The Best of “Big Tech” (Part – II)

Following our previous post from yesterday, listed below is the next set of links. Happy reading !!

Katie Canales, Apple was Just Slapped with a Lawsuit that Accuses the Company of Monopolizing the Mobile-Gaming Market by Blocking Apps like Xbox Game Pass and Google Stadia (Business Insider)

AP, Google to Pay $1 Billion Over 3 Years for News Content (Times of India)

Marcy Gordon, For Big Tech, Biden Brings a New Era but no Ease in Scrutiny (AP)

The “Lifeline Program”: A Perfect example of how NOT to promote Digital India.

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At the very outset, in all fairness, India as on date does not have a program similar to the “Lifeline Program” of the F.C.C., but it doesn’t hurt to put out a pre-emptive rant to make sure they never even consider one in the future.

BACKGROUND

As per the website of the F.C.C., the Lifeline Program for Low Income Consumers has since 1985, provided a discount on phone service for qualifying low-income consumers to ensure that all Americans have the opportunities and security that phone service brings, including being able to connect to jobs, family and emergency services. Lifeline is part of the Universal Service Fund. The Lifeline program is available to eligible low-income consumers in every state, territory, commonwealth, and on Tribal lands. The Lifeline program is administered by the Universal Service Administrative Company (U.S.A.C.). The U.S.A.C. is responsible for data collection and maintenance, support calculation, and disbursement for the low-income program. Cellphone subscriptions were included in 2005. Furthermore, On 31st March, 2016, the F.C.C. adopted a comprehensive reform and modernization of the Lifeline program. In the 2016 Lifeline Modernization Order, the Commission included broadband as a support service in the Lifeline program. The Commission also set out minimum service standards for Lifeline-supported services to ensure maximum value for the universal service dollar, and established a National Eligibility Verifier to make independent subscriber eligibility determinations.

PROBLEMS

The program is definitely a laudable initiative, and considering the high cost of mobile service in the U.S., probably a much needed initiative which recognises digital communication service as an essential service. Maybe it even implies it as a human right, though the same is no where expressly mentioned. However, the pitfalls of the program have led to severe criticism against it, with the current dispensation more than happy to cut its budget and probably let it die a slow death.

The problems with the Lifeline program are the same which so many government subsidy programmes and poverty alleviation programmes In India suffer from: inflated costs, allegations of fraud, lack of access to key systems and data to weed out inefficiences and fake enrollments. and the hard reality is, the deficiencies in such a program can never be fully eradicated. All one can constantly focus on is the benefits out weighting the costs. But the core reason why the program suffers from so many issues because it chooses to focus on individual benefits rather than provide macro solutions to the problem of affordable access.

UNIVERSAL SERVICE OBLIGATION IN INDIA: THE WAY TO CONTINUE ONWARDS

This is where we in India are fortunately doing a better job under the Universal Service Obligation Fund.

The Universal Service Obligation Fund (U.S.O.F.) is the primary scheme administering spread of broadband connectivity in rural areas. According to the Department of Telecommunications (D.o.T.), “…apart from the higher capital cost of providing telecom services in rural and remote areas, these areas also generate lower revenue due to lower population density, low income and lack of commercial activity. Thus normal market forces alone would not direct the telecom sector to adequately serve backward and rural areas. Keeping in mind the inadequacy of the market mechanism to serve rural and inaccessible areas on one hand and the importance of providing vital telecom connectivity on the other, the New Telecom Policy – 1999 (NTP’99) provided that the resources for meeting the Universal Service Obligation (USO) would be raised through a ‘Universal Access Levy (UAL)’, which would be a percentage of the revenue earned by the operators under various licenses. The Universal Service Support Policy came into effect from 01.04.2002. The Indian Telegraph (Amendment) Act, 2003 giving statutory status to the Universal Service Obligation Fund (USOF) was passed by both Houses of Parliament in December 2003. The Rules for administration of the Fund known as Indian Telegraph (Amendment) Rules, 2004 were notified on 26.03.2004. As per the Indian Telegraph Act 1885 (as amended in 2003, 2006 and 2008), the Fund is to be utilized exclusively for meeting the Universal Service Obligation.” In summary, the U.S.O.F. uses

The recently cabinet approved National Digital Communications Policy, 2018 further pushes four initiatives to be funded by USOF:

(i) BharatNet: Providing 1 Gbps to Gram Panchayats upgradeable to 10 Gbps
(ii) GramNet: Connecting all key rural development institutions with 10 Mbps upgradeable to 100 Mbps
(iii) NagarNet: Establishing 1 Million public Wi-Fi Hotspots in urban areas
(iv) JanWiFi: Establishing 2 Million Wi-Fi Hotspots in rural areas

These targets are ambitious, and they may not even be achieved during the duration of this policy at all, but achieving even fifty percent of this target would be a fantastic growth in internet access to the underprivileged.

The Big Bang Tech.

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Things in the media have become typically quiet after the initial flurry of headlines, and as usual, I was supposed to write a lengthy blog post on the antitrust actions against Big Tech , and as usual, it kept getting delayed to the extent that it has now become an exercise in futility. (Man I need to get more disciplined with my writing !! )

So to just bring this to the closure in my own head more than anything else, here is a list of the major and most informative headlines (in no particular order of importance) on the issue:

Silicon Valley pressured as Washington turns up antitrust heat

Tech Giants Amass a Lobbying Army for an Epic Washington Battle

Unheard for years, smaller fished finally get a say against tech sharks.

On priority: Regulating online giants for financial viability of news business

Google Made $4.7 Billion From the News Industry in 2018, Study Says

Senator Warren urges antitrust chief to recuse himself from Google, Apple probes

Four reasons why antitrust actions will likely fail to break up Big Tech

The Week in Tech: What Not to Expect From Big Tech’s Antitrust Showdown

Regulating or breaking up Big Tech: an antitrust explainer

Network Neutrality: An Update

Yesterday (30.08.2017) will be marked as a watershed day by observers for Network Neutrality. The issue is being hotly contested in arguably the world’s most capitalistically advanced jurisdiction for telecom and the internet (U.S.A.) as well as the jurisdiction with potentially the biggest telecom and internet market, both by the number of users as well as revenue (India) and yesterday was an eventful day in both.

In India, the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (T.R.A.I.) held and concluded an Open House Session in New Delhi on the issue of Network Neutrality. Unfortunately, being bed – ridden with a fracture, I was unable to attend it myself, but I am informed that all parties were “extremely vocal” with their opinions. T.R.A.I. is likely to publish its recommendations by October. On a side note, Certain telecom companies also complained against SIM-locked handsets coupled with a tariff plan and said that a limited access to certain applications through such devices was as good as a “walled – garden” and against Network Neutrality (No prizes for guessing who they’re talking about).

At the opposite end of the globe, yesterday was the last day to file comments on the Federal Communications Commission plan to deregulate broadband service and roll back net neutrality rules, and at least 21.9 million comments have been confirmed to have been received. Voting by the F.C.C. on the issue is not expected anytime soon, as the Commission is known to take it’s time with decisions after such commentary periods.

Here’s to waiting and watching and hoping for the best.

December 4, 2015: D – Day for Network Neutrality.

Sri Srinivasan, Stephen F. Williams and David S. Tatel are the three Judges of the U. S. Court of Appeals for the D. C. Circuit who will hear the challenge to the F.C.C.’s Network Neutrality Order on December 4th, 2015.

For a brief profile of the three Judges by Brian Fung of The Washington Post, Click here.

Also, see here the Hindustan Times coverage of Sri Srnivasan (Any surprise considering the obsession of India with famous PIO’s who may or may not even relate to our Country ?!?! 😀 )

What Goes Around, Comes Around.

VERIZON’S HUGE VICTORY IS ABOUT TO TURN INTO A HUMILIATING DEFEAT.

(Ya the Justin Timberlake image may not be the most appropriate. 🙂 )

The Speed Limit Debate

As the Network Neutrality debate rages in the U.S. over the Comcast – Time Warner Merger, here are two interesting pieces on the flak which Comcast is receiving. It goes without saying, Comcast isn’t happy and it seems to have started losing it’s cool over the issue.

The first is an article on how Network Neutrality is already being subverted through the indirect route of the broadband network. This is not surprising, as the potential for this abuse was already pointed out some time ago by Susan P. Crawford in the Yale Law and Policy Review.

The second is a novel solution (and one which I really liked) by BitTorrent, Inc. CEO Eric Klinker on reaching a middle ground on the Network neutrality debate and torrent websites: pay the torrent websites to slow down rather than the websites paying the network provider for equal treatment at par with other websites. Interestingly, BitTorrent, according to the post, “has voluntarily remained in a “slow lane” of sorts for several years because of the uTorrent Transport Protocol (uTP), which reduces the speed of data transmissions when they might harm other applications. BitTorrent and its users don’t get paid for relying on this protocol, of course, but Klinker suggested they should.”

Why the CCI Google Investigation faces Difficulty.

A recent Economic Times Article states that the “probe by Indian authorities to examine if Google abused its dominant position in the Internet search engine market is progressing at a sluggish pace, mainly due to a lack of understanding on Internet-related issues.” Furthermore, it also stated that “India (presumably through the C.C.I.) has sought the FTC’s help in this matter.”

While the reason stated above is probably true, I feel another important reason the investigation faces difficulty is becaue of the direction the D. G. Office seems to be taking to reach its goal. This is evident from the second line quoted above, where the article states that the C.C.I. is looking for aid from the F.T.C. There is no harm in asking for aid from others, but in this case, the Commission may be asking for aid from the wrong people. One needs to understand that the F.T.C. and the European Commission have SETTLED their cases with Google on the basis of certain commitments they received from the company. (See here for the F.T.C. commitments and here for the E.U. commitments). It is more than evident from their respective press release and the commitments received from Google that both the competition authorities never approached the investigation with an intention to prosecute. Their primary intention was merely to ensure competitiveness without disrupting the market (being the internet search engine market and online advertisement market) to the best possible extent. The merits of such an approach are of course debatable, but are presently outside the scope of this post. What is important is that settlements require a mediative approach (far different from an adjudicatory approach) and this is not the approach the C.C.I. wishes to follow. Even if it wishes to, it as of now can’t, as explained in a previous post.

It is better if the Commission looks eastwards to the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (A.C.C.C.) for help. The judgement of the Federal Court of Australia is the only case which Google has lost on allegations against its Adwords programme, which is the primary subject of investigation even in India.