August 9, 2012 (What Happens When Our Cellphones Can Predict Our Every Move?)
BENTON'S COMMUNICATIONS-RELATED HEADLINES for THURSDAY, AUGUST 9, 2012
Getting Schooled by a Third Grader today at the New America Foundation http://benton.org/calendar/2012-08-09/
INTERNET/BROADBAND
White House considers executive action to address cybersecurity
Help wanted: Geek squads for US cybersecurity - op-ed [links to web]
UK now has 2 million “superfast” broadband connections [links to web]
WIRELESS/SPECTRUM
What Happens When Our Cellphones Can Predict Our Every Move?
Another Apple vs. Samsung Battle: The Mobile Web
Android, iPhone dominate smartphone market [links to web]
T-Mobile dropping 'largest 4G network' ad was proper, report says [links to web]
Advertisers cautious of move to mobile [links to web]
ELECTIONS AND MEDIA
Fact-Checking Is Not Enough - analysis
WMGM-TV Gets Waiver From Online Political File Posting [links to web]
DC TV Stations Raking in the Citizens United Cash [links to web]
Hot Chicago suburban congressional race gets hotter with big TV buy [links to web]
Pandora asks listeners to share their e-mail addresses with Romney
A Candidate Whose Ads Are Never Off the Air
CONTENT
Google: Building the search engine of the future, one baby step at a time - press release
Two years after the tipping point, papers’ web readership is booming - analysis [links to web]
Digital Music Broadcast Royalties: The Case for a Level Playing Field - research [links to web]
Universal's EMI gambit - editorial [links to web]
TELEVISION/RADIO
Pay TV Should “Afraid, very Afraid” of Google Fiber, SNL Kagan says
R. Peter Straus, Radio Pioneer, Dies at 89
Social Media Expands on TV and Radio - research [links to web]
A Candidate Whose Ads Are Never Off the Air
CHILDREN AND MEDIA
Social networks confront challenges in rush to attract youngest users
Why Just for Kids is such a big deal for Netflix [links to web]\
EDUCATION
Can Technology Replace Teachers?
The Friendly, Neighborhood Internet School - op-ed
JOURNALISM
Between the Spreadsheets
GOVERNMENT COMMUNICATIONS/PERFORMANCE
Commerce Department Needs Your Input on Digital Strategy - public notice
COMPANY NEWS
Connectify combines Wi-Fi, 4G into a superfast wireless pipe [links to web]
Why Just for Kids is such a big deal for Netflix [links to web]\
Why Starbucks is betting on Square [links to web]
News Corp writes $2.8 billion off its publishing activities [links to web]
Liberty spins off Starz: Who will buy it? [links to web]
STORIES FROM ABROAD
UK now has 2 million “superfast” broadband connections [links to web]
A rather too British Broadcasting Corp - analysis [links to web]
Sir Bernard Lovell Dies at 98; a Radio Telescope Bears His Name [links to web]
MORE ONLINE
Why shopping will never be the same [links to web]
HHS: New rules will save up to $9 billion [links to web]
INTERNET/BROADBAND
WH CONSIDERS CYBERSECURITY ACTION
[SOURCE: The Hill, AUTHOR: Carlo Muñoz]
White House chief counterterrorism adviser John Brennan said the Administration is considering exercising executive authority to impose cybersecurity mandates after lawmakers failed to adopt legislation to implement those measures. Those options include President Obama possibly introducing several cybersecurity measures via presidential executive orders. "We will see what we can do ... the critical infrastructure of this country is under threat" by cyberattacks from state and non-state actors, Brennan said during a speech at the Council on Foreign Relations in Washington. Brennan and other administration officials argue the United States cannot afford to abide by congressional timelines to get cybersecurity mandates in place, especially while U.S. government and commercial networks are under continued attack. "We have to improve our [cyber] defenses in this country," Brennan said. "We cannot wait."
Separately, Rep Ed Markey (D-MA) said, “I’m calling on President Obama to do by Executive Order what Congressional Republicans refuse to do through legislation: protect our nation from the 21st century cyber-armies preparing to wage war on our banking, health care, and defense systems by knocking out America’s electricity grid.” He accused Republicans of putting business interests ahead of the country’s defense in blocking the Cybersecurity Act in the Senate. “Congressional Republicans once again have shown their legislative agenda to be one big I.O.U. – Insurers, Oil companies, and Utilities. … The moneyed minions behind Citizens United have driven Republicans to prioritize the interests of the wealthiest corporations over America’s national security,” he said.
benton.org/node/131870 | Hill, The | Reuters | The Hill | B&C
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WIRELESS/SPECTRUM
CELLPHONES PREDICT ACTION
[SOURCE: Slate, AUTHOR: Will Oremus]
Your cellphone knows where you’ve been. And new research shows it can take a pretty good guess at where you’re going next. A team of British researchers has developed an algorithm that uses tracking data on people’s phones to predict where they’ll be in 24 hours. The average error: just 20 meters. That’s far more accurate than past studies that have tried to predict people’s movements. Studies have shown that most people follow fairly consistent patterns over time, but traditional prediction algorithms have no way of accounting for breaks in the routine. The researchers solved that problem by combining tracking data from individual participants’ phones with tracking data from their friends—i.e., other people in their mobile phonebooks. By looking at how an individual’s movements correlate with those of people they know, the team’s algorithm is able to guess when she might be headed, say, downtown for a show on a Sunday afternoon rather than staying uptown for lunch as usual. For this innovation, the researchers—Mirco Musolesi, Manlio Domenico, and Antonio Lima of the University of Birmingham—won this year’s Nokia Mobile Data Challenge. It’s fascinating from an academic standpoint. But how exactly might it be used in the real world?
benton.org/node/131895 | Slate
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APPLE, SAMSUNG AND MOBILE WEB
[SOURCE: Wall Street Journal, AUTHOR: Ina Fried]
Chitika, which tracks Web share use on its ad network, says Samsung’s Galaxy S III is quickly becoming a force, though Apple remains the clear leader. For every one ad impression that comes from a Samsung device, there are four from Apple devices. “Both the sales and Web presence numbers have been impressive early on for the Galaxy S III, but does it have the staying power to compete with the iPhone 5 due for release this September?” Chitika said. “Particularly in the context of the series of patent lawsuits between the manufacturers, this head-to-head matchup will be one of the most intriguing contests in the smartphone market this year.” As for the Galaxy S III, it now accounts for more than 11 percent of all Web surfing coming from Samsung smartphones. “The device has quickly surpassed the Galaxy Nexus in activity, and is hot on the tails of other Galaxy S models,” Chitika said.
benton.org/node/131867 | Wall Street Journal
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ELECTIONS AND MEDIA
FACT-CHECKING POLITICAL ADS
[SOURCE: New York Times, AUTHOR: Ross Douthat]
In the Internet era, the number of would-be watchdogs and fact-checking teams has proliferated, but the same problems remain. It isn’t just that even hostile media coverage tends to just widen an attack ad’s audience. It’s also that the interpretation of advertisements often has more in common with cultural criticism than it does with rigorous magazine fact-checking, which makes it hard for even the most down-the-middle reporter to define what counts as fair. Sometimes this manifests itself in straightforward political bias. In a lengthy critique of “non-partisan” outlets like Politifact last winter, The Weekly Standard’s Mark Hemingway argued persuasively that their ostensibly neutral analysis often feels more “a rearguard action to keep inconvenient truths” – mostly the ones that favor conservatives – “out of the conversation.” But even when outright bias doesn’t intrude, the problem of interpretation remains. This means that with rare exceptions, viewers and voters, not reporters and pundits, will always get the final say on whether a particular advertisement crosses a line. And the press needs to learn to trust them with it. Negative ads will always be a feature of American politics, and voters have generally shown good judgment about what counts as a legitimate issue and what doesn’t.
benton.org/node/131869 | New York Times
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PANDORA AND CANDIDATES
[SOURCE: Washington Post, AUTHOR: Lois Beckett]
Pandora's targeted e-mail sharing pitch isn't new, but it's being offered to political advertisers for the first time this year, a company spokeswoman said. Both Democrats and Republicans, and both local and national campaigns, have used the service to collect voter e-mails. It's among the latest in a series of increasingly sophisticated tactics that campaigns are using to target narrow groups of voters online — from sending ads to Internet users who have visited a candidate's website, to creating a mobile app for campaign volunteers that marks the names and addresses of nearby voters on a Google map.
benton.org/node/131866 | Washington Post
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LL12 IN HAWAII
[SOURCE: New York Times, AUTHOR: Adam Nagourney]
Channel 110 is a choice spot on Hawaii’s digital cable dial, coming right after Fox News and right before CNN Headline News. These days, it is the home of LL12, a station that will soon devote every minute of every day to one topic: Linda Lingle, a Republican running for the United States Senate. Just in case there are not enough political advertisements on existing television stations here — and most people say there most certainly are, given the Senate campaign, two Congressional races, and a lively race for Honolulu mayor — Ms. Lingle has created her own cable station. It provides viewers with a feast of Lingle speeches, Lingle advertisements and Lingle endorsements, as well as video issue papers, televised forums and testimonials delivered in 10 of the languages spoken on these islands.
benton.org/node/131893 | New York Times
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CONTENT
GOOGLE SEARCH
[SOURCE: Google, AUTHOR: Amit Singhal]
Here are some of the latest steps Google is taking today to make search even more intelligent:
Understanding the world: In May we launched the Knowledge Graph, our database of more than 500 million real-world people, places and things with 3.5 billion attributes and connections among them. The feedback has been phenomenally positive and we want to extend this feature to people outside the U.S. So starting today, you’ll see Knowledge Graph results across every English-speaking country in the world. If you’re in Australia and search for [chiefs], you’ll get the rugby team—its players, results and history. We’ll also use this intelligence to help you find the right result more quickly when your search may have different meanings.
Putting your info at your fingertips: Sometimes the best answer to your question isn’t available on the public web—it may be contained somewhere else, such as in your email. We think you shouldn’t have to be your own mini-search engine to find the most useful information—it should just work. A search is a search, and we want our results to be truly universal. So we’re developing a way to find this information for you that’s useful and unobtrusive, and we’d love your feedback. Starting today, we’re opening up a limited trial where you can sign up to get information from your Gmail right from the search box.
Understanding your intent: Often the most natural way to ask a question is by asking aloud. So we’ve combined our speech recognition expertise, understanding of language and the Knowledge Graph so that Voice Search can better interpret your questions and sometimes speak the answers back as full sentences. This has been available on Android for a few weeks and people love it.
benton.org/node/131850 | Google | NYTimes | USAToday | LATimes
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TELEVISION/RADIO
PAY TV AND GOOGLE FIBER
[SOURCE: paidContent.org, AUTHOR: Daniel Frankel]
While even its vast cash resources won’t allow it to roll out fiber to every TV home in the U.S., Google Fiber is something pay TV operators should be “very, very afraid of,” said a report issued by research group SNL Kagan. “Google Inc. is reinventing the business of pay TV and broadband — and it may not need to wire every U.S. city to make an impact,” wrote SNL Kagan analyst Deborah Yao, in the report’s lead. For $120 a month, subscribers get uncapped internet access that’s 172 times faster than the national average. They get a 2 terabyte DVR, capable of recording up to 500 hours of programming and eight shows at one time. And they get an as yet incomplete but growing selection of basic cable channels, albeit one that currently lacks such powerful draws as Disney’s ESPN, News Corp.’s Fox News and AMC. But as SNL Kagan insinuates, Google — which spent $500 million to bring its Fiber to Kansas City — might just try to expand Google Fiber. Quoting our own Stacey Higginbotham, the research group noted Google’s belief that it won’t lose money in Kansas City, with a customer-required $300 connection fee covering deployment cost. SNL Kagan added that Google cut expenses by building its own set tops and running its fiber over aerial power lines instead of cutting them into the ground. Also notable: Verizon spent $23 billion to bring FiOS fiber to 17 million homes.
benton.org/node/131887 | paidContent.org
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R PETER STRAUS
[SOURCE: New York Times, AUTHOR: Robert McFadden]
R. Peter Straus, who took over WMCA in New York in the late 1950s and turned it into one of the nation’s most innovative radio stations, broadcasting what are regarded as the first radio editorials and political endorsements and helping to popularize rock ’n’ roll, died on August 6 at his home in Midtown Manhattan. He was 89. The son of a radio entrepreneur and the scion of a family steeped in public service, Mr. Straus counted diplomats, cabinet officials, legislators and philanthropists among his forebears. He became a United Nations official, director of the Voice of America and administrator of American aid to Africa. But his most memorable contributions were in radio. Long before NPR created a network for high-quality news, music and discussion programs, WMCA pioneered public service radio in New York. It was the first station in the country to run editorials on political and civic issues, with Mr. Straus himself reading opinions on the air, and the first to endorse a presidential candidate, backing John F. Kennedy in 1960.
benton.org/node/131880 | New York Times
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CHILDREN AND MEDIA
SOCIAL MEDIA AND YOUNG PEOPLE
[SOURCE: Washington Post, AUTHOR: Cecilia Kang]
A growing crop of social networks are racing to capture the loyalties of the Web’s youngest and most vulnerable users. The rush to capture young users has sparked fresh concerns from lawmakers and health advocates over whether social networks will keep children in front of computer and mobile-gadget screens for too long. They also worry about online predators. Networks that specialize in kids tout themselves as safe environments for children, although they acknowledge that there may be no fool-proof way to block predators. Yoursphere, for instance, says it does a thorough background check on adults who register their children for the site. Under law, the sites must seek permission from parents to sign up users younger than 13. Facebook restricts users under that age, but an estimated 6 million underage users have lied about their age to get on the site, consumer groups say.
benton.org/node/131833 | Washington Post
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EDUCATION
TECHNOLOGY, BUDGETS, AN TEACHERS
[SOURCE: Education Week, AUTHOR: Ian Quillen]
Of all the recent budget cuts made by the Eagle County (CO) school district—the loss of 89 staff jobs through attrition and layoffs, a 1.5 percent across-the-board pay cut, and the introduction of three furlough days—none sparked as much anger or faced the same scrutiny as the decision to cut three foreign-language teaching positions and replace them with online instruction. At a spring school board meeting, supporters of the targeted programs in French and German, as well as the affected teachers, railed against the 6,200-student district for replacing face-to-face instructors with a digital option they argued would not be as rich or as meaningful. The highly charged response reflects the fear many teachers are beginning to feel that technology could push them out of their jobs, especially in an era of persistently tight budgets.
benton.org/node/131825 | Education Week
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NEIGHBORHOOD INTERNET SCHOOLS
[SOURCE: Wall Street Journal, AUTHOR: David Gelernter]
[Commentary] A local Internet school sounds like a contradiction in terms: the Internet lets you discard geography and forget "local." But the idea is simple. A one-classroom school, with 20 or so children of all ages between 6th and 12th grade, each sitting at a computer and wearing headsets. They all come from nearby. A one-room Internet school might serve a few blocks in a suburb, or a single urban apartment building. Each child does a whole curriculum's worth of learning online, at the computer. Most of the time he follows canned courses on-screen. But for an hour every day, he deals directly, one-to-one over phone or videophone with a tutor. Ideally there's a teaching assistant on an open phone line throughout the day, each assistant dealing with a few dozen students. In early years, parents will need to help here too. And each child needs a mentor who advises parents on courses and keeps track of the student's progress. The wealthy conservative foundation, think tank or consortium that spends liberally to get this idea off the ground will probably provide mentors, in early years, from its own staff. [Gelernter is a professor of computer science at Yale]
benton.org/node/131892 | Wall Street Journal
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JOURNALISM
DATA JOURNALISM
[SOURCE: Columbia Journalism Review, AUTHOR: Anna Codrea-Rado]
Numbers have always informed reporting. But in the last couple of years, the appetite for big data, coupled with a willingness to experiment with how to present this information, has led to an eruption of visualized narratives and rich data explorations. Advances in multimedia have given rise to new opportunities for displaying these pieces, especially online. As a consequence, media organizations are growing their interactive departments, and journalism schools are adapting curricula to incorporate computer science courses. Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism, for example, is now in its second year of offering a dual degree in computer science and journalism. If sports are a statistician’s dirtiest fantasy, then the Olympics are the ultimate playing ground for the datarazzi. Among the bickering and backbiting about logistics, budget, organization, and badminton, London 2012 has had another impact: giving news outlets their own podium from which to showcase excellent examples of data journalism.
benton.org/node/131849 | Columbia Journalism Review
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GOVERNMENT COMMUNICATIONS/PERFORMANCE
COMMERCE DIGITAL STRATEGY
[SOURCE: Department of Commerce]
On May 23, 2012, the White House released the Federal Digital Strategy that outlined the use of “modern tools and technologies to seize the digital opportunity and fundamentally change how the Federal Government serves both its internal and external customers–building a 21st century platform to better serve the American People.” The Office of Management and Budget (OMB) is requiring agencies to implement at least two such tools or technologies by August 23, 2012.
As part of the Digital Strategy, the Department of Commerce has identified two areas that are ripe for improvement and several platforms within each that could be updated: APIs and mobile-optimization. As such, today we are asking for your input in deciding which two items we will commit to completing by OMB’s August 23 deadline. In the comments section contained below, we welcome your feedback on the possible candidates for improvement, or other opportunities we may have overlooked. Your feedback, combined with other internal and external conversations, will guide Commerce’s digital plan in the coming months and years.
benton.org/node/131862 | Department of Commerce
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