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Dawn of Convergence-Era Content Regulation at the FCC? “Child Safe Viewing Act” NOI Launched

by on March 3, 2009 · 17 comments

The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) has just released a Notice of Inquiry (NOI) in the matter of “Implementation of the Child Safe Viewing Act; Examination of Parental Control Technologies for Video or Audio Programming.” (MB Docket No. 09-26)  This NOI was required by S. 602, the “Child Safe Viewing Act of 2007,” which Congress passed last October and President Bush signed into law on December 2nd.  The measure requires the FCC to examine:

(1) the existence and availability of advanced blocking technologies that are compatible with various communications devices or platforms; (2) methods of encouraging the development, deployment, and use of such technology by parents that do not affect the packaging or pricing of a content provider’s offering; and (3) the existence, availability, and use of parental empowerment tools and initiatives already in the market.

The Act defines the term “advanced blocking technologies” as “technologies that can improve or enhance the ability of a parent to protect his or her child from any indecent or objectionable video or audio programming, as determined by such parent.”  Importantly, the Act also directs the agency to look into blocking technologies that “may be appropriate across a wide variety of distribution platforms, including wired, wireless, and Internet platforms” and which “operate independently of ratings pre-assigned by the creator of such video or audio programming.”   The Act requires that the FCC issue a report to Congress about these technologies no later than August 29, 2009.

When writing about the Child Safe Viewing Act shortly after its introduction in the summer of 2007, I noted that the measure potentially represented the beginning of “convergence-era content regulation” at the FCC.  Those two clauses highlighted above are of particular importance in that regard.  Congress has essentially invited the FCC to engage in unprecedented oversight of media platforms and ratings systems that the agency previously had very little ability to influence.  Continue reading →

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Copps: The “Public Interest” Requires Regulation of the Internet!

by on February 25, 2009 · 14 comments

Acting FCC Chairman Michael Copps declared yesterday in a speech celebrating the 75th anniversary of the FCC and the Communications Act, that it was time to think “more rigorously” about the impact of the migration of communications to the Internet and “how to ensure that as the Internet becomes our primary vehicle for communicating with one another, it protects the public interest and informs the civic dialogue that America depends on.”

“In the beginning was the Word,” said John Something-or-other.  Well, the word here is “public interest” and—make no mistake about it—this is the beginning of a wholesale attempt to impose the regulatory regime of the broadcast era onto the Internet.

As Adam Thierer has pointed out, the “public interest” is really no standard at all—just so much hot air.

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