BENTON'S COMMUNICATIONS-RELATED HEADLINES for FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 24, 2012
A busy Friday includes the FCC’s Consumer Advisory Committee http://benton.org/calendar/2012-02-24/
WIRELESS
Debate on How to Free Up More Spectrum is Far From Over
Freeing Up Spectrum for Rural Broadband
On Behalf of the 1%, the Best Bargain Since Manhattan - op-ed
Pros and Cons of the Verizon Wireless – SpectrumCo/Cox Deal - analysis
Will Verizon become the only wireless company in the country?
The dirty secret inside Verizon’s cable spectrum buy - analysis
Is Throttling Smartphones Pointless? Study Suggests So
Why your cell phone bill is going up
How Will T-Mobile USA Fight the iPhone? Network Upgrades [links to web]
T-Mobile pounds the first nail in 2G’s coffin - analysis
Why Mozilla Is Entering the Smartphone War [links to web]
Smartphone security gap exposes location, texts, email, expert says [links to web]
Ergen: Dish Has 80% Chance of Wireless Success [links to web]
Mobile Use, Apps Soar, Tablets Gain Traction [links to web]
The Smartphone Revolution Is Over (For Now) [links to web]
If Android is a "stolen product," then so was the iPhone - analysis [links to web]
4 ways to stave off the cell phone apocalypse - analysis [links to web]
Google to sell stake in Clearwire for $47m, a tenth of the price it originally paid [links to web]
Apple Said to Pay About $50 Million for Application-Search Startup Chomp [links to web]
PRIVACY
Consumer Data Privacy in the Networked World
Big Tech, Obama And The Politics Of Privacy
‘Privacy bill of rights’: Advocacy groups, industry weigh in
Reps. Barton and Markey vow to push ahead with 'Do Not Track' legislation [links to web]
Chairman Bono Mack plans hearing on White House privacy plan [links to web]
‘Do Not Track’ button — what it will and won’t do - analysis [links to web]
Web privacy guidelines viewed as ‘win’ for Google
Is 'Do Not Track' a magic button? - analysis [links to web]
Will online privacy laws actually make a difference? - analysis [links to web]
Google’s new privacy policy complicates protecting personal data - editorial [links to web]
Facebook sued over tracking members' Internet use
CONTENT
A California Civil War Over Internet Piracy - analysis
Why Amazon’s Kindle Battle With IPG Matters - analysis [links to web]
Does social media always work for the good? - analysis [links to web]
HEALTH
NPRM for Stage 2 of Meaningful Use
Sen. Warner calls for tougher standards for electronic medical records
HHS selects challenge winners for Facebook app - press release [links to web]
Trying to Find a Cry of Desperation Amid the Facebook Drama
We need limits on dashboard distractions - editorial [links to web]
JOURNALISM
Tech media misconceptions - editorial
Are aggregation and curation journalism? Wrong question [links to web]
People don’t care about scoops, they care about trust [links to web]
Religion Coverage in 2011 [links to web]
Sam Zell Blames Tribune Failure on 'Greedy' Journalists [links to web]
GOVERNMENT & COMMUNICATIONS
DOJ Urges Supreme Court to Halt Challenge to Warrantless Eavesdropping
The FBI and the DOJ want you to report suspicious people and monitor social networks. Goodbye liberty - analysis [links to web]
Iran's "Second Internet" Rivals Censorship Of China's "Great Firewall"
MEDIA & ELECTIONS
Stations Need Transparency in Political Ads - op-ed
TELEVISION
Canoe To Shutter Interactive TV Ad Business, Lay Off 120
What does Google Fiber mean for the future of TV? [links to web]
COMPANY NEWS
Apple Shareholders Meeting: No News, No Complaints, No Dividend [links to web]
Apple Case in Shanghai Is Suspended [links to web]
Fight Over iPad Name Spills Into US Court [links to web]
Foxconn Is Good At Making Itself Look Good Enough
Google names former GOP House member Susan Molinari to head DC office [links to web]
MORE ONLINE
Introducing Generation C: Americans 18-34 Are the Most Connected [links to web]
Analysis details digital lives in USA [links to web]
Silicon Valley pans Obama tax overhaul [links to web]
Companies expect Australia’s National Broadband Network to boost digital economy: survey [links to web]
WIRELESS
SPECTRUM DEBATE CONTINUES
[SOURCE: National Journal, AUTHOR: Juliana Gruenwald]
The ink is barely dry on spectrum legislation and experts already are saying more work is needed to ensure a steady stream of spectrum is available in the future. Legislation included in the payroll tax cut package would free up more spectrum for wireless broadband by enticing broadcasters to give up some of their airwaves. The legislation authorizes the Federal Communications Commission to conduct reverse auctions to see how much it would take to get broadcasters to give up some of their spectrum. Then it allows auctions of the airwaves broadcasters give up. The FCC has said it hopes to free up 120 megahertz from this process, an amount some say is overly optimistic. Former Rep. Rick Boucher (D-VA) praised the passage of the legislation as an important step in providing more spectrum to meet the growing demand for wireless technologies such as smart phones and tablets. But he added that policymakers need to move quickly to free up spectrum now being used by federal agencies. Wireless carriers failed to persuade Congress to include language in the spectrum legislation to re-purpose a chunk of spectrum now being used by the Defense Department.
benton.org/node/115029 | National Journal
Recommend this Headline
back to top
SPECTRUM FOR RURAL BROADBAND
[SOURCE: Bloomberg, AUTHOR: Brendan Greeley]
On Jan. 26, Wilmington (NC) rolled out a wireless network that links security cameras and offers Internet access in public parks. No biggie. Networked cameras and free Internet are common. What’s different in Wilmington is the radio bands the network runs on: unused television channels known as “white spaces” that separate stations. The Wilmington experiment shows the potential benefit of a measure tucked into the payroll tax cut law signed by President Barack Obama on Feb. 22. The Federal Communications Commission created the white spaces between channels decades ago to prevent stations from interfering with each other, ensuring that, say, The Cosby Show in Washington wasn’t compromised by The Simpsons on the same frequency in Baltimore. The new law opens up the white space channels for “unlicensed” use. Unlike the spectrum controlled by carriers such as AT&T and Verizon Wireless, which is reserved for specified companies, unlicensed bandwidth is open to any user with an approved device. Wi-Fi, microwave ovens, baby monitors, and cordless phones all use frequencies that the industry calls the “junk band.” These radio waves can’t easily penetrate walls and are hard to maintain over long distances. The TV frequencies where the white space is located, by contrast, carry long distances and remain strong even inside buildings. Since rural areas have fewer TV stations, opening up white space could prove a boon to rural wireless Internet providers, which have struggled to provide service using a more robust version of Wi-Fi.
benton.org/node/115070 | Bloomberg
Recommend this Headline
back to top
SPECTRUM GIVEAWAY
[SOURCE: The Huffington Post, AUTHOR: JH Snider]
[Commentary] The Middle Class Tax Relief and Job Creation Act of 2012 has been publically promoted as a bill to extend payroll-tax cuts, thereby providing about $100 billion in tax relief to the bottom 99% of Americans by income. Unmentioned is that the bill, by bipartisan agreement, sets in motion a much larger transfer of public assets to the top 1%. For bundled into the bill's fine print and camouflaged in the Orwellian doublespeak of "Incentive auctions" is a giveaway of public spectrum assets (popularly known as "public airwaves") worth over $200 billion, which would make it the largest corporate welfare program in history. Usually, when it comes to "minor" modifications of spectrum licenses that enhance the value of incumbents' licenses by a mere millions of dollars, Congress lets the FCC discreetly do the dirty work. But in this case the giveaway was orders of magnitude larger and thus blatantly conflicted with the Communications Act, which specifies that the FCC cannot allocate spectrum in such a way as to cause "unjust enrichment." Congress and the Administration thus came up with the idea of calling the giveaway an "incentive auction," promising it would bring the U.S. Treasury billions of dollars to offset the cost of extending the payroll-tax cuts. This promise provided a rationale for adding the special interest spectrum provisions to a bill supposedly about middle class tax relief. But this is an auction of public assets unlike any other you've heard about. The terms of the auction are cleverly designed so that the bulk of the proceeds will go to broadcast licensees. Moreover, the licensees still get their windfall even if they don't participate in the auction.
benton.org/node/115069 | Huffington Post, The
Recommend this Headline
back to top
PROS AND CONS
[SOURCE: JSI Capital Advisors, AUTHOR: Cassandra Heyne]
Parties filed comments and petitions to deny the proposed Verizon Wireless purchase of cable spectrum assets held by SpectrumCo (Comcast, Time Warner and Bright House Networks) and Cox on February 21, 2012. Although the FCC was not inundated with thousands of furious consumer comments a la AT&T/T-Mobile (yet anyway), this $3.6b deal is certainly not skating by unopposed. Some strong opposition comes from seemingly unlikely sources, including AT&T/T-Mobile champion union Communications Workers of America and AT&T target T-Mobile. Expected opposition from the Rural Telecommunications Group (RTG), Sprint, Public Knowledge and Free Press outlines why the deal is anticompetitive and not in the public interest. As RTG expressed, this deal “trumpets the dawn of a new era in America – the oligopolistic cartel of Big Cable + the Twin Bells.” Fear of excessive market power is a clearly a theme carried over from the AT&T/T-Mobile deal. The Verizon/SpectrumCo deal has the potential to create “an unprecedented level of market power” in the quad-play arena, and “could hinder video and broadband competition, resulting in higher cable rates, less network investment and fewer jobs,” according to the Communications Workers of America and International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (CWA/IBEW). Despite many familiar and predictable negative sentiments about mega-deals, the comments reveal some interesting positions both for and against these uncharted waters in cross-platform consolidation. Comments generally focused on the pros and cons of 1) the spectrum transfer and 2) the applicants’ Commercial Agreement.
benton.org/node/115060 | JSI Capital Advisors
Recommend this Headline
back to top
VERIZON’S SPECTRUM BUY
[SOURCE: American Public Media, AUTHOR: John Moe]
Verizon wants to buy a large portion of spectrum from Comcast, Cox Communications and Time Warner Cable. T-Mobile has filed a complaint with the Federal Communications Commission seeking to stop the deal, saying it would leave T-Mobile unable to compete. “What they're saying is the benefits of this transaction are way outweighed by harms to the public that would be caused,” says Susan Crawford, visiting professor at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government and Harvard Law School. “Because from their perspective, what Verizon's trying to do with this spectrum deal is just foreclose competition, make it impossible for any maverick new entrant to show up. Verizon said as recently as a month ago it's got plenty of spectrum; in fact, it's sitting on spectrum it's not using and T-Mobile is saying don't let this go through." Crawford says T-Mobile’s goals in this protest and the AT&T deal are the same: “T-Mobile felt forced to do a deal with AT&T last year because it wasn't getting access to enough spectrum. Now T-Mobile is saying we're not getting access to enough spectrum. Basically a lot of spectrum has been taken off the table in the last couple of years, spectrum that T-Mobile feels it needed in order to compete effectively. This is its last ditch battle to make sure that there's something left for it to buy." Verizon and the cable companies seem to be marking out territory here by agreeing to market each other’s services and stay off each other’s turf. “Implicitly they're saying, ‘Comcast you cover wired connections, and Verizon, you cover wireless,’” says Crawford. Thing is, demand for spectrum will keep going up as people get more smartphones and tablets and go online. And you can't make more spectrum. That’s impossible due to the realities of physics.
benton.org/node/115031 | American Public Media
Recommend this Headline
back to top
DIRTY SECRET OF VERIZON DEAL
[SOURCE: GigaOm, AUTHOR: Stacey Higginbotham]
[Commentary] The debate over Verizon’s purchase of unused spectrum from cable companies is a fight that should involve everyone from consumers to the Internet companies whose businesses rest on access to the wireline and wireless pipes affected by this deal. This deal reduces the amount of both wireless and wireline competition: the loss of the cable companies’ spectrum marks the loss of the last real likelihood for another entrant into the wireless market dominated by AT&T and Verizon. It will also prevent smaller, spectrum-hungry operators from buying the airwaves (which is T-Mobile’s biggest argument against the deal). Additionally, the exclusivity agreements on the wireline side could preclude the cable companies from signing up to use wireless from a smaller, hungrier player offering a new channel and maybe some cash that T-Mobile, Clearwire or another provider could have sorely used. On the wireline side, it signals that the speeds of FiOS aren’t going to increase further, and takes out Verizon as a potential competitor with an over-the-top video service that changes the way ISPs have to sell their triple play. Now everything fast, and even pay-TV related, will continue to rest in the hands of cable companies. And there’s another big issue we’re not talking about yet. But we should.
The marketing agreements create a shadow joint-operating entity (JOE) between Verizon and the cable companies. This JOE is worrisome to those of us who realize that getting Verizon in a room once a month with the executives at the nation’s largest cable companies could lead to agreements about technology, deployment strategies and R&D that will be controlled by the large ISPs. The fear is that this organization will be able to slowly stifle new innovations for Internet services or even devices attached to wireline networks by creating technologies and standards that are only available to the JOE participants. Perhaps others might be able to license those technologies, but there’s no guarantee of that, or that the JOE would do so for a fair and reasonable amount.
benton.org/node/115030 | GigaOm
Recommend this Headline
back to top
THROTTLING SMARTPHONES
[SOURCE: New York Times, AUTHOR: Brian Chen]
Validas, a company that analyzes wireless bills, said it looked at data from 55,000 cellphone bills from AT&T and Verizon subscribers in 2011. Depending on the conditions of their networks, AT&T and Verizon sometimes throttle customers who are in the top 5 percent of data users. So Validas analyzed data use on bills from unlimited data plans and customers on limited, tiered plans to calculate the amount of data used by the top 5 percent for each type of customer. The results? For Verizon bills, the top 5 percent of data customers on unlimited plans used nearly the same amount of data as those on tiered plans. And for AT&T, the top 5 percent of customers on unlimited data plans used only slightly more data than those on limited plans. “When we look at the Top 5 percent of data users, there is virtually no difference in data consumption between those on unlimited and those on tiered plans — and yet the unlimited consumers are the ones at risk of getting their service turned off,” Validas wrote in a blog post. “So it’s curious that anyone would think the throttling here represents a serious effort at alleviating network bandwidth issues.”
benton.org/node/115093 | New York Times
Recommend this Headline
back to top
RISING CELL PHONE BILLS
[SOURCE: CNNMoney, AUTHOR: David Goldman]
Demand for wireless data services is soaring, forcing carriers to invest massively to keep up. They have two main options: Upgrade their network technology or acquire more wireless spectrum to give them more bandwidth. Both approaches cost billions. AT&T led its rivals by spending $95 billion over the past five years upgrading its network. Verizon just agreed to pay $3.6 billion for a small but tactically significant bundle of spectrum from a group of cable companies. Those expenses are getting transferred to you, the consumer. "The insatiable thirst for mobile broadband is going to force all of us to pay more," says Dan Hays, a partner at PricewaterhouseCoopers' consultancy. "Phone bills are going up." The price creep is already happening. AT&T instituted a $5 across-the-board price hike in January for new contracts, and Sprint raised its monthly smartphone rates by $10 a year ago.
benton.org/node/115028 | CNNMoney
Recommend this Headline
back to top
T-MOBILE AND 2G
[SOURCE: GigaOm, AUTHOR: Kevin Fitchard]
T-Mobile isn’t just launching a sizable LTE network in 2013, it’s becoming the Grim Reaper for 2G technology as we know it. T-Mobile unveiled a plan to radically reshape its networks, shutting down the majority of its 2G GSM capacity so it can focus almost entirely on 4G. As a result T-Mobile will get a bigger, badder mobile broadband network and, to boot, will almost certainly land the iPhone. With this new network configuration, T-Mobile is pulling a technological coup. Though it is the spectrum-poorest operator of the Big 4, it will wind up with a higher-capacity LTE network than Sprint and one with comparable capacity to AT&T, while still being able to milk a massive HSPA+ network for years to come. In the process, T-Mobile is calling into question the so-called spectrum crisis. While other operators are desperately searching for new airwaves, T-Mobile found its future growth spectrum sitting right under its nose. Consumer groups and regulators are almost certainly going to ask why AT&T and Verizon Wireless don’t do the same.
benton.org/node/115026 | GigaOm
Recommend this Headline
back to top
PRIVACY
WH PRIVACY POLICY FRAMEWORK
[SOURCE: The White House]
At the center of this framework is a Consumer Privacy Bill of Rights, which embraces privacy principles recognized throughout the world and adapts them to the dynamic environment of the commercial Internet. The Administration has called for Congress to pass legislation that applies the Consumer Privacy Bill of Rights to commercial sectors that are not subject to existing Federal data privacy laws. The Federal Government will play a role in convening discussions among stakeholders—companies, privacy and consumer advocates, international partners, State Attorneys General, Federal criminal and civil law enforcement representatives, and academics—who will then develop codes of conduct that implement the Consumer Privacy Bill of Rights. Such practices, when publicly and affirmatively adopted by companies subject to Federal Trade Commission jurisdiction, will be legally enforceable by the FTC. The United States will engage with our international partners to create greater interoperability among our respective privacy frameworks. This will provide more consistent protections for consumers and lower compliance burdens for companies.
benton.org/node/115066 | White House, The
Recommend this Headline
back to top
THE POLITICS OF PRIVACY
[SOURCE: paidContent.org, AUTHOR: ]
[Commentary] For now, the lack of details in the grand privacy announcements means it is unclear when (or if) consumers will be able to turn of behavioral tracking entirely. But in the short term, the “Privacy Bill of Rights” is a political winner for both President Obama and for the tech companies with which he is ideologically and financially allied. More specifically, it allows the President to appear out front on the privacy debate at a time when Republicans also want to make political hay out of the issue. For the Internet companies, the announcement will permit them at least a partial reprieve as they lobby to minimize regulatory oversight. Their ability to do so is shrinking, though, as other political actors continue to step into the privacy arena.
benton.org/node/115025 | paidContent.org
Recommend this Headline
back to top
GROUPS WEIGH IN ON PRIVACY
[SOURCE: Washington Post, AUTHOR: Hayley Tsukayama]
There was a lot of reaction from online privacy advocates and Internet companies to the White House’s “privacy bill of rights” — much of it positive.
“The Administration would seek implementation of a Consumer Privacy Bill of Rights by way of enforceable Codes of Conduct that would be derived through a collaborative process involving multiple stakeholders,” said privacy expert Lisa Sotto. “But the Administration does not put its faith entirely in the stakeholders to implement the Bill of Rights through Codes of Conduct; the Administration also calls for legislation to enact the Bill of Rights into law, as well as stronger FTC enforcement authority.”
Chris Wolf, the co-chair of the Future of Privacy Forum, echoed those comments, saying this is a “co-regulation” model, and one that he believes will help the U.S. address privacy in an era of changing technological innovation. In a statement, Wolf said he hopes lawmakers in Europe will look to this same model as a potential one for regulation.
Privacy advocate Justin Brookman, of the Center for Democracy and Technology, also said in a statement that the announcement is a step in the right direction. He gave the advertising industry credit for voluntarily implementing “do not track” technology” in web browsers.
The ACLU called it an "important first step. Day by day, we live more of our lives online, shopping, managing bank accounts and communicating with friends and family," said ACLU legislative counsel Christopher Calabrese. "It's crucial that the information we share is properly safeguarded. It's very encouraging to see the Obama administration making this issue a priority. Americans need clear and distinct policies in place when it comes to the kind of access law enforcement and private companies have to their online information."
Consumers Union (which published Consumer Reports) and Consumer Federation of America said the announcement signaled progress toward more consumer control of online data collection and use. "By including a Consumer Privacy Bill of Rights, the government is emphasizing the importance of transparency, individual control, and the ability to access and correct personal information, and recognizes there may be a need to for heightened protections for children and teens on the Internet," the groups said.
benton.org/node/115023 | Washington Post | B&C | USAToday | Chairman Rockefeller | Chairman Bono Mack | Sec Bryson | National Journal
Recommend this Headline
back to top
A WIN FOR GOOGLE?
[SOURCE: Washington Post, AUTHOR: Cecilia Kang]
Silicon Valley was alarmed. Across the country in Washington, federal lawmakers were proposing legislation that could have crippled the efforts of Web companies to collect consumer data that is crucial to selling advertisements online. After a year of negotiations, the White House unveiled privacy guidelines for these firms that urged them to install “do not track” technology on browsers but fell short of requiring it. Tech giants, in particular Google, breathed a sigh of relief. They would agree to curb some tracking activities, but it would largely be on their terms and wouldn’t hobble their cash cow. “The White House announcement is a huge victory for Google on privacy,” said Jeff Chester, executive director of the Center for Digital Democracy. The “victory” didn’t happen by accident. Google has become a major force in Washington. Once disdainful of the lobbying tactics of other companies, Google’s Beltway operations have become nearly indistinguishable from the most powerful corporations that line K Street. Last year, it doubled the amount it spent on lobbying to $10 million and doubled the size of its employee political donation fund to $836,000.
benton.org/node/115090 | Washington Post
Recommend this Headline
back to top
FACEBOOK SUED
[SOURCE: San Francisco Chronicle, AUTHOR: Benny Evangelista]
Two prominent Baltimore attorneys, one who is the majority owner of that city's baseball team, have filed a lawsuit against Facebook claiming the company spies on the Internet activities of members after they have logged off the social network. The suit filed by Peter G. Angelos, chief executive officer of the Baltimore Orioles, and William "Billy" Murphy Jr. claims that Facebook's actions broke several local and national privacy laws, including the federal Wiretap Act and the California Internet Privacy Requirements Act. "The days when online service providers can run roughshod over the privacy rights of their customers are over," Murphy said. Plaintiffs Laura Maguire of Charlotte, N.C., and Christopher Simon of Baltimore are seeking class-action status to represent millions of Facebook members. The suit claims Facebook illegally used browser cookies, identified last year by Australian security blogger Nik Cubrilovic, that could track users' Internet activity even after they logged out of Facebook. The suit noted that Facebook said the tracking was inadvertent and that the company resolved the issue, but had also filed a patent for "tracking information about the activities of users of a social networking system while on another domain." The plaintiffs are also represented by San Francisco attorney Eric Gibbs.
benton.org/node/115092 | San Francisco Chronicle
Recommend this Headline
back to top
CONTENT
CIVIL WAR
[SOURCE: National Public Radio, AUTHOR: Laura Sydell]
There's a civil war going on in California. It's the north vs. the south — Hollywood vs. Silicon Valley. And much like that other American Civil War, there are two different economic worldviews at stake. One of the highest-profile battles was fought last month, when large Internet sites like Wikipedia staged an online blackout to protest anti-piracy bills in Congress. The north won that battle, and for now, the legislation is on hold. But the war between Hollywood and Silicon Valley over how to deal with intellectual property is far from over. In the south, Hollywood, there are the people making their livings off of music, movies and TV. Southerner Gavin Polone is an executive producer on such shows as Gilmore Girls and Curb Your Enthusiasm. "What is the key element is that a movie or a television show or a song or a book is actually someone's property," he says. And to Polone and other southerners, taking that property without permission is a criminal act. That's why Hollywood has used the law to try to shut down the revolving door of sites that traffic in music, movies, television and film, from Napster to Megaupload. But up north in Silicon Valley, in the hub of technological innovation and newly minted millionaires and billionaires, techies like Tim O'Reilly have a different view. "I'm a creature of a technology world where you accept a high level of competition and you don't have a lot of respect for business protecting their turf, except by innovating," O'Reilly says.
benton.org/node/115058 | National Public Radio
Recommend this Headline
back to top
HEALTH
MEANINGFUL USE 2
[SOURCE: Health Data Management, AUTHOR: ]
The Department of Health and Human Services has sent to the Federal Register two notices of proposed rulemaking for Stage 2 of the electronic health records meaningful use program. The rules will be available on Feb. 23 on the Federal Register Public Inspection Desk, and within days officially published. The proposed rules have a 60-day public comment period following publication. Federal officials hope to publish final rules in mid-summer. One rule sets the policies and criteria for achieving Stage 2 meaningful use; the other rule would adopt standards, implementation specifications and certification criteria to ensure EHRs support Stage 2 objectives. National HIT Coordinator Farzad Mostashari, M.D., says the main message in Stage 2 proposed rules is “stay the course.” Much of the meaningful use objectives in Stage 2 are familiar, as the Office of the National Coordinator adopted recommendations of the HIT Policy and Standards advisory committees “in very very large part,” he notes. But there are significant changes and new flexibility in the proposed rules, compared with the Stage 1 meaningful use program. Stage 2 includes specific emphasis on data exchange, Mostashari says. “We can’t wait five years to get standards-based exchange.” That goal, he adds, will be reached when the next phase of meaningful use starts in October 2013 for hospitals and January 2014 for eligible professionals. The proposed rules require use of the Direct Project protocols for secure e-mail, although optional certification of the SOAP approach is permitted. There are specific standards--no longer a menu of options--for lab results and vocabulary.
benton.org/node/115063 | Health Data Management
Recommend this Headline
back to top
EHR STANDARDS
[SOURCE: The Hill, AUTHOR: Julian Pecquet]
Congress’s gambit to create a national system of electronic health records is “at risk of failure or mediocrity” if federal regulators continue to water down the standards that doctors and hospitals must meet, Sen. Mark Warner (D-VA) wrote in a letter to federal health officials. Lawmakers have set aside $27 billion in Medicare and Medicaid incentives for medical providers to switch to paperless records, and 780 products have already been certified under the first stage of the program created by the 2009 stimulus bill. Sen Warner said the process so far has been “too limited.” For example, regulators don’t publish performance data for certified vendors, and failing to deliver medical data to a public health agency is still acceptable. For the next stage of the program, Sen Warner wrote, regulators should:
Require providers to submit data electronically and allow the Medicare agency to conduct “aggressive oversight of the program”;
Mandate “clear and robust” requirements that certified Health Information Technology be able to communicate and exchange data with different types of healthcare providers and systems, including health information exchanges; and
Support electronic access by consumers, including the ability to download data in a useful format.
benton.org/node/115062 | Hill, The
Recommend this Headline
back to top
KIDS AND FACEBOOK
[SOURCE: New York Times, AUTHOR: Jan Hoffman]
Last year, researchers examined Facebook profiles of 200 students at the University of Washington and the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Some 30 percent posted updates that met the American Psychiatric Association’s criteria for a symptom of depression, reporting feelings of worthlessness or hopelessness, insomnia or sleeping too much, and difficulty concentrating. Their findings echo research that suggests depression is increasingly common among college students. Some studies have concluded that 30 to 40 percent of college students suffer a debilitating depressive episode each year. Yet scarcely 10 percent seek counseling. “You can identify adolescents and young adults on Facebook who are showing signs of being at risk, who would benefit from a clinical visit for screening,” said Dr. Megan A. Moreno, a principal investigator in the Facebook studies and an assistant professor of pediatrics at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
benton.org/node/115084 | New York Times
Recommend this Headline
back to top
JOURNALISM
TECH MEDIA MISCONCEPTIONS
[SOURCE: Fortune, AUTHOR: Dan Primack]
[Commentary] All journalists who break news are in the business of giving and receiving favors. I know that sounds more like Godfather than Columbia J-School, but it's the truth. When we talk about "developing sources," all it means is forming a business relationship to further improve our product. And just like in any business relationship, both sides expect to get something out of it. Sometimes, a source simply wants someone to listen to them. Sometimes they want to leak information that damages a rival, or benefits a friend. Sometimes a source simply likes to trade gossip. You tell me something, I'll tell you something. Yes, there are situations in which a new source magically appears with valuable information with the purest of intentions. But it's the rare exception. In any case, it is a journalist's job to weigh a source's motives against the information's value to readers (after first confirming the information's authenticity). Ultimately, it all comes down to reader trust, which journalists and media outlets gain over time by regularly publishing accurate, insightful and/or entertaining information. Anyone can publish unfounded rumors or gushy pabulum about their own supporters. But those outlets won't stand the test of time (and, consequently, won't produce a good return on investment for their VC backers). Readers have limited time, don't suffer fools lightly and have plenty of options. The work is what matters. The rest will come out in the wash.
benton.org/node/115061 | Fortune
Recommend this Headline
back to top
GOVERNMENT & COMMUNICATIONS
WARRANTLESS EAVESDROPPING
[SOURCE: Wired, AUTHOR: David Kravets]
The Obama Administration is urging the Supreme Court to halt a legal challenge weighing the constitutionality of a once-secret warrantless surveillance program targeting Americans’ communications that Congress eventually legalized in 2008. The FISA Amendments Act, the subject of the lawsuit brought by the American Civil Liberties Union and others, allows the government to electronically eavesdrop on Americans’ phone calls and e-mails without a probable-cause warrant so long as one of the parties to the communication is outside the United States. The communications may be intercepted “to acquire foreign intelligence information.” The Administration is asking the Supreme Court to review an appellate decision that said the nearly 4-year-old lawsuit could move forward. The government said the ACLU and a host of other groups don’t have the legal standing to bring the case because they have no evidence they or their overseas clients are being targeted.
benton.org/node/115012 | Wired
Recommend this Headline
back to top
IRAN’S SECOND INTERNET
[SOURCE: Fast Company, AUTHOR: Neal Ungerleider]
Iran is unveiling a nationwide "Halal Intranet" this spring that will try to seal the nation off from the corrupting influences of Google, Facebook, and Twitter. But can it work? In whatever form it will take, other governments will be eagerly watching. Initiatives to envision a successor technology to the Internet such as Stanford's Clean Slate program have been eagerly followed by two separate groups. Nation-states such as China and North Korea believe that a successor technology to the Internet--such as a nationwide intranet--would be easier to monitor, and international organizations such as the United Nations suspect the Internet has fundamentally dangerous native technology flaws and could be bought down by malicious hackers. Either way, if Iran pulls off their “Halal Internet,” it will have profound international consequences.
benton.org/node/115078 | Fast Company
Recommend this Headline
back to top
MEDIA & ELECTIONS
TRANSPARENCY IN POLITICAL ADS
[SOURCE: TVNewsCheck, AUTHOR: Susan King]
The public has a right to know who is paying for advertising for politicians who put themselves before the public in election cycles. And I believe that it is in the interest of the community and the larger political audience to know exactly what a station has earned in an election campaign cycle and to know who purchased those ads. The Internet will not replace the role of the local broadcaster in the community. It will, however, change some of the practices. Transparency is now easily affordable and the coin of the Internet realm. The Federal Communications Commission must stand for that value and ask only that broadcasters offer the body politic the insight into the "who," "what" and "how much" is contributed in an advertising cycle in a campaign year.
[King is dean and the John Thomas Kerr Distinguished Professor of the School of Journalism and Mass Communication at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.]
benton.org/node/115021 | TVNewsCheck
Recommend this Headline
back to top
TELEVISION
CANOE CLOSING
[SOURCE: Multichannel News, AUTHOR: Todd Spangler]
Canoe Ventures is shutting down interactive TV advertising operations -- closing its New York office and laying off 120 employees, including CEO Kathy Timko -- leaving about 30 employees to focus on VOD ads as its sole product, the company confirmed. The decision to abandon ITV ads and dramatically pare back Canoe's mission came after a review by its cable operator owners, according to a Canoe spokeswoman. "It's the result of what the marketplace told us," she said. Despite Canoe's technical achievements, Madison Avenue did not buy the promise of nationally delivered interactive TV ads in a significant way. Among the reasons were that Canoe's reach across households and networks simply wasn't broad enough for the biggest marketers, and that the complexity of executing interactive campaigns didn't justify the additional time and expense. Canoe, in its radically slimmed-down form, will now attempt to create a national video on demand advertising platform that encompasses both traditional on-demand and eventually TV Everywhere. The company will be based in Denver and headed by newly appointed CEO Joel Hassell, who previously was chief technology officer.
benton.org/node/115019 | Multichannel News | AdAge | AdWeek | paidContent.org
Recommend this Headline
back to top
COMPANY NEWS
FOXCONN MAKES ITSELF LOOK GOOD
[SOURCE: The Atlantic, AUTHOR: Rebecca Greenfield]
Somehow Foxconn has convinced the world that its treatment of workers isn't that bad. Sure, we've heard the stories from those on the inside, seen workers in their natural habitats, and we know all about the suicide nets. And yet, Foxconn has managed to turn its image around, allowing us to rationalize it, Apple, and our own obsession with iThings.
benton.org/node/115067 | Atlantic, The
Recommend this Headline
back to top