the Globe reels, papers must drop elitism
US Presses Antitrust Inquiry Into Google Book Settlement
BROADCASTING
Red Cross: People Should Update Disaster Plans Due To DTV Transition
Broadcast TV Never Converted Its Digital Dream
MORE ONLINE
The iPhone 3G S May Be A Sucker's Bet Right Now
Tech lobby ramps up battle against Obama tax proposal
NIST Releases Smart Grid Interoperability Standards for Public Comment
Digital Signature Standards
CDT: Comprehensive Privacy and Security Framework Needed for Personal Health Records
The Bottom Line Of Local Search
Newhouse School announces winners in third annual Mirror Awards
Nielsen: U.S. Ad Spending Plummets $3.8 Billion
US Deals Blow to Online-Poker Players
Former AT&T Chief to Be GM Chairman
IT staff snooping on colleagues on rise
IT firms urge China to reconsider filter
Verizon puts cellphone customer through the wringer
NATIONAL BROADBAND PLAN COMMENTS
BROADBAND SHOULD BE TREATED AS 'ESSENTIAL UTILITY'
[SOURCE: Public Knowledge, AUTHOR: Press release]
Public Knowledge, Media Access Project, New America Foundation and US PIRG said the Federal Communications Commission needs to change how broadband is regulated, because the service is an 'essential utility' and not a luxury. In a filing with the Commission, the groups said any new approach should reflect the failures of the marketplace, which have resulted in minimal competition, and higher rates for lower speeds than in many other industrialized nations. The lack of competition can be traced to the reclassification of high-speed broadband services into Title I. As a result, proposed a range of options for the Commission to consider, such as: the FCC should reclassify broadband services into Title II; impose structural separations on the offering of wholesale and retail broadband services; impose functional separations or divestiture on the companies offering wholesale and retail broadband services. Local, state or federal government construction of infrastructure can provide a means of enhancing competition and consumer choice, the groups added. In addition, the FCC should conduct a thorough review of competition and prices in the special access market, with the goal of making certain that incumbents make bandwidth available at reasonable and non-discriminatory rates. The absence of competition for this crucial building-block of the broadband economy makes its regulation necessary.
http://benton.org/node/25832
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MDC: INTERNET IS TOOL TO ENSURE THE FUNDAMENTAL RIGHTS OF ALL TO COMMUNICATE
[SOURCE: Media and Democracy Coalition, AUTHOR: Beth McConnell]
On June 8th 2009, the Media and Democracy Coalition filed brief comments with the Federal Communications Commission on the National Broadband Plan. The comments summarize recommendations MDC members will make in a full report, to be released in July 2009. This forthcoming report was developed from the ground-up, involving local community groups in the policy setting process from the start, and linking them with allies at DC-based policy groups. The comments and report stress: 1) the Internet as tool to ensure the fundamental rights of all to communicate; 2) the need for verifiable and transparent data to drive the broadband policy process; 3) the importance of locally-owned networks, as well as competition; 4) the need for wiser use of public resources such as spectrum and rights of way; and 5) that digital inclusion programs must be a critical part of U.S. broadband policy.
http://benton.org/node/25831
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BE BOLD WITH BROADBAND PLAN, WIRED READERS TELL FCC
[SOURCE: Wired, AUTHOR: Ryan Singel]
Wired magazine collected readers' input on the National Broadband Plan, allowing them to also vote on proposals. Editors then took the most popular and significant proposals and added them to the docket at the Federal Communications Commission. Wired.com readers are asking policymakers to be bold. Readers support a model where the Internet's pipes aren't owned by ISPs anymore. They'd rather multiple companies be able to rent the shared lines and compete on service, a model that has worked in Britain. Australia is using a version of that model to build a national fiber and wireless network that will serve all Australia. Or, as one anonymous submitter put it: "Internet cables/routers are 'infrastructure,' and no company should be allowed to control them more tightly than we would allow a company to control our roads, electricity, water, sewage, etc. The Internet's is not an entertainment service." And the word fiber, as in fiber optic cables, proved popular with readers.
http://benton.org/node/25830
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ALA: LIBRARIES KEY TO NATIONAL BROADBAND
[SOURCE: Library Journal, AUTHOR: Norman Oder]
Libraries can play a crucial role in developing the national broadband plan that will result from recent stimulus legislation, says the American Library Association (ALA) in comments before the Federal Communications Commission. "The national broadband plan has the potential to benefit millions of people by enabling high-capacity, 'future-proof' connections to the Internet in large multi-user locations such as libraries," said Emily Sheketoff, executive director of ALA's Washington Office. As the premier public computing centers around the country, libraries can serve as "community anchor institutions" by providing broadband, Sheketoff said.
http://benton.org/node/25829
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CDT TELLS FCC TO INCLUDE OPENNESS, PRIVACY IN BROADBAND PLAN
[SOURCE: Center for Democracy and Technology, AUTHOR: ]
In comments submitted to the Federal Communications Commission , the Center for Democracy and Technology stressed that a national broadband plan should include a commitment to maintain and indeed strengthen the legal and policy framework that has enabled the Internet to become such a dynamic and innovative medium. CDT also recommended that the plan feature further measures to safeguard the Internet's open character, promote online privacy, harness broadband to achieve greater transparency in government, and more.
http://benton.org/node/25828
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NECA: UBIQUITOUS NATIONWIDE FIBER TO THE HOME
[SOURCE: National Exchange Carrier Association, AUTHOR: Elizabeth Newson]
The National Exchange Carrier Association suggests that the Federal Communications Commission should set as the national broadband goal: Ubiquitous nationwide access to fixed and mobile broadband services, with fiber-to-the-home (or equivalent-speed technology) as the long-term standard for fixed networks. NECA also says the plan should affirm the importance of universal service fund support for broadband networks in uneconomic-to-serve areas. Rather than attempt to support multiple networks, NECA recommends the Commission set a policy goal to provide cost-based support to only one fixed, and one mobile, broadband network in such areas. NECA represent over 1,400 local telephone companies ("exchange carriers").
http://benton.org/node/25827
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AFBF: BROADBAND INTERNET'S CRITICAL FOR RURAL AMERICA
[SOURCE: American Farm Bureau Federation, AUTHOR: Mark Maslyn]
The American Farm Bureau Federation sent comments last week to the Federal Communications Commission on the development of a national broadband plan. The AFBF says people who live and work in rural America are often unable to access the same educational, medical, business and government services as Americans living in more populated areas, and access to modern broadband Internet service has the potential to correct this inequity. AFBF stressed the need for affordable broadband access for farmers, many who run their businesses from their homes. Affordable home broadband access is important for keeping American agriculture competitive in the world marketplace, according to AFBF. AFBF urged the FCC to consider location when determining broadband availability and to consider price or marketplace competition in determining access to broadband services. AFBF also said broadband should be designated as a "supported service" eligible to receive support directly from the Universal Services Fund. AFBF said broadband deployment should be increased through any technology, including wireless.
http://benton.org/node/25826
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FIRSTMILE.US COMMENTS ON NATIONAL BROADBAND PLAN
[SOURCE: FirstMile.US, AUTHOR: ]
The legislated goal of the national broadband plan is to "ensure that all people of the United States have access to broadband capability." FirstMile.US has reframed the goal of the broadband plan as this: universal adoption and usage of broadband. Merely having access to broadband is not enough to meet the desired outcomes: meeting the government policy goals and create the nation¹s 21st century innovation engine. Rather than trying to adapt our current communications policies and regulations to "fit" this new communications infrastructure, a clean slate approach is needed. The barriers to broadband access and adoption must be dissolved, in both the public and private sectors. Trying to retrofit the myriad of existing policies and regulations is a disservice to broadband users and a potential obstacle to the ongoing economic leadership of this country. FirstMile.US is an advocate for "big broadband."
http://benton.org/node/25837
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FPF FILES COMMENTS TO FCC ON NATIONAL BROADBAND PLAN
[SOURCE: Future of Privacy Forum, AUTHOR: ]
The Future of Privacy Forum filed comments with the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) about the National Broadband Plan, which the Commission will be formulating over the next several months. As a think tank focused on promoting greater transparency and consumer online data use, we believe that privacy issues should be at the forefront of any discussion about a national broadband plan. Privacy means that consumers are informed about and have control over how companies that deliver Internet services collect and use their data. Therefore, as we said in our comments to the FCC, "The national broadband plan should make clear that transparency and control are essential to consumers' confidence about the privacy of their information online, and that only with such consumer confidence will we achieve the Internet usage that is tied to our national broadband goals." It is our hope that transparency and control will be among the key ingredients in the national broadband plan, and we look forward to seeing the Commission's ideas in 2010.
http://benton.org/node/25836
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COX: REDUCE BROADBAND-UNSERVED TOTAL BY HALF BY 2012
[SOURCE: Multichannel News, AUTHOR: John Eggerton]
Cox has proposed that the Federal Communications Commission set a target of cutting the number of American homes unserved by broadband in half by 2012, and ensure that broadband is in every K-12 classroom by that same date. Cox estimated there are currently about 9-10 million unserved households, which means reaching about five million more households in two years. Those were two key action items in the company's comments to the FCC on a national rollout plan. The company also talked about improving broadband speeds, but not by establishing a baseline definition of high-speed, as some public-interest groups and computer companies have suggested. Instead, Cox suggested establishing a national "speed index" by next year, which will required the FCC to gather more of the broadband data it wants. Cox wants the commission to come up with a reliable average of broadband speed, then commit to try to double that by 2012.
http://benton.org/node/25835
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THE STIMULUS
SATELLITE, BROADBAND OVER POWER LINES AND MICROWAVE TECHNOLOGIES CONTEND FOR STIMULUS FUNDS
[SOURCE: BroadbandCensus.com, AUTHOR: Andrew Feinberg]
A diverse "undercard" of broadband technologies is being largely overlooked in the battle for stimulus dollars. Though often ignored, broadband over powerlines (BPL) is a reality and moving fast - with help from existing Rural Utility Service loans, said International Broadband Electric Communications government affairs coordinator Alyssa Clemsen. Many rural electric cooperatives are choosing BPL and funding build-out with RUS loans, she said. An initial deployment has allowed co-ops to roll equipment and service out over thousands of miles — enough to reach hundreds of rural consumers who would otherwise have no other options, Clemsen said. BPL can reach five homes per mile that would otherwise have no service, she said. The co-ops currently deploying BPL hope to have 300,000 subscribers over the next 18 months - to symmetrical 5 Megabit per second (Mbps) connections consumers demand from fiber, she boasted. Satellite Internet service is not the same one-way pipe sold ten years ago, said Jeffrey Carlisle, vice president of regulatory affairs for SkyTerra Communications. The industry now boasts capabilities that have advanced by an "order of magnitude," and are competitive with wireline connections, he said.
http://benton.org/node/25838
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TELECOM
NASUCA: CONSUMERS NEED A BREAK ON UNIVERSAL SERVICE CHARGES
[SOURCE: National Association of State Utility Consumer Advocates, AUTHOR: Press release]
Struggling with a national recession, consumers should not have to pay a proposed record-high assessment on the interstate portions of their telephone bills. Consumers need a break, the National Association of State Utility Consumer Advocates (NASUCA) told the Federal Communications Commission. NASUCA filed its comments with the FCC in response to a projection that the contribution level for the Universal Service Fund will be 12.9 percent, the highest in history, for the third quarter of 2009. Every customer with a cellular and/or traditional home telephone line pays into the fund. The contribution factor is an assessment on a customer's interstate and international portions of their telephone bills. Under FCC decisions, interstate portions to which the assessment is applied include 35 percent of cellular charges, 100 percent of interstate long-distance home telephone charges, and 100 percent of the subscriber line charge on local home telephone bills.
http://benton.org/node/25839
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SMARTPHONE RISES FAST FROM GADGET TO NECESSITY
[SOURCE: New York Times, AUTHOR: Steve Lohr]
Sales of BlackBerrys, iPhones and other smartphone models are rising smartly and are projected to increase 25 percent this year, according to Gartner, a research business. Widely anticipated new models like the Palm Pre, which went on sale nationwide on Saturday, will help fuel that growth. Meanwhile, total cellphone sales are expected to fall. The smartphone surge, it seems, is a case of a trading-up trend in technology that is running strong enough to weather the economic downturn. And as is so often true when it comes to adoption of new technology, the smartphone story is as much about consumer sociology and psychology as it is about chips, bytes and bandwidth. For a growing swath of the population, the social expectation is that one is nearly always connected and reachable almost instantly via e-mail. The smartphone, analysts say, is the instrument of that connectedness — and thus worth the cost, both as a communications tool and as a status symbol.
http://benton.org/node/25843
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AGENDA
CONFIRMATION HEARING SET FOR FCC CHAIRMAN, COMMISSIONER JUNE 16
[SOURCE: US Senate Commerce Committee]
On Tuesday June 16, the Senate Commerce Committee will hold a hearing on the nominations of: 1) Julius Genachowski to be Chairman of the Federal Communications Commission and 2) Robert McDowell to continue as Commissioner of the FCC until July 2014. If the Senate Commerce Committee votes out the nominations, they must still get a full-Senate vote. That usually comes pretty quickly, although that did not prove the case with proposed new NTIA head Larry Strickling, who appeared to sail through the nomination hearing but did not get a vote with the other nominees sharing that hearing.
http://benton.org/node/25825
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HATCH SEES MOVEMENT ON IP AGENDA
[SOURCE: CongressDaily, AUTHOR: ]
Sen Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) said Tuesday he is hopeful the Senate Judiciary Committee will move forward on its intellectual property agenda as early as this summer despite a packed schedule of judicial appointments, most prominently that of Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor. Among the issues awaiting the panel's attention include a proposal to end an AM/FM radio royalty exemption; overhauling a portion of U.S. copyright law that deals with musical tracks, images, videos or other content whose owners cannot be easily located; and a bill to reauthorize expiring provisions of a statute that lets satellite systems retransmit local and distant TV signals into markets across the country. His comments at the World Copyright Summit echoed Thursday remarks by Judiciary Chairman Patrick Leahy (D-VT). At the same meeting, Public Knowledge President Gigi Sohn urged the Obama administration on Tuesday to employ "a nuanced, balanced" approach to naming key intellectual property posts in the federal government. President Obama has yet to name a White House IP enforcement coordinator, as mandated by a law that passed the 110th Congress, or Patent and Trademark Office director.
http://benton.org/node/25824
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MORE NEWS FROM CONGRESS
HOUSE PASSES WEBCASTER LEGISLATION
[SOURCE: CongressDaily, AUTHOR: Andrew Noyes]
The House on Tuesday passed legislation under suspension of the rules that would allow royalty negotiations between the music and Internet industries to continue while delaying full implementation of a controversial rate-setting for webcasters imposed by the Copyright Royalty Board. The legislation is sponsored by Rep Jay Inslee (D-WA) with support from Judiciary Chairman John Conyers (D-MI), Telecom Subcommittee Chairman Rick Boucher (D-VA) and California Democrats Zoe Lofgren and Anna Eshoo. It would replace a Feb. 15, 2009 deadline that was part of legislation that passed the 110th Congress, with a 30-day window from the date of enactment for a deal to be reached between digital royalty collector SoundExchange, which is negotiating on behalf of copyright owners and performers, and Internet radio services represented by the Digital Media Association and others. Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR) introduced a companion measure with Sen. Sam Brownback (R-Kansas) last month and the bill has been referred to the Judiciary Committee.
http://benton.org/node/25823
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US LAWMAKERS PLAN BAN ON NEW STATE, LOCAL CELL-PHONE
[SOURCE: Dow Jones, AUTHOR: Fawn Johnson]
US lawmakers are setting the stage to halt state and local governments from imposing new taxes on cell-phone and mobile e-mail services. Several Democrats and Republicans on the House Judiciary Committee's commercial law panel agreed Tuesday that "discriminatory" cell-phone taxes, or taxes on wireless services alone, are unfair. House members plan to act this year on a bill that would impose a five-year moratorium on new state and local taxes for cell phones. The bill would allow new taxes on general services that include cell phones, but cell-phone use couldn't be singled out. It also would preserve any existing state and local cell-phone taxes. The bill would be a boon to the wireless industry, particularly small companies like Leap Wireless, which specializes in low-cost cell-phone service. The measure also could help other major wireless companies win mobile Internet subscribers. The carriers are all aggressively rolling out high-speed mobile Internet networks around the country. Some economists say increases in the cost of wireless services cause customers to use fewer of them. Areas that may be more costly for deployment could be ignored by service providers if taxes continue to go up, they say.
http://benton.org/node/25822
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FCC SPENT $150,000 EVALUATING ONE VERIZON PRICING BID
[SOURCE: Dow Jones, AUTHOR: Fawn Johnson]
The Federal Communications Commission devoted more than 2,000 staff hours, costing about $150,000, to a single petition from Verizon Communications to raise wholesale prices in Virginia Beach and Rhode Island, FCC Chairman Michael Copps said in a letter to House Commerce Committee Chairman Henry Waxman (D-CA). Chairman Copps said substantial private resources also were expended for the petition, which Verizon withdrew at the last minute. Excluding Verizon's filings with the FCC, the docket for the case exceeded 1,850 pages. Verizon's filings alone totaled roughly 400 pages. Chairman Waxman asked Copps to detail the FCC's activities on the petition after Verizon withdrew it days before the commission was set to deny it. Verizon said it yanked its request because a federal appeals court hadn't ruled on the company's separate bid to raise prices in six markets. Experiences such as this have prodded Chairman Copps to attempt to change the way the FCC processes requests from telecom companies for regulatory relief, often to raise wholesale prices or to change other business-to-business contracting terms. Chairman Copps argues that the process, known as "forbearance," significantly strains the FCC's resources at a telecom company's discretion.
http://benton.org/node/25821
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MEDIA OWNERSHIP
NEW YORK TIMES DOES NOT PLAN TO CLOSE BOSTON GLOBE
[SOURCE: Reuters, AUTHOR: Robert MacMillan]
The New York Times Co said on Tuesday that it does not plan to close The Boston Globe, a day after its largest union rejected a $10 million package of concessions aimed at cutting costs at the 137-year-old newspaper. The Boston Newspaper Guild narrowly rejected the concessions, which include an 8.4 percent pay cut, elimination of some benefits and furloughs, on Monday evening. In response, the Times said that it would cut guild members' pay by 23 percent to get the savings that it needs.
http://benton.org/node/25820
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AS THE GLOBE REELS, PAPERS MUST DROP ELITISM
[SOURCE: The Christian Science Monitor, AUTHOR: Jerry Lanson]
[Commentary] Conventional wisdom holds that newspapers have been crippled by the flight of advertising to the Web. But they've been crippled just as much by corporate profiteering, arrogance, elitism, and encroaching dullness that have driven away readers, sometimes in droves. Newspapers must look back to have a future. They need to reclaim their populist roots - roots that the Web increasingly controls. Consider what newspapers long did best: Even when faced with the immediacy of radio and then TV, good newspapers offered their communities serendipity and surprise, originality, readable-to-good writing, a sense of purpose and shared experience. The best papers set the agenda in their news and opinion, offering not the tepid voice of the referee seen in the recent Obama-Cheney torture "debate," but a strong voice of moral leadership. Newspapers can reclaim this legacy and their leadership by acting more and reacting less. Three steps come to mind: 1. Stop giving readers yesterday's headlines today. 2. Develop more enterprise that measures the impact of government policies on people and community. 3. Spend less time covering the bankers, power brokers, and masters of spin who dominate news, and spend more time in coffee shops and corner stores, bowling alleys and backyards.
http://benton.org/node/25844
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US PRESSES ANTITRUST INQUIRY INTO GOOGLE BOOK SETTLEMENT
[SOURCE: New York Times, AUTHOR: Miguel Helft]
In a sign that the government has stepped up its antitrust investigation of a class-action settlement between Google and groups representing authors and publishers, the Justice Department has issued formal requests for information to several of the parties involved. The Justice Department has sent the requests, called civil investigative demands, to various parties, including Google, the Association of American Publishers, the Authors Guild and individual publishers, said Michael J. Boni, a partner at Boni & Zack, who represented the Authors Guild in negotiations with Google. "They are asking for a lot of information," Boni said. "It signals that they are serious about the antitrust implications of the settlement."
http://benton.org/node/25848
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BROADCASTING
RED CROSS: PEOPLE SHOULD UPDATE DISASTER PLANS DUE TO DTV TRANSITION
[SOURCE: Broadcasting&Cable, AUTHOR: John Eggerton]
The Red Cross has advised people to update their disaster-preparedness plans in light of the DTV transition hard date June 12. That is because a battery-powered TV with an antenna has been part of many people's plans -- sets that won't work without a converter box. "If you don't have a television capable of receiving a digital signal or if you rely on an antenna for reception (not pay television, cable, or satellite service), you will need to act now and make the changes necessary to make sure you will be able to access local television stations. This access is especially crucial during a disaster, when many people in the past have used battery operated televisions with an antenna to get disaster news."
http://benton.org/node/25819
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BROADCAST TV NEVER CONVERTED ITS DIGITAL DREAM
[SOURCE: Washington Post, AUTHOR: Paul Farhi]
It was going to be glorious, positively Jetsonian. With digital broadcasting, the television industry once promised, the TV set would be transformed into a miraculous info-appliance, the modern household's electronic brain. No longer would the TV be a mere conduit for sitcoms and soap operas. With digital broadcasts, the TV -- or perhaps the PCTV -- would become a shopping portal, an information node, an Internet-surfing console. Thanks to digital's limitless interactive capabilities, you'd be able to call up player stats during ballgames, play video games with people across the country or take college-level courses from your couch. Each night while you slept, a digital "data" broadcast would send a customized daily newspaper to your set-top box; all you'd have to do in the morning was hit "print." Well, the future officially arrives this week, and it's . . . not exactly as advertised.
http://benton.org/node/25845
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