April 2010

On April 21, the Federal Communications Commission started to put the National Broadband Plan into action. FCC Commissioners adopted six items that range from planting the seeds for the Connect America Fund to efforts to bolster cyber security. Giga Om described the meeting as the beginning of the "long process of building a regulatory regime for a broadband-centric — as opposed to telephone-centric — communications world."

Carol Mattey from the FCC's Wireline Competition Bureau introduced the Connect America Fund which would directly support broadband without increasing the cost of the existing Universal Service Fund. The proposed Notice of Inquiry considers replacing the "legacy high cost program" with "efficient, targeted funding of networks that can provide data and voice service." FCC Commissioners were overwhelmingly supportive. Reservations expressed arise from their recognition that this is a herculean undertaking. There's a reason it has taken such a long time to enact reform. Chairman Genachowski said, "[reforming Universal Service is a] multi-layered, complex, rubik's cube of a project. It will not be easy. But it is also what we're committed to do...There's no dispute that we need to do this. It's a big challenge."

The FCC also reversed a 2007 order that did not require cell phone carriers to offer roaming services to other carriers in areas where they owned spectrum but had not built out network coverage. Wednesday's vote to abolish home roaming rules for voice services and also opened an inquiry into whether automatic roaming rules should apply to mobile data services. Smaller carriers have argued the existing practice harms consumers since they need roaming agreements while they build out their networks.
The FCC launched an inquiry into a smart video device platform it says will help spur broadband adoption and promote the investment and competition that is something of a Hippocratic oath for broadband. At the same time, it issued a notice of proposed rulemaking on a number of changes to the CableCARD regime that separates channel-surfing and security functions in cable set-tops. The FCC's ultimate goal is to come up with a "gateway" platform that works with all multichannel video providers and that will "spur innovation, draw users to broadband, and change how people perceive and use broadband."

The FCC will study whether the country's broadband networks could handle "significant damage and severe overloads" that could result from terrorist attacks, massive security hacks or national disasters. Interested parties have 45 days to offer comments on the "survivability" of the country's broadband infrastructure, and the ways that federal regulators can boost the nation's cybersecurity. The Commission described the inquiry in a release this afternoon as the "first step in ensuring the FCC can take all necessary actions to ensure ongoing communications in times of disaster or crisis."

The Federal Communications Commission took action toward promoting nationwide mobile connectivity for consumers and encouraging continued mobile innovation, investment, and deployment. The FCC's Order on Reconsideration enhances mobile voice service through roaming agreements that provide consumers with access to other carriers' networks. In a Second Further Notice of Proposed Rulemaking, the FCC seeks input on whether to extend roaming obligations to data services, such as mobile broadband and Internet access services.

The Order on Reconsideration expands the availability of mobile voice services by eliminating a home roaming exclusion that the Commission found in many circumstances discouraged, rather than encouraged, facilities-based competition. By eliminating the exclusion, the Order encourages carriers of all sizes to reach commercially reasonable voice roaming agreements, and promotes competition, fosters innovation and empowers consumers, while creating a fair process for the Commission to handle disputes that may arise in an expedited and equitable manner. The Order on Reconsideration also affirms that carriers must provide push-to-talk roaming upon reasonable request. The Commission will address any disputes on a case-by-case basis, taking into consideration the totality of the circumstances presented to determine whether requiring a roaming agreement would best further the public interest goals.

In the Second Further Notice of Proposed Rulemaking, the Commission opens a new phase in its examination of data roaming, seeking comment on whether to extend roaming obligations to data services such as mobile broadband and Internet access services. A more detailed and updated record will assist the Commission in developing policies for broadband data roaming that can encourage carriers to build out new networks and better ensure that consumers have access to mobile data networks anywhere in the United States.

The House Subcommittee on Communications, Technology, and the Internet held a hearing entitled "The National Broadband Plan: Deploying Quality Broadband Services to the Last Mile" on Wednesday, April 21, 2010. The hearing examined assessments in the National Broadband Plan of the availability of broadband and how most effectively to deploy broadband to areas that are unserved and underserved, so all Americans can benefit from good quality broadband services.

Rick Boucher (D-VA), the chair of the subcommittee, commended the Federal Communications Commission for the broadband plan. He said the agency had done a "truly outstanding job" sifting through the comments and coming up with a plan. But he's worried it had not accurately reflected broadband deployment. The hearing focused on deployment to unserved and underserved areas, including rural areas like much of his district. He said he wanted to insure access at "meaningful speeds" and "truly affordable prices." The broadband plan found that 95% had access to at least 4 Mbsp download service, leaving only about 7 million without service. Boucher said he had "serious concerns" about the accuracy of that figure, echoing concerns raised by Free Press in prepared testimony for the hearing. Chairman Boucher said the broadband availability map for his own district overreports figures, and said he was sure it had happened elsewhere. "I can't consider those projections to be reliable," he said.

House Commerce Committee Chairman Henry Waxman (D-CA) voiced his support for a proposal to dig tunnels for broadband fiber while constructing new roads and highways. Chairman Waxman called the proposal, known as the "ditch-digging bill", an example of better coordination among government resources The legislation -- Broadband Conduit Deployment Act -- the was introduced almost a year ago by Rep. Anna Eshoo (D-CA) with a companion bill by Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-MN). The bill would direct the Department of Transportation to require the installation of broadband channels -- which could be filled with fiber later -- while the ground is already being torn up for federally funded highway construction and other transportation projects. As a result, Internet companies can simply install the fiber lines when they build out new networks.

Ranking committee member Cliff Stearns (R-FL) invoked the BitTorrent decision as a warning to take a light touch on broadband regulation. He pushed for letting the unfettered free market build out broadband. He said he was not saying government should have no role, but that it should target the remaining 5%, rather than the 95% that have it. "Congress and the FCC must not revert to failed regulatory ideas," he said, like net neutrality or forcing access to facilities.

[Commentary] Matthew Gentzkow and Jesse Shapiro, both of the University of Chicago Booth School of Business, have measured ideological segregation on the Internet.

They took methodologies that have been used to identify racial segregation, and they tracked how people of different political views move around the Web.

The methodology is complicated, but can be summarized through a geographic metaphor. Think of the Fox News site as Casper (WY). If you visited and shook hands with the people reading the site, you'd be very likely to be shaking hands with a conservative. The New York Times site, they suggest, is like Manhattan (NY). If you shook hands with other readers, you'd probably be shaking hands with liberals. The study measures the people who visit sites, not the content inside.

According to the study, a person who visited only Fox News would have more overlap with conservatives than 99 percent of Internet news users. A person who only went to The Times's site would have more liberal overlap than 95 percent of users. But the core finding is that most Internet users do not stay within their communities. Most people spend a lot of time on a few giant sites with politically integrated audiences, like Yahoo News. But even when they leave these integrated sites, they often go into areas where most visitors are not like themselves. People who spend a lot of time on Glenn Beck's Web site are more likely to visit The New York Times's Web site than average Internet users. People who spend time on the most liberal sites are more likely to go to foxnews.com than average Internet users. Even white supremacists and neo-Nazis travel far and wide across the Web. It is so easy to click over to another site that people travel widely. And they're not even following links most of the time; they have their own traveling patterns.

Gentzkow and Shapiro found that the Internet is actually more ideologically integrated than old-fashioned forms of face-to-face association -- like meeting people at work, at church or through community groups. You're more likely to overlap with political opponents online than in your own neighborhood. This study suggests that Internet users are a bunch of ideological Jack Kerouacs. They're not burrowing down into comforting nests. They're cruising far and wide looking for adventure, information, combat and arousal. This does not mean they are not polarized. Looking at a site says nothing about how you process it or the character of attention you bring to it. It could be people spend a lot of time at their home sites and then go off on forays looking for things to hate. But it probably does mean they are not insecure and they are not sheltered.

If this study is correct, the Internet will not produce a cocooned public square, but a free-wheeling multilayered Mad Max public square. The study also suggests that if there is increased polarization (and there is), it's probably not the Internet that's causing it.