On the podcast this week, Hal Singer, managing director at Navigant Economics and adjunct professor at Georgetown University’s McDonough School of Business, discusses his new paper on wireless competition, co-authored by Gerald Faulhaber of the University of Pennsylvania, and Bob Hahn of Oxford. The FCC produces a yearly report on the competitive landscape of the wireless market, which serves as an overview to policy makers and analysts. The report has found the wireless market competitive in years past; however, in the last two years, the FCC is less willing to interpret the market as competitive. According to Singer, the FCC is using indirect evidence, which looks at how concentrated the market is, rather than direct evidence, which looks at falling prices, to make its assessment. In failing to look at the direct evidence, Singer argues that the report comes to an erroneous conclusion about the real state of competition in wireless markets.
Related Links
Assessing Competition in U.S. Wireless Markets: Review of the FCC’s Competition Reports, by Singer et al
“FCC report dodges answers on wireless industry competition”, Washington Post
“FCC Mobile Competition Report Is One Green Light for AT&T/T-Mobile Deal”, Technology Liberation Front
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On the podcast this week, Tim Harford, economist and senior columnist for the Financial Times, discusses his new book, Adapt: Why Success Starts With Failure. He argues that people and organizations have a poor record of getting things right the first time; therefore, the evolutionary process of trial and error is a difficult yet necessary process needed to solve problems in our complex world. Harford emphasizes the importance of embracing failure in a society focused on perfection. According to Harford, one can implement this process by trying different things in small doses and developing the ability to distinguish success and failures while experimenting. A design with failure in mind, according to Harford, is a design capable of adaptation.
Related Links
Adapt: Why Success Starts With Failure
“Tim Harford on failure”, Washington Post
“No, statistics are not silly, but their users . . .”, By Harford
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On the podcast this week, Daniel Solove, professor at the George Washington University Law School, discusses his new book Nothing to Hide: The False Tradeoff Between Privacy and Security. He suggests that developments in technology do not create a mutually exclusive relationship between privacy and national security. Solove acknowledges the interest government has in maintaining security within our technological world; however, Solove also emphasizes the value of personal privacy rights and suggests that certain procedures, such as judicial oversight on governmental actions, can be implemented to preserve privacy. This oversight may make national security enforcement slightly less effective, but according to Solove, this is a worthwhile tradeoff to ensure privacy protections.
Related Links
Nothing to Hide: The False Tradeoff Between Privacy and Security
I‘ve Got Nothing to Hide’ and Other Misunderstandings of Privacy, by Solove
“No rights left to lose: Destroying privacy in name of security in the age of terror”, The Daily
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On the podcast this week, Pamela Samuelson, the Richard M. Sherman Distinguished Professor of Law at Berkeley Law School, discusses her new article in the Columbia Journal of Law & the Arts entitled, Legislative Alternatives to the Google Book Settlement. Samuelson discusses the settlement, which was ultimately rejected, and highlights what she deems to be positive aspects. One aspect includes making out-of-print works available to a broad audience while keeping transaction costs low. Samuelson suggests encompassing these aspects into legislative reform. The goal of such reform would strike a balance that benefits rights holders, as well as the general public, while generating competition through implementation of a licensing scheme.
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On the podcast this week, Ronald Rychlak, Mississippi Defense Lawyers Association Professor of Law and Associate Dean at the University of Mississippi School of Law, discusses his new article in the Mississipi Law Journal entitled, The Legal Answer to Cyber-Gambling. Rychlak briefly comments on the history of gambling in the United States and the reasons usually given to prohibit or regulate gambling activity. He then talks about why it’s so difficult to regulate internet gambling and gives examples of how regulators have tried to enforce online gambling laws, which often involves deputizing middlemen — financial institutions. Rychlak also discusses his legal proposal: create an official framework to endorse, regulate, and tax online gambling entities.
Related Links
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On the podcast this week, Steven Levy, a columnist for Wired and author of the tech classic Hackers, among many other books, discusses his latest book, In The Plex: How Google Thinks, Works, and Shapes Our Lives. Levy talks about Googliness, the attribute of silliness and dedication embodied by Google employees, and whether it’s diminishing. He discusses Google’s privacy council, which discusses and manages the company’s privacy issues, and the evolution of how the company has dealt with issues like scanning Gmail users’ emails, scanning books for the Google Books project, and deciding whether to incorporate facial recognition technology in Google Goggles. Levy also talks about prospects for a Google antitrust suit and the future of Google’s relationship with China.
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On this week’s podcast, Larry Downes, who writes for CNet, blogs at Forbes.com and the Technology Liberation Front, and is the author of several books, including most recently, The Laws of Disruption, discusses enforcement of intellectual property rights online. Downes talks about the Protect IP Act, a bill recently introduced into Congress that aims to curtail infringement of intellectual property rights online by so-called rogue websites. Downes argues that forcing intermediaries to blacklist domain names has the potential to “break the internet.” He discusses how the rogue website problem could better be addressed and how the proposed bill could be improved.
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On the podcast this week, Konstantinos Stylianou, a former Fulbright Scholar now working on a PhD in law at Penn Law School, and author of the provocative new essay, “Hasta La Vista Privacy, or How Technology Terminated Privacy,” discusses technological determinism and privacy. Stylianou’s thesis is that the evolution of technology is eliminating privacy; therefore, lawmakers should switch emphasis from regulating the collection of information, which he claims is inevitable, to regulating the use of that information. Stylianou discusses why digital networks specifically make it difficult to keep information private, differences between hard and soft technological determinism, and when he thinks people will realize about their private information what the recording industry has finally realized about digital music.
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On the podcast this week, Micah Sifry, co-founder of the Personal Democracy Forum, editor of techPresident.com, and author of the new book, Wikileaks and the Age of Transparency, discusses government transparency. Sifry talks about the various purposes of government transparency, technology’s effect on it, and bi-partisan competition that can promote it. He also discusses Bradley Manning’s case, the evolution of WikiLeaks, and the transparency, or lack thereof, within the WikiLeaks organization.
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On the podcast this week, Joseph Menn, a Financial Times technology reporter and the author of Fatal System Error: The Hunt for the New Crime Lords Who Are Bringing Down The Internet, discusses cyber crime. Menn says that one of the main challenges of cybersecurity is that the internet was never intended for many of the things it’s used for today, like e-commerce or critical infrastructure management. He talks about the implications of the internet still being in beta form and comments on the recent Sony data breach and other similar cyber attacks. Menn also discusses his book, telling a few anecdotes about the people who go beyond computer screens in pursuit of internet crime lords.
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The Technology Liberation Front is the tech policy blog dedicated to keeping politicians' hands off the 'net and everything else related to technology.