February 10, 2012 (We are the media)
BENTON'S COMMUNICATIONS-RELATED HEADLINES for FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 10, 2012
First Amendment Challenges in the Digital Age headlines the day’s events http://benton.org/calendar/2012-02-10/
CITIZEN ENGAGEMENT
We are the media, and so are you - op-ed
Who really was behind the SOPA protests?
'Ethical iPhone' protests hit Apple stores
SPECTRUM/WIRELESS
The FCC map of places your mobile data plan won’t work
Dozens of lawmakers call for more unlicensed spectrum
Sen. Kohl: GOP spectrum bill a 'serious threat to consumers'
Rep Walden: Unlicensed Is Important, But FCC Should Not Give Away Billions
Can't We All Get Along?
Since the FCC no longer listens, AT&T tries Congress
AT&T users report getting throttled at 2GB despite 'unlimited' data plans
AT&T Says Throttling Policy Isn’t as Bad as You Think
If 2 GB is excessive, why is AT&T selling 3-GB mobile data plans? - analysis
AT&T offers “Just a Glimpse into Our Wireless Future” - editorial [links to web]
Sprint CEO: Failure Of AT&T/T-Mobile Deal Means 'Many More Options' For Sprint [links to web]
Australia Expects to Raise A$3 Billion From Telstra, Optus Spectrum Sales [links to web]
INTERNET/BROADBAND
BTOP Case Study Four: Andrew Buss, Director of Public Programs, Office of Innovation & Technology, City of Philadelphia
If Not Orwell, Then Huxley: The Battle for Control of the Internet - op-ed [links to web]
Expansion of Net Gambling Worries Indian Tribes [links to web]
Google Enters Georgia’s Public Broadband Debate [links to web]
Internet-Only TV Homes Surge 22.8%, Spend 9% Of TV Time Online [links to web]
Super Bowl XLVI Drove Internet Traffic Down As Much As 20% [links to web]
CONTENT
Latest pact on internet piracy set to be derailed
The tone of life on social networking sites - research
Social Media Share a History Lesson [links to web]
January Search Engine Rankings Press release [links to web]
2012 US Digital Future in Focus - press release [links to web]
In world of copyright craziness, BitTorrent soars to new heights [links to web]
Google Books Lawsuit Lurches Forward [links to web]
Penguin Ends E-Book Library Lending And Relationship With OverDrive [links to web]
PRIVACY
House Commerce Committee Leaders Pose Additional Questions to Google on Privacy Changes - press release
Path fumble highlights Internet privacy concerns [links to web]
Groups warn of privacy concerns in cybersecurity bills [links to web]
A Guide to the Digital Advertising Industry That's Watching Your Every Click - op-ed [links to web]
Magazines Sued For Violating California Privacy Law [links to web]
Federal court expedites case on Google privacy policies
Trying to balance privacy, free speech on Internet - analysis
Cloud computing and the looming global privacy battle - op-ed
OWNERSHIP
Dinner at Rupert's
Calpers seeking support for Apple board proposal [links to web]
TELEVISION/RADIO
Big Media Executives Take To FCC To Fight Political Advertising Disclosures
How Americans are Spending their Media Time… and Money [links to web]
GOVERNMENT & COMMUNICATIONS
Senate panel clears bill to allow cameras in Supreme Court [links to web]
PATENTS
Who’s Ready for the (Heaven Forbid) Social Networking Patent Wars? [links to web]
Apple and Google disagree over licensing of essential patents [links to web]
FCC REFORM
Public Interest Groups to Congress: So-Called Reform Bills Would Compound Corporate Influence at the FCC - press release
MORE ONLINE
Apple vs. Google: The Stakes Are Rising [links to web]
Catholic TV network sues to block U.S. contraception rule [links to web]
FBI’s Steve Jobs file: He will ‘distort reality ... to achieve his goals’ [links to web]
Beloved Librarian Who Signed With Amazon: ‘The Vehemence Surprised Me’ [links to web]
eRx makes steady gains in California, report shows [links to web]
Users of Citibank Bill-Pay App Charged Twice [links to web]
CITIZEN ENGAGEMENT
WE ARE THE MEDIA, AND SO ARE YOU
[SOURCE: Washington Post, AUTHOR: Jimmy Wales, Kat Walsh]
[Commentary] It’s easy to frame the fight over SOPA and PIPA as Hollywood vs. Silicon Valley — two huge industries clashing over whose voice should dictate the future of Internet policy — but it’s absolutely wrong. The bills are dead, thanks to widespread protest. But the real architects of the bills’ defeat don’t have a catchy label or a recognized lobbying group. They don’t have the glamour or the deep pockets of the studios. Yet they are the largest, most powerful and most important voice in the debate — and, until recently, they’ve been all but invisible to Congress. They are you. And if not you personally, then your neighbors, your colleagues, your friends and even your children. The millions of people who called and wrote their congressional representatives in protest of the Stop Online Piracy Act and the Protect Intellectual Property Act were “organized” only around the desire to protect the Web sites that have become central to their daily lives. The laws we need now must recognize the more broadly distributed and broadly valuable power of free and open knowledge. They must come from an understanding of that power and a recognition that the voices flooding the phone lines and in-boxes of Congress on Jan. 18 represented the source of that power. These laws must not simply be rammed through to appease narrow lobbies without sufficient review or consideration of the consequences. Because we are the media industry. We are the creators. We are the innovators. The whole world benefits from our work. That work, and our ability to do it, is worth protecting for everyone. [Wales Walsh are members of the Wikimedia Foundation board of trustees]
benton.org/node/112956 | Washington Post
Recommend this Headline
back to top
WHO WAS BEHIND SOPA PROTESTS?
[SOURCE: IDG News Service, AUTHOR: Grant Gross]
Some critics have blamed Silicon Valley tech firms for the massive online protests last month against two controversial copyright bills. Other groups have trumpeted the grassroots nature of the protests. The reason it’s important to explain what happened is to show that it’s possible to again organize large-scale online protests in the US. “What we’re seeing here is this integration of the organizations with [Washington] expertise, and these organizations that are very plugged into these user-driven social networks,” said Harold Feld, legal director of Public Knowledge, one of several groups that worked behind the scenes on the protest. “Multiply all of that across a community that is used to figuring out ways in which people can use these technologies for social interaction very quickly.” Fight for the Future, a fledgling group started in late 2011, plans to build on the SOPA protest model to draw together a network of websites to form an “Internet defense league” to contact Congress about future bills that threaten Web freedoms, said Tiffiniy Cheng, cofounder of Fight for the Future and OpenCongress.org, a congressional watchdog site.
benton.org/node/112894 | IDG News Service
Recommend this Headline
back to top
PROTESTS AT APPLE STORES
[SOURCE: CNNMoney, AUTHOR: Laurie Segall]
Protesters visited a half-dozen Apple stores around the world to deliver petitions calling for reforms in the working conditions at factories run by Apple's suppliers in China and other overseas locations. A demonstration at Apple's Grand Central Terminal store drew a small crowd of around a dozen people, who peacefully handed their petition -- hundreds of pages stacked in a shipping box -- to the store's manager. "I'm a big fan of Apple products, but I can no longer ethically support products that harm the people that make them," said Shelby Knox, an organizing director with Change.org who participated. "When people join together, we can hold companies accountable." The protests are the offline outgrowth of an online petition drive launched two weeks ago on social activism site Change.org. Created by Mark Shields, a self-described lifelong Apple customer who says he was "shocked to learn of the abusive working conditions in many of Apple's supplier factories," the petition has drawn almost 200,000 signatures since its launch. A parallel petition effort, led by corporate accountability lobbying group SumOfUs.org, has drawn another 50,000 signatures. Both groups teamed up for the protest. The day began with petition deliveries at Apple stores in Bangalore and London, and will continue with events in in Washington, DC; San Francisco and Sydney.
Hackers protesting harsh working conditions at iPhone manufacturer Foxconn dumped what they said were megabytes of private data belonging to the outsourcing giant.
benton.org/node/112888 | CNNMoney | GigaOm | ars technica
Recommend this Headline
back to top
SPECTRUM/WIRELESS
MAPPING MOBILE BROADBAND
[SOURCE: GigaOm, AUTHOR: Stacey Higginbotham]
The Federal Communications Commission is spearheading a big effort to get rural Americans online, and to help, later this year carriers can apply for a $300 million fund to bring wireless broadband to the heartlands. Only it’s not the heartlands, as the nifty interactive map shows. The largest areas without 3G coverage are in the Western US. So for those of you planning a road trip, a move or who might want to avoid the lure of the web while on holiday, the map gives a big picture view at how much physical area of the U.S. isn’t connected via 3G –something that isn’t always apparent because carriers measure their coverage in terms of the percent of the population covered.
benton.org/node/112908 | GigaOm
Recommend this Headline
back to top
LAWMAKERS CALL FOR MORE UNLICENSED SPECTRUM
[SOURCE: The Hill, AUTHOR: Brendan Sasso]
Dozens of House lawmakers called for Congress to preserve the Federal Communications Commission's (FCC) authority to set aside airwaves, or spectrum, for unlicensed use. The 42 lawmakers, led by Reps. Anna Eshoo (D-CA) and Darrell Issa (R-CA), argued that additional unlicensed spectrum, which can be used by any company for free, would spur innovation and economic growth. A congressional conference committee is expected to include provisions that would restructure how the country uses its airwaves as part of a package to extend payroll tax cuts. In their letter to the conference committee, the lawmakers said Congress should allow the FCC to set aside additional unlicensed spectrum, including some of the most valuable frequencies in the broadcast television band. "Exploring the use of beachfront spectrum, specifically in the television band, is vital given its ability to penetrate buildings, enhance rural coverage, and carry more data traffic than traditional Wi-Fi," the lawmakers wrote. They claimed that setting aside additional unlicensed spectrum would "unlock billions of dollars in private investment, new innovations, job creation, and economic growth." The letter was mostly signed by Democrats, but in addition to Issa, the group also included Reps. Jason Chaffetz (R-UT) and Dave Reichert (R-WA).
benton.org/node/112954 | Hill, The
Recommend this Headline
back to top
KOHL ON SPECTRUM BILL
[SOURCE: The Hill, AUTHOR: Brendan Sasso]
Sen. Herb Kohl (D-WI) urged congressional negotiators to drop a provision that would restrict the Federal Communications Commission's (FCC) ability to oversee auctions of airwaves, or spectrum, saying the measure would hamper competition in the wireless industry. "Taking away the authority to structure auctions in a way that will promote competition is a serious threat to consumers and the future of wireless competition in this country," Sen Kohl wrote. In his letter, Sen Kohl said Section 4105 of the House bill would "fundamentally alter the current framework and limit the FCC's auction authority" to promote a competitive marketplace. "As the government is planning to auction massive amounts of valuable spectrum over the next decade, this is not the time to take a primary tool used in designing auctions to promote competition," Sen Kohl wrote. He added that Section 4105 was not in the bill when it cleared the House Energy and Commerce Committee and "did not receive full consideration by all interested parties before being inserted" into the bill when it passed the full House. Sen Kohl urged the conference committee to drop the provision "until a more thorough examination of spectrum auction policies can be held."
benton.org/node/112953 | Hill, The
Recommend this Headline
back to top
WALDEN RESPONDS ON UNLICENSED SPECTRUM
[SOURCE: Broadcasting&Cable, AUTHOR: John Eggerton]
As the conferees get down to the short strokes on a compromise payroll tax break extension package, the issue of unlicensed wireless is heating up. That is because a House Communications-passed version of incentive auction legislation being considered as part of that package, the so-called JOBS Act, would not give the Federal Communications Commission free reign to carve out more of the reclaimed broadcasters' spectrum for unlicensed wireless. "Unlicensed spectrum has an important role to play, and we have worked hard to find the right balance on a policy that protects taxpayers and promotes innovation," House Communications Subcommittee Chairman Greg Walden (R-OR) said. "There is currently more unlicensed spectrum than there is licensed spectrum for wireless broadband use. The JOBS Act not only preserves unlicensed spectrum, it creates more for future innovation. The JOBS Act simply says that the FCC cannot spend taxpayer funds to clear additional spectrum and then give away that billions of dollars' worth of spectrum. Taxpayers deserve a return on their investment."
benton.org/node/112951 | Broadcasting&Cable
Recommend this Headline
back to top
CAN’T WE GET ALONG?
[SOURCE: National Journal, AUTHOR: Juliana Gruenwald]
If you thought the sparring between AT&T and Sprint ended with the demise late last year of AT&T's bid to buy T-Mobile, think again. AT&T is once again on opposite sides of a major telecom issue with Sprint, a fierce critic of the AT&T-T-Mobile merger, and several other smaller rivals. The issue this time is over legislation aimed at freeing up more spectrum to meet the public's growing demand for wireless technologies. Sprint, along with T-Mobile, C-Spire Wireless, Cricket and other smaller wireless operators want members of Congress to give the Federal Communications Commission discretion to design future spectrum auctions as it sees fit. They called on lawmakers Wednesday to strip a provision from House spectrum legislation that would bar the FCC from imposing restrictions on who can bid for spectrum given up for auction by broadcasters. "The proposed provision would substantially limit the FCC's ability to promote competition and a competitive wireless marketplace for consumers throughout America. It would facilitate spectrum warehousing, inefficient use of scarce spectrum resources, and reduce spectrum auction revenues to the U.S. Treasury," they wrote in a letter to the House and Senate payroll tax conference committee. The payroll tax cut package could include the spectrum legislation.
benton.org/node/112909 | National Journal
Recommend this Headline
back to top
AT&T TURNS TO CONGRESS
[SOURCE: GigaOm, AUTHOR: Stacey Higginbotham]
The payroll extension tax before Congress has two surprisingly technical segments related to mobile broadband that raise big mobile broadband questions — namely, will the Federal Communications Commission be allowed to set rules to promote mobile broadband competition in its next spectrum auction and can the agency can set aside some airwaves for unlicensed use? In strict consumer terms, will this limit the competition further in mobile broadband and will it kill the next Wi-Fi or Bluetooth before it’s even born. In recent weeks AT&T has gone into overdrive defending its efforts to stop the FCC from setting any rules that might limit AT&T’s attempts to bid for the hoped-for spectrum. AT&T’s machinations are puzzling, since it has managed to pick up a considerable amount of spectrum under the rules that the FCC has set in previous years for auctions, and because it actually seems like it wouldn’t want a completely neutered FCC overseeing the wireless industry, especially given the amount of partisan bickering that can hold up its favored legislation in Congress.
benton.org/node/112937 | GigaOm
Recommend this Headline
back to top
AT&T THROTTLING UNLIMITED PLANS
[SOURCE: Network World, AUTHOR: Brad Reed]
If you're an old-school iPhone user who still has one of AT&T's unlimited data plans, be prepared for a rude awakening. Some AT&T customers have reported that they are getting knocked from 3G speeds down to 2G speeds after they exceeded 2GB of data consumption per month despite having grandfathered-in unlimited data plans from the carrier. Blogger John Cozen wrote a detailed post this weekend describing his attempts to get AT&T to justify throttling his data speeds despite the fact that he had only consumed 2.1GB of data on the month. AT&T representatives told Cozen that the carrier begins throttling users' data speeds if they are among the top 5% of data users among users with unlimited plans. In other words, if the top 5% of data users consume 2GB of data or more on their unlimited plans, then they get their service reduced for exceeding 2GB, despite the fact that AT&T offers users tiered data plans that charge $30 a month for 3GB of data.
benton.org/node/112898 | Network World
Recommend this Headline
back to top
THROTTLING IS GOOD FOR YOU
[SOURCE: New York Times, AUTHOR: Brian Chen]
Mark Siegel, an AT&T spokesman, said that as of last summer, the top 5 percent of AT&T’s heaviest data users have typically used 2 gigabytes or more per month. Siegel said that even if you do exceed 2 gigabytes of data usage and qualify as one of the top 5 percent, that doesn’t absolutely mean you’re going to be throttled. AT&T will only reduce speeds for the top 5 percent of users in areas where network capacity or spectrum is insufficient, he said. In other words, throttling is done on a case-by-case basis, not based on a hard number, according to AT&T’s claims. “There’s a very good chance you wouldn’t be slowed,” Siegel said. He added that in the last month, less than 1 percent of AT&T smartphone customers were affected by the policy. AT&T’s throttling policy only applies to customers with unlimited data plans. The wireless company stopped offering an unlimited data plan in 2010; those who had already signed up for one before the cut-off had the option of being grandfathered in.
benton.org/node/112896 | New York Times
Recommend this Headline
back to top
AT&T THROTTLING
[SOURCE: GigaOm, AUTHOR: Kevin Fitchard]
When AT&T first implemented its throttling policies on unlimited mobile data plans last fall, it justified the move by claiming it had to limit the “extraordinary” consumption of a few greedy smartphone customers. We’re starting now to get a glimpse of what AT&T means by extraordinary. It’s only 2 GB – a full gigabyte less than it sells its newest customers under its most-common data plan. But AT&T just overhauled its plan pricing. It’s newest mid-tier plan charges customers $30 for 3 GB. Why is AT&T inviting new customers to consume a full gigabyte more of data while telling older customers – who pay the exact same monthly fee – that 2 GB of data is excessive? My bet is that the former is really a false invitation.
benton.org/node/112936 | GigaOm
Recommend this Headline
back to top
INTERNET/BROADBAND
BTOP CASE STUDY 4
[SOURCE: National Telecommunications and Information Administration]
The City of Philadelphia is using a Recovery Act award to open or expand 77 computer centers in health and social service agencies, homeless shelters, affordable housing locations and recreation centers in low-income communities across the city. The project, led by Philadelphia's Office of Innovation & Technology, gives the city's most vulnerable residents access to everything from job postings to health information to educational resources on the Internet. It is part of a broader program called KEYSPOT, Powered by Freedom Rings Partnership. The partnership is a coalition of more than a dozen city agencies, grass-roots organizations and universities working to increase broadband adoption rates in Philadelphia. Another lead agency in the partnership, the Urban Affairs Coalition, is using a separate Recovery Act grant to teach digital literacy skills and provide workforce training in KEYSPOT computer centers. Working together, the two projects are providing online access, instruction and support to help all Philadelphia residents participate in today's wired society.
benton.org/node/112942 | National Telecommunications and Information Administration
Recommend this Headline
back to top
CONTENT
ACTA DERAILED?
[SOURCE: Financial Times, AUTHOR: Stanley Pignal, Jan Cienski]
A controversial international trade agreement, which campaigners fear would restrict internet freedom, looks likely to be delayed or scrapped, the latest in a string of measures planned to combat online piracy to falter in the face of coordinated protests. The Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement, or ACTA, is set to join SOPA and PIPA – the Stop Online Piracy Act and the Protect Intellectual Property Act – two US planned laws designed to boost copyright enforcement, which were shelved last month after sophisticated online campaigns. The fight against ACTA has centered on Europe, even though the US, Australia, Japan and seven others are participants alongside the European Union’s 27 governments. Anti-ACTA campaigners are worried that heavy-handed measures to crack down against illegal file-sharing included in the wide-ranging trade pact will compromise internet freedom. They are planning hundreds of protests across Europe on Saturday, spanning Vienna to Edinburgh, Athens and Strasbourg. At least one march is planned in each of the EU’s 27 member states.
benton.org/node/112980 | Financial Times
Recommend this Headline
back to top
TONE OF LIFE ON SOCIAL NETWORKS
[SOURCE: Pew Research Center's Internet & American Life Project, AUTHOR: Lee Rainie, Amanda Lenhart, Aaron Smith]
The overall social and emotional climate of social networking sites (SNS) is a very positive one where adult users get personal rewards and satisfactions at far higher levels than they encounter anti-social people or have ill consequences from their encounters. A nationally representative phone survey of American adults finds that:
85% of SNS-using adults say that their experience on the sites is that people are mostly kind, compared with 5% who say people they observe on the sites are mostly unkind and another 5% who say their answer depends on the situation.
68% of SNS users said they had an experience that made them feel good about themselves.
61% had experiences that made them feel closer to another person. (Many said they had both experiences.)
39% of SNS-using adults say they frequently see acts of generosity by other SNS users and another 36% say they sometimes see others behaving generously and helpfully. By comparison, 18% of SNS-using adults say they see helpful behavior “only once in a while” and 5% say they never see generosity exhibited by others on social networking sites.
At the same time, notable proportions of SNS users do witness bad behavior on those sites and nearly a third have experienced some negative outcomes from their experiences on social networking sites. Some 49% of SNS-using adults said they have seen mean or cruel behavior displayed by others at least occasionally. And 26% said they had experienced at least one of the bad outcomes that were queried in the survey.
benton.org/node/112901 | Pew Research Center's Internet & American Life Project
Recommend this Headline
back to top
PRIVACY
MORE GOOGLE PRIVACY QUESTIONS
[SOURCE: House of Representatives Commerce Committee]
Following a briefing with Google last week, Commerce, Manufacturing, and Trade Subcommittee Chairman Mary Bono Mack (R-CA) and Ranking Member G.K. Butterfield (D-NC) sent a letter to Google’s Chief Executive Officer Larry Page requesting additional information on the company’s recent privacy policy changes. Reps Bono Mack and Butterfield asked the company to provide detailed responses to a series of questions regarding Google’s policies for capturing and storing users’ personal information. The letter seeks additional information regarding these policies and the effect of the policy changes effective March 1, including: (1) how Google implements user requests to delete information; (2) more detail on how a user can control what information is collected when browsing the web or conducting searches while logged into a Google account; (3) how Google’s recent settlement with the Federal Trade Commission affects the planned changes to its privacy policy; and (4) how Google’s educational campaign may be affected by questions from authorities in the United States and Europe; and (5) clarification of Google’s information sharing policies and standards for consumer consent. The subcommittee has been actively engaged in online privacy issues over the past year, holding a series of hearings to track and understand the latest developments in a rapidly changing online environment and what it means for individual users' privacy and data security.
benton.org/node/112941 | House of Representatives Commerce Committee | The Hill
Recommend this Headline
back to top
COURT EXPEDITED GOOGLE CASE
[SOURCE: Washington Post, AUTHOR: Cecilia Kang]
A federal court said that it would accelerate a lawsuit that aims to punish Google for alleged privacy violations. The U.S. District Court of the District of Columbia agreed to a request by plaintiffs The Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC) to speed the review of a lawsuit the privacy group filed against the Federal Trade Commission earlier this week. In its suit, EPIC said Google’s planned privacy policy changes scheduled for March 1 will violate a settlement with the FTC. The court ordered the FTC to respond to EPIC’s complaint by Feb. 17. EPIC will then reply to those comments by Feb. 21. The court case adds pressure to Google and could delay its plans to combine databases between its 60 services for account holders of Gmail and other products. The company hopes to form more complete user profiles and then tailor ads to those users’ preferences.
benton.org/node/112981 | Washington Post
Recommend this Headline
back to top
PRIVACY AND FREE SPEECH ON THE INTERNET
[SOURCE: San Francisco Chronicle, AUTHOR: James Temple]
Should people have the right to delete information about themselves online? That’s the political minefield the European Commission is charging through. Late last month, the executive body for the European Union proposed a strict set of privacy rules that included a "right to be forgotten." The regulations must be approved by member states, but the language sent a jolt through companies such as Google and Facebook, which have built business models dependent on user data and could face multimillion-dollar fines for infractions. Scholars, lawyers and privacy advocates are also scrambling to sort through the implications of the rules, which set up a pitched battle between the right to privacy and freedom of expression online.
benton.org/node/112978 | San Francisco Chronicle
Recommend this Headline
back to top
CLOUD COMPUTING AND PRIVACY
[SOURCE: Washington Post, AUTHOR: Michael Chertoff]
[Commentary] A grave threat is said to be stalking Europe. No, it isn’t the financial crisis and the potential demise of the euro. It’s the “rapacious” U.S. approach to privacy — which portends, for those engaged in the development of cloud architecture, a coming “clash” of privacy laws. Simply put, the fundamental question about international Internet governance over the next decade is going to be whose law dictates control — and the Europeans are making a bold play to say that the answer is “Europe’s.” This raises a challenge for the private sector and for governments: When the user is a private-sector company, the transition to cloud storage and processing services will create difficult questions over jurisdiction. The globalized nature of the Internet and the distributed nature of cloud architecture suggest the need for a universal set of rules to protect privacy; rules that apply to cloud services everywhere on the network. But there is little reason to be sanguine about the prospects for a satisfactory global privacy regime. [Chertoff was secretary of homeland security from 2005 to 2009]
benton.org/node/112983 | Washington Post
Recommend this Headline
back to top
OWNERSHIP
DINNER AT RUPERT’S
[SOURCE: Bloomberg, AUTHOR: ]
May 19, 2011. Red wine in hand, Rupert Murdoch chatted with guests at his London townhouse on what would be one of the most important nights to the future of his company. Gathered for cocktails were Rupert’s son James, heir apparent to the family media empire; Rebekah Brooks, the chief ¬executive of News Corp.’s U.K. unit; and Chase Carey, the New York-based president and chief operating officer. Joining the executives were a pair of legal heavyweights: Joel Klein, former New York City schools chancellor, and Brendan Sullivan Jr., the well-connected Washington lawyer brought into the Murdoch fold at Klein’s request. he senior Murdoch had flown in two days earlier for a whirlwind of meetings with his top London executives. He had called the dinner party to hash out once and for all how to handle the phone-hacking scandal that had been hanging over the company for months and was suddenly spinning out of control. A lawsuit filed by actress Sienna Miller—charging that a senior editor at the company’s British Sunday tabloid, News of the World, was behind a campaign to hack into her phone—sparked a police investigation, producing a steady drip of disclosures about repeated incidents of phone hacking at Murdoch’s British tabloids.
benton.org/node/112944 | Bloomberg
Recommend this Headline
back to top
TELEVISION/RADIO
MEDIA EXECS FIGHT DISCLOSURE
[SOURCE: TVNewser, AUTHOR: ]
Have you ever wondered exactly how much the Mitt Romney or Barack Obama campaigns are paying for their television advertising? If the companies that own most of those TV outlets get their wish, you won’t. Executives from News Corporation, NBCUniversal, the Walt Disney Company and the National Association of Broadcasters met with officials at the FCC on Monday to express their displeasure at proposed public interest rules, according to FCC filings. The rules in question would force TV networks to share details online about political advertising, including the rates that political campaigns pay for ad time. The executives argued that by posting the rate information in their “public files” and posting those files online:
“[C]ompetitors in the market and commercial advertisers may anonymously glean highly sensitive pricing data, which, by law, will represent the lowest rates charged by the station to its most favored commercial advertisers,” adding that they were “[O]pen to discussing other options for keeping sensitive rate information out of the online public file.”
benton.org/node/112926 | TVNewser
Recommend this Headline
back to top
FCC REFORM
OPPOSITION TO FCC REFORM BILLS
[SOURCE: Free Press, AUTHOR: Press release]
Forty-five public interest groups sent a letter to the House Commerce Committee opposing two bills that would severely limit the Federal Communications Commission’s ability to promote competition, innovation and access to communications services. The two bills, under the guise of “reforming the FCC,” would put the very companies the FCC is tasked with regulating in control of the agency. The letter urges lawmakers to adopt more sensible reforms that would better protect consumers and promote economic development. The groups write: “These bills would severely hinder the FCC’s ability to carry out its congressional mandate to promote competition, innovation and the availability of communications services. We urge the Committee to cancel its proposed markup of these two bills as currently drafted, and consider more suitable reforms to the FCC that focus on protecting consumers and limiting the undue influence of corporate lobbyists.”
benton.org/node/112925 | Free Press | read the letter
Recommend this Headline
back to top