Revere Digital

Comcast has some explaining to do about its Internet policies, thanks to a massive new data request from federal regulators looking into the cable giant’s deal to acquire Time Warner Cable.

It took Federal Communications Commission staff 29 pages to list the 93 questions and requests for data they want from Comcast for their review of the deal.

Seventeen of the questions or data requests in the FCC’s inquiry were related to Comcast’s use of data caps, traffic management, middle-mile Internet interconnection deals and network neutrality policies as well as data related to complaints from Netflix and Level 3 about Comcast.

The companies have until September 11 to provide the data to the agency.

AT&T has developed “Cascade,” which routes a wireless subscriber’s calls and messages to an array of devices -- flowing from a smartphone to a wearable device to the car.

Theoretically, you would be able to leave your smartphone at home while jogging with your smartwatch or wearable and still remain in touch.

Community Health Systems, which operates 206 hospitals in 29 states, most of them in rural communities, said that it suffered a data breach affecting the personal information of some 4.5 million patients.

In a regulatory filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission, the company said it was attacked during April and June of 2014 by an “Advanced Persistent Threat” group believed to be operating out of China. Once it detected the attack, Community Health said it hired Mandiant, a unit of the security company FireEye, to investigate the incident.

Overtime, wage and other violations were found at two facilities in China operated by one of Apple’s suppliers, Quanta, according to a new report from the Fair Labor Association.

The non-profit organization conducted inspections of plants in Shanghai and Changshu in August 2013, and interviewed hundreds of workers. The longest consecutive work period stretched to 16 days, without a break.

[Commentary] The cable TV business hit an important milestone in July: It turned into the Internet business. For the first time ever, the biggest cable TV providers has begun selling more broadband subscriptions than video subscriptions, according to a new tally from Leichtman Research Group.

This is directionally important. The future for the pay TV guys isn’t selling you pay TV -- it’s selling you access to data pipes, and pay TV will be one of the things you use those pipes for.

T-Mobile clarified that it has no plans to broadly throttle its unlimited data customers, but is reaching out to a small number of customers using the service in violation of company policies.

In particular, T-Mobile is calling people using the service to run a full-time Web camera or a server, or using their phones for large-scale peer-to-peer file sharing, to let them know that such practices aren’t allowed. That memo, T-Mobile’s Chief Marketing Officer Mike Sievert said, was misinterpreted by some to mean some sort of broad throttling of heavy users.

He stressed that for customers paying for totally unlimited service on their phone, T-Mobile means unlimited.

[Commentary] The United States added 209,000 jobs in July, the Labor Department unveiled. But don’t pop the champagne cork just yet. Job openings are staying open because there are not enough qualified applicants to fill them.

Beyond STEM fields of science, technology, engineering, art and math, we must find common-denominator skills that all employees should have, regardless of the industry. This is why an increasing number of industry leaders are paying attention to a highly promising and scalable approach called Deeper Learning.

Deeper Learning focuses on a range of knowledge and skills that include mastery of core academic content, critical thinking and problem solving, collaboration, effective communication, self-directed learning, and acquisition of an “academic mindset”

[Joseph is Senior Director of Worldwide Education, Autodesk]

A Q&A with Kunal Bahl, CEO of the fast-growing Indian shopping site Snapdeal.

Bahl discussed Amazon, government regulation and the Indian mobile shopping revolution. "You don’t want them [government regulators] to introduce regulations which are onerous for the industry. I don’t think it’ll happen,” he said. However, he said that Snapdeal’s main competitor, Amazon, is only allowed to sell to third parties in India.

Bahl says Snapdeal’s annual gross merchandise volume run rate has hit $1 billion and sales on mobile phones account for 60 percent of Snapdeal’s GMV. Howver, Bahl thinks that within the next 12 months, mobile sales will go up to 75 percent as user gain more trust in mobile commerce.

A California bill that would require cellphone makers to install a “kill switch” to render stolen devices inoperable has passed the state legislature, and now moves to the governor’s office for consideration.

The bill won Senate approval by a vote of 27-8. If Gov Jerry Brown (D-CA) signs the bill, it would be among the first such laws in the nation.

CBS is working on shows that you won’t see on CBS. Instead, the plan is for you to see them on the Internet, via video services like Netflix or Amazon’s Prime Instant Video.

If that happens, it means CBS will have opened up a new revenue source: In addition to selling its reruns to Netflix and its competitors, it will also be selling them brand-new shows those services can stream exclusively.