BY LARRY DOWNES AND GEOFFREY A. MANNE The FCC published in June its annual report on the state of competition in the mobile services marketplace. Under ordinary circumstances, this 300-plus page tome would sit quietly on the shelf, since, like last year’s report, it ‘‘makes no formal finding as to whether there is, or is [...]

Last week the Senate Commerce Committee passed–with deep bi-partisan support–the Public Safety Spectrum and Wireless Innovation Act. The bill, co-sponsored by Committee Chairman Jay Rockefeller and Ranking Member Kay Bailey Hutchison, is a comprehensive effort to resolve several long-standing stalemates and impending crises having to do with one of the most critical 21st century resources:  [...]

We’ve added about a dozen new posts to the Media Page on my website, reflecting a sampling of articles, media quotes, and radio appearances from the last few months. These include several pieces for CNET News.com and Forbes, as well as links to appearances on NPR’s “Science Friday” (debating Sen. Al Franken on privacy law) [...]

For CNET this morning, I write about the latest tempest in the AT&T/T-Mobile USA merger teapot: cellular backhaul or “special access” as its known in the industry. Like a child sitting on Santa’s lap at the mall, Sprint CEO Dan Hesse included backhaul in his wish list of conditions he’d like to see attached to [...]

I’ve written two articles on the Protect IP Act of 2011, introduced last week by Sen. Leahy (D-Vt.). For CNET, I look at some of the key differences, better and worse, between Protect IP and its predecessor last year, known as COICA. On Forbes this morning, I have a long meditation on what Protect IP [...]

For Forbes.com this morning, I take a close look at last month’s controversial FCC order requiring facilities-based wireless carriers to negotiate data roaming agreements with other carriers. There are business, technical, and legal reasons why the order stands on unsteady ground, which the article looks at in detail. The order, by encouraging artificial competition in [...]

I’ve written a long article this morning for CNET (See “Privacy panic debate:  Whose data is it?”) on the discovery of the iPhone location tracking file and the utterly predictable panic response that followed.  Its life-cycle follows precisely the crisis model Adam Thierer has so frequently and eloquently traced, most recently at the Technology Liberation [...]

Following AT&T’s announcement last month of its planned acquisition of T-Mobile USA, pundits and other oddsmakers have settled in for a long tour of duty. Speculation, much of it uninformed, is already clogging the media about the chances the $39 billion deal—larger even than last year’s merger of Comcast and NBC Universal—will be approved. Both [...]

I’ve posted a long article on Forbes.com this morning on the Global Network Initiative. A non-profit group aimed at improving human rights though the agency of information technology companies, GNI has never really gotten off the ground. Since its formal launch in 2008, following two years of negotiations among tech companies, human rights groups and [...]

In the rush of ink that flowed yesterday over AT&T’s announced merger with T-Mobile USA, I posted a long piece on CNET calling for calm, reasoned analysis of the deal by regulators, chiefly the Department of Justice and the FCC. Since the details of the deal have yet to be fleshed out, it’s hard to [...]