April 12, 2012 (DoJ and E-Books)
BENTON'S COMMUNICATIONS-RELATED HEADLINES for THURSDAY, APRIL 12, 2012
The Center for Investigative Reporting and Google host TechRaking 2012 today in Mountain View http://benton.org/calendar/2012-04-12/
E-BOOKS AND JUSTICE
Three Book Publishers Settle with Dept of Justice; Apple, Two Other Publishers Face Suit - press release
States pile on, claim Apple e-book conspiracy cost consumers $100 million
Publishers: E-books were 'disrupting the industry'
Cut in E-Book Pricing by Amazon Is Set to Shake Rivals
E-Book Borrowing, Preceded by E-Book Waiting
CFA's Cooper: Trial of Apple/Publishers Might Be Beneficial
CEA Slams DOJ, Obama Administration Over E-Book Lawsuit Against Apple [links to web]
Winners and losers from DOJ suit against Apple, publishers - analysis
The DOJ’s half-baked explanation of Apple’s role in the e-book case - analysis
MORE ON CONTENT
Intellectual Property and the U.S. Economy: Industries in Focus - research
Music Industry, Online Services Strike Deal
Russia looks to ISPs to crack down on piracy [links to web]
PRIVACY
NTIA’s Strickling defends framework protecting online privacy
INTERNET/BROADBAND
Broadband at the Speed of Light - research
This Internet provider pledges to put your privacy first. Always.
Cybersecurity Bill Faces Tough Odds [links to web]
It’s imperfect, but CISPA isn’t the devil in disguise - analysis [links to web]
Cyber czar: Power companies need to watch their backs [links to web]
Deadline Looms For New Internet Domain System [links to web]
London looks to net its own web domain [links to web]
Facebook is scared of the internet - editorial
WIRELESS/BROADBAND
AT&T's Text Messaging Plans Are a Regressive Tax - analysis
New Apps Challenge, Apps Economy Legislation And A New Jersey Startup Incubator - press release
Verizon Wireless to charge for phone upgrades [links to web]
The not-too-distant future of driving: When cars can talk, crashes may be avoided [links to web]
Is Your Company Late to the Mobile Party? - op-ed [links to web]
MEDIA & ELECTIONS
Biggest loser in Pennsylvania primary isn't Santorum - analysis
As Santorum Moves On, So Does the Coverage [links to web]
How Twitter lets politicians route around the media [links to web]
Wealthy Group Seeks to Reform Election Giving in New York
JOURNALISM
Finding journalism's future - op-ed
Black, Latino, Asian and White: Diversity at NPR - analysis
Project Glass Takes Social Media by Storm - research [links to web]
GOVERNMENT & COMMUNICATIONS
Transparency groups say THOMAS legislative website is outdated
FCC wants to bring web developers and agencies together
National Emergency Alert System Goes Live [links to web]
California bill would block cellphone tracking without warrant [links to web]
MORE ONLINE
Federal employees working remotely in various ways, survey finds [links to web]
Can Online Education Be Both Successful and Good for Us? [links to web]
FCC Seeks Further Comment on Foreign Ownership Policies [links to web]
Study: Young Consumers Switch Media 27 Times An Hour [links to web]
Fox Sports Objects to Dodgers’ Plan for Bankruptcy Exit [links to web]\
Vital Signs by Phone, Then, With a Click, a Doctor’s Appointment [links to web]
E-BOOKS AND JUSTICE
JUSTICE E-BOOK SETTLEMENT AND SUIT
[SOURCE: Department of Justice, AUTHOR: Press release]
The Department of Justice announced that it has reached a settlement with three of the largest book publishers in the United States -- Hachette Book Group (USA), HarperCollins Publishers L.L.C. and Simon & Schuster -- and will continue to litigate against Apple and two other publishers -- Holtzbrinck Publishers LLC, which does business as Macmillan, and Penguin Group (USA) -- for conspiring to end e-book retailers’ freedom to compete on price, take control of pricing from e-book retailers and substantially increase the prices that consumers pay for e-books. The department said that the publishers prevented retail price competition resulting in consumers paying millions of dollars more for their e-books. The civil antitrust lawsuit was filed in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York against Apple, Hachette, HarperCollins, Macmillan, Penguin and Simon & Schuster. At the same time, the department filed a proposed settlement that, if approved by the court, would resolve the department’s antitrust concerns with Hachette, HarperCollins and Simon & Schuster, and would require the companies to grant retailers -- such as Amazon and Barnes & Noble -- the freedom to reduce the prices of their e-book titles. The department’s Antitrust Division and the European Commission cooperated closely with each other throughout the course of their respective investigations, with frequent contact between the investigative staffs and the senior officials of the two agencies. The department also worked closely with the states of Connecticut and Texas to uncover the publishers’ illegal conspiracy. According to the complaint, the five publishers and Apple were unhappy that competition among e-book sellers had reduced e-book prices and the retail profit margins of the book sellers to levels they thought were too low. To address these concerns, they worked together to enter into contracts that eliminated price competition among bookstores selling e-books, substantially increasing prices paid by consumers. Before the companies began their conspiracy, retailers regularly sold e-book versions of new releases and bestsellers for, as described by one of the publisher’s CEO, the “wretched $9.99 price point.” As a result of the conspiracy, consumers are now typically forced to pay $12.99, $14.99, or more for the most sought-after e-books, the department said.
benton.org/node/119730 | Department of Justice | Attorney General Eric Holder | Acting Assistant Attorney General Sharis Pozen | WSJ | WashPost | LATimes | AP | The Hill | B&C | Bloomberg | The Verge | paidContent | Fortune
Recommend this Headline
back to top
STATES’ SUIT AGAINST APPLE, PUBLISHERS
[SOURCE: paidContent.org, AUTHOR: Jeff John Roberts]
Apple and book publishers already have their hands full after the Justice Department sued them for allegedly fixing the price of e-books. Now, state governments are seeking their own pound of flesh. Connecticut Attorney General George Jepsen has just announced that his state and 15 others have filed an antitrust lawsuit against Apple and five publishers in Texas. Jepsen says that two of the publishers — Hachette and Harper Collins — have already capitulated and agreed to pay $52 million in “consumer restitution.” The case turns on the publishers’ decision in 2010 to switch to “agency pricing” in which they set the prices and give retailers like Apple and Amazon a commission. The states allege that agency pricing cost e-book buyers $100 million overall. Unlike the states’ lawsuit, the federal complaint doesn’t seek money but instead asks the court to order the publishers’ and Apple to abandon their current pricing model. HarperCollins, Hachette and Simon & Schuster have settled with the Justice Department. Macmillan and — presumably — Penguin will fight the suit in court.
benton.org/node/119729 | paidContent.org
Recommend this Headline
back to top
E-BOOKS WERE DISRUPTING
[SOURCE: USAToday, AUTHOR: Scott Martin]
Amazon's Kindle e-readers and its bargain pricing of e-books apparently posed an existential threat for publishers. Publishers believed the low prices for these newly released and best-selling e-books were "disrupting the industry," according to the Justice Department's lawsuit. Publishers worried that if $9.99 solidified as the de facto standard that consumers expected on retail prices for e-books, Amazon and other retailers would demand that they lower their wholesale prices, further squeezing publisher profit margins, according to the lawsuit. Those publishers feared that this $9.99 price point could become so popular that digital publishers could challenge "incumbent publishers' basic business model," according to the lawsuit.
benton.org/node/119761 | USAToday
Recommend this Headline
back to top
AMAZON TO SLASH PRICES
[SOURCE: New York Times, AUTHOR: David Streitfeld]
The government’s decision to pursue major publishers on antitrust charges has put the Internet retailer Amazon in a powerful position: the nation’s largest bookseller may now get to decide how much an e-book will cost, and the book world is quaking over the potential consequences. As soon as the Department of Justice announced Wednesday that it was suing five major publishers and Apple on price-fixing charges, and simultaneously settling with three of them, Amazon announced plans to push down prices on e-books. The price of some major titles could fall to $9.99 or less from $14.99, saving voracious readers a bundle. But publishers and booksellers argue that any victory for consumers will be short-lived, and that the ultimate effect of the antitrust suit will be to exchange a perceived monopoly for a real one. Amazon, already the dominant force in the industry, will hold all the cards.
benton.org/node/119763 | New York Times | WSJ | FT
Recommend this Headline
back to top
E-BOOK BORROWING
[SOURCE: New York Times, AUTHOR: Alan Finder]
As a technical matter, it’s remarkably easy to borrow an e-book from your local library. But not if you want to take out the best-selling biography of Steven P. Jobs, the hero of the Internet age who helped lure tens of millions of people to personal computers, tablets and other digital devices. The publisher of the Jobs biography, Simon & Schuster, does not sell digital books to libraries. Five of the six major publishers of trade books either refuse to make new e-books available to libraries or have pulled back significantly over the last year on how easily or how often those books can be circulated. And complaints are rampant about lengthy waiting lists for best sellers and other popular e-books from the publishers that are willing to sell to libraries. Want to borrow “The Help,” the novel by Kathryn Stockett? On New Jersey’s state e-book consortium, 375 people were waiting for a copy recently. “We hear a lot of frustration,” said Christopher Platt, the director of collections and circulation operations at the New York Public Library. “It’s rational. We don’t expect our readers to understand the complexities of the publishing industry.” These complexities may only increase with the announcement that the Justice Department had filed a civil antitrust action against major book publishers and Apple, accusing the companies of colluding in 2010 to raise the prices of e-books. In the meantime, though, if you can find the e-book you want in the library, it’s easy to check it out. You can browse a library’s digital holdings from the comfort of your living room at any time. You don’t have to go to the library to borrow a book, and even better, you don’t have to go there to return it. Books vanish from your device when they are due. And you can get access to a library’s e-books from myriad devices, including e-readers, tablets and smartphones.
benton.org/node/119762 | New York Times
Recommend this Headline
back to top
CONSUMERS FEDERATION LOOKS FORWARD TO TRIAL
[SOURCE: Broadcasting&Cable, AUTHOR: John Eggerton]
The Consumer Federation of American said it almost hoped Apple and the two publishers that did not settle with the Department of Justice over allegations of e-book price fixing. The complaint and lawsuit filed today by the Department of Justice confirms our worst fears," said CFA director of research Mark Cooper. He said the reasons the spotlight of a trial might be useful were that Justice would almost certainly win, that it would help demonstrate why digital disintermediation is pro-consumer, an argument that CFA has made for remaking video delivery models online, and because it will illustrate the importance of antitrust laws in insuring competition in the new digital economy.
benton.org/node/119759 | Broadcasting&Cable
Recommend this Headline
back to top
WINNERS AND LOSERS
[SOURCE: Washington Post, AUTHOR: Hayley Tsukayama]
Who are winners and who are the losers in the Justice Department’s lawsuit against Apple and five top publishers?
Apple: Loser. But not as big as you might have expected. Despite being painted in the DOJ filing as a huge part of a major conspiracy to fix prices on e-books, but e-books aren’t a large part of Apple’s business. Investors aren’t that interested in this particular suit.
Amazon: Winner. Even the company has said so.
Publishers: Losers. The agency model that Apple proposed — where publishers set the prices and retailers got a cut — was a godsend for the companies that were chafing under Amazon’s way of doing business. But their decision to act together and move to completely change from letting retailers set prices to taking that power for themselves ended up backfiring on them in a big way.
Barnes and Noble: Snatched defeat from the jaws of victory. The Justice complaint mentions the mega-retailer frequently as a victim of the pricing agreement, and it would seem that any agreement that keeps publishers from setting prices would be a win for retailers. But Barnes and Noble stock was down — almost 6 percent at one point — since the loss of the agency model opens the door for Amazon to sell books cheaply to gain market share.
Consumers: Unclear. On one hand, the price of e-books is likely to go down if Justice is successful. That’s good for consumers, who — for obvious reasons — like lower prices. On the other hand, if Amazon rises to be the dominant force in the e-book market, that will certainly mean that there are fewer competitors. That can be bad for the industry as a whole.
benton.org/node/119758 | Washington Post
Recommend this Headline
back to top
APPLE’S ROLE
[SOURCE: paidContent.org, AUTHOR: Jeff John Roberts]
[Commentary] The Justice Department is pouncing on statements by Apple like “aikido move” and “trounce Amazon” to prove its case that Apple was the hub of an illegal conspiracy to fix the price of e-books. While the statements sounds serious, the government’s overall explanation of Apple’s role in the conspiracy is far from convincing. The “aikido” comments appear in a court filing that coincided with a long-expected announcement that the government is suing Apple and book publishers for antitrust violations. The filing instead relies on circumstantial evidence like frequent phone calls and lunches between executives, as well as the publishers’ common concern over Amazon’s $9.99 e-book pricing. While this might or not be evidence of a conspiracy among the publishers, the government’s explanation for why Apple participated is far-fetched at best.
benton.org/node/119757 | paidContent.org | Fortune | Bloomberg | GigaOm
Recommend this Headline
back to top
MORE ON CONTENT
IP AND THE US ECONOMY
[SOURCE: Department of Commerce, AUTHOR: ]
The US Commerce Department today released a comprehensive report, entitled “Intellectual Property and the U.S. Economy: Industries in Focus,” which finds that intellectual property (IP)-intensive industries support at least 40 million jobs and contribute more than $5 trillion dollars to, or 34.8 percent of, U.S. gross domestic product (GDP). The report has several important findings, including:
IP-intensive industries contributed $5.06 trillion to the U.S. economy or 34.8 percent of GDP in 2010.
40 million jobs, or 27.7 percent of all jobs, were directly or indirectly attributable to the most IP-intensive industries in 2010.
Between 2010 and 2011, the economic recovery led to a 1.6 percent increase in direct employment in IP-intensive industries, faster than the 1.0 percent growth in non-IP-intensive industries.
Merchandise exports of IP-intensive industries totaled $775 billion in 2010, accounting for 60.7 percent of total U.S. merchandise exports.
benton.org/node/119755 | Department of Commerce | The Hill | B&C
Recommend this Headline
back to top
MUSIC DEAL
[SOURCE: Wall Street Journal, AUTHOR: Ethan Smith]
Record labels, music publishers and digital music services have reached an agreement on proposed royalty rates for a range of online services, potentially making it easier to offer music in new ways via the Internet. The proposal would create guidelines for five new types of services, including online "locker" services such as Apple’s iTunes Match and Amazon 's Cloud Drive. Some of the new rates address music bundled with other goods, such as Internet-service plans, cellphones and vinyl records, which are sometimes sold with codes that allow downloading of MP3 versions of the music. The agreement "reflects our mission to make it easier for digital music services to launch cutting-edge business models and streamline the licensing process," said a statement from Cary Sherman, who heads the Recording Industry Association of America, the trade group for the record industry. The deal expands the number of categories for which royalty rates are set by law. Under federal law, the rates for royalties collected by music publishers on sales of recorded music, known as mechanical royalties, are set every five years. Until now, those rates have been established for three types of music delivery: physical sales, such as CDs, records and tapes; digital downloads from online stores like Apple's iTunes Store or Amazon; and on-demand music services such as Spotify and Rhapsody. To go into effect, the new royalties require the approval of the Copyright Royalty Board, part of the Library of Congress.
benton.org/node/119770 | Wall Street Journal
Recommend this Headline
back to top
PRIVACY
STRICKLING DEFENDS PRIVACY FRAMEWORK
[SOURCE: The Hill, AUTHOR: Andrew Feinberg]
Assistant Commerce Secretary Lawrence Strickling remains adamant that the Obama administration can partner with industry and public interest stakeholders to create a robust, fair and enforceable framework for protecting Americans' privacy online. At a Hudson Institute event, Strickling said he understands that misuse and theft of personal data can cause financial risk and identity fraud. But there are harms "that go beyond financial," he said, harms that "are more difficult to quantify" because while they may not leave victims poorer, they leave them "filled with embarrassment ... surprised and shocked." The goal of the privacy process, he said, will be to prevent abridging the Internet's role as "an amazing engine for economic growth" and to "preserve the trust between all actors on the Internet." That trust is fragile, he said, not only for consumers but also to industry because if consumers don't think their information is protected, they will pull their business. He said privacy regulations must be formed "in a way that will protect innovation" because to do otherwise would hurt the Internet economy.
benton.org/node/119756 | Hill, The
Recommend this Headline
back to top
INTERNET/BROADBAND
BROADBAND AT THE SPEED OF LIGHT
[SOURCE: Institute for Local Self-Reliance, AUTHOR: Christopher Mitchell]
Chattanooga, Tennessee, is well known for being the first community with citywide access to a “gig,” or the fastest residential connections to the Internet available nationally. Less known are Bristol, Virginia, and Lafayette, Louisiana – both of which now also offer a gigabit throughout the community. A new report just released by the Institute for Local Self-Reliance (ILSR) and the Benton Foundation explains how these communities have built some of the best broadband networks in the nation. “It may surprise people that these cities in Virginia, Tennessee, and Louisiana have faster and lower cost access to the Internet than anyone in San Francisco, Seattle, or any other major city,” says Christopher Mitchell, Director of ILSR’s Telecommunications as Commons Initiative. “These publicly owned networks have each created hundreds of jobs and saved millions of dollars.” “Communities need 21st century telecommunications infrastructure to compete in the global economy,” said Charles Benton, Chairman & CEO of the Benton Foundation. “Hopefully, this report will resonate with local government officials across the country.” The new report offers in-depth case studies of BVU Authority’s OptiNet in Bristol, Virginia; EPB Fiber in Chattanooga, Tennessee; and LUS Fiber in Lafayette, Louisiana. Each network was built and is operated by a public power utility.
benton.org/node/119731 | Institute for Local Self-Reliance | read the report
Recommend this Headline
back to top
NICHOLAS MERRILL
[SOURCE: C-Net|News.com, AUTHOR: Declan McCullagh]
Step aside, AT&T and Verizon. A new privacy-protecting Internet service and telephone provider still in the planning stages could become the ACLU's dream and the FBI's worst nightmare. Nicholas Merrill is planning to revolutionize online privacy with a concept as simple as it is ingenious: a telecommunications provider designed from its inception to shield its customers from surveillance. Merrill, 39, who previously ran a New York-based Internet provider, told CNET that he's raising funds to launch a national "non-profit telecommunications provider dedicated to privacy, using ubiquitous encryption" that will sell mobile phone service and, for as little as $20 a month, Internet connectivity. The ISP would not merely employ every technological means at its disposal, including encryption and limited logging, to protect its customers. It would also -- and in practice this is likely more important -- challenge government surveillance demands of dubious legality or constitutionality.
benton.org/node/119721 | C-Net|News.com
Recommend this Headline
back to top
FACEBOOK IS SCARED
[SOURCE: Financial Times, AUTHOR: John Gapper]
[Commentary] It is no wonder that Mark Zuckerberg got so defensive this week. As he was paying $1 billion to eliminate the threat to Facebook from Instagram, an 18-month old photo sharing site, the web’s former giants were being humbled. Yahoo, which unveiled another reorganization under its fifth chief executive in five years, and AOL, which sold a portfolio of 800 patents to Microsoft for $1.1 billion, are under attack from hedge funds. Both are worth a fraction of their value during the 1990s internet bubble. Silicon Valley was always competitive but barriers to entry in the late stages of the social network boom are so low, and capital so plentiful, that creative destruction is on fast-forward. If Facebook, which is about to launch its initial public offering, will pay $1 billion to neutralize Instagram, how much are Path, Pinterest and others yet to be invented worth? Warren Buffett is famously averse to technology investments because of their unpredictability, and the consumer internet has the shallowest moat of all. Facebook’s bulwark is the network effect of having millions of users but Instagram’s rise and the fall of Bebo, MySpace and others shows how fragile it is. Zuckerberg has so far avoided the pitfalls by handling the rise of Facebook cleverly, and reversing his mistakes rapidly enough not to alienate users. But as its growth has slowed in the US, he has clearly got worried at the growing competitive threats to its dominance. Instagram was one but there are others, some of which would be even more expensive. The internet has a nasty habit of consuming its mature companies – Yahoo took 18 years from being founded in 1994 to get into its current state. Facebook will be lucky to last that long.
benton.org/node/119767 | Financial Times
Recommend this Headline
back to top
WIRELESS/BROADBAND
AT&T TEXT PLANS
[SOURCE: Technology Review, AUTHOR: Christopher Mims]
The most active senders and receivers of texts are nonwhite, earn incomes below $30,000, and do not have a high school education, says a 2011 study conducted by the Pew Research Center’s Internet & American Life Project. AT&T, to use but one example, charged $1,310 per megabyte to send text messages in 2008. In 2011, the company effectively doubled that amount. And that's assuming you're even on a monthly plan. Most low-income users are almost certainly on prepaid devices, where fees for text messages are even higher. Yet it costs the carrier virtually nothing to handle text messages. This raises an obvious question. Are text messages a regressive tax on the poor that helps subsidize cell service for the rest of us?
benton.org/node/119764 | Technology Review
Recommend this Headline
back to top
NEW JERSEY STARTUP INCUBATOR
[SOURCE: Federal Communications Commission, AUTHOR: Press release]
In partnership with Stevens Institute of Technology, Rutgers University, and the New Jersey Institute of Technology (NJIT), FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski and Senator Frank Lautenberg announced the “New Jersey Apps Challenge” for students and entrepreneurs to showcase how the booming apps economy can help New Jersey. Sen. Lautenberg also announced new legislation to help researchers attract investment and President Nariman Farvardin of Stevens Institute of Technology announced plans for a technology incubator hub.
Following the announcement, Lautenberg and Genachowski led a discussion on how the public and private sectors can work together to create jobs and catalyze growth in New Jersey’s mobile apps economy.
New Jersey Apps Challenge: Leading New Jersey academic institutions unveiled a competition to showcase the booming mobile apps marketplace; winner meets Co-Founder and CEO of FourSquare.
The America Innovates Act: Senator Lautenberg announced that he will introduce new legislation that will spur the growth of high tech jobs and train scientists to turn their discoveries into new products. This bill:
Establishes an “American Innovation Bank” to provide universities, researchers, and private companies with the resources necessary to turn discoveries into products that will attract private investment and create jobs. The American Innovation Bank will leverage federal investments in science into new products, companies, and jobs.
Provides industry training for graduate students in science. The bill expands existing fellowship programs so that students can perform research in local companies and provides federally-supported graduate students with industry-related training, including the importance of patenting and commercializing discoveries. The bill supports the development of new curricula that train science graduate students for careers in industry.
benton.org/node/119723 | Federal Communications Commission | Chairman Genachowski | The Hill
Recommend this Headline
back to top
MEDIA & ELECTIONS
POLITICAL ADS IN PENNSYLVANIA
[SOURCE: Sunlight Foundation, AUTHOR: Kathy Kiely]
That sniffling sound you hear is not Rick Santorum's supporters bemoaning his decision to pull the plug on his presidential campaign but the managers of forty-six Keystone State television stations counting the ad dollars they have lost. So far this year, the race for the Republican presidential nomination has brought a bonanza of ad dollars to broadcasters in states that have played host to early contests, the more so because of the rise of super PACs, political action committees that can raise and spend money in unlimited amounts in support of -- or opposition to -- candidates for office. Spending in Pennsylvania had only begun to ramp up in advance of the much anticipated April 24 primary featuring Santorum, who represented the state for 16 years in Congress, and GOP frontrunner Mitt Romney. The biggest ticket item on Sunlight’s tracker so far: $153,000 in media buys by the pro-Romney super PAC Restore Our Future for ads in opposition to Santorum. But local station managers had to be licking their chops at reports that Romney was planning to launch a multi-million-dollar ad war to finish Santorum off.
benton.org/node/119716 | Sunlight Foundation
Recommend this Headline
back to top
NY ELECTION REFORM
[SOURCE: New York Times, AUTHOR: Thomas Kaplan]
An unusual and well-heeled coalition, trying to tap public anger over the flood of money into politics, is pushing to enact a public financing system for elections in New York State. The backers include media moguls — Barry Diller and Chris Hughes, a founder of Facebook — as well as investment bankers, unions, MoveOn.org, the restaurateur Danny Meyer and the philanthropist David Rockefeller Sr. They say New York, which they call a symbol of institutionalized corruption, could become a national model for the effort to free elections from the grip of big money. The campaign will start next week with mailings to the constituents of four state senators.
benton.org/node/119773 | New York Times
Recommend this Headline
back to top
JOURNALISM
FUNDING JOURNALISM
[SOURCE: Philadelphia Inquirer, AUTHOR: Victor Pickard]
[Commentary] This failure of the market suggests a need for policies to preserve public-service journalism and encourage new journalistic experiments. Since journalism is vital to self-government, threats to its survival should be a focus of national debate. We can no longer take the Fourth Estate for granted. The current crisis should stimulate debate about journalism's role in a democratic society and about alternative structures that can support it. While scrutinizing The Inquirer's sale, we should take this opportunity to consider broader solutions. Otherwise, our struggling news media could disappear - or become playthings of the wealthy and powerful. [Pickard is an assistant professor at the Annenberg School for Communication at the University of Pennsylvania]
benton.org/node/119715 | Philadelphia Inquirer
Recommend this Headline
back to top
DIVERSITY AT NPR
[SOURCE: National Public Radio, AUTHOR: Edward Schumacher-Matos]
When National Public Radio announced the hiring of Gary Knell as CEO in October, Joel Dreyfuss of The Root, an African-American oriented website, published an open letter challenging Knell and NPR to work harder to diversify its staff and programming. So, over recent months, I have been building my own notes in an attempt to measure just how good a job NPR is doing now. What I find so far is that, racially and ethnically, NPR is not doing badly, and is getting better. To see if Latino, black and Asian listeners find programming that appeals to them, I broke down NPR audience figures by higher education and income. I discovered that within these categories, the levels of representation of the minority groups and whites are not far apart. Minority staffing in the newsroom and on air, meanwhile, continues to improve. NPR does significantly better than the industry averages in radio, television and newspapers. But then, we expect NPR to do better.
benton.org/node/119714 | National Public Radio
Recommend this Headline
back to top
GOVERNMENT & COMMUNICATIONS
IS THOMAS OUTDATED?
[SOURCE: FederalComputerWeek, AUTHOR: Alice Lipowicz]
The Library of Congress’ THOMAS online system for tracking legislation is outdated and needs to be overhauled to better serve the public, according to more than two dozen transparency watchdog groups. The THOMAS website ought to be changed to allow for bulk downloads of the legislative data, the groups wrote in an April 10 letter to members of Congress. While THOMAS, named after Thomas Jefferson, initially was an innovative provider of basic information, its technology has fallen behind the times and the system is difficult to use, the groups, including the Sunlight Foundation and Project on Government Oversight, wrote in their letter. Because of the difficulties with THOMAS, millions of Americans are relying on free third-party websites such as GovTrack, OpenCongress and Washington Watch, the groups asserted. But those websites still rely on THOMAS for the data, a process that is “imperfect, expensive and time-consuming,” the watchdog groups wrote.
benton.org/node/119717 | FederalComputerWeek
Recommend this Headline
back to top
GOV DEVELOPER MEET-UP
[SOURCE: The Hill, AUTHOR: Andrew Feinberg]
On April 16, the Federal Communications Commission will host a ".Gov Developer Meet-Up" that organizers hope will encourage web developers and agencies needing web apps to interact. The amount of raw data produced by government agencies and made available to the public has increased markedly since the Obama administration Office of management and Budget's promulgation of the Open Government Directive. While "data" once meant spreadsheets and documents, it now includes large sets of raw numbers and information that can be organized, reorganized, displayed, mixed and mashed up in custom applications. Federal agencies increasingly make data available through application programming interfaces (APIs) and web services, the former numbering more than 25. But there is still no comprehensive forum for potential developers to see the full scope of available resources. The ".Gov Developer Meet-Ups" aim to fill that void.
benton.org/node/119766 | Hill, The
Recommend this Headline
back to top