December 2013

Verizon Responds to Shareholders’ Concerns on User Data

Verizon Communications has taken an aggressive stance against a proposed shareholder resolution that would require it to be more forthcoming about the customer information it shares with the government.

Activist investors sent the resolution to Verizon and AT&T in November 2013. AT&T said that it opposed the resolution, and Verizon has taken an even harder stance. Trillium Asset Management, an investment firm, which submitted the proposal to Verizon, demanded that the company publish reports on the information it hands over in response to government surveillance requests. In response, Verizon’s lawyer said the company would skip a vote on the proposal if Trillium did not prove it was eligible to file the resolution in the first place. “The materials that Verizon has received from Trillium fail to establish that Trillium has the authority to submit the proposal,” Verizon said in a letter dated Nov 25 that Trillium provided. Trillium has responded, detailing its eligibility to file the resolution.

Aereo Supports Broadcasters Petition to Supreme Court

Aereo told the Supreme Court that the Court should agree to hear broadcasters appeal of a lower court decision not to block its service, though it disagrees with how the broadcasters framed the appeal.

In its response to the petition by the major commercial networks and noncommercial broadcasters, Aereo says the appeals court got it right and that Aereo does not transmit a public performance, but will let the High Court try to put a stop to further broadcasters litigation. "The essential bargain that petitioners made to obtain, for free, public spectrum worth billions of dollars was that, once they have broadcast their programming, consumers have a right to receive and to view that programming using an antenna and to copy that programming for their personal use," Aereo told the court. “We have decided to not oppose the broadcasters’ petition for certiorari before the United States Supreme Court. While the law is clear and the Second Circuit Court of Appeals and two different federal courts have ruled in favor of Aereo, broadcasters appear determined to keep litigating the same issues against Aereo in every jurisdiction that we enter," said Chet Kanojia, CEO, Aereo. "We want this resolved on the merits rather than through a wasteful war of attrition."

Colorado School Broadband Provider Reports To Lawmakers

An entity charged with connecting Colorado schools to broadband told lawmakers it hopes to have more than 80 percent of districts covered by the end of 2014 as federal grant funding is running out. Eagle-Net Alliance President Mike Ryan told lawmakers during a hearing about $5 million is left from a 2010 $100 million grant to link 168 school districts to broadband. Ryan said after the hearing that that an additional $10-to-$15 million is needed to get all school districts linked within the next three to five years

Who Will Win the 1 GigaBit Ultra High-Speed Internet Race?

[Commentary] While the United States is a leader in Internet technology, and while the majority of citizens have access to the Internet, providing ultra-high speed access has not been on anyone’s radar. However, all of a sudden the overwhelming focus is on speed. So where are we in the rollout of this service and who will the winners and losers be going forward? Who needs this much speed?

Neither carriers nor customers were screaming for ultra-high speed Internet connections. Everyone seemed happy and satisfied. Most customers got their high-speed Internet access from their local phone company or their cable television company. However others like Google wanted more. They didn’t see carriers upping the speed so a few quarters ago they decided to get into the service provider business. They built and rolled out a full, one Gigabit service in the Kansas City area. This move turned out to be a big success. Out of the blue customers and companies loved it and cities wanted to be the next in line for this competitive advantage. In any case the first mover advantage will be in play. Winners will be companies like AT&T, CenturyLink and C Spire. Google too if they stay a service provider. The early players in this new space. Winners will be early adopter cities who will have an advantage very few others cities have. Winners will be users who have access to the newest and fastest service in the market.

[Kagan is a Technology Industry Analyst and consultant]

Austin may change rules to allow Google to attach fiber to AT&T’s poles

The Austin City Council is expected to vote to force AT&T to allow Google use of its utility poles to install its planned high-speed Google Fiber network in the city.

The proposed action has ruffled feathers with AT&T officials, as the telecommunications company says shouldn’t have to allow the Internet giant access to its poles across the city. But city officials and Google say the proposed ordinance change, which is scheduled to come up before the Austin City Council, would minimize disruptions to city infrastructure as Google beings to implement its network. “We’re not trying to get in and solve a company’s problems for itself. That’s not the purpose,” said Rondella Hawkins, the city of Austin’s telecommunications and regulatory affairs officer. “It’s just that we’re stepping in because we want to minimize the impact to our right-of-way and (avoid) traffic delays. We don’t want additional poles put up in the right-of-way.” The city owns about 80 percent of the utility poles in Austin, with AT&T owning roughly the remaining 20 percent. Those poles are interspersed throughout the city, Hawkins said. The rules change would require utility pole owners to allow all communication services providers to “place attachments … on the user’s poles within the city’s right-of-way on rates, terms, and conditions that are just, reasonable and non-discriminatory.” Hawkins said the city believes it has right-of-way authority to change the ordinance. “We don’t want people to put up their own poles,” she said. “We want to avoid anybody putting up redundant utility poles. Could you imagine a city where all the (telecommunications) providers individually have their own utility poles? It would be a mess.”

How Americans Value Public Libraries in Their Communities

Americans strongly value the role of public libraries in their communities, both for providing access to materials and resources and for promoting literacy and improving the overall quality of life. Most Americans say they have only had positive experiences at public libraries, and value a range of library resources and services. Some 90% of Americans ages 16 and older said that the closing of their local public library would have an impact on their community, with 63% saying it would have a “major” impact. Asked about the personal impact of a public library closing, two-thirds (67%) of Americans said it would affect them and their families, including 29% who said it would have a major impact.

Moreover, the vast majority of Americans ages 16 and older say that public libraries play an important role in their communities:

95% of Americans ages 16 and older agree that the materials and resources available at public libraries play an important role in giving everyone a chance to succeed;
95% say that public libraries are important because they promote literacy and a love of reading;
94% say that having a public library improves the quality of life in a community;
81% say that public libraries provide many services people would have a hard time finding elsewhere. However, although many library services are seen as important, there are varying levels of enthusiasm for different services. Some 91% of Americans say they have had some exposure to libraries in the past.

We asked these respondents a series of questions about the importance of various library services to them and their families and their response shows that Americans strongly value library services such as access to books and media; having a quiet, safe place to spend time, read, or study; and having librarians to help people find information. Other services, such as assistance finding and applying for jobs, are more important to particular groups, including those with lower levels of education or household income.

Network News Coverage Of Obamacare Rollout Overwhelmingly Negative

Broadcast evening news programs slanted coverage of the Affordable Care Act (ACA) by hyping negative aspects of the law's rollout while underplaying or not exploring positive changes to insurance coverage under the health care law, including the role that subsidies would play in making health care affordable. All three major broadcast networks aired more segments that took on a negative tone than a positive tone in October and November 2013, according to a Media Matters study.

FCC’s Rosenworcel: We Need Engineers

At the IEEE Globecom 2013 conference in Atlanta (GA) on Dec 11, Federal Communications Commission member Jessica Rosenworcel offered three ideas on how to address the communications challenges ahead.

To get outside the box, government needs to do more work in the sandbox: she suggested setting up small-scale policy experiments in the FCC’s experimental spectrum licensing process and the nationwide transition to next-generation Internet Protocol -- or IP – networks
More efficient use of spectrum: We need to create incentives for
all users to be more efficient with their spectrum. We need to support technologies – from dynamic spectrum access to frequency agile radios to smart antenna systems -- that make this possible.
Sandboxes and spectrum efficiency have something in common -- they benefit from engineers: the FCC should create an honors engineer program to help recruit talented, young legal professionals.

Continuing to Build Smart Policies for Spectrum Sharing

Finding ways to use wireless spectrum more efficiently is a critical part of President Obama’s ambitious strategy for expanding the availability of spectrum for innovative and flexible commercial uses, including for broadband services, to drive innovation, expand consumer services, and create jobs.

Balancing the growing needs of both commercial and Federal spectrum users presents opportunities for increased efficiency and economic growth, but also poses challenges. In particular, commercial wireless providers must learn how to operate their systems in spectrum bands that will be shared by Federal agencies using that same spectrum for operations such as conducting military training exercises, maintaining air safety, or tracking criminal activity. That’s why it is absolutely essential to enhance collaboration and information sharing between Federal agencies and private-sector wireless technology companies. And we already know that it can work. On December 13, the National Telecommunications and Information Administration will host a Lessons Learned Meeting, convening Federal agencies, industry experts, and other stakeholders to review the collaborative process that helped inspire the Defense Department proposal regarding the 1755 MHz band, in anticipation of additional collaboration and information sharing efforts that address the ever-increasing demand for wireless services.

This White House petition on Internet privacy now requires a response

Over 100,000 people have signed onto a WethePeople petition asking President Barack Obama to support changes in a 27-year-old privacy law called the Electronic Communications Privacy Act (ECPA).

The law, which was written in 1986, and long before Gmail and Facebook, allows the seizing of e-mail and other digital communications without a warrant. Critics say it doesn't provide enough privacy protections for online communications. "Americans are deeply concerned about NSA surveillance," the petition reads. "But the NSA’s not the only problem. An outdated law says the IRS and hundreds of other agencies can read our communications without a warrant." Crossing the 100,000-signature threshold means that the White House must now issue a response to the petitioners, though there's no telling when that might come. The petition narrowly made the deadline with several hundred extra signatures to spare (and more are still coming in).

Benton

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