December 2011

The good news for broadcasters is that National Cable & Telecommunications Association President Michael Powell championed broadcast deregulation. The bad news is that he said that should happen because broadband was poised to supplant broadcasting as the best use of the nation's spectrum.

Powell said technology was going to force the government to reconsider its deregulatory models, even if that is short of a complete overhaul of the Telecommunications Act of 1996. "Congress and the FCC are on the verge, perhaps for the first time, of declaring that the highest and best use of spectrum is not broadcasting, but broadband," he said in a speech to the Media Institute in Washington. While a speech about communications and jobs is common these days, Powell's was linked to Steve Jobs and his mantra of simplicity. Like the less-is-more approach to Apple products' elegant functionality or rail thin TV sets, regulators should also look to pare back, he suggested. Powell was echoing another former FCC chair, Reed Hundt, who said back in 1994 that the Internet would become the common medium of the nation. Powell said that the two cornerstones on which the Act was built -- the public trustee model of broadcasting and the common carrier regime in telephony -- were "cracking badly."

Tired of waiting for Congress to pass a law protecting consumer privacy online, cyber advocates have persuaded federal regulators to take matters into their own hands: They’ve sentenced Web giants like Facebook and Google to 20 years of privacy audits and other sanctions.

The Federal Trade Commission’s proposed settlement with Facebook last month is the latest example of the watchdog agency protecting privacy online under long-existing trade rules. Facebook allegedly mishandled sensitive data from more than 800 million users, and the FTC crafted a lengthy punishment to fit the crime. The FTC has been buoyed by online privacy advocates, who have brought the initial complaints that some of the biggest Web companies had violated their own privacy policies by failing to safeguard user data or sharing it against consumer wishes with other users, advertisers or third-party apps. Privacy advocates have chalked up countless examples of Internet giants crossing the line with tools that surreptitiously track users’ locations, recognize their faces and recall their personal interests. But while members of Congress have discussed online privacy at countless hearings and drafted a number of bills over the years, a mix of congressional politics, a difficult calendar and industry lobbying has prevented legislation from making it to the floor. The onus for online privacy protections has instead fallen to federal agencies, which have advanced the conversation with their own policy papers, public statements and enforcement actions. Chiefly pushing the envelope is the FTC. Amid work on a final set of online privacy guidelines, the agency has handed down landmark settlements targeting the Internet’s biggest names — including Google and Facebook this year, and Twitter in 2010 — as well as a bevy of smaller advertisers and smart phone apps.

Think of it as the Battle of the Tweets. Somalia’s powerful Islamist insurgents, the Shabab, just opened a Twitter account, and in the past week they have been writing up a storm, bragging about recent attacks and taunting their enemies.

It is an odd, almost downright hypocritical move from brutal militants in one of world’s most broken-down countries, where millions of people do not have enough food to eat, let alone a laptop. The Shabab have vehemently rejected Western practices — banning Western music, movies, haircuts and bras, and even blocking Western aid for famine victims, all in the name of their brand of puritanical Islam — only to embrace Twitter, one of the icons of a modern, networked society.

A coalition of 402 companies, from 1-800 Contacts to Zumba Fitness, sent a letter to Congress, urging lawmakers to crack down on online piracy.

"We urge Congress to enact legislation that targets those who abuse the Internet ecosystem and reap illegal profits by stealing the intellectual property (IP) of America’s innovative and creative industries," the companies wrote. "These rogue sites—websites dedicated to counterfeiting and piracy—put American jobs, consumers, and innovation at risk." The letter was signed by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, Wal-Mart, Walt Disney, Nike, Reebok, Ford, CVS, Electronic Arts, Comcast, DIRECTV, the major television networks and the major professional sports leagues.