Digital Content

Each country has its own car safety regulations and tax codes. But should every country also decide its own bounds for appropriate online expression? We probably don’t want internet companies deciding on the freedoms of billions of people, but we may not want governments to have unquestioned authority, either. Regulating online expression in any single country — let alone in the world — is a messy set of trade offs with no easy solutions. Let us lay out some of the issues:

Section 230 of the Communications Act has been dubbed the “twenty six words” that created the interactive free expression of the internet: No provider or user of an interactive computer service shall be treated as the publisher or speaker of any information provided by another information content provider. This simple piece of legislation provides immunity from liability as a speaker or publisher for providers and users of an “interactive computer service” who host and moderate information provid

In the third quarter of 2020, more than 50% of US broadband households reported that their broadband usage has increased since the start of the COVID-19 crisis. While consumers report broadband performance is keeping pace with the increased demand, in Q3 2020, 24% of fixed broadband households reported plans to upgrade their speed in the next six months, compared to 18% in 2Q 2020. “Broadband upgrade plans indicate many households see some COVID-19-related changes as permanent,” said Steve Nason, Research Director, Parks Associates.

Donald Trump has been impeached for trying to kill the results of our last election, but we should have no illusions that whatever happens at his trial, the weapon he used is still freely available for others to deploy. It’s a realm called “cyberspace” — where we’re all connected but no one is in charge. Trump, like no leader before, took advantage of that realm to spread a Big Lie, undermine trust in our electoral system and inspire an attack on our Capitol.

As the lead staffer for Chairman Ed Markey (D-MA) on Telecommunications Act of 1996 (TA96), I often smile when people “correct” me to explain that Section 230 wasn’t part of TA96, but rather part of the Communications Decency Act (CDA). The reality is that Section 230 is contained in Title V of the Telecommunications Act of 1996, a title that the framers of TA96 indicated could also be referred to by its “short title,” as the “Communications Decency Act of 1996.” Today, however, I feel people can simply call it what they want.

Sir Tim Berners-Lee and his business partner, John Bruce, have launched Inrupt, a company that allows consumers, rather than companies, to control their own data, to store it in pods, and to move it wherever they please. That means Facebook, Google or any other Big Tech company will no longer be able to extract an individual's photos, comments or purchase history without asking.

The Safeguarding Against Fraud, Exploitation, Threats, Extremism and Consumer Harms (SAFE TECH) Act would clarify that Section 230:

Comcast will suspend its new fees on heavy home Internet users in more than a dozen Northeastern states, reversing course on a policy that threatened higher bills for some families amid the coronavirus pandemic. Comcast will postpone the new charges after Pennsylvania Attorney General Josh Shapiro (D-PA) raised concerns that Comcast’s policy threatened to disproportionately harm cash-strapped Americans who are learning, working, and communicating primarily online.

Three institutional and strategic problems that President Joe Biden’s Federal Communications Commission will have to resolve:

Rates for many of the communications and content services we’ve all grown to rely on over the last year have risen recently or will rise in 2021, and there’s little you can do about it. Pay-TV service providers have watched their revenue decline as a growing number of Americans cut the cable cord and rely instead on internet-based streaming services. To compensate, and to keep shareholders happy, the industry keeps steadily increasing the cost of broadband internet access — and claiming that the higher fees are justified by ongoing investments in data networks.