March 24, 2011 (AT&T deal could delay spectrum bills)
BENTON'S COMMUNICATIONS-RELATED HEADLINES for THURSDAY, MARCH 24, 2011
Who wants to talk SmartGrids? http://benton.org/calendar/2011-03-24/
AT&T|T-MOBILE
Analyst: AT&T deal could delay spectrum bills
AT&T, T-Mobile Deal to Cost $100 Million in Lobbying?
Say no to AT&T’s mobile monopoly
James Cicconi, head of AT&T lobbying effort, confident in approval of T-Mobile deal
AT&T lobbies Silicon Valley for merger support
US deal remedies offer hope to AT&T
AT&T|T-Mobile is job killer
Backing for AT&T/T-Mobile
DirecTV Loses AT&T Safety Net
Wireless Merger Has Steep Path to Approval
The Likely AT&T Wireless Playbook for Securing Authority to Acquire T-Mobile
AT&T and T-Mobile deal: More mergers ahead?
Public would lose out from AT&T, T-Mobile deal
AT&T: 1, Consumers: 0
AT&T purchase of T-Mobile should be rejected
AT&T and T-Mobile Merger Could Impact Local Government Revenue
MORE ON WIRELESS
US carriers battle over cutting-edge network features
CTIA Wants to Help Consumers Choose the Right Accessible Wireless Devices and Services
Can T-Mobile's dual-carrier HSPA+ match Verizon's LTE?
INTERNET/BROADBAND
Phoenix report on National Broadband Map
133 US cities now have their own broadband networks
Google's Vint Cerf touts broadband measurement tools
Department of Education Maps Broadband Availability for US Schools
CONTENT
What The Collapse Of The Google Books Deal Really Means
See also: Google Books Rejection Highlights Need for Orphan Works Reform
Book Ruling Cuts Options for Google
A Digital Library Better Than Google’s
How Google Uses Data to Make a Better Google
NY Times vs Workarounds
Did file-sharing cause recording industry collapse? Economists say no
'Gay It Up' Just Stage Direction, American Idol Lawyer Says
Beyond The Swag: Bloggers Use Social Media To Do Good
Google Said to Face Possible Antitrust Probes in Ohio, Wisconsin
BUDGET
House Democrats keep pressure on Obama on NPR funding bill
See also:Liberal Bias at NPR?
Genachowski to Defend FCC Budget During House Hearing
ADVERTISING
TV Advertising Most Influential
Nielsen Sues comScore In The Battle Of The Audience-Measurement Firms
HEALTH
E-Health Records Can Boost Care in Developing Countries, Study Finds
The Direct Project: Accelerating Government Innovation in Health IT
Health IT Part of National Strategy for Quality Improvement in Health Care
Telemedicine 'holds promise' for patients after major disaster
POLICYMAKERS
Marvin Ammori Joins the Open Technology Initiative as a Legal Fellow
Waz Leaving Comcast for Broadband Internet Technology Advisory Group
STORIES FROM ABROAD
These headlines presented in partnership with:
Leaked New Zealand broadband plan comes in for criticism
Amended network neutrality regulation calms critics in Chile
Australians: Google should be regulated
Google Street View is legal, says German court
Age UK reports broadband usage high among older Brits
MORE
Facebook Booting "20,000" Underage Users Per Day: Reaction to Growing Privacy Concerns?
Verizon now Massachusetts’s 2d-largest cable-TV provider
AT&T|T-MOBILE
AT&T DEAL COULD DELAY SPECTRUM BILLS
[SOURCE: The Hill, AUTHOR: Sara Jerome]
AT&T's decision to purchase T-Mobile could throw a monkey wrench in a key Federal Communications Commission (FCC) goal: Convincing Congress to pass incentive auction legislation this year. Paul Gallant at MF Global said in a note to clients: "We believe the proposed AT&T/T-Mobile transaction reduces the likelihood of legislation this year that would facilitate the movement of spectrum from broadcast TV and government uses into the commercial wireless market." The chances of passing spectrum legislation could rise again in 2012 and 2013, he said. He placed the odds of major spectrum legislation this year at 35 percent.
benton.org/node/53806 | Hill, The
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STEEP PATH TO APPROVAL
[SOURCE: National Journal, AUTHOR: David Hatch]
At first glance, there’s ample reason to believe that AT&T’s proposed $39 billion acquisition of T-Mobile could be dead on arrival in Washington. After all, the deal would remove a nationwide wireless competitor from the marketplace and reduce the number of major national carriers from four to three. As a result, the transaction is expected to trigger close scrutiny from both the Federal Communications Commission and the Justice Department, and will be the focus of Senate and House hearings. But despite the hurdles, experts agree that there is a path for the companies to win approval of the merger. The Obama administration has been advocating many of the goals that AT&T says would result from the deal, such as faster rollout of advanced 4G wireless technology and more efficient use of spectrum resources. With the White House stepping up its outreach to the business sector and emphasizing the importance of spurring innovation, it might be difficult to justify blocking the transaction, analysts said. “On its face, it’s a very, very heavy lift,” said Jeffrey Silva, a telecom analyst with Medley Global Advisors. Nevertheless, regulators might be wooed by AT&T’s promises of billions of dollars in infrastructure investments, job creation, and nationwide, next-generation broadband service, he noted.
benton.org/node/53743 | National Journal
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AT&T'S LIKELY SONG
[SOURCE: TeleFrieden, AUTHOR: Rob Frieden]
[Commentary] There are several tried and true tactics that AT&T Wireless can use to convince the Federal Communications Commissions and Department of Justice to approve the company’s merger with T-Mobile notwithstanding the obvious harmful and anticompetitive consequences. Regardless of which party controls the White House these tactics work as evidenced by the rare instance where a market concentrating telecommunications mega-merger is not approved. AT&T will reframe the merger away from market concentration and into the realm of better serving the consumer and responding to delays in FCC regulatory reform.
1) This merger will benefit consumers! 2) The FCC made us do it! 3) Prominent scholars and consultants endorse the merger! 4) Our merger will achieve the same type benefits as other mega-mergers.
Prediction: A year or so from now AT&T probably will get conditional merger authority. The future dominant means for accessing the Internet will become an unregulated conduit controlled by companies free to leverage employment and infrastructure buildouts for a free reign.
benton.org/node/53741 | TeleFrieden
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JUST SAY NO TO AT&T|T-MOBILE
[SOURCE: Financial Times, AUTHOR: John Gapper]
[Commentary] AT&T's purchase of T-Mobile
should be blocked by US regulators and the Department of Justice. Unless they are stopped, Verizon and AT&T are on their way to replicating in mobile the power they exert in fixed-line telephony and broadband – lack of competition means most consumers can only choose between one phone company and one cable company. In spite of the clear antitrust problem – AT&T already has 96 million subscribers and, with Verizon, controls 80 percent of the industry’s earnings before interest and depreciation – it is sure enough that it will clear regulatory hurdles to agree to a $3 billion break-up fee if it fails. The deal, it appears to believe, is as good as done.
The first irony of this is that AT&T is one of the symbols of the past determination of regulators not to be dissuaded by big business from imposing antitrust law. The original AT&T phone system – founded by Alexander Graham Bell – was broken up by the DoJ in 1982 into “Ma Bell” and the “Baby Bells”. Now the DoJ may stand aside as AT&T turns itself into Ma Mobile.
The second irony is that AT&T announced its bid as Ofcom, the UK telecoms regulator, unveiled a design this week for a spectrum auction that diminishes the potential pay-out to the UK Treasury in order to ensure that at least four mobile phone companies will operate fourth-generation (4G) networks. It feared going down the path that AT&T is forcing the US along.
The third is that the US confusion of standards – with a split between CDMA and GSM third-generation technology – is likely to be ended by operators moving to a unified 4G standard, known as LTE. That would not only cut costs but make it easier for consumers to switch among networks, and harder for their providers to trap them.
The US already performs badly in fixed-line broadband services in terms of price and speed compared with other countries, hurt by Verizon and AT&T having shrugged off the imposition of competition. The last thing the US now needs is AT&T, which already has mobile operating margins of more than 40 per cent, pulling that trick again. Come on, DoJ. Just say no.
benton.org/node/53818 | Financial Times
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JAMES CICCONI
[SOURCE: Washington Post, AUTHOR: Ian Shapira]
If one AT&T executive is considered crucial in the company’s quest to win over federal regulators and merge with T-Mobile USA, that person would be James W. Cicconi. At the helm of AT&T’s vast lobbying operation, the veteran Republican playmaker displays little fear that his company’s wager — gobbling up a small competitor to form a wireless industry giant — will fail. “We don't believe for a moment that [a rejection] will occur. We’re a very careful and cautious company in our strategic decisions,” Cicconi said. He added that the company has no need for a backup plan, such as filing suit against the government if regulators nix the deal. “We understand the antitrust laws ... and we've examined all these with great care. We wouldn't be doing this deal if we did not expect approval.”But AT&T faces risks if its proposed $39 billion acquisition of T-Mobile does not receive the blessing of the Justice Department and Federal Communications Commission, the two agencies charged with approving the deal. First, it would have to hand over to T-Mobile $3 billion in breakup fees, which is about three times the profit AT&T made in last year’s fourth quarter. Without T-Mobile’s added spectrum, AT&T would also continue to struggle with its 3G wireless network, which has been frequently criticized for dropped calls. “If a company like ours is having bandwidth constraints, you have to ration that bandwidth — pricing is usually the way you do it,” Cicconi said. “That’s the story we’re going to lay out at the Justice Department and FCC, and that’s why we hope consumers keep an open mind.”
benton.org/node/53817 | Washington Post | Bloomberg
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MORE ON WIRELESS
BATTLE OVER CUTTING-EDGE FEATURES
[SOURCE: IDG News Service, AUTHOR: Stephen Lawson]
The network chiefs of the three biggest U.S. mobile operators disagreed about some emerging network technologies during a panel discussion at CTIA Wireless but agreed that the wireless industry is in a period of major change. "I've never seen a point in time where it's so open for innovation everywhere," AT&T CTO John Donovan said. The rapid growth of data traffic is forcing carriers to rethink the fundamental designs of their networks, and new technologies are emerging to help solve that traffic problem, he said. Wi-Fi, cloud-based network management, and policy-based controls are among those new tools, he said. Donovan and network heads from Verizon Wireless and Sprint Nextel disagreed about the practical value of specific technologies, but all cited the eventual need for more spectrum and current requirements to make more efficient use of current networks. Expanding capacity was one of AT&T's main motivations in making a deal to buy T-Mobile USA for $39 billion. Yet, two mobile network concepts that have drawn close attention recently received a generally cool reception from the big-carrier technology executives. The "lightweight radio" concept, highlighted last month with announcements by Ericsson and Alcatel-Lucent, is overhyped, according to Sprint Senior Vice President Bob Azzi and Verizon Communications Executive Vice President and CTO Tony Melone. Lightweight radios, such as the Ericsson Air (antenna integrated radio) and Alcatel's lightRadio concept, are designed to be much smaller and less power-hungry than current cellular base stations. The vendors hope to achieve this by centralizing some parts of the base-station gear and having the lightweight radios configure themselves. Proponents say the new radios ultimately could make cell towers unnecessary.
benton.org/node/53717 | IDG News Service
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INTERNET/BROADBAND
CHALLENGES IN USING THE NATIONAL BROADBAND MAP’S DATA
[SOURCE: Phoenix Center for Advanced Legal and Economic Public Policy Studies, AUTHOR: George Ford]
As part of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, Congress set forth an ambitious goal of establishing a definitive National Broadband Map. Understandably, researchers are now anxious to use the data received to quantify the extent of broadband availability and to explain the relationships between availability and socio-economic factors. While the National Telecommunications and Information Administration should be lauded for its inaugural effort to complete this Herculean task, it is nonetheless important to recognize that the mapping data currently has many known and yet-to-be-discovered defects. These errors include, but are not limited to, measurement errors and sample selection, both of which can cause severe problems with empirical analyses. In light of the known defects in the data and the lack of a robust data verification process, the analyst must proceed with caution and considerable modesty.
Indeed, until a data verification process is put into place and the known defects remedied, all statistical and econometric results using the National Broadband Map data should be viewed with skepticism as such work permits no strong causal and policy-relevant conclusions. Over time, as some of the measurement error and sample selection problems are resolved, econometric models may offer more robust conclusions. As always, empirical research using the Map data should begin with a sound, rational framework explaining observed outcomes.
benton.org/node/53794 | Phoenix Center for Advanced Legal and Economic Public Policy Studies
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MUNICIPAL BROADBAND MAP
[SOURCE: ars technica, AUTHOR: Nate Anderson]
More than 130 US cities now operate publicly owned broadband networks, according a comprehensive new map developed by the Institute for Local Self-Reliance (ILSR). The group compiled what it calls the first-ever such list of 54 city-wide fiber networks and 79 city-wide cable networks "whose objective is to maximize value to the community in which they are located rather than to distant stockholders and corporate executives." Such publicly owned networks can offer services that incumbents don't. And they sometimes have more incentive to reach every resident, even in surrounding rural areas, in ways that might not make sense for a profit-focused company. The ILSR map shows that most community-owned networks exist in the eastern half of the US -- and this isn't just because of population density. The northwest quadrant of Iowa, for instance, has eight such networks, most in small communities. California has only a few in the entire state.
benton.org/node/53800 | Ars Technica | ILSR
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BROADBAND MEASUREMENT TOOLS
[SOURCE: The Hill, AUTHOR: Gautham Nagesh]
Google and the New America Foundation unveiled a new set of tools that depict broadband availability and performance across the globe at an event in Washington. Google chief Internet evangelist Vint Cerf took the stage to show off new visualization tools that he said would help researchers make sense of the mountain of data. Cerf said the goal is to understand broadband experiences across the U.S. and internationally without relying on advertised speeds. "There are lots of assertions about broadband rankings that are often not very quantitative," Cerf said. "We're interested in making those more crisp and understandable by getting solid data behind everything." The search giant teamed up with researchers in 2009 to create Measurement Lab (M-Lab), an open-source set of broadband measurement tools; since then the project has conducted more than half a billion tests and generated 300 terabytes of data. The data is collected from computers across the globe conducting tests using the M-Lab platform and downloaded to Google servers. Cerf emphasized that Google is simply hosting the data and has made it publicly available.
benton.org/node/53734 | Hill, The
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CONTENT
WHAT GOOGLE BOOKS RULING MEANS
[SOURCE: paidContent.org, AUTHOR: Joe Mullin]
For all the growth in the digital book market over the last few years, Google Books is still the only project with the outsize ambition of scanning every book, and it’s not an exaggeration to say the deal it reached with publishers would have changed our relationship to books forever. Now, that agreement looks like a failure. So what does that mean for the digital-book business and for the universal digital library Google is trying to create? For the modern e-book market, it’s really status quo. It’s hard to see anyone coming out ahead because this deal fell through, unless you count Google competitors as indirect “winners” in any Google setback. Amazon and Apple have built healthy businesses selling contemporary, in-print e-books. The big money will continue to be in that space, which is unaffected by this settlement. It’s also a market where Google is a new entrant and a small presence, so far. But even though there aren't any big winners from this recent decision, there are some parties who lost out. First of all, Google would have been positioned to have a dominant position in the market for in-copyright but out-of-print works, so it has lost something. That’s not a huge or lucrative market, but it’s not insignificant either, and would have seen a fair amount of use by researchers and universities. Speaking of academics, they’re the ones most likely to want full copies of hard-to-find out-of-print books, so they have also clearly lost out here. Finally, authors of some out-of-print books would have seen a new, albeit modest, revenue stream. The “status quo” for them just means that when searchers find their works in Google Book Search, they'll continue to be directed to used book stores -- a solution that’s inconvenient for users and doesn't get a penny to publishers and authors.
benton.org/node/53802 | paidContent.org
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GOOGLE'S OPTIONS
[SOURCE: New York Times, AUTHOR: Claire Cain Miller]
Now that a judge has curtailed Google’s ambitions to create a giant digital bookstore and library, the company is left with few appealing options. Google may take the battle from the courtroom to Congress, to promote a law that would make orphan works — books that are still under copyright but whose author or copyright owner can't be found — widely available. Publishers and authors could drop or revive their original copyright lawsuit against Google, which claimed that even Google’s more modest initial plan to scan books and show snippets of their text was illegal. Those issues have never been litigated. Another option, which publishers and authors said was attractive to them, would be to reach a new settlement with Google that requires each author or copyright owner to opt in and permit Google to digitize their works. Google has called the opt-in solution unworkable. Google would not be interested in such an agreement because it already allows publishers to join with Google to show more of their digitized works, and the point of the original settlement was to automatically opt in vast quantities of books, said people briefed on the settlement who were not authorized to speak publicly about it.
benton.org/node/53826 | New York Times | WSJ
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A BETTER DIGITAL LIBRARY
[SOURCE: New York Times, AUTHOR: Robert Darnton]
[Commentary] We we should not abandon Google’s dream of making all the books in the world available to everyone. Instead, we should build a digital public library, which would provide these digital copies free of charge to readers. Yes, many problems — legal, financial, technological, political — stand in the way. All can be solved. We really need is a noncommercial option: a digital public library. A coalition of foundations could come up with the money (estimates of digitizing one page vary enormously, from 10 cents to $10 or more), and a coalition of research libraries could supply the books. The library would respect copyright, of course, and it probably would exclude works that are now in print unless their authors wanted to make them available. It would include orphan books, assuming that Congress passed legislation to free them for non-commercial use in a genuinely public library. To dismiss this as quixotic would be to ignore digital projects that have proven their value and practicability throughout the last 20 years. All major research libraries have digitized parts of their collections. Large-scale enterprises like the Knowledge Commons and the Internet Archive have themselves digitized several million books. [Darnton is a professor and the director of the Harvard University Library]
benton.org/node/53828 | New York Times
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BUDGET
NPR FUNDING
[SOURCE: The Hill, AUTHOR: Mike Lillis]
House Democrats upped the pressure on President Obama to stand firm on continued funding for National Public Radio with a unanimous show of support for the broadcaster last week. Without even a nudge from party leaders, all 185 voting Democrats rejected a Republican bill Thursday that would eliminate NPR’s federal cash. The bill passed the House 228-192. The unanimous vote sends "a very powerful signal to the Senate and the White House," according to Ross Baker, political scientist at Rutgers University. "Anything that brings together Heath Shuler and Maxine Waters," Baker said, is sure to gain notice from other Democratic leaders. He was referring to the two Democratic lawmakers, a centrist North Carolinian and a liberal from California. Although the White House said it “strongly opposes” the defunding measure, it stopped short of threatening to veto it. Observers on and off Capitol Hill said the White House is likely reserving its veto threats for bills with better odds of actually clearing the Senate and reaching Obama's desk. "There's a kind of political economy to veto threats," said Baker, of Rutgers. "You don't want to issue too many of them."
benton.org/node/53823 | Hill, The
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BUDGET HEARING
[SOURCE: Broadcasting&Cable, AUTHOR: John Eggerton]
On March 30, the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Commerce, Justice, Science and Related Agencies will hold a hearing on the Federal Communications Commission's fiscal year 2012 budget. The FCC's budget has been targeted by some House Republicans as a way to defund the FCC's new network neutrality rules and to zero out funding for its chief diversity officer position, which has been branded part of an unelected czardom the Republicans said the Administration had installed in positions of power that did not require congressional confirmation.
benton.org/node/53821 | Broadcasting&Cable
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POLICYMAKERS
AMMORI JOINS NAF
[SOURCE: New America Foundation, AUTHOR: ]
World-renowned jurisprudent Marvin Ammori has joined the new America Foundation as a Legal Fellow. He currently helps lead the JD/LLM program in Space and Telecom Law at the Nebraska-Lincoln College of Law and teaches courses on cyberlaw and domestic and International telecommunications. Professor Ammori was Free Press's top policy lawyer in Washington, DC, where he served as the lead lawyer before the Federal Communications Commission on the Comcast-BitTorrent case regarding network neutrality. His scholarship, published in journals at Michigan, Missouri, Indiana, and Catholic, focuses on freedom of speech and new technologies. He is also a Term Member of the Council on Foreign Relations and a regular blogger at Balkinization and the Huffington Post.
benton.org/node/53787 | New America Foundation
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STORIES FROM ABROAD
These headlines presented in partnership with:
LEAKED GOVT BROADBAND PLAN COMES IN FOR CRITICISM
[SOURCE: New Zealand Herald, AUTHOR: Juha Saarinen]
Leaked documents show that New Zealand's new ultra-fast broadband (UFB) network will come with a variety of options and moderate prices, with connections starting at an estimated $47 a month. The Herald has obtained a "price book" revealing the wholesale charges set by the Government agency in charge of the UFB, Crown Fiber Holdings. The wholesale charges are for the Local Fiber Companies bidding on ultra-fast broadband contracts around the country, and will be set at different levels for the next ten years. While retail costs for ultra-fast broadband plans remain unclear as of now, they can be estimated by adding an 18 per cent retail margin as defined by the Commerce Commission previously, and GST. Despite the government's promise that New Zealanders will receive at least 100Mpbs downloads and 50Mbps uploads on the fibre-optic network that will cost tax payers $1.5 billion, the price book shows that the entry-level service runs at more modest 30Mbps downstream and 10Mbps upstream. Today's broadband over the country's ageing copper phone network provides up to 15Mbps downloads and 800kbps uploads. With a ten-fold increase in upload speed, the UFB is expected to substantially improve people's broadband experience. More importantly, the government guarantees the minimum speeds of the UFB even though each fibre-optic network segment will be shared between as many as 24 residential customers
benton.org/node/53773 | New Zealand Herald
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