Free Press

This is a lousy deal that would raise prices and give AT&T way too much power. The Justice Department should reject it. Making AT&T sell must-have content properties like the Turner Networks and CNN, or even divest a nationwide video-distribution platform like DIRECTV, could be legitimate ways to soften the concentration harms if the deal goes through. While there are plenty of good reasons to oppose AT&T’s Time Warner takeover, punishing CNN for trying to hold this administration accountable isn’t one of them.

People from across the country have already generated more than 1 million comments and signatures opposing Federal Communications Commission Chairman Ajit Pai’s destructive plan to kill network neutrality. And outside the agency’s headquarters May 18, a range of advocacy groups, members of Congress and nearly 100 activists rallied to preserve the open internet.

Among the speakers were Sens Ed Markey (D-MA) and Ron Wyden (D-OR) and Reps. Barbara Lee (D-CA) and Jared Polis (D-CO). “The debate we’re here to begin is over democracy itself. It’s over whether we have a free and open internet for all voices, all competitors,” said Sen Markey. “The Trump administration is intending to shut down Net Neutrality at the behest of a few corporate behemoths. … This is the beginning of a historic fight to save Net Neutrality.” Advocates from groups including the ACLU, the Center for Media Justice, CREDO Action, Color Of Change, Common Cause, Demand Progress, EFF, Faithful Internet, Free Press Action Fund, the National Hispanic Media Coalition, Popular Resistance and Public Knowledge all gave forceful speeches testifying to the need to preserve the internet’s level playing field. Daily Kos, Fight for the Future, The Nation and Women’s Institute for Freedom of the Press were also represented at the rally.

Financial and marketplace evidence demonstrates that the FCC’s 2015 Open Internet Order is an absolute success, accomplishing its stated goal of preserving and promoting the online ecosystem’s “virtuous cycle of investment.” ISP investments accelerated following the vote (e.g., aggregate capital expenditures by publicly traded ISPs have risen by more than 5 percent during the two-year period since the FCC’s February 2015 vote; investments in core network technology at cable companies during that same time period are up by more than 48 percent). Investments in the edge, including those by online video providers and edge computing firms, are up as well (e.g., capital expenditures by firms in the U.S. data-processing sector increased 26 percent in the year following the FCC’s order while there was just 4 percent growth in the year prior). More new U.S. “over-the-top” video services launched in the two years following the vote than in the seven years prior. Furthermore, the certainty the FCC’s action created spurred the entry of numerous pay-TV full replacement providers, with vertical carriers such as AT&T now distributing (and others poised to distribute) their pay-TV services via other ISPs’ last mile networks. In sum, the 2015 Open Internet Order and accompanying legal classification decision settled the prior uncertainty about open, nondiscriminatory broadband telecom service access. What followed that decision was a historic period of U.S. investment and innovation.

Sprint and T-Mobile have begun preliminary talks to work toward a merger. The deal, if approved, would join the third- and fourth-largest US wireless companies, which together would serve 132 million subscribers.

Free Press' Craig Aaron said, “While we need more competition in the mobile-internet market, it's undeniable that these moves have given people more choice and fairer prices. That never would have happened had the Federal Communications Commission approved AT&T’s T-Mobile takeover or signaled to Sprint a willingness to approve a merger like this one in 2014. The competition between Sprint and T-Mobile is particularly important for lower-income families, many of whom rely on mobile as their only home-internet connection. If Sprint and T-Mobile merge, prices will spike and the digital divide will widen. The legal standard for approving giant mergers like this is not whether Wall Street likes it. Communications mergers must enhance competition and serve the public interest. This deal would do just the opposite: It would destroy competition and harm the public in numerous irreversible ways. So unless Ajit Pai wants his tenure at the FCC to go down as the worst for consumers in the agency’s 83-year history, the chairman should speak out and show us he’s willing to do more than rubber-stamp any harmful deal that crosses his desk.”

Free Press and a coalition of media-rights groups petitioned the Federal Communications Commission to stay its ruling reinstating an obsolete television-ownership rule. The rule in question, called the “UHF discount,” allows broadcasters to exceed the national ownership cap by discounting the actual population coverage of their UHF broadcast stations for purposes of calculating their stations’ reach.

The FCC under Chairman Ajit Pai voted in April to put this rule back on the books to pave the way for runaway broadcast-industry consolidation, like the Sinclair-Tribune merger that was announced earlier this week. These conglomerates hope to exploit the discount to leap over the 39 percent national audience-reach cap Congress put in place. In their petition to the agency, Common Cause, Free Press, Media Alliance, Media Mobilizing Project, the National Hispanic Media Coalition, Prometheus Radio Project and the United Church of Christ Office of Communication, Inc. explain that this is a dangerous outcome stemming from a bad agency decision. The UHF discount is a technically obsolete loophole that allows the FCC to underestimate the true reach of broadcast companies. It’s technically obsolete because while UHF stations once had weaker signals, today stations broadcasting on these channels actually have better signals thanks to the Digital TV transition that occurred a decade ago. As the groups’ filing makes clear, “Reinstatement of the UHF discount opens the door for rapid and massive consolidation despite a congressional directive that there should be a limit on the scope of national ownership.”

[Commentary] In addition to the US, Canada was also all abuzz with Network Neutrality news last week, and for the completely opposite reason: Our communications regulator, the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC), released a landmark decision that planted a flag for Net Neutrality, bolstering the future of online innovation, competition and affordable choice and allowing residents to meaningfully participate in today’s digital society.

There are two key takeaways from this decision that should give Net Neutrality advocates and internet users in the United States some hope: First, public input was crucial to this victory.Over 55,000 people made their views known to the Commission in one way or another, and the CRTC took note. Second, persistence pays off. This fight isn’t a sprint or a marathon. It’s more like an obstacle course where you emerge exhausted and covered in mud — but know the effort was worth it. There’s always another battle to struggle through, but each one still takes you forward, even if it doesn’t seem like it at the time.

[Cynthia Khoo is a Toronto-based lawyer working on internet policy and digital rights, including acting as external counsel to OpenMedia.]

April 29 marked the end of the first 100 days of the Trump administration. Shortly after Donald Trump was elected, I wrote about how Free Press would approach this era: “This isn’t a time to tinker around the edges. There is no compromise or engagement strategy that can meet these serious threats. The only option is resistance.” We launched our 100 Days of Disruption campaign the day Trump was inaugurated. Thousands of you did something daily as part of this effort to resist Trumpism (which goes beyond the man to all those enabling him or exploiting this political moment).

ogether we’ve fought back, stood up for communities under attack, experimented with new forms of activism and built new alliances across the resistance. As we enter the next 100 days, the need to resist is no less urgent. And the attacks in Free Press’ corner of the world — at the intersection of media, technology and democracy — have only intensified. In the weeks ahead, you’ll see us resisting and refocusing on the issues and in the areas where we can make the greatest difference and our allies need us the most.