Issues

Digital transmissions of television broadcasts require much less spectrum than analog broadcasts. As a result, when over-the-air broadcasters change to a digital broadcast as mandated by Congress, they no longer need large areas of spectrum that they have traditionally controlled. This auction involves a large portion of that vacated spectrum.

ACTA is the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement being negotiated by the US, the EU, Japan, South Korea, Canada, Mexico, Australia, and New Zealand. The stated goal of the agreement is the international enforcement of strong intellectual property rights through increased cooperation and coordination among international governmental agencies. ACTA does not yet exist, though its ongoing discussions are confirmed by all of the participating governments.

“Broadband” is the general name given to high-speed Internet services. It differs from the alternative, “narrow-band” because it is “always on” — you simply click on an Internet browser and the service is activated. Broadband services bring World Wide Web content to users much faster than the older technologies, which require users to make a telephone call.

The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 contains two sections that deal with broadband. These sections are designed to expand broadband penetration across the country. There are a number of ways that the bill intends to accomplish this goal.

The Broadcast Flag is a technology mandate and promoted by the motion picture industry that aimed to protect digital broadcast television. Content would be broadcast free and clear with a visually imperceptible “flag” that the FCC required digital devices to respond to by limiting distribution of the flagged content.

In recent months, cable Internet provider Comcast has used spoofing technology to interrupt peer-to-peer applications and traffic on their network. Consumers groups have filed a formal complaint against Comcast with the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), asking it to enforce its four policy principles on network neutrality.

Copyright, put simply, is a personal monopoly on an original writing, song, piece of art, or a group of any of those, for 70 years after the death of the creator. If a corporation is the creator, the copyright monopoly lasts for 95 years.

On October 28, 1998, President Bill Clinton signed the Digital Millenium Copyright Act (DMCA) into law. The law provided “safe harbors” for Internet service providers, thereby paving the way for services like YouTube, Flickr, Facebook and the Web as we know it today. At the same time, the DMCA ushered in a set of “anti-circumvention” rules that placed restrictions on a variety of users and innovators.

Net Neutrality is the shorthand term for the concept that companies which operate a telecommunications network, like the telephone and cable companies, shouldn’t be able to play favorites with the content that goes over the network.

Open access (OA) literature is digital, online, free of charge, and free of most copyright and licensing restrictions.

Opening the White Space would enable the use of mobile devices on the empty spectrum between TV channels.

“Orphan Works” are copyrighted works — books, music, records, films, etc — whose owner cannot be located. Works can become “orphaned” for a number of reasons: the owner did not register the work, the owner sold rights in the work and did not register the transfer, the owner died and his heirs cannot be found … the list goes on.

A patent is a monopoly granted by law to an inventor. It allows the inventor to prevent others from making, selling, offering for sale or importing into the United States his invention. The Constitution of the United States empowers Congress to grant patents in order to encourage innovation.

Selectable Output Control is a technology mandate promoted by movie studios to protect the “early” distribution of movies over cable television. It’s a battle over the video outputs on the back of your cable box or DVR. Who gets to control which outputs you can use—the movie studios or you?

Public Knowledge, along with a coalition of concerned non-profits, has filed a petition with the Federal Communications Commission asking that they clarify that text messaging is a service which is subject to nondiscrimination rules, and that blocking text messaging services to quell speech or to stifle competition is unjust and unreasonable discrimination which violates the law.

Trademark in the U.S. is generally a consumer protection used to associate a mark or term with the originator of a product or service.

Internet and WiFi hot-spots have been popping-up everywhere lately, at a favorite coffee shop or maybe even in a local park. Sometimes these networks are provided by stores and shops. Other times the networks are provided by the city or a non-profit.

The WIPO Broadcasting Treaty (officially, the WIPO Treaty on the Protection of Broadcasting Organizations) is a proposal within the World Intellectual Property Organization to give broadcasters intellectual property rights in their signals, in addition to the copyrights held by the creators of the works. Public Knowledge opposes the treaty, as it would create numerous conflicts with existing copyright law and policy in the US, as well as creating an additional hurdle for any users of broadcast content.