Op-Ed

[Commentary] In Houston, local journalists were leading the effort to inform people on the ground, explaining how to get rescued, where to go and what to do. What if they hadn’t been there? Melanie Sills, a former editor at the Raleigh News & Observer, argues that extra effort will have to be made to shore up local reporting in the months to come, from national-local partnerships, public-service journalism and elsewhere, and she’s right. For those who want to find charities to support in the days to come, here’s an idea: Alongside shelters and immediate rescue operations, think about finding a way to support local journalism. You never know when you might need it yourself.

[Applebaum writes a biweekly foreign affairs column for The Washington Post]

[Commentary] At the moment, the Federal Communications Commission defines home “broadband” as providing 25 mbps download and 3 mbps upload (“25/3”). Many communities can only get that speed from a cable provider – assuming they have one that serves their communities. If the FCC discovers that certain identifiable groups of people, like rural Americans, don’t have access to broadband that meets the standard, then the law requires the FCC to take steps to ensure that those left behind get the access they need. FCC Chairman Ajit Pai’s Proposal: Lower the Standard for Broadband So We Can Say Everyone Has Access.

Rural Americans who care about getting real broadband not only need to file at the FCC, but also need to contact their Senators and members of Congress. Members of Congress from both parties have made it clear to the FCC that rural Americans continue to lack choices for affordable broadband that meets their needs.

[Harold Feld is senior vice president of Public Knowledge]

[Commentary] The think-tank world has come to be dominated by a distinctly modern kind of doublethink, which combines a rational understanding that corporations spend money to influence public policy with an instinctual belief that some of the institutions that benefit from it–often those that employ the thinker or his friends–function with complete independence. The New America Foundation runs several programs, including the Open Technology Institute , which researches issues that affect Google directly. The scholars who work on those projects don’t think of themselves as Google shills, and it’s hard to believe that they significantly changed their opinions in order to secure think-tank gigs. But it’s also hard to believe that their research isn’t affected by the funding that allows them to do the work they do.

Which leads us to the other big problem in the think-tank world–how the presence of so much corporate money distorts what work gets funded in the first place.

[Robert Levine is an author and journalist who writes about the media and technology businesses]

[Commentary] The Federal Trade Commission can challenge harmful non-neutral practices on a case-by-case basis under its antitrust authority and under its consumer protection authority. These complementary tools ensure that consumers can effectively pursue their many, varying market preferences, including preferences for values of openness and free expression online.

First, the FTC’s antitrust tools protect the competitive process, which motivates companies to deliver what consumers want. Second, the FTC uses its consumer protection authority to ensure that consumers get the benefit of the bargain they strike. This two-pronged competition and consumer protection enforcement approach is case-by-case. We evaluate each practice to see if it actually harms consumers. Such an approach has advantages over prescriptive regulation, which prejudges, in the abstract, entire categories of business practices. In dynamic, fast-changing industries, case-by-case enforcement better protects consumers and promotes innovation because it focuses agency resources on actual consumer injury and doesn’t require regulators to predict the future.

[Maureen K. Ohlhausen is acting chairman of the Federal Trade Commission.]

[Commentary] There is a national conversation taking place on how to get broadband providers to go the last mile, and strike a balance with electric utilities to utilize their existing or planned infrastructure. And, private investment remains an essential component to any broadband buildout. The Energy and Commerce Committee, of which I am a member, is currently considering legislation to streamline federal permitting processes, create common contracts for siting wireless facilities on federal properties, and create an inventory of federal assets. One of the key roles of Congress is to facilitate policy and programs that help unserved or underserved communities. The infrastructure bill that will likely be debated later this year must include provisions for rural broadband deployment.

Many bureaucrats in Washington simply don’t understand the challenges we here in Eastern and Southeastern Ohio face. We will not be left behind anymore. There’s a lot of intellectual capital here in rural Appalachia…and, America needs to start tapping into it.

[Commentary] President Donald Trump’s assault on journalistic integrity and shared verifiable facts has ignited a reaction among public intellectuals to demand fealty to scientific truth. Unfortunately, the reaction, like so many produced in the haste of political controversy, has oversimplified and overcorrected for the problem.

One common assumption within the resistance is that existing systems for regulating scientific claims are self-evidently wise. My new article, “Snake Oil“ (forthcoming in the Washington Law Review), is therefore coming out at a rather inconvenient time. I loathe the Trump administration’s disregard for and delegitimization of scientific institutions, including expert federal agencies. Nevertheless, the methods that some expert agencies use to constrain the information flow to consumers are highly flawed.

[Commentary] According to a new survey, Americans overwhelmingly favor a permanent law over regulations that can be changed from administration to administration. Indeed, 74 percent of Americans said they would support net neutrality legislation that enabled them to use the internet free from government or corporate censorship, while creating rules that ensure a level playing field. It’s time to end the slowest game of policy pingpong before it drags into another decade.

It is high time for Congress to finally step up — after multiple decades of hibernation — and pass affirmative, bipartisan legislation that makes net neutrality the law of the land. That is something that CALinnovates has proposed for three years now; we are gratified that others are finally jumping on the bandwagon. Congress must wake from its two-decade slumber regarding internet policy to take the decision away from the FCC and cement net neutrality once and for all.

[Mike Montgomery is the executive director of CALinnovates]

[Commentary] Fostering competition and punishing anti-competitive conduct creates an environment where innovators can create new products and services in response to consumer demand more freely, without having to spend time and money to comply with static, “one-size-fits-all” regulations from Washington, D.C. With that in mind, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), with its jurisdiction over our nation’s antitrust and competition laws, is ideally equipped to both protect the interests of consumers and foster competition in the ISP marketplace.
FTC enforcement of antitrust laws preserves innovation and consumer benefits.
FTC has the most extensive experience to address anticompetitive conduct.
FTC provides regulatory certainty and prevents overregulation.

[Rep Bob Goodlatte (R-VA) is Chairman of the House Judiciary Committee]

[Commentary] Government and corporate control of the press is certainly not new but has gone in a new direction, exacerbated not just by the rise of right wing populism but also by digital technology and the far reach of the internet. It’s hard to remember now how many people thought the internet would secure the reign of independent journalism by boosting the flow of information. Instead, the loss of advertising revenues for traditional media has created a cascading effect that in some countries has left the press fighting for its life. This collapse of the old business model paved the way for media capture to take hold. Finding solutions to the problems of capture, or at least ways to limit its effects, is one of the crucial challenges of our time. Government regulation of cross-ownership, digital taxation, and financial support for quality media are just a few much-needed solutions.
[Schiffrin is the director of the Technology, Media and Communications specialization at Columbia University’s School of International and Public Affairs.]

[Commentary] The Federal Communications Commission’s proposal to reclassify broadband as an information service – the status it had for nearly two decades under which the internet grew and flourished -- has received over 20 million comments expressing views on both sides of the issue. Amid all the noise, it’s important to ensure that one aspect of the rulemaking not be overlooked: its huge impact on rural America.

The best way to ensure that all corners of the country get the connectivity they need is for the FCC to restore the classification of broadband as an information service. Thereafter, Congress should enact legislation that codifies open internet rules and at long last puts to rest a debate that has raged for more than a decade.

[Rick Boucher was a Democratic member of the US House for 28 years and chaired the House Communications Subcommittee. He is honorary chairman of the Internet Innovation Alliance (IIA) and head of the government strategies practice at the law firm Sidley Austin.]