BENTON'S COMMUNICATIONS-RELATED HEADLINES for TUESDAY, MARCH 9, 2010
America's Digital Inclusion Summit headlines a busy telecom policy day http://bit.ly/bGaQXo
NATIONAL BROADBAND PLAN
FCC broadband plan: It must spur competition
Networking the Green Economy: How Broadband and Related Technologies Can Build a Green Economic Future
FCC Has Legal Obligation to Preserve Free TV
The Economic Impact of Digital Exclusion
The poor care about broadband
THE STIMULUS
Treasury Department says broadband stimulus capital expenditures will not be counted as taxable gross income
See also: NARUC Asks For Clarification on Broadband Grant Tax Status
Stimulus Stories: Telecom veteran Evslin readies Vermont for Round 2 -- and Google
KeyOn Communications Drops in Value on Broadband Stimulus Rejection
MORE ON BROADBAND
The Reclassification Debate, Part II
Cisco: Internet to change forever Tuesday (place your bets!)
Tough Road for Google's Network
AGENDA
Boucher makes plans for telecom reform while ramping up re-election campaign
EDUCATION
National Education Technology Plan
Wide Web of diversions gets laptops evicted from lecture halls
TELEVISION/RADIO
Television Is Not Free and Does Not Want to Be
More Retrans Disputes On The Horizon
Disney May Pull ABC From Bigger Cable Rivals Next
FCC Tackles Backlog of Indecency Inquiries
FCC REFORM
Experts Review Reform and Standards at the FCC
GOVERNMENT & COMMUNICATIONS
White House tweeting spreads president's message
PRIVACY
Buzz + Latitude = A Minefield for Google | Why Google keeps your data forever, tracks you with ads
HEALTH
Consumers weigh in on top 10 meaningful use arguments
Family Physicians urge changes to meaningful use rule
STORIES FROM ABROAD
These headlines presented in partnership with:
Europe threatens web openness | UK next-gen broadband gets funding body | UK launches new body for universal broadband push | Antitrust tribunal orders Telefónica to unbundle broadband packages | Victoria expands Linux e-voting roll-out | Hospital networks key to e-health plan: Rudd's health reform | Google's Computing Power Betters Translation Tool | Google's digital library faces key hurdles | Patents' growing role in battle of mobile | Crunch Time for Health Care
MORE ONLINE
IT adds 25,000-plus jobs so far in 2010
Treasury Issues New General License to Boost Internet-Based Communication, Free Flow of Information in
Justice Department Requires Key Divestiture in Election Systems & Software/Premier Election Solutions Merger | ICANN CEO Blasts African Telecom Monopolies | Getting Older Without Getting Old | For the first time advertisers will spend more on digital than print | The new age of online grocery shopping
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NATIONAL BROADBAND PLAN
BROADBAND PLAN MUST SPUR COMPETITION
[SOURCE: The Christian Science Monitor, AUTHOR: Editorial staff]
What should the Federal Communications Commission's role in wider broadband adoption? Primarily, to encourage competition so that prices come down and service and speed improve. And, in a business where wireless connectivity is the rage, to make sure spectrum is available. It must also provide incentives for companies to connect to remote, rural areas. FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski has said the need is to "unleash investment, promote innovation, promote competition." His plan must do that.
benton.org/node/32976 | Christian Science Monitor, The
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NETWORKING FOR A GREEN ECONOMY
[SOURCE: Progressive States Network, AUTHOR: ]
The Progressive States Network, Communications Workers of America, Sierra Club and the Blue Green Alliance released a report that how smart buildings, smart grids, telehealth, teleconferencing, digital education -- all of which are part of a highly-networked economy -- will reduce carbon dioxide emissions, conserve energy resources, and promote and retain good, green jobs. The report notes that, according to The Climate Group, transforming the way people and businesses use technology can reduce U.S. carbon dioxide emissions by an estimated 13-22 percent by 2020, and potentially see gross energy and fuel savings of $140-$240 billion. This report, setting forth ideas, research and recommendations to achieve these goals, details three broad areas of energy savings from networked technology that can help achieve energy savings and environmental goals: smart grids to improve the transmission, management, and distribution of energy; smart technologies, like smart meters or other demand management tools that reduce energy use at home or office; and broadband-based services including telehealth, long-distance business communication, and e-commerce to reduce travel and associated fuel costs. The report offers several policy recommendations, including increasing access and addressing affordability of broadband technologies, supporting and promoting implementation of smart grids and devices, installing smart meters and implementing real-time pricing in a manner that protects consumers and strengthens the economy through the creation of green jobs, and adopting telehealth practices to decrease environmental impacts.
benton.org/node/32964 | Progressive States Network | Read the report
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FCC MUST PRESERVE FREE TV
[SOURCE: Broadcasting&Cable, AUTHOR: John Eggerton]
What if you started a voluntary spectrum reclamation program and everyone came? [Like you never asked yourself that before.] What if the Federal Communications Commission allowed broadcasters to give up their spectrum and every station in market decided to do so? FCC broadband plan spokesman Mark Wigfield says the commission, by law, has to ensure that some level of over-the-air service remains in each market. That means the commission, at least under current law, can't clear the broadcast band. It also means that not everyone who wants a buyout may get it.
benton.org/node/32961 | Broadcasting&Cable
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DIGITAL EXCLUSION STUDY
[SOURCE: Digital Impact Group, AUTHOR: Press release]
Digital Impact Group and Econsult Corporation have produced an assessment of the economic impact of digital exclusion in the US. The report quantifies costs associated with the significant proportion of the population that lacks high-speed Internet access at home, and estimates an annual cost to individuals, government and the nation of $55 billion. In the US, over 100 million individuals representing over 40 million households are unable to use high-speed Internet, or broadband, because they cannot access it, cannot afford it, do not know how to use it, or are not aware of its benefits. This "digital divide" is costly not only for those who lack computer access and skills, but for businesses, government, and the nation as a whole. The DIG/Econsult report develops a taxonomy of negative economic impacts associated with digital exclusion, articulates the mechanisms through which digital exclusion has adverse impacts, and qualitatively and quantitatively evaluates 11 categories of significant impact. For example, in the area of education, analysis focuses on increased earnings potential resulting from increased educational success made possible by broadband access. The estimate in the economic opportunity category accounts for increased job searching ability via the Internet, and greatly improved access to employment for the disabled, citing the vast proportion of companies that accept job applications online only. The report seeks to identify minimum likely levels of impact in each category. The estimates of all 11 categories of economic impact yield an aggregate estimate of the current cost of digital exclusion of over $55 billion per year. The cumulative figure does not directly account for a number of significant, albeit hard to quantify, considerations that are more diffuse in nature but are no less important. For example, the study notes but does not attempt to quantify the social and economic benefits of greater civic engagement, or the environmental impacts associated with the reductions in travel that result from online shopping. In these areas and more, as well as in those areas that were quantified, the report is intended to be the start of a conversation about the economic impact of digital exclusion. As such, it identifies aspects of the cost of digital exclusion that warrant further exploration and precision.
benton.org/node/32946 | Digital Impact Group | Read the report
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THE POOR CARE ABOUT BROADBAND
[SOURCE: ars technica, AUTHOR: Matthew Lasar]
There's an allegedly stubborn portion of the population -- mostly poor, rural, and older -- who don't use the Internet at all, because they supposedly don't care to do so. But a new study suggests that this community of broadband outsiders is rapidly disappearing from the landscape, particularly among low income Americans. "We found no such group," concludes the Social Science Research Council, "even among respondents with profound histories of marginalization -- the homeless, people with long-term disabilities, people recently released from lengthy prison sentences, non-English speakers from new immigrant communities, and residents of a rural community without electricity or running water. No one needed to be convinced of the importance of Internet use or of the value of broadband adoption in the home." It may be that SSRC's staff didn't find these blasé types because their sample size was much smaller than the National Telecommunications & Information Agency's recent survey of 'Net use (based on census queries of 54,000 households), or last year's Pew study concluding that two-thirds of those without broadband just don't want it. But the report -- "Broadband Adoption and Low Income Communities" -- is backed up with interviews that are of much greater depth than either of those previous studies. Produced for the Federal Communications Commission, the new study confirms the trend that the NTIA report hinted at: disinterest is taking a back seat to unaffordability, uncertainty, lack of equipment, and lack of skill. More worrisome is SSRC's identification of a new category in the broadband sociosphere: "un-adopters"—households that once had high speed Internet, then dropped the service because they could not afford it any more.
benton.org/node/32945 | Ars Technica
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THE STIMULUS
TREASURY ANSWERS
[SOURCE: Broadcasting&Cable, AUTHOR: John Eggerton]
The Treasury Department has told the National Telecommunications & Information Administration that some broadband grants will be tax deductible, and others won't. Generally, a corporation's gross income includes all income, including governmental grants, absent any exclusion. But there is an exclusion for grants for capital expenditures to be used solely for acquiring capital assets to expand the business and that also meet other criteria -- be used for working capital rather than compensation for service and be of commensurate benefit to the size of the grant. In that case, the grant is not counted as taxable gross income. But grant money used for operating expenses is taxable as gross income grant recipients will be able to deduct business expenses, operating losses and other deductions.
benton.org/node/32962 | Broadcasting&Cable
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MORE ON BROADBAND
BIG CISCO ANNOUNCEMENT
[SOURCE: ars technica, AUTHOR: Ken Fisher]
After the close of markets today, Cisco is expected to significant news which will "forever change the Internet and its impact on consumers, businesses and governments." Cisco has been rumored to be about to purchase almost every interesting company in the technology field over the last decade. One may feel tempted to think that Cisco wants to get in the bandwidth game, chasing after Google's recent announcement: a trial of open-access, fiber-to-the-home Internet service at speeds of 1Gbps in select locations. But Cisco claims that they have no interest in being a service provider.
benton.org/node/32973 | Ars Technica
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TOUGH ROAD FOR GOOGLE NET
[SOURCE: Wall Street Journal, AUTHOR: Ben Worthen]
Google last month said it would provide ultrahigh-speed Internet connections for up to 500,000 people in the US. Now the search giant must deal with the challenging part: building the network and making sure there are services available to take advantage of it. Since its ultrahigh-speed announcement last month, Google has reached out for advice to several communities such as Cleveland that have already embarked on such projects. Among other things, Google asked about the need to have online programs that prove the benefits of an ultrahigh-speed service, says Lev Gonick, chief information officer at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland. Google's outreach comes as it confronts the hurdles in building its ultrahigh-speed Internet network and services to go along with it. The company plans to target a small number of communities and says it may target as few as 50,000 households or as many as 500,000. But regardless, building such a network is a giant construction problem, with the cost potentially surpassing $1 billion if Google pursues the higher number, say people who have embarked on similar efforts. In addition, there isn't online content designed for people with such high-speed Internet connections, which could make the completed network underwhelming. "Beyond the cost issues and economic challenges in terms of what it takes to develop the infrastructure, to me one of the most significant barriers is that we don't have a vision of what we're missing and what [ultrahigh-speed Internet connections] will enable us to do," says Jim Baller, a Washington lawyer who is consulting with Google.
benton.org/node/32972 | Wall Street Journal
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AGENDA
BOUCHER'S 2010 AGENDA
[SOURCE: The Hill, AUTHOR: Kim Hart]
A Q&A with Rep Rick Boucher (D-VA). He has big plans this year. He wants to reform the nearly $8 billion-a-year fund to subsidize Internet services. He also wants to enact the first online privacy legislation. That's not all--he also wants to push the Spectrum Inventory Act through the House and hold a number of oversight hearings on the FCC's National Broadband Plan. All the while, Boucher will be campaigning against a Republican challenger for his seat. As chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on Communications, Technology and the Internet, he has a lot to accomplish in Washington while also defending the seat he has held for 28 years. He is the 10th most powerful member of the House, but he faces a tough race in southern Virginia. Republicans have attacked him for his support of cap-and-trade legislation, despite his district's roots in coal-mining. And critics say he has been in Washington so long he has lost touch with his constituency.
benton.org/node/32944 | Hill, The
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EDUCATION
DRAFT ED-TECH PLAN
[SOURCE: Department of Education, AUTHOR: ]
The plan calls for revolutionary transformation rather than evolutionary tinkering. It urges our education system at all levels to: 1) Be clear about the outcomes we seek, 2) Collaborate to redesign structures and processes for effectiveness, efficiency, and flexibility, 3) Continually monitor and measure our performance, and 4) Hold ourselves accountable for progress and results every step of the way. Just as technology is at the core of virtually every aspect of our daily lives and work, we must leverage it to provide engaging and powerful learning experiences, content, and resources and assessments that measure student achievement in more complete, authentic, and meaningful ways. Technology-based learning and assessment systems will be pivotal in improving student learning and generating data that can be used to continuously improve the education system at all levels. Technology will help us execute collaborative teaching strategies combined with professional learning that better prepare and enhance educators' competencies and expertise over the course of their careers. To shorten our learning curve, we can learn from other kinds of enterprises that have used technology to improve outcomes while increasing productivity. Julie Evans, CEO of the nonprofit organization Project Tomorrow, said the plan provides some "long-overdue recommendations" for how technology can enhance education. "The plan accurately sums up that hard realization that today's classroom environment for most students does not mirror they way they are living their lives outside of school or what they need to be prepared for future jobs, and that this disconnect is actually creating a relevancy crisis in American education," Evans said.
benton.org/node/32943 | Department of Education | Read the report | eSchoolNews
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TELEVISION/RADIO
TV DOES NOT WANT TO BE FREE
[SOURCE: New York Times, AUTHOR: Eduardo Porter]
[Commentary] The TV spats of the past few weeks -- between Cablevision and the Walt Disney Company over payments for ABC, and between Time Warner and the News Corporation over Fox -- suggest that the future lies in the opposite direction from free. Americans watch 153 hours of TV a month, on average, according to a Nielsen survey. On prime time, ABC has a 9 percent share. At $1 a month, a rough, back-of-the-envelope estimate (assuming families watch TV together) would suggest Disney wants, at most, 7 cents an hour from the average Cablevision subscriber to watch its shows. Compare that with today's price of TV. Cablevision's basic "family cable" package costs $55.95 a month, which works out at most to 37 cents an hour per home. That is cheap compared with the real price we pay for television: 18 minutes out of every hour that we are expected to spend watching ads. Those 18 minutes are much more valuable to me and you than they are to ABC. A study in 2009 estimated that advertisers paid about $230,000 for a 30-second spot on ABC's "Desperate Housewives." That amounts to 79 cents an hour for each of the 10.6 million homes plugged into the show on Sunday nights. But if average hourly wages are $22.05 an hour, 18 minutes of the average workers' time are worth $6.60. Imagine a world in which information isn't free. Your TV set is fitted with a coin slot — or a PayPal account. Wouldn't you rather pay 79 cents for an hourlong show to get rid of the ads? Technology might move us inevitably in this direction. Broadcast TV networks are badgering cable systems for money because falling ad revenues are forcing them to find new sources of income. Digital video recorders that offer customers the ability to strip out commercials could hasten the trend. If we're lucky, we'll get a world in which TV is not free, but we will only pay for it when we want to watch it.
benton.org/node/32975 | New York Times
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MORE RETRANS DISPUTES ON THE HORIZON
[SOURCE: Associated Press, AUTHOR: Deborah Yao]
Stay tuned for more fee disputes threatening local television stations on cable TV lineups. Broadcasters hurt by declining ad revenue are demanding more fees from cable and other subscription TV providers to carry the stations. The providers are resisting. More blackouts loom as several networks and various providers across the country have contracts set to expire this year, including one covering major ABC stations in Time Warner Cable Inc. markets. All signs point to down-to-the-wire talks that could leave viewers scrambling for other ways to watch their favorite shows and major sporting events. "There's a lot of money at stake," said Robin Flynn, an analyst at SNL Kagan. "There are a lot more fights coming up." Such disputes used to be limited to cable channels such as CNN and ESPN, as they have long been paid per-subscriber fees by the providers. But in recent years, stations that are broadcast for free over the air have demanded such fees from cable TV and other providers as well. That began first in smaller markets, with affiliates that are not owned by the networks but carry their programming. Now, the networks are demanding such fees for the stations they do own, especially in the larger markets such as New York and Los Angeles.
benton.org/node/32974 | Associated Press
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DISNEY HUNTS BIGGER FISH
[SOURCE: Bloomberg, AUTHOR: Kelly Riddell]
Walt Disney, fresh from a dispute with Cablevision, may be about to do it again with bigger cable operators, analysts said. Disney's agreement with Time Warner Cable ends in August. Time Warner Cable has already put its 13 million viewers on alert, noting in an e-mail to subscribers yesterday that they haven't lost access to the signal "yet." Larger rival Comcast Corp., whose contract for ABC isn't up this year, also will face off with CBS Corp. at the end of 2010 as more broadcasters seek payment for channels that used to be free. "As the broadcast networks are less able to get advertising revenue, they're turning to the cable guys to make up for that shortfall," said Todd Mitchell, an analyst with Kaufman Brothers. "For the cable guys, these programming costs are vastly outstripping their subscription pricing, so we're getting to the point of showdowns."
benton.org/node/32960 | Bloomberg
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FCC INDECENCY BACKLOG
[SOURCE: Broadcasting&Cable, AUTHOR: John Eggerton]
After a hiatus of what numerous attorneys say is close to two years, the Federal Communications Commission has begun to follow up on some of the one million-plus indecency complaints it has acknowledged are in its pipeline, including one concerning a Dr. Phil episode that aired four years ago. This development will require broadcasters to once again hunt down old show tapes, and accrue documents and other materials -- along with new lawyers' fees -- to defend their own or their networks' programming decisions. Two communications attorneys who spoke on background acknowledged that they are aware of at least three letters of inquiry sent out by the FCC in the last two months. After a complaint is filed, the letter is essentially the FCC's first step in following up on a complaint if the Enforcement Bureau deems that it merits further inquiry. It is a step the FCC has heretofore been reluctant to take. The letters come after a period of court-enforced-or at least prompted-inactivity on that front, the attorneys said. That hiatus was due to the court decisions, including the FCC's indecency findings against the Super Bowl halftime and swearing on Fox, that initially went against the FCC.
benton.org/node/32959 | Broadcasting&Cable
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