Thursday, December 3, 2020
Headlines Daily Digest
Don't Miss:
GOP picks McMorris Rodgers for top spot on House Commerce Committee
Senate Commerce GOP OKs Trump FCC Nominee Over Democrats' Opposition
Broadband/Internet
Wireless
Privacy/Security
Platforms
Taxes
Labor
Television
Policymakers
Stories From Abroad
Broadband/Internet
A bipartisan, bicameral group of lawmakers, including Sens Joe Manchin (D-WV) and Susan Collins (R-Maine), is allocating $10 billion for broadband connectivity as part of its $908 billion emergency relief plan. Sen Manchin explicitly mentioned broadband as a priority during a news conference introducing the measure. Prospects for the proposal are still unknown, and likely shaky given the handful of days left in the 116th Congress. But these lawmakers have spoken with Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin and leadership in their parties about the proposal, and they’re expressing urgency about moving at least some pared-down rescue package before lawmakers leave this month.
Once a center for music production and automotive engineering, the City of Detroit has spent the last 10 years recovering from decades of depopulation, systemic divestment, and underdeveloped telecommunications infrastructure. Six years after it declared financial bankruptcy, municipal leaders, public school officials, and grassroots activists are all working to develop programs that will improve internet access and facilitate adoption for all residents. Detroit should continue to consult with local nonprofits to support neighborhood-based digital ambassador programs.
- Conducting a survey of small business owners, organizations, and community leaders could help municipal leaders understand the structural connectivity barriers and develop effective ways to communicate with largely disconnected communities
- Much like other cities, public libraries are instrumental in workforce development for residents who lack affordable and reliable broadband
- Detroit public schools and libraries should collaborate on ways to access state and federal resources
With approximately 200,000 residents, Huntsville is the second-largest city in Alabama. It houses the brainpower and imagination that fuels NASA’s space flight center and the US Army’s missile command. Research and engineering are an integral part of the City’s legacy. Long before they were known as a GIG City, residents and small businesses complained about expensive, unreliable internet connectivity. In this technology hub, broadband access is an expectation, much like access to clean water and electricity. However, today, broadband access is still unequal. Recommendations to improve broadband adoption:
- Expand free digital literacy training programs
- Enroll parents in workforce development programs
- Collect data, analyze research, and make recommendations on broadband adoption and digital literacy
- Public-private partnerships are essential for providing devices
- Connect student volunteers with teachers and parents who need assistance with virtual learning software
- Provide additional funding to the public library system for the surge in need for hotspot devices
Comcast will subject all its residential broadband customers to a 1.2 terabyte monthly data cap. The threshold that Comcast will start enforcing does, indeed, allow for a lot of online life before getting socked by surcharges of $10 for each extra 50 GB, up to $100 a month. For example, streaming 200 hours of high-definition Netflix (at 3 GB an hour) would still leave half that 1.2 TB allocation free. Comcast claims that about 95% of its customers nationally do not reach that threshold. But as users who have ascended these heights of data use can testify, it’s never just one or two things. With entire families working and learning remotely, data use can add up quickly. And don’t forget all the devices that make their own data demands when you’re not looking: Those huge system, app, and game updates on game consoles, computers, and phones (over Wi-Fi) add up, too. For those whose usage gets into the TB range, keeping under Comcast’s new data cap can be maddeningly difficult when the internet providers responsible provide no useful data-management tools.
The 5G Fund Supporters -- which includes the Multicultural Media, Telecom and Internet Council, Rainbow-PUSH and the NAACP -- asked the Federal Communications Commission to clarify how it plans to ensure that 1) the upcoming 5G mobile broadband subsidy program will accommodate needy areas other than rural, and better ensure 2) that diverse contractors have a chance at the money. In a petition for reconsideration, the coalition said, "We laud the Commission for abandoning its reliance on 'rurality' in favor of an 'adjustment factor' that will prioritize historically underserved or unserved areas. However, on reconsideration, we believe the Commission should explain, prior to the pre-auction phase, 1) how the 'adjustment factor' will provide adequate prioritization to ensure that historically underserved or unserved areas will receive support in the Phase I auction based on need, low wealth, persistent poverty, and the digital divide; and 2) require that applicants for 5G Fund subsidies broadly disseminate contracting opportunities to ensure that diverse contractors have an opportunity to compete for contracts awarded under the Fund."
Taxes
A fight over foreign countries' efforts to tax big American tech companies' digital services is likely to come to a head in January just as Joe Biden takes office. Governments have failed to reach a broad multilateral agreement on how to structure such taxes. That could leave the American firms that dominate consumer digital services — including Google, Facebook and Apple — stuck with massive tax bills from different countries. Although the Trump administration has attacked Big Tech over allegations of anti-conservative bias and launched antitrust investigations into several key companies, the digital services tax fight puts the US government in a more traditional role of defending tech firms as American success stories.
House Republicans tapped Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers (R-WA) to lead the party on the House Commerce Committee, making her the first woman to hold a leadership role at the committee that has sweeping authority over the nation’s health care, technology, environmental and energy policy. Ranking Member McMorris Rodgers beat Reps. Michael Burgess (R-TX) and Bob Latta (R-OH) to win the position. Rep McMorris Rodgers will replace retiring Ranking Member Greg Walden (R-OR). She is expected to continue the embrace of technological innovation and nature-based solutions to combat climate change, a far more narrow approach than Democrats are expected to take.
The Senate Commerce Committee approved the nomination of Nathan Simington, of Virginia, to be a Member of the Federal Communications Commission. The vote was 14-12 along party lines. The nomination now goes before the full Senate. Senate Democrats said that Simington is not qualified to be an FCC commissioner and that he misrepresented his work in the Trump administration during the committee's confirmation process. If Simington is confirmed by the full Senate, the FCC would be deadlocked at two Republicans and two Democrats after the upcoming departures of Chairman Ajit Pai and Michael O'Rielly. To get a 3-2 majority on the FCC, President-elect Joe Biden would have to nominate a Democrat after taking office and hope that the Senate confirms the nomination.
Reaction:
OTI Urges Senate to Table FCC Nomination, Focus on Pandemic (New America)
Senate Commerce Committee Caves to the Trump Agenda and Advances Simington FCC Bid (Free Press)
Chairman Ajit Pai renewed the charter of the Federal Communications Commission's Consumer Advisory Committee (CAC or Committee) for an eleventh two-year term. Chairman Pai also announced the appointment of CAC members, including its Chair and Vice Chair. Scott Marshall, Attorney-Advisor, Consumer Policy Division, Consumer and Governmental Affairs Bureau (CGB), will continue to serve as the Designated Federal Officer (DFO), and Gregory V. Haledjian, Legal Advisor, Office of the Bureau Chief, CGB, will continue to serve as Deputy Designated Federal Officer (DDFO).
During the eleventh term, it is anticipated that the CAC will hold at least three full-day meetings per year. In addition, as needed, working groups or subcommittees will be established to facilitate the CAC’s work between meetings of the full CAC on consumer-related matters specified by the FCC.
Chair: Stephen Pociask, President/CEO American Consumer Institute
Vice Chair: Debra Berlyn, Executive Director, Project GOAL
[full roster at the link below]
The Covid-19 pandemic has laid bare the scale and consequences of the digital divide and underlined the urgent need to find solutions to digital inequality. Governments are being forced to reassess priorities and step up with innovative solutions to address a range of challenges across health, employment, education, and economic resiliency. As the internet and digital technology will play an increasingly important role in our world, governments must develop policies to deliver affordable and meaningful connectivity to all. The 2020 Affordability Report looks at the state of policy progress to bring down the cost of internet access and points to the importance of effective national broadband plans (NBPs) in providing the conditions for internet prices to decline. Data on policy and prices is trending in the right direction. In the past five years, mobile broadband has become more affordable, and Affordability Drivers Index (ADI) scores have risen in most countries across all three regions we study — Africa, Latin America and Caribbean, and the Asia-Pacific region — signalling improvement in broadband policies.
- Broadband policies continue to improve. The average ADI score across the countries we study has risen by 13.6 points, from 42 to 55.6 since 2014, with improvements most notable in low-income countries.
- Africa sees the biggest policy advances. While Africa remains the region with the lowest average ADI score, this year it saw the fastest improvement (6.7% since 2019), with countries improving planning, better spectrum management and supporting programmes to narrow the digital gender gap.
- Mobile broadband prices have fallen consistently among countries within the Affordability Drivers Index, with the average cost of 1GB data declining by more than half since 2015, from 7.0% to 3.1% of average monthly income.
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.
© Benton Institute for Broadband & Society 2020. Redistribution of this email publication — both internally and externally — is encouraged if it includes this message. For subscribe/unsubscribe info email: headlines AT benton DOT org
Kevin Taglang
Executive Editor, Communications-related Headlines
Benton Institute
for Broadband & Society
727 Chicago Avenue
Evanston, IL 60202
847-328-3049
headlines AT benton DOT org
Share this edition:
The Benton Institute for Broadband & Society All Rights Reserved © 2019