July 22, 2010 (FCC Defends Martin-Era Media Ownership Rules)
BENTON'S COMMUNICATIONS-RELATED HEADLINES for THURSDAY, JULY 22, 2010
Today's agenda http://bit.ly/dfRzOT
MEDIA OWNERSHIP
FCC to Defend Martin-Era Media Ownership Rules
Comcast tells FCC critics of its NBC deal are 'self-serving'
Comcast Purchase of NBC May Require the Selling of Stations or Arbitration
BROADBAND/INTERNET
With New Report FCC Makes a Bid for Universal Broadband
RECLASSIFICATION
Rep. Dingell to FCC Chair: hold off on re-regulation of broadband
Sen. Casey opposes FCC plan to boost its authority
Stearns: FCC Should Not Put Title II on September Meeting Agenda
POLICYMAKERS
Where Do Telecom Lobbyists Come From?
See also: Google Boosts Spending on Lobbying as FCC Tackles Internet Access Issue
SPECTRUM/WIRELESS
Rockefeller deals blow to FCC public safety proposal
NTIA/FCC Web-based Frequency Coordination System
Cell phone safety advocates call on FCC, FDA to update rules, radiation standards
ACCESSIBILITY
House Commerce Committee OKs Communications Disability Access Bill
Waxman Says Commerce Committee Will Look Into Access to PEG Channels
PRIVACY
Connecticut's Google Probe Draws 37 States
See also: Google Boosts Spending on Lobbying as FCC Tackles Internet Access Issue
CONTENT
Facebook Tops 500 Million Users
The State of Internet Music on YouTube, Pandora, iTunes, and Facebook
CYBERSECURITY
DHS outlines cybersecurity planning
HEALTH
Officials Defend E-Health Standard As Work In Progress
ENERGY
Swept Away? How the Smart Grid Tsunami Could Destroy Utilities (And What to Do About It)
Smart Grid into the Home: The Battle Begins
Do Consumers Really Care About the Smart Grid? Some Think Not
JOURNALISM
Some Thoughts On Digital Media And The Future Of The Newspaper Business
Don't give the press a bailout
Shirley Sherrod, race and media: How ideologically slanted media organizations are hurting America
The Vast Left-Wing Media Conspiracy
Recent Comments on:
Lawmakers, industry lament costs of online piracy at hearing
MEDIA OWNERSHIP
FCC DEFENDS MEDIA OWNERSHIP RULES
[SOURCE: Federal Communications Commission, AUTHOR: ]
On July 21, the Federal Communications Commission filed a brief to Third Circuit Court of Appeals in Philadelphia defending the media ownership rules adopted in 2007 under then-Chairman Kevin Martin. The FCC relaxed rules on cross ownership of newspapers and broadcast outlets in the nation's 20 largest markets. "While the rules being challenged were adopted before I became chairman, I support our general counsel in arguing that the order was within the discretion of the commission and the brief's general defense of the commission's authority to make decisions based on the information before it at the time," FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski said. In its defense, FCC General Counsel Austin Schlick argued in the brief that it was reasonable to relax the rules in the top 20 markets because "combinations ‘generally raise fewer diversity concerns' in the top 20 markets because those markets 'have more media outlets.'" The FCC brief describes the change as modest. The commission brief also defended the Martin commission decision not to scrap the ban. "To protect against the realistic prospect that consolidation of media outlets in some instances could harm viewpoint diversity, the Commission adopted a presumption against newspaper/broadcast cross-ownership in markets below the top 20," it said. FCC Commissioner Michael Copps, took the commission to task for its defense. "It is difficult for me to believe that our new FCC, with its new majority, is in court today basically accepting the validity of the pro-consolidation decision of a previous Commission," said Copps. "We have had 18 months to reconsider the awful vote that loosened our newspaper-broadcast cross ownership rules, but the best we can do, judging from today's brief, is to kick the media ownership can farther down the road."
benton.org/node/39750 | Federal Communications Commission | Chairman Genachowski | Chairman Copps | Broadcasting and Cable | Congress Daily
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COMCAST REBUTTAL
[SOURCE: Los Angeles Times, AUTHOR: Joe Flint]
Comcast fired back at its critics July 21, telling the Federal Communication Commission that the cable giant's proposed merger with NBC Universal will not hurt consumers or competitors. "Despite the self-serving claims of various competitors and the predictable responses from certain familiar critics, this transaction will not diminish competition in any relevant market ... the combined entity cannot and will not pursue anti-foreclosure strategies, despite the contrived efforts of certain opponents to show otherwise," Comcast said in its filing. The filing at the FCC is part of the back-and-forth Comcast and NBC Universal have been engaged in with media watchdogs, consumer activist groups, competitors and politicians over what impact their proposed $30-billion marriage will have on the public as well as on the media industry. The FCC, along with the Justice Department, are reviewing the deal and will decide if it should be given a green light and what, if any, conditions should be put on the two companies as part of any approval. Opponents of the deal include public interest groups such as Free Press and Media Access Project as well as Bloomberg LP, the business news giant which owns a cable network that competes against NBC's financial channel CNBC. Various factions of the creative community have expressed concern that the deal will further squeeze independent producers, and some minority groups are worried that the deal will harm diversity both in front of the camera and in the executive suites. In a 327-page response to its critics, Comcast argued that the merger of its cable systems with NBC's content is primarily a vertical one and hence "does not pose any of the traditional harms that some associate with traditional media consolidation."
In addition, Comcast, General Electric and NBC Universal claim their new joint venture entity won't dominate the TV market -- declaring it ranks fourth among media companies in terms of its advertising and affiliate revenue. The proposed $28 billion entity will have only a 12 percent share of advertising and affiliate revenue in the national cable market -- and will sit behind Disney, Time Warner and Viacom and only just ahead of News Corp. (owner of The Post), Comcast claimed. That ranking is surprising given that NBC Universal houses some of the most profitable cable stations around. They include USA Network, regularly a No. 1 network in terms of audience, which Bernstein Research estimated would earn $1.7 billion in revenue in 2010, and CNBC, which makes profits in excess of $300 million.
benton.org/node/39757 | Los Angeles Times | New York Post
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COMCAST MERGER CONDITIONS
[SOURCE: Bloomberg, AUTHOR: Jeff Bliss, Todd Shields]
Comcast may have to sell some NBC television stations or agree to have independent arbitration settle pricing disputes to get government approval for buying General Electric's NBC Universal. These are among the remedies the Federal Communications Commission or the Justice Department may require to ease fears about keeping television markets competitive following the $28 billion deal, antitrust analysts said. Comcast, the largest U.S. cable operator, would get control of the NBC television network and broadcast stations and sports networks in Boston, New York, Philadelphia, Chicago, San Francisco and Washington, six of the biggest U.S. television markets, plus Hartford, Connecticut. Comcast also would acquire NBC's national cable networks, including Bravo, USA Network, MSNBC and CNBC, and national sports and Olympic Games programming. Philadelphia-based Comcast's power in key markets is "absolutely going to be a major concern" for officials, said Craig Moffett, an analyst at New York-based Sanford C. Bernstein & Co. Investigators will take into account Comcast's past attempts to thwart competition, said Lloyd Constantine, a former New York state assistant attorney general in charge of antitrust enforcement. For more than a decade, Comcast has refused to sell Philadelphia sports programming to DirecTV and Dish Network Corp., two satellite competitors, DirecTV said in an FCC filing. "They have in essence a rabid dog here," Constantine said. Noll said Comcast has several points in its favor, including its small share of national TV and cable channels and increased competition from the Internet to distribute programming.
benton.org/node/39756 | Bloomberg
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BROADBAND/INTERNET
MORE ON NEW FCC BROADBAND REPORT
[SOURCE: GigaOm, AUTHOR: Kevin Tofel]
[Commentary] Regardless of what statements and actions come from the latest Federal Communications Commission broadband report, there's at least one sign of a step forward in the actual definition of "broadband," which as recently as 2008 was considered by the FCC to be 200 kbps down. The new standards, which were initially suggested in the National Broadband Plan, are four Mbps down and one Mbps up. Fiber technologies already trump this minimum definition, but fiber-to-the-home is expensive — even in non-rural areas. The FCC's newest findings, then, could give additional life to DSL, which although prominent, is seen as a slower pipe with its use of copper for the last mile instead of fiber optics. A more likely solution for covering the broadband "black hole" that tens of millions now face is wireless as the last mile -- carriers wouldn't have to wire each individual home in rural areas. Instead, their wire investment would be limited to single lines of backhaul to towers among the fields and forests.
benton.org/node/39736 | GigaOm
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RECLASSIFICATION
DINGELL ON RECLASSIFICATION
[SOURCE: Washington Post, AUTHOR: Cecilia Kang]
Rep John Dingell (D-MI) urged Federal Communications Commission Chairman Julius Genachowski to hold off on the agency's push to re-regulate broadband service providers. Rep Dingell said Chairman Genachowski had not yet responded to a letter sent two months ago for an explanation of the reasoning behind the agency's move to redefine broadband as a telecommunications service. "I find it wholly frustrating that Chairman Genachowski, after nearly two months, still has not responded to my questions," Rep Dingell said. "I have serious concerns about the FCC's proposed course of action. There is intense interest in the Congress about this, and I feel Chairman Genachowski's responses to my questions would be invaluable in informing the debate on the matter."
benton.org/node/39755 | Washington Post
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CASEY OPPOSES RECLASSIFICATION
[SOURCE: The Hill, AUTHOR: Sara Jerome]
In a June 15 letter Sen. Bob Casey (D-PA) urged Federal Communications Commission Chairman Julius Genachowski to find a "more targeted" answer to uncertainty over the agency's authority over broadband. Sen Casey staked out his opposition to an FCC regulatory maneuver known as "reclassification" and urged Chairman Genachowski to instead reach a deal on network regulation with key stakeholders. Sen Casey also said a stakeholder deal would be preferable to waiting for a Congressional overhaul of telecommunications law to settle the legal landscape around network neutrality regulations.
benton.org/node/39754 | Hill, The
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STEARNS ON FCC RECLASSIFICATION AGENDA
[SOURCE: Broadcasting&Cable, AUTHOR: John Eggerton]
On July 21, Rep Cliff Stearns (R-FL) said he was concerned that Federal Communications Commission Chairman Julius Genachowski might be planning to put the reclassification of broadband access under Title II regulations on the FCC's September meeting agenda, and asked House Commerce Committee Chairman Henry Waxman (D-CA) to advise the chairman not to do so. He argued that it would provide little time for the FCC to consider the comments it had solicited on the proposal (replies are due in mid-August). He also said Hill discussions suggested that there was a way to have a targeted legislative solution. It would also provide Congress little time to ponder that move since it will only have just returned from its August recess. FCC Commissioner Meredith Attwell Baker, for one, has said she expected the FCC to take up reclassification, which she has major concerns about, in early fall or even late summer, "while the leaves are still on the trees."
benton.org/node/39735 | Broadcasting&Cable
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POLICYMAKERS
WHERE DO TELECOM LOBBYISTS COME FROM?
[SOURCE: Sunlight Foundation, AUTHOR: Laurenellen McCann]
The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) has a bit of a conundrum. Following an unfavorable court ruling on the extent of the FCC's powers to regulate Internet Service Providers (ISPs), the FCC has gone back to the drawing board to sketch out how "Internet Services" should be defined -- but they won't be making this decision alone. A multitude of parties with a stake in the (re)definition of these services have directed their resources toward Capitol Hill in an effort to influence lawmakers into seeing things their way. To shine a little sunlight on this process, the Sunlight Foundation developed this network neutrality primer including a micro-history of the issue, a chart to introduce you to the major players, and some graphic-packed research into the lobbyists they've brought on board. By an overwhelming majority, most lobbyists on both sides of the issue have had experience working in Congress. Of the 274 lobbyists hired by AT&T, Verizon, Comcast, Time Warner Cable, National Cable & Television Association, and the US Telecom Association against net neutrality, 247 worked in some capacity in Congress — that's ninety percent of the lobbyists hired. Of that 247, 201 trace their work history back to Congress exclusively; the other 47 held positions with multiple branches of government. For those hired by Google, Microsoft, Amazon, eBay, TiVo, and the Independent Film & Television Association (IFTA) to lobby in favor of net neutrality, ninety-three percent (147 of 158 lobbyists) had work experience in Congress. Of those, 121 worked only with Congress, and 26 lobbyists worked with multiple branches of government.
benton.org/node/39734 | Sunlight Foundation
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SPECTRUM/WIRELESS
ROCKEFELLER SPECTRUM BILL
[SOURCE: The Hill, AUTHOR: Sara Jerome]
Senate Commerce Committee Chairman Jay Rockefeller (D-WV) may have dealt a significant setback to the Federal Communication Commission (FCC) on July 21 when he announced that he will introduce a bill creating a nationwide broadband network for first responders. The FCC shares the goal, but has spent considerable energy this year defending a proposal of its own, which differs from Rockefeller's on a major point: whether to auction off a valuable chunk of spectrum known as the D-block. The FCC proposed this auction, and says the proceeds will fund a public safety broadband network that allows police and firemen all over the country to connect on wireless devices during emergencies. But in what could be a setback for the FCC proposal, Chairman Rockefeller declined to support a D-block auction in the plan he announced. Public Safety Alliance (PSA), a coalition of first responder groups, hailed Chairman Rockefeller's proposal. Until Rockefeller made his announcement, it had looked like the FCC plan was gaining momentum. A proposal from House Energy and Commerce Chairman Henry Waxman (D-CA) lined up on major points with the FCC's plan. And when President Barack Obama signed an executive order last month committing the federal government to freeing up more spectrum for wireless broadband, the White House emphasized commercial auctions and made no overtures to the groups who want the D-Block devoted to first responders.
benton.org/node/39753 | Hill, The | Broadcasting&Cable | CongressDaily
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COMMENT SOUGHT ON FREQUENCY COORDINATION SYSTEM
[SOURCE: National Telecommunications and Information Administration, AUTHOR: Gwellnar Banks]
The National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) hosts a Web-based system that collects specific identification information (e.g., company name, location and projected range of the operation, etc.) from applicants seeking to operate in existing and planned radio frequency (RF) bands that are shared on a co-primary basis by federal and non-federal users. The Web-based system provides a means for nonfederal applicants to rapidly determine the availability of RF spectrum in a specific location, or the need for detailed frequency coordination of a specific newly proposed assignment within the shared portions of the radio spectrum. The Web site allows nonfederal applicants proposed radio site information to be analyzed, and a real-time determination made as to whether there is a potential for interference to, or from, existing Federal government radio operations in the vicinity of the proposed site. This Web-based coordination helps expedite the coordination process for non-federal applicants while assuring protection of government data relating to national security. The information provided by non-federal applicants will also assure the protection of the applicant's station from radio frequency interference from future government operations.
Comments are invited on: (a) Whether the proposed collection of information is necessary for the proper performance of the functions of the agency, including whether the information shall have a practical utility; (b) the accuracy of the agency's estimate of the burden (including hours and cost) of the proposed collection of information; (c) ways to enhance the quality, utility, and clarity of the information to be collected; and (d) ways to minimize the burden of the collection of information on respondents, including through the use of automated collection techniques or other forms of information technology.
Written comments must be submitted on or before September 20, 2010.
benton.org/node/39733 | National Telecommunications and Information Administration
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CELL PHONE SAFETY
[SOURCE: Washington Post, AUTHOR: Cecilia Kang]
As concerns rise over the potential health risks posed by cellphone radiation, advocates of cell phone safety are urging federal regulators to do more to protect users of wireless gadgets. In a letter to Federal Communications Commission Chairman Julius Genachowski, the American Association for Cell Phone Safety wrote that while the popularity of cellphones has soared, federal health and communications regulators are relying on outdated standards to evaluate phone safety. "The FCC is clearly not a health agency and makes no mention of the agency's qualifications to set health and safety standards with cell phones and wireless PDA's," the group wrote in its letter dated July 11. A similar letter was sent to Food and Drug Administration Commission Margaret Hamburg. The group asked the FCC to review its role in ensuring that radiation emissions from mobile phones are at safe levels. It also requested that the agency study how it informs the public about the impact of cellphone radiation on human body tissue.
benton.org/node/39749 | Washington Post
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ACCESSIBILITY
ACCESSIBILITY BILL MOVING IN HOUSE
[SOURCE: Broadcasting&Cable, AUTHOR: John Eggerton]
The House Commerce Committee approved HR 3101, a bill that updates disability access to communications services elements of the 1996 Telecommunications Act, but with changes that address some of the issues that industry had with the bill. The legislation, the Twenty-First Century Communications and Video Accessibility Act of 2010, now goes to the House floor for a vote. A Senate version has already passed out of the Senate Commerce Committee. Among other things, the bill requires the captioning of any online video that is closed captioned on TV, and asks the Federal Communications Commission to study captioning of Web-original video. It also requires smart phones and other mobile devices to be accessible to the disabled, if that is achievable, and restores the FCC's video description rules thrown out by the courts in 2002. What passed Wednesday in the House committee was a substitute bill reflecting talks with stakeholders, including industry players, said Communications Subcommittee Chairman Rick Boucher (D-VA). Rep Ed Markey (D-MA), sponsor and driving force behind the bill, outlined some of the changes that give industry more flexibility. He pointed out that the new version now exempts live or "near live" programming from video description, provides program owners and distributors an exemption from descriptions if they would be "economically burdensome." And while it also expands the original top 25 market mandate for descriptions to all media markets, it does that over six years, Rep Markey pointed out, and gives the FCC the ability to grant waivers for markets where it deems that appropriate.
benton.org/node/39752 | Broadcasting&Cable
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CONGRESS TO REVIEW PEG
[SOURCE: Broadcasting&Cable, AUTHOR: John Eggerton]
House Commerce Committee Chairman Henry Waxman (D-CA) called access to public, educational, and government (PEG) cable channels an important issue and one the committee would look into. The assurance was made to Rep. Tammy Baldwin (D-WI) who had asked for assurances that the committee would take up PEG issues "in the near future." Those issues included the move of PEG channels from analog to digital tiers, the clustering on digital channels on subchannels to a single, menu-driven channel, and other moves by cable operators that she argues can make them harder to access, including for the disabled.
benton.org/node/39751 | Broadcasting&Cable
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PRIVACY
GOOGLE INVESTIGATION
[SOURCE: Wall Street Journal, AUTHOR: David Benoit]
The attorney general of Connecticut said 37 states have joined his investigation of Google and that he continues to seek information about whether privacy laws were broken when Google's Street View vehicles collected personal data of unsuspecting Internet users. In a letter dated July 21 sent to Google, Attorney General Richard Blumenthal seeks specific details about the collection of data, including whether Google sold or used any of the information it collected. He threatened legal recourse if he doesn't get the answers he wants, requesting the response by July 23. Blumenthal also asked Google if it had tested the program, how long the software might have spent collecting data from specific signals and to divulge specific names of employees involved and their explanations. Blumenthal, updating an investigation that began last month, said if Google had been testing the data it should have foreseen the trouble.
benton.org/node/39747 | Wall Street Journal | The Hill | LA Times
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CONTENT
FACEBOOK TOPS 500 MILLION
[SOURCE: New York Times, AUTHOR: Jenna Wortham]
Facebook, the social network created in the dormitories of Harvard six years ago, said on Wednesday that it now had 500 million members. The company has grown at a meteoric pace, doubling in size from a year ago and pushing international competitors aside. Each month, Facebook says, more than 30 billion photographs, links to Web sites and news articles are shared through the site, and its members spend roughly 700 billion minutes there.
benton.org/node/39745 | New York Times | Los Angeles Times | San Jose Mercury News
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INTERNET MUSIC
[SOURCE: Fast Company, AUTHOR: Austin Carr]
Of the some 100,000 albums released last year, 17,000 of them sold only 1 copy; more than 81,000 albums sold under 100 copies. In fact, just 1,300 albums sold over 10,000 copies, an astonishing figure given that these numbers combine physical and digital album sales. And for physical sales alone? Only 2% of new albums on Soundscan sold over 5,000 copies -- that's a skydiver's plummet from the golden era of the music industry. Physical sales of albums continues to plummet while digital singles sales grow. Eric Garland, CEO of Big Champagne, says industry folks today are obsessed with "FFF numbers"--that is, an artist's friends, fans, and followers. "It's a race, but to what end?" he wonders. Interestingly, it wasn't Apple that Garland viewed as the most important name in music, even though the company's iPods, iPhones, and iTunes indicate otherwise. "YouTube is increasingly the category killer," argued Garland. "When people ask me what is the biggest name in music in my opinion, they want me to say Apple. I usually answer: YouTube." Garland told audiences that if you actually look to where people are listening to music--not even just looking at videos--consumers are turning more and more to YouTube, which he calls the "largest catalog of on-demand music on the Internet." If only Google could make this service profitable, right?
benton.org/node/39727 | Fast Company
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CYBERSECURITY
CYBERSECURITY PLAN
[SOURCE: FederalNewsRadio, AUTHOR: Max Cacas]
Rand Beers, the Undersecretary for the National Protection and Programs Directorate with the Department of Homeland Security has a lot on his mind. For one thing, he's currently overseeing completion of the National Cyber Incident Response Plan -- essentially, the playbook for how the federal government will respond to an attack on the nation's cyber infrastructure, part of what has been called the National Response Framework. "This will be the new plan. It is in the final stages of coordination," Beers told cybersecurity industry representatives at the Intelligence and National Security Alliance breakfast meeting yesterday in Arlington. "It was built as part of a broad outreach program within the government, and within the private sector. And it's absolutely critical to have that kind of input. As we try to move forward in trying to manage cyber-incidents, we can pretty much count on the fact that it's not going to be limited to the government, but it's going to have to involve the private sector." Beers says also on his to do list: the newest version of a well-known test that will stress the National Cyber Incident Response Plan.
benton.org/node/39732 | FederalNewsRadio
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HEALTH
MEANINGFUL USE UNDER FIRE
[SOURCE: nextgov, AUTHOR: Emily Long]
Standards that define what constitutes an official electronic health record aren't strict enough to justify the billions of dollars in incentives the government plans to pay physicians and hospitals to install the systems, Republican lawmakers said on July 20. In a hearing of the House Ways and Means Health Subcommittee, officials from the Health and Human Services Department defended the recently released standards, which are known as meaningful use and are requirements and expectations that health providers must meet when applying for funding to pay for the adoption of the e-records. The regulations were designed to accommodate diverse communities looking to move away from paper-based records systems, they said. Some lawmakers expressed concern that the final rule watered down the meaningful use requirements. The regulations represent a missed opportunity to improve patient care and reduce waste because the standards are lower than expected, said Rep. Wally Herger (R-CA). He said he expected a better return on the $36 billion investment in incentive payments to providers. Witnesses agreed the expected outcome of electronic records adoption is to improve the quality and efficiency of care, but were unable to estimate how much it would cost Medicare and Medicaid. The technology is only one way to reduce waste and must be combined with other activities, they said.
benton.org/node/39731 | nextgov | The Hill
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ENERGY
SMART GRID TSUNAMI
[SOURCE: SmartGridNews.com, AUTHOR: Jesse Berst]
[Commentary] It's easy to figure a strategy for surviving a tidal wave ... run like hell for the high ground. It's more difficult to apply that thinking to the Smart Grid. We can see the wave is about to hit the shore... but which way is the high ground? Should a utility start offering all sorts of new energy services behind the meter? Or become a wires-only utility and leave the new services to others? Or compete with the EnerNOCs of the world? Or partner with them? Or emigrate to New Zealand to herd sheep? Surviving this kind of turmoil requires a strategic re-adjustment, often best accomplished through the lens of the "Three Rs": 1) Recognizing the scope of the transformation, 2) Rethinking the organization's role, 3) Repositioning to optimize for the new role(s).
benton.org/node/39730 | SmartGridNews.com | Edison Electric Institute
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SMART GRID INTO HOME
[SOURCE: SmartGridNews.com, AUTHOR: Bob Gohn]
[Commentary] Recent announcements illustrate that battle lines are forming over who, what, and how home energy management will be offered to consumers. Demand-responsive homes that throttle their electricity consumption based on the real-time generation capacity are key to the Smart Grid vision of distributed renewable and plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs). The big question is: Who will entice pesky consumers into "behavior change" and be able to make money doing it? Whether supplied by utilities or within carrier quadruple-play services, do consumers really want any of this? A forthcoming Pike Research consumer survey indicates they do, but are uncertain how much they would pay, and are most open to utilities as suppliers. [Bob Gohn is a senior analyst with Pike Research, a market research and consulting firm that provides in-depth assessment of global clean technology markets.]
benton.org/node/39729 | SmartGridNews.com
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DO CONSUMERS CARE ABOUT SMART GRID?
[SOURCE: BroadbandBreakfast.com, AUTHOR: ]
The "smart grid," or the way that the electric infrastructure can be enhanced with interactive, telecommunications- and broadband-related capabilities, may not be that important for consumers, said panelists at the July 20 Broadband Breakfast Club. At the same time, Nick Sinai, the Federal Communications Commission Energy and Environment Director, said that intelligent electric infrastructure -- including consumer data about energy use -- could enhance competition in electricity and in broadband. "The federal government's role isn't to figure this out, neither is it the state role," said Sinai. However, "We need to set the conditions, so that utilities can continue to modernize, and deliver secure and reliable" electricity.
benton.org/node/39728 | BroadbandBreakfast.com
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JOURNALISM
FUTURE OF THE NEWSPAPER BUSINESS
[SOURCE: The Huffington Post, AUTHOR: Henry Blodget]
[Commentary] The problem, in a nutshell, is this: A print newspaper is not just a vehicle for delivering news -- it's a vehicle for delivering a truckload of high-priced ads. No one has any idea whether these ads are actually seen, of course, but for the $40 billion still spent on newspaper ads each year, that lack of accountability has never been a problem (in part because there was never an alternative.) What matters to newspaper advertisers is circulation--the number of folks who might--might--see those ads. The print newspaper is such a good vehicle for delivering ads, in fact, that the New York Times generates about $55 per month of advertising revenue for every print subscriber it has ($650 million of annual print revenue divided by 1 million subscribers divided by 12 months). That's in addition to the $58 per month the New York Times induces subscribers to pay for the daily print ad-delivery vehicle ($700 million of annual circulation revenue divided by 1 million subscribers divided by 12 months). The New York Times web site, in contrast, only generates about $0.70 of ad revenue per month from each of the 18 million people who visit it--and zero (ZERO) circulation revenue. As print circulation declines, the print newspaper becomes a less-miraculous vehicle in which to deliver ads--because fewer people might see them. Just as bad, as circulation declines, the cost of printing and delivering each newspaper goes up (thanks to the loss of economies of scale). Eventually, the cost of writing and printing and delivering the print newspaper more than offsets the revenue that can be generated from the print-based ads, and the print paper collapses. That's why the newspaper business is "all about circulation."
benton.org/node/39726 | Huffington Post, The
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DON'T GIVE PRESS BAILOUT
[SOURCE: Boston Globe, AUTHOR: Jeff Jacoby]
[Commentary] Are government subsidies the cure for what ails the news business? Why should journalists be entitled to a multi-billion-dollar batch of media subsidies? Subsidies always amount, in the end, to confiscating money from many taxpayers in order to benefit relatively few. Those who call for keeping newspapers and other old media alive with injections of public funds are really saying that if people won't support those forms of journalism voluntarily, they should be made to do so against their will. The argument for most government subsidies is that the activity they support generates a larger public benefit — a benefit that would be lost if it were left up to the marketplace. But for the better part of two centuries, newspapers flourished in the market. They are struggling now not because there is no commercial value to "provid[ing] all the news coverage we need," but because tens of millions of consumers have come to prefer other vehicles for getting that news. There hasn't been a market failure, only a market transformation.
benton.org/node/39725 | Boston Globe
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SHERROD, RACE, AND MEDIA
[SOURCE: St. Petersburg Times, AUTHOR: Eric Deggans]
[Commentary] This is what happens when ideologically-focused noise machines are treated like real news outlets. The sad case of Shirley Sherrod -- a black woman whose story of overcoming her own prejudice was perverted into a false example of racism by a media savvy conservative activist -- provides an important lesson for journalists and news consumers, if we're willing to heed it. So why are TV reports this morning centered on the Obama administration, and not the media frenzy which kicked all this off in the first place? Tantalizing as the political questions are, shouldn't someone be asking why organizations such as Fox News Channel -- a cable channel with "news" in its title -- passed along the clip without vetting it? This, in the end, is the value of transparency in media organizations; so you know why something happened when they get a story wrong. As cable newschannels profit by echoing and amplifying the political viewpoints of their target audiences, their value as news organizations plummet. Reporting on Sherrod's case without looking closely at media's role in amplifying it misses the biggest aspect of the story, moving the incident into the more comfortable confines of politics rather than news outlet's own conflicted values and compromised news judgments.
benton.org/node/39724 | St. Petersburg Times
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