IP: Ex-PBS and FCC chiefs want $18 billion new agency, WSJ says

[David Farber <dave () farber net>]

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> Date: Tue, 24 Jul 2001 02:22:29 -0400
> To: politech () politechbot com
> From: Declan McCullagh <declan () well com>
>
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> I'm not sure why this below article is news. The Grossman-Minow duo were 
> highlighted in Gary Chapman's now-discontinued LA Times column on May 5. 
> Chapman reported the pair are eager to launch a new federal bureaucracy, a 
> "Digital Opportunity Investment Trust, a public agency modeled on the 
> National Science Foundation." It'll be paid for with $18 billion in 
> spectrum auctions -- money that could have given every American family 
> perhaps $100-$200 in tax rebates instead.
>
> Chapman laments that "new developments in online business are creating a 
> heightened sense of urgency because many Web-based companies are starting 
> to explore 'pay-per-view' or subscription-based fees to maximize the value 
> of their intellectual property."
>
> Well, yes. Advertising is in the toilet, so companies are choosing to sell 
> content as an alternative to going out of business. Salon is a perfect 
> example, and plenty of news articles have described how other 
> formerly-free services are trending toward pay services. This is not a 
> pernicious development; in fact it has advantages. On pay services, we 
> won't see as many ads.
>
> As for this new federal agency, who needs it? There already are more 
> "public spaces" on the Net than content to fill them -- I daresay Grossman 
> and Minow have never been on Usenet -- and setting up a web server with a 
> large hard drive is hardly expensive. If people really want content 
> online, the market will respond by producing it. We don't have $18 billion 
> federal book, magazine or newspaper projects, but somehow we see splendid 
> writing nonetheless.
>
> I talked about this at greater length instead of in midnight-rant form in 
> my testimony last year before the Democracy Online Project:
> http://www.politechbot.com/p-01184.html
>
> -Declan
>
> *********
>
> WHY NOT FUND ONLINE CONTENT?
> Lawrence K. Grossman, former president of PBS, and Newton Minow, former 
> FCC chief, have proposed what they call a Digital Opportunity Investment 
> Trust, which would be a federally chartered agency along the lines of the 
> National Science Foundation or the National Institutes of Health. The goal 
> would be public funding of online content, focusing on educational and 
> civic uses of digital technology. The money ($18 billion), which the 
> backers suggest could be taken from spectrum auction revenues, would be 
> used to help build worthwhile places to visit in cyberspace: "You could 
> have a virtual solar system, a 3D model of the human body or a recreation 
> of Mark Twain's America," says Grossman. Minow compares his Digital 
> Promise Project's approach to the 19th-century legislation that created 
> land-grant colleges. "There's an opportunity to do that again," he says. 
> (Wall Street Journal 23 Jul 2001)
> http://interactive.wsj.com/articles/SB995840737736919399.htm
>
>
> Democratizing Information
> Jun. 3, 2001 07:26 ET
> http://www.latimes.com/print/editorials/20010602/t000045934.html
>
> Television, more vast than ever, turns toxic Author of famed '61 quote 
> revisits the vast wasteland
> May. 10, 2001 04:46 ET
> http://www.usatoday.com/usatonline/20010509/3301798s.htm
>
> Paying for Net Foils 'Public Space' Idea
> May. 4, 2001 05:57 ET
> http://www.latimes.com/print/techtimes/20010503/t000037177.html
>
>
>
>
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