December 2011

FTC's Leibowitz Criticizes Plan to Add Top-Level Domains

The advertising industry's fight to halt or at the very least slow down the new plan for adding hundreds of domain names to the Internet is gaining traction. In an appearance before a House Judiciary subcommittee, Federal Trade Commission Chairman Jon Leibowitz called the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers’ decision to begin accepting new top-level domains (TLDs) like .bank or .coke "a potential disaster" for consumers and businesses.

Chairman Leibowitz said his concern was the effect the addition of hundreds of new TLDs might have on the agency's ability to fight Internet fraud. "We worry that if ICANN goes broadly and doesn't ensure accuracy, it's going to be exponentially worse. There is going to be a burden on businesses, which will have to defensively register. We see a lot of cost, but not a lot of benefit," he said. Leibowitz told the subcommittee the FTC has been in talks with the Commerce Department, which manages a contract that ICANN needs to operate. The FTC also plans to speak with ICANN.

Sen Grassley Still Plans to Block FCC Nominees

A day before the Senate Commerce Committee is scheduled to vote on the nominations of FCC commissioner nominees Jessica Rosenworcel and Ajit Pai, Sen Charles Grassley (R-Iowa) continued to pledge to block those nominations if they are approved and teed up for a full Senate vote, which otherwise could follow almost instantaneously.

Grassley's hold has nothing to do with the qualifications of the nominees, but instead with the FCC's refusal to turn over to him documents related to the waiver the FCC granted to LightSquared to launch a terrestrial wireless broadband network using satellite spectrum. A single senator can hold up nominations, and does not even have to make that public, though Sen. Grassley has made no secret of his. The Senator will likely release a statement about that hold after the vote Dec 8, according to his office, but "Sen. Grassley's planned hold stands," a staffer said.

Verizon confirms family data plans coming in 2012

Verizon Wireless customers can expect data plans that allow for multiple devices on a single account in 2012. Verizon CEO Lowell McAdam confirmed this family plan approach at the UBS Global Media and Communications Conference. Hints of shared mobile broadband plans have surfaced throughout the past year, but McAdam’s remarks, reported by Fierce Wireless, are the most tangible confirmation yet. Rumors suggest AT&T has also been considering similar plans, but the operator has yet to confirm such initiatives and is now focused on rolling out its own LTE network to compete with the one Verizon launched a year ago.

DC gets 100 gigabit network, maybe politicos will finally get broadband

Washington (DC) went live with the first link of a 100-gigabit network. The new network, called the DC Community Access Network (DC-CAN), will provide links out to communities east of the Anacostia River, but the ultra-high-speed network will soon serve the entire District.

Unlike what Google is building in Kansas City, this isn’t crazy fast fiber to the home, though, it’s a city-owned middle mile network link that other providers can tap into in order to deliver faster broadband to homes and businesses. The 100 gigabit fiber network will connect out to the big long-haul networks run by Level 3 Communications and other providers, offering a way for existing or new ISPs to connect to the larger web. In many areas these middle mile links are owned by AT&T and Verizon, and it can be expensive, difficult or impossible to connect out to them. So while the network may not seem fabulous today, it most decidedly could be. Already 24 community anchor institutions such as libraries, schools and other municipal buildings are connected to the 100 gig network. As the network expands, the city hopes to link up to 199 more. And having a low-cost middle mile network could entice other service providers to hook up D.C. homes and businesses with faster broadband access. The network was funded in part by federal broadband stimulus funds and is expected to be complete by 2013.

Despite law against it, stealth commercials frequently masquerade as TV news

Alison Rhodes is passionate about child safety, and in hundreds of TV news interviews, the self-styled “Safety Mom” has talked up products designed to increase it. During a segment on WTTG’s morning news last year, for example, Rhodes showed off a home electronic monitor made by ADT and a backpack with a built-in alarm known as the iSafe bag. “It’s amazing,” she gushed to Fox5 host Tony Perkins about the backpack. “It really is amazing.” What neither Rhodes nor WTTG mentioned to viewers was this: The companies Rhodes mentioned on the air had paid her to plug their products.

In effect, Rhodes’s appearance was a kind of stealth commercial dressed up as a traditional product-review interview. Such product-friendly segments aren’t just potentially deceptive; they’re illegal, under a federal law that prohibits “payola” or “plugola,” as the practice is commonly known. Yet similar types of segments have grown as TV stations have expanded their early-morning newscasts over the past decade, packing them with “expert” reviews. And they are especially rife during the holiday gift-giving season. Rhodes is one of a small army of hosts and reviewers of fashion, toys, electronic gadgets and other consumer-oriented topics who pop up on morning news shows with advice about what to buy. The advice almost always involves products from companies that have paid the expert to slip in a few favorable words. The disclosures about this arrangement can range from minimal to nonexistent.

In health technology, an enthusiasm gap between startups and doctors

Dr. Eric Topol is a cardiologist who doesn’t use a stethoscope. As a keynote speaker at a mobile-health convention near Washington, Topol took the stage and performed an echocardiogram on himself using an iPhone. He later reached under his shirt and gave himself an ultrasound using a hand-held device called a Vscan and some hotel-room lotion (he forgot his ultrasound gel). “I once diagnosed a patient who was having a heart attack on an airplane,” Topol said. He explained his passion for portable health devices to the audience: “You’re familiar with digitalizing books and magazines, but now we’re talking about digitizing man, and that’s the future of medicine.” Topol and the other presenters at this week’s mHealth Summit predict that health care in coming years will be highly personalized, ultra-efficient and will most likely involve smart phones and tablets. That is, of course, only if mobile health entrepreneurs can get health care providers to embrace the new technologies, which so far they have been slow to do. During his presentation, Topol clicked through slides of potential apps and devices — some already in existence — that would help patients monitor health conditions remotely. There are contact lenses that can check for glaucoma symptoms, a photo app that can track changes in a suspicious mole and small test strips that can analyze saliva droplets for disease. Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, another keynote speaker, described a future “where you can take a video of a rash on your foot and get a diagnosis later that afternoon without making a doctor’s appointment....Or get a calorie estimate of how many calories are on your plate by snapping a picture.”

Test results prompt new round in GPS, LightSquared fight

The government began testing whether LightSquared's proposed wireless service interferes with GPS devices after concerns were raised in Congress, agencies, and industry earlier this year. The next phase in the debate begins this month: a clash over what the results mean.

LightSquared CEO Sanjiv Ahuja will begin to present his company's findings on the interference issue in a briefing with Capitol Hill staffers Dec 7. But the results from government tests won't arrive until later this month when federal agencies send their findings to the Commerce Department. LightSquared's effort to get a jump on the government tests is an early attempt to shape the conversation about the results, which the company hopes will move it forward to winning approval to launch its wireless operations. The government test results will be revealed in two rounds, according to Save Our GPS and LightSquared representatives. A test of problems for consumer devices is expected to become public mid-month, while a test of high-precision GPS devices used by industry is expected next year. The government results will land at the Commerce Department, which is expected to present a recommendation on the issue after it sees the findings. But the Federal Communications Commission will ultimately decide what happens, since LightSquared's government approval is contingent on the company satisfying the FCC that it has resolved its inference issues.

As budgets get stretched, schools turn to free digital tools

Think of it as a welcome demand meeting an urgent need: Even as public school funding plummets, it’s never been easier to find inexpensive or free high-quality education tools online. The digital revolution, which smashed old patterns of other traditional media, is radically changing what can be found in the average classroom. Teachers and school districts are turning online for teaching games, collaborative tools, and even custom-made entire “textbooks.”

Will Clearwire, Sprint build a 4G monster or a mouse?

Once again, Sprint and Clearwire have thrown their lots together, agreeing to pursue their 4G future as a team. The technology is different, but the situation remains the same: Sprint needs a mammoth LTE network, and only Clearwire is in a position to build it.

To do that, Clearwire needs cash, and while Sprint has committed to pony up $1.6 billion and to match any equity Clearwire raises, that investment will only be enough to plant the seeds of the 4G network they want to grow. If the two of them want to take on Verizon Wireless and AT&T in the coming mobile broadband war, Sprint and Clearwire will need to check their caution at the door. With more than 100 MHz of spectrum, Sprint and Clearwire can build the biggest, baddest mobile broadband network in the industry; the only thing holding them back is depth of their pocketbooks. It’s pretty clear, though, that both operators are still thinking conservatively.

AT&T cites Apple’s iPhone as driver for record smartphone sales

AT&T said that it expects to break its record for smartphones sold during a single quarter in Q4 2011, based in part on the success of Apple’s iPhone 4S, which prompted a very high number of upgrades among its users.

For the fourth quarter of 2011, AT&T has already seen around 6 million smartphones sold; already near its previous record of 6.1 million smartphones during a single quarter. With only a month left to go in the fourth quarter (December, one of the busiest shopping months of the year for smartphones), it definitely isn’t a case of counting chickens before they hatch to say that AT&T will pass the 6.1 million mark this time around. AT&T singled out the iPhone 4S when talking about how it managed such strong smartphone sales, calling attention to its earlier announcement of more than 1 million iPhone 4S handsets activated in the first five days of its availability. It also said that iPhone 4S sales “remain strong” for the carrier, two months after its initial release in the US.

Benton

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