New America

New America's Open Technology Institute (OTI) sent recommendations to the FCC on the “broadband nutrition label,” a standardized form that clearly discloses the price and terms of internet service plans. OTI submitted the following comments and recommendations:

We need to shift the narrative around digital equity. Top of mind for many participants were the very ways we talk about and define digital equity—and how it shapes and sustains the larger systemic challenges we see play out in school systems. Inequitable funding formulas, digital redlining, and biased, eurocentric curriculum, for example, all contribute incrementally to inequitable educational experiences.

Do you have concerns about whether students and families in your community or school have adequate, consistent access to the internet and digital devices?

The conversation around 5G usually fails to address how it will likely exacerbate the already deep digital divide.

If Congress passes comprehensive privacy legislation, it will need to delegate a federal agency to enforce the law and conduct rulemaking. The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has used its general consumer protection authority to bring enforcement actions against companies violating user privacy, and has therefore been considered the de facto privacy agency. However, three bills have challenged this assumption and would create a new agency to enforce privacy law rather than relying on the FTC. This report compares the new agencies in three legislative proposals to one another and to the FTC.

Today’s USTelecom report is the latest in a spate of flawed and deeply conflicted research from internet service providers on the price of their own service. It is curious that USTelecom would rely on third-party surveys rather than get the pricing data directly from its ISP members. If internet service is as affordable as USTelecom claims, ISPs could prove it by disclosing their pricing data to the Federal Communications Commission.

Is our practice of dumping the proceeds from the privatization of the public airwaves into the federal treasury, as is now routinely done, the best use of this precious public resource? No. The nation should dedicate a sizable share of spectrum auction proceeds to closing these digital equity gaps and should establish a reliable, proven vehicle to pursue this task. An endowed, independent, and private charitable foundation would best have the flexibility, research focus, long-term time perspective, and ability to engage other partners that such a mission will require.