January 2014

'Digital divide' persists in health IT adoption

Adoption of electronic medical records by primary care physicians has grown substantially, but the "digital divide" between large and small physician practices persists, according to a new study from the Commonwealth Fund.

Between 2009 and 2012, adoption grew from 46 percent to 69 percent. A majority of physicians use core health IT functions such as e-prescribing, electronic ordering of lab tests and certain types of clinical decision support. Practice size, however, is the major factor affecting adoption. Ninety percent in practices of 20 or more physicians use EMRs, compared to just half of those in solo practices. In 2012, 33 percent of primary care physicians could exchange clinical summaries with other doctors, and 35 percent could share lab or diagnostic tests with doctors outside their practice. Roughly one-third offered electronic access to patients. Physicians who are part of an integrated delivery system, such as Kaiser Permanente or the Veterans Administration, practices that share resources or those eligible for financial incentives have higher rates of health IT adoption. The report's authors suggest that technical assistance programs and financial incentives can help close this "digital divide." In addition, they say, physician practices remain behind schedule in their preparation for International Statistical Classification of Diseases and Related Health Problems.

Proposed Law Would Give US Chief Technology Officer Oversight Of Major It Projects

Reps Anna Eshoo (D-CA) Gerry Connolly (D-VA) are floating legislation that would give the US government’s chief technology officer the power to review and in some cases take charge of major information technology projects throughout the government.

The Reforming Federal Procurement of Information Technology, or RFP-IT, Act would put the power of legislation behind the position of federal chief technology officer, which has existed since the start of the Obama Administration. The legislation would also put the CTO in charge of a Digital Government Office that reviews all agency proposals for “major IT projects.” After reviewing the proposal, the office could either manage the project itself, help the agency manage the project or leave the agency to manage the project itself.

DC Court Delays FilmOn Hearing Until Supremes Decide Aereo

A DC federal appeals court has granted a broadcaster request that it delay a decision on a DC Circuit Court's injunction against FilmOn until the Supreme Court rules on the legality of similar service, Aereo.

Fox and others had asked the court on Jan 15 to defer the decision and suspend the briefing schedule for the Aereo appeal. On Jan 23, the court agreed to grant the broadcaster motion to hold the case in abeyance for now. It signaled that the parties would have until 30 days after that Supreme Court decision -- which is expected to come in June -- to file motions governing future proceedings. FilmOn and Aereo both argue they do not have to pay a copyright fee for broadcast programming because they are not transmitting a performance, but instead providing technology to remotely access a recording of broadcast TV station signals that users are free to access and copy without payment. The Supreme Court has agreed to decide if they are right, or whether broadcasters are correct when they argue it is a public performance subject to copyright payments.

State of the Net Conference 2014

Internet Education Foundation
Tuesday, January 28, 2014
http://www.stateofthenet.org/

Read more about State of the Net 2014

Dish and DirecTV Combine Addressable Ad Efforts for Political Campaigns

Dish Network and DirecTV are combining their sales efforts for addressable TV advertising for political campaigns. The partnership will allow political campaigns to use both operators' addressable capabilities to target commercials at a household level, the companies said.

Combined, DirecTV and Dish reach over 20 million households. Addressable TV advertising is currently available in 37 million households, one media buyer estimated, but advertisers would have to do separate deals with multiple satellite and cable companies to actually approach that kind of reach. Stitching two pay-TV systems' addressable offerings together is meant to make it easier for advertisers to target TV commercials on a wide scale. The move now was inspired partly by the use of data of in the most recent presidential election, executives at Dish and DirecTV said. The partnership will give campaigns the ability to show their messages to a precise set of potential voters and eliminate spending waste, said Keith Kazerman, senior VP-ad sales, DirecTV.

Candidates of both parties run vs. NSA

Edward Snowden’s leaks didn’t just cause turmoil in the U.S. intelligence community, prompt international backlash toward President Barack Obama and revive a debate in Congress over civil liberties. They spawned a whole new breed on the 2014 campaign trail: The anti-National Security Agency candidate. Many of these candidates are unlikely to knock off well-financed incumbents. But for Republicans, the debate highlights the growing divide within the party over whether to move sharply away from the national-security hawk mindset that has prevailed since President Ronald Reagan.

Do Municipal Networks Offer More Attractive Service Offerings than Private Sector Providers?

Do municipal broadband providers offer lower prices than private firms for similar triple-play bundles as has been claimed? No. The evidence is clear. If anything, it appears that the prices of municipal providers are higher than that of their private-sector rivals for similar triple-play bundles. This evidence supports the notion that triple-play prices offered by commercial broadband service providers are today consistent with competitive outcomes.

Google exec boosts GOP data effort

Michele Weslander Quaid, who serves as Google’s “Innovation Evangelist” and chief technology officer for its public-sector division, is joining the board of directors of Voter Gravity, a campaign technology company that serves GOP candidates and conservative groups.

It’s a bit of a political coming-out for Weslander Quaid, who joined Google in 2011 and had not previously been active in partisan politics. The move comes as Google, which had become known in Washington as a reliable source of campaign cash and technology talent to Democrats, is working to diversify its political footprint. Weslander Quaid is certainly among – if not the – highest-ranking employee to lend expertise to a Republican tech company. She worked for a decade in the private sector as an engineer and data scientist, but was recruited after the 2001 terrorist attacks by the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency, eventually working in senior technology roles for the Director of National Intelligence and the Defense Department during the administrations of both George W. Bush and Obama. Though she had been a registered Republican, Weslander Quaid switched her registration to independent around the time she entered government and has not donated to federal candidates of either party or openly affiliated with any political groups or companies until now.

Obama's NSA blind spot

[Commentary] President Obama's recent speech on government surveillance is dominating the conversation, but he won't be making the key decisions on the future of the National Security Agency's collection of domestic phone data.

The statutory provision authorizing these massive sweeps expires June 1, 2015. If Congress simply does nothing, the NSA's domestic spying program will soon come to a screeching halt. The question is whether Americans will seize this opportunity to gain critical perspective on the crisis responses of the George W. Bush years. Voters elected and reelected President Obama precisely because he promised to engage in this decisive reappraisal. But his speech failed to redeem this promise. In contrast, President Obama never mentions the 4th Amendment's demand that "no warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause ... describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized." The President has no right to sit on the sidelines until the high court tells him what the Constitution means. The president is under an independent obligation to determine that his actions are legitimate.

[Ackerman is a professor of law and political science at Yale]

Google plans mystery experiments at 76-77 GHz

Google filed a highly secretive application with the Federal Communications Commission for an experimental radio authority, via which the company aims to test technology in the 76-77 GHz millimeter-wave band.

That spectrum is authorized for short-range radar applications, including vehicle radars. The Jan 22 filing was uncovered by consulting engineer Steven Crowley. Google asked in a request for confidentiality, which can be accessed by the public, that the FCC treat certain information in its application as confidential and not subject to public inspection. "The designated information constitutes confidential and proprietary information that, if subject to public disclosure, would cause significant commercial, economic, and competitive harm," said the letter. What little can be gleaned from the highly redacted letter indicates that Google wants to conduct an experiment under statutory temporary authority (STA). The company contends granting of this experimental STA "will not adversely impact any authorized user of RF spectrum." Google is seeking authorization for testing across the United States over 24 months, beginning no later than March 1, 2014. Given that the 76-77 GHz band is used for short-range vehicular radar, Google's planned experiments may involve its self-driving car efforts.

Benton

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