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ADELSTEIN BLASTS WHITE HOUSE OVER ACCESS TO BROADBAND
[SOURCE: Technology Daily 3/6, AUTHOR: David Hatch]
FCC Commissioner Jonathan Adelstein leveled fresh accusations at the Bush administration over what he says is a failed policy on high-speed Internet deployment. "I really believe we lack a coordinated vision for success," he said at the Freedom to Connect technology conference. "This has got to be a greater national priority than it is now." Adelstein and the FCC's other Democrat, Commissioner Michael Copps, regularly take aim at the White House's broadband policies. In 2004, the Bush administration set a goal of affordable, universal broadband access by 2007. But critics say that goal will not be met by the end of this year in many rural areas, even though administration officials insist the plan is on track. Commissioner Adelstein called for a national broadband strategy that includes benchmarks, deployment timetables and measurable thresholds to gauge its success.
http://www.njtelecomupdate.com/lenya/telco/live/tb-NZEO1173296524287.html
Adelstein Blasts White House Over Access To Broadband
SEN INOUYE SEEKING TO CRAFT BIPARTISAN UNIVERSAL SERVICE BILL
[SOURCE: Technology Daily 3/1, AUTHOR: David Hatch]
Senate Commerce Chairman Daniel Inouye (D-Hawaii) will work with members of his panel from both parties to craft legislation aimed at overhauling the universal service fund. Apparently, the measure would focus only on revamping the multibillion-dollar fund, which subsidizes telecommunications service in rural and impoverished areas -- and is not envisioned as broader telecom legislation. Noting that the committee's membership is heavily rural, Sen Inouye said during a USF hearing, "I can assure you that we will have some action here, including a measure on the floor." But to do so, he acknowledged that he must consider the concerns and interests of many parties. "It will be a challenge, but I can assure you, we will take on that challenge," he said. To assist with the process, Inouye plans an in-depth briefing on the potential -- and limitations -- of high-speed Internet and wireless services. Lawmakers and regulators agreed that the USF is bloated and outdated, but disagreed on how to improve it.
http://www.njtelecomupdate.com/lenya/telco/live/tb-JZQH1173297103250.html
Sen. Inouye Seeking To Craft Bipartisan Universal Service Bill
SATELLITE VS LOCAL: KARMAZIN, BROADCASTERS SQUARE OFF
[SOURCE: Broadcasting&Cable, AUTHOR: John Eggerton]
At the House Telecom Subcommittee hearing on the Future of Radio, Sirius CEO Mel Karmazin again made the case for the merger of his company and XM. But Peter Smyth, president of radio station owner Greater Media, wasn't buying the pledge of lower prices, saying "subscription prices will rise because there will be no competition to restrain monopoly rates," then, sounding like an anti-media consolidation activist, he added: "Jobs will be eliminated. Innovation will suffer. Neither listeners nor advertisers will benefit. Put simply -- private corporate interests will benefit, but the public will suffer." Gene Kimmelman of Consumers Union said the merger as advertised would not be in consumer's interest. He said that satellite radio was a distinct service, a mobile national offering, that broadcasters do not directly compete with. One legislator pointed out that Kimmelman had seen some "significant benefits" in the proposed merger of DirecTV and EchoStar in 2002 -- a merger that was found to be anticompetitive -- while he opposed outright the current satellite radio merger, not even proposing conditions on a possible merger. Kimmelman said the difference was that cable prices were going up three times the rate of inflation and that he was looking to satellite to be a governor on that price. By contrast, he said, "last time I looked, the price of free radio wasn't going up." He also said there had been a proposal of spectrum divestiture. He then suggested that if the combined companies wanted to divest some spectrum and combine into one service, that would be an interesting proposal.
http://www.broadcastingcable.com/article/CA6422600.html?display=Breaking...
* Karmazin Counters Character Qualification Criticisms
http://www.broadcastingcable.com/article/CA6422620.html?title=Article&sp...
* For more on the hearing see http://energycommerce.house.gov/cmte_mtgs/110-ti_hrg.030707.future_radio...
* Sirius-XM Merger
http://techdailydose.nationaljournal.com/2007/03/more_openers_siriusxm_m...
* Women & Minority-Owned Radio
http://techdailydose.nationaljournal.com/2007/03/openers_women_minorityo...
* XM, Sirius Pitch Merger to Hill
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/03/07/AR200703...
* New Net radio rules draw fire on Capitol Hill
Rep Ed Markey (D-MA) had harsh words for a ruling released Tuesday by the U.S. Copyright Royalty Board. It proposes raising the amount that commercial Internet radio services pay to record companies by 30 percent retroactively to 2006 and in each of the next three years through 2009. Each station would have to hand over a minimum $500 royalty payment.
http://news.com.com/New+Net+radio+rules+draw+fire+on+Capitol+Hill/2100-1...
* Markey Examines Radio Industry, Merger at Hearing
http://markey.house.gov/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=2660&I...
http://www.broadcastingcable.com/article/CA6422600.html?display=Breaking%20News
FCC MEETING ADDRESSES MEDIA, DIVERSITY
[SOURCE: The Repository (Canton, Ohio), AUTHOR: Paul Kostyu paul.kostyu@cantonrep.com]
Three of the five commissioners of the Federal Communications Commission heard this message over and over: Ohio's minority population is not being well-served by policies that allow consolidation of media. And two of the commissioners, Jonathan S. Adelstein and Michael J. Copps, agreed. They and fellow commissioner Robert M. McDowell attended a Columbus town meeting Wednesday night on the "Future of Media." Copps said the most important issue in America today is media ownership, because all other issues, such as education, health care, employment and the Iraq war, "filter through the funnel of the big media."
http://www.cantonrep.com/index.php?ID=340661
* FCC Commissioners Attend Media-Ownership Meeting in Ohio
http://www.broadcastingcable.com/article/CA6422700.html?display=Breaking...
* Columbus Speaks Out Against Consolidation
http://www.freepress.net/press/release.php?id=218
http://www.cantonrep.com/index.php?ID=340661
FCC EXTENDS COMMENT WINDOW FOR KTLA RENEWAL
[SOURCE: Broadcasting&Cable, AUTHOR: John Eggerton]
The FCC has given critics of, and commenters on, the license renewal of Tribune's KTLA Los Angeles a little more time to do both. Saying that "a full and complete record should be assembled with respect to the KTLA-TV license renewal application," the commission Wednesday said that it has opened a 30-day window for comments or petitions to deny the renewal. KTLA is owned by the Tribune Company which also owns the Los Angeles Times.
http://www.broadcastingcable.com/article/CA6422602.html?display=Breaking...
* FCC seeks more input on Tribune's media holdings
http://www.latimes.com/business/printedition/la-fi-waiver12mar12,1,92707...
(requires registration)
http://www.broadcastingcable.com/article/CA6422602.html?display=Breaking%20News
CHANGING TV ECONOMICS PROMPTS FRESH THINKING ABOUT PUBLIC AIRWAVES
[SOURCE: Seattle Times, AUTHOR: Alex Alben]
[Commentary] Shifting economics between the networks and their affiliates already reflect this: We increasingly live in an age in which producers of high-quality TV shows will go directly to the consumer to monetize their investment. This sea change in TV economics is occurring against the background of a mandatory review by the Federal Communications Commission of local TV station ownership rules and regulations. For example, the commission will consider lifting the ban against a newspaper also owning a TV station in its local market. Advocates of lifting the ban say that news quality will actually improve, if a local TV outlet can draw upon the depth and experience of local print reporters. Besides, the argument goes, in a world where people can go to the Internet any moment of the day to get news from sources around the world, the concept of maintaining independent control between territorial news outlets is outmoded. But local stations, after all, enjoy a government monopoly on a finite resource — the spectrum for VHF and UHF broadcast signals. To continue to enjoy their monopoly, local stations file simplified forms every few years when their FCC licenses come up for renewal. There are very few requirements to offer locally generated programming or even local news. Most stations make their money by inserting their local ads into reruns of "Seinfeld" and other secondhand programming. Local TV needs to do more than simply exist as an "over the airwaves" channel for the distribution of content available in other formats. Despite the changing economics of video distribution, is it really too much to ask that local stations address the informational interests of the people within the regions they are chartered to serve?
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/opinion/2003604342_alben07.html
Changing TV economics prompts fresh thinking about public airwaves
GOOGLE, INTEL, SKYPE AND YAHOO SEEK RULES FOR BIDDING ON BROADCAST FREQUENCIES
[SOURCE: Wired in Washington, AUTHOR: Drew Clark]
The country's two satellite television companies have joined forces with four major technology companies and a wireless company to promote the auction of frequencies currently used by television broadcasters. In a March 5 meeting at the Federal Communications Commission with FCC Commissioner Jonathan Adelstein, the tech companies  Google, Intel, Skype and Yahoo!  joined with Access Spectrum to promote their "Coalition for 4G in America." The engagement of Internet giants like Google and Yahoo!, which traditionally have not lobbied the FCC, suggests considerable interest by the technology industry in the upcoming auction, which is set to begin no later than January 28, 2008. In 2006, Congress fixed February 19, 2009, as the end-date for analog television, freeing a wide swath of radio-frequencies for use by new technologies. The frequencies to be made available at auction are in the 700 Megahertz (MHz) range, and are among the most desirable because they easily penetrate buildings and trees. Wireless communications using the WiFi wireless broadband standard currently takes place at 2.4 or 5.8 Gigahertz (GHz), frequencies that are much less desirable. Technology companies like Intel, Microsoft and Motorola played a key role in the lobbying campaign to put a fixed date on the digital television transition. The first priority of the group is to ensure that both the auction date and the digital television switchover date are not altered.
http://www.drewclark.com/2007/03/google-intel-skype-and-yahoo-seek-rules...
Google, Intel, Skype and Yahoo! Seek Rules for Bidding on Broadcast Frequencies
AFTER LIBBY TRIAL, NEW ERA FOR GOVERNMENT AND PRESS
[SOURCE: New York Times, AUTHOR: Adam Liptak]
The investigation and trial of I. Lewis Libby Jr., who was Vice President Dick Cheney’s chief of staff, will have many legacies and lessons — for government officials, for supporters and critics of special prosecutors and for historians of the events leading to the war in Iraq. But the institution most transformed by the prosecution, and the one that took the most collateral damage from Patrick J. Fitzgerald’s relentless pursuit of obstruction and perjury charges against Mr. Libby, may have been the press, forced in the end to play a major role in his trial. After Mr. Libby’s conviction Tuesday, it is possible to start assessing that damage to the legal protections available to the news organizations, to relationships between journalists and their sources and to the informal but longstanding understanding in Washington, now shattered, that leak investigations should be pressed only so hard. Ten out of 19 of the witnesses in Mr. Libby’s trial were journalists, a spectacle that would have been unthinkable only a few years ago.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/08/washington/08fitzgerald.html
(requires registration)
After Libby Trial, New Era for Government and Press
BIG PROFITS IN SMALL PACKAGES
[SOURCE: Washington Post, AUTHOR: Frank Ahrens]
If there's any good news about the businesses of newspapering these days, it can be found at the industry's littlest papers, which are doing well even as their bigger brothers founder. The average daily circulation of all U.S. newspapers has declined since 1987. The smallest papers, however -- community weeklies and dailies with circulation of less than 50,000 -- have been a bright spot in a darkened industry. As the Internet dramatically transforms the largest papers in the business -- siphoning classified advertising and commoditizing national news -- many small papers are weathering the decline with relative ease, and some are even prospering. Why? Small papers face less competition from other media outlets, are insulated from ad slumps that have hammered big papers, employ smaller staffs of lower-salaried journalists and have a zealous devotion to local news, both in print and online, industry experts agree. Also, there is less competition on the Web for local news.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/03/07/AR200703...
(requires registration)
Big Profits in Small Packages
OVERSIGHT QUESTIONS FOR NTIA
[SOURCE: House of Representatives Commerce Committee 3/6/2007]
On March 22, the House Commerce Committee will hold an oversight hearing on the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA). In preparation, Committee Chairman John Dingell (D-MI) and Telecom Subcommittee Chairman Ed Markey (D-MA) have sent a list to questions to NTIA head John Kneuer, asking him to respond before St Patrick's Day. Topics include: 1) efforts the NTIA has taken to achieve the President's goal of universal, affordable broadband by 2007; 2) Internet governance and security; and 3) minority media ownership.
http://energycommerce.house.gov/Press_110/110-ltr.030607.NTIA.Kneuer.pre...
Oversight Questions for NTIA