Subscription Options
Subscribe to Subscription Options- Subscribe to all content from Andrew Feinberg
- Subscribe to the author's blog
Or Subscribe by Email...
Contact Information
- Email:
- AIM: agfhome
- Skype: andrew_feinberg
- Phone: 301-637-0219
Andrew Feinberg
We’re just under five months out from the analog shutoff. And no one really knows what will happen after those transmitters go dark and a few million Americans turn on their TV’s to see…maybe nothing. Just snow. And even if they got a converter box, they might still have a problem. We might have a disaster, or everything will be hunky dory. But there’s a way to avoid the either/or scenario.
{ 3 comments }
I had the misfortune recently of sitting through a discussion of the policies of both Presidential candidates on data protection and cybersecurity. Or so I thought.
While the representative from the Obama campaign, a respected law professor and privacy expert who I have seen testify before Congress many times, was direct but cautious in his answers [...]
{ 1 comment }
Cheap video and still digital cameras, broadband, and the advent of blogging have brought about this idea of “citizen journalism,” presumably to report the “real” stories that get ignored by “mainstream media.” Many bloggers have assumed this mantle of “citizen journalist,” and some sites like The Uptake have embraced the idea of publishing firsthand reporting by Joe Sixpack, as Sarah Palin would say. This has acquired the “citizen journalism” title. Some sites take this further, like the “collaborative journalism” of NowPublic. CNN has had an “iReport” site that posts “citizen journalists’” clips, reports, and other snippets.
{ 2 comments }
Congressional use of online video, (an issue that this site has covered since the beginning) finally got over its last hurdle today as the Committee on House Administration adopted new rules allowing use of outside websites by Members.
I thought yesterday would be a great opportunity to ask one of the pioneers of the information age what he thought would be sound technology policies for the next administration to pursue.
Instead, I got a generic paen to deregulation and letting the market work. Ironic, considering the failure of the bailout bill Monday afternoon.
So I [...]
I know FCC issues can be complex, and for an “outsider” they can easily be reduced to black and white. But there is a serious lack of in-depth technology policy coverage on the web, good coverage that exposes the many shades of gray and layers in these issues. There is a real need for it, so If you’re going to do it, do it right. That means more than quoting comments, adding some editorializing and posting it. The job of a good reporter or blogger isn’t just to ask tell your readers what the questions are, it is also to FIND THE ANSWERS, or at least to try, in order to get the truth to those readers.
{ 4 comments }
A resolution for the House of Representatives to adopt a more relaxed Senate rule on Web video sites was stopped dead in its tracks by House Administration Committee chairman Mike Capuano, D-Mass., during a contentious Thursday hearing.
The proposed resolution, offered by Rep. Vern Ehlers, R-Mich., is similar to positions he articulated in a letter earlier [...]
I do apologize for the infrequency of posts. I expected more to write about.
Now I have no excuse. Starting Friday, there will be a confluence of technology events that will be covered, here and elsewhere.
Friday morning, I’ll be at the Broadband Census for America conference. I’ve written in this space about infrastructure before, and I [...]
Another filing deadline, another blast of press releases about the Comcast “network management” debacle.
To quote the great philosopher Rodney King, “can’t we all just get along?”
No, really. This topic gets people in an uproar, whether it’s the good and well-meaning people at Free Press and Public Knowledge, who brought the complaint, or the folks at [...]
So, has anyone else been watching Wall Street do the 2000 style dot-com dance while the TechCrunch-watching, TechMeme-obsessed crowd throws parties like it’s 1999? I feel for the guys at Lehman and AIG, some of them my age, now out on the street. In fact, I feel even more sorry for them than I did for the guys caught in the dot-com bust.
{ 5 comments }
‘ll admit it. I’ve been guilty of being mean to the cable company. Which is surprising since I’ve spent most of my life around Cable, as the son of two former FCC attorneys and one who spent a good part of his career representing cable before the FCC. Bite the hand that feeds me? Nah.
I spent most of my afternoon at a “blogger summit” hosted by NCTA CEO Kyle McSlarrow, where a bunch of us (including Dave Zatz, Art Brodsky from Free Press, and Josh Wein from my former employer Communications Daily) went over a plethora of issues ranging from liability for internet content, to the digital switch, to, yes, network management.
{ 1 comment }
Meanwhile, one of the major problems facing this Congress is what to do with the massive Universal Service Fund (USF), which was originally meant to keep the copper phone network working in rural areas. Those areas are pretty well served now. But there is still lots of cash flowing into USF. You pay for it on your mobile phone bill. On your landline bill. On your VOIP bill. Look. It’s there.
{ 3 comments }
In an issue Washington Internet Daily last month there is (as one co-worker put it) “double-barreled” coverage of the Senate and House Judiciary hearings on the Google-Yahoo partnership (aka GooHoo, a term I will no longer be using).
I covered the Senate hearing in the morning, coincidentally ending across the table from Kara Swisher, which was [...]
I love campaign season. I especially love campaign commercials that talk about voting records, and outrage generated over votes that wouldn’t change the outcome of a bill, amendment, motion, or resolution (all different kinds of votes).
Why do I mean?
Some bodies are simple. The FCC has five members. One member has a tremendous amount of power if the positions of the other members are known. The Supreme Court, although not a political or regulatory body, is the same way, sort of.
{ 10 comments }
And when Congress isn’t in session, the cameras go off. Because there is nothing to see.
Except today, right? We probably won’t ever know what was said in that room, because there was no record. No stenographer. No recording devices or video cameras, either
Capitol Geek Fact #2: Congress recesses in August because of the oppressive humidity in Washington, DC.
Today it’s just a tradition, but an important one. August is the start of the campaign season, especially for House members. Remember, they have two jobs, and the second job is to keep the first job. So it’s not exactly a vacation.
