Ownership

The US Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit has denied a petition from Prometheus Radio Project that it effectively stay the Federal Communications Commission's November vote to deregulate local broadcast ownership.  The court suggested the jury was still out on the FCC's response to the court's direction on ownership diversity and that Prometheus did not make a case for direct action from the court.

Allow me to highlight where the current Federal Communications Commission’s competition policy needs a makeover, and round things out with a couple of bright spots that are ripe for addressing in a bipartisan way. This Administration seems to only pay lip service, when it comes to ensuring competition, and, what is worse, it has a particularly creative view of what kind of services actually “count” as competitive. But I always seek out a silver lining no matter how gray or thick the cloud formation. First, we can take action to unleash competition in multiple-tenant environments. Second, re

YouTube is the new television, with more than 1.5 billion users, and videos the site recommends have the power to influence viewpoints around the world. Those recommendations often present divisive, misleading or false content despite changes the site has recently made to highlight more-neutral fare. People cumulatively watch more than a billion YouTube hours daily world-wide, a 10-fold increase from 2012, the site says. Behind that growth is an algorithm that creates personalized playlists.

AT&T has expanded its fixed wireless Internet infrastructure in four states. AT&T fixed wireless is now available in 33 counties serving more than 37,000 locations in AL, 40 counties serving more than 26,000 locations in AR, 46 counties serving more than 27,000 locations in GA and 51 counties serving more than 37,000 locations in TN.

The U.S. technology industry has grown into one of America's most powerful and prestigious business sectors, now including 4 of the 5 most valuable companies in the world. But as the United States becomes a more diverse country overall, tech has increasingly come under fire for its striking lack of diversity. Even the most sincere efforts to fix the problem face one big obstacle, however: There are frustratingly few corporate policies that have been shown to work, over the long term, to improve diversity.

The Chicago-based owner of the Los Angeles Times is expected to announce it is selling the newspaper in a surprise move that probably spells the end of its long-troubled relationship with Southern California’s leading news outlet. The buyer is Patrick Soon-Shiong, a Los Angeles-area physician and a major shareholder of the paper’s current parent company, Tronc. Soon-Shiong is the billionaire founder and chief executive of NantHealth, based in Culver City (CA). He will also buy its sister newspaper, the San Diego Union-Tribune.

[Commentary] China is racing to become the first to implement a pervasive system of algorithmic surveillance. Harnessing advances in artificial intelligence and data mining and storage to construct detailed profiles on all citizens, China’s communist party-state is developing a “citizen score” to incentivize “good” behavior. A vast accompanying network of surveillance cameras will constantly monitor citizens’ movements, purportedly to reduce crime and terrorism.

The Multicultural Media, Telecom and Internet Council (MMTC) has been a formal partner for some key initiatives at the Federal Communications Commission. I’m speaking in particular about our Advisory Committee on Diversity and Digital Empowerment and our Broadband Deployment Advisory Committee. I wanted to spend some timegiving an update on the latest developments regarding these important ventures.

US lawmakers examining the role of social media in elections plan to meet with counterparts from the UK the week of Feb 5. Apparently, Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Richard Burr (R-NC) and Vice Chairman Mark Warner (D-VA) would meet with British Members of Parliament Damian Collins and Paul Farrelly, who are on the committee looking into social media platforms across the Atlantic.

Prometheus Radio Project and Media Mobilizing Project have asked the Third Circuit Court of Appeals to deny broadcasters' requests that the court allow them to argue against Prometheus et al.'s challenge to the Federal Communications Commission's broadcast deregulation.