November 2016

BENTON'S COMMUNICATIONS-RELATED HEADLINES for TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 29, 2016

WIRELESS/SPECTRUM
   Free Press Launches Campaign to Use FCC Airwaves Auction to Strengthen Journalism and Serve Local Communities - press release
   Public TV and the FCC Spectrum: A Mystery and an Opportunity - Free Press research
   FCC's Latest TV Reverse Auction Ending Dec 1
   AT&T Users Will Be Able to Stream DirecTV Now Without Using Their Data [links to Verge, The]
   Nielsen Studies WiFi Vs. Cellular Usage Patterns [links to telecompetitor]

ELECTIONS & MEDIA
   Fake News May Not Be Protected Speech - Bloomberg op-ed
   Trump aide: Media chasing 'shiny object' of recount instead of voter fraud [links to Hill, The]
   White House insists hackers didn't sway election, even as recount begins [links to Politico]
   President-elect Trump has already defeated the news media. And it’s unclear what we can do about it. [links to Washington Post]
   News media struggles to cover Trump's tweets and falsehoods [links to CNN]
   Fake News Is Not the Only Problem - Medium op-ed [links to Benton summary]
   We Tracked Down A Fake-News Creator In The Suburbs. Here's What We Learned - NPR [links to Benton summary]
   What is the future of news? Bleak, probably. - Vox analysis [links to Benton summary]
   The Failings Of Both Traditional And Social Media Have Led To The Concerning Destruction Of Fact [links to Huffington Post]

TRUMP TRANSITION
   Let’s rethink market power in tech - AEI's Mark Jamison (Trump FCC Transition Leader) op-ed [links to Benton summary]
   President Trump and Open Internet [links to Davis Wright Tremaine]
   How Trump will attack the FCC's net neutrality rules [links to IDG News Service]
   Trump’s Next Battle: Keeping These Republican Senators Happy [links to New York Times]
   How Will Lobbyists and Executives Navigate the Presidential Transition? [links to Bloomberg]
   Pragmatic tech industry now wants to work with Trump [links to USAToday]
   What President-elect Trump’s $1 trillion infrastructure plan means for red and blue states - Bloomberg op-ed [links to Benton summary]
   Trump’s ‘Art of the Deal’ goes to Washington [links to Vox]

INTERNET/BROADBAND
   Innovative district expands access like never before using E-rate [links to Benton summary]
   Has the Internet become a failed state? - The Guardian op-ed [links to Benton summary]

SECURITY/PRIVACY
   San Francisco’s light-rail system was held hostage by hackers [links to Washington Post]
   Newly discovered router flaw being hammered by in-the-wild attacks [links to Ars Technica]

GOVERNMENT & COMMUNICATIONS
   18F Co-Founder on Why Tech Transcends Party Politics [links to nextgov]
   High-Tech Nation: How Technological Innovation Shapes America’s 435 Congressional Districts - ITIF analysis [links to Benton summary]

CONTENT
   Twitter 'verifies' Muslim Brotherhood while expelling conservatives [links to Hill, The]
   E-commerce won Black Friday weekend. Now Walmart really has to compete on Amazon’s turf. [links to Vox]

OWNERSHIP
   CNN Brings In the Social App Beme to Cultivate a Millennial Audience [links to Benton summary]
   Meet the men who want to buy Time Inc. [links to Vox]

COMPANY NEWS
   AT&T Offers 3 Ways to Stream Premium Video Content, Launches DirectTV Now - press release [links to Benton summary]
   Sling TV is launching a cloud DVR in Jan [links to Verge, The]

JOURNALISM
   The tech/editorial culture clash - CJR editorial [links to Benton summary]

LABOR
   Silicon Valley Has an Empathy Vacuum - New Yorker op-ed [links to Benton summary]

HEALTH
   The tech industry and the search for a cancer cure [links to Vox]

STORIES FROM ABROAD
   Why the media is a key dimension of global inequality [links to Huffington Post]
   Facebook Must Stay Out of China [links to Foreign Policy]

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WIRELESS/SPECTRUM

FREE PRESS LAUNCHES NEW VOICES CAMPAIGN
[SOURCE: Free Press, AUTHOR: Press release]
Free Press and the Free Press Action Fund launched a campaign to set aside proceeds from the auction of public TV station licenses to strengthen local journalism and community-information projects. According to new Free Press research, at least 54 public television stations around the country are taking part of the ongoing Federal Communications Commission broadcast incentive auction. Spectrum held by public TV stations alone is expected to bring in as much as $6 billion in the auction, with state governments, local school boards, university trustees and other station owners each likely raking in tens or even hundreds of millions of dollars for taking their stations off the air or moving down the dial to free up bandwidth to meet the growing demand mobile data. The initial phase of the campaign — which is being launched at NewsVoices.org — will focus on New Jersey and urge lawmakers there to devote a portion of the proceeds from auctioning state-owned public TV licenses to support innovative journalism and community-driven projects across the state. Free Press and the Free Press Action Fund will be pushing to create a $250 million permanent public fund to support local information needs for decades to come. Ideas for use of proceeds include support for community-focused digital news sites, blogs, podcasts, YouTube channels, public data access apps and other civic engagement tools.
benton.org/headlines/free-press-launches-campaign-use-fcc-airwaves-auction-strengthen-journalism-and-serve | Free Press | Free Press blog | B&C
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PUBLIC TV AND THE FCC SPECTRUM
[SOURCE: Free Press, AUTHOR: Craig Aaron, Dana Floberg]
The Free Press Action Fund recently set out to determine which public TV stations are taking part in the Federal Communications Commission's broadcast incentive auction. First we noted which stations had already publicly announced their intention to participate or not. Then in July, we contacted by phone all auction eligible public broadcasters that had not yet publicized their plans. Here's what we found:
54 public TV stations confirmed that yes, they are participants in the auction.
87 public TV stations confirmed that no, they aren't participants in the auction.
40 stations refused to say whether they applied to participate.
104 stations didn't respond to the survey.
The participating stations the Free Press Action Fund identified are concentrated in 18 states and the District of Columbia. If they were to sell their spectrum at the maximum opening-bid prices, they would collectively stand to earn over $14 billion.
benton.org/headlines/public-tv-and-fcc-spectrum-mystery-and-opportunity | Free Press
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FCC'S LATEST TV REVERSE AUCTION ENDING DEC 1
[SOURCE: Broadcasting&Cable, AUTHOR: John Eggerton]
The Federal Communications Commission signaled that, barring the unforeseen, stage three of the reverse portion of the broadcast incentive auction will close Dec 1. That had been the expectation, but the FCC put an exclamation point on it by announcing it would hold up to five rounds that day, rather than the planned three rounds, to insure it wraps up, with the first two rounds an hour apiece and the last three lightning rounds at a half-hour apiece in case some last-minute decisions need to be accommodated. That means on Dec 1, the FCC will announce the latest value broadcasters have put on the spectrum they are volunteering to give up entirely or move off of, which is the total that forward auction bidders will have to meet—plus auction and broadcaster moving expenses—in order for the auction to close successfully. Stage three of the forward auction will likely begin within a matter of days. So far, forward auction bidders—primarily wireless companies or would-be wireless companies looking to use it for broadband—have failed to come near broadcasters first two asking prices, which was about $86 billion for 126 MHz and then about $55 billion for 114 MHz.
benton.org/headlines/fccs-latest-tv-reverse-auction-ending-dec-1 | Broadcasting&Cable
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ELECTIONS & MEDIA

FAKE NEWS MAY NOT BE PROTECTED SPEECH
[SOURCE: Bloomberg, AUTHOR: Noah Feldman]
[Commentary] In the free marketplace of ideas, true ideas are supposed to compete with false ones until the truth wins -- at least according to a leading rationale for free speech. But what if the rise of fake news shows that, under current conditions, truth may not defeat falsehood in the market? That would start to make free speech look a whole lot less appealing. The rise of fake news therefore poses a serious challenge to our basic ideas about the First Amendment. Much of the debate in recent weeks has focused on social media and search engines. But whether the market for ideas is failing is more fundamental than whether Facebook or Google can be blamed for algorithms that promote and spread false stories. False news that hinders public discussion and encourages irrationality may have a role in the marketplace; but it doesn’t contribute to the good functioning of democracy
[Noah Feldman is professor of constitutional and international law at Harvard University.]
benton.org/headlines/fake-news-may-not-be-protected-speech | Bloomberg
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