Benton Foundation

On September 26, 2018, executives from six major U.S. tech and communications companies testified before the Senate Commerce Committee at a hearing titled Examining Safeguards for Consumer Data Privacy. Representatives from Amazon, AT&T, Google, Twitter, Apple, and Charter were there to help lawmakers as they all discussed “possible approaches to safeguarding privacy more effectively.” Tech companies, on the whole, followed the trend that has emerged out of Silicon Valley when they testify before Congress: Apologize, explain, and offer to work with lawmakers on a regulatory solution.

Among the hundreds of people waiting to visit Mahatma Gandhi one day was a mother who sought help in battling her son’s obsession with eating sugar. When it was their turn in line, instead of immediately counseling the boy, Gandhi asked the pair to come back in two weeks. Following a two-hour wait on the day of their return, the anxious mother repeated her request. Gandhi promptly spoke with her son and the boy agreed to work on breaking his sugar fixation.

"Our media is precious. It’s how, outside of our strictly personal spheres, we speak to each other, inform each other, learn from each other, entertain each other, increasingly how we govern ourselves." With these words, Michael Copps opened a public hearing on media ownership rules. The hearing was not in Washington, DC, but Chicago, Illinois. Copps was not a local official, but a commissioner at the U.S. Federal Communications Commission (FCC).

This report, part history, and part strategy playbook, examines the tactics and policy priorities of former-Commissioner Michael J. Copps during his 10 years at the FCC. An analysis of Commissioner Copps’s tenure, his political strategies, and his legacy is a timely endeavor, both for its historical importance and for its contemporary relevance. As a commissioner in the minority during the George W.

On September 26, at the Federal Communications Commission’s open meeting, commissioners will vote on an order that will limit the roles of local policymakers in the deployment of fifth generation (5G) wireless infrastructure.

In our working paper, we discuss how civil rights and minority-focused advocacy groups have engaged – or circumvented – Internet policy issues to better serve the communication and technology needs of their underrepresented constituents. In addition, in accordance with critical race theorists (e.g.

I am thrilled to return to TPRC to present the winners of the Charles Benton Early Career Scholar Award. Deeply embedded in the DNA of the Benton Foundation are three key values: access, equity, and diversity. Today we celebrate a paper that, we feel, makes an important contribution to communications and media policy literature. We know that communities of color face complex challenges achieving equitable outcomes. This paper delves into why. There are a couple of takeaways here that I’d like to highlight.

The Coalition for Local Internet Choice and the National Association of Telecommunications Officers and Advisors asked for my view of the Federal Communications Commission’s pending order, proposing to cap the fees that state and local governments may charge for small-cell attachments. According to the FCC’s draft order, these price‐caps will save the industry $2 billion in costs to operate in metropolitan areas—which will translate into $2.5 billion in new wireless investment, primarily in rural areas. Here are my concerns:

How can we solve the rural broadband digital divide? On September 6, the Broadband Connects America (a new coalition which includes the Benton Foundation) offered a set of principles for attacking the problem. With countless federal, state, and local projects underway, if there's any telecom policy consensus these days, it is on this: we need better broadband data.

On September 5, 2018, lawmakers on Capitol Hill hosted two hearings with the heads of Facebook and Twitter. In the morning, Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg and Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey testified before the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence at the hearing on Foreign Influence Operations’ Use of Social Media Platforms.