May 2016

Continuing its push to expand access to broadband in rural areas, the Federal Communications Commission took important steps toward investing an additional $2 billion in rural networks over the next decade. The item adopted by the Commission establishes rules of the road for an auction that will harness market forces to expand broadband in targeted rural areas. The item also seeks comment on a number of issues surrounding the auction so that it can deliver support to unserved communities as equitably and efficiently as possible.

The item builds on the substantial progress the FCC has made in recent years connecting rural America to broadband. Last year, the nation’s largest carriers – known as “price cap” carriers – accepted $9 billion over six years from Phase II of the Connect America Fund to expand broadband in their rural service areas. And in March, the FCC reformed its broadband support for the nation’s smallest carriers, providing $20 billion over the next decade. The auction seeks to expand service to census blocks unserved by broadband delivering speeds of 10 Mbps downloads/1 Mbps uploads in 20 states where the price cap carriers declined last year’s Connect America Fund offer. Also included in the auction are locations across the country with extremely high deployment costs.

The Federal Communications Commission proposed to eliminate two public inspection file rules. These rules currently require: (1) commercial television and radio broadcast stations to retain, and make available to the public, copies of correspondence from viewers and listeners; and (2) cable operators to maintain and allow public inspection of the location of a cable system’s principal headend. The Commission adopted online public file rules for broadcast television licensees in 2012, moving television public files that previously were retained at stations’ local main studios to an online, Commission-hosted database. TV broadcasters completed their transition to the online file in July 2014. Modernizing the filing process made it easier for consumers to access information about their broadcast services without having to travel to the station’s main studio and reduced the cost of broadcaster compliance.

Last January, the Commission expanded the move to online filing to cable, radio and satellite operators. The proposal furthers the Commission’s recent progress in modernizing its public inspection file rules. The proposed elimination of these rules will reduce regulatory burdens on commercial broadcasters and cable operators without adversely affecting the general public. Removing these requirements also would enable broadcasters and cable operators to make their entire public inspection file available online and permit them to cease maintaining local public files. While it appears that the general public does not need access to it, principal headend information must be made available to certain entities, including the FCC and local television stations. The proposal asks for comment on how this information should be collected and made available to entities that need it.

Women used warmer, gentler words in their status updates on Facebook compared to men, who were more likely to swear, express anger and use argumentative language, a study of 10 million postings found. In a bit of a surprise, the study showed that women used slightly more assertive language, said H. Andrew Schwartz, an assistant professor of computer science at Stony Brook University and one of its authors.

The study, “Women are Warmer but No Less Assertive Than Men: Gender and Language on Facebook,” was a data-driven analysis of the words used by more than 65,000 Facebook users who gave researchers permission to examine their status updates. That shift in assertiveness might reflect the cultural and societal changes brought about by a generation that heavily uses social media, said Margaret L. Kern, a senior lecturer at the Center for Positive Psychology at the University of Melbourne in Australia and one of the study’s authors. In the study, the user’s average age was 26.“Those conversations have shifted over time,” she said. “On Facebook, people are friends. They’re not talking up or down to each other. Women’s writing largely reflected compassion and politeness compared with men, who were hostile and impersonal, according to the study, which Schwartz and Kern discussed in advance of the release.