DIGITAL DIVIDE
Broadband For All - Canada's 'New National Dream' (Newsbytes)
The Push to Push Women Higher (Wired)
POLICY
Michael Powell: The Great Deregulator (WP)
Senate Commerce Committee To Talk Telecom Competition (Newsbytes)
Hollings Announces Hearings on Local Telephone Competition (Senate)
DIGITAL DIVIDE
BROADBAND FOR ALL - CANADA'S 'NEW NATIONAL DREAM'
Issue: Broadband
The Canadian National Broadband Task Force recently acclaimed universal
access to the broadband Internet as Canada's "new national dream," and has
estimated it will cost $4 billion Canadian dollars to deploy broadband to
all Canadians by 2004. Industry Minister Brian Tobin, who pledged to adhere
to the 2004 deadline, compared this commitment to Canada's "original"
national dream to link its coasts by railway in the late 1800s. Tobin
remarked that around 4800 of its 6000 communities lie outside of urban or
suburban areas, and said that "Without appropriate government involvement,
many rural and remote communities might not have access to the private
sector's (infrastructure)." Canadian internet service providers warned about
the impact of government subsidies on encouraging monopolies in the
technology and of companies. "While we applaud the goal of extending
broadband access to all Canadian communities by 2004," said President of the
Canadian Association of Internet Providers (CAIP) Jay Thomson, "Canadians
living and working in those communities will only see the real benefits
broadband can offer if multiple suppliers are able to compete for their
business."
[SOURCE: Newsbytes, AUTHOR: Steven Bonisteel]
(http://www.newsbytes.com/news/01/166964.html)
THE PUSH TO PUSH WOMEN HIGHER
Issue: Digital Divide
Fortune magazine named Carly Fiorina, CEO of Hewlett-Packard, the most
powerful woman in technology, but only 12 percent of technology
professionals recognized her by name, compared to 98 percent who recognized
Microsoft's Bill Gates and 59 percent who recognized Apple's Steve Jobs.
According to a study called Women in Technology Leadership released by
Deloitte & Touche, women executives in the technology industry are not
nearly as well known as their male counterparts because male executives
maintain high profiles. "There are a lot of the same obstacles and
challenges in existence in the technology industry (as in the old economy),"
said Sue Molina, director of Deloitte & Touche's Initiative for the
Retention and Advancement of Women. The Women in Technology International
(WITI) Professional Women's Summit this week will launch a new initiative to
network prominent women executives with other business leaders and CEOs.
[SOURCE: Wired, AUTHOR: Kendra Mayfield]
(http://www.wired.com/news/women/0,1540,44519,00.html)
POLICY
MICHAEL POWELL: THE GREAT DEREGULATOR
Issue: FCC
Michael Powell, the new head of the Federal Communications Commission, is
emerging as a deregulatory chairman, and not surprisingly the commercial
broadcasters like him. Recently, he voted for rules that will allow the four
major television networks - ABC, CBS, NBC or Fox - to buy one of the smaller
ones - UPN or the WB. Critics see this as another step toward corporate
consolidation. "He has a disappointingly narrow view of the role that
government has played in creating the marketplace and the diversity that is
in the marketplace and in the mass media," says Andrew Schwartzman,
president of the Media Access Project, a Washington telecommunications
watchdog group. Regarding the role of government Powell said: "I believe
government has the role and duty of proving the merits of intervention
rather than the other way around. If I can't demonstrate with rigor the
necessity of intervention, then the obligation of the government is to stay
out."
[SOURCE: Washington Post, AUTHOR: Frank Ahrens]
(http://www.washtech.com/news/regulation/10574-1.html)
SENATE COMMERCE COMMITTEE TO TALK TELECOM COMPETITION
Issue: Competition
The Senate Commerce Committee's new Democratic chairman Ernest "Fritz"
Hollings (SC) has scheduled three panels to testify on local telephone
market competition at the launch his first hearing. The first panel will
include as a witness Rep. Edward Markey (D-MA), chair of a House
subcommittee on telecommunications. The second panel will represent on the
one side the AT&T chairman and the BellSouth Corp. Vice President, and on
the other side two leading competitive local phone carriers. Concluding the
series on the third panel will be former Pennsylvania Public Utilities
commissioner David W. Rolka, Illinois state senator Dave Sullivan and
co-director of the Consumers Union Gene Kimmelman. Hollings has taken a
strong position against the Tauzin-Dingell bill to allow Baby Bell
incumbents to enter the broadband market without first proving that they
have opened up their local markets to competition, and is expected to
harshly criticize incumbent carriers for resisting against opening up their
local markets.
[SOURCE: Newsbytes, AUTHOR: Staff]
(http://www.newsbytes.com/news/01/166972.html)
See also:
HOLLINGS ANNOUNCES HEARINGS ON LOCAL TELEPHONE COMPETITION
On Tuesday, June 19, the Committee will hold a hearing on the status of
competition in the telephone marketplace. Examining the goals and objectives
of the 1996 Telecommunications Act, the Committee will hear testimony
regarding the current state and future prospects of local telephone
competition as governed by the landmark legislation.
[SOURCE: US Senate]
(http://www.senate.gov/~commerce/press/107-64.html)
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