BENTON'S COMMUNICATIONS-RELATED HEADLINES for WEDNESDAY SEPTEMBER 24, 2008
ELECTIONS & MEDIA
Cell Phones and the 2008 Vote: An Update
McCain-Palin Love-Hate Media
Deregulated Media And Our Endless Campaign "Silly Season"
How the Media Have Handled Palin's Religious Faith
Ad Bounty Hasn't Arrived
Candidates Pitch on Sports Networks
Talked-About Ads Were Seldom Aired
INTERNET/BROADBAND
How IT could have prevented the financial meltdown
Net-Enabled Appliances Can Save Energy
Internet callers may see price hike
Confirmed: The blogosphere is mainstream
BROADCASTING/CABLE
Digital TV transition concerns get technical
Inouye Urges Agencies to Redouble DTV Transition Efforts
Media Cos. Plug Product Placement at FCC
Study: Gay TV characters on the rise
MEDIA OWNERSHIP
The Financial Meltdown & Media Deregulation Connection
DOJ lays out concerns to Yahoo and Google, no lawsuit threats yet
Antitrust group urges limits on Google, Yahoo deal
Google Android is about advertising, not the enterprise
Yahoo clears path for AOL talks
Music industry online royalty disputes
MEDIA & CHILDREN
Martin: Voluntary Ad Efforts Not Enough
FTC Testifies on Report Regarding Food Marketing to Children and Adolescents
WIRELESS
Why DC Lobbyists Fear 'White Spaces'
Wireless carriers trying to block free broadband
Open-access proponents point fingers
Lawmakers question FCC Chairman Martin on Public Safety Spectrum Auction
QUICKLY -- Google, Internet Users Push Back Against U.S. Copyright Treaty; FCC No Longer Inquiring About Interactive TV; Obama's call for change impacts language, TV; Digital debate: Prepare kids for exams or life?
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ELECTIONS & MEDIA
CELL PHONES AND THE 2008 VOTE: AN UPDATE
[SOURCE: Pew Research Center for the People & the Press, AUTHOR: Scott Keeter, Michael Dimock, Leah Christian]
Current polling in the 2008 presidential election shows a very tight race between Democrat Barack Obama and Republican John McCain. In part because of the strong support Obama is attracting among younger voters, and as the number of Americans who are reachable only by cell phones rises, interest continues to grow in the question of whether public opinion polls that do not include cell phones are accurately measuring the relative levels of support for the two candidates. The Pew Research Center for the People & the Press has conducted three major election surveys with both cell phone and landline samples since the conclusion of the primaries. In each of the surveys, there were only small, and not statistically significant, differences between presidential horserace estimates based on the combined interviews and estimates based on the landline surveys only. Yet a virtually identical pattern is seen across all three surveys: In each case, including cell phone interviews resulted in slightly more support for Obama and slightly less for McCain, a consistent difference of two-to-three points in the margin.
http://benton.org/node/17217
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MCCAIN-PALIN LOVE-HATE MEDIA
[SOURCE: Benton Foundation, AUTHOR: Kevin Taglang]
The McCain-Palin campaign seems to be at war with the media. On Monday, John McCain's senior adviser Steve Schmidt slammed the New York Times as nothing more than a partisan rag. Schmidt might want to break the news to Steve Duprey, the McCain adviser who scurries at many campaign stops to get copies of it for the candidate and his top aides. He might also want to break the news to McCain himself, who has enjoyed a very friendly relationship with the paper and many of its biggest stars -- as recently as 24 hours before the Schmidt attack. The McCain campaign also complained about being called "liars," asking the media to scrutinize specific elements of Sen Barack Obama's record. But the call was so rife with simple, often inexplicable misstatements of fact that it may have had the opposite effect: to deepen the perception, dangerous to McCain, that he and his aides have little regard for factual accuracy. Then on Tuesday, the traveling press was informed that reporters would be banned from covering Gov Sarah Palin's meeting in New York with world leaders; only photographers and a TV crew were to be allowed in. The move appeared designed to ensure that Palin, who has faced only two interviews since becoming the GOP Veep candidate would face no questions. CNN decided to yank its crew in protest, a major blow to the McCain campaign's efforts to get TV coverage of this highly stage-managed moment. The Associated Press also apparently objected, as did other networks. According to The New York Times, the campaign subsequently relented and decided to let in a producer. But that left print reporters out in the cold.
http://benton.org/node/17208
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DEREGULATED MEDIA AND OUR ENDLESS CAMPAIGN "SILLY SEASON"
[SOURCE: The Huffington Post, AUTHOR: Sarah O'Leary]
[Commentary] As a democracy, the U.S. government guarantees us the right to "free and fair" elections. Ideally, every licensed voter can cast a ballot without fear of harm or reprisal, and all votes are counted. But this certainly isn't all that there is to a free and fair election. Our government, through the unconscionable complacency of the deregulated Federal Communications Commission (FCC), the Federal Elections Commission (FEC), the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and Congress has derailed our right to fair elections well before we pull the curtain to cast our votes. The roles played by broadcasters and political advertisers in the months leading up to the first Tuesday in November are critical to the legitimate execution of our political process. Thanks to the blatant and careless airing of false advertising and broadcaster retreat from journalistic responsibilities, the American people are denied the fundamental democratic principle of free and fair elections. If citizens are fed half-truths and lies, the outcome of the election process certainly cannot be considered fair.
http://benton.org/node/17207
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HOW THE MEDIA HAVE HANDLED PALIN'S RELIGIOUS FAITH
[SOURCE: Project for Excellence in Journalism, AUTHOR: Jesse Holcomb]
Who is Sarah Palin? The question has dominated campaign coverage in the weeks since her nomination as John McCain's running mate. In the mainstream media at least, the answer has focused almost as much on her family life as on her public record. But despite that focus, and the debate over her beliefs, coverage of her religious background and beliefs has often been a peripheral element in the story. These are among the findings of the Pew Research Center's Project for Excellence in Journalism and Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life, which examined front-page and lead stories among top print, television, radio and online news media. Many news stories have raised Palin's religion, and its implications, as part of her profile, but quite often, in-depth reporting of Palin's religious biography have only been included as details below the lead. Even the media's coverage of her personal life -- including her choice to give birth to a baby with Down syndrome -- did not translate into analysis of the policy implications of her values or in-depth consideration of the belief system that informs her choices.
http://benton.org/node/17206
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AD BOUNTY HASN'T ARRIVED
[SOURCE: TVWeek, AUTHOR: Ira Teinowitz]
As the presidential campaigns wage war over the economy, they're starting to dump advertising revenue on broadcast stations and cable systems. But surprisingly, the widely anticipated massive increase in individual market spending hasn't materialized. Broadcasters in several battleground states say the presidential campaign is generating significant revenue—especially in a down economy—but they've been a little surprised and disappointed so far. "It's not the tsunami that many thought would occur," said Bob Bee, director of sales for Hearst-Argyle's WTAE-TV in Pittsburgh. Evan Tracey, chief operating officer of TNS Media Intelligence's Campaign Media Analysis Group, noted that even with a sluggish start to the fall campaigns, the $3 billion in political spending he anticipates from all candidates and for all issues for this election is $600 million or 25% more than the $2.4 billion spent last time. Tracey said $180 million has been spent on 337,000 airings of political commercials since the middle of June, with the Obama campaign spending $70 million, the McCain campaign $63 million and the rest coming from other candidates or issues. Tracey said on average, $2.7 million a day is being spent on political ads. He said he now anticipates the $3 billion will be the maximum rather than the minimum, as had been thought.
http://benton.org/node/17205
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CANDIDATES PITCH ON SPORTS NETWORKS
[SOURCE: Wall Street Journal, AUTHOR: Sam Schechner]
Regional sports networks are becoming an attractive venue for candidates to reach swing voters. The amounts the campaigns are spending on regional sports networks are still tiny when compared with the hundreds of millions of dollars being dedicated to TV advertising across the board. It's likely regional sports networks have pulled in well under $10 million in election ads, according to estimates from people familiar with their political sales. Nevertheless, regional sports networks offer unusually ardent audiences. Their viewers usually watch live so they don't zap commercials. Most of them are men, a difficult demographic for any marketer to reach. And they may be swing voters, too. More viewers of Fox Sports Net, for instance, are "middle of the road" politically compared with most other cable networks, according to Mediamark Research & Intelligence.
http://benton.org/node/17216
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TALKED-ABOUT ADS WERE SELDOM AIRED
[SOURCE: Washington Post, AUTHOR: Howard Kurtz]
Sen. John McCain received considerable publicity for a television ad accusing his Democratic opponent of having "lashed out at Sarah Palin, dismissed her as good-looking . . . then desperately called Sarah Palin a liar. How disrespectful." In the two weeks after the Republican convention, the commercial aired seven times. Sen Barack Obama drew substantial media attention for a spot declaring: "John McCain is hardly a maverick. . . . Sarah Palin's no maverick, either. She was for the 'Bridge to Nowhere' before she was against it. Politicians lying about their records." During the same period, that commercial aired eight times. In the two-week period that ended Sunday, the McCain campaign released 25 ads, 12 of which aired fewer than 25 times. The Obama campaign released 28 ads, 11 of which aired fewer than 25 times. "They've smartly figured out that there's news of the day, and by feeding the content beast that is cable news and the blogosphere, they're getting out their unfiltered take on the news of the day," said Evan Tracey of TNS Media Intelligence/Campaign Media Analysis Group, which compiled the figures. Given the media's hunger for controversy, he said, "the campaigns are the enabling girlfriend." By contrast, McCain's most frequently aired spot during this period, casting him and Alaska Gov. Palin as the "original mavericks," aired 15,938 times. Obama's top spot, detailing the lobbying records of senior McCain aides, ran 14,809 times.
http://benton.org/node/17215
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INTERNET/BROADBAND
HOW IT COULD HAVE PREVENTED THE FINANCIAL MELTDOWN
[SOURCE: InfoWorld, AUTHOR: Ephraim Schwartz]
In the coming weeks the feds and the surviving financial services institutions will have the daunting task of unraveling all the securitized loans and other instruments that are hiding the toxic investments. But does the technology exist to do that? And if so, could it have been used to prevent the bad debt from hitting the fan in the first place? The fact is that despite government regulations like Sarbanes-Oxley, there is little visibility mandated by current regulations into the origination of loans and how they are broken up, resold, and resold again. Not only could those mortgages be sold to other banks, but they could be divided into five, 10, or 20 slices and resold to five to 10 different organizations, making it difficult to track who was involved and who ended up taking the risk. Had these financial services companies and banks established business intelligence metrics as to the ratios of what kind of debt they were holding versus the cash reserves they held, their analytics systems might have driven alerts earlier in the process, says Michael Corcoran, a product manager at the BI provider Information Builders. But as anyone in business already knows, consolidating that kind of data to get those answers more often than not is a slow process that typically ends up being done manually in an Excel spreadsheet well after the fact.
http://benton.org/node/17214
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NET-ENABLED APPLIANCES CAN SAVE ENERGY
[SOURCE: BusinessWeek, AUTHOR: Celeste LeCompte]
The idea of using the Internet to cut energy use is gaining traction, with a number of startups launching online energy dashboards and in-home displays that supply information about how much you're using and at what cost. Information is power, they argue, and the research proves them right. One British study found that energy management systems can help cut residential electricity use by as much as 15%. Most of the products currently on the market require consumers to react to the information provided, either through timed schedules or immediate actions: High prices? Don't run the dryer. Critical peak period? Run down to the basement and turn down the water heater. But for monitoring systems to really pack an energy-savings punch, the information needs to be instantly actionable, with limited input required by the end user. That's where your Web-surfing refrigerator comes in.
http://benton.org/node/17211
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INTERNET CALLERS MAY SEE PRICE HIKE
[SOURCE: The Wichita Eagle, AUTHOR: Dion Lefler]
Phone customers who make calls through the Internet in Kansas may see higher bills come January. On Monday, the Kansas Corporation Commission issued an order requiring voice-over-Internet-protocol services -- also known as VoIP -- to kick into a state fund that assures phone service is available to everyone, especially hard-to-serve rural areas. Customers of regular phone companies have paid the Kansas universal service charge for years, but Internet phone providers haven't until now. The commission order requires VoIP companies to pay 4.65 percent of their Kansas revenue to the fund --the same as traditional phone companies pay. The VoIP companies can absorb the cost or pass it on to customers in a bill charge, said commission spokeswoman Rosemary Foreman. Because VoIP companies operate outside state regulation, no one knows how many Kansas customers they have, said Sandy Reams, managing auditor for the commission. She estimated that VoIP companies make about $35 million a year in Kansas. She estimated their universal service payments will be about $1.6 million.
http://benton.org/node/17188
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CONFIRMED: THE BLOGOSPHERE IS MAINSTREAM
[SOURCE: C-Net|News.com, AUTHOR: Dan Farber]
With nearly 1,000,000 posts a day, the blogosphere is overflowing with content and now fully established as a mainstream rather than fringe phenomenon. Traditional media have adopted blogs as a complementary form of content to the traditional news and feature stories. According to Techhnorati's latest report on the state of the blogosphere, many bloggers are making money. Technorati surveyed a sample of about 1,000 bloggers and found that the mean annual revenue for advertising is $6,000, but sites with 100,000 or more unique visitors are generating more than $75,000 in revenue.
http://benton.org/node/17187
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BROADCASTING/CABLE
DIGITAL TV TRANSITION CONCERNS GET TECHNICAL
[SOURCE: Associated Press, AUTHOR: John Dunbar]
Even if all goes smoothly, next February's digital television shift is likely to generate hundreds of thousands of complaints from television viewers around the country. A smaller digital footprint may affect as many as 15 percent of television markets in the US. The Federal Communications Commission is still calculating what impact that may have nationwide. It's not certain what -- if anything -- the FCC or broadcasters can do for affected viewers, short of recommending that they buy a bigger antenna.
http://benton.org/node/17204
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INOUYE URGES AGENCIES TO REDOUBLE DTV TRANSITION EFFORTS
[SOURCE: US Senate Commerce Committee]
With February 17, 2009 less than five months away, the Senate Commerce Committee held an oversight hearing to assess the Federal Communications Commission and the National Telecommunications Information Administration's efforts to promote broadcaster and consumer preparedness, as well as the recent test pilot in Wilmington, North Carolina. Committee Chairman Daniel Inouye (D-Hawaii) expressed concern about a possible flood of coupon requests and calls that we can expect just before and after the transition. He also said a failed transition should not be something a President Obama or president mccain has to deal with in just the 29th day of their term. FCC Chairman Kevin Martin said the commission had learned some things from its early analog shutoff in Wilmington which would help it going forward, including taking steps to fix issues with changing TV-station coverage areas and putting more emphasis on helping viewers to set up the boxes, scan for the new channels and understand what antenna issues they may have. But he agreed with Inouye that Congress had not provided sufficient funding for transition education, saying that the FCC needed at least $20 million more. Inouye said he would try to make sure the FCC gets the extra money. NTIA acting head Meredith Attwell Baker outlined progress in sending out DTV-to-analog converter-box coupons and its request for more money to administer the program given the expected "surge" in coupon requests as the deadline approaches. The Government Accountability Office also reprised its findings from last week's House hearing that the government may not have done enough to prevent some folks from losing their TV picture Feb. 17, 2009, when the national DTV switch occurs, or to plan for the coupon surge.
http://benton.org/node/17203
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MEDIA COS PLUG PRODUCT PLACEMENT AT FCC
[SOURCE: Broadcasting&Cable, AUTHOR: John Eggerton]
Saying that product placement is here to stay, is growing and is integral to the survival of free ad-supported media in a multiplatform environment that has already put the 15- and 30-second ad in jeopardy, a mix of big media companies, broadcast groups and advertisers got together to tell the Federal Communications Commission not to adopt any new policies on enhanced sponsorship identification or product placement. In a filing in the FCC's inquiry into sponsorship-identification rules and embedded advertising, the companies and associations, together dubbing themselves the National Media Providers, argued Monday that the boost in product placement should not result in a boost in FCC rules. They argued that the FCC lacks jurisdiction in one case and justification in all cases, and that, legally speaking, product placement isn't even advertising but more akin to the sponsorship IDs in noncommercial shows.
http://benton.org/node/17213
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STUDY: GAY TV CHARACTERS ON THE RISE
[SOURCE: Associated Press, AUTHOR: ]
Broadcast television will have 16 gay and bisexual regular characters in prime-time series this fall, more than double the seven of a year ago, a new study has found.
The Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation said it was a positive sign of networks making their shows more representative, although more work needed to be done. These characters accounted for 2.6 percent of all the regular characters in TV series, up from 1.1 percent last year and 1.3 percent in 2006, according to the study.
http://benton.org/node/17210
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MEDIA OWNERSHIP
THE FINANCIAL MELTDOWN & MEDIA DEREGULATION CONNECTION
[SOURCE: Digital Destiny, AUTHOR: Jeff Chester]
[Commentary] Much of journalism has a `deer-caught-in-the-headlights' quality as it reports on the current fiscal crisis. Why was this issue off the radar screen for so many reporters and producers? Part of it is that the very system that underlies professional reporting is connected (and funded) by the very forces that have helped wreck the economy. But over the last ten years, journalism in the U.S. has undergone a further serious deterioration, with its ranks thinned. Investigative reporting is on the endangered professions list (with investment bankers perhaps now joining that list as well). Media consolidation has helped play a role here, further contributing to a news culture where reporters and their parent news organizations really don't spend time examining beneath the surface of events. All the media mergers we have witnessed since the 1996 Telecom Act has decimated newsrooms, slashed news budgets, and has left journalism on life support (at best).
http://benton.org/node/17202
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DOJ LAYS OUT CONCERNS TO YAHOO AND GOOGLE, NO LAWSUIT THREATS YET
[SOURCE: C-Net|News.com, AUTHOR: Dawn Kawamoto]
Federal antitrust regulators have clearly laid out their concerns to Yahoo and Google regarding their controversial search advertising agreement, but discussions of potential remedies have yet to come up, according to a source familiar with the discussions. Antitrust regulators with the Department of Justice have largely narrowed their concerns into two buckets, one centering on the potential affect on advertising pricing in the short run and to what extent there would be a negative impact on the industry, and the second being will the agreement eventually lead to Yahoo exiting the search advertising business altogether, the source noted. Currently, the parties are discussing those concerns, but the conversations have not yet migrated to a point where the DOJ is saying they are illegal and the agency is contemplating filing a lawsuit to block the partnership, the source said. In most cases, once the DOJ indicates it may file a lawsuit, the agency leaves it up to the companies to suggest possible remedies to mitigate regulators' concerns, said the source. Yahoo and Google have not offered up any potential remedies to mitigate the DOJ's concerns, according to the source. Within the coming weeks, it will be clear whether such action is needed.
http://benton.org/node/17201
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ANTITRUST GROUP URGES LIMITS ON GOOGLE, YAHOO DEAL
[SOURCE: Reuters, AUTHOR: Diane Bartz]
Google and Yahoo's deal to let Google place some ads on Yahoo's search pages, which the Justice Department is reviewing, should be allowed with limits, the American Antitrust Institute said on Tuesday. Because the search advertising market is already extremely concentrated with Google by far the dominant firm, the institute argued that consumers would be best served if No. 2 Yahoo remained independent. "Prohibiting Yahoo from using Google ads could result in Yahoo's acquisition by Microsoft, which would effectively remove Yahoo from the market," wrote Norman Hawker, who teaches at Western Michigan University and is a fellow at the AAI.
http://benton.org/node/17200
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GOOGLE ANDROID IS ABOUT ADVERTISING, NOT THE ENTERPRISE
[SOURCE: InfoWorld, AUTHOR: Nancy Gohring]
Even though three companies hosted the launch event and the software is backed by a consortium, the introduction of the first Android phone made it very clear that Android is about one company: Google. Android is Google's attempt to dominate the mobile advertising market, just as it has dominated the online PC advertising market, said Craig Wigginton, industry leader for Deloitte's telecommunications practice. "Their number-one driver for pushing this is the advertising model," he said. But in order to grab a major share of the mobile advertising market, Google will have to convince a large number of people -- including business users -- to buy Android phones. That's a significant challenge in the increasingly crowded mobile phone market.
http://benton.org/node/17199
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YAHOO CLEARS PATH FOR AOL TALKS
[SOURCE: Financial Times, AUTHOR: Richard Waters]
Yahoo's new board on Tuesday cleared the way for a fresh round of discussions with Time Warner over the future of its AOL unit, potentially reigniting negotiations for a combination of the two Internet businesses that stalled earlier this year. The green light for the talks came as Yahoo's directors met for the first time since activist investor Carl Icahn was granted access to the boardroom. Mr Icahn and two allies, former Viacom boss Frank Biondi and former Nextel head Frank Chapple, were given seats at the board table as part of a settlement to head off a revolt at the Internet company's last shareholder meeting.
http://benton.org/node/17212
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MUSIC INDUSTRY GROUPS SETTLE SOME ONLINE ROYALTY DISPUTES (BUT NOT THE BIG ONE OVER RADIO)
[SOURCE: Los Angeles Times, AUTHOR: Jim Puzzanghera]
The different parts of the music industry are in harmony, at least when it comes to some online royalties. In an agreement hailed as a "breakthrough that will facilitate new ways to offer music to consumers online," groups representing songwriters, music publishers, record labels and digital music websites have ended a seven-year dispute over two types of music royalties. Unfortunately, neither of those is the controversial performance royalty for Internet radio. That remains the subject of a high-stakes stalemate between SoundExchange, which collects the fees for artists and record companies, and Internet radio sites such as Pandora and Live365. The agreement resolves some contentious issues that were the subject of a six-month trial earlier this year before the Copyright Royalty Board, a group of judges charged by Congress with tackling these disputes. The groups -- the Digital Media Assn., the National Music Publishers' Assn., the Recording Industry Assn. of America, the Nashville Songwriters Assn. International, and the Songwriters Guild of America -- have agreed on so-called "mechanical royalties" for interactive streaming music and limited music downloads. It's all pretty complicated, but the groups said the deal should help lead to more cutting-edge music services.
http://benton.org/node/17198
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MEDIA & CHILDREN
MARTIN: VOLUNTARY AD EFFORTS NOT ENOUGH
[SOURCE: Federal Communications Commission]
Federal Communications Commission Chairman Kevin Martin testified before the Senate Committee on Appropriations Subcommittees on Labor, Health and Human Services, and Education, and Related Agencies and Financial Services and General Government. The subject was marketing food products to children. Chairman Martin said that the Joint Task Force on Media and Childhood Obesity succeeded in producing some significant voluntary commitments aimed at reducing the negative impact of the media on children's eating habits and increasing its positive influence on their behavior, ultimately it did not reach an agreement on two key issues: 1) a uniform standard of what constitutes healthy versus unhealthy foods; and 2) the willingness of most media companies to place any limit on the advertising of unhealthy foods on children's programs. While it was Martin's hope that the government would not have to resort to actual requirements, and he strongly encouraged the media companies to propose some voluntary limitations on advertising targeting our children, in the end no widespread voluntary commitment on behalf of the media industry was forthcoming. He concluded, "On the voluntary side, I am left to conclude that, sadly, no limit was even close to being presented." FTC Commissioner Jon Leibowitz testified that the report, Marketing Food to Children and Adolescents: A Review of Industry Expenditures, Activities, and Self-Regulation, found 44 major food and beverage marketers spent $1.6 billion to promote their products to children under 12 and adolescents ages 12 to 17 in the United States in 2006. The FTC recommends that all food and beverage companies adopt and adhere to meaningful nutrition-based standards for marketing their products to children under 12.
http://benton.org/node/17197
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FTC TESTIFIES ON REPORT REGARDING FOOD MARKETING TO CHILDREN AND ADOLESCENTS
http://benton.org/node/17196
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WIRELESS
WHY DC LOBBYISTS FEAR 'WHITE SPACES'
[SOURCE: The Huffington Post, AUTHOR: Timothy Karr]
[Commentary] What if I told you we could use empty TV channels to connect millions of people to the Internet? The technology exists to do just that. But a powerful corporate lobby is standing in the way with a multimillion-dollar misinformation campaign aimed at Congress and the Federal Communications Commission. This month and next Washington will face a critical choice: Use new technology to open the Internet for everyone, or side with the lobbyists and prevent millions from getting connected. This latest front in the battle over the future of the Internet is about "white spaces" -- empty frequencies between TV channels on the public airwaves. Unless we urge Congress and the FCC to push back against industry and open up white spaces, Washington could side with the lobbyists and deny us one of our last, best opportunities to build a better Internet. It's a familiar story. Big media companies use any means possible to squash new ideas that threaten their control over information. It's time we changed that status quo and opened up white spaces for everyone. Paper has been flying at the Federal Communications Commission since its technicians traveled to Seattle three weeks ago to determine whether wireless Internet activity on an unused block of airwaves would cause interference in an adjacent swath owned primarily by T-Mobile USA. The problem is that the FCC hasn't weighed in on the results, leaving parties on both sides scrambling to offer competing interpretations. T-Mobile, a unit of Deutsche Telekom, says wireless Internet activity on the now-fallow channels would cripple its own wireless network, causing dropped calls and wide coverage holes for subscribers in densely populated areas. M2Z Networks Inc., a startup that wants to use the airwaves for nationwide free Internet service, says that with reasonable standards, interference on T- Mobile's network would be so minimal it wouldn't be noticed.
http://benton.org/node/17195
Interference Queries Unanswered In FCC's Free Net Proposal
INTERFERENCE QUERIES UNANSWERED IN FCC'S FREE NET PROPOSAL
http://benton.org/node/17193
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WIRELESS CARRIERS TRYING TO BLOCK FREE BROADBAND
[SOURCE: InfoWorld, AUTHOR: Grant Gross]
Mobile telephone service providers are trying to block a plan to create a free, nationwide wireless broadband network by insisting on protections from interference that would make it impossible to deliver wireless broadband, according to the company proposing the network. Mobile carriers, led by T-Mobile, are insisting on interference protections for their existing spectrum that goes beyond any current protections and would disqualify several widely used products that currently emit low levels of energy in the radio spectrum, including microwave ovens and Wi-Fi equipment, said officials with M2Z Networks, a startup that proposed building a free wireless network on unused spectrum. The two sides are now arguing about the interference questions before the U.S. Federal Communications Commission, which has released its own proposal to auction spectrum for a free, nationwide network. Mobile carriers don't want a free broadband network that would compete with their own services, John Muleta, M2Z's CEO, said at a Monday press briefing previewing an M2Z filing to the FCC.
http://benton.org/node/17194
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OPEN-ACCESS PROPONENTS POINT FINGERS
[SOURCE: RCR Wireless News, AUTHOR: Jeffrey Silva]
The open-access policy debate, which raged last year and then curiously subsided after Federal Communications Commission Chairman Kevin Martin said the agency should not force wireless networks to give unfettered access to third-party devices and applications, is once again alive. The issue appears to have been re-energized by a confluence of forces, though there is little indication the cellphone industry -- whose largest players have vowed to loosen their iron-clad grip on networks -- is losing any ground in its campaign to fend off a wholesale open-access mandate.
http://benton.org/node/17192
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LAWMAKERS QUESTION FCC CHAIRMAN MARTIN ON PUBLIC SAFETY SPECTRUM AUCTION
[SOURCE: House of Representatives Commerce Committee]
Reps John Dingell (D-MI), Ed Markey (D-MA) and Jane Harman (D-CA) have written Federal Communications Commission Chairman Kevin Martin about the D-block/700 MHz spectrum auction. The lawmakers are concerned that 1) the public has too little to review and comment on proposed rules for the auction and 2) the proposed rules lean toward a national license instead of regional ones.
http://benton.org/node/17191
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QUICKLY
GOOGLE, INTERNET USERS PUSH BACK AGAINST US COPYRIGHT TREATY
[SOURCE: Bloomberg News, AUTHOR: Mark Drajem]
Internet companies led by Google Inc. joined groups representing Web users in challenging the Bush administration's bid to toughen international enforcement against copyright pirates. Testifying before Commerce Department in Washington today, Google urged the U.S. to exclude from a proposed treaty provisions on the sale of copyrighted movies and music on the Internet. The administration is negotiating the treaty with the European Union, Japan and other nations. The companies said the U.S. courts and Congress are still working out the correct balance between protecting copyrights and the free exchange of information on the Web and a treaty could be counterproductive. They also said their views deserve equal consideration with those of the movie and recording industries.
http://benton.org/node/17190
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FCC NO LONGER INQUIRING ABOUT INTERACTIVE TV
[SOURCE: Light Reading, AUTHOR: Jeff Baumgartner]
The Federal Communications Commission has formally terminated a Notice of Inquiry that sought comment and information about the emerging interactive television (ITV) market amid fears that the cable industry might somehow discriminate against competing applications. The FCC inquiry was triggered in 2001 following the merger of AOL and Time Warner and the subsequent launch of AOLTV, which didn't last long.
http://benton.org/node/17189
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OBAMA'S CALL FOR CHANGE IMPACTS LANGUAGE, TV
[SOURCE: Reuters, AUTHOR: Jill Serjeant]
"ObamaSpeak" -- encompassed by words such as "obamamentum," "obamabot," "obamacize," "obamarama" and "obamanation" -- has been the second-most-used catchphrase on U.S. television this past year, topped only by No. 1 word "Beijing" referencing the recent Olympics, according to a study from the Global Language Monitor released on Tuesday.
http://benton.org/node/17186
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DIGITAL DEBATE: PREPARE KIDS FOR EXAMS OR LIFE?
[SOURCE: eSchool News, AUTHOR: Laura Devaney]
An Australian educator's decision to let students use cell phones and the Internet during exams has prompted a global dialog about the nature of 21st-century assessment--and whether the definition of cheating should be changed in light of ubiquitous technology use.
http://benton.org/node/17185
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