August 2010

Broadcasting board decides Voice of America can peruse WikiLeak documents

Some new members of the Broadcasting Board of Governors were most upset by news noting that the IT and security folks at the International Broadcasting Bureau had instructed Voice of America employees to not read or e-mail any of the WikiLeaks material on their government computers (bit of a blow to original reporting). The matter was added to the agenda at Friday's gathering of the new board, which passed a unanimous resolution in closed session that "authorized the Director of the Voice of America to proceed with reporting on the disclosure of classified documents available on the WikiLeaks website in a manner that is consistent with the VOA Charter and the BBG's statutory mission, and to balance this effort with due consideration for the laws and executive orders" on using classified information.

BlackBerry Maker Resists Governments' Pressure

Mike Lazaridis, founder and co-chief executive of Research In Motion, the Canadian company that makes BlackBerry smartphones, said that his company would not give in to pressure from foreign governments to provide access to its customers' messages.

That pressure increased on August 3 as Saudi Arabia ordered local cellphone providers to halt BlackBerry service, saying it failed to meet the country's regulatory requirements. Lazaridis said that allowing governments to monitor messages shuttling across the BlackBerry network could endanger the company's relationships with its customers, which include major companies and law enforcement agencies.

UAE's BlackBerry ban: Why is Canada silent?

Human rights organizations have joined the United States in condemning the decision of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) to suspend Blackberry Messenger, Blackberry E-mail, and Blackberry Web-browsing services starting Oct. 11 unless it can access encrypted messages, citing security concerns. But the Canadian government is mum.

"The US can't be doing this all the time. Where was the Canadian government?" says Robert Guerra, the Internet freedom project director at Washington-based Freedom House. "The Canadian government has traditionally been a big supporter of human rights. I'm surprised. Maybe it's summer and they're away."

Tech Gadgets Steal Sales From Appliances, Clothes

Americans are spending more on electronics like iPads and flat-screen televisions and less on durable goods like furniture, washing machines and lawn mowers, according to government data. The shift reflects a change in priorities for American consumers. After pouring money into all aspects of their homes during the previous decade, consumers are redirecting their purchases to eye-grabbing technology and socking away more of what's left over into savings. Apparel company executives are worried the lure of electronics will eat into their sales as the back-to-school season gets under way.

Outlays for televisions, computers, video and telephone equipment grew 1.8% in the first six months of this year, compared to the first half of pre-recession 2007, the Commerce Department said Tuesday. By comparison, spending on appliances decreased 3.6% during the same period, and spending on furniture decreased 11% during that time. Overall, consumer spending stayed flat in June from the previous month, the Commerce Department said Tuesday. Meanwhile, the U.S. savings rate ticked up to 6.4% in June from the previous month, its highest point in a year and far above its pre-recession level.

On the Web's Cutting Edge, Anonymity in Name Only

Websites are gaining the ability to decide whether or not you'd be a good customer, before you tell them a single thing about yourself.

The technology reaches beyond the personalization familiar on sites like Amazon.com, which uses its own in-house data on its customers to show them new items they might like. By contrast, firms like [x+1] tap into vast databases of people's online behavior—mainly gathered surreptitiously by tracking technologies that have become ubiquitous on websites across the Internet. They don't have people's names, but cross-reference that data with records of home ownership, family income, marital status and favorite restaurants, among other things. Then, using statistical analysis, they start to make assumptions about the proclivities of individual Web surfers.

At CBS, a Recovery in Local Ad Sales and a Focus on Cost Controls Bolster Results

Reflecting a resurgence in advertising revenue, the CBS Corporation reported earnings of $150.1 million in its second quarter, up from $15.4 million in the period a year earlier.

Revenue climbed 11 percent, to $3.33 billion. Like other major media companies, CBS said it was capitalizing on the economic recovery. Its earnings are an indication that local advertisers are starting to spend more after severe cutbacks in 2008 and 2009, which hurt local TV and radio stations. CBS said advertising at its local broadcasting unit was up 17 percent from the period a year earlier. Over all, local broadcasting revenues rose to $678 million from $579 million a year earlier. Though the midterm elections are still months away, companies like CBS are already benefiting from an increase in political advertising.

CBS Chief Executive Leslie Moonves will now turn up the heat on its network affiliates to pay more to the network for its shows. He said CBS has struck some deals already and will make more down the road. "That is part of the new way of doing business," Moonves said. The push is part of the effort broadcast networks are making to better compete with cable. While cable channels get money from both subscribers and advertisers, broadcasters have traditionally only had an advertising revenue stream.

File-sharing now a no-no at colleges

College students who download music and movies from peer-to-peer file-sharing programs such as LimeWire and KaZaA will find themselves cut off when they return to campus this fall.

Every college across the country must either have installed software to block illegal file-sharing or have created some other procedure for preventing it. The requirement is part of the 2008 Digital Millennium Copyright Act, which took effect July 1. Some schools have been working to comply with the provisions for several years. Under the law, student violators face fines from $750 to $30,000 for each song or movie downloaded. If a court determines the infringement was "willful," that fine can be as much as $250,000, although some judges have reduced higher fines, saying they're unreasonable. Schools' liability is limited if they cooperate with law enforcement. Campus punishments vary.

Fair Political Practices Commission should regulate online political activity

[Commentary] Raise your hand if you think that online paid political advertising is subject to the same state and federal election laws as television, newspaper or direct mail ads. If you did, you're wrong.

That's because laws governing California's political activity haven't been updated since 1974, when Ronald Reagan was governor and Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak were still two years away from building the first Apple computer. The watchdog agency that oversees California's campaigns, the Fair Political Practices Commission, is proposing new rules that finally would make paid advertising on the Internet subject to similar disclosure requirements as print or broadcast ads. So far, so good. But rapid advancements in the online world will constantly require updating the rules: Who knows what the next Twitter will be, or when? So the FPPC also should plan regular reviews to quickly catch new technologies that elude what's on the books.

Politicians' accountability extends online

[Commentary] San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom announced his gubernatorial candidacy via Twitter. Carly Fiorina established her political persona with an unusual series of Internet advertisements. And, of course, President Obama created a much-imitated online donation infrastructure that rivaled his door-to-door outreach. These examples and many more show the increasing importance of the Internet for politicians and their campaigns.

The web has clear benefits for politicians - it's cheap, easy (with the help of an intern or two), and it allows them to interact directly with voters. So as more and more of them scramble to launch Facebook fan pages and plaster their thoughts all over YouTube, it's important for regulators to establish some ground rules about transparency and disclosure. A subcommittee of California's Fair Political Practices Commission has just released a report that recommends requiring similar disclosure treatment for online political communications and traditional political communications. To put it simply: the subcommittee is recommending that paid political advertising online should be subject to the same disclosure regulations as mailers, phone calls, and television commercials.

British government moves to dramatically cut public funding for the arts

The art scene exploded in Britain over the past decade, giving rise to jewels like the Tate Modern museum on the silvery banks of the Thames and sparking a renaissance of playwrights, filmmakers, artists and dancers. The fuel for that boom: a surge in generosity from Britain's single biggest patron of the arts -- the government. But now cash-strapped and desperate to slash the largest budget deficit in Europe, the new ruling coalition of Conservatives and Liberal Democrats is moving to close the curtain on an era of what they describe as excessive government patronage. The coalition is preparing to cut arts funding so dramatically that it could sharply reduce or sever the financial lifelines for hundreds of cultural institutions from the National Theatre to the British Museum. The cuts would be more than a temporary fix. Officials are calling for a permanent shift toward the U.S. model of private philanthropy as the main benefactor of the arts, upending a tradition of government sponsorship.

Benton

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