Regulating Broadband Communication Networks

Professor Allen Hammond argues that the impending development of broadband communication networks has the potential to expand and equalize speech rights by endowing the public with more numerous and more powerful opportunities for speech. To realize these benefits, however, Congress must design a novel regulatory scheme that will maximize the speech rights of both the owners and the users of broadband communication networks. Current regulatory schemes governing print, broadcast and cable provide media owners and editors with extensive speech rights, but fail to provide sufficient public access. In contrast, the regulatory scheme governing telephone service providers assures public speech rights only by depriving media owners of all opportunities for speech

Measuring the Nexus: The Relationship Between Minority Ownership and Broadcast Diversity After Metro Broadcasting

In Metro Broadcasting, Inc. v. FCC, the Court found a nexus between minority ownership and diversity of viewpoint. The recent Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod v. FCC decision dismissed the government’s arguments that a nexus exists between minority employment in broadcast stations and greater diversity in broadcast programming, and that the government has an interest in fostering such diversity. Given the challenge of the Lutheran Church opinion and potentially significant changes in the regulation and operation of the broadcast market, sole reliance on Metro Broadcasting’s holdings may be ill advised and a new study documenting the continued existence of the nexus may be warranted. Forum: New Approaches to Minority Media Ownership, Columbia Institute for Tele-Information, Columbia University

FCC Comment: In the Matter of Connect America Fund

The Broadband Institute of California (BBIC) and the Broadband Regulatory Clinic of Santa Clara Law (BRC) petition the Commission to expressly consider the needs of rural tribal lands in promulgating regulations regarding spectrum allocated for the development of 5G technologies, and encourages the Commission to work with prospective auction participants, broadband service providers and tribal communities to develop 5G use cases targeting rural and tribal needs. Presently, barriers to broadband deployment across tribal lands include geographical isolation, low population densities, difficult terrain, and political fragmentation arising from tribal governance issues. The first portion of this Comment explains these particularly crippling barriers. Enabling tribes with access to broadband connectivity can assist in combating social problems that arise as a result of these barriers. With regards to geographic isolation, access to healthcare and employment opportunities would improve, without the need for commuting long distances, as consumer markets expand

Deliberative democracy and inequality: Two cheers for enclave deliberation among the disempowered

Deliberative democracy grounds its legitimacy largely in the ability of speakers to participate on equal terms. Yet theorists and practitioners have struggled with how to establish deliberative equality in the face of stark differences of power in liberal democracies. Designers of innovative civic forums for deliberation often aim to neutralize inequities among participants through proportional inclusion of disempowered speakers and discourses. In contrast, others argue that democratic equality is best achieved when disempowered groups deliberate in their own enclaves (interest groups, parties, and movements) before entering the broader public sphere. Borrowing from each perspective, the authors argue that there are strong reasons to incorporate enclave deliberation among the disempowered within civic forums. They support this claim by presenting case study evidence showing that participants in such forums can gain some of the same benefits of deliberation found in more heterogeneous groups (e.g., political knowledge, efficacy and trust), can consider a diversity of viewpoints rather than falling into groupthink and polarization, and can persuade external stakeholders of the legitimacy of the group’s deliberations

Superconducting niobium thin film slow-wave structures

A superconducting comb structure as a slow-wave element in a traveling-wave maser will significantly improve maser noise temperature and gain by reducing the insertion loss. The results of the insertion loss measurements of superconducting niobium slow-wave structures subjected to maser operating conditions at X-Band frequencies are presented

Role of iron in the tubulo-interstitial injury in nephrotoxic serum nephritis

Role of iron in the tubulo-interstitial injury in nephrotoxic serum nephritis. We studied the possibility that tubule fluid iron could be involved in the pathogenesis of the tubulo-interstitial injury associated with primary glomerular disease. Tubule fluid iron is determined by the magnitude of the glomerular leak for transferrin and the iron saturation of transferrin. To minimize tubule fluid iron in an experimental model of glomerulonephritis, iron deficiency was induced in rats prior to the induction of nephrotoxic serum nephritis. Iron deficiency did not effect the development of glomerular disease as determined by proteinuria, but had a marked effect on preventing the development of tubulo-interstitial disease and renal functional deterioration. There was also a strong correlation between the amount of functional deterioration and extent of tubulo-interstitial disease and urinary iron excretion in both the control and iron deficient animals. It is proposed that injury results from iron being dissociated from transferrin at the more acid pH of the tubule fluid. Iron, a transition element, is able to catalyze the Haber-Weiss reaction with the formation of free hydroxyl radicals which causes renal tubule cell injury. This tubulo-interstitial injury is the major determinate of progressive renal functional deterioration in this experimental model of glomerulonephritis