INTERNET GOVERNANCE
Government Officials Join Voices Urging Caution on Internet
Oversight
Vote (NYT)
Controversy Swirls Around Cyberspace Report (USA)
Estee Lauder Gains Victory in Suit Over Web Use of Its Trademark
(WSJ)
WOMEN AND TECHNOLOGY
For Museum, Online Way Is Only Way, for Now (NYT)
The Dot-Com World Opens New Opportunities for Women to Lead (NYT)
CIVIC ENGAGEMENT
2000 Census (Shhh!) on the Net (NYT)
Thousands Vote Online in Arizona (NYT)
BROADBAND
High-speed Access Prices Tumbling (SJM)
TELEPHONY
In Never-Bell Land, Phone Service Is Way Above Average, and
Competitive
(NYT)
Truth in Telephone Billing Act of 1999 Hearing (House)
DTV
FCC Commences Periodic Review of Digital Television Conversion
(FCC)
INTERNATIONAL
German Giant Seeks Qwest and U.S. West (WSJ)
U.S. Deputy Commerce Secretary Robert L. Mallett To Lead U.S.
Delegation
To Fifth Annual Latin American Telecommunications Summit
(NTIA)
INTERNET GOVERNANCE
GOVERNMENT OFFICIALS JOIN VOICES URGING CAUTION ON INTERNET OVERSIGHT
VOTE
Issue: Internet
As members of the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers
(ICANN) met in Cairo, officials from more than 20 countries were
calling for the group to be more cautious about the elections the group
has planned for September. This came just after public interest groups
issued a report last week saying that ICANN would have to make
significant changes before a fair vote, free from the influence of
special interests, would be possible. As the first experiment in
Internet democracy, the vote will be the first step in electing a new
board for ICANN, replacing the interim board that was appointed in 1998
after the Clinton administration selected ICANN to take over the
administrative functions of the Internet's addressing, or domain name,
system. And those interim board members are eager to hand over the
reigns. However, ICANN's president, Mike Roberts, said the board would
keep an open mind until it makes a final decision on the election
process on Friday. "A lot of the proposals want a delay just so we can
look at it some more," he said. "We've been looking at it for a year
and a half."
[SOURCE: Cyber Times, AUTHOR: Jeri Clausing]
(http://www.nytimes.com/library/tech/00/03/cyber/articles/09domain.html
)
ESTEE LAUDER GAINS VICTORY IN SUIT OVER WEB USE OF ITS TRADEMARK
Issue: Intellectual Property
Estee Lauder announced a victory in Germany's District Court of Hamburg
over Internet companies Excite and iBeauty, forcing both to stop using
certain Estee Lauder trademarks as keywords to trigger banner ads on
Web sites. Keywords are terms entered into Internet search engines to
find information online. Such words have been sold to advertisers, who
want their banner ads to pop up when the words are entered. This case
has major implications for sites across the Web since keyword-based ads
currently generate hundreds of millions of dollars in revenue. Drew
Ianni, an analyst for Jupiter Communications, said that the German
decision, "is at least the first precedent out there in cyberspace
related to this type of conflict." Estee Lauder has filed similar suits
against iBeauty and Excite, in France and federal court in New York.
[SOURCE: Wall Street Journal (B14), AUTHOR: Karen Jones]
(http://interactive.wsj.com/articles/SB952566850153204842.htm)
CONTROVERSY SWIRLS AROUND CYBERSPACE REPORT
Issue: Privacy/Security
Attorney General Janet Reno will release a report today that seeks to
expand the powers of law enforcement to conduct investigations in
cyberspace. The report is the product of a presidential working group
that was appointed last summer. It recommends a loosening of
restrictions on several technical and legal procedures that would make it
easier to identify and track individual Internet users. "They make the
assertion that there is all this illegal conduct on the Internet that
they must investigate, but nowhere in the report do they show any
numbers or proof," says Emily Whitfield of the American Civil Liberties
Union, which asked Reno in a letter to reject the report's conclusions.
"The report treats anonymity of Internet users as a 'thorny issue,'
rather than a constitutional right," says the ACLU letter.
[SOURCE: USAToday (4A), AUTHOR: M.J. Zuckerman and Kevin Johnson]
(http://www.usatoday.com/usatonline/20000309/2012177s.htm)
WOMEN AND TECHNOLOGY
THE DOT-COM WORLD OPENS NEW OPPORTUNITIES FOR WOMEN TO LEAD
Issue: Gender/Employment
Women are using Internet companies to find opportunities that are equal
or better to those found in more traditional "brick an mortar"
companies. As reported by the research firm VentureOne, women were
chief executives in about 6% of venture capital backed Internet firms
and held top management positions in 45% of such start-ups in 1999. In
1998, women held the chief executive position 4% of the time and
accounted for 21% of senior management positions. These numbers are
much different than those in the "brick and mortar" world. There, as
found in a 1998 census conducted by the women's research firm Catalyst,
women occupied fewer than 1% of the chief executive positions and only
3.8% of the highest ranking corporate officer positions. Internet
companies are, "definitely causing a leveling of the playing field"
said Denise Brosseau, the president of the Forum for Women
Entrepreneurs. The main reason Internet opportunities are in such
abundance for women is that there is an unquenchable need for talent.
But, Gayle Crowell of epiphany.net argues that the Internet is a whole
new playing field, "it's about brand building and knowing the consumer,
and women are great at that."
[SOURCE: The New York Times (C1), AUTHOR: Leslie Kaufman]
(http://www.nytimes.com/library/tech/00/03/biztech/articles/09net.html)
FOR MUSEUM, ONLINE WAY IS ONLY WAY, FOR NOW
Issue: Media & Society
After nearly a decade of planning, the Women of the West Museum has
finally opened. At least virtually. When the museum's backers couldn't
raise enough money for a building, they decided to open a location on
the Web. The museum's first exhibition, the LoDo Mural Project,
combines a public mural project in downtown Denver with corresponding
online images and text. "Originally the museum was going to be a
bricks-and-mortar stand-alone facility," said Marsha Semmel, president
and chief executive of the Women of the West Museum, based in Boulder,
Colo. "What we are doing is what many businesses are doing -- adapting
to the changing ways people spend their time and get their information.
As if to underscore the breadth of the museum's reach, Semmel adds:
"When our site was named a Yahoo pick-of-the-week, we heard about it
from a male engineering student in Shanghai who e-mailed us." Visitors
to the site can learn about pioneer and contemporary women who helped
shape the West, like Molly Brown (the unsinkable Titanic passenger) and
Teresita Sandoval, one of the 1800's founders of Pueblo, Colorado.
[SOURCE: The New York Times (G11), AUTHOR: Mindy Sink]
(http://www.nytimes.com/library/tech/00/03/circuits/articles/09west.htm
l)
CIVIC ENGAGEMENT
2000 CENSUS (SHHH!) ON THE NET
Issue: Internet
The Census Bureau has a secret: people in many parts of the country
will be able to fill out their census forms online. Even as the Bureau
has embarked upon a massive advertising campaign to get people to
participate in the census, it has not said much at all about the online
version. Edison Gore, assistant division chief for field programs at
the Census Bureau, said census officials prefer that people stick to
the "tried and proven" method of pen and paper. "We know what's going
on there, and it's very controlled. The Internet is something new."
This time out, only households that receive the shorter of the two
census forms (about five out of every six households nationwide) may
submit their information electronically, others must stick to the paper
form. And even those who wish to submit the information electronically will
still need the paper form, each of which contains a bar code with a 22-
digit number that must be entered to call up the on-screen version. The
site, which is off of the main census site, (www.census.gov), provides
guidance for completing the form. And if people run into trouble, the
site suggests they give up and revert to the paper form. It is unclear
whether the Internet will help the census in its primary goal of
increasing the response rate. Census officials say that Internet
collection is unlikely to encourage responses among the poor and other
groups that traditionally do not answer the census.
[SOURCE: The New York Times (G11), AUTHOR: Joyce Cohen]
(http://www.nytimes.com/library/tech/00/03/circuits/articles/09cens.htm
l)
THOUSANDS VOTE ONLINE IN ARIZONA
Issue: Internet
More than 17,000 Democrats in Arizona have cast ballots via the Internet in
the first two days of voting during a primary billed as the first
binding online election. Despite technical glitches and a federal
lawsuit that sought to block the Internet voting, more than 13,000 votes
had been cast online by the end of Tuesday. "This election was about
expanding opportunities to participate," said Mark Fleisher, chairman
of the state party. A United States District Court judge rejected a
request for a temporary injunction against the Internet vote last week.
The Voting Integrity Project, a nonprofit voting rights group based in
Virginia, challenged the Internet election on the ground that
minorities and the poor would not have equal access to voting. Deborah
Phillips, president of the Voting Integrity Project, said the group
hopes to challenge the Arizona election in court after the vote is
final.
[SOURCE: Cyber Times, AUTHOR: Rebecca Fairley Raney]
(http://www.nytimes.com/library/tech/00/03/cyber/articles/09vote.html)
BROADBAND
HIGH-SPEED ACCESS PRICES TUMBLING
Issue: Internet
High speed Internet access prices are falling, as competition between
providers has already helped cut $300 off of the price of the first
year of service. Traditional Internet service providers are scrambling
to enter the high-speed access market, and a favorable federal
regulatory ruling could help them push prices down even further this
year. New regulations -- which take effect later this summer -- slash
the fee competitors must pay to the local phone company to gain access
to a customer's home by 75 percent. This has observers predicting the
monthly cost of DSL could go as low as $29.95 by the end of the year.
That may be low enough to convince a typical consumer who is paying
$21.95 each month to an ISP. "Everybody is running to grab customers,"
said Liz Fetter, CEO of NorthPoint Communications, which offers high-
speed Internet services. Together, high-speed cable and DSL connections
account for about 5 percent of homes with Internet access in the United
States and Canada today, said Kinetic Strategies president Michael
Harris. "In the long run, pricing of DSL won't be important," said
Kevin Mitchell, an analyst for Infonetics Research. "Companies will be
giving it away."
[SOURCE: San Jose Mercury News, AUTHOR: Chris O'Brien]
(http://www.mercurycenter.com/svtech/news/indepth/docs/dsl030900.htm)
TELEPHONY
IN NEVER-BELL LAND, PHONE SERVICE IS WAY ABOVE AVERAGE, AND COMPETITIVE
Issue: Telephony
Somewhat lost among the giant telecommunications firms are the more
than 1,000 small independent phone companies providing services in
mostly rural areas of the US. As phone service becomes an increasingly
important economic factor, little phone companies that serve out-of-
the-way communities find themselves in demand by new business. Set up
to serve the more costly low-population areas, they are finding that
they can branch out into neighboring towns without much added expense.
This is a result of the Telecommunications Act of 1996, which allowed
federal regulators to push down the cost of leasing phone lines to
jump-start competition. But independents that do not grow seem to be
heading for consolidation. In the past, former Bell companies weren't
interested in consolidating independents because arcane regulations
made the acquisitions too costly. Now, companies that specialize in
acquiring rural telecommunications businesses are snapping up local
access lines at $2,400 to $5,000 each. Those independents that are not
selling are upgrading, installing fiber optic lines and offering
Internet access with high-speed connections.
[SOURCE: The New York Times (C1), AUTHOR: Julie Flaherty]
(http://www.nytimes.com/yr/mo/day/news/financial/richmond-phones.html)
TRUTH IN TELEPHONE BILLING ACT OF 1999 HEARING
Issue: Telephony
Legislative Hearing H.R. 3011, the Truth in Telephone Billing Act of
1999 and H.R. 3022, the Rest of the Truth in Telephone Billing Act of
1999 Subcommittee on Telecommunications Trade & Consumer Protection
March 9, 2000 10:00 AM 2322 Rayburn House Office Building Live Audio
Broadcast
[SOURCE: House of Representatives]
(http://com-notes.house.gov/cchear/hearings106.nsf/12b6a0781fa86e88852567e50
07558f4/ba047f137cab5f9e8525689c0070d8fb?OpenDocument)
DTV
FCC COMMENCES PERIODIC REVIEW OF DIGITAL TELEVISION CONVERSION
Issue:
The FCC today began its first periodic review of the progress of
conversion of the U.S. television system from analog technology to
digital television (DTV). The Commission noted that broadcast stations
are facing relatively few technical problems in building digital
facilities, and that problems encountered by some stations with tower
availability and/or local zoning issues do not seem to be widespread.
[SOURCE: FCC]
(http://www.fcc.gov/Bureaus/Mass_Media/News_Releases/2000/nrmm0005.html
)
INTERNATI0NAL
GERMAN GIANT SEEKS QWEST AND U.S. WEST
Issue: Mergers
Deutsche Telekom made separate offers to acquire Qwest and US West,
deals that could total more than $100 billion. Qwest and U.S. West had
agreed to merge last summer but it was only recently that U.S. West
became aware of Qwest's conversations with a major telecommunications
firm, thought to be Deutsche Telekom. Many of the regulators in the 14
states in which US West has a presence had already agreed to the Qwest-
US West merger. If Deutsche Telekom were to secure a deal with Qwest,
the entire process would have to be restarted. Deutsche Telekom's
intent in offering two separate deals is to give Qwest the bulk of the
premium it is willing to pay for both companies, but show respect for
Qwest's deal with US West.
[SOURCE: Wall Street Journal(A3), AUTHOR: Rebecca Blumenstein]
(http://interactive.wsj.com/articles/SB952556369441537877.htm)
U.S. DEPUTY COMMERCE SECRETARY ROBERT L. MALLETT TO LEAD U.S.
DELEGATION TO FIFTH ANNUAL LATIN AMERICAN TELECOMMUNICATIONS SUMMIT
Issue: International
U.S. Deputy Secretary of Commerce Robert L. Mallett and Peru's Minister
of Transportation, Communications and Construction, Alberto Pandolfi
will co-host the fifth Latin American Telecommunications Summit in
Lima, Peru March 13-16, 2000. The Ministerial-level conference provides
an opportunity for senior U.S. and Latin American government officials
and telecommunications industry leaders to discuss major policy issues
affecting the region.
[SOURCE: NTIA]
(http://204.193.246.62/public.nsf/docs/8C90FBD7182638498525689B007608D0
)
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