Apologies, but I’m going to be a bit brief tonight. I have a lot going on this week, and starting Tech at Night at midnight my time just isn’t good. Sorry!
Chuck Grassley’s continuing the fight against the runaway FCC, leaving open the option of continuing after initial investigations. Good on him. Don’t foreclose options needlessly.
But even as Republicans attempt to keep government from being a problem, the administration is trying to keep pesky job creation from popping up. Merger review has become a monster. So have the ever-multiplying facets of spectrum review.
The more the administration does, the more we need Congressional oversight.
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I know, I know. The way that broadcasts travel across state lines, it’s important that some sort of national control step in, because the states can’t do it. But the way the Obama FCC operates, sometimes I wonder if it’s worth all the trouble.
Instead of working to ensure we have the spectrum we need allocated to the purposes we want, The Obama FCC constantly works as a roadblock, earlier against AT&T, and now against Verizon.
This same FCC is also, with apparently no objection from the President, actively and openly stonewalling Chuck Grassley and the Senate in attempts at applying reasonable oversight to the committee.
The FCC has too many secrets and tries to make too many decisions over the private sector. We have to fix this.
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Special Tuesday edition! Having been very busy hitting a launch window for a client, I had to skip Friday and Monday. So to make up for it, this week I start on Tuesday.
Riddle me this: FCC refuses to be transparent about its dealings with LightSquared (who by the way just changed CEOs, as the firm continues to flail desperately in response to the FCC’s LTE refusal), but FCC wants broadcasters to put files online. I’m with Richard Burr: Let’s look closer at that plan before we let FCC go ahead with it.
And speaking of the un-transparent FCC, Democrats are trying to talk down Chuck Grassley over his insistence on transparency, but have no fear: the House is now on the case.
The insistence by both the FCC and by LightSquared that no information be turned over to Chuck Grassley is itself suspicious. More investigation is essential.
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FCC overreach doesn’t seem like it should be a new topic, but it actually is. Consider that the FCC is threatening to get into cybersecurity which is interesting since the Congress is working on it. FCC wants to get into campaign finance regulation. And it’s unclear whether the FCC would enforce White House calls for new privacy regulations.
The runaway FCC to me is the biggest reason to fear UN regulation of the Internet. A treaty would give the Barack Obama FCC an excuse.
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The big stories this week continue to be LightSquared and cybersecurity. Even as House Democrats complain about government doing too much, incredibly, we see that Senate Democrats are so inflexible that John McCain is in a gang of Republicans to fight the Democrats on the cybersecurity bill. Consider that. That’s how extreme Harry Reid, Joe Lieberman, Jay Rockefeller, and Susan Collins are on this. John McCain is putting together a team to make a Republican bill with Kay Bailey Hutchison and others, rather than sign on with a Democrat on a bill. Danger, Will Robinson! Harry Reid is that much of an extremist!
Reid is rushing to pass it, but details come out anyway, such as an attack on FOIA. Transparency! Not.
Speaking of transparency, the firm that the Barack Obama FCC has remained oddly silent on, and that insists the FCC should remain silent on, is ready to go on the offensive. It almost seems like LightSquared bet the company on this, and will go down swinging. They may end up making a spectrum trade though, which if workable would be interesting.
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I meant to talk about the cybersecurity bill on Monday as it’s a big story. But, it’s gotten even bigger since. You see, a broad spectrum of Republicans is coming out against it. Names like Kay Bailey Hutchison, John McCain, Mike Enzi, Saxby Chambliss, Jeff Sessions, and even Lisa Murkowski are against the crazy Rush Harry Reid and the Democrats are putting on the bill pushed by Joe Lieberman, Jay Rockefeller, and Susan Collins.
And they’re right to oppose it. The case is overblown, and even if they claim the Internet Kill Switch is gone, it’s still a power grab. We’re at the point where Dianne Feinstein is a voice of reason, as she promotes voluntary data sharing, a plan Tech at Night has previously supported when also proposed by Dan Lungren in the House. Yeah, seriously. If you know California political history you know how funny it is that Republican Lungren and Democrat Feinstein now have another thing in common. But I think they’re both right on this. The way we’ll get more secure is to share more data and to prosecute the offenders.
In other major news, the FCC has rejected LightSquared’s proposal to build a terrestrial wireless LTE network.
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Yes, we beat SOPA, but the problem of foreign infringers is still around. And we’re not just talking about online copyright infringement, either. Copies of clothing, purses, gadgets, you name it: foreign free riders are a problem. It’s an important tradeoff to find, so an open process for the Darrell Issa OPEN Act is a good one. A slow, consensus-based approach is also smart, so I’m glad consensus is what Eric Cantor and John Boehner are demanding from a bill on this topic.
The alternative is picking winners and losers. That’s not good for government to do, even if it’s been a problem for a long time, to the annoyance of Frédéric Bastiat.
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Sometimes, the anarchists lose. Even in leftist Sweden, The Pirate Bay’s founders lost their last appeal. It’s guys like these, who deliberately put up a system for infringing on US copyrights while playing word games to justify it, that motivated SOPA and that drive the desire for a treaty like ACTA.
Google considers its privacy changes a public policy issue as the firm is getting plenty of criticism. This suggests to me they believe the critics won’t actually stop using Google services like Gmail, but will rather try for government regulation.
Considering Google is implementing a censorship plan much like that Twitter recently announced, and yet you don’t really see the same angry protestors saying they’ll quit using Google services in protest, that did a “Twitter blackout,” I think Google’s right that nobody will quit them over any of this. Hey, people: If you don’t like Google, use somebody else. It’s not that hard.
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So, Google is integrating its websites more. As a result, some privacy settings will apply network-wide, and one site will be able to use data from another site. People are flipping out, naturally. People have been giving Google this data for ages. People have known that Google was watching them, and yet they chose to keep using Google and in fact use one account for many Google services.
Note that the new policy changes nothing about what Google already knew about you. It just changes what certain Google sites will use about you. As Marsha Blackburn and other members of Congress begin to look into it though, Google isn’t helping its case by pleading that it’s alright because certain users are excluded, which just furthers the premise that there’s something wrong with it.
But ultimately, you’re in control of what you do online. Personal responsibility: it’s not just for breakfast anymore.
I feel vindicated though in having about a dozen Google accounts for the limited times I had use for their services, usual in the course of helping somebody else. Different accounts for different uses and different sites. It was never hard. You just had to do it. Oh, and not use their email.
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Some are still worried about the Megaupload takedown (including many the Obama got the concept right when he said “It’s not right when another country lets our movies, music, and software be pirated.” Foreign countries should not be allowed to be free riders on American copyright.
So I’m glad to hear that Patrick Leahy is open to SOPA alternatives such as the Ron Wyden/Darrell Issa OPEN Act. Follow the money. If money can’t be made from Americans by selling infringing materials back to Americans, then property rights win the day. And we can achieve that goal without censorship.
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