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[Commentary] To cool off a hot argument, sometimes it needs to be turned upside down. That may well happen in the national dispute over media violence if enough Americans heed a new study that reverses the terms of that debate.
The study, by researchers in Seattle and published in the journal Pediatrics, found that young children who are encouraged to watch TV programs that depict kindness, respect, and cooperation are more likely to express those traits than kids who watch everyday TV fare that includes fictional violence. Two other surprising results of the study are worth noting: Low-income boys, who tend to watch the most television, benefited the most in displaying empathy after watching nonviolent shows. And many of the parents who were guided on what kind of pro-social content to watch and how to avoid violent shows asked that such advice continue even after the study. The nation’s gun debate should be an opportunity for parents, community groups, and perhaps government to advocate for better nonviolent and uplifting entertainment in all the media now available to children. Advocacy groups such as Common Sense Media already provide such guidance to parents. The number of media outlets available to children will only keep rising as will likely the average number of hours of using them. The quality must increase with it. Gun violence may be reduced if media for children teach them the opposite of violent behavior.
Instead of blaming media violence for kids who kill, demand more nonviolent video games
Imagine a smart phone that can record your facial features, identify a criminal suspect with voice recognition, and reduce fraud in welfare and other programs. In a few years, Smart Mobile Identity technology (SMI) may become an essential part of our daily lives, transforming everything from phone reception and online banking to identity verification of criminal suspects and enemies in combat.
The Department of Defense is looking to take advantage of biometrics developments with smart phones and similar devices. AOptix, a biometrics and identity technology firm, has received a $3 million contract from the Defense Department to help develop smart phones with SMI capabilities. Its team will collaborate with CACI International, a data security company.
Military invests in smart-phone reconnaissance
The first in a series of new reports the Center for Digital Democracy will release in 2013 on digital consumer protection issues, including on multicultural digital target marketing.
Digital marketing, including data collection, profiling, tracking and targeting, pervades the Internet experience. One of the less-discussed areas is the targeting of individuals because of their race or ethnicity. This report discusses how multicultural groups are "In the Digital Bullseye" with online advertisers and others focused on reaching African Americans, Hispanics, Asian Americans and others. Data collected on each of us can include our financial status, health concerns, location, spending habits -- and also ethnicity and race. Multicultural groups are seen as vitally important markets for advertisers, bringing in new revenues and influencing overall cultural attitudes.
In The Digital Bullseye: Online Marketers Take Aim At Multicultural Consumers CDD Study Warns of Downsides Of Multicultural Marketing (Multichannel News)
Privacy regulators from France and other European Union countries have proposed a coordinated crackdown before summer on Google's privacy practices, escalating European efforts to reshape how global companies treat user data.
France's privacy watchdog said it and an unspecified number of other European regulators want to coordinate a "repressive action" against Google, after the company had failed to give "precise and effective" answers to a warning that all 27 EU national regulators issued in October. The full group of privacy regulators, known as the Article 29 group, is scheduled to vote on the proposal at the end of February. Led by France's Commission Nationale de l'Informatique et des Libertés, or CNIL, the group said in October that Google's treatment of user data doesn't comply with European law. They recommended that Google implement a list of changes—such as easier opt-outs for targeted advertising—to get back in line. Google said that its policy complies with European law. "We have engaged fully with the CNIL throughout this process and will continue to do so," said a Google spokesman.
EU Regulators Weigh New Google Crackdown
There is a joke that the only reason why customers visit a well-known coffee chain is for the free Wi-Fi and toilets. Certainly not for the terrible coffee. For many mobile users, being able to access the internet wirelessly has become a public convenience, in particular in city centers where industry experts say there is an increasingly fierce “land grab” for Wi-Fi hotspot ownership. There are other ways for companies to make money out of Wi-Fi, including using a customer’s sign-in and location details to target them with adverts. However, the provision of Wi-Fi has mostly a more benign objective for internet service providers. For most it is a useful additional service to offer customers, even if users themselves take for granted the little antenna signal alongside their lattes.
Race to put more Wi-Fi hotspots on the map
Record numbers of television programs are being watched outside their scheduled broadcast time and on a variety of devices, industry research shows.
The trend reflects rising ownership of computers, smartphones and digital recorders – requiring advertisers to change tack. Taking into account on-demand viewing and digital recordings, more than 10 per cent of TV programs – a record – were viewed on a “time-shifted” basis last year, according to Thinkbox, the marketing body for TV advertising. The changes are said to be driving strong growth in TV advertising online. Carat, a media planning and buying company, predicts advertising spending in the online video market will grow more than 20 per cent this year to £175m. Commercial broadcasters, such as ITV and Channel 4, will take about 40 per cent of this total, it predicts.
Rise of TV-on-demand poses ad challenge
The National Broadband Plan stated that when private investment isn’t a feasible option for broadband deployment, local governments ‘have the right to move forward and build networks that serve their constituents as they deem appropriate.’ If a community can’t gain access to broadband services that meet its needs, then it should be able to serve its own residents directly. Proposals that would tie the hands of innovative communities that want to build their own high-speed networks will slow progress to our nation’s broadband goals and will hurt economic development and job creation in those areas. I urge state and local leaders to focus instead on proposals that incentivize investment in broadband infrastructure, remove barriers to broadband build-out, and ensure widespread access to high-speed networks.
FCC’s Genachowski on Proposed Municipal Broadband Legislation
[Commentary] A few weeks ago, a tremor was felt in the Force as Federal Communications Commission Chairman Genachowski announced his Gigabit City Challenge – an initiative to get at least one citywide gigabit network per state by 2015. The range of responses went from cautious optimism to “is this the best we can do? and a range ” Meanwhile, as we were getting our heads round the Challenge, the Empire, um, incumbent telcos, struck back last week in Georgia with a an anti muni network bill that appears reasonable, but would kill hopes for a gig city in the Peach State. Windstream, AT&T and Georgia’s other incumbents are incapable of delivering gigabit services, so they have taken the easy way out and lobbied the legislature to kill cities’ ability to do so. Meanwhile, most of the gigabit networks elsewhere are run or being built by muni governments and public utilities, with just a few private companies leading gig projects. Even the most ardent community broadband supporters, while happy the FCC’s gigabit challenge, believe the devil is in the details. Sure, quite a few fiber networks have moved past the planning stage. But it’s going to take hard work to meet the FCC challenge. Some of the hurdles are money-related. Others come from broadband policies and legislation that need to be approved, or improved, or as is the case in Georgia, flat out rejected.
To meet the FCC’s Gigabit Challenge, cities will have to get political
Experts have long known that children imitate many of the deeds — good and bad — that they see on television. But it has rarely been shown that changing a young child’s viewing habits at home can lead to improved behavior. In a study published in the journal Pediatrics, researchers reported the results of a program designed to limit the exposure of preschool children to violence-laden videos and television shows and increase their time with educational programming that encourages empathy.
They found that the experiment reduced the children’s aggression toward others, compared with a group of children who were allowed to watch whatever they wanted. “Here we have an experiment that proposes a potential solution,” said Dr. Thomas N. Robinson, a professor of pediatrics at Stanford, who was not involved in the study. “Giving this intervention — exposing kids to less adult television, less aggression on television and more prosocial television — will have an effect on behavior.” While the research showed “a small to moderate effect” on the preschoolers’ behavior, he added, the broader public health impact could be “very meaningful.”
Certain Television Fare Can Help Ease Aggression in Young Children, Study Finds
If there is one theme that will be the topic of digital business this year, it is mobile. ComScore, which tracks Web and mobile usage, published a report about what happened in 2012, and what to expect in 2013. It shows that the effects of a movement toward mobile are everywhere, from shopping to media to search. According to the report, “2013 could spell a very rocky economic transition,” and businesses will have to scramble to stay ahead of consumers’ changing behavior.
Tech Predictions for 2013: It’s All About Mobile