President-elect Barack Obama has named two telecom industry and policy veterans and a leader of Google’s philanthropy arm to craft the new administration’s high-tech policy priorities.
The policy working group on Technology, Innovation and Government Reform will “develop proposals and plans from the Obama Campaign for action during the Obama-Biden Administration,” according to the president-elect’s transition web site www.change.gov.
The authors of what could be sweeping changes in broadband rules, privacy and government transparency include:
–Blair Levin, a telecom investment analyst at Stifel Nicolaus and former chief of staff to Federal Communications Commission Chairman Reed Hundt. Levin is also seen among a short list of candidates to head the FCC in the new administration.
–Julius Genachowski, former chief counsel to Hundt at the FCC and a member of Obama’s…
Tags: Barack Obama, Blair Levin, Broadband, Department of Treasury, Federal Communications Commission, former law school classmate, Goldman, Google, Google Inc., high-tech policy priorities, IAC/InterActiveCorp, India, Indicorps, Julius Genachowski, Obama-Biden Administration, Obama-Biden Transition Project Advisory Board, policy working group, Reed Hundt, Rock Creek Vetnrues, Sachs and Co., Sonal Shah, Stifel Financial Corp., Stifel Nicolaus, telecommunications leaders, The Washington Post Company, transition web site www.change.gov, Washington Post.
Worldwide mobile messaging grew nearly 10 percent in the third quarter compared to the second quarter of the year, fueled by new trends in the messaging market, according to VeriSign, which provides Internet infrastructure services and delivers messages on behalf of carriers and content providers.
The company reported Tuesday that VeriSign enabled more than 58.3 billion messages per day during the third quarter of 2008. This was up from about 52 billion messages sent during the second quarter of 2008.
On average, this means that VeriSign facilitated the delivery of about 634 million messages per day during the third quarter, compared to 572 million messages a day in the second quarter. In the third quarter of 2007, the company helped move 280 million messages per day across…
Vint Cerf, who can fairly be described as one of the godfathers of Internet has endorsed Barack Obama in the US presidential race, saying that his decision is swayed by Obama’s stance on net neutrality - the question of whether content providers should be charged more for different content by the “pipe” providers.
Extracts:
We believe that the Internet should remain an open environment. It’s vital to innovation. Companies like Google, and Yahoo, and eBay, and Amazon, and Skype and so on, got their start without having to get permission from any ISP or any broadband provider to offer services. They simply acquired access to the internet, put their services up and then made them available to the general public.
We think that’s the best way for the…
Tags: Amazon, Barack Obama, Broadband, eBay, Google, ISP, net neutrality, Skype, United States, Vint Cerf, Yahoo!.
Senator Barack Obama, the Democratic candidate for U.S. president, mentioned broadband rollout as one of his top priorities during a debate Friday evening, bringing applause from several groups promoting universally available broadband as a key part of a turn-around in the U.S. economy.
Obama, debating Senator John McCain, the Republican candidate for president, listed broadband rollout to rural areas as one of his top priorities that he wouldn’t cut when asked about U.S. government budget constraints.
Read the full story in ‘Network World’ here.
This might not be good news for the proponents of Net Neutrality. Barack Obama has recently edited his website with significant revisions to the technology plans. Guess what goes out. A large paragraph on Net Neutrality! (which is reproduced below):
[quote] Users must be free to access content, to use applications, and to attach personal devices. They have a right to receive accurate and honest information about service plans. But these guarantees are not enough to prevent network providers from discriminating in ways that limit the freedom of expression on the Internet. Because most Americans only have a choice of only one or two broadband carriers, carriers are tempted to impose a toll charge on content and services, discriminating against websites that are unwilling to pay…
Barack Obama stands for Net Neutrality while John McCain sternly opposes. Internet should be open space, says Obama, for anyone to use any application of his/her choice without discrimination.
That is like saying the roads are free for anyone to drive any vehicle they like at any time. It sounds good in theory. However, in practice it is a different story.
Can we let the container-trucks to move during peak hours congesting roads? Can we let bullock carts in a high way?
In spite of the tech-savvy image he tries to cultivate, perhaps Obama has not heard about the broadband quality issues. Perhaps he assumes at the zenith of developed world USA does not face bandwidth issues. He is wrong.
Net Neutrality comes with a price tag attached. If…
Leading Democrats on Tuesday attacked the Bush administration’s broadband policy and the technology track record of GOP presidential hopeful John McCain, while leading tech companies pushed for a more tech-savvy and innovative federal government.
“The Obama campaign is the broadband campaign and the McCain campaign is the dial-up campaign,” said Edward Markey, a Massachusetts Democrat and chairman of the House Energy and Commerce subcommittee on telecom and the Internet.
Markey and other members of Congress were on hand at the Democratic National Convention in Denver for several technology panels hosted by the Computer and Communications Industry Association (CCIA) and the Silicon Flatirons Center at the University of Colorado.
“On McCain’s watch, the U.S. fell from third to fifteenth in broadband penetration,” said Julius Genachowski, technology advisor to Democratic…
Tags: Barack Obama, Broadband, Bush administration, Colorado, Commerce Committee, Computer and Communications Industry Association, Congress, Denver, Edward Markey, House Energy and Commerce subcommittee, John McCain, Julius Genachowski, Massachusetts, open Internet, Republican Party, Silicon Flatirons Center, technology industry, technology panels, technology track record, United States, University of Colorado.
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