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The House That Jack Built
by Randy Barrett
He may be a man of diminutive stature, but former Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) President Jack Valenti casts a long shadow in Washington. Valenti led the MPAA for 38 years before retiring in 2004, and his name will linger. His friends in high places named a building after the venerable king of the quick quip.
The former vanilla MPAA headquarters office is now officially the Jack Valenti Building. No word yet on whether there is a new dress code to enter the building, in keeping with the high sartorial standards set by the longtime head of the movie group.
Several congressional heavies weighed in during the naming ceremony. "I'm pleased to honor Jack Valenti, a good public servant and a tireless advocate for his industry," House Majority Whip Roy Blunt, R-Mo., said in a statement. "The MPAA today honors him with the naming of their headquarters, and we in Congress feel his legacy as we work hard to address some of the issues he championed."
Two Takes On Media Monopolies
Media monopoly myths are unfounded, Adam Thierer, a senior fellow and director at the Progress and Freedom Foundation's Center for Digital Media Freedom, argued last week at the National Press Club.
In discussing his new book, "Media Myths: Making Sense of the Debate over Media Ownership," Thierer said there is no dearth of diversity in the media marketplace, with more than 18,000 magazines produced last year, 85 percent of Americans subscribing to cable television and 170 terabytes of information on the World Wide Web.
"If there was a golden age of media we are living in it today," he said.
Not so fast, said former Federal Communications Commissioner Susan Ness, who argued that bulky media giants do not translate to a "public benefit." The goal is "to keep a balance in the marketplace for diversity in viewpoints," she added.
While she said technology one day will enable consumers to receive "intelligent transmissions ... we are not there yet" because media ownership remains in the "hands of the few."
Professor To Create Telecom Center
Simon Wilkie, a senior research associate in economics at the California Institute of Technology, soon will move to the University of Southern California to create a telecommunications study center. The organization will be called the Center for Communications Law and Policy.
Wilkie is a former FCC chief economist. Most recently, he has been crunching numbers in support of competitors to the regional Bell telecom companies as they seek to derail the proposed mergers of AT&T with SBC Communications and MCI with Verizon Communications.
Tech Executive Joins EFF Board
Joe Kraus has joined the board of the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF). Kraus is the founder of DigitalConsumer.org, which helps consumers get access to digital media, and is currently CEO of the software company JotSpot.
"I think the work of EFF is critical to a thriving and innovative online world where people are free to create new technologies, content and communities," Kraus said in a statement.
Other members of EFF's executive board include John Perry Barlow, David Farber, John Gilmore, Brewster Kahle, Lawrence Lessig, Pam Samuelson and Brad Templeton.
Congress, meanwhile, has been busy on moving administration nominees through the confirmation process. The Senate Commerce Committee approved six administration nominees.
They are: Edmund Hawley as assistant secretary of Homeland Security; Israel Hernandez as director general of the U.S. Foreign and Commercial Service; William Jeffrey as director of the National Institute of Standards and Technology; Ashok Kaveeshwar as administrator of the Research and Innovative Technology Administration at the Transportation Department; David Sampson as deputy Commerce secretary; and John Sullivan as Commerce's general counsel.
Hernandez started his career as the travel aid to then-Texas Gov. George Bush and had the all-important job of handing the chief breath mints at opportune moments. For this he was dubbed "Altoid Boy" by the future president.
Plug, Spin, Rock and Roll
While Grokster and Streamcast Networks, the maker of the Morpheus file-sharing software, were getting soundly scolded by the Supreme Court on Monday, RealNetworks CEO Rob Glaser took the opportunity to pitch his company's online music platform.
"Today the Supreme Court reaffirmed an important basic principle: Thou shalt not steal," Glaser said. "Two months ago, we introduced the first and only legal, free music-sharing network with over a million songs from all the major labels -- Rhapsody 25. With the court's ruling now clear, we invite everyone in America to come to www.rhapsody.com to experience digital music the way it should be -- free, legal and fun."
The plug warranted a closer look because it sounded too good to be true. Indeed, the Rhapsody 25 player software is free. The music, however, is not, hence the legal part of it. The service operates by a monthly subscription fee.
Quote Of The Week
"This is somewhat Orwellian. The content and copyright industry now become thought police. It seems to me this will be a full-lawyer employment outcome -- not a great way for a business to have to function."
-- Streamcast General Counsel Matthew Neco, commenting on the Supreme Court's decision against his company in a dispute over the liability of file-sharing firms for copyright infringement by their customers.
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