March 2011

Daily's Hierarchy Of Broadband Needs

Daily's Hierarchy of Broadband Needs will provide a framework within which to focus broadband policies and initiatives. There are four levels to Daily's Hierarchy of Broadband Needs:

Availability is the most basic level of a user's broadband needs. Broadband needs to first be available for anyone to use it. Without availability established then none of the other levels matter.
Adoption is about getting people to use broadband and covers areas like affordability, value, and starts getting us into issues of education and usability.
Utilization relies largely on explaining to people why they should use broadband and how they can do so.
Innovation is what holds the key to broadband's limitless potential to encourage community and economic development -- once broadband is available, adopted, and being utilized, we start finding new ways to use broadband to grow opportunity and drive efficiency.

Digital Spaces and the Future of Free Speech

[Commentary] Law professors have a lot of theories about what the First Amendment means, but the most "standard" theory is not very useful for addressing some of the most important free speech issues of our time -- and that theory would even limit average Americans' ability to speak with one another. To understand these theory's frequent uselessness, consider that it does not really incorporate mass media, broadcasting, cable, and Internet laws. Nor does it usually incorporate rules ensuring that all speakers have access to government-owned public parks and streets. These areas of law are merely "exceptions" to their theories, revealing little about the First Amendment's meaning.

FTC Official: Cases Against Twitter, Chitika Provide Roadmap To Privacy Enforcement

The Federal Trade Commission seems to have stepped up its privacy enforcement efforts lately, but hasn't yet taken action regarding mobile privacy. But that could potentially change.

The FTC's Maneesha Mithal, director of the division of privacy and identity presentation, told attendees at a Fordham Law event today that, even though the agency lacks jurisdiction over common carriers, it can take enforcement actions against app developers that engage in deceptive practices. What kinds of privacy practices would the FTC consider deceptive? Mithal said two recent cases offered insight. First, the FTC is concerned when companies don't keep users' data secure -- as happened when Twitter security glitches resulted in hackers gaining access to some users' names, passwords and private messages. The agency recently finalized a settlement with Twitter stemming from that data breach. Secondly, she says, failing to live up to promises in privacy policies can trigger FTC action. The agency recently settled with ad network Chitika for telling users they could click on a link to opt out of online behavioral targeting, but then setting those opt-outs to expire after only 10 days. Beyond that, while the FTC would like to see mobile app developers take privacy-friendly steps -- like shedding information as soon as it's no longer needed, and notifying cell phone users about data collection -- the agency doesn't appear to have the authority to force the issue.

Data brokers and scrapers feast on freely divulged personal data

A Q&A with Michael Fertik, founder and CEO of identity management firm Reputation.com.

Freely divulging information about yourself on Facebook, Foursquare, Twitter and other websites causes your personal data to feed directly into the lucrative business models of information brokers and data scrapers, as a newly-released video from Reputation vividly depicts. Fertik elaborates on the drivers behind this rapidly emerging piece of our digital economy.

How to Make TV Even Better

[Commentary] TV is not going away, DVRs are not killing commercials, and people actually are interested in watching creatively conceived advertising. Now, nothing's perfect in this world, including TV. So what could be done to make TV even better? In no particular order:

As an industry, we can do a better job with metrics and Set-top-box data is clearly the answer;
We can make commercials more relevant to the viewer by 1) adding interactivity and 2) bringing addressability to the national :30 marketplace;
We can allow people to watch what they want when they want on the platform of their choice.

[Verklin is CEO of Canoe Ventures]

Australian Senate Passes Key Broadband Bill

One of two key pieces of legislation relating to the operation of the $36 billion National Broadband Network (NBN) has passed through the Australian Senate.

The government moved to extend sitting hours and recall the Senate today, as it battles to push through two NBN-related bills before a six-week parliamentary break. The NBN Companies bill was passed this morning with the support of the Australian Greens, independent senator Nick Xenophon and Family First senator Steve Fielding. The Greens demanded last-minute changes to a deal struck between the government over the way the NBN Co can be scrutinized under freedom of information laws. The Greens, with the support of Senator Xenophon and the opposition, have demanded the FOI minister review in a year whether the FOI laws are being “abused”. Greens communications spokesman Scott Ludlam said he wanted to ensure information requested under FOI was not rejected by NBN Co that was “not just commercially sensitive but commercial at all.”

Black Caucus a player in AT&T|T-Mobile merger

[Commentary] What do the Congressional Black Caucus and AT&T have in common? They share an “interest” in expanding broadband access and diminishing the nation’s digital divide.

If the omnivorous AT&T wants to gobble up T-Mobile, it should include a little healthy altruism in its diet. Universal and cheap broadband would help. The nation’s inner cities suffer from countless festering maladies -- joblessness, troubled schools, wealth inequalities, just off the top. Securing digital connectivity among low-income and minority communities is a solvable problem. A 2009 study by the University of Illinois at Chicago and the University of Iowa found that 40 percent of all Chicagoans have little or no Internet access. Surveys showed that one in four Chicagoans are completely offline and another 15 percent have limited access. How about free Internet access for our kids? Enter the Congressional Black Caucus. Its 43 members represent urban and minority constituents in dire need of an economic lifeline across the digital divide. It can deploy its brand to provide cover for long-maligned corporate behemoths like AT&T. The caucus’ clout could be crucial to congressional approval. African-American political leadership is well-positioned to extract a pound of flesh in return for a helping hand. The merger partners want this one. Badly. They are eager to plow massive cash into winning congressional and government approval. This deal is a no-brainer for congressional Republicans, but a strange-bedfellow partnership between AT&T and black congressional leaders could help sway the U.S. Senate’s Democratic majority and build momentum for regulatory approval. It’s a historic opportunity for the CBC to reach out and touch the constituents it purports to serve. Free or reduced-rate Internet access can level the playing field for the digitally disadvantaged.

Social Media and Kids

Pediatricians are adding another topic to their list of questions for visits with school-aged and adolescent patients: Are you on Facebook? Recognizing the increasing importance of all types of media in their young patients’ lives, pediatricians often hear from parents who are concerned about their children’s engagement with social media. To help address the many effects -- both positive and negative -- that social media use has on youth and families, the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) has issued a new clinical report, “The Impact of Social Media Use on Children, Adolescents and Families” in the April issue of Pediatrics (published online March 28). The report offers background on the latest research in this area, and recommendations on how pediatricians, parents and youth can successfully navigate this new mode of communication.

“For some teens and tweens, social media is the primary way they interact socially, rather than at the mall or a friend’s house,” said Gwenn O’Keeffe, MD, FAAP, co-author of the clinical report. “A large part of this generation’s social and emotional development is occurring while on the Internet and on cell phones. Parents need to understand these technologies so they can relate to their children’s online world – and comfortably parent in that world.”

The new AAP guidelines include recommendations for pediatricians to help families navigate the social media landscape, including:

Advise parents to talk to children and adolescents about their online use and the specific issues that today’s online kids face, such as cyberbullying, sexting, and difficulty managing their time.
Advise parents to work on their own “participation gap” in their homes by becoming better educated about the many technologies their children are using.
Discuss with families the need for a family online-use plan, with an emphasis on citizenship and healthy behavior.
Discuss with parents the importance of supervising online activities via active participation and communication, not just via monitoring software.

Global Networking Technologies Guilty of Defrauding E-rate Program

A former owner of an Illinois-based technology company has pleaded guilty to participating in a conspiracy to defraud the federal E-Rate program, the Department of Justice announced.

Tyrone Pipkin was originally charged in U.S. District Court in New Orleans on Nov. 18, 2010, for his role in the conspiracy to defraud the E-Rate program. Pipkin, a former co-owner of Global Networking Technologies Inc. (GNT), pleaded guilty today in U.S. District Court in New Orleans to conspiring to defraud the E-Rate program by providing bribes and kickbacks to school officials in multiple states. The department said that Pipkin, who acted on his own behalf and on behalf of Computer Training Associates and GNT, participated in the conspiracy beginning on or about December 2001 through September 2005. According to the court document, Pipkin participated in the conspiracy to provide bribes and kickbacks to school officials and employees responsible for the procurement of Internet access services at certain schools in Arkansas, Illinois and Louisiana. In return, those individuals ceded control of the E-Rate competitive bidding process to Pipkin and his co-conspirator, ultimately allowing them to ensure E-Rate contracts at these schools were awarded to their companies. The schools and school districts affected by the conspiracy are: in Arkansas - Gould and Holly Grove public school districts; in Illinois - Antioch Center, Fairfield Center, Ingleside Center, St. Mary’s Center, Waukegan Center, Zion Center and Niles Terrace Center; and in Louisiana - All Saints School, St. Augustine High School, St. David School and St. Monica School.

Digital literacy mortally wounded in budget battle

[Commentary] If you're one of the thousands of teachers who've found inspiration in the National Writing Project, think of the end of its federal funding as a bit of foreshadowing.

This sort of pulling the fiscal rug out from under a valuable program is likely to happen with depressing frequency as the endless budget battle in Washington rages on. Foreshadowing, cliché, hyperbole. If you're among those who've found inspiration in the National Writing Project, then surely you've talked about writing devices when you gather for the Berkeley-based program's intense summer sessions on college campuses nationwide. And increasingly you've talked about the literary power of Twitter, Facebook, Google Docs and multimedia storytelling. Now the dramatic tension: The writing project, which started on the UC Berkeley campus 37 years ago, is staring death in the face. When Congress passed a resolution early this month to keep the government running, something had to give. Literally -- and in this case literarily. Among the nearly $4 billion in cuts in the March 2 resolution was $25.6 million for the writing project, money that the national organization uses to attract an equal amount of matching money from states, universities, local school districts and nonprofits.

Benton

Search