November 2012

Putting a 13-Year-Old Child Safely on Facebook

Even for an adult, Facebook’s privacy settings are as daunting as trying to do your taxes with an abacus. For teenagers, unaware of the consequences of their online actions, using Facebook incorrectly could potentially leave a digital trail that might follow them all the way through high school, college and into the real world. What’s more, there are also creepy people out there on social networks. First, you should sit down with children and explain that anything — stress the word anything –they post can and will be used against them on the Internet. Teenagers should assume that there is no such thing as private on Facebook.

Buffett Says He Remains Bullish on Newspapers, Despite Closing One

Warren E. Buffett isn’t letting one troubled newspaper color his view of buying what many media experts consider the dinosaurs of the news business. He still plans to buy newspapers, even though he recently announced that he would be shutting down one that he recently bought by the end of the year.

Doug Hiemstra, president of the World Media Enterprises, which is a Berkshire Hathaway Company, sent a letter to his staff saying that the company would shut down The News and Messenger in Manassas (VA), by year’s end. Hiemstra wrote in his Nov. 14 letter that “The News and Messenger has lost money for a number of years under the Media General ownership, and after our team made an exhaustive review of The News and Messenger, we were unable to come up with a scenario that would result in a likelihood of profitable operations there.” The company announced it would cut 105 positions, mainly at The News and Messenger.

According to public filings, Berkshire Hathaway also cut back its stake in Lee Enterprises, a chain of mostly small dailies based in Iowa.

Buffett said that the cuts at Media General were focused on one troubled paper. He said he planned to share more of his thoughts about newspapers soon and was working on a section about them in his annual letter to shareholders.

Internet surfing while driving is on the rise

Who wants to look at the road when your smartphone is so much more interesting? That's the thinking of a growing number of people who admit to "webbing" and driving -- or surfing the Internet while driving their car.

According to a study of 1,000 drivers by State Farm Insurance, 48% of drivers 18 to 29 have admitted to accessing the Internet while driving. That's up from 29% three years ago. In the same age group, 43% of drivers said they check email while they are driving, up from 32% in 2009. In 2011, State Farm found that 30% of people 18 to 29 admitted to updating their social networks while they were driving too. These numbers may be frightening, but they are not necessarily unexpected because more drivers now have smartphones.

Sen Leahy keeps tough protections in email privacy bill

Privacy advocates are pleased with the latest version of Sen Patrick Leahy's (D-VT) bill to require police to obtain a warrant before reading e-mails, Facebook messages and other forms of electronic communication.

Sen Leahy released the latest version of his bill on Nov 26. The Senate Judiciary Committee, which Sen Leahy chairs, is scheduled to vote on the legislation on Nov 29. There had been speculation that Sen Leahy would water down the privacy protections after CNET, a technology news site, reported last week that a draft bill circulating on Capitol Hill included broad exceptions for civil investigations. The latest version does not include those exceptions, and Sen Leahy denied that he ever supported them.

Silicon Valley's dirty secret - age bias

A look at the pressures in Silicon Valley, where the start-up ethos extols fresh ideas and young programmers willing to toil through the night. Chief executives in their 20s, led by Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg, are lionized, in part because of their youth. Many investors state bluntly that they prefer to see people under 40 in charge. Yet the youth worship undercuts another of Silicon Valley's cherished ideals: that anyone smart and driven can get ahead in what the industry likes to think of as an egalitarian culture. To many, it looks like simple age discrimination -- and it's affecting people who wouldn't fit any normal definition of old.

Stations Uncover Scary, Dangerous, Nasty

Here's another small sampling of the investigative reporting being done at stations. The stories turned up breaches of airport security in Nashville; abbreviated prison sentences in Indiana; industrial pollution in North Birmingham; and uncertified, previously owned mattresses in Detroit.

House Wants Answers on Receivers' Role in Spectrum Sharing

The House Communications Subcommittee wants industry input on how to allow spectrum users -- like broadcasters, wireless companies and the government -- to occupy increasingly close quarters without "stepping on each other's toes."

That is according to a majority staff memo on a Nov. 29 hearing in the subcommittee on "The Role of Receivers in a Spectrum-Scarce World." The issue is growing in importance given a number of FCC initiatives to boost spectrum efficiency and use, including allowing unlicensed devices to share the so-called "white spaces" in the broadcast band, moving broadcasters to make room for wireless companies, the FCC's so far unsuccessful attempt to allow LightSquared to operate alongside GPS spectrum, and the FCC's recent move to loosen rules on terrestrial use of satellite spectrum. "Good fences make good neighbors," say the staffers, "but how do you know how high to build your fence or what materials to use if you don't know who your neighbors might be in the future or precisely what they will be doing on their lot?" They point out that the two main "fences" are guard bands on the spectrum side and filters and power limits on the transmitter/receiver side.

Publishers brace for authors to reclaim book rights in 2013

A copyright law that lets authors break contracts after 35 years will start taking effect in January. The law, which is meant to give authors like Stephen King and Judy Blume a “second bite at the apple,” could provide yet another disruption for traditional publishers. While authors have the option to bolt their publisher, many may prefer to simply seek a sweeter deal rather than fly solo or risk triggering a lawsuit. And, as Law360 notes, there may be only a relative handful of works that are valuable enough to justify expending millions in legal fees.

Multitasking Media Impacts TV's Dominance

Television gets more total consumer use than all other media -- but fragmentation of those audiences and multitasking make those results less clear. Average time use for TV was just over four-and-a-half hours a day -- 278 minutes, according to a recent study by eMarketer. This is up from 274 in 2011. Online consumer daily use is 173 minutes; in 2011, it was 167. Radio comes next, slightly down to 92 minutes in 2012 versus 94 minutes in 2011. Mobile use is perhaps the fastest-growth area: 82 minutes versus 54 minutes a year ago. On the flip side, print is now at 38 minutes, down from 55 minutes. All media use per day is now at 699 minutes -- just over 11-and-a-half hours a day. In 2011, it was at 678 minutes. But multitasking makes it less of an easy victory for TV.

Defending Free Speech in the Digital Age

Freedom of speech is under threat around the world. On one side of this battle are governments and corporations seeking, to various degrees, to set limits on what is acceptable to say and what is not. On the other are ordinary citizens and activists demanding that their voices be heard -- voices that, in this new age of smartphones and social media, are harder than ever to silence, even as technology puts new implements of censorship into the hands of autocrats. In many cases, the battle is being joined in societies that are struggling with the powerful repercussions of free expression for the first time.

Benton

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