E-GOVERNMENT
Va. Firms to Aid Veterans on Benefits (WP)
SPECTRUM
Small Companies' Spectrum Auction Shows Signs of Giants' Intrusion
(WSJ)
Rival's Request to Share Airwaves With WorldCom, Sprint Is Denied
(WSJ)
GRANTS
TOP's Next Grant Round: Congress Has Appropriated $45.5 Million For
Grants (NTIA)
WIRELESS
Asst. Secretary Rohde Commends FCC on Wireless Rulemakeing (NTIA)
Firms Scramble to Reassure Europeans About the Safety of Cell-Phone
Towers (WSJ)
E-GOVERNMENT
VA. FIRMS TO AID VETERANS ON BENEFITS
Issue: E-government
Two Virginia firms will help the federal government bring e-government
services
to the nation's veterans. The companies will build 200,000 "smart cards"
which
will be issued by the Department of Veterans Affairs to veterans in the
Great
Lakes area from late January through May. The cards are similar to
traditional
credit cards, but come embedded with plastic-coated microprocessor chips
that
store the digital identities of users. The veterans will be able to access
their
benefits information online and digitally sign for them using any computer
with
an attached smart-card reader. Veterans who use the card to register at
their
local VA facility will also automatically get access to their biographical
information, emergency medical records and benefits details in VA clinics,
hospitals and regional offices across the country. The program is part of a
larger effort by the Clinton administration to phase out the federal
government's reliance on paper systems.
[SOURCE: Washington Post (E05), Author: Dina ElBoghdaby]
(http://washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A21435-2001Jan4.html)
SPECTRUM
SMALL COMPANIES' SPECTRUM AUCTION SHOWS SIGNS OF GIANTS' INTRUSION
Issue: Spectrum Auction
Regulators set out last year to help entrepreneurs enter the hot cell-phone
business
by giving them preferences in an auction for a slice of the airwaves. But
halfway
through the spectrum auction, nine of the top 15 bidders classified as small
companies are,
in fact, backed by the industry's biggest players like AT&T and Sprint. The
big backers, which own stakes in the entrepreneurs, have promised to give
the
start-ups billions of dollars in the bidding under way at the Federal
Communications
Commission. Most observers expect that the small companies will end up
either closely
linking their networks with those of their backers, or simply transferring
to them
any spectrum licenses they win. "That is not the way it was intended," says
Andrew Barrett,
who was a member of the FCC in the mid-1990s when it drafted the original
rules meant to
help entrepreneurs. "The intent was not to have big wireless companies take
over.
But clearly, if you don't write the rules correctly, you can't blame [the
companies]
for doing that.'' The FCC says it will wait until after the auction to
examine whether
the small companies are truly independent, as required by law.
[SOURCE: Wall Street Journal (Interactive), AUTHOR: Mark Wigfield]
(http://interactive.wsj.com/articles/SB978653666894634971.htm)
(requires subscription)
RIVAL'S REQUEST TO SHARE AIRWAVES WITH WORLDCOM, SPRINT IS DENIED
Issue: Spectrum
A request by Satellite Industry Association to share airwaves for mobile
Internet services
with WorldCom and Sprint was denied by the Federal Communications
Commission. Although
the FCC promised to continue to studying Sprint's and WorldCom's spectrum
for possible
mobile Internet use, it has proposed looking instead at bands being
transferred from
government to private use, as well as another swath of spectrum used for a
variety of
fixed and mobile services. The agency is under pressure to free up valuable
spectrum for
mobile Internet services. Last fall, the Clinton administration said it
would push to
find new space in the crowded airwaves for "third-generation," or 3-G,
mobile wireless
service, or mobile Internet access. Satellite Industry Association hasn't
yet decided
whether to appeal the FCC's decision, according to its executive director.
[SOURCE: Wall Street Journal (Interactive), AUTHOR: Staff Reporter]
(http://interactive.wsj.com/articles/SB978662505707926207.htm)
(requires subscription)
GRANTS
TOP'S NEXT GRANT ROUND: CONGRESS HAS APPROPRIATED $45.5 MILLION FOR GRANTS
Issue: Grants
Congress has appropriated $45.5 million for grants through the Commerce
Department's Technology Opportunities Program (TOP) for Fiscal Year 2001.
TOP expects to release its Notice of Availability of Funds on January 11,
with an expected deadline for proposals sometime in March. For this year's
grant round, TOP will hold Technical Assistance Workshops in Washington, DC;
Denver, CO; and St. Louis, MO. (Yes, it was in yesterday's news. But it
seemed
worth repeating.)
[SOURCE: NTIA]
(http://www.ntia.doc.gov/new.html)
WIRELESS
ASST. SECRETARY ROHDE COMMENDS FCC ON WIRELESS RULEMAKING
Issue: Wireless
Gregory L. Rohde, assistant secretary of commerce for communications and
information
and administrator of the National Telecommunications and Information
Administration
(NTIA), said that yesterday's release of the Notice of Proposed Rule Making
(NPRM)
by the FCC is a major development in the Administration's plan to make
sufficient
spectrum available for 3rd generation wireless services. "This NPRM marks
the passage
of another important step to advance broadband wireless services in the
United
States," Rohde said. Rohde urged industry and consumers to take part in the
effort
to advance the development of 3rd generation wireless services by submitting
comments.
For more details on NTIA and 3G policy, see the NTIA Web site at
http://www.ntia.doc.gov/ntiahome/threeg/index.html.
[SOURCE: NTIA]
(http://www.ntia.doc.gov/new.html)
FIRMS SCRAMBLE TO REASSURE EUROPEANS ABOUT THE SAFETY OF CELL-PHONE TOWERS
Issue: Wireless
While Americans are quicker to embrace new technology with few questions
about potential risks,
Europeans tend to be more wary. The latest anxiety strikes in a field where
Europe leads the
world: cell-phone technology. The cell phone agitation centers not on the
phones themselves
but on radiation from the powerful towers that beam signals to those phones.
A year ago,
pupils of St. Mary's Grammar School in Belfast walked out of their
classrooms to protest
a mast on the school roof. A smattering of studies have suggested that
lower-frequency waves
may reduce fertility, damage DNA and cause cancer in animals, but those
reports haven't been
independently replicated. Given the uncertainty, Italy and Switzerland have
set radiation
limits at about one-tenth the maximum level recommended by the European
Union.
[SOURCE: Wall Street Journal (), AUTHOR: Gautam Naik]
(http://interactive.wsj.com/articles/SB978651953256485674.htm)
(requires subscription)
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