November 2016

Tech groups reach out to President-elect Trump for infrastructure boost

More than a dozen tech groups extended an olive branch to President-elect Donald Trump, penning a joint letter to the President-elect congratulating him on his win and offering recommendations for working with the tech sector. “We stand ready to help your Administration tap into 21st century innovation to achieve prosperity for the nation,” read the letter from a coalition of 17 tech trade groups. The letter was signed by leaders from trade associations including the Information Technology Industry Council and Internet Association, which represent companies such as Google, Facebook and Intel.

“We recognize a critical early step in achieving your goals of moving the country forward in a productive way will be identifying the right people for critical positions,” the trade association leaders wrote. “We would welcome the opportunity to meet with your leadership team to discuss our policy and personnel ideas in greater depth.” Their recommendations included support for investing technology infrastructure and tax and regulatory reform to spur job growth.

Apple, Google, Amazon ask Trump for focus on financial tech

A coalition of major tech companies — including Google, Amazon and Apple — is calling on President-elect Donald Trump to appoint a Treasury undersecretary for technology. Financial Innovation Now (FIN), which also includes PayPal and Intuit, is asking the Trump Administration to appoint regulators and promote policies that will bolster the use of financial technology (FinTech) as it gains popularity and prominence. FinTech includes a wide array of smartphone apps and websites that aim to offer quicker, safer and more accessible financial services.

FIN executive director Brian Peters emphasized Trump’s business experience in a letter outlining the coalition’s desire for “a national vision and coordinated strategy” to grow FinTech jobs and use FinTech to drive competition between financial services providers. FIN asked Trump to appoint regulators, including a special Treasury undersecretary for technology, that “value technology and who will seek to promote innovation as a means to foster competition in financial services.”

President-elect Trump hires put premium on TV prowess

For all Donald Trump's attacks on the media, a TV career seems to help the chances of anyone hoping to get a job in his Administration. In recent days, President-elect Trump has appointed KT McFarland, a Fox News contributor, as his deputy national security advisor, and met with Sheriff David Clarke, a more controversial figure who frequently appears on the same network. The TV prowess of Trump’s campaign manager, Kellyanne Conway, has been widely reported to boost her standing with her boss. Meanwhile, President-elect Trump’s national security advisor, retired Gen Mike Flynn, is a frequent presence on Fox, as are several politicians apparently under consideration for positions, including former UN ambassador John Bolton and former Arkansas Gov and two-time presidential candidate Mike Huckabee.

The focus on TV commentators is beginning to attract attention of its own. The Washington Post noted the trend and suggested that Trump was in the business of “stocking the federal government with … people that he’s seen on TV and likes.” It could be as simple as that. But it could also be that Trump — who has taken the use of social media to an art form, albeit a deeply controversial one — has a keener eye than most for the importance of effective TV communication.

TV executives need to better answer tough questions, not duck the press

[Commentary] It’s official: Refusing to meet the press is in. President-elect Donald Trump has gone ages without a news conference. And now, CBS’ Glenn Geller, ABC’s Channing Dungey, Fox’s Gary Newman and Dana Walden and NBC’s Bob Greenblatt — the people in charge of programming at these networks — have announced that they won’t hold news conferences for reporters and critics at the Television Critics Association press tour in January.

They claim they want critics to focus on the new series they’ll be presenting and promise that they’ll reinstate the sessions this summer. Amazon and Netflix won’t be presenting either new content or making executives available either. The press tour, which happens twice a year in January and July, is one of the few opportunities for reporters from all over the country to meet with the people who make television, and the people who decide what television gets made.

Uber, Seeking to Expand, Defends Itself at Europe’s Highest Court

Uber asserted that it was helping to bolster Europe’s digital economy as part of its defense in a long-awaited hearing to decide how the popular ride-hailing service should be able to operate across the region. The case at the European Court of Justice comes as the American company continues to push aggressively into overseas markets, often butting heads with local lawmakers and taxi associations that say the company flouts transportation and competition rules.

Uber has expanded into more than 300 cities across six continents and has an estimated value of $68 billion. Europe’s legal challenge represents a direct attack on how Uber operates in the region, one of its most important markets. It also raises questions about the company’s growth plans as it looks to expand beyond ride-hailing to food delivery and other online services. In its defense at the hearing, the company framed itself as a new player in Europe’s often lackluster digital economy, offering users and drivers new ways to connect and helping to support cities’ existing transportation networks.

The Far Right Has a New Digital Safe Space

When the white nationalist leader Richard B. Spencer was suspended from Twitter recently, he hopped over to YouTube to address his supporters. “Digitally speaking,” he said, Twitter had sent “execution squads across the alt-right.” He accused Twitter of “purging people on the basis of their views,” calling it “corporate Stalinism.” Then he mapped out a path forward. “There’s obviously Gab, which is an interesting medium,” he said. “I think that will be the place where we go next.”

Gab is a new social network built like a hybrid of Twitter and Reddit — posts are capped at 300 characters, and the crowd votes to boost or demote posts in the feed. But Gab’s defining feature is its user guidelines, or rather, its lack thereof. Gab bans illegal activities — child pornography, threats of violence, terrorism — and not much else. Think of Gab as the Make America Great Again of social sites: It’s a throwback to the freewheeling norms of the old Internet, before Twitter started cracking down on harassment and Reddit cleaned out its darkest corners. And since its debut in August, it has emerged as a digital safe space for the far right, where white nationalists, conspiracy-theorist YouTubers, and minivan majority moms can gather without liberal interference.

The age of the cyborg in journalism

[Commentary] You've probably heard that news organizations such as AP, Reuters, and many others are now turning out thousands of automated stories a month. It’s a dramatic development, but today’s story-writing bots are little more than Mad Libs, filling out stock phrases with numbers from earnings reports or box scores. And there’s good reason to believe that fully automated journalism is going to be very limited for a long time. At the same time, quietly and without the fanfare of their robot cousins, the cyborgs are coming to journalism. And they’re going to win, because they can do things that neither people nor programs can do alone.

[Jonathan Stray leads the Overview Project for the Associated Press]

Let's build infrastructure for the future, not just today

[Commentary] What goals are appropriate to government and what decisions should be left to the private sector? This bedrock question underlies most disputes in modern American politics, even when the issue is framed in scientific, economic or moral terms. However, one role that almost everyone agrees belongs to government is the planning and funding of large-scale infrastructure. Broadband and wireless networks, in addition to the power grid, must be resistant and resilient to cyberattack.

[David M. Lodge is the Francis J. DiSalvo Director of Cornell University's Atkinson Center for a Sustainable Future and a professor in Cornell's Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology.]

FBI and NSA Poised to Gain New Surveillance Powers Under Trump

The FBI, National Security Agency and CIA are likely to gain expanded surveillance powers under President-elect Donald Trump and a Republican-controlled Congress, a prospect that has privacy advocates and some lawmakers trying to mobilize opposition. President-elect Trump’s first two choices to head law enforcement and intelligence agencies -- Sen Jeff Sessions (R-AL) for attorney general and Rep Mike Pompeo (R-KS) for director of the Central Intelligence Agency -- are leading advocates for domestic government spying at levels not seen since the aftermath of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. The fights expected to play out in the coming months -- in Senate confirmation hearings and through executive action, legislation and litigation -- also will set up an early test of Trump’s relationship with Silicon Valley giants including Apple and Alphabet’s Google.

At last, a Presidential Medal of Freedom for communications

It’s not often that the Chairman of the Federal Communications Commission becomes known outside the relatively narrow confines of those who are regulated by the FCC. But Newton N. Minow broke that mold six decades ago, and recently he became the first FCC Chairman ever to be awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom, our nation’s highest civilian honor.

Minow, only 35 years old when appointed by President Kennedy, achieved what now would be considered viral status by telling the National Association of Broadcasters in May 1961 that their members’ programming was a “vast wasteland.” That speech, and especially this memorable phrase, brought him appearances on Meet the Press, the cover of Time magazine, and even the question to an answer on Jeopardy. But there is so much more to this man than his challenge to the dominant media industry with a catchphrase that has endured for over a half century. His tenure as FCC Chairman was quite brief (about two years), but the impact he had truly shaped the communications revolution. Perhaps his strong suit as FCC Chairman beyond using the bully pulpit of his position was his ability to forge consensus and work closely with Congress in crafting impactful new legislation.

Benton

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