March 2010

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."

Google is looking to integrate its Latitude and Buzz offerings which means Buzz's privacy problems may be about to get even bigger.

Latitude, which launched last year, enables users to find friends and broadcast their whereabouts to others. Those aren't revolutionary features, of course — Loopt and Useful Networks are just two that have gained some traction with similar friend-finding offerings. But Latitude's tracking functionality is potentially more invasive than Buzz, which requires users to check in every time they want to update their location. And Google a few months ago sparked controversy by adding location alerts and history, features that inform users when their fellow Latitude friends are nearby and allowing users to see where they've been. Integrating Latitude features with Buzz — which has millions of users — will further complicate a service that for some is already too confusing and who are likely to inadvertently broadcast their location information to Buzz-using friends even if Google does a good job of informing them that the two offerings sometimes work as one. Unless Google first makes Buzz much simpler, CEO Eric Schmidt will have a lot more opportunities to blame users for misunderstanding the service.

Although the American Academy of Family Physicians agrees with many of the stated goals of the proposed meaningful-use criteria for receiving federal subsidies for health IT investments, the CMS needs to "significantly modify the proposed rule," said Ted Epperly, board chairman of the group, in a seven-page letter to acting CMS Administrator Charlene Frizzera.

This new set of 'Meaningful Use' regulations shares a similar vision and objectives with AAFP policy, and we are excited about the potential health IT progress made possible with these regulations," Epperly wrote. "We are especially encouraged by the focus on care coordination, quality, and patient-centeredness. It is our hope that we can move the health care system rapidly toward more patient-centered, coordinated, and reliably high quality care." That said, Epperly then went on to note several details in the proposed rule that the AAFP found "unworkable, excessive, or redundant, and will actually impede the very goals of the legislation." The letter said that the administrative burden of reporting computerized physician order entry measures "is excessive to the point of being unachievable for most eligible providers." Another concern was that the rule could require manually entering results from laboratories that don't have an interoperable interface with the physician's electronic health record.

The Department of the Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) amended the Iranian Transactions Regulations, Sudanese Sanctions Regulations, and Cuban Assets Control Regulations to ensure that individuals in these countries can exercise their universal right to free speech and information to the greatest extent possible.

The amendments add general licenses authorizing the exportation of certain personal Internet-based communications services - such as instant messaging, chat and email, and social networking - to Iran, Sudan and Cuba. The amendments also permit the exportation of related software to Iran and Sudan. The new general licenses authorize exports from the United States or by U.S. persons to persons in Iran and Sudan of services and software related to the exchange of personal communications over the Internet, including web browsing, blogging, email, instant messaging, and chat; social networking; and photo and movie sharing. Today's amendments also provide that specific licenses may be issued on a case-by-case basis for the exportation of services and software used to share information over the Internet that not covered by the general licenses.