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WHY THE US DOESN'T MEASURE UP
[SOURCE: Free Press, AUTHOR: Ben Scott]
In testimony before the Senate Commerce Committee , Free Press Policy Director Ben Scott urged lawmakers to pursue a comprehensive national broadband policy that will bring more broadband competition to American households. “Above all, we need competition policy to drive down prices, accelerate speeds, and deliver an attractive value to the consumer,†Scott said. “We must not sacrifice the long-term interests of the country for the short-term interests of incumbents that have long shielded themselves from an open market.†“This isn’t just a matter of pride at stake,†Scott said. “This is real money. The economic benefits of higher broadband penetration accumulate exponentially. Even a small increase in broadband penetration can generate a consumer surplus measured in the billions of dollars. While we aren’t capturing these dollars, someone else is.†“This is a paradigm-shifting moment for American telecommunications,†Scott concluded. “It is imperative that we choose wisely.â€
http://www.freepress.net/news/22657
* Read Scott's testimony at: http://www.freepress.net/docs/42407bssentestimony.pdf
* U.S. Falling Behind Further and Faster on Broadband
http://www.consumersunion.org/blogs/hun/2007/04/us_falling_farther_and_f...
Why the U.S. Doesn’t Measure Up
STATE DEPARTMENT LETTER ON OECD STUDY ON BROADBAND USE
[SOURCE: National Telecommunications and Information Administration]
The Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development released new broadband statistics on Monday that worry some in the US as the country fell farther behind in per capita broadband penetration. On Tuesday, the US Department of State responded with concerns about the OECD's methodology. David Gross, US Coordinator of Internatonal Communications and Information Policy, wrote that the OECD underestimates US broadband use because the organization relies solely on broadband subscribership numbers. Ambassador Gross believes the survey should also include Wi-Fi hotspot users -- especially on college campuses -- and people who use broadband at work. He writes: "The United States strongly believes that the world community would greatly benefit from a balanced picture of broadband deployment that accurately reflects and captures the rich variation of how people actually gain access to broadband services, and that provides such information in context."
http://www.ntia.doc.gov/ntiahome/press/2007/State_OECD_042407.pdf
* Fact Sheet: United States Maintains Information and Communication Technology Leadership and Economic Strength
The National Telecommunications and Information Administration focuses on the bright side of the broadband research. It highlights findings from non-OECD research: The US has the most broadband subscribers, the most Internet users and the most Wi-Fi hotspots in the world. Between June, 2001 and June 2006, the number of homes with broadband in the United States has increased by 599%, from 9.2 million high-speed lines 64.6 million.
http://www.ntia.doc.gov/ntiahome/press/2007/ICTleader_042407.html
Bush Administration: U.S. Maintains Telecommunications Technology Leadership
ACTIVISTS CALL FOR DTV OBLIGATIONS BEFORE DUAL CARRIAGE
[SOURCE: Broadcasting&Cable, AUTHOR: John Eggerton]
Media activist groups The Campaign Legal Center and Common Cause sent a letter to the FCC commissioners Monday asking them not to expand TV station's carriage rights until they have resolved the issue of TV stations' DTV public interest obligations. “The FCC's inaction on public interest obligations remains a gaping hole in the fabric of our nation's telecommunications policy," they argued. With at least two of the commissioners, Democrats Jonathan Adelstein and Michael Copps--they were preaching to the choir. They have both pushed for a resolution of a 1999 inquiry into DTV public interest obligations. At its April 25 monthly meeting, the commission is scheduled to consider a proposal by FCC Chairman Kevin Martin that cable operators be required to deliver both an analog and digital version of TV station's signals after the conversion to all-digital broadcast TV as a means of insuring viewers get a "viewable signal," as required by law.
http://www.broadcastingcable.com/article/CA6435988.html
-- See also --
* Benton supports Broadcasters' Disclosure rules
http://www.benton.org/benton_files/bentonltr.doc
Activists Call For DTV Obligations Before Dual Carriage
EXPERT PANEL FAULTS US POLICIES ON DISABLED PEOPLE
[SOURCE: Reuters, AUTHOR: Will Dunham]
Outdated U.S. policies are keeping many disabled Americans from getting help they need, an expert panel said on Tuesday in a report faulting government inaction toward the needs of this growing population. The report looked at a wide range of issues affecting the disabled such as accessibility of buildings and other places, gaps in public programs such as those paying for wheelchairs and scooters and health insurance coverage. The panel said younger and middle-aged people face increasing risk for future disability due to factors such as diabetes, obesity and a sedentary lifestyle. The report concludes that immediate action is essential for the nation to avoid harm and to help people with disabilities lead independent and productive lives. Report includes a chapter on "Assistive and Mainstream Technologies for People with Disabilities" and an appendix on "Access to Telecommunications Technology by Americans with Disabilities: Key Laws and Policies."
http://www.reuters.com/article/domesticNews/idUSN2441044520070424?pageNu...
* The Future of Disability in America (Committee on Disability in America)
http://www.nap.edu/catalog.php?record_id=11898
http://www.reuters.com/article/domesticNews/idUSN2441044520070424?pageNumber=1
FCC TO UNVEIL AUCTION PLAN TODAY
[SOURCE: Reuters, AUTHOR: Rachelle Younglai]
The Federal Communications Commission will take its first stab on Wednesday at defining how a 2007 auction of airwave spectrum will take place. The agency plans to auction airwaves later this year that are being returned by television broadcasters as they move to digital signals early in 2009. The sale is touted as the last opportunity for new players to enter the wireless market and is expected to raise billions of dollars. But first the FCC has to define how the auction will work, provide a set of rules on how the spectrum will be divided and say what kind of services can be offered using the airwaves. The FCC is expected to outline a tentative plan at an open meeting of its commissioners on Wednesday -- a crucial step that will help potential bidders craft their strategy. The Media Access Project and other consumer advocacy groups such as Consumers Union are pushing for rules they say would increase competition. The groups want half the airwaves up for auction to be designated as "open access" spectrum. That would allow other companies to buy access on established wireless networks so they can offer their own wireless services. The consumer groups also want rules to ensure that broadband providers treat all Internet content in the same way.
http://www.reuters.com/article/technologyNews/idUSN2441759420070424
* Wireless tech's high-stakes turf
http://news.com.com/FCC+to+reveal+spectrum+auction+plan/2100-1039_3-6178...
FCC to unveil auction plan today
BARTON, UPTON 'DISTURBED' BY MARTIN'S CABLE AGENDA
[SOURCE: Broadcasting&Cable, AUTHOR: John Eggerton]
Former House Commerce Chairman Joe Barton (R-TX) and former House Telecom Subcommittee Chairman Fred Upton (R-MI) have asked FCC Chairman Kevin Martin to lay off the cable industry when it comes to "additional, unnecessary and burdensome regulations." The Congressmen wrote Chairman Martin on Tuesday saying they are "disturbed that with respect to the cable industry, you appear to be making proposals that are leading the Commission precisely down the road of intrusive regulation when it is least justified." Their concerns include Chairman Martin's push for a la carte cable pricing, mandatory cable carriage of TV station's multicast digital signals, a new plan to require cable to carry TV stations in both digital and analog after the DTV transition, his insistence that the FCC hold to its July 1 deadline for banning integrated cable set-top boxes, reports he plans to reimpose a 30% national cap on one cable company's subs, and plans to allow stations to lease digital capacity to women and minorities, who would then get mandatory cable carriage for the channels they create.
http://www.broadcastingcable.com/article/CA6436156.html
* House Leaders Back Cable in FCC Fight
http://www.multichannel.com/article/CA6436192.html
Barton, Upton 'Disturbed' By Martin's Cable Agenda
RESEARCHERS BREAK INTERNET SPEED RECORDS
[SOURCE: Associated Press, AUTHOR: Anick Jesdanun]
A group of researchers led by the University of Tokyo has broken Internet speed records -- twice in two days. Operators of the high-speed Internet2 network announced Tuesday that the researchers on Dec. 30 sent data at 7.67 gigabits per second, using standard communications protocols. The next day, using modified protocols, the team broke the record again by sending data over the same 20,000-mile path at 9.08 Gbps. That likely represents the current network's final record because rules require a 10 percent improvement for recognition, a percentage that would bring the next record right at the Internet2's current theoretical limit of 10 Gbps. However, the Internet2 consortium is planning to build a new network with a capacity of 100 Gbps. With the 10-fold increase, a high-quality version of the movie "The Matrix" could be sent in a few seconds rather than half a minute over the current Internet2 and two days over a typical home broadband line.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070424/ap_on_hi_te/faster_internet;_ylt=A0W...
NAB WARNS TOWER CHANGES WILL AFFECT ROLLOUT
[SOURCE: Broadcasting&Cable, AUTHOR: John Eggerton]
The National Association of Broadcasters warns that changes to tower heights, sites or lights that are driven by concerns over bird collisions could delay the DTV transition, impede the rollout of broadband, jeopardize homeland security, contribute to global warming and even possibly cause planes to crash. [OK, the NAB did not mention global warming.] Broadcasters say it is all for "little, if any, impact on the future ecological viability of migratory birds." NAB and the wireless phone industry argue in comments to the FCC that migratory bird collisions with towers are only a fraction of other "human-caused aviation mortality" which includes "window collisions, vehicle collisions, transmission lines, wind energy facilities, pesticides and oil pollution, hunting and domestic cat predation." Estimates vary from 4 million to as many as 50 million tower-related bird deaths annually. Most estimates fall on the lower end of that scale.
http://www.broadcastingcable.com/article/CA6436115.html
NAB Warns Tower Changes Will Affect Rollout
A HOST DIALS DOWN, AND BUSH SPEAKS UP
[SOURCE: New York Times, AUTHOR: Alessandra Stanley]
Charlie Rose is a talk show host known for long and rambling questions. President Bush is famous for his short, Texas-terse answers. On last night’s show, the two men reversed roles. President Bush spoke forcefully and at length about Iraq. Mr. Rose was succinct. It was the closest President Bush has come to the kind of winding declamations that Richard M. Nixon delivered to the British interviewer David Frost in 1977 and that are now resurrected on Broadway in “Frost/Nixon,†a play by Peter Morgan. Mr. Morgan, who was one of Mr. Rose’s guests on Monday, told the host that American audiences would see parallels “between presidents facing the wrath of a country that feels that in their name, bad decisions were made.†Actually, President Bush looked more at ease than he usually does in interviews, but he did not offer any revelations about his showdown with Congress over financing for additional troops or his support for his embattled attorney general, Alberto R. Gonzales. He mostly expanded on positions he had staked out in the past. It was his wordiness that spoke volumes.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/04/25/arts/25teevee.html?_r=1&oref=slogin
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http://www.nytimes.com/2007/04/25/arts/25teevee.html?_r=1&oref=slogin
CHINA SETS OUT TO CUT SECRECY, BUT LAWS LEAVE BIG LOOPHOLES
[SOURCE: New York Times, AUTHOR: Jim Yardley]
China announced new regulations on Tuesday to reduce government secrecy and grant citizens greater access to official information, but the regulations include broad exceptions that raise questions about how much new openness will be tolerated. The regulations, approved in a decree signed by Prime Minister Wen Jiabao, were announced with fanfare on Tuesday but will not become effective until May 1, 2008. And the caveats suggest that the new regulations may represent only measured steps in fulfilling promises by top leaders to create a more transparent and accountable government.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/04/25/world/asia/25china.html
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China Sets Out to Cut Secrecy, but Laws Leave Big Loopholes