Subject: [Benton's Communications-related Headlines] July 18, 2007 (Kid ads; Net Neutrality; Dow Jones Deal)

From: Kevin Taglang <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 18 Jul 2007 06:44:54 -0500

BENTON'S COMMUNICATIONS-RELATED HEADLINES for WEDNESDAY JULY 18, 2007

CHILDREN & MEDIA
	Limiting Ads of Junk Food to Children

INTERNET/BROADBAND
	Hundreds weigh in on net neutrality
	Make free wi-fi truly free
	Study: Broadband Viewing Up, But Not Affecting TV
	On the Internet, everyone may find you're a dog

OWNERSHIP
	Regulators Urge Minority Tax Credit Plan
	Dow Jones Board Reaches Deal With Murdoch

BROADCASTING
	Cable Blasts Dual Must-Carry at FCC
	U.S. radio hopes politics, advertisers boost 2008
	Back to the Paper Bag

GOVERNMENT & COMMUNICATIONS
	Freedom of Information delays drag on for year

TELECOM
	Costly calls

CHILDREN & MEDIA

LIMITING ADS OF JUNK FOOD TO CHILDREN
[SOURCE: New York Times, AUTHOR: Brooks Barnes]
Trying to persuade critics the industry does not 
need government regulation, 11 big food 
companies, including McDonald’s, Campbell Soup 
and PepsiCo, have agreed to stop advertising to 
children under 12 products that do not meet 
certain nutritional standards. Some of the 
companies, like Coca-Cola, have already withdrawn 
all such commercials or are in the process of 
doing so. Others, like General Mills, said they 
would withdraw them over the next year or so, 
while a handful agreed to expand their 
self-imposed bans to radio, print and Internet 
advertising. Still, the agreements will probably 
amount to a ripple rather than a sea change in 
terms of what foods children see pitched on their 
favorite television shows and Web sites. For 
example, while General Mills will no longer be 
advertising Trix to the 12-and-under crowd, it 
will continue to peddle Cocoa Puffs, which have 
one less gram of sugar per serving. And it will 
be able to continue advertising Trix on 
television shows and other media that are 
considered to cater to “families” rather than 
just children. The companies have also agreed for 
the first time to open their marketing plans to 
the Council of Better Business Bureaus and its 
Children’s Advertising Review Unit, which will 
review them and report publicly on the findings. 
This scrutiny and the pledges to self-regulate, 
which will be announced at a Federal Trade 
Commission event today, are an attempt to show 
corporate responsiveness to growing concerns about childhood obesity.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/07/18/business/18food.html
(requires registration)
* Major brands to revamp ads aimed at kids
http://www.usatoday.com/printedition/money/20070718/1b_kidads18.art.htm

INTERNET/BROADBAND

HUNDREDS WEIGH IN ON NET NEUTRALITY
[SOURCE: PCWorld, AUTHOR: Grant Gross, IDG News Service]
Hundreds of groups and individual Internet users 
sounded off to the U.S. Federal Communications 
Commission on net neutrality in comments filed 
Monday, the deadline for responding to the 
agency's inquiry into the proposed regulation. 
Individual Internet users, trade groups and 
advocacy organizations filed about 670 comments 
about net neutrality rules with the FCC Monday. 
Individuals and organizations have submitted 
nearly 29,000 comments on net neutrality since 
the FCC opened its inquiry in late March. Net 
neutrality advocates want the FCC or the U.S. 
Congress to prohibit large broadband providers 
such as AT&T Inc. and Comcast Corp. from blocking 
or slowing Web content from competitors. Many of 
the comments Monday came from individual Internet 
users who asked the FCC to protect them against 
new fees that they fear broadband providers could charge Web content providers.
http://www.pcworld.com/article/id,134632/article.html
* Public Floods FCC with Net Neutrality Support
Tens of thousands of public comments supporting 
Net Neutrality flooded the Federal Communications 
Commission before the close of the agency's 
official inquiry yesterday. In a landslide, well 
over 95 percent of the comments called for rules 
that prohibit phone and cable companies from 
discriminating against Web sites or services.
* Senators Push FCC on Network Neutrality
The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) 
should expand the focus of its network neutrality 
inquiry to include the impact of carrier 
practices on content providers, U.S. Senators 
Byron Dorgan (D-N.D.) and Olympia Snowe (R-Maine) said Monday.
http://www.internetnews.com/article.php/3689261
* Dorgan and Snowe File with FCC
Under normal circumstances, U.S. Senators don't 
file comments in proceedings at the Federal 
Communications Commission (FCC). And filing reply 
comments is unheard of. But Net Neutrality 
champions Sens. Byron Dorgan (D-ND) and Olympia Snowe (R-ME) did just that.
http://www.publicknowledge.org/node/1094
* CDT Responds to Arguments in FCC Neutrality Inquiry
[SOURCE: Center for Democracy and Technology]
In reply comments submitted to the Federal 
Communications Commission (FCC) today, CDT 
emphasized that certain types of discriminatory 
practices by network operators could undermine 
the Internet's openness to innovation and hence 
warrant close scrutiny. CDT responded to several 
arguments raised by opponents of policies to 
preserve Internet neutrality, but also said that 
the FCC should not move on its own authority to 
mandate neutrality by regulation. The comments 
follow up on CDT's June 15 comments to the FCC 
outlining a number of ways that network operators 
might differentiate among Internet traffic.
CDT Reply Comments: http://www.cdt.org/speech/20070716fcc-comments.pdf
CDT Neutrality Comments: http://www.cdt.org/speech/20060615fcc-neutrality.pdf
* Net Neutrality Vital to Creative Artists AND American Public, CV Tells FCC
http://www.creativevoices.us/php-bin/news/showArticle.php?id=186

MAKE FREE WI-FI TRULY FREE
[SOURCE: San Francisco Chronicle, AUTHOR: Nicole Ozer, Kurt Opsahl]
[Commentary] Municipal wireless programs help 
ensure greater access to information and bridge 
the significant disparities in technology access 
among community members, but without more privacy 
and free speech protections, San Francisco's 
pending contract with Earthlink and Google 
threatens to undermine these worthy goals. As the 
contract stands, there will be no such thing as 
"free" municipal wireless in San Francisco. If 
city officials fail to bargain aggressively in 
the final stages of contract negotiations, San 
Franciscans will pay a high price for free 
Internet access -- with their privacy and free 
speech rights. San Francisco officials need not 
be timid at the bargaining table with Earthlink 
and Google. They should use their leverage to 
press for strong privacy and free speech 
protections and make San Francisco a model for 
how to do municipal wireless right.
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2007/07/17/EDG6QQ501G1.DTL

STUDY: BROADBAND VIEWING UP, BUT NOT AFFECTING TV
[SOURCE: Multichannel News, AUTHOR: Linda Haugsted]
According to “A Barometer of Broadband Content 
and Its Users,” an estimated 81 million people, 
or 63% of daily Internet users, reported that 
they watch broadband video at work or home. That 
level increased by 16% in just six months. 33% 
said watching video via the Internet increased 
their overall viewing time, while 13% said they 
were watching less television in favor of 
broadband content. The top destinations for 
online streaming? ABC.com for television shows 
and Yahoo Movies for theatrical releases.
http://www.multichannel.com/article/CA6461083.html?rssid=196

ON THE INTERNET, EVERYONE MAY FIND YOU'RE A DOG
[SOURCE: The Christian Science Monitor, AUTHOR: Tom Regan]
[Commentary] Anonymity on the Web may seem 
attractive, but how you use it raises interesting ethical dilemmas.
http://www.csmonitor.com/2007/0718/p17s01-stct.html

OWNERSHIP

REGULATORS URGE MINORITY TAX CREDIT PLAN
[SOURCE: Technology Daily, AUTHOR: David Hatch]
Two FCC commissioners endorsed tax breaks as the 
best way to encourage large corporations to sell 
communications outlets to minority- and 
women-owned businesses to improve paltry 
ownership levels. Commissioner Robert McDowell 
said Supreme Court decisions have made it 
difficult to adopt race-based preferences, but 
Commissioner Jonathan Adelstein urged the FCC to 
pursue "narrowly tailored race-conscious" 
initiatives anyway. To sidestep judicial 
complications, Commissioner McDowell recommended 
incentives targeted at "economically 
disadvantaged businesses." Commissioner 
Adelstein, meanwhile, said he is not sure his 
approach can win agency approval. The 
Commissioners made their remarks at a policy 
conference sponsored by the Minority Media and 
Telecommunications Council. Commissioner 
Adelstein blamed himself and other regulators for 
neglecting the matters. "I guess I haven't done a 
very good job in the last four years, but it 
hasn't been for a lack of trying," he said. "The 
FCC needs to do its part, and I don't think we've 
done a very good job up to now."
http://www.njtelecomupdate.com/2007/07/regulators_urge_tax_credits_fo.html

DOW JONES BOARD REACHES DEAL WITH MURDOCH
[SOURCE: New York Times, AUTHOR: Andrew Ross Sorkin & Richard Siklos]
It’s now down to the Bancrofts. After months of 
back-and-forth negotiations, the board of Dow 
Jones voted last night in favor of recommending a 
tentative deal to sell the publisher of The Wall 
Street Journal for $5 billion to Rupert Murdoch’s 
News Corporation. The final decision will be made 
by Dow Jones’s fractious controlling family, the 
Bancrofts, which could still seek to scuttle the 
sale, people who have spoken with family members 
said. That point was underscored by the fact that 
two of the four Bancroft family members on the 
board did not take part in the vote.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/07/18/business/media/18dow.html
(requires registration)
* Dow Jones set to OK Murdoch bid
http://www.usatoday.com/printedition/money/20070718/6b_dj_18.art.htm
* Dow Jones board backs Murdoch bid
http://www.latimes.com/business/printedition/la-fi-dowjones18jul18,1,3390981.story?coll=la-headlines-pe-business
* Murdoch's Deal for WSJ Could Be an Opportunity for Rivals
[SOURCE: AdAge, AUTHOR: Nat Ives]
If News Corp. closes a deal to buy Dow Jones and 
its crown jewel, The Wall Street Journal, it 
won't just complicate life for all the 
competition out there -- it may create some 
opportunities as well. Given all the very public 
concern over Rupert Murdoch's potential to meddle 
in The Journal's news operations, why shouldn't 
rivals try to claim the mantle of your 
independent business-news source?  "If people are 
going to be concerned about the quality and 
independence of The Journal, that plays quite 
well for us," said Paul Rossi, publisher for 
North America at The Economist. "Do readers look 
to The Wall Street Journal in a different light, 
do they start to look for different sources? That 
could be an opportunity for us. Do advertisers 
think the market's changed somehow? That could be an opportunity."
http://adage.com/mediaworks/article?article_id=119333
* Murdoch's Journal Is Bad News
"Rupert Murdoch's takeover of the Wall Street 
Journal may not be illegal, but it's certainly 
wrong. The cost of giving one company — and one 
man — this much media power is simply too high."
http://www.freepress.net/press/release.php?id=253

BROADCASTING

CABLE BLASTS DUAL MUST-CARRY AT FCC
[SOURCE: Multichannel News, AUTHOR: Ted Hearn]
Cable operators and programmers strongly oppose 
on legal and policy grounds proposed federal 
rules that could furnish certain local TV 
stations with greater carriage rights on cable 
systems than they currently possess. Comcast, 
Discovery Communications, the National Cable & 
Telecommunications Association and the American 
Cable Association all condemned the proposals, 
rejecting Federal Communications Commission 
Chairman Kevin Martin’s position that new 
carriage rules were needed to ensure a smooth 
national switchover to digital broadcasting in 
February 2009. Martin’s plan “proposes an 
unlawful command-and-control approach over the 
cable operator’s property, using the broadcast 
digital transition as [a] cloak to disguise a 
perpetual violation of the Constitution,” the 
NCTA said in comments filed at the FCC Monday -- 
the first phase in a battle that could eventually 
involve the courts and perhaps Congress.
http://www.multichannel.com/article/CA6461135.html

US RADIO HOPES POLITICS, ADVERTISERS BOOST 2008
[SOURCE: Reuters, AUTHOR: Sue Zeidler]
With 2007 poised to be its seventh straight year 
of slow to no growth, the $20 billion U.S. radio 
industry hopes to break the trend with political 
advertising and revenues from nontraditional 
sources in 2008. While revenue from Web sites, 
concert promotions and other nontraditional areas 
amount to less than 10 percent of the total radio 
industry revenue base, it has grown steadily over 
the past few years as the rest of the industry 
lagged in the face of increased competition from 
iPods, the Web, music- playing cellphones and 
other entertainment devices. Radio industry 
officials believe these revenue sources will 
contribute more over time. Large operators such 
as market leader Clear Channel Communications 
Inc, CBS Corp and Emmis Communications Corp have 
cited good traffic and ad revenue growth at radio 
station Web sites, which provides them with helpful audience data.
http://www.reuters.com/article/internetNews/idUSN1735606820070717

BACK TO THE PAPER BAG
[SOURCE: Drew Clark]
[Commentary] 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-OR) uttered these famous words: “The NAB can't 
lobby its way out of a paper bag.”
http://www.drewclark.com/2007/07/back-to-paper-bag.shtml

GOVERNMENT & COMMUNICATIONS

FREEDOM OF INFORMATION DELAYS DRAG ON FOR YEARS
[SOURCE: USAToday, AUTHOR: Richard Wolf]
For four decades, the Freedom of Information Act 
has enabled journalists, businesses, public 
interest groups and ordinary citizens to get 
government information. It's been used to break 
stories on subjects ranging from the anthrax 
vaccine to conditions at Guantanamo Bay. Lengthy 
waits plague FOIA. To fix that, Congress is on 
the verge of mandating that requests are tracked, 
deadlines enforced and agencies penalized for 
delays. Following easy passage by the House of 
Representatives and the Senate Judiciary 
Committee, however, the FOIA fix has been halted. 
Despite recent reports detailing delays and 
difficulties in getting government information, 
the Department of Justice has objected to the new 
legislation. Sen. Jon Kyl (R-AZ) is blocking it 
under Senate rules that allow any senator to 
place a "hold" on a bill. The bill is supposed to 
speed up the FOIA process. It would establish a 
system to better track requests, create an 
ombudsman's office to mediate disputes with 
government agencies, and make the government pay 
requestors' legal fees if their information was 
withheld. The measure passed the House in March, 
308-117. The Senate Judiciary Committee passed it 
in April, but it has been held up ever since. The 
Bush administration opposes the bill, arguing it 
could impose new administrative and financial 
burdens on agencies and diminish the Justice 
Department's supervisory role. It wants the bill 
shelved while agencies respond to a 2005 
executive order from President Bush directing them to fix FOIA operations.
http://www.usatoday.com/printedition/news/20070718/a_foia18.art.htm
http://www.usatoday.com/printedition/news/20070718/edit18.art.htm
http://www.usatoday.com/printedition/news/20070718/editbox18.art.htm

TELECOM

COSTLY CALLS
[SOURCE:  Los Angeles Times, AUTHOR: Editorial staff]
[Commentary] AT&T and Verizon wasted little time 
taking advantage of the freedom that the 
California Public Utilities Commission granted 
them in August. Unleashed from regulations that 
limited how they priced many of their services, 
California's largest telcos quickly hiked the 
fees they charged for many of their custom 
calling services, such as caller ID and call 
waiting. The phone companies had argued for 
unlimited "pricing flexibility" by pointing to 
the many phone lines they were losing to rivals, 
such as cable TV operators. They also said 
allowing them to respond quickly to competitors' 
promotional offers would (in AT&T's words) ensure 
that "customers reap the full benefits of 
competition." Here are a few of the benefits: 
AT&T has upped the monthly charge for caller ID 
service from $6.17 to $9, an increase of more 
than 45%. And call waiting is up 55% to $5. It's 
worth noting that it costs a telephone company 
almost nothing to provide custom calling 
services, which are a function of the software 
built into phone switches. Thus, the rate hikes 
will generate more revenue to subsidize other 
services, such as DSL. Consumers with modest 
appetites for phone service shouldn't let 
themselves be milked to support other, heavier 
users. It may be time for them to cut the cord.
http://www.latimes.com/news/printedition/opinion/la-ed-phones18jul18,1,7086287.story?coll=la-news-comment
(requires registration)
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Communications-related Headlines is a free online 
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Editor, Communications-related Headlines
Benton Foundation
Communications in the Public Interest
1625 K Street, NW 11th Floor
Washington, DC 20006
headlines AT benton DOT org 

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