A Government Spectrum Ownership Corporation (GSOC) should be established to lease spectrum to government agencies, much in the same way as the General Services Administration (GSA) does with real estate, explain Thomas Lenard and Lawrence White in comments filed today with the Office of Science and Technology Policy. The goal would be to provide incentives for government agencies to economize on spectrum use and free up spectrum for the private sector.
Press Releases
Registration Now Open for TPI Aspen Forum
Online registration is now open for the 2014 Technology Policy Institute Aspen Forum, scheduled this year for August 17 – 19. The TPI Aspen Forum brings together leaders from business, government, and academia to discuss key public policy issues affecting information and communications technology. This year’s theme is, “Tech in Transition: Policy Challenges.”
Competition and Cost-Effectiveness Analysis should Drive FCC Policy
Promoting competition, entry, and experimentation with innovative business models should be the goal of an updated Telecommunications Act, states Technology Policy Institute’s Scott Wallsten in comments sent today to the U.S. House Energy and Commerce Committee in response to their recent white paper. In order to achieve these goals, Wallsten urges the Committee to require the Federal Communications Commission to apply competition analysis and cost-effectiveness analysis to its decision making. In addition, Wallsten advises Congress to continue to support schemes for efficient and flexible uses of spectrum.
Event – The Future of Video Policy and Business Models
Traditional pay TV is beginning to lose subscribers. Wall Street analyst Craig Moffett called this past year pay TV’s “worst 12 month stretch ever.” At the same time, over-the-top providers, primarily Netflix, are growing quickly. Yet, not all analysts believe Netflix has the winning business model. New business models and threats to old business models dovetail with various efforts at policy reform in Washington, including debates over usage-based billing, Internet “signal importation,” and a la carte choices rather than bundles of channels. This conference will discuss these and other issues facing the video market.
Claim that Anonymization is Impossible Unsupported
The assertion in a recent petition by public interest groups that it is impossible to anonymize data does not stand up to scrutiny, states Technology Policy Institute President Thomas Lenard in comments filed with the Federal Communications Commission. The agency should not base any decisions on this faulty analysis, which could have broader implications beyond sharing of customer proprietary network information (CPNI).
Event – The Big Data Revolution: Privacy Considerations
The Information Technology revolution has produced a data revolution-now commonly referred to as “big data”-in which massive amounts of data can be collected, stored and analyzed at relatively low cost. While the benefits of big data are numerous, from tracking health risks to helping consumers find the lowest prices on goods and services, the emergence of big data has also raised privacy concerns on the part of advocates and government officials. To alleviate these concerns, some are calling for remedies to either restrict or make more transparent how data are collected and used. Speakers at the event will discuss the big data revolution, proposed remedies for privacy concerns and their potential effects, including the findings in the recent paper, “The Big Data Revolution: Privacy Considerations,” authored by TPI’s Thomas Lenard and Paul Rubin.
No Evidence of Privacy Harms from “Big Data”
There is no evidence that the use of “big data” for commercial and other non-surveillance purposes has caused privacy harms according to a new paper, “The Big Data Revolution: Privacy Considerations,” by Technology Policy Institute’s Thomas Lenard and Paul Rubin. Moreover, the familiar remedies embodied in the Fair Information Privacy Practices (FIPPs) are ill-suited to the world of big data and are potentially a serious barrier to much of the innovation we hope to see from the big data revolution.
Stress Cooperation, Not Competition, to Combat “Emporiophobia”
Economists “have committed a fundamental semantic error” by focusing on the term competition and ignoring the cooperative nature of markets, explained TPI senior fellow Paul Rubin in his Presidential Address to the Southern Economic Association this past weekend. By correctly emphasizing cooperation, economists could help combat the “emporiophobia,” or the fear of markets that is prevalent in the general public and current political discourse.
Broadband Stimulus Funds Distribution Inefficient, Incoherent
The National Telecommunications Information Agency process for awarding funds to projects through the $4.7 billion Broadband Technology Opportunities Program was “largely incoherent,” explain Scott Wallsten and Gregory Rosston in “The Broadband Stimulus: A Rural Boondoggle and Missed Opportunity,” released today by the Technology Policy Institute. The selection process failed to provide a means for measuring the expected cost-effectiveness of proposals, and, as a result, was highly inefficient.
Michael Smith Joins TPI as Adjunct Senior Fellow
Michael D. Smith, Professor of Information Systems and Marketing and Co-Director of the Initiative for Digital Entertainment Analytics at Carnegie Mellon University, has joined the Technology Policy Institute as an Adjunct Senior Fellow. Smith’s research focuses on firm and consumer behavior in online markets – specifically markets for digital information and digital media products. Recent papers authored by Professor Smith and his colleagues include “Piracy and Copyright Enforcement,” and “Gone in 60 Seconds: The Impact of the Megaupload Shutdown on Movie Sales.”