FCC Delays 700-MHz Spectrum Auction (NewsFactor)

In testimony before the House Committee on Small Business, Martin said the open-access rules that will govern the auction of a third of the spectrum will benefit small business by improving access to wireless broadband, allowing small businesses to compete in providing wireless devices and software, and "providing meaningful opportunities" for small businesses to gain access to the spectrum. Speaking to reporters after his testimony, he brushed aside a lawsuit from Verizon that called for the FCC to remove the open-access requirements. "I don't have any plans to try to revise our open-platform rule the way Verizon wants us to," he said. Verizon had asked the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia to expedite a hearing, but the court refused. Auction Delayed On Thursday, the FCC announced it would delay the auction date by eight days. It is now set for January 24. In addition, there will be a $10 billion limit on the auction bidding. The auction will foster deployment of rural broadband, Martin said, because the rules will require licensees to serve at least 70 percent of their geographic area. "The Commission has tried to ensure these areas have the same access to broadband enjoyed elsewhere in the country," he said. Wireless broadband connections will be available to "businesses of all sizes and in nearly every location, not just corporate headquarters in major metropolitan areas," he said. The open-access provisions are a critical factor in making the spectrum accessible to small businesses, he added. "It is our goal that this open platform requirement will allow smaller businesses — namely, nascent wireless device manufacturers and smaller application software developers — to put their products directly into the hands of consumers without having to seek prior permission from the wireless providers, as they do today," he said. Fostering the Next Internet Martin went on to say that the open-access rules would create greater opportunities for innovation and that the "open-platform requirement" would have an impact on broadband akin to the break-up of the old AT&T. That breakup led to innovation in telecommunications, he said, "driven by entrepreneurs, who for the first time were able make their latest innovations available directly to consumers and compete in the equipment market to which they had previously been denied access." According to Martin, just as the break-up led to the Internet, the model of open access will provide similar benefits for wireless entrepreneurs "by allowing them to introduce an array of niche applications and devices for the open wireless platform, including those tailored to meet the unique needs of small businesses and individual consumers." Perhaps most importantly, Martin said the FCC would provide bidding credits for eligible small businesses. The bidding credits enabled small businesses to win 55 percent of licenses in last year's AWS-1 auction, he said.

Will Apple Support Third-Party Developers for iPhone? (NewsFactor)

On Wednesday, the iPhoneDevTeam announced a hack that allows users who have installed the 1.1.1 firmware update to revert their phones to 1.0.2, "jailbreak" it to install third-party programs, and then upgrade to 1.1.1 without "bricking" the phone. This hack won't work on phones that were bricked after installing 1.1.1, however. Another team, the iPhoneSimFree group, announced Thursday that its latest software will "unbrick" phones that were disabled by the Apple update. This solution involves following the iPhoneDevTeam's technique for rolling the phone back to 1.0.2 and then installing the SimFree 1.6 software. Apple Ready To Support Apps? Meanwhile, Glenn Fleishman reported on Tidbits that Apple might be close to making an announcement on third-party development for the iPhone. What developers want, said Fleishman, is integration with Xcode, Apple's programming environment for OS X. "If Apple simply inserted an iPhone framework into Xcode, so that developers could work with tools they already had, with the limitations imposed on what the iPhone could do, you'd see applications released in minutes," he said. Fleishman suggested that Apple would have some sort of application certification process, but that programs that don't access certain features might not need to be certified. For instance, Research In Motion certifies programs that access dialing features. Other phones sometimes restrict network access to Wi-Fi. "Apple could pull a neat trick by allowing programs that want to access only Wi-Fi network features to operate in an unlimited fashion; if EDGE service is desired, then a program needs to be registered and certified, and be a good network customer. There could even being a revenue requirement or split to make those kinds of applications work in AT&T's model," Fleishman wrote. 'A Moment for Apple To Seize' Embracing third-party development is practically an imperative, Greg Sterling, principal analyst at Sterling Market Intelligence, said in a telephone interview. "Apple almost has to embrace third-party developers. The demand is so strong, the behavior of developers almost forces them to do this," he said. The perpetual cat-and-mouse game between Apple and hackers is a "big distraction from a real opportunity" for Apple, he said. With third-party development in place, "people will build cool stuff, which will further differentiate it from the clones that are coming onto market." An iPhone that runs third-party apps has a chance to become the mobile Internet device of the future, Sterling said. "This is a real opportunity, a moment for Apple to seize," he said. Playing this card right will go far to make up for the mistake of the exclusive relationship with AT&T, he added. "If they fail to open it up as a development platform, this will be a second blunder." Sterling noted that users and developers have "really responded to it very dramatically. People are hungry for this." The iPhone is the first device that "opens the door to the real potential of mobile. There's an imperative for Apple to embrace that momentum."

Feds: Cell Phones Safe From Telemarketers

China censors ratchet up Web monitoring (AP)

“Each time I would see one of my entries blocked, I’d feel so furious and indignant,” said Liu, a 43-year-old Beijing lawyer. “It was just so disrespectful.” Liu’s frustration is hardly unique. For China’s 162 million Web users, surfing the Internet can be like running an obstacle course with blocked Web sites, partial search results, and posts disappearing at every turn. Blog entries like Liu’s, which mused on sensitive topics such as the death penalty, corruption and legal reform, are often automatically rejected if they trigger a keyword filter. Sometimes, they’re deleted by human censors employed by Internet companies. In the lead-up to the sensitive Communist Party Congress, which convenes Monday to approve top leaders who will serve under President Hu Jintao through 2012, authorities have been casting an even wider net than usual in their search for Web content they deem to be politically threatening or potentially destabilizing. “What you see now is unprecedented,” said Xiao Qiang, director of the China Internet Project at the University of California, Berkeley. “They are forcing most of the interactive sites to simply close down and have unplugged Internet data centers. These are things they haven’t done before.” Thousands of sites suddenly went offline in August and September when Internet data centers, which host Web servers, were shut down. In three cities, some services were temporarily cut off, while some interactive Web sites remain unplugged — until after the congress. It’s not uncommon for authorities to crack down on public opinion before party congresses, which are held every five years. In an increasingly wired China, political rumors and speculation that used to end up in Hong Kong’s more liberal media are now often found circulating first in Chinese cyberspace. At the party congress, there’s plenty of opportunity for commentary, speculation and gossip. “Who’s going to be up and who’s going to be down? Who’s going to retire and who’s going to be in the Politburo? The losers in the Internet age aren’t necessarily going to go down quietly,” said Xiao. The government has built a patchwork system of controls that include software to root out offensive keywords and block blacklisted web sites. Government censors, known as Net nannies, surf the web looking for pornography, subversive political content or other illegal material. Major Internet portals like Sohu.com Inc. and Sina Corp. employ their own censors to make sure nothing runs afoul of government restrictions. China is among a handful of countries that have extensive filters for political sites. Iran, Myanmar, Syria, Tunisia and Vietnam also strictly block political content, according to the OpenNet Initiative, a collaboration between researchers at Cambridge, the University of Oxford, Harvard University and the University of Toronto. In a report this week, Reporters Without Borders said China’s Internet censorship system “is unparalleled anywhere in the world and is an insult to the spirit of online freedom.” Commercial sites that don’t comply with censorship orders are criticized, fined, forced to fire the employee responsible for the error, or closed down, the Paris-based group said. A point system is also used to keep track of compliance, with sites that rack up a certain number of demerits at risk of losing their business licenses, it said. To underscore its determination, the government also imprisons people who mail, post online, or access politically sensitive content within China. Reporters Without Borders says 50 Chinese “cyber dissidents” are currently in prison. All the controls reinforce a climate of fear and obedience that keep most Internet users in line, experts said. But if self-censorship fails, “Sohu will protect you from yourself,” said Rebecca MacKinnon, a new media expert at Hong Kong University. Liu, the Beijing lawyer, did not want to be protected. He has tried to sue Sohu for breach of contract for blocking nine of his blog entries. Yang Bei, a Sohu spokeswoman in Beijing, said the company had no comment on the case. Liu insists the postings conformed with Sohu’s user guidelines as well as Chinese law. He said that identical material posted to his Sina blog was not blocked. He is not asking for compensation, only to have his entries restored. A Beijing district court dismissed his suit in August, saying that it did not meet unspecified criteria. His appeal is pending with the Beijing No. 1 Intermediate Court. Despite the controls, Chinese cyberspace is also a surprisingly dynamic environment with online auctions, film and music downloads, social networks, huge virtual gaming populations and even spirited debate on social and political issues — though often conducted in protective double speak. “You don’t say ‘tanks in Tiananmen,’” explains Xiao, referring to the 1989 military crackdown on democracy protesters. “You say ‘the tractors that came into the city.’ You don’t say ‘press freedom,’ you say ‘press professionalism.’” Anxiety over such veiled conversations likely prompted the closure of several data centers last month, a move that affected thousands of small personal and commercial sites and warned millions of others. The centers were told the shutdown was part of a larger campaign to clean up the Web ahead of the congress. MacKinnon said the government appears afraid that something from one of those smaller sites will “jump out and bite the regime.” An employee with the Zitian Internet Data Center in the central city of Luoyang who would only give his surname, Feng, said its servers were unplugged on Aug. 23 and resumed on Sept. 5. But interactive sites, such as bulletin boards and blogs, were closed until after the congress, which is expected to last about 10 days, on orders from state-run China Telecom, he said. Shanghai’s Waigaoqiao Internet Data Center was shut down Sept. 3-14 on orders from a China Telecom subsidiary, said an employee named Tang. Again, customers were told their interactive sites could reopen after the congress. Another in the southeastern city of Shantou was also shuttered around the same time. A Chinese blogger writing in English under the name Moonlight, catalogued the shutdowns in a post titled “Chinese Internet censorship goes crazy.” Xiao from Berkeley said the measures were intentionally heavy-handed. “It’s overkill to scare other people. Now the other IDCs are shaking,” he said. China’s Ministry of Information Industry, which is the main government body in charge of the Internet, and China Telecom did not respond to a request for comment about the Internet data center shut downs. Meanwhile, Chinese bloggers who have been censored say they’ve been “harmonized,” a nod to President Hu’s goal of creating a “harmonious society.” One sarcastic Chinese blogger called Xiucai — or the Scholar — mockingly posted a banner to his or her site on Sept. 4 saying: “Joyfully welcome the 17th Party Congress, building a harmonious society together. The Scholar is a good comrade. This site has temporarily shut down comments and forum features.” Within two weeks, Xiucai took the banner down too. ___ On the Net: Moonlight’s Blog (English):

Google, Random House move closer on book search (Reuters)

The two parties are talking to one another about the less controversial part of Google's book-scanning project, its partner program, sources with knowledge of the matter told Reuters at this week's Frankfurt Book Fair. Google has agreements with more than 10,000 publishers, large and small, who give their books to Google to be scanned in full. Google then makes them partially available — according to agreements with each publisher — for online readers. It also works with 27 academic and reference library partners to gain access to out-of-print works. But part of the library project has proved controversial and thrown Google into legal dispute with U.S. publishers as Google also scans works from its U.S. library partners that are still in copyright without asking the publishers first. Random House, a unit of German media group Bertelsmann, has until now held out and not joined the publisher partner program, which can help boost book sales, especially of publishers' so-called backlists of older titles. When asked this week whether the parties were close to an agreement, a Random House spokesman said: "Random House continues to have periodic constructive conversations with Google on issues of mutual relevance." Google declined to comment. Random House, as a member of the American Association of Publishers, says it continues to support a U.S. copyright case filed against Google in 2005 and funded by the association. The lawsuit — brought by Penguin, Pearson,, McGraw-Hill, Wiley and Simon & Schuster — aims to stop Google from scanning in-copyright works it gets from its library partners without explicit permission from publishers. The Bookseller trade magazine reported on Thursday that Random House was "close to healing its rift with Google." CULTURE MONOPOLY Google has so far digitized the full texts of more than 1 million books. The total number of books in the world is unknown but global library collective WorldCat has more than 91 million bibliographic records in its database, the biggest of its kind. Google has come some way toward pacifying its critics since causing a furor after it launched the project in 2004 amid fears, most vociferous in Europe, that Google would gain something close to a monopoly of world culture. Google now works with 27 libraries worldwide, up from seven a year ago, and its book search is available in 11 languages Oxford University's Bodleian Library and Japan's Keio University library. The company, which does not charge or pay its publisher partners, gains depth and authority for its Internet search engine by making not only Web pages but also books searchable. It has already integrated book results into its U.S. search engine and is beginning to do so in Europe. Google does include advertising on its partner program book-search pages, with its publisher partners getting most of the advertising revenue. It has no current plans to do so on its library search pages while it still improving them, for example by including links to Google Maps to show where the action in a book is taking place or adding braille layers for the visually impaired.

Oracle Bids $6.7 Billion for BEA Systems (NewsFactor)

The letter proposes to acquire BEA for $17 per share in an all cash deal. That's a 25 percent premium over Tuesday's closing pricing of $13.62. According to the letter, Oracle is prepared to proceed immediately to the next step: a definitive agreement. BEA sells application server software and middleware. Software developers use its products to build systems on which other applications run. If Oracle successfully acquires BEA, it would mark the company's biggest deal since it bought Siebel for about $6 billion in 2006. Earlier this year, Oracle purchased Hyperion Solutions, a business software developer, for more than $3 billion. "We believe our all cash offer provides the best value for BEA's shareholders and the best home for BEA's employees and customers. This proposal is the culmination of repeated conversations with BEA's management over the last several years. We look forward to completing a friendly transaction as soon as possible," Oracle President Charles Phillips said in a statement. Building BEA Phillips said Oracle intends to protect the investment customers have made in BEA's products by supporting those customers and products for years to come. As evidence of this "continuing support commitment," Phillips pointed to Oracle's previous acquisitions, including PeopleSoft and Siebel. "The acquisition of BEA by Oracle will enable an increase in engineering resources that will in turn accelerate the development of our world-class suite of middleware," Phillips asserted. "Both Oracle and BEA customers will benefit from this increase in engineering investment as they migrate to modern SOA technologies." Oracle's letter comes in the wake of SAP's agreement to buy Business Objects for $6.7 billion. SAP is the fourth largest software seller and the top player in business management programs. Microsoft is the largest software maker, with IBM second. Chasing the Titans Zeus Kerravala, an analyst at Yankee Group, said Oracle's move to acquire BEA is a sign of continued consolidation in the software industry and a competitive move against the industry leaders. "This is part of Oracle's roll-up strategy and it shouldn't be a surprise. Oracle has been chasing Microsoft and IBM for years trying to catch up," Kerravala said. "BEA is a good application server platform, but it's a little small to stand alone with the software giants. BEA probably needs to be acquired if it is going to be a significant player down the road. It makes sense." It might make sense to billionaire investor Carl Icahn, too. Icahn recently moved to boost his ownership stake in BEA and has been lobbying for BEA to sell itself. Icahn has a 13.22 percent stake in the company. BEA could not immediately be reached for comment.

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