Lobbying

In what they say is a first, five electric cooperatives in three states have formed an association of broadband co-ops aimed at bolstering services in underserved rural areas. The Virginia, Maryland & Delaware Association of Broadband Cooperatives (VMDABC) is structurally modeled after existing cooperative associations. VMDABC will offer classes of membership based on types of co-op members and their goals. VMDABC classes of membership will include co-op affiliates offering retail fiber, co-ops pursuing middle mile or “backbone” fiber, other broadband entities, and vendors.

Both presidential campaigns are facing calls to commit to keeping industry faces and corporate conflicts of interest out of the White House — as speculation swirls about who from the tech world could wind up in the winning administration. Nearly 50 groups -- including Revolving Door Project, Fight for the Future and the Open Markets Institute -- wrote to the candidates pressuring them “to commit not to appoint any individual to a senior policy role in an agency or department w

Nonprofits and local politicians are lining up to support a Charter Communications petition that would let the ISP impose data caps on broadband users and seek interconnection payments from large online-video providers. Charter filed the petition with the Federal Communications Commission in June, asking the FCC to eliminate merger conditions applied to its 2016 purchase of Time Warner Cable two years early.

Public Knowledge announces that it will not accept funding from Facebook for any of the organization’s programs or initiatives. The decision follows a June 1 meeting between Facebook’s CEO Mark Zuckerberg and civil rights leaders to discuss the company’s choice to leave up without moderation comments made by President Donald Trump, including one in which he posted, “when the looting starts, the shooting starts,” in reference to protests over George Floyd’s death. Twitter, meanwhile, labeled the content with a disclaimer that it “glorified violence.”

As the country confronts its long, deeply rooted history of racism, we must all acknowledge our own role in racist systems and make changes to ensure we are part of the solution, rather than the problem. With over 2.6 billion users, Facebook has a clear responsibility to reckon with its role in these systems or risk continuing to facilitate oppression that imperils Black lives. Despite repeated calls to action from inside and outside the company, Facebook has long struggled with this responsibility.

In Virginia, as in other states, school officials are racing to reach families by publicizing discounted offers from Internet providers, extending school Wi-Fi into parking lots, and distributing hotspot devices. And schools trying to do more face a major hurdle: long-standing laws that effectively bar county governments and public school systems from providing Internet directly to families.

If the coronavirus pandemic has taught the technology and communications policy world anything, it is that policymakers have utterly failed to meet the mission of the National Broadband Plan. Although the National Broadband Plan provided a road map and initially tracked progress, we have seen a relatively nonpartisan tech policy space abandon consensus views on the technicalities of the network and the importance of universal service principles.

Facebook is working behind the scenes to help launch a new political advocacy group that would combat US lawmakers and regulators trying to rein in the tech industry, escalating Silicon Valley’s war with Washington at a moment when government officials are threatening to break up large companies. The organization is called American Edge, and it aims through a barrage of advertising and other political spending to convince policymakers that Silicon Valley is essential to the US economy and the future of free speech, apparently.

A new coalition, backed by a wide range of players in the mobile ecosystem --, including U.S. operators AT&T and Verizon -- has formed to advocate for government policy that helps drive open radio access network (RAN) adoption to fund research and development of open and interoperable 5G networks. Executive director for the 31-member Open RAN Policy Coalition, launched today, is former Acting Administrator of the National Telecommunications and Information Administration Diane Rinaldo.