EFF statement on Bell Atlantic/TCI deal

[Mike Godwin]

The following is an offical EFF statement with regard to the Bell
Atlantic/TCI deal.


--Mike


======

The recent spate of telecommunications mergers -- Bell Atlantic/TCI, US
West/Time-Warner, AT&T/McCaw, plus numerous others in the works -- raise
the stakes for information policy makers and those of us who are concerned
about the development of an open, accessible information infrastructure.  

EFF has just released a major new statement on our Open Platform Campaign,
which explains EFF's approach to infrastructure policy.  Our big concern is
encourage Congess and the Administration to do the right thing and set out
a new, positive communications policy that is ready for the information
age.  We believe that this policy must achieve the following goals:

+    Diversity of Information Sources:  Promote a fully interactive
infrastructure in which the First Amendment flourishes, allowing the
greatest possible diversity of view points;

+    Universal Service:  Ensure a minimum level of affordable
information and communication service for all Americans;

+    Free Speech and Common Carriage:  Guarantee infrastructure access
regardless of the content of the message that the user is sending;

+    Privacy:  Protect the security and privacy of all communications
carried over the infrastructure, and safeguard the Fourth and Fifth
Amendment rights of all who use the information infrastructure;

+    Development of Public Interest Applications and Services:  Ensure
that public interest applications and services which are not produced by
the commercial market are widely available and affordable.

Our policy proposal, available by anonymous ftp on ftp.eff.org in
/pub/eff/papers/op2.0, contains a discussion of these principles and
concrete legislative recommendations on how to accomplish many of these
goals.  Here are a few selected paragraphs from the main paper to give a
flavor of our positions, but we hope you'll read the whole thing.

     "Regulatory changes should be made, and mergers approved or barred
based on specific, enforceable commitments that the electronic
superhighways will meet public goals and realize the potential of digital
technology.  That potential arises from the extraordinary spaciousness of
the broadband information highway, contrasted with the scarcity of
broadcast spectrum and the limited number of cable channels that defined
the mass media era.  Properly constructed and administered, the information
highway has enough capacity to permit passage not only for a band of
channels controlled by the network operator, but also for a common carriage
connection that is open to all who wish to speak, publish, and communicate
on the digital information highway.  For the first time, electronic media
can have the diversity of information we associate only with the print
media."

But we can't rely on the promises of industry or the wonders of the
competitive marketplace alone to create this infrastructure.  We need
legislative benchmarks to ensure that all citizens have access to advanced
information infrastructure.  We will achieve this goal not by having
government build the whole thing, but by finding a new communications
policy framework that works for the market and brings benefits to
consumers.

We've expanded the concept of "Open Platform Services" from just narrowband
ISDN, to include any switched, digital service, offered on a common
carriage basis, by any provider.

     "To achieve the full potential of new digital media, we need to
make available what we call Open Platform services, which reach all
American homes, businesses, schools, libraries, and government
institutions.  Open Platform service will enable children at home to tie
into their school library (or libraries all around the world) to do their
homework.  It will make it possible for a parent who makes a video of the
local elementary school soccer game to share it with parents and students
throughout the community.  Open Platform will make it as easy to be an
information provider as it is to be an information consumer."

     "Open Platform services provide basic information access
connections, just as today's telephone line allows your to connect to an
information service or the coaxial cable running into your home connects
you to cable television programming.   This is not a replacement for
current online services such as America Online or Compuserve, but rather is
the basic transport capacity that one needs to access the multimedia
version of these information services.

     "Specifically, Open Platform service must meet the following criteria:

+    widely available, switched digital connections;
+    affordable prices;
+    open access to all without discrimination as the content of the message;
+    sufficient "up-stream" capacity to enable users to originate, as
well as receive, good quality video, multimedia services.

"Open Platform service itself will be provided by a variety of providers
over interconnected networks, using a variety of wires, fiber optics, coax
cable, and wireless transmission services.  But however it is provided, if
it is affordable and widely available, it will be the on-ramp for the
nation's growing information superhighway."

Rather than a narrow focus on stopping or delaying the proposed mergers,
policy makers should use the leverage of the moment to create a new
Communications Act that serves the public interest.

     "The Administration and Congress can create an prompt the
deployment of open platforms by using the political leverage at its
disposal.  Bell Atlantic, TCI, Time Warner, US West and others involved in
recent mergers are all promising to build open platforms. 
Telecommunications giants are asking policymakers for permission to enter
new markets or to form new, merged entities.  Rather than per se opposition
to current mergers, or mere reliance on competition to build the data
highways, make the mergers and other accommodations conditional on
providing affordable open platform services.  The terms of this new social
contract should be written into a new Communications Act, revised for the
information age.  With a real "social contract" in hand, we just might
realize the Jeffersonian potential of the data superhighways. "

     "Together with a coalition of public interest groups and private
industry, the Electronic Frontier Foundation is working to establish Open
Platform objectives in concrete legislation.  Open Platform provisions,
which would cause near term deployment of Open Platform services, are
present in both the recent Senate infrastructure bill and the latest draft
of House telecommunications legislation, soon to be introduced.  We are
also working with the Administration to have Open Platform policies
included in the recommendations of the Information Infrastructure Task
Force.  In addition to federal policy, critical decisions about the shape
of the information infrastructure will be made at state and local levels. 
Since 1991, EFF has been working with a number state legislatures and
public utility commissions to have affordable, digital services offered at
a local level.  As cable and telephone infrastructures converge, we will
also work with local cable television franchising authorities.  We invite
all who are concerned about these issues to join with us in these public
policy efforts."


We hope that everyone will have a look at our new proposal, and join in to
help us.  


===================================================================
FOR MORE INFORMATION ABOUT THE OPEN PLATFORM CAMPAIGN CONTACT:

Daniel J. Weitzner, Senior Staff Counsel, <djw at eff.org>


MEMBERSHIP:

Sarah Simpson, Membership Coordinator, <ssimpson at eff.org>


ONLINE RESOURCES AND INFORMATION:

Stanton McCandlish, Online Activist, <mech at eff.org>

EFF DOCUMENTS ON THE SUBJECT (in ftp.eff.org):

Open Platform Campaign: Public Policy for the Information Age
/pub/eff/papers/op2.0

Senate Telecommunications Infrastructure Act of 1993 (S. 1086)
/pub/eff/legislation/infra-act-s1086
/pub/eff/legislation/infra-act-s1086-summary

EFF Testimony on Senate Infrastructure Bill
/pub/eff/legislation/kapor-on-s1086