Tuesday, December 24, 2019
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California Invests $12.7 Million in Broadband Infrastructure
How Your Phone Betrays Democracy
Trump elevates Mulvaney aide to telecom post weeks after he defied impeachment subpoena
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California Invests $12.7 Million in Broadband Infrastructure and Access for Unserved California Households
The California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) approved $12,689,849.72 in grant funding to build high-speed broadband Internet infrastructure and access to unserved Californians. The awards, under the California Advanced Services Fund (CASF) broadband infrastructure grant program administered by the CPUC, will serve households in Lassen, Modoc, Kern, Riverside, San Bernardino and Ventura counties, and include affordable subscription options. Collectively, the grants—primarily for fiberoptic infrastructure investments—will provide high-speed Internet service to 542 unserved households. The grants were awarded to:
- Frontier Communications for the Phase I Northeast Project in the amount of $10,912,972.96 (Resolution T-17671)
- Frontier Communications for the Taft Cluster Project in the amount of $399,701.79 (Resolution T-17668)
- Charter Communications for the Country Squire Mobile Home Park, Highland Orchid Drive and Silver Wheel Ranch Mobile Home Park Projects in the amount of $1,377,174.97 (Resolution T-17680)
At Broadband Communities’ 2019 economic development conference, held in October in Alexandria, Virginia, participants shared stories about how communities are improving broadband access to facilitate economic development, digital literacy and consumer choices. Followi the link to some of the highlights of the conference sessions.
In August, Comcast announced the most sweeping eligibility change in Internet Essentials' eight-year history. Comcast is now offering Internet connections to all low-income Americans, wherever Comcast offers service. Since the program launched in 2011, more than eight million low-income Americans have connected to the Internet at home, roughly 90 percent of whom were not connected prior to joining Internet Essentials. Comcast has invested more than $650 million in digital skills training, benefiting nearly 9.5 million people. Internet Essentials has provided 100,000 heavily discounted and subsidized laptop or desktop computers.
In a Dec 20 court filing, the Department of Justice and the Federal Communications Commission argued that T-Mobile's purchase of Sprint is in the best interest of the US, and any nationwide injunction holding up the merger would block "substantial, long-term, and procompetitive benefits for American consumers." The argument, in large part, boils down to: trust us, we're the experts. "Both the Antitrust Division and the FCC have significant experience and expertise in analyzing these types of transactions and do so from a nationwide perspective," the agencies write. "Thus, their conclusions that the merger as remedied is in the public interest deserve appropriate weight in this remedy inquiry by this honorable court."
Granular surveillance is still new. But some experts argue the window to define our cultural values around tracking citizens may be closing. In the United States, and across the world, any protester who brings a phone to a public demonstration is tracked and that person’s presence at the event is duly recorded in commercial datasets. At the same time, political parties are beginning to collect and purchase phone location for voter persuasion. “Without question it’s sinister,” said Todd Gitlin, professor of journalism at Columbia University and former president of Students for a Democratic Society, a prominent activist group in the 1960s. “It will chill certain constitutionally permitted expressions. If people know they’ll be tracked, it will certainly make them think twice before linking themselves to a movement.” The hundreds of thousands of phones that light up the sky in places like Hong Kong are the expression of peaceful opposition to authority. But the inspiring images and the democratic spirit the glittering devices represent only work if the lights are eventually able to vanish.
President Donald Trump has promoted a central figure in the House impeachment inquiry who defied a subpoena to testify. Robert Blair — a top aide to acting chief of staff Mick Mulvaney — was named the special representative for international telecommunications policy, a position that puts Blair in a central role atop a US effort to “promote a secure and reliable global telecommunications system.” “In this new capacity, Mr. Blair will support the Administration’s 5G efforts led by the Assistant to the President for Economy Policy, Larry Kudlow,” the White House said in a statement. “Mr. Blair will continue to serve as Assistant to the President and the Senior Advisor to the Chief of Staff.”
Democrats subpoenaed Blair on Nov. 3 to testify about his awareness of Trump’s order to hold military aid to Ukraine, which they allege was part of an effort to coerce an ally — desperately fighting off a Russian invasion — to investigate his political rivals. Blair refused to appear for a Nov. 4 deposition under orders from the White House.
Benton (www.benton.org) provides the only free, reliable, and non-partisan daily digest that curates and distributes news related to universal broadband, while connecting communications, democracy, and public interest issues. Posted Monday through Friday, this service provides updates on important industry developments, policy issues, and other related news events. While the summaries are factually accurate, their sometimes informal tone may not always represent the tone of the original articles. Headlines are compiled by Kevin Taglang (headlines AT benton DOT org) and Robbie McBeath (rmcbeath AT benton DOT org) — we welcome your comments.
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