Feb 9, 2010 (BTOP in VA)

BENTON'S COMMUNICATIONS-RELATED HEADLINES for TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 9, 2010

Check local listing before braving snow for today's events http://bit.ly/aM2KcH

INTERNET/BROADBAND
   Commerce Awards Recovery Act Broadband Expansion Grants Totaling More than $20 Million for Virginia
   Reed Asks, His State Receives
   Last mile' broadband access key to small-business growth
   Ringside at the Web Fight

NETWORK NEUTRALITY
   FCC Wrestles With Depth, Breadth of Network Neutrality Comments
   Verizon Blocks 4chan

MEDIA OWNERSHIP
   Obama, Congress should take dim view of Comcast/NBC Universal merger
   AWOL on Comcast/NBC Merger: Olbermann, Maddow, Schultz, Matthews
   Music Inc. Gets Bigger

WIRELESS
   Mobile Data Traffic Expected to Surge
   IPad event shows Apple's focus: mobile devices
   Google drops Nexus One early cancellation penalty to $150 after federal review

BUDGET
   In Obama's budget, it's techies vs. taxes
   DHS CIO taking on IT governance

GOVERNMENT & COMMUNICATIONS
   An Open Door to Open Government

ADVERTISING
Station Revenues Down $5.5 Billion From 2006-09 | Clutter Causing TV Ads to Lack Effectiveness | Toyota Dealers Pull ABC TV Ads; Anger Over 'Excessive Stories' | Google's Display-Ad Sales Should Top $1 Billion | Pepsi picks social media over Super Bowl ads | Technology leading to more invasive marketing | AdMob may win big even as privacy debate rages

STORIES FROM ABROAD
These headlines presented in partnership with:

   Government to protect Australian content on commercial television
   Fibre-optic network backbone begins in Australia
   BT to share its tunnel network with rivals
   Canada enlists HIT in chronic disease campaign
   El Salvador's government seeks to lower basic fixed line fee
   Open-source repository hits 2,000 apps
   Beijing Heralds Bust of Major Hacker Ring
   China plans online gambling crackdown
   Iran's resistance keeps up cat-and-mouse Web game

MORE ONLINE
Publishers Win a Bout in E-Book Price Fight | As Data Flows In, the Dollars Flow Out | Digital sales poised as game changer | Will Google's Translator Phone Lead Us to Babylon or Babble On? | All that user-generated content? 95% is malware, spam | Internet prompts the publishing itch in over-60s | Four things every student should learn ... but not every school is teaching | In Age of Friending, Consumers Trust Their Friends Less | Motorola reverts to Plan A: splitting into two publicly traded companies | Nominees for President's Committee on the Arts and the Humanities

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INTERNET/BROADBAND

VIRGINIA BTOP GRANTS
[SOURCE: Department of Commerce, AUTHOR: Press release]
The Department of Commerce's National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) announced two grants totaling more than $21.5 million to expand broadband Internet infrastructure in Virginia. The two grants will add 575 miles of new high-speed Internet infrastructure in southern Virginia. The grants were announced during a press conference call with White House Chief Technology Officer Aneesh Chopra, NTIA Administrator Larry Strickling, Sens. Jim Webb (D-VA) and Mark Warner (D-VA), and Rep. Tom Perriello (D-VA).
Mid-Atlantic Broadband Cooperative: $16 million infrastructure grant with an additional $4 million in applicant-provided matching funds to add 465 miles of new fiber that will directly connect 121 K-12 schools in southern Virginia to an existing 800-mile, fiber, high-speed network. By improving connection speeds for these schools from 1.5 Mbps to at least10 Mbps, these new fiber connections will allow the schools, many in isolated areas, to take advantage of distance learning and virtual classroom opportunities. In addition, the expanded fiber network will spur affordable broadband service to local consumers by enabling more than 30 Internet service providers to connect to the project's open network.
Virginia Tech Foundation: $5.5 million infrastructure grant with an additional $1.4 million in applicant-provided matching funds to add 110 miles of open access, fiber-optic network between Blacksburg and Bedford City—an existing network operated by the Mid-Atlantic Broadband Cooperative. The resulting network will cross six counties in Virginia's Appalachian region, and provide direct, high-speed connections to Virginia Tech's main campus in Blacksburg and the Virginia Tech Carilion School of Medicine in Roanoke, enhancing the ability for both institutions to collaborate on cutting-edge medical and other scientific research with institutions in the United States and abroad.
benton.org/node/32058 | Department of Commerce | The Hill | B&C | TechDailyDose | WashPost
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RHODE ISLAND BTOP WINNER
[SOURCE: CongressDaily, AUTHOR: Juliana Gruenwald]
Just two weeks ago, Sen Jack Reed (D-RI) questioned National Telecommunications and Information Administration chief Lawrence Strickling about whether states with high unemployment such as Reed's home state of Rhode Island would get priority when the agency doles out broadband grants funded by the economic stimulus package enacted last year. During the Senate Appropriations subcommittee hearing on the broadband funding, Strickling indicated that one of the seven criteria the agency will use in the second round will be whether a proposed project is in an "economically depressed area." Rhode Island's unemployment rate hovered at 12.9 percent in December, the third worst in the country, according to the Providence Business Journal. The NTIA must be listening because it announced Friday that Rhode Island has been awarded a $1.2 million grant to expand broadband Internet access to 71 public libraries in the state. At the same hearing, Commerce Secretary Gary Locke told the subcommittee that he expects every state will receive at least one broadband grant, as stipulated by the economic stimulus package legislation.
benton.org/node/32043 | CongressDaily
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USING COOPER TO DELIVER BROADBAND
[SOURCE: The Hill, AUTHOR: Carl Grivner]
[Commentary] Just as the nation has pulled itself from previous cycles of "economic bust" through new technologies, today's leading technology, the Internet, stands poised to deliver the next generation of American success stories. There remains just one missing link: lack of affordable "last mile" broadband access for many of America's small businesses, one of our greatest sources of job creation. As CEO of a business that creates small-business broadband solutions, I remain amazed when my jobs-creating small-business customers remain desperately in need of technologies now considered basic tools for their larger competitors. Fortunately, Federal Communications Commission Chairman Julius Genachowski has recognized broadband's importance to small business, and we've seen good progress as the FCC formulates rules for broadband deployment in its National Broadband Plan. Regulatory efficiency, social equality, and economic strategy all argue that the National Broadband Plan recognize the importance of bringing broadband to small businesses immediately in order to spur job creation. This can happen by recognizing the value of copper and promoting access to that infrastructure.
benton.org/node/32034 | Hill, The
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RINGSIDE AT THE WEB FIGHT
[SOURCE: Vanity Fair, AUTHOR: Michael Wolff]
[Commentary] People who follows the next big thing believe that this year -- emerging from recession, with the death of so many aspects of conventional media -- will be a year of, in Internet-speak, radical inflection, precipitating a wave of acquisitions and IPO's and a river of new investment. If you can only focus on what so many geniuses are saying, you can win big. But deciphering the chatter is no small talent, because the technology business is at least as much talk as it is science. The next big thing can sometimes feel like the coming of Christ, but it can also feel like the internecine debates about socialist doctrine that famously took place in the cafeterias of City College, in New York, in the 1930s. So Wolff tries to align the factions, parse the theories, distinguish the geek Lenins from the geek Trotskys, and offer the possibility for you to profitably know what this year is going to bring (or, anyway, hold your own at a cocktail party).
benton.org/node/32032 | Vanity Fair
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NETWORK NEUTRALITY

NETWORK NEUTRALITY DEBATE
[SOURCE: BroadbandBreakfast.com, AUTHOR: Rahul Gaitonde]
The Federal Communications Commission has received thousands of comments both lauding and criticizing its proposed plan to address the controversial issue of network neutrality. The media and communications communities spent hundreds if not thousands of hours carefully crafting their arguments as their members view net neutrality as a linchpin to the future of Internet innovation and economic growth. Content distributors, consumers and parties concerned about limitations on free speech largely favor net neutrality in their filed comments. Some content makers also support the concept, but the largest content makers appear to oppose it. Net neutrality supporters argued that a free and open Internet is necessary for innovation and that a lack of competition among service providers removes market protection from infringement.
benton.org/node/32042 | BroadbandBreakfast.com
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VERIZON BLOCKS 4CHAN
[SOURCE: ReadWriteWeb, AUTHOR: Jolie O'Dell]
According to 4chan, they have been "explicitly blocked" by the Verizon wireless network. Why would Verizon choose to block the site now? Does this put Verizon on par with foreign ISPs that block torrent sites and social networks? Or is there more to the story? The incident calls to mind AT&T's temporary blocking of the site in July 2009. Eventually, AT&T said the block was due to a DDoS originating from 4chan IP addresses. Verizon Wireless spokesman, Jeffrey Nelson, said two of 4Chan's related sites (not its main one) were sources of malicious attacks, which threatened the wireless network. He said the company didn't block the site but was addressing the security concerns. He said both sites should be accessible to users by the end of the day.
benton.org/node/32057 | Read Write Web | WashPost
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MEDIA OWNERSHIP

ADMIN, CONGRESS SHOULD BLOCK COMCAST-NBC
[SOURCE: Seattle Times, AUTHOR: Ryan Blethen]
[Commentary] Since President Obama took office last year, Democrats in Washington, DC, have made noise about taking on special interests, lobbyists and big corporations. So far, it has been mostly talk. Democrats have a chance to act on their tough talk. By squashing Comcast's bid to buy a controlling interest in NBC Universal from General Electric Co., the Obama administration and Democrats have an opportunity to show Americans that big corporations don't always get what they want from Washington. If the deal is blessed by regulators it is likely that Comcast's and NBC Universal's competitors will try and find ways to grow, which means more media consolidation. A worrisome proposition considering that a handful of corporations already control most of what Americans read, watch and listen to.
benton.org/node/32045 | Seattle Times
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MSNBC SILENT ON COMCAST DEAL
[SOURCE: The Huffington Post, AUTHOR: Paul Abrams]
[Commentary] When it came to Citizens United--the recent decision by the Supreme Court that found the original intent of the Founders was to grant Constitutional personhood to corporations, creatures of the State--Olbermann, Maddow, Schultz and Matthews were intensely concerned about its implications. They covered the case, the aftermath, and periodically follow-up with reports of Congressional efforts to blunt its effects or overturn it by Constitutional Amendment. Enter, Comcast/NBC Universal. Comcast is the nation's largest cable operator, and NBC Universal one of the major content creators. Comcast wants to purchase NBC Universal from General Electric. MSNBC and CNBC are part of NBC Universal and would become owned by Comcast. Where is the coverage Rachel? Ed? Olbermann? Matthews? Where is the outrage over increased media concentration and corporate control? Where is the exposé of Comcast's past egregious actions? The deafening silence from this quartet is all the testimony needed to show why this merger is...very bad news, indeed.
benton.org/node/32044 | Huffington Post, The
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MUSIC IN GETS BIGGER
[SOURCE: New York Times, AUTHOR: Editorial staff]
[Commentary] President Obama has made a welcome break with the Bush administration's disregard for enforcing antitrust law. The Department of Justice and the Federal Trade Commission have become more aggressive about questioning mergers and challenging monopolies and anticompetitive behavior. But antitrust regulation still suffers from an unwillingness to challenge "vertical integration," in which companies, suppliers and customers become intertwined and a few corporations can control all aspects of their industry. Such is the case in the merger of Ticketmaster and Live Nation, which was approved with some limitations by the Justice Department's antitrust division recently. Ideally, the merger should not have been. The Justice Department challenged the "horizontal" consolidation of the companies' overlapping ticketing businesses. But it was weaker when it came to dealing with the perils that arise from the emergence of a company that will operate on every level of its business.
benton.org/node/32068 | New York Times
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WIRELESS

MOBILE DATA TRAFFIC EXPECTED TO SURGE
[SOURCE: New York Times, AUTHOR: Jenna Wortham]
There is a coming tsunami of mobile devices, from tablets to smartphones, that will guzzle data and consume scarce bandwidth. But how much more data will these devices consume? "When we look at overall mobile forecast, we're seeing some dramatic growth that is taking place," said Doug Webster, senior director of market management for Cisco Systems' service provider group. Webster said the company expects the volume of mobile data traffic to increase 39 times over the next 5 years, largely due to the fact that there will 5 billion devices, from e-readers to tablets and smartphones, connected to mobile networks over that timespan. "We're going from less than a tenth of an exabyte to more than 3.6 exabytes per month," he said. The findings are part of a Cisco report released Tuesday that forecasts mobile data growth between 2009 and 2014.
benton.org/node/32064 | New York Times
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APPLE'S MOBILE FUTURE
[SOURCE: San Francisco Chronicle, AUTHOR: Ryan Kim]
Apple's recent unveiling of the iPad was primarily a product announcement aimed at priming the pump for consumers, developers and content owners. But for the notoriously secretive company, the iPad event provided observers with a glimpse of the company's growing ambitions and strategies. By trumpeting its own chipset for the iPad, passing on Adobe Flash software and putting even more emphasis on its iTunes system, Apple appears intent on tightening its command over the user experience and delivering a distinct vision of mobile computing, Internet connectivity and media consumption. But perhaps the most obvious upshot of the latest unveiling was Apple's continued recognition that its future, unlike its origin, is tied to mobile devices. Three years after dropping the word "computer" from its name, Apple's CEO Steve Jobs said the company's annual revenue of $50 billion from iPhones, iPods and MacBook laptops make it the largest maker of mobile devices in the world.
benton.org/node/32063 | San Francisco Chronicle
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GOOGLE DROPS ETF
[SOURCE: Washington Post, AUTHOR: Cecilia Kang]
Google said Monday it is lowering a fee it charges Nexus One customers who cancel service for their phones early following a review by the Federal Communications Commission into the charge. The company said it has reduced its "equipment recovery fee" to $150 from $350 for customers who cancel service subscriptions with T-Mobile after 14 days and within 120 days of purchasing the phone. Customers who cancel subscriptions within 14 days aren't charged penalties by Google. The recovery fee provoked a backlash among consumers and public interest groups. Coupled with T-Mobile's $200 own early termination fee on service for the phone, the charge from Google could make returns of the Nexus One handset cost customers as much as $550.
benton.org/node/32066 | Washington Post | TechDailyDose
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BUDGET

TECHIES VS TAXES
[SOURCE: Fortune, AUTHOR: Jia Lynn Yang]
There's a frequent line in President Obama's speeches that makes every U.S. tech executive cringe: his vow to cut tax breaks for "companies that ship our jobs overseas." Obama's brushing over some details here. The U.S. tax code does not literally give a company a tax break every time it moves a job offshore. But it does allow companies to defer paying taxes on their overseas profits, so long as the money remains invested outside the U.S. Obama has vowed to change this part of the law, and for months tech CEOs have been coming through Washington howling about the dire consequences of raising such taxes on multinationals. They've made some inroads with the administration, but based on what's in the president's 2011 budget released last week, Silicon Valley and DC are far from done battling over taxes. The details are buried in the budget on page 161, Table S-8 under the heading "Reform the U.S. international tax system." If the proposed changes go through, the administration estimates it will bring in $122.2 billion in added tax revenue. As far as the administration is concerned, the added money will not only help close the gaping deficit, but stop U.S. companies from ducking out of domestic taxes by shopping around for which country has the best tax rate.
benton.org/node/32033 | Fortune
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DHS CIO TAKING ON IT GOVERNANCE
[SOURCE: FederalNewsRadio, AUTHOR: Jason Miller]
The Homeland Security Department's information technology budget request for fiscal 2011 is $6.4 billion, the highest among civilian agencies. And Richard Spires, the DHS chief information officer, is concerned that the agency doesn't have the processes, skills and people in place to successfully manage all of it. "What bothers me most we have very little institutionalization of process disciplines, standards and tools to run programs," says Spires today during a speech in Washington sponsored by IAC. "We have pockets of excellence, but we also some very troubled programs." Spires is reviewing all 79 major IT investments at the agency. He says the review is about half way done and, so far, no program has been deemed "fatally flawed."
benton.org/node/32031 | FederalNewsRadio
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GOVERNMENT & COMMUNICATIONS

AN OPEN DOOR TO OPEN GOVERNMENT
[SOURCE: The White House, AUTHOR: Dan Pfeiffer]
Since early December, agencies have worked to create their own webpages to serve as the gateway for each agency's implementation of the Open Government Directive. These pages all went live this weekend, complete with the latest news and updates, downloadable information unique to that agency, and information about how each agency is moving to implement the President's call for a more transparent, participatory, and collaborative government. Importantly, each of these sites will be the focal point for the agency's open government plans that, after public feedback and suggestion, will make our work across the Administration more accessible to the American people. That's why each Open Government Webpage incorporates a mechanism to seek your ideas and insights. Most agencies are leveraging a new, no-cost public engagement app from the General Services Administration that allows them to pay less attention to designing tools and more attention to running, moderating, and analyzing public input. It will help to make the agency open government pages more effective at turning public suggestions into government actions.
benton.org/node/32056 | White House, The
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ADVERTISING

STATION REVENUES DOWN
[SOURCE: Broadcasting&Cable, AUTHOR: John Eggerton]
According to SNL Kagan, between 2006 and 2009, TV station revenues were down over five and a half billion dollars -- from $24.6 billion to under $19 billion. By 2013, Kagan predicts TV station revenues will only have recovered about half of that drop, to $21.7 billion. Kagan predicts increases in retransmission fees and online revenues, while still only a relatively small fraction of the total pie, will lead to a healthier future. According to its predictions, retrans revenues are expected to increase from just one percent of the total in 2006 to 9% in 2013, with online increasing from 2% to 7%.
benton.org/node/32041 | Broadcasting&Cable
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CLUTTER AND TV ADVERTISING
[SOURCE: MediaWeek, AUTHOR: Katy Bachman]
The bloom may be coming off the TV advertising rose. According to a joint Association of National Advertisers and Forrester Research survey of more than 100 national advertisers, 62 percent of respondents think TV ads have become less effective in the past two years. The main culprit cited by respondents was clutter, with 69 percent saying they would like fewer commercials per pod. Advertisers will be cautious with TV budgets this year, holding spending flat, the study found. Advertisers are also altering their media mix allocating 41 percent to TV compared in 2009 compared to 58 percent in 2008. Contributing to dissatisfaction with the medium was a lack of new audience metrics beyond reach and frequency. Eight-two percent of respondents would like individual commercial ratings. Seventy-eight percent would like to more precisely target consumers.
benton.org/node/32054 | MediaWeek
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TOYOTA DEALERS PULL ADS BECAUSE OF NEWS COVERAGE
[SOURCE: ABC News, AUTHOR: Joseph Rhee, Mark Schone]
Toyota dealers in five southeast states have pulled their commercials off ABC TV local affiliates, complaining about the coverage of Toyota safety problems by ABC News and its chief investigative correspondent Brian Ross. The ad agency representing the 173 dealers told ABC affiliates last week that the shift was due to "excessive stories on the Toyota issues." The dealers shifted their commercial time buys to non-ABC stations in the same markets, "as punishment for the reporting," according to an ABC station manager. ABC News and Ross began reporting on the problem of "runaway Toyotas" last November in a series of stories that preceded the large recalls ordered by the company, and apologies for quality shortcomings as well as misstatements about the extent of the defects. Toyota is now expected to add the 2010 Prius to its list of recalled vehicles.
benton.org/node/32035 | ABC News | B&C
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GOOGLE'S DISPLAY-AD SALES
[SOURCE: BusinessWeek, AUTHOR: Douglas MacMillan]
Google CEO Eric Schmidt hinted in July that display advertising would probably be the next of his company's businesses to generate $1 billion in sales. Analysts say 2010 is the year he'll deliver on that prediction. Display ads are likely to contribute a little more than $1 billion, or about 4% of Google's total sales this year—an increase of as much 40% over last year—say analysts, including Doug Anmuth at Barclays Capital. That marks an important threshold for Mountain View (Calif.)-based Google, which makes most of its sales from ads placed alongside search results and which has been criticized for not getting more revenue from other businesses. Demand for display ads, which include marketing messages in videos and banner ads adorning Web pages, may rise faster this year than for search-related ads, according to eMarketer. "You have to go somewhere else to get the next legs of growth," says Jim Friedland, an analyst at Cowen & Co. In display advertising, Google lags behind Yahoo!, which had revenue of $6.5 billion in 2009 that was generated largely from its display ads. Google has tried to catch up in part through acquisitions. Two of the biggest were aimed at the display ad market: The company paid $1.65 billion for YouTube in 2005 and $3.1 billion for DoubleClick in 2007.
benton.org/node/32040 | BusinessWeek
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TECHNOLOGY LEADING TO MORE INVASIVE MARKETING
[SOURCE: San Francisco Chronicle, AUTHOR: Alejandro Martínez-Cabrera]
Sure, flying cars may not be zooming near the windows of our 40th-floor lofts and robots with aprons aren't cooking our meals, but the future is getting here. Unfortunately, it's starting to look like something between "Minority Report" and "1984" - at least when it comes to marketing. Advertisers and retailers are increasingly using technologies to mine for consumers' demographical information, create super-personalized ads and zero in on people's shopping habits. Proponents say new technologies are getting products that consumers want into their hands faster and eliminating ads that don't speak to them. But privacy advocates are concerned no one's asking people if they want targeted ads or if they agree to be studied as they shop.
benton.org/node/32061 | San Francisco Chronicle
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ADMOB MAY WIN BIG EVEN AS PRIVACY DEBATE RAGES
[SOURCE: San Francisco Chronicle, AUTHOR: James Temple]
AdMob Inc. isn't well known among consumers, but privacy groups, the Federal Trade Commission and mobile businesses all know its name. The 160-person San Mateo (CA) company is at the center of what could be the next big online opportunity, as well as a raging debate over privacy in the digital age and an escalating war between Google and Apple. The company works with marketers, application developers and publishers to place display advertisements on mobile devices. It's not a huge market today, but most observers expect that consumers will eventually conduct the majority of their online surfing over smart phones, tablets and similar contraptions. It's a promising enough opportunity that Google, which has made a concentrated effort to parlay its Internet dominance into the mobile space, agreed to pay $750 million for the 4-year-old company in November. Apple, with its lucrative iPhone franchise to protect, quickly countered with a $275 million purchase of AdMob rival Quattro Wireless. What's the appeal?
benton.org/node/32062 | San Francisco Chronicle
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STORIES FROM ABROAD
These headlines presented in partnership with:

GOV TO PROTECT AUSTRALIAN CONTENT
[SOURCE: Minister for Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy, AUTHOR: Sen Stephen Conroy]
The Government will protect Australian content on commercial television by offering licence fee rebates to broadcasters in 2010 and 2011. The rebate recognizes the importance of the Australian Content Standard in ensuring TV audiences have strong levels of Australian programs. The rebate is also in recognition of the current level of licence fees in Australia compared with other countries such as the US, UK and Canada, and the new technology and commercial challenges facing the sector, including the switch to digital television. The initiative builds on the Government's funding increase for the ABC and SBS in the 2009-10 Budget to fund Australian content on the national broadcasters. The Australian Content Standard requires commercial television broadcasters to produce and screen Australian content, including 55 per cent of transmission between 6am and midnight, 7 days per week, and provides for the production of Australian drama and children's programming. "Broadcasters have a unique role in preserving our national culture and the commercial television sector invests hundreds of millions of dollars each year in the production of local content," Senator Conroy said. "However, they are faced with a converging media environment and switch to digital television, as well as the impact on revenue created by a decline in advertising spend as a result of the Global Financial Crisis. New media platforms are bringing a wealth of choice to Australian viewers, but the Government recognizes that Australian television broadcasters have an important role in ensuring that Australian stories remain at the center of our viewing experience." Australia commences the switch to digital television in Mildura this year.
benton.org/node/32028 | Minister for Broadband | Variety | Herald Sun
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FIBER-OPTIC NETWORK BACKBONE BEGINS
[SOURCE: The Australian, AUTHOR: Mitchell Bingemann]
The Australian government is a week away from seeing the first sod of soil turned in the construction of fiber-optic backbone links for its ambitious $43 billion national broadband network. Mount Isa in northwest Queensland will be the first site in mainland Australia to have fiber-optic lines laid as part of the government's $250 million regional backbone blackspots program. The program seeks to alleviate the strangled state of broadband competition in rural regions ahead of the construction of the NBN in metropolitan areas. Leighton Holdings' Nextgen Networks was awarded the lucrative contract to dig the trenches and lay fiber for the links in December last year. Mount Isa falls on one of six fiber-optic backbone links that will be built to connect 100 regional towns around the nation to the high-speed broadband network.
benton.org/node/32048 | Australian, The
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BT TO SHARE ITS TUNNEL NETWORK WITH RIVALS
[SOURCE: Financial Times, AUTHOR: Andrew Parker]
British Telecom is preparing to open up its underground ducts so that rivals can run their own high- speed broadband networks through the telecoms company's infrastructure. Action by BT could allow competitors to lay their optical fiber cables without the expense of digging up pavements. BT's willingness to open up its ducts marks an important policy shift and emphasizes the intensifying political and business pressure it faces.
benton.org/node/32050 | Financial Times
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CANADIAN HIT
[SOURCE: GovernemntHealthIT, AUTHOR: Bernie Monegain]
More than 30 organizations from across Canada are forming partnerships in a $15.5 million series of initiatives aimed at preventing chronic disease ­ a challenge that the United States is also tackling. Electronic health records play a critical role in Canada's plan. Canada's Minister of Health Leona Aglukkaq announced Feb. 3 the launch of seven innovative chronic-disease prevention programs, supported by $15.5 million from the Canadian Partnership Against Cancer, the Public Health Agency of Canada and the Heart and Stroke Foundation.
benton.org/node/32051 | GovernemntHealthIT
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EL SALVADOR SEEKS TO LOWER BASIC FIXED LINE FEE
[SOURCE: TeleGeography, AUTHOR: ]
El Salvador's congress is looking to amend Article 8 of the Law on Telecommunications to allow basic charges for fixed telephony lines to be based on costs rather than be inflation indexed, BNamericas reports. The state hopes the move will lower the basic monthly fixed line fee; according to a government statement, El Salvador has the highest rate in Central America at USD9.43 per month, followed by Guatemala (USD5.43), while Honduras has the lowest fee at USD2.10.
benton.org/node/32047 | TeleGeography
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OPEN-SOURCE REPOSITORY HITS 2,000 APPS
[SOURCE: ZDNet UK, AUTHOR: Tom Espiner]
An European Union platform for exchanging free and open-source code now offers more than 2,000 applications for use by public bodies in the region. The EU Open Source Observatory and Repository (Osor.eu) announced the milestone on Wednesday. "The federation of the 2,000th open-source project is an important milestone for Osor and a proof of its value," said Francisco García Morán, European Commission director of informatics, in a statement. "Furthermore, I am very happy to see the use of open-source progressing in public administrations."
benton.org/node/32046 | ZDNet UK
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CHINA HERALD BUST OF MAJOR HACKER RING
[SOURCE: The Wall Street Journal, AUTHOR: James T. Areddy]
China heralded a major bust of computer hackers to underscore its pledge to help enhance global online security, with state media saying officials had shut what they called the country's largest distributor of tools used in malicious Internet attacks. Three people were arrested on suspicion of making hacking tools available online, the state-run Xinhua news agency said on Monday. Their business, known as Black Hawk Safety Net, operated through the now-shuttered Web site 3800cc.com and generated around $1 million in income from its over 12,000 subscribers, the report said.
benton.org/node/32049 | Wall Street Journal
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CHINA PLANS ONLINE GAMBLING CRACKDOWN
[SOURCE: Reuters, AUTHOR: Emma-Graham Harrison]
China plans to crack down on the online gambling industry, including the banks and websites that support it, the Ministry of Public Security said. The campaign will "concentrate on investigating major and important cases of online gambling, knock out domestic and foreign groups that organize online gambling, and severely punish the criminal elements", the statement said. The crackdown, to be conducted between February and August, was agreed to by eight government bodies including the Supreme Court, Propaganda bureau, the Central Bank and the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology.
benton.org/node/32060 | Reuters
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IRAN'S RESISTANCE KEEPS UP CAT-AND-MOUSE WEB GAME
[SOURCE: Reuters, AUTHOR: Reza Derakhshi]
With their paths through the Internet increasingly blocked by government filters, Nooshin and her fellow Iranian opposition-supporters say their information on planned protests now comes in emails. They say they don't know who sends them. Internet messages have been circulating about possible rallies on February 11, when Iran marks the 31st anniversary of the Islamic revolution. But the climate in the Islamic Republic is much harder than before last year's post-election protests. Last June, social media sites were hailed in the West as promising opposition supporters an anonymous rallying ground -- especially when they were accessed via proxy servers that could mask participants' actions and whereabouts. For determined Iranians now, they are a high-risk tactic in a strategic game with the authorities, amid reports of mounting Internet disruption. Almost 32 percent of Iranians use the Internet and nearly 59 percent have a cellphone subscription, according to 2008 estimates from the International Telecommunications Union.
benton.org/node/32059 | Reuters
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