November 2014

2016: Democrats Win White House, FCC

[Commentary] The momentum behind the huge topic that has broiled through several Republican and Democratic administrations and decades, and has rarely gone anywhere forward, i.e., the Immigration issue, moved substantially forward, again. Yet, again, it did so, solely at the hand of President Barack Obama. In that act, the more important political accomplishment by the chief executive was to capture another four years at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue for a Democratic administration. That result also promised to extend the 3-2 Democratic commissioners’ current majority at the Federal Communications Commission from eight to 12 years, at minimum (along with the power base at just about every other administrative office at the federal level). Thus, judging the odds, if one were making important political and business decisions about the leanings of the FCC as we round the next decade, the folks whose mascot is the donkey might well get the nod.

[Schaeffler is chairman and CSO of the streaming/broadband, broadcast, and pay TV/video consultancy, The Carmel Group]

TV Tax Paid by Big-Box Blitzers and Small-Business Supporters

[Commentary] Americans are paying too much for their televisions. As often happens, the extra cost is due to outdated mandates imposed by the federal government. Several years ago, an international standards body called the Advanced Television Systems Committee (ATSC) settled on a technical standard for digital over-the-air broadcasts. The Federal Communications Commission requires television manufacturers to include a digital TV tuner with a specific collection of technical protocols that display digital TV signals sent via antenna or cable box. This requirement ends up costing about five dollars extra for every set sold. Of course, the added cost of the ATSC mandate is felt by those who are buying TVs for reasons other than programming. Small businesses -- and therefore many female-owned businesses -- likely bear this burden disproportionately, because they are growing faster than the national average. The reality is that many smaller businesses never use televisions to receive digital broadcasting. Rather, they use TVs for a variety of displays and closed-circuit content. So these businesses are paying for multiple licenses they will never use.

[Kasoff is President and Co-Founder of the Women Impacting Public Policy]

Why Serial is important for journalism

[Commentary] The hit podcast Serial, a journalist’s exploration of whether a young man was wrongly convicted of murder, breaks new ground for our field.

There are reams of articles and TV “newsmagazines” that expose the killers of the famous -- and not so famous -- in gruesome detail. What makes Serial so special and so meaningful for journalism is reporter Sarah Koenig’s transparency. She takes her listeners along with her as she ponders the innocence or guilt of Adnan Syed. As she says, she has no skin in the game. She is simply looking into a story about a promising high school student of Pakistani origin accused of killing his former girlfriend, Hae Min Lee, an exuberant, talented teenager of Korean descent. For journalists listening to the series, Koenig does what we all do, all the time.

[Barnathan is president of the International Center for Journalists]

Actually, Robert McCulloch, social media is doing a better job than you are

[Commentary] Social media cannot be either angel or devil, able to quell and raise mobs at the drop of a hat. Instead, it's a constant devil's advocate, pushing back against things that don't necessarily make sense and chipping away at the authoritarian façades of those who wish it would just stop existing already. It can't stop the news. It probably can't even change the world. But it can force us to look anew, to stop tired narratives in their tracks. And in that, it at least can make us feel like we're having some small effect, even if it's just shouting into the void.

Ferguson prosecutor slams “non-stop” social media while calling for increased attention to race

St. Louis County Prosecutor Robert McCulloch delivered a sometimes combative 25-minute address to announce a grand jury's decision not to indict Ferguson (MO) police officer Darren Wilson for the Aug. 9 shooting death of black teenager Michael Brown.

During the announcement, McCulloch focused particular attention on the role of social media in covering the story, which he blamed for misleading the public and making the investigation of Brown's death fraught from the start. He said retellings of the incident on social media were "filled with speculation, and little, if any solid, accurate information." In fact, the most significant challenge in his three-month investigation, he said, was the insatiable 24-hour news cycle and "non-stop rumors on social media," which he said clung to any available scrap of real or imagined insight into the case.

What Internet Users Know about Technology and the Web

American Internet users’ knowledge of the modern technology landscape varies widely across a range of topics, according to a new knowledge quiz conducted by the Pew Research Center as part of its ongoing series commemorating the 25th anniversary of the World Wide Web.

The survey -- which was conducted among a nationally representative sample of 1,066 internet users -- includes 17 questions on a range of issues related to technology, including: the meaning and usage of common online terms; recognition of famous tech figures; the history of some major technological advances; and the underlying structure of the Internet and other technologies. Substantial majorities of internet users are able to correctly answer questions about some common technology platforms and everyday Internet usage terms. But relatively few Internet users are familiar with certain concepts that underpin the Internet and other modern technological advances. Only one third (34%) know that Moore’s Law relates to how many transistors can be put on a microchip, and just 23% are aware that “the Internet” and “the World Wide Web” do not, in fact, refer to the same thing.

Carriers Issue Billions in Debt As Spectrum Auction Bids Top $36 Billion

As bids in an unexpectedly hot auction for US wireless spectrum topped $36 billion, carriers went about issuing billions of dollars in debt for when the time comes to pay for it.

Verizon Communications outlined plans to raise 2.4 billion euros in debt citing spectrum as a use of the funds. Smaller carrier US Cellular said it plans to raise up to $500 million in new debt to pay for spectrum purchases among other purposes. Chief Executive Kenneth Meyers said the company’s existing financial resources, though strong, “may not be sufficient to fund all of the long-term investments that the company is making.” Companies seeking a piece of the new spectrum will need to line up extra cash in advance. Winning bidders will owe a 20% down payment on their new licenses by Jan. 7 or 10 days after the auction ends, whichever is latest. Final payments are due the later of Jan. 21 or 10 days after down payments come due.

$36B auction shows network neutrality is no threat to investment

When President Barack Obama called for network neutrality, AT&T said the sky would fall. It warned that a policy banning internet providers from giving special treatment to some websites over others would lead companies to stop investing in new network capacity. So much for that.

As of Nov 25, an airwave auction by the FCC is still going gangbusters as companies scramble for a series of spectrum licenses that will let them deliver more data and stream more video to consumer cellphones. While most people expected the bidding to exceed the $10 billion reserve price set by the agency, the FCC has already raked in more than triple that -- bids have exceeded $36 billion, and the auction is still going. Companies like T-Mobile, Dish and, yes, AT&T are all participating in the bidding. All of this is occurring despite the fact that the airwaves in question could and (in Gigaom’s view) should be subject to so-called Title II regulation, a type of net neutrality that would ban companies from providing fast lanes for some websites, while slowing down others. In other words, contrary to AT&T’s warning that the specter of Title II would chill investment, what we’re seeing instead is wireless companies -- who have long fought net neutrality tooth and nail -- falling over themselves to buy up resources that will let them offer consumers more internet.

Verizon promises not to sue over net neutrality -- if FCC avoids utility rules

Verizon is trying to convince the Federal Communications Commission that it won't sue to block network neutrality rules as long as they're issued without reclassifying broadband providers as utilities. Yet, Verizon did sue the FCC the last time it crafted net neutrality rules without relying on its utility regulation powers.

Verizon Executive VP Randal Milch e-mailed FCC Chairman Wheeler to say Verizon won't sue if the FCC uses Section 706, even though that's exactly what Verizon did last time. Section 706 requires the FCC to encourage the deployment of advanced telecommunications capability to all Americans, and it can be used to govern broadband providers' treatment of Internet traffic. Milch's e-mail was made public in an ex parte letter filed with the FCC. Milch wrote that rules based on Section 706 "will not be the object of a successful court challenge -- by Verizon or anyone else."

Mark Cuban made billions from an open Internet. Now he wants to kill it

[Commentary] Over the last few weeks, billionaire and former tech executive Mark Cuban has become increasingly vocal on the subject of net neutrality. He said that he was in favor of creating "fast lanes" on the Internet that would ensure the quality of certain services. It’s worth pointing out what a hypocritical asshat he sounds like, pushing a position that would have been a death blow to the very startup that made him so rich in the first place.

The bulk of Cuban’s wealth comes from the sale of a company he created, Broadcast.com. How did he build that company? In 1995, Cuban and fellow Indiana University alumnus Todd Wagner started Audionet, combining their mutual interest in Indiana Hoosier college basketball and webcasting. With a single server and an ISDN line, Audionet became Broadcast.com in 1998. By 1999, Broadcast.com had grown to 330 employees and $13.5 million in revenue for the second quarter. In 1999, during the dot com boom, Broadcast.com was acquired by Yahoo! for $5.7 billion in Yahoo! stock. This is the picture-perfect example of the permission-less innovation that the internet has fostered. A pair of entrepreneurs had an idea and built it using a set of free, open protocols that connected them to tens of millions of consumers. How well would this same idea have worked in a world full of dedicated "fast lanes" on the internet? Terribly.

Benton

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