Pai Brings Unprecedented Transparency to Open Internet Proceeding

["Dave Farber" <dave () farber net>]

---------- Forwarded message ---------
From: Dewayne Hendricks <dewayne () warpspeed com>
Date: Thu, Nov 23, 2017 at 10:21 AM
Subject: [Dewayne-Net] Pai Brings Unprecedented Transparency to Open
Internet Proceeding
To: Multiple recipients of Dewayne-Net <dewayne-net () warpspeed com>


Pai Brings Unprecedented Transparency to Open Internet Proceeding
By Graham Owens
Nov 22 2017
<
https://techpolicycorner.org/pai-brings-unprecedented-transparency-to-open-internet-proceeding-8f3d70698178
>

Chairman Pai is running the most transparent FCC maybe ever, but you won’t
hear that in the coming weeks. Instead, Pai’s critics claim the new Open
Internet Order announced today was rushed or hidden in the holidays to
minimize criticism.

Yet, nothing could be further from the truth. The current FCC Chairman has
done more to make the FCC’s decision-making transparent and open than any
FCC chairman in the agency’s 73-year history.

FCC rules have long required the Chairman to circulate draft orders —
“white copies” — three weeks before the meeting at which they’ll be voted
on. But until Pai took office, no Chairman had ever made these white copies
available to the public. In fact, previous Chairmen often took weeks after
the vote before allowing the public to see any order text at all.
Conversely, at the start of his tenure as Chairman, Pai committed to making
draft text available three weeks prior to the vote.

Pai published the draft Open Internet Order today because tomorrow, a
holiday, is three weeks from the December 14 meeting, when the Commission
will vote on the final order. Previous Chairmen have even refused to
release draft language to the other Commissioners (yes, those who
ultimately vote on its passage) until the day of the vote, even while
well-connected political allies were privy to the same non-public
information. By releasing the order over three weeks in advance, Chairman
Pai is giving all stakeholders — regardless of position on the policy
underlying the order — a chance to weigh in and provide comments.
Regardless of your stance on the policy underlying the order, going against
previous agency policy and opening yourself up to immense criticism is
admirable and should be applauded.

Yes, today’s white copy came out the day before Thanksgiving, But it was
Chairman Wheeler who wrote the schedule of this year’s meetings — putting
the December meeting on the 14th, thus making the white copy date today.
Pai promised to resolve this issue back in April by the end of the year.
Had the order been ready to be released in October and voted on at the
November meeting, he surely would have done so.

If you really want to see what burying an item looks like, consider Julius
Genachowski, President Obama’s first FCC Chairman, who first released the
2010 Open Internet Order on December 23rd. Not only was that two days
before Christmas, it was also two days after the Commission actually voted
on the language. Not to be outdone, it took Chairman Wheeler two weeks to
publish his 2015 Open Internet Order text.

Chairman Pai has clearly done his best to release the draft as soon as it
was ready, giving the public and other Commissioners as much time as
possible to review and address any concerns.

[snip]

Dewayne-Net RSS Feed: http://dewaynenet.wordpress.com/feed/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/wa8dzp



-------------------------------------------
Archives: https://www.listbox.com/member/archive/247/=now
RSS Feed: https://www.listbox.com/member/archive/rss/247/18849915-ae8fa580
Modify Your Subscription: https://www.listbox.com/member/?member_id=18849915&id_secret=18849915-aa268125
Unsubscribe Now: 
https://www.listbox.com/unsubscribe/?member_id=18849915&id_secret=18849915-32545cb4&post_id=20171123213712:5DAFA104-D0C0-11E7-9EFF-DECB355C8A40
Powered by Listbox: http://www.listbox.com