Seattle Times

When Seattle librarians visited the gated cluster of tents and tiny houses that make up Camp Second Chance in White Center, they brought Star Wars comics, Dean Koontz books and Jon Krakauer’s “Into the Wild” for homeless campers to check out. But the most popular item was­n’t a book. It was a Wi-Fi hotspot in a lockbox with a combination.

Seattle (WA) Mayor Ed Murray has directed that curbs be imposed on internet providers to protect customers’ data privacy. Under a new rule scheduled to take effect May 24, the three companies that have cable franchise agreements with the city must get customer permission if they want to sell personal information or web browsing details.

The city privacy protections come after President Donald Trump signed a bill in April rolling back upcoming federal measures that would have stopped internet companies from collecting and selling customer information without permission. “Where the Trump administration continues to roll back critical consumer protections, Seattle will act,” Murray said.

Washington State Sen Don Benton (R-Vancouver) is weighing a new “litter fee” that would apply only to The Columbian and cost the newspaper $150,000 a year. The Columbian reports the fee is one of several ideas floated by Benton’s environmental services department to pay for a costly settlement the county incurred for violations of the Clean Water Act. Other options include fee increases to homeowners and owners of private roads. The $150,000 annual fee would apply to “daily newspapers that are produced and distributed in Clark County with a circulation of more than 28,500. Only The Columbian meets those parameters,” the paper notes. Sen Benton claimed the newspaper is among the “top five” polluters, but the county’s public works director told the Columbian he wasn’t aware of newspapers being a problem. The city attorney added the litter fee may not be legal.

[Commentary] Five months into his term, Federal Communications Commission Chairman Tom Wheeler has arrived at a critical juncture. The proposed Comcast-Time Warner merger, a court’s rejection of the FCC’s network neutrality rules and the looming deadline for the commission’s media-ownership review provide an opportunity for Wheeler and the commission to begin reshaping our media landscape.

That landscape, now dominated by a few large players, needs to reflect the dynamism and vibrancy of our nation’s diverse multitudes. Here are some ideas on how the FCC should proceed:

• Say no to the outrageous Comcast-Time Warner Cable deal. We need more competition, not less, in the cable and broadband industries. This merger isn’t the way to deliver it.
• Answer the US Court of Appeals decision that struck down its open Internet, aka net neutrality, rules with a set of new rules that guarantee it -- this time in a way that will pass muster in the courts.
• Resist pressures to leave loopholes open and further relax media-ownership rules. If it permits a few billionaire moguls to monopolize the airwaves, the commission will do the nation a tremendous disservice.
• Take a hard, new look at what is keeping African-American, Hispanic and other minority entrepreneurs and women out of broadcasting and what help is needed for media to better reflect the diversity of the country

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[Copps was a Federal Communications Commissioner from 2001 to 2011 and currently heads the Media & Democracy Reform Initiative at Common Cause, a nonpartisan nonprofit in Washington, DC]