April 2013

Verizon Wireless Pursues Clearwire Spectrum

Verizon Wireless has offered to pay as much a $1.5 billion to buy spectrum leases from Clearwire, people familiar with the matter said. The move would give the largest U.S. wireless carrier the right to use airwaves currently controlled by Clearwire in big markets in the U.S. It also further complicates a three-way series of deals in which Clearwire had agreed to sell itself to part-owner Sprint Nextel and Sprint agreed to sell a controlling stake in itself to Japan's Softbank.

Verizon's offer, as well as Sprint's bid to buy the rest of Clearwire, highlights how the U.S.'s biggest carriers are trying to lock up the airwaves needed to carry fast-growing volumes of wireless data. It is unclear whether Verizon Wireless, which is a joint venture of Verizon Communications and Vodafone Group, has any ambitions with Clearwire beyond the spectrum purchase or how it might fit in with Sprint's agreement to buy the roughly 50% of Clearwire it doesn't already own. Clearwire said in the filing that it would evaluate the proposal and discuss it with "Party J" and Sprint. Any bid for Clearwire spectrum could face hurdles if Sprint doesn't approve. Sprint has a number of contractual rights that pose steep obstacles for any outsider trying to do a deal.

Facebook teams up with attorneys general on safety campaign

Facebook and 19 state attorneys general announced they’re joining forces to educate young people about the basics of online security.

Maryland state attorney general Doug Gansler, currently the president of the National Association of Attorneys General, said the attorneys general and Facebook will distribute public service announcements outlining how teens and their parents can control online information on Facebook and across the Web. Facebook will post the announcements on its Facebook Safety page, while state attorneys general will do the same on their own Facebook pages and official Web sites. “We hope this campaign will encourage consumers to closely manage their privacy and these tools and tips will help provide a safer online experience,” Gansler said in a Facebook release. Facebook will also release a video answering top questions it has heard from teachers, parents and teens about online privacy, bullying and Internet safety. Those participating in the initiative will also distribute a tip sheet on what users can do to protect their online privacy.

Privacy advocate Jeffrey Chester, executive director of the Center for Digital Democracy and a critic of Facebook’s past privacy efforts, said he was not that impressed with Facebook’s latest initiative.

FTC Approves Final Order Settling Charges Against Software and Rent-to-Own Companies Accused of Computer Spying

Following a public comment period, the Federal Trade Commission has approved nine final orders settling charges that seven rent-to-own companies and a software design firm and its two principals spied on consumers using computers that consumers rented from them. The companies used software to take screenshots of confidential and personal information, log customers’ computer keystrokes, and in some cases take webcam pictures of people in their own homes, all without the customers’ knowledge.

For Broadcast Nets, Cable Path Is Twisty

Converting Fox, or any of the other broadcasters, to a cable net would not be easy.

"The challenge is not whether it can be done. It's how long would it take to happen. It's not easy or quick," warns Wall Street analyst Richard Greenfield, who believes that as long as Aereo is legal, "it significantly changes the leverage imbalance that has dominated retrans negotiations" that now favor broadcast. Long before News Corp’s Chase Carey threatened to play the cable card in Vegas, Fox studied the model in 2008- 09. (Little-known fact: before News Corp got control of DirecTV, DirecTV boxes contained TV antennas. But outfitting boxes with antennas is an expensive proposition.) A decade ago, NBC's Bob Wright and Disney's Bob Iger flirted with the cable conversion idea in public when they needed a way to get pesky affiliates back in line. Fox's plan, as developed about four years ago, would have moved the network to cable "with" its affiliates, making the change even more complicated. The idea was to run locally originated programming, including news, network and syndicated fare, over cable. The WB set up similar "virtual stations" in markets where it couldn't get broadcast affiliates. A drastic change from broadcast to cable has several pros and cons.

ACA: National Broadband Map Is Good Enough

The National Telecommunications and Information Association's National Broadband Map may be imperfect, but it is good enough for the Federal Communications Commission to use to determine where broadband is already being delivered and should not be overbuilt.

That was the word from the American Cable Association to the FCC in reply comments on the commission's second phase of broadband subsidies in the Connect America Fund, which the FCC created to migrate traditional phone support to broadband. In reply comments to the commission, ACA, which represents smaller and mid-sized cable operators, said there were a number of reasons to use the map even though it conceded it is a flawed "work in progress."

The fastest way to speedy networks: ignore Uncle Sam

[Commentary] Local leaders are starting to crack the code for how to drive broadband network upgrades in their communities. They are learning to build agreements with private enterprise that work for both the private and public interests.

These efforts lower deployment and operating costs as well as risk, while at the same time creating numerous public benefits including attractive service levels and reasonable consumer pricing. These agreements, in effect, are new versions of the social contracts that enabled phone companies and cable companies to build out their networks in the last century. While the network upgrade may seem to be only about speed, in actuality it will also drive other public improvements as well. Federal policymakers certainly understand the importance of faster networks, but as a recent workshop at the Federal Communications Commission demonstrated: The federal government’s actions, other than a one-time Recovery Act investment, have been neutral, at best, and probably negative. There are positive steps that can, and should, be taken.

[Blair Levin is the Executive Director of the University Community Next Generation Innovation Project, or Gig.U; he led the development of the National Broadband Plan in 2010 for the Federal Communications Commission. Ellen Satterwhite is Program Director at Gig. U]

Comcast is encrypting basic cable now

Comcast customers, get ready for yet another television transition: The cable provider has started to alert its customers in some markets that it is about to encrypt their basic cable signals, forcing them to order a digital adapter if they want to continue to receive basic programming through the service.

Comcast is making adapters available for free in select markets, and the company even has a model that works with third-party set-top boxes — but some users could still be left in the dark. Consumers who already use a Comcast-provided set-top box on all of their TV sets don’t have to worry, their service will continue to work as before. But if you have a TV in your den that’s hooked up to your cable outlet without a set-top box, then you’re going to have to get an adapter to keep it working. Comcast is contacting consumers ahead of the transition, offering them up to two digital TV adapters for free for two years.

Simon & Schuster launches e-book lending pilot with New York City public libraries

Simon & Schuster has never made its e-books available to libraries, but that is finally changing with the company’s announcement of a one-year trial with the New York City public libraries.

Beginning April 30, Simon & Schuster will make its entire e-book catalog available to the New York and Brooklyn Public libraries; the pilot with the Queens Library is expected to begin in mid-May. Simon & Schuster had been the only remaining Big Six publisher that did not make its e-books available to libraries at all. During the pilot, the libraries will also sell Simon & Schuster titles through their online portals, so that a patron who doesn’t want to wait on the hold list for a particular title can purchase it instead. The library gets a cut each time an e-book is sold through its platform.

Deputies brace for backlash as cellphone ban kicks in Monday at Chicago Court House

Authorities expect to encounter “a number of upset people” when enforcement of a full ban on cellphones and other electronic devices begins at Cook County’s George N. Leighton Criminal Court Building.

Between 5,000 and 6,000 people come into the courthouse — one of the busiest in the country — on a daily basis, according to Cook County Sheriff’s spokesman Frank Bilecki. But he said just 180 storage lockers will be available for people who use public transportation to get to the courthouse. That may not be enough but Anna Ashcraft, the county’s director of real estate management, said that’s simply all the storage space that’s available. The ban, first announced Jan. 11, is expected to be phased in at the remaining Cook County courthouses — except for the Richard J. Daley Center — in the coming months. Chief Judge Timothy C. Evans has said it makes more sense to begin enforcement of the ban at the Leighton Criminal Court Building at 26th and California because the potential for security breaches there is highest. Signs hung outside the courthouse Sunday warning of the ban. And as usual, deputies found themselves verbally scolding visitors whose cellphones went off during bond court. The ban nearly went into full effect in January. But Evans, apparently responding to concerns about the significant indigent population arriving at the courthouse via public transportation, announced a three-month grace period that ends April 15. Certain people are exempted from the ban, including current or former judges, licensed attorneys, news media, government employees, anyone reporting for jury duty and people with disabilities who require electronic devices to communicate.

AT&T Researchers Set a Long-Haul Data Record

Researchers at AT&T have devised a way to increase the distance that large amounts of data can travel through a fiber-optic connection.

The technique should allow 400-gigabit-per-second signals to travel for a distance of 12,000 kilometers—four times the previous distance possible—and it promises faster ocean-crossing transmission without adding more equipment. The feat is like sending 170 HD movies 12,000 kilometers—half-again as far as the distance from San Francisco to Tokyo. The advance, which is described in terms of the amount of data one wavelength can carry, comes a few months after Japan’s NTT and research partners hit another fiber milestone, demonstrating the transmission of vastly more data—a petabit (1,000 terabits) of data per second—for about 50 kilometers. The AT&T work uses a novel approach to modulating light and new algorithms to speed up the processing of data carried in that light signal. The NTT work was more radical. It involved a change in the way individual fiber strands are arranged in optical backbones, greatly reducing signal loss, and also exploited additional properties of light—phase and polarization—to carry more data.

Benton

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