An Open Knowledge Base for the National Broadband Project

With the death of the last year's video franchising-Net neutrality bill, Democrats have now firmly taken the reins on telecommunications policy in Congress. Senate Commerce Committee Chairman Daniel Inouye, D-Hawaii., has legislation designed to map out the availability of broadband, or high-speed Internet connections, in the United States, and it passed out of committee on July 19. Now, this week, Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., announced an online effort to write national broadband strategy legislation. He will joined by several telecommunications and Internet experts in open-comment blogging sessions for four nights from July 24 - 27 at OpenLeft.com. Durbin says he will be crafting legislation based on the input he gets during those sessions. He will then post drafts of that legislation online for more feedback before filing it as a bill.

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URL: http://www.drewclark.com/2007/07/open-knowledge-base-for-national.shtml

and

http://www.publicintegrity.org/telecom/telecomwatch.aspx?eid=2982

Back to the Paper Bag

By Drew Clark

The National Association of Broadcasters likes to think of itself as the king of Capitol Hill. It carefully cultivates an invincible image. And some in the mainstream media buy it. The New York Times describes NAB as “the powerful trade lobby.” But in truth, right now television and radio broadcasters have never been weaker than in 1982, when Sen. Bob Packwood, R-Ore., uttered these famous words: “The NAB can’t lobby its way out of a paper bag.”

Over the last 10 years, the NAB spent $55 million in lobbying expenditures – more than any other association – to disprove Packwood’s hypothesis. But still, the association is now getting hit on all sides. On radio, this year NAB is battling the proposed merger of XM Satellite Radio and Sirius Satellite Radio. Besting such a merger would normally be easy – if NAB hadn’t been arguing for the opposite of what it now seeks. And last month an alliance of performers and recording companies called MusicFirst decided to strike for a performance royalty from over-the-air radio stations. American copyright law exempts terrestrial broadcasters from paying for performances.

But the biggest deal is now heading into the spotlight: vacant television channels known as “white spaces.” Everyone covets them: technology companies like Dell, Google, Intel and Microsoft, wireless carriers like Sprint-Nextel, advocates for rural broadband, and non-profit spectrum utopians who look at white spaces and see decentralized community networks.

Consider what the 700 Megahertz (MHz) brouhaha is all about. There, about 60 MHz of choice beachfront property will go on sale by January 2008. There is buzz about who will bid – even if the Federal Communications Commission decides to endorse the plan put forward by Frontline Wireless, which it probably hasn’t. FCC Chairman Kevin Martin has already gotten great press out of less-than-complete open access plan.

But the reason we’re even having this discussion is because the broadcasters lost the spectrum wars – or at least the first spectrum war of the 21^st Century. In early 2006, Congress said enough: broadcasters weren’t effectively using channels 52 to 69, and certainly wouldn’t need them after the transition to digital television (DTV) was completed. Television stations will be forced off those channels, corresponding to 698-806 MHz, on February 17, 2009.

That’s 700 MHz. But what about 500 MHz and 600 MHz? All told, there are 294 MHz of frequencies that broadcasters will continue to occupy ever after the DTV switchover. If more than 85 percent of Americans receive television from cable or satellite, as they do, what sense does it make to reserve these choice frequencies for broadcasters’ exclusive use?

Not very much. And that’s where the advocates of white spaces make their entry. A look at the broadcast band for the ZIP code 20006 demonstrates that no more than four of the 21 channels between 30 and 50 are occupied: 32, 45, 47 and 50. That leaves 17 available as white spaces. The channel numbers vary from city to city, and will likely change with the DTV transition. Still, there’s still going to be a lot of unused real estate in the sky.

The coalition of techies wants to open them up for wireless broadband devices capable of “sensing” the local broadcast signals. When vacant, they would transmit data over the vacant channels. Microsoft and Philips Electronics have both presented the FCC with prototypes of such devices.

But the broadcasters are fighting back, and their coalition, including Walt Disney, E.W. Scripps, and Hubard Broadcasting, has been making the lobbying rounds at the FCC to complain that these devices would cause digital TVs to go dark. But this battle won’t be decided at the FCC. Chairman Kevin Martin refused to have anything to do with white spaces until Congress – both Republicans and Democrats – made it clear it wanted him to proceed.

Putting the broadcasters’ arguments about interference aside, are white spaces a good idea? In pure Washington fashion, the answer depends on how you see the NAB’s future strength. White spaces makes the most sense if you still believe that broadcasters treat the airwaves the way Texans treat the Alamo. But for those who believe that the NAB is amenable to reason, and economic incentives, here’s the next puzzle: what will it take to entice broadcasters to sell, give up or vacate the remaining airwaves? There are plenty of telcos, techies, and community activists that believe they can do better with them. All they need now is a game plan to help the broadcasters out of their paper bag.

This column originally appeared on the blog "TelMeTech: The Politics of Telecom, Media and Technology." URL: http://www.telmetech.com/2007/07/back-to-paper-bag.html

FTC Report on Broadband Resurrects Freedom of Service Information

By Drew Clark

WASHINGTON, July 3, 2007 – The Federal Trade Commission intends to monitor the information that telecom and cable companies provide about high-speed Internet service in the service plans they offer to customers, according to a report issued last week by the agency.

The FTC asserts in the report, released on June 27, that since it has jurisdiction over matters involving consumer protection, it "will continue to enforce the consumer protection laws in the area of broadband access."

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URL: http://www.publicintegrity.org/telecom/telecomwatch.aspx?eid=2977

Corporate Blogs: The New Editorial Page?

Google's public policy shop today officially joined the blogosphere, joining Cisco (February 4, 2005), Global Crossing (November 7, 2005), and Verizon Communications (October 2, 2006), each of which already have corporate policy blogs. The maiden post, by Andrew McLaughlin, Google's director of public policy and government affairs, promises "public policy advocacy in a Googley way." It's one in which users will "be part of the effort" to help "refine and improve" the company's policy positions. The blog already has 12 posts, done during the company's internal test. The most recent – which I suspect provided the occasion to officially launch the blog – is a short summary of the official Google position on network neutrality.

McLaughlin stoked controversy among bloggers (including this one) when in February he publicly suggested that it would be OK for broadband providers to charge other companies for quality-of-service guarantees "as long as it is done in a non-discriminatory way." The Internet search company went all-out to put out that fire, insisting that it hadn't changing its position on the hot-button telecom subject.

For the record, the Google blog states that the company's official position is that prioritizing all applications of a certain type, like streaming video, is OK. By contrast, prioritization of packet delivery based on the ownership or affiliation of the content – and charging a third party – is not OK.

The Google Policy blog already has some criticism from its co-corporate policy bloggers, including Verizon and Cisco. Incidentally, the companies disagree with Google on Net neutrality. Verizon's John Czwartacki says:

So I opened Wikipedia and learned that in Cricket a "googly" is a trick pitch, essentially a spinning curve ball designed to fool the batter or wicket guy or whatever he's called in Cricket.

So to prevent the tragically creative from accusing your Googley blog of also being "googly," I'd parse out that term carefully.

Cisco's John Earnhardt urges tells McLaughlin to:

Aim low…. Your stated goals are very high, and that is to be commended, but it is an awful lot of pressure to put on a blog...and your team.

For me, the most noteworthy part of the Google policy blog so far is its collection of videos of visits by presidential candidates – Hillary Clinton, John Edwards, John McCain and Bill Richardson – that have traipsed out to the Googleplex in less than four months. Hmm… I wonder if The New York Times editorial page, or CBS, can boast that kind of traction?

Drew Clark Participating in Aspen Institute Roundtable on Spectrum Policy

Broadband is in the air, so to speak, and I'll have a chance to weigh in at the Aspen Institute Communications Policy Project's annual roundtable on spectrum policy on Thursday and Friday, May 17 and 18, in Queenstown, Maryland.

With increasing talk of broadband, including a national broadband policy, this brief conference of the Aspen Institute is sure to focus on some of the current controversies around the 700 Megahertz (MHz) spectrum auctions, which must take place by January 2008. These frequencies, which are considered to have some of the best propagation characteristic in the airwaves, are currently being used by television broadcasters. But with broadcasters vacating that portion of the spectrum, the FCC is currently wrestling with some big questions about how to structure the auctions for the 700 MHz zone.

Our readings include "What is Broadband Good For," by Susan Crawford, "Reforming Spectrum Policy and Expanding Wireless Broadband Access," by John Peha, and "Spectrum Sharing and Spectrum Efficiency," by Ellen Goodman. I'm looking forward to a stimulating debate!