The Federal Communications Commission has considered four aspects of diversity: 1) Viewpoint diversity ensures that the public has access to a wide range of diverse and antagonistic opinions and interpretations provided by opportunities for varied groups, entities and individuals to participate in the different phases of the broadcast industry; 2) Outlet diversity is the control of media outlets by a variety of independent owners; 3) Source diversity ensures that the public has access to information and programming from multiple content providers; and 4) Program diversity refers to a variety of programming formats and content.
Diversity
Working Group Members Announced for FCC Diversity Council
Federal Communications Commission Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel has appointed the individuals listed here to serve as members of the three working groups of the Communications Equity and Diversity Council (CEDC). The working groups include members of the CEDC, additional working group members, and independent subject matter experts.
Native American Advocates Discuss Barriers to Broadband Before the Senate
A bevy of witnesses elucidated the longstanding challenges Native American communities face in overcoming the digital divide before the Senate Committee on Indian Affairs on January 12, calling attention to the inadequate basic telecommunications infrastructure.
Remote Work Policies Helped Twitter Boost Workforce Diversity
Twitter’s early shift to a “work from anywhere” model during the pandemic, as well as the implementation of a requirement to add more people of color to final job candidate slates, helped the social media company post significant gains in 2021 in hiring Black and Latinx employees.
Will government funding solve Washington's digital divide?
Living here in many tribal and rural parts of Washington state, even on the fringes of cities including Seattle, Spokane and Leavenworth, means it’s often difficult or impossible to connect to the online world. When the pandemic largely turned the online world into the world for many urbanites, hundreds of thousands of people in Washington were shut out. The federal government has spent billions trying to solve the digital divide — a project many say is as big and necessary as it once was to get electricity into every home — and is on the verge of spending more than ever.
Department of Commerce Invests $3.2 Million for Tribal Broadband Infrastructure in Montezuma County, Colorado
US Secretary of Commerce Gina Raimondo announced that the Department’s Economic Development Administration (EDA) is awarding a $3.2 million grant to the Ute Mountain Ute Tribe, Towaoc (CO) to construct broadband infrastructure. The project will provide high-speed internet service connecting the Ute Mountain Ute Indian Reservation and the city of Towaoc to the city of Cortez, increasing access to distance learning and telemedicine, supporting public safety, and allowing for business and entrepreneurial growth across the reservation and region.
NTIA Awards Additional $1 Million in Grants to Tribal Groups Seeking to Expand Broadband
The Department of Commerce’s National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) has awarded two additional grants as part of the Tribal Broadband Connectivity Program. These grants, totaling nearly $1 million, are being awarded to the Yavapai-Apache Nation in Arizona and the Lac Courte Oreilles (LCO) Band of Lake Superior Chippewa Indians in Wisconsin.
Care to confirm?
While the logjam of Biden administration nominees is slowly loosening, Democrats say that it’s not happening equitably. Progressive activists and party officials are accusing Republicans of disproportionately delaying women and nominees of color in their quest for confirmation to the executive branch. Jeff Hauser, the executive director of the Revolving Door Project, said, "There are some very slow nominations.
Smartphones Are a New Tax on the Poor
Science fiction author William Gibson famously said that the future is already here, it’s just not very evenly distributed. Smartphones and on-the-go internet access have made many of our working lives more efficient and flexible. But the requirement for constant connectivity isn’t only a fact of white-collar work—it has spread to workers up and down the income ladder. And while the requirement has spread, the resources that workers need to maintain it are not evenly distributed. More than a quarter of low-income Americans depend solely on their phones for internet access.
Rural online businesses expect a coming broadband boom
The $65 billion federal boost to expand broadband access in the US will be a boon to the women-run companies on platforms like Etsy and Airbnb, especially as they see an increase in rural businesses. Expanding high-speed internet access across the country will enable more women to participate in the online economy at a time when women
Digital Inequity Decreased by One-Third in 13 Months, Yet Black and Latinx Students Remain Disproportionately Impacted
From April 2020 to May 2021, the Public Policy Institute of California (PPIC), a Michelson Spark Grantee, studied the impact the COVID-19 pandemic had on digital inequity, particularly among school-age children in California. Researchers leveraged 2019 census data from over 35,000 households in California to establish the pre-COVID baseline as they considered how ethnic groups, income levels, educational attainment, and locality impacted device access and connectivity.