August 2015

Helping Seniors Bridge the Digital Divide

[Commentary] Pew Research Center recently issued a report on who is online and who is not. Seniors are most likely to be offline, with 39 percent reporting they do not use the Internet. Yet, there has been significant progress in getting seniors online. In 2000, 86 percent of adults age 65+ were offline. This progress is due in part to baby boomers entering the age 65+ group, but also to the work of many organizations across the country working diligently to help seniors overcome the obstacles they face in broadband adoption. Here are just a few of them:

SeniorNet is a nonprofit organization specializing in computer and Internet education for adults age 50+.

Generations on Line (GoL) was founded in 1999 by communications professional Tobey Dichter, whose mother inspired a passion to change the face of aging and kindle respect for older people.

This comprehensive Computer Learning Center (CLC) for seniors began five years ago when the Springfield DEA’s SCSEP became a partner in the aforementioned SSAI DII program. Since then, the program has expanded to a five-day week with four hours of classes each day.

St. Barnabas Senior Services (SBSS) began its mission to “provide and promote a continuum of innovative services that empower a diverse community of elders to live well, feel well, and age well” in 1908, long before the age of computers, much less the Internet. Its service area in Los Angeles (CA) is very diverse, the home of Chinatown, Koreatown, Filipinotown, and many older Latino residents.

eWIRED is a senior digital literacy project created by Alliance for Aging, Inc. (AAI), the Area Agency on Aging (AAA) for Miami-Dade and Monroe Counties (FL). In 2009, AAI’s Board endorsed broadband access for elders as an important strategic initiative to close the “grey gap.”

[Cecilia Garcia, former Executive Director of the Benton Foundation, is a communications advisor with an extensive background in public affairs, television production and advocacy. Bob Harootyan is the research manager at Senior Service America, Inc. (SSAI), where he directs internal and external projects related to low-income older workers and the aging workforce.]

Senate delays vote on cybersecurity bill to September

The US Senate will not vote on a cybersecurity bill until September, after lawmakers return from a four-week recess and consider the nuclear agreement with Iran, the chamber's leaders said on Aug 5. Some lawmakers had called for urgent consideration of the "Cybersecurity Information Sharing Act of 2015" (CISPA) legislation after massive hacking attacks on government and corporate networks. The bill would make it easier for corporations to share information about cyberattacks with each other or the government without concern about lawsuits.

Some privacy advocates raised concerns about the bill and senators could not agree on what amendments should be allowed on the legislation in time for a vote before the August break. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) and Minority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV), said they had agreed to allow 10 Republican amendments and 11 Democratic amendments. Congress has until Sept. 17 to vote on a resolution to reject the nuclear agreement announced on July 14 between the United States, five other world powers and Iran. Majority Leader McConnell and Minority Leader Reid said they had agreed to begin debate on the resolution as soon as lawmakers return to Washington on Sept. 8.

Windstream Accepts Nearly $175 Million in Annual Support from CAF to Expand Rural Broadband

Windstream Communications Inc. has accepted $174,895,478 in annual, ongoing support from the Connect America Fund to expand and support broadband for over 800,000 of its rural customers in 17 states. The Connect America Fund support will enable Windstream to deliver broadband at speeds of at least 10 Mbps for downloads and 1 Mbps uploads to over 404,000 homes and businesses in its rural service areas nationwide where the cost of broadband deployment might otherwise be prohibitive.

“Windstream’s decision to accept support from the Connect America Fund will greatly benefit its rural customers by expanding robust broadband in their communities,” said Federal Communications Commission Chairman Tom Wheeler. “The Connect America Fund is delivering on its promise of ensuring that all Americans have access to the opportunities provided by modern broadband service, no matter where they live.”

The Internet could end up like TV

Far from being a place of freedom, innovation and information, the Internet is dying, Stanford University's Jennifer Granick told a packed house at the Black Hat computer security conference on Aug 5. "It's not the level playing field that we once thought it would be," she said. The openness and freedom that originally made it so disruptive is fading, being replaced with a centralized, regulated entity. The Internet, she fears, will end up like TV. "It's going to be this slick, stiff, controlled, closed thing," said Granick a lawyer and director of civil liberties at the Stanford Center for Internet and Society at Stanford University.

She gave the opening keynote address at the conference, which in 2015 has drawn more than 10,000 security researchers to Las Vegas (NV). A long-time writer on computer crime and security, electronic surveillance and consumer privacy, Granick has also defended several well-known hackers against what she feels was over-zealous government prosecution. Granick painted a picture for the audience of what the Internet could look like in 20 years if nothing is done. To overcome this, hackers, programmers and those building Internet systems need to make them decentralized, add in encryption to make it harder for governments to snoop on citizens and fight against laws that muzzle free speech." And if that doesn't work," Granick said to applause, "we need to smash it apart and make something new and better."

FCC decision on auction discounts may derail Dish’s plans to compete

In his heart, Dish chairman, president and CEO Charlie Ergen wants to take on AT&T and Verizon. But those dreams may be over, now that the Federal Communications Commission is likely to disallow $3.3 billion in auction discounts claimed by two companies that Dish backed with cash in the recent AWS-3 auction. “Our bet was, based on the rules of the [AWS-3] auction, that they were set up for us to do exactly what we did to compete with AT&T and Verizon,” Ergen said. “That this is exactly what they want us to do, to be disruptive in the marketplace.”

The FCC is circulating a draft order that would deny $3.3 billion in auction discounts to Northstar Wireless and SNR Wireless, two entities in which Dish has an 85 percent non-controlling interest. In the order, the FCC concludes that Dish does indeed have a controlling interest. Absent the discount, Dish would be on the hook for the $3.3 billion if the companies want to keep the spectrum. Dish has made a big bet on spectrum to offset the company’s struggling core pay TV business. In the quarter, Dish lost 81,000 pay TV subscribers. Since the FCC is likely to say “no” to the 25 percent discount, Ergen said that creates “more risk than anticipated,” to go in and compete in the wireless business. “We’ll get pushed more towards a sale or lease of spectrum. We’ll take a little bit of a shorter view,” he said.

Sinclair Puts A Value On Its Spectrum

Sinclair Broadcast Group could sell $2 billion worth of spectrum in the Federal Communications Commission auction and it would have only about a 3 percent impact on broadcast cash flow, CFO Chris Ripley said. Those numbers stem from a market-by-market, station-by-station analysis of Sinclair's spectrum based on the most recent Greenhill median estimates for spectrum value. Ripley also noted that the company is "in active discussions with people around the option of channel sharing," though the spectrum sale-BCF analysis does not include the potential impact of sharing deals.

While Ripley's comments pinned a value estimate on the spectrum Sinclair could sell at the auction, they apparently weren't intended to signal a change of course. Sinclair top boss David Smith has said the company can realize more value retaining its spectrum and potentially leasing some of it while deploying new products and services through an updated broadcast standard, ATSC 3.0. "There hasn't been a change internally that we will participate," Ripley said, noting that "The market perception is that we won't participate ... We're here to maximize shareholder value and the auction is a way to do that. "When you do the math and look to maximize shareholder value, there's substantial opportunity for Sinclair," via the spectrum auction.

The Internet of Things and the Importance of Unlicensed Spectrum

[Commentary] On July 29, the Senate Commerce Committee held a hearing on “Wireless Broadband and the Future of Spectrum Policy,” where Ranking Member Bill Nelson observed, “[t]oday, there are more wireless devices in this country than there are people.” Meanwhile, on the other side of the Hill, the House of Representatives Judiciary Committee was holding a hearing at the exact same time on the Internet of Things, discussing the impact of electronic devices on public policy. Both hearings made it clear that the need for more unlicensed spectrum is immediate, because billions of devices depend on it. The Senate hearing participants discussed unlicensed spectrum, but the discussion of how to profit from and relicense spectrum dominated the conversation.

FCC Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel was one of the witnesses at the hearing and championed changes in unlicensed policies in her testimony, saying that we need “[n]ot just more licensed spectrum - but also more unlicensed spectrum. In short, we need more Wi-Fi.” Commissioner Rosenworcel was particularly on-point for unlicensed spectrum. She pointed out that historically, legislative processes have overlooked the value of unlicensed spectrum – a history that repeated itself that day. Relicensing spectrum from agencies, creating incentives for spectrum holders to relinquish their spectrum, and identifying additional bands all dominated the Senate Committee’s policy discussion at the hearing. Unlicensed spectrum took the back seat. The two committees had disconnected visions of the role of unlicensed spectrum in the future, but there is no reason for that disconnect to continue. More unlicensed spectrum must be opened up to support the devices that demand it. The Internet of Things is growing and consumers expect connectivity at a low price. In these conversations about the “future of spectrum,” it is in everyone’s interest for Congress to come together and prioritize unlicensed spectrum, so that innovation and the growth of modern technologies can continue.

Trump dominating Google searches

Donald Trump is the most searched for Republican presidential candidate on Google, according to data from Google Trends released ahead of the first debate in Cleveland (OH). A map hosted on GitHub shows that Trump was the most heavily searched for in every region of the country throughout June and July. Trump led the pack in several states with early nominating contests. The GOP front-runner was the most Googled candidate in every county in New Hampshire. He was similarly dominant on Google in many counties in Iowa and almost all of the counties in South Carolina. The businessman also was the most Googled candidate in most counties in Nevada.

Gov Scott Walker (R-WI) dominated searches in his home state, and other candidates lead in a patchwork of counties around the country. No candidate dominated so clearly the second-place ranking among the most searched for candidates. Former Florida Gov Jeb Bush was the second most searched-for candidate in nearly half of the counties in the Sunshine State, while Gov. Bobby Jindal (R-LA) was the second most Googled candidate in his home state.

Cities with Best Mobile Performance: Atlanta, Chicago Top List

How do US cities rank in terms of mobile services performance? Atlanta (GA) is tops, not only in network speed and data performance, but overall, according to RootMetrics’ first half 2015 rankings. Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International also topped RootMetrics’ ranking of mobile service performance across the 50 busiest US airports. The third-largest US city, Chicago (IL) ran a close second to Atlanta in overall mobile service performance. The two largest U.S. cities – New York (NY) and Los Angeles (CA) -- came in 74th and 89th, near the bottom of RootMetrics’ rankings. Washington (DC) scored lowest among the 10 largest US cities, finishing 95th. Denver (CO) didn’t show well either, finishing 118th of the 125 cities in which RootMetrics tested mobile services performance.

The top 5 metro areas for mobile services:
Atlanta (GA) (pop. 4.51M)
Chicago (IL) (pop. 8.60M)
Knoxville (TN) (pop. 558,696)
Nashville (TN) (pop. 969,587)
Jacksonville (FL) (pop. 1.06M)

The bottom 5:
Hudson Valley (NY) (pop. 423,566)
Reno (NV) (pop. 392,141)
Omaha (NE) (pop. 725,008)
Colorado Springs (CO) (pop. 559,409)
El Paso (TX) (pop. 803,086)

The Dawning of High Mobility

[Commentary] Over the past few months, I’ve been running a series of experiments analyzing my own time spent using computers. Primarily, I’ve been tracking the amount of time I spend per day on my Mac versus on my iPhone. I’ve started doing this because of some assumptions I’ve had about the future -- mainly that the smartphone is the primary computing device for billions of people, including those in markets where PC penetration is high.

A PC is great when you can sit down to use it. For many people, their life is not spent at a desk. The shift from desktop to high-mobility solutions is where computers, software and services are all adapting to the mobile era. This is the central reason I believe we are seeing a behavioral shift in the market of time away from traditional PCs to highly mobile ones. The mobile Internet is the true consumer Internet. Business, commerce, banking, searching, discovering, and all kinds of consumer opportunities are shifting to mobile. Outside of some hardware and productivity software, there is little happening that is interesting and exclusive to the desktop or notebook computer. The world is embracing this shift because the opportunity is significantly larger. The time spent observation signals the changing of the times to our mobile future. Hundreds of millions of people live highly mobile lives, and now computing can, as well.

[Ben Bajarin is principal analyst at Creative Strategies, Inc.]

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