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Benton media news digest – May 2008

INTERNET/BROADBAND DOES THE US NEED A BROADBAND POLICY?
[SOURCE: InfoWorld, AUTHOR: Grant Gross]
Several groups in recent months have called for a wide-ranging US broadband policy, saying say the nation is falling behind others in key broadband statistics. Many groups have expressed concern that the U.S. continues to fall behind other nations in broadband adoption. The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) ranked the U.S. 15th among its 30 member nations in broadband adoption per capita as of December. One problem, however, is that the debate over broadband policy spills over into many issues, including concerns about a lack of competition and Network Neutrality. The call for a stronger broadband policy is far from unanimous. Broadband providers say they're spending billions of dollars a year to expand and improve their networks. And an FCC decision to deregulate telecom-based broadband providers, allowing them to stop sharing parts of their networks with competitors, is only three years old, others say. Critics of the FCC's deregulation approach say it has eliminated most competition. But deregulation is "really bearing fruit" and should be given more time to work, said Bret Swanson, senior fellow at the conservative think tank, the Progress and Freedom Foundation (PFF).
http://www.infoworld.com/article/08/05/23/Does-US-need-new-broadband-policy_1.html

CABLE PRICES KEEP RISING, AND CUSTOMERS KEEP PAYING
[SOURCE: New York Times, AUTHOR: Matt Richtel]
(5/24) Americans discouraged by higher gas prices and airline fares may decide to spend more vacation time at home, perhaps watching television. But that, too, will cost them more than ever. Cable prices have risen 77 percent since 1996, roughly double the rate of inflation, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported this month. Cable customers, who typically pay at least $60 a month, watch only a fraction of what they pay for — on average, a mere 13 percent of the 118 channels available to them. And the number of subscribers keeps growing. The resiliency of cable is all the more remarkable because the Internet was supposed to change all things digital. Technology has led to more choices and lower prices for news and music as well as cellphone and landline minutes — not to mention computers, cameras, music players and phones themselves.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/24/technology/24cable.html
(requires registration)

SUIT AGAINST YOUTUBE CALLED A THREAT TO THE FLOW OF INFORMATION ON THE WEB
[SOURCE: Associated Press, AUTHOR:]
A $1-billion copyright infringement lawsuit challenging YouTube's ability to keep copyrighted material off its popular video-sharing Internet website threatens how hundreds of millions of people exchange all kinds of information, YouTube owner Google said. Google's lawyers made the claim in papers filed in U.S. District Court in New York as the company responded to Viacom's latest lawsuit alleging that the Internet has led to "an explosion of copyright infringement" by YouTube and others. The back-and-forth between the companies has intensified since Viacom brought its lawsuit last year, saying it was owed damages for the unauthorized viewing of its programming from MTV, Comedy Central and other networks. In papers submitted to a judge late Friday, Google said YouTube "goes far beyond its legal obligations in assisting content owners to protect their works." It said that by seeking to make carriers and hosting providers liable for Internet communications, Viacom "threatens the way hundreds of millions of people legitimately exchange information, news, entertainment and political and artistic expression."
http://www.latimes.com/business/printedition/la-fi-youtube27-2008may27,0,3217201.story
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CABLE TV's DISASTER COVERAGE GETS LOW MARKS
[SOURCE: Reuters, AUTHOR: ]
Tens of thousands have died in the natural disasters in Myanmar and China, but the coverage has been fighting for airtime with Campaign 2008 on the U.S. cable news channels. The Pew Research Center for the People & the Press said Thursday that there was a fair amount of interest among Americans in the Chinese earthquake, about as much as the presidential campaign. But it accused cable news channels of devoting way more coverage to the politicians. A Pew survey of 1,000 adult Americans conducted last week said that 22 percent of Americans said they followed the earthquake more closely than any other news story during the week of May 12-18. It was slightly ahead of the percentage of Americans who closely followed the 2008 presidential campaign (20 percent) but nowhere near the top news story of the week, which was gasoline prices (31 percent). Yet the earthquake got 13 percent of news coverage for the week, compared with 37 percent for the campaign.
http://www.reuters.com/article/televisionNews/idUSN2629179720080527

WOMEN'S GROUP: NETWORK NEWS COVERAGE IS SEXIST
[SOURCE: Broadcasting&Cable, AUTHOR: John Eggerton]
The Women's Media Center (WMC) has launched a petition targeting what they say is sexist media coverage on the major cable news networks. The group, whose board includes Jane Fonda, Gloria Steinem and former PBS President and current Museum of Television & Radio President Pat Mitchell, combined the online petition with a YouTube video of news clips they posted, "Sexism Might Sell, But I'm Not Buying It!"
http://www.broadcastingcable.com/article/CA6563939.html?rssid=193

SPECTRUM/WIRELESS GOOGLE CO-FOUNDER PUSHES TV "WHITE SPACE" PLAN
[SOURCE: Reuters, AUTHOR: Peter Kaplan]
Google co-founder Larry Page was in Washington on Thursday to promote the company's proposal for a new generation of wireless devices to operate on soon-to-be-vacant television airwaves. Page was scheduled to meet with lawmakers in Congress and officials at the Federal Communications Commission hoping to convince them to allow the "white space" between television channels to be accessed by low-power wireless devices. Page highlighted the benefits of making more spectrum available, while downplaying opposition from broadcasters, and makers and users of wireless microphones, who fear the wireless devices would cause interference.
http://www.reuters.com/article/internetNews/idUSN2250113020080522

PHONE GIANT IN GERMANY STIRS A FUROR
[SOURCE: New York Times, AUTHOR: Mark Landler]
Germany was engulfed in a national furor over threats to privacy on Monday, after an admission by Deutsche Telekom that it had surreptitiously tracked thousands of phone calls to identify the source of leaks to the news media about its internal affairs. In a case that echoes the corporate spying scandal at Hewlett-Packard, Deutsche Telekom said there had been “severe and far-reaching” misuse of private data involving contacts between board members and reporters. The disclosure, which was prompted by a report on Saturday on the Web site of the news magazine Der Spiegel set off a storm of protest from privacy advocates, journalists, and labor representatives at the company. The German government, which effectively controls Deutsche Telekom through a 32 percent stake, demanded a thorough investigation, describing the spying operation as a “serious breach of trust.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/27/business/worldbusiness/27tapes.html?ref=todayspaper
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CHINA SHUFFLES TELECOMS, OPENING OPPORTUNITIES
[SOURCE: Wall Street Journal, AUTHOR: Jason Dean]
China unveiled plans for a long-awaited shake-up of its telecommunications sector that could enhance competition among its carriers and lead to billions of dollars in new contracts for global wireless-equipment companies. The restructuring, announced Saturday after years of preparation, will reshape China's telecom industry, one of the world's most lucrative with total revenue last year of 728 billion yuan ($104.9 billion). It will meld six main state-owned telecom companies into three full-service carriers offering fixed-line and wireless service nationwide. That will mean two more robust rivals for China Mobile Ltd., the world's biggest wireless carrier, with about 400 million subscriber accounts, which dominates its sole competitor. The plan was announced in a statement from three ministries posted on a government Web site. It gave no timetable for execution, saying only that the companies should "as quickly as possible" report detailed arrangements for carrying out the plan.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB121170876064020167.html?mod=todays_us_marketplace
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THE SAD STATE OF US BROADBAND
[SOURCE: BusinessWeek, AUTHOR: Catherine Holahan]
For the second year running, the U.S. ranked 15th among the 30 members of the Organization for Economic Cooperation & Development in terms of broadband availability. Denmark ranked first again in the annual OECD survey, followed by a host of European and Asian nations. Indeed, while the number of Americans with access to broadband service rose 20% last year, to nearly 70 million people, the most in the OECD, that amounted to just 23 of every 100 residents. By contrast, the top five countries in the OECD ranking all sport per-capita penetration rates of better than 30%. Why isn't the U.S. up to speed online? The Federal Communications Commission is quick to point out differences in population and geography that have made it more difficult for the nation to catch up with smaller countries. But challenges of wiring remote communities don't tell the whole story. The OECD also found that U.S. broadband providers charge more than those in many developed nations. Broken down by megabit per second of download speed, U.S. rates ranged from $2.83 to $38.41 in late 2007. Consumer advocacy groups blame what they see as a market with little competition. They say the ability of major telephone and cable operators, such as Verizon Communications, AT&T, Time Warner Cable, and Comcast, to dominate their markets without sharing their lines with rivals has kept out new competition, enabling the companies to keep prices high and investments in faster technologies low.
http://www.businessweek.com/technology/content/may2008/tc20080522_340989.htm?campaign_id=rss_tech

FTC WANTS TO KNOW WHAT BIG BROTHER KNOWS ABOUT YOU
[SOURCE: Washington Post, AUTHOR: Peter Whoriskey]
The growing practice of "behavioral targeting," or sending ads to online users based on their Internet habits, is now under scrutiny by the Federal Trade Commission, whose review could shape not only Web advertising rules but the character of the Web itself. For while public interest groups argue that compiling profiles of largely unsuspecting Internet users ought to be illegal, online advertisers and publishers respond that their ad targeting tactics protect privacy and may be essential to support the free content on the Web. Behavioral targeting allows many Web sites to raise ad prices, because advertisers will pay more when they can isolate a particular audience. Limiting behavioral targeting could "jeopardize the consumer's ability to get free content on the Internet," said Paul Boyle of the Newspaper Association of America, a trade group that represents the business interests of most U.S. dailies, including The Washington Post. The FTC is considering guidelines, for now voluntary, that would make it harder to target behavior. The principles were issued in December after town hall meetings, and the public comment period ended last month. As the commission's deliberations begin, some federal and state lawmakers are weighing measures that would be mandatory. New York lawmakers, for example, are considering a law similar to the FTC guidelines.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/05/21/AR2008052102989.html
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WHAT MICROSOFT'S BLOCK OF 'AMERICAN GLADIATORS' TEACHES US
[SOURCE: C-Net|News.com, AUTHOR: Greg Sandoval]
Users of Windows Media Centers who were blocked from recording two NBC shows last week are eager to learn why Microsoft is taking marching orders from broadcasters. Microsoft is soon expected to explain why it inserted technology into Vista that blocked digital TV viewers from recording their favorite shows. Their current excuse--that Microsoft adheres to regulations proposed by the Federal Communications Commission--makes little sense, as the only rules on controlling recording from broadcast TV were struck down by the courts in 2005.
http://news.cnet.com/8301-10784_3-9950082-7.html?tag=nefd.lede

THE CASE OF THE MISSING iPHONE: WHY OPEN NETWORKS WOULD BENEFIT RURAL CONSUMERS
[SOURCE: Public Knowledge, AUTHOR: Mehan Jayasuriya] [Commentary]
Apple’s iPhone, being sold as it is through exclusive deals with wireless carriers, is currently only available in the US, UK, France, Germany and Austria. While plenty of folks outside of those countries would love to buy an iPhone, they can't -- at least, not without modifying the device’s firmware and violating Apple’s end user license agreement. Fortunately, it looks like the iPhone is set to become a truly global phenomenon next month. According to carrier announcements, rumors and speculation, the second-generation iPhone may launch simultaneously in as many as 42 countries worldwide. That means that the device will finally be available in Asia, Australia, Africa, Latin America, Canada and previously unserved markets in Europe. Will there be any corner of the globe left untouched by the iPhone? Sure—just try the faraway locales known as Alaska, Vermont and Arizona.
http://www.publicknowledge.org/node/1586

MOBILE SUBSCRIBERS REALLY DO WANT CHOICE
[SOURCE: C-Net|News.com, AUTHOR: Marguerite Reardon]
Consumers want more choice when it comes to mobile phone service. At least that's the big conclusion from a consumer survey published Wednesday by IBM's Institute for Business Value. According to the report, 80 percent of consumers said they'd prefer a service provider that gave them more choice in the applications and services available on their mobile device. The results of this survey shouldn't come as a shock to anyone in the industry. As more people use the mobile Internet, they expect to have the same freedom to access applications that they can get on their PCs at home. Imagine the outrage if Internet service providers like AT&T or Comcast told a broadband customer that they couldn't access Facebook or download a Skype client? They'd be outraged.
http://news.cnet.com/8301-10784_3-9950016-7.html?part=rss&subj=news&tag=2547-1_3-0-5

STATES RACE TO WOO TV AND FILM
[SOURCE: Wall Street Journal, AUTHOR: Peter Sanders]
An arms race has broken out among states hoping to lure big-budget movie and television productions with financial incentives. In the past month and a half, at least four states -- Georgia, New York, Mississippi and Michigan -- have increased the scope of tax credits, cash rebates and other incentives to encourage spending money in the state and hiring local workers. They are competing with nearly 40 other states and U.S. territories that have incentive programs on the books, some with established film- and TV-production infrastructure, including New Mexico, Texas, Louisiana and Pennsylvania. California, Hollywood's home state, offers no incentives to producers despite several efforts in the state legislature. Concerns about "runaway production" cropped up again this spring when the producers of ABC's TV hit "Ugly Betty" decided to move production to New York from Los Angeles. New York recently sweetened incentives so that producers can receive back up to 30% of their production expenses via a tax credit, or 35% of expenses in New York City.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB121141287312512425.html?mod=todays_us_page_one (requires subscription)

HILLARY CLINTON HITS 'SEXISM' IN MEDIA COVERAGE -- SAYS GENDER BIGGER DRAWBACK THAN RACE
[SOURCE: Editor&Publisher, AUTHOR: ]
Hillary Clinton hit "sexism" in media coverage of her campaign as "deeply offensive to millions of women." She criticized "misogynists" and said that the race factor was often discussed but not gender: "[E]very poll I've seen show more people would be reluctant to vote for a woman to vote for an African American, which rarely gets reported on either." She said her treatment by the media has "been deeply offensive to millions of women. ... I believe this campaign has been a ground breaker in lots of ways, but it certainly has been challenging given some of the attitudes that have been forthcoming in the press, and I regret that because I think it's been really not worthy of the seriousness of this campaign and the historical nature of the two candidacies that we have here."
http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1003805819

THE PRESS CORPS' UNSHAKEABLE CRUSH ON MCCAIN
[SOURCE: Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting, AUTHOR: Peter Hart]
If you pay even passing attention to national politics, you know that presumptive GOP presidential candidate John McCain is a maverick who bucks his own party’s line and never wavers in his political beliefs. At least, that’s what the corporate media say—reality tells a very different story. A candidate could only get away with such an elaborate and long-running con with the media as willing accomplices. “The press loves McCain,” explained NBC host Chris Matthews (9/10/06). “We’re his base.” For much of the press, the early stages of the 2008 presidential campaign were a chance to fall in love all over again. “Those of us on the Straight Talk Express eight years ago got a breathtaking journalistic opportunity: to be inside the lively mind and heart of a leading contender for president,” Newsweek’s Howard Fineman recalled (3/3/08). “McCain was as joyously combative as Popeye and as earnestly confessional as Oprah.” Fineman was actually restrained when compared to some of the coverage from eight years prior. “I know it shouldn't be happening, but it is,” wrote Charles Lane in the New Republic (10/18/99). “I'm falling for John McCain.” Lane’s confession was in turn surpassed in awkwardness by another writer in the same magazine: Michael Lewis (9/30/96) declared that his feelings for McCain were like “the war that must occur inside a 14-year-old boy who discovers he is more sexually attracted to boys than to girls.”
http://www.fair.org/index.php?page=3369

SENATORS WEIGH NEW LAWS OVER CHINA ONLINE CENSORSHIP
[SOURCE: C-Net|News.com, AUTHOR: Anne Broache]
Senators on Tuesday pressed executives from Yahoo, Google, and Cisco Systems to justify their business practices in China and other Internet-censoring countries, with Cisco in the hot seat over new allegations of cozier-than-confessed ties with the Chinese police. Sen Richard Durbin (D-IL), who led the morning hearing in the Senate Judiciary Committee's human rights panel, said he is actively considering whether to draft new legislation that, similar to a pending House of Representatives proposal, would place a host of new restrictions on American companies doing business in Internet-restricting countries. Sen Durbin said he appreciates the efforts of American companies to promote free expression in otherwise oppressive countries but believes some are falling short on those pledges. "Perhaps it's time for Congress to consider converting this moral obligation into a legal obligation," he said. Still, the event lacked the pervasive finger pointing and name calling that punctuated two previous hearings about similar topics in the House of Representatives during the past two years.
http://www.news.com/8301-10784_3-9948331-7.html

A DISCOMFITING THREAT TO FREE SPEECH
[SOURCE: New York Times, AUTHOR: Editorial staff] [Commentary]
The Supreme Court upheld a law on Monday that sweeps too broadly in its attempt to ban child pornography, which is repellent and illegal. Those who traffic in it must be punished, but this law is drawn in a way that also criminalizes speech that should be protected by the First Amendment. The dissenters are right that the court should have made Congress go back and pass a more carefully written law. They are also right that the court’s analysis undermines protections for political speech.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/21/opinion/21wed2.html?ref=todayspaper (requires registration)

CDT: GLOBAL INTERNET FREEDOM SHOULD BE TOP HUMAN RIGHTS AND FOREIGN POLICY PRIORITY
[SOURCE: Center for Democracy and Technology, AUTHOR: ]
The Congress and Administration should make global Internet freedom a top human rights and foreign policy priority, CDT said today in testimony submitted to the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Human Right and the Law. The government should closely monitor and report on global Internet freedom and factor progress in this area into criteria for development assistance and conditions for trade agreements. CDT also called for greater cooperation between the U.S. government and the technology industry to better manage human rights risks associated with offering Internet services in repressive countries.
http://cdt.org/testimony/20080520harris.pdf

CANADIAN INTERNET REGULATION
[SOURCE: The Toronto Star, AUTHOR: Chris Sorensen]
The Canadian Radio-television Telecommunications Commission, Canada's broadcast watchdog, will hold public hearings next year into the thorny question of extending its purview to the Internet, a medium that it deemed a regulatory-free zone nearly a decade ago. The CRTC released a final, 75-page report that summarizes research and stakeholder opinion on a wide range of issues, including Canadian content that's broadcast online or mobile devices, and the recent debate over Internet Service Providers who deliberately slow certain types of Internet traffic. The report, a draft version of which was first revealed in March, was created amid pressure from some Canadian content creators who are concerned their work is increasingly being broadcast on the Internet, where it is free from regulatory oversight. Among the more controversial proposals are raising a levy on Internet Service Providers to pay for the creation of new media content. The public is also invited to comment on the issues at
http://crtc.newmedia.econsultation.ca
until June 15. Also, a group of Internet service providers that resell bandwidth on Bell Canada's network has lost a temporary bid to shelter their subscribers from the phone company's practice of slowing down certain types of Internet traffic. The CRTC turned down the Canadian Association of Internet Providers' request for an injunction, saying the group failed to demonstrate its members are being harmed by Bell's efforts to "shape" the Internet traffic of its wholesale clients. CRTC mailed out a set of questions to Bell Canada asking the company to explain exactly how and why it decided to slow down certain file-sharing traffic on wholesale networks it leases to smaller independent Internet service providers. Traffic shaping generally refers to the use of special software to sniff out and slow down data packets associated with bandwidth-intensive services such as file sharing.
http://www.benton.org/node/11042

NEW STUDY CALLS 'EMBED' PROGRAM FOR US MEDIA IN IRAQ A 'VICTORY' -- FOR THE PENTAGON
[SOURCE: Editor&Publisher, AUTHOR: Greg Mitchell]
Debate over the "embedded journalist" program run by the Pentagon since the weeks before the Iraq invasion in 2003 has long raged, with some claiming that it gave reporters valuable close access to action while others saying that the journalists were severely compromised within it. Now sociologist Andrew M. Lindner, writing in the spring issue of the American Sociological Association's "Context" magazine describes what is billed as the only sociological study to date of the substantive content of media coverage during the first six weeks of the Iraq war. Lindner found that journalists embedded with American troops emphasized military successes more often than they covered consequences for Iraqi citizens. "The embedded program proved to be a Pentagon victory because it kept reporters focused on the horrors facing the troops, not the horrors of the civilian war experience," wrote Lindner, who is completing his doctoral dissertation at Penn State University. "The end result: a communications victory for an administration that hoped to build support for the war by depicting it as a successful mission with limited cost." Lindner's conclusions are the result of a content analysis of 742 news articles written by 156 English-language print reporters in Iraq during the first six weeks of the war.
http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1003803787

A SURFEIT OF NETWORK-NEUTRALITY LEGISLATION
[SOURCE: ComputerWorld, AUTHOR: Scott Bradner] [Commentary]
Largely due to the continued dumb statements and actions of a few apparently PR-challenged carriers, the Network Neutrality issue is alive and well in the U.S. Since any issue like this seems to create a legislative void that must be filled, we now have at least two Network Neutrality-related bills for Congress to consider. If one liked legislation-based solutions, merging these bills and tossing out a bit of Federal Communications Commission make-work would not be too bad, but there would still be some questions left unanswered.
http://www.computerworld.com/action/article.do?command=viewArticleBasic&articleId=9085519&source=rss_news50

AFRICA MAKING PROGRESS IN INTERNET ACCESS
[SOURCE: Reuters, AUTHOR: Niclas Mika]
Improving Internet access in Africa is a fight on several fronts -- building undersea cables, setting up regional exchanges and bridging the last mile to homes and businesses -- but the continent is making progress. For example, Africa's mobile industry is booming -- subscribers grew by 33 percent over the past year -- and carriers say they will invest $50 billion over five years to boost cellphone coverage. But more than 300 million people in rural parts of Africa are not yet covered by any mobile phone network, let alone one that would support Internet access, and the continent has only 35 million fixed telephone lines for almost a billion people.
http://www.reuters.com/article/internetNews/idUSL1477680420080514
* Africans change the face of mobility (InfoWorld)
http://www.infoworld.com/article/08/05/14/Africans-change-the-face-of-mobility_1.html

ACTORS DON'T WANT TO LOSE GRIP ON WEB CLIPS
[SOURCE: Los Angeles Times, AUTHOR: Richard Verrier]
Few things are more precious to actors than control over their images. A stark reminder of that came last week when the studios suspended contract talks with the Screen Actors Guild after three weeks of negotiations. A cause for the logjam: Actors balked at a studio proposal that would allow the studios to sell or license excerpts of TV shows and movies for use on the Internet, cellphones and other new-media devices -- without the actors' consent. "As an actor you want to control how your image is used and how studios get to exploit it," SAG President Alan Rosenberg said. "We can't erase 50 years of protections that we've had for our members." Studios counter that the decades-old consent requirement -- which gives actors a say over whether their images can be reused in a clip on another television show or film -- would tie their hands as they seek new ways to exploit their vast libraries on the Web and tap into a growing appetite among younger consumers for short-form entertainment.
http://www.latimes.com/business/printedition/la-fi-clips15-2008may15,0,44967.story
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Communications-Related Headlines are compiled, summarized and edited by Rachel Anderson (rachel@benton.org), Andy Carvin (andy@benton.org) and Charles Meisch (charlie@benton.org) of the Benton Foundation -- we welcome your feedback. Based in Washington DC, the Benton Foundation's mission is to articulate a public interest vision for the digital age and demonstrate the value of communications for solving social problems. Other projects at Benton include:
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