Daily Digest 3/12/2018 (Ajit Pai is Hurting Poor People)

A city councilman proposed that Los Angeles (CA) study creating a new publicly owned and operated department to provide affordable broadband internet services to residents. According to a motion introduced by Councilman Paul Krekorian, the new department's mission would be to improve the city's network capabilities, provide community and economic development with at-cost internet service to businesses and residents and bridge the digital divide among neighborhoods lacking high-speed services. "Los Angeles owns a network of fiber-optic cable that runs through every part of the city,'' Krekorian said. ``I want to see if we can maximize its use and ensure that everyone has access to fast, affordable internet services.''

[Press release] A bipartisan group of Senators, led by Sen Roger Wicker (R-MS) sent a letter to Federal Communications Commission Chairman Ajit Pai expressing serious concerns about the agency’s recently released Mobility Fund Phase II (MF II) map. The purpose of this fund is to allocate $4.53 billion over the next 10 years to preserve and expand mobile coverage to rural areas. “We understand that the map was developed based on a preliminary assessment from a one-time data collection effort that will be verified through a challenge process,” the Sens wrote. “However, we are concerned that the map misrepresents the existence of 4G LTE services in many areas.  As a result, the Commission’s proposed challenge process may not be robust enough to adequately address the shortcomings in the Commission’s assessment of geographic areas in need of support for this proceeding."

Earlier in 2018, a space startup from Silicon Valley launched four of its first prototype communications satellites on top of an Indian rocket. Except the Federal Communications Commission says that the company didn’t have authorization to send up those spacecraft from the US government. The four satellites reportedly belong to a fledgling company called Swarm Technologies, which was started by former Google and NASA JPL engineer Sara Spangelo in 2016. The probes, dubbed SpaceBees 1, 2, 3, and 4, are meant to test out Swarm’s idea for a “space-based Internet of Things” network and went up as part of a cluster of 31 satellites aboard an Indian Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV) rocket on January 12th. 

A group of former Justice Department officials is raising concerns about whether President Donald Trump had any improper influence over the agency’s decision to sue to block the $85 billion AT&T-Time Warner merger. In a federal court filing submitted late March 9, the group urged the judge to explore whether the White House had pressured the Justice Department to file the lawsuit as retaliation for critical coverage from CNN, an outlet that President Trump often criticizes and a subsidiary of Time Warner. “President Trump has urged a criminal investigation of his political rivals; he has suggested that he can instruct the Department to halt investigations into his associates; and he has claimed an ‘absolute right to do what I want to do with the Justice Department,’ ” the filing reads. “Indeed, this case is being pursued under a cloud, with a perception — at least by some — that DOJ brought this case at the behest of President Trump in order to punish CNN for what he viewed as unfavorable coverage of his administration.” The group of officials includes Preet Bharara, the former U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York who was fired in the early days of Trump's presidency, and John Dean, who served as President Nixon’s White House counsel after a stint as attorney general. The group noted the president’s long history of clashing with CNN and his pledge on the campaign trail to block the merger. They also argued that his record of threatening to use his regulatory authority to retaliate against media outlets is a major red flag for the lawsuit.

[Editorial] Sinclair’s behavior in trying to merge with Tribune is doing it — and the entire broadcasting industry — no favors. By dragging out this process, and by pressing for every advantage, Sinclair is making life difficult for Federal Communications Commission Chairman Ajit Pai, who has been broadcasters’ best friend in that job in decades. All the hooting and hollering by Democrats has apparently prompted the FCC inspector general to looked into Chairman Pai’s dealings with Sinclair. What he will find, I believe, is that Sinclair CEO David Smith met with Pai and made his case for regulatory relief and 3.0. That sounds like business as usual to me. In fact, if the head of any FCC-regulated business has not been into see Chairman Pai with a wish list at this point, they ought to be fired.

[Commentary] Are Facebook and Google's practices of privileging certain information really analogous to what newspaper editors do, and therefore similarly protected by the First Amendment? The answer is no. Making decisions about what and how information is conveyed does not automatically make one an editor entitled to First Amendment protection. There are also other analogies to draw between Google is doing (eg providing users information) that would not entitle it First Amendment protection. For instance, grocery stores also provide customers information through their shelf displays. And we all know the saying that “actions speak louder than words.” We say that because actions provide information, but we surely do not think each of us an editor protected by the First Amendment every time we act. So far, the debate over what role the internet giants are playing as they gather, remix, and disseminate information has been playing out in the courts. But with the growing interest in Congress in the way social media companies are shaping public discourse suggests these questions will soon be debated there as well, very possibly with an eye toward new regulations. 

[Heather Whitney is a doctoral candidate in philosophy at New York University.]

Verizon and the Communications Workers of America (CWA) have reached a settlement requiring the telco to repair and make improvements to its copper network infrastructure throughout New York state. Under the terms of the agreement, the service provider agreed to repair 54 central offices across the state; replace bad cable, defective equipment and faulty backup batteries; and take down 64,000 double telephone poles. Additionally, the agreement addresses broadband expansion to major apartment buildings in New York City and over 30,000 homes across the state. CWA said that the settlement with Verizon was prompted by a CWA campaign to pressure the New York Public Service Commission to require Verizon to upgrade and repair the legacy telephone network and to expand consumer access to broadband.

“Interoperability” isn’t a word most people hear every day. But when it comes to the future of patient-centered healthcare in the United States, few technological developments may prove to be more important. Interoperability is essentially the ability of different computer systems to communicate with each other quickly and effectively. For healthcare specifically, that means being able to share patient data in an instant regardless of what hospital, pharmacy, laboratory, or clinic houses the information—and being able to do so with complete reliability and privacy protection.

The Trump Administration views interoperability as a top priority for the Federal government. This week, White House Senior Adviser Jared Kushner laid out President Donald J. Trump’s plan at HIMSS18, a leading conference focusing on health information and technology transformation. Kushner, who leads the White House’s Office of American Innovation, wants the Federal government to set the example. 

Freeing data is only a starting point. “Unleashing data will unleash innovation,” Kushner said. “This is the essence of the Administration’s goals: more decision making in hands of customers, medical data belongs to the patients, a whole-of-government approach that leads to private innovation.”