Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 1 CONSUMER ADVISORY COMMITTEE MEETING FEDERAL COMMUNICATIONS COMMISSIONS 445 12th Street, S.W., Room TW-C305, Washington DC Friday, April 7, 2006 Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 2 1 WELCOME AND CALL TO ORDER - Shirley Rooker 2 Ms. Rooker: I'm Shirley Rooker. I'm the 3 Director of WTOB's radio Call for Action and the 4 President's Call for Action. We're going to save 5 the introductions. We already went around the room 6 real fast for introductions. Before we do that, 7 we're glad to have Commissioner Michael Copps with 8 us this morning. And since he is here and eager to 9 speak with us, we're going to turn the program over 10 to him at this moment and then we will do other 11 business and intro's after that. 12 So Commissioner Copps, thank you so much. 13 Please join me in welcoming him. 14 [Applause] 15 STATEMENT OF FCC COMMISSIONER MICHAEL J. COPPS 16 Commissioner Copps: Thank you very much. I 17 wanted to come down and apologize for the fact that 18 I couldn't make the last couple of sessions that 19 were held because I was out of town. But I really 20 wanted to come and thank you all for a number of 21 reasons. Number one, just like I thank all the 22 advisory committees, it's just a thank you for the 23 time, and energy, and dedication, and hard work you 24 put into this effort. I'm a great believer in 25 public/private sector partnerships and this kind of Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 3 1 advisory panel. 2 When I was at the Department of Commerce in 3 the Clinton Administration, I had responsibility 4 for overseeing I think, 16 or 17 of our industry 5 sector advisory committees and policy committees 6 and all, where the private sector came in and 7 really did this same sort of thing you're doing 8 here and it was invaluable to have that kind of 9 advice when we were negotiating treaties or doing 10 things like that. And I often stop to think, what 11 if we were doing this just alone without any input 12 from those folks who are out there in the real 13 world? It would have been tough going. 14 But I'm particularly anxious to come down here 15 and thank you, because I think this has been really 16 a stellar performance by this committee. It's a 17 good and activist committee. It's tackled really 18 not only difficult, but depressing and immediate 19 problems that we, as a country need to be facing 20 right now. So, I'm happy for that. 21 I've always told committees, set your own 22 agenda. Use the Commission staff to help you, but 23 you set the agenda, you set the priorities, you set 24 the direction, and you go the road you want to go. 25 And this committee has really done that and that is Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 4 1 I think, how you can really make a wonderful 2 contribution to the Federal Communications 3 Commission, and to the public, and to public 4 policy, and serving the public interest. I think 5 the issues that you have tackled are really 6 critically important. 7 As you know, I've been involved in several of 8 them since coming here since 2001, whether it's the 9 media ownership you're going to be talking about 10 today. I don't think there's a more important 11 problem that faces the United States right now. I 12 often tell people that media ownership isn't your 13 number one concern and your number one issue. It 14 ought to be your number two concern or issue, 15 because your number one issue is going to be 16 filtered through that lense of the media, and you 17 ought to be interested in that, and I'm glad that 18 you are interested in that, and we will be 19 addressing that as a Commission at the Chairman's 20 discretion. 21 But I presume fairly soon, as we revisit the 22 media ownership rules that unwisely went through 23 displacing 2003, and finally receive their just 24 desserts and were sent back to the Federal 25 Communications Commission. From my standpoint, it Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 5 1 was kind of a check status. It was good news that 2 those rules didn't go into effect. But now, we're 3 right back where we were before and we have to have 4 the same kind of input from the American people - 5 from you. So I look forward to your consideration 6 of that issue today and your actions today. 7 Ditto on the public interest obligations of 8 the DTV transition where you already have sent some 9 recommendations to us. I was thrilled when that 10 happened because I've been saying for months, this 11 Commission has done it for years really. This 12 Commission has done a pretty good job from the 13 standpoint of dealing with the mechanics of the DTV 14 transition whether it's digital, tuners, or we even 15 tried to do something in the broadcast lag until 16 the courts told us to get out of the way on that 17 one. That it was none of our business. But I 18 think under Chairman Powell, we did a good job in 19 trying to get commitments from the broadcasters and 20 everybody carrying high definition. 21 But that one whole gigantic area -- what's in 22 this for the American people, what's in it for 23 consumers? We just ignore it. And those 24 recommendations have been around here for years, 25 and years, and years. And we finally got the Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 6 1 children's TV one up last year and got that through 2 here. And that was a good proceeding and a lot of 3 you folks helped on that. But that's only the tip 4 of it. There are lots of other recommendations 5 that were made and before we make this transition, 6 this is our chance and this may be our only chance 7 to really address this issue of what is in it the 8 public interest? And not only the American 9 consumer's need to know what the rules of the road 10 are, industry does too. So I think you do us all a 11 big favor on that. And I don't want to filibuster 12 here, but I'm so happy to see you go off and you're 13 going to have a report from your Rural Task Force 14 today. 15 We went down with Chairman Martin to Keller, 16 Texas last month and had our full Commission 17 meeting down there and he wanted us to go see some 18 of this IPT technology that's been developed by 19 Verizon and AT&T, and it's wonderful stuff and 20 we're all going to welcome having new competition 21 for the media, but you really -- you kind of wonder 22 when you leave there. You see all of this 23 wonderful technology and this very bandwidth 24 intensive, and you know high tech communities like 25 Keller, Texas are going to have that, and Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 7 1 Washington, DC's going to have that, and Chicago's 2 going to have that. How are we going to get that 3 out to rural America? And I really think -- and 4 it's not just IPT we're talking about, but it's 5 bandwidth and having access to advanced 6 technologies, and the tools of economic 7 opportunity, and the tools of education in the 21st 8 century. We could end up in the 21st century, with 9 a larger rural/urban split, a larger digital gap in 10 this age of advanced technology. 11 I think then, we head back to the base of 12 plain old telephone service and incipient broadband 13 in the 20th century. We're not talking about that 14 too much now, but we ought to be talking about it. 15 And Glen, again, I'm so glad to see you 16 talking about that. It is curious to me, we all 17 understand we live in such hugely transformative 18 times, all these technologies are migrating to new 19 tools and new services, and we're spending so much 20 time just debating whether the basic protections 21 that people fought so hard for in the 20th century, 22 whether it's consumer protections or privacy, or 23 universal service, or what have you, are going to 24 accompany this migration of technology and I would 25 hope we could get some kind of national consensus Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 8 1 on that before long. 2 But anyhow, I'll get off my soapbox. I came 3 down to say, thank you for being an activist 4 committee, for being a productive committee. 5 You're really serving the public interest and I'm 6 grateful for it. 7 Ms. Rooker: You will take a couple of 8 questions. Does anyone have questions? 9 Commissioner Copps: As long as their 10 softballs. 11 [Laughter] 12 Ms. Rooker: Does anybody have any questions 13 or comments? 14 Commissioner Copps: Another area I wanted to 15 mention, if I could just take a second, is the work 16 on disabilities. And the first speech I gave as a 17 member of this Commission was to the Deaf and Hard 18 of Hearing community out in Sioux Falls, South 19 Dakota. It's so important. I remember having 20 dinner with those folks the night before my speech 21 and I said, what's the unemployment rate amongst 22 this community? And they said, well it's like 75 23 or 80 percent. And I just kind of sat there in 24 shock, because here you had these people with all 25 this tremendous ability wanting nothing more than Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 9 1 to be productive citizens. We're getting the tools 2 now that can help make them that. We've got to 3 find a way to integrate them into that process and 4 make those tools available to them. So that's 5 another thing I'm really happy you all are 6 interested in. 7 Ms. Rooker: Well thank you so much. And we 8 do have a question. Gene? 9 Mr. Crick: One thing that we recognize -- all 10 of us here, is it's very difficult to address these 11 issues with the limited time as volunteers that we 12 have. Do you have any suggestions of this 13 committee or any of the working groups? And it's 14 not just as softball as it may seem. And it would 15 be something like, how do you manage to do such 16 wonderful work? 17 [Laughter] 18 Mr. Crick: Our question is, how could we more 19 effectively make our contributions to FCC policy 20 and say the real level of that is, how can we be 21 effective and in the sense of being influential? 22 We're going to your first question, how do we do 23 such a wonderful job? 24 [Laughter] 25 Commissioner Copps: I think some of the Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 10 1 things I talked about at the beginning and tried to 2 have something like this. You have to have 3 necessarily, a wide agenda I guess, but you also 4 have to have a sense of priorities and a sense of 5 what it is that you hope to achieve in the limited 6 lifetime that these things are chartered for. And 7 so I think, get control of your own committee, set 8 your own priorities, use the FCC staff as your 9 tool, and keep them on tap with that. And then I 10 think, put the end prioritized recommendations to 11 the committee, not 9,000 recommendations on each 12 subject, but really trying to get to the nitty 13 gritty so that they're highlighted and they make an 14 impression. And I guess all of this with some kind 15 of a public relation strategy when you come forward 16 with these things get out on the news, get up on 17 Capitol Hill, let people know you're working out on 18 these. Those are some of the things that would 19 occur to me off the top of my head. 20 Mr. Crick: I am far that, that it's 21 appropriate that if we do make public our 22 recommendations, that is actual, I mean, I don't 23 want that to be loaded question, I'm just simply 24 saying, that I don't know. 25 Commissioner Copps: I think that's right. I Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 11 1 would defer to your designated Federal Officers and 2 any legal problems that are involved in that or 3 confidentiality. I shouldn't probably opine on 4 that. But, that this is not -- this should not be 5 classified information. This is not, some of the 6 industry sector advisory committees I had at 7 Commerce, you had to get a security clearance and 8 you were dealing with secret stuff and necessarily 9 so, and that was fine or business propriety stuff 10 like, but you don't just broadcast far and wide. 11 But I think when you're dealing with important 12 public policy questions that affect each and every 13 American, because there are stakeholders in owning 14 the public airways, that there's probably more than 15 adequate ways to have strategies that would get 16 that information into the public domain where it 17 belongs so that they can help. We don't always 18 help to make the right decisions. They could help 19 us make the right decisions. 20 It was just pointed out to me that the 21 recommendations are on the website. 22 Ms. Rooker: Well thank you so much, for 23 taking the time to come and join us this morning 24 and for your nice comments. Thank you. 25 [Applause] Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 12 1 Ms. Rooker: We've also been joined by 2 Commissioner Adelstein and we're going to let him 3 go next on the agenda, if that's okay. 4 STATEMENT OF FCC COMMISSIONER JONATHAN S. ADELSTEIN 5 Commissioner Adelstein: Good morning 6 everybody. Thank you so much for having me. It's 7 really a pleasure to be here. I know that our CGB 8 does such a great job of bringing you all together. 9 Monica Desai and Shirley Rooker made time for me on 10 the agenda and for Commissioner Copps, and we 11 appreciate that. It's nice to see so many friendly 12 faces this morning, and it's good just to have you 13 here and to have your input. 14 I've got to say, that we are inundated here by 15 an awful lot of lobbyists representing special 16 interests. Some of the most powerful corporations 17 in America, with some of the best and most 18 effective lobbyist you could possibly imagine, the 19 highest paid, the one's that have been here at the 20 highest levels or in Congress and it is just 21 nonstop. And you're really the bull work against 22 just being inundated by that and making sure that 23 we represent the people that we're really here to 24 represent under the law, the public, the consumers. 25 So we need your input. Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 13 1 We appreciate your being aggressive and really 2 taking advantage of this opportunity. The CBG and 3 the Chairman have been so gracious in providing you 4 to come together, to make sure that we hear from 5 you, because it is so critical to us. I take what 6 you say with a great deal of seriousness and 7 respect because of where you come from, because I 8 know that you represent the people that I 9 represent. You represent consumers, not the 10 companies that seek to profit by taking advantage 11 of regulations or somehow moving us around in ways 12 that benefit them. I don't blame them for doing 13 that. That's their job. They're good at it. 14 But our job is to wade through all that and 15 try to get to what the bottom line effect is on the 16 American people and you're the ones who can help us 17 to wade through that and you've done that. You've 18 made some recommendations here and I want to get 19 into some of those in a minute. 20 At your November meeting, I understand some 21 very important recommendations and I appreciate the 22 hard work that you did on those in both VRS and on 23 the consumer interest obligations for broadcasters. 24 I also understand that you will consider some 25 additional recommendations from the TRS Working Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 14 1 Group and I look forward to hearing your findings 2 on those. 3 You know as well as anybody in this country 4 about how we need to implement the Americans with 5 Disabilities Act and its vision. You have 6 expertise on that, that we need to hear from. And 7 I'm also pleased that the Advanced Technologies 8 Working Group is going to be offering a 9 recommendation to clarify our closed captioning 10 rules for DTV services. 11 When it comes to DTV transition, I think we 12 can't leave anyone behind. I know Janice Schacter 13 has spent some time yesterday, talking to me about 14 her experience as a mother of a young girl with 15 some hearing impairment and how important it is 16 that this be done right. And I think we're going 17 to make sure that happens, but we need your input 18 to make sure we can do it right. 19 I wanted to get into some of your 20 recommendations just briefly on VRS and the 21 consumer interest obligations of broadcasters. I 22 know that VRS interoperability issue is something 23 that is of great importance to all of us here. I 24 know that Monica Desai and our CGB have made 25 addressing this issue a priority. These systems Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 15 1 have to be interoperable. Everybody in this 2 country should be able to make calls. Whether they 3 have a disability or not, we understand the need 4 for emergency communications. It doesn't matter 5 whether you have a disability. Everybody has the 6 same need to have that access. Everybody has the 7 same right under the law to have that access and we 8 are going to make sure that that happens. We're 9 making this a priority and actively working on it. 10 So thank you for your input on that and you can see 11 how it makes a difference here because we're going 12 to be acting on that and it is thanks in part, to 13 your efforts. 14 On the DTV obligations, consumer interest, I 15 know at your last meeting in November, you made a 16 recommendation that was extremely helpful also to 17 us. I think that it was really timely, because 18 subsequently, Congress approved the DTV deadline 19 for February 2009 and as the consumers become more 20 aware of the transition and its cost to them, 21 they're going to ask what's in it for me and I 22 think it is important that we have a good response. 23 Here at the Commission, we spent a lot of time 24 making sure that broadcasters get the spectrum that 25 they need. They've been given $10's of billions of Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 16 1 dollars worth of free spectrum by Congress and 2 deservedly so, because they provide a wonderful 3 service. But what are we going to make sure that 4 we do to have the public benefit, as well as those 5 companies that are using that spectrum? What's the 6 measurable value to the consumer? In other words, 7 what specifically do we need to put on there as 8 they get additional capacity in response to the 9 digital transition to make sure that that 10 additional capacity comes with it? Commensurate 11 responsibilities for the public interest, because 12 after all, that's our sole interest under the law. 13 The public interest. 14 Now yesterday, I was at an unveiling of a 15 study that was very disturbing about video news 16 releases. You may or may not have noticed it. It 17 was in the press only marginally. But this public 18 interest group on behalf of the people, took the 19 effort to try to determine what was happening to 20 these video news releases. And it turned out, that 21 they found 98 instances where they were being 22 passed directly from a corporate propaganda source 23 to the American people via the public airwaves 24 without any disclosure apparently, about the source 25 of it. So it looks like a news story. It's about Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 17 1 an eczema cream. But guess who paid for it? The 2 pharmaceutical company that produces that cream, or 3 General Motors, or Daimler-Chrysler. No indication 4 to the public that these things are paid for by 5 corporate America. 6 Now there's nothing wrong with that, if they 7 want to substitute fake news for real news. If 8 they want to put on some phony thing that saves 9 them time from doing real local news, I guess that 10 is their right. But it's not their right under the 11 law, to not disclose to the public who's behind it. 12 Of course it's extremely embarrassing to disclose 13 to the public that rather than having real news, 14 they just took some clip from Daimler-Chrysler and 15 just threw it on. So maybe that's why their not 16 disclosing it. 17 But that is not what the [inaudible] asked 18 them to do and that is not what the public asked 19 them to do. So clearly, there's a role we have 20 here to make sure that this DTV transition benefits 21 the public and that we have a diversity of 22 viewpoints represented. 23 We promote civic participation. We expanded 24 local and community programming and increased 25 children's programming. So your recommendations Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 18 1 are something we take real seriously, again and 2 thank you so much for doing it. I think the 3 children's DTV compromise bodes well for the 4 Commission action on other challenging items like 5 this. We have enhanced disclosure requirements. 6 We need to act on them right away and get ready to 7 go. We need to get the public interest obligations 8 on all broadcasters, both radio and television, and 9 we have a local list in proceeding that has been 10 hanging out there for a while. We need to wrap 11 that up and we need your help on that. And now of 12 course, we have media ownership coming up, we have 13 the 3rd Circuit. It has remanded to us the 14 decision which was I think, unfortunate decision, 15 but we have an opportunity now to get it right. 16 And whatever we do, we'd better get it right 17 because the American people will care about what is 18 on their media and they need to be involved in the 19 process. 20 Again, the only standard I can tell in the law 21 as I read it, is the public interest and so it's 22 great that we hear from all the companies that are 23 affected by the regulations and that want to loosen 24 the ownership rules, and they have every right to 25 come here and to make their case as well as they Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 19 1 can. But ultimately, we have to weigh that against 2 what is in the public interest. Is their interest 3 aligned with the public, or is it different, or 4 where can we find a way that their needs are met so 5 that they can provide the service? But that 6 ultimately, our sole legal obligation to the public 7 interest is served and you are a critical part of 8 that. 9 We need to hear from you on that, whatever it 10 is you want to say, whether you think we need more 11 consolidation or less. It's just your viewpoint is 12 critical to us because you, in many ways, represent 13 the public and those are the issues that you have 14 before you today. And I really want to encourage 15 you to speak your mind, to let us know what you 16 think, to be open and vigorous in your advocacy and 17 in your recommendations, and I would invite all of 18 you, if you really want to come to my office and 19 say hi, I would love to. Janice did it yesterday 20 and feel free to come by, because we want to hear 21 from you. We hear from a lot of people, but not 22 always people representing your viewpoints. So 23 again, thank you for taking the time to participate 24 and make your contribution to this effort. Thanks 25 for having me. Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 20 1 Ms. Rooker: I think we're going to have some 2 questions. Just to remind people, put your hand up 3 and give the people in the control booth time to 4 get to you with your microphone. And we have a 5 question, is this okay? Commissioner Adelstein, do 6 you have time? 7 Commissioner Adelstein: Sure. 8 Mr. Conran: I really don't have a question. 9 I want to thank you, because I know you've made 10 yourself personally available to many of the public 11 members who, when we've come to your office to talk 12 about issues, rather than shuttling us off to staff 13 people. , I know you met with many of us on 14 occasions and I told you at the last meeting how 15 much I think it is appreciated by the public 16 members of this panel who are paying their own way 17 to come here and are not being subsidized. And you 18 have been, I think a good partner to this group. 19 You've made yourself very available, and it is very 20 appreciated, and I just wanted to express that 21 publicly. 22 Commissioner Adelstein: That's kind of you to 23 say that. 24 Ms. Rooker: And I can say, it's nice to hear 25 the affirmation of our work from you. So that is a Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 21 1 lovely thing. 2 Okay, Jim? 3 Mr. Tobias: Thank you very much Commissioner, 4 for coming and addressing that way. And listening 5 to you, I'm beginning to hear the sounds that 6 maybe, our long national nightmare of market 7 idolatry is coming to an end, and that the 8 Commission at least, might be one of the places 9 where some balance is restored between market 10 dynamics and needs of consumers of many types. 11 Specifically, and with reference to one of the 12 events -- Technology Working Group's 13 recommendations, the idea of having an ability to 14 plan for consumer issues, the specific 15 recommendation is to have a disability impact 16 statement for new technologies, products, services, 17 and features that will have an effect on 18 accessibility before they actually enter the 19 market. That is in the process of Commission 20 vetting or review. 21 I think it's a very interesting concept, but 22 it raises a larger picture for me and that is not 23 just with respect to accessability. But in every 24 way, so many of us, as consumer advocates, are in a 25 reactive mode and we needn't be. We should be able Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 22 1 to come together and well in advance of the 2 introduction of a new product or service, 3 understand and help guide the industry actually, in 4 targeting better and in providing consumer service 5 better by warning them essentially, this is going 6 to be a problematic area or this is a particularly 7 attractive proposal that will serve a market that 8 you may not be aware of. So both in the negative 9 and the positive to have a planning component, an 10 ability to get ahead of the market, and kind of do 11 some horizon scanning. And I'm wondering if either 12 currently or in any imagined real organization 13 within the Commission, that such a function might 14 be expanded? 15 Commissioner Adelstein: It is the idea. It's 16 something that you need to -- I think, give us your 17 thoughts on and after some more reflection -- I 18 mean, one of the issues is the nature of our 19 authority over equipment manufactures is somewhat 20 limited. We will work with them in terms of 21 licensing items and ensuring they don't create 22 harmful interference in the case of wireless items. 24 A lot of consumer products that are in this 25 field, we have very limited authority over. And we Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 23 1 have, for example, on the broadcast flag, we got 2 handed back to the court that we couldn't use a 3 broad public interest authority to try to protect 4 copyright holders and that has implications for how 5 much we can go in to. And that's an area where we 6 have some specific authority from Congress on the 7 DTV transition. 8 So more broadly, the question is, what can we 9 do and possibly ADA compliance be brought to bear? 10 I think it is something that needs a lot more 11 thought and this is good venue to try to think 12 through what we could do. Maybe instead of having 13 a requirements, we could work in some kind of 14 cooperative way with our friends in the Consumer 15 Governmental Affairs Bureau, to try to make sure 16 that these issues are thought up early in the 17 production process. That there's an opportunity 18 for input from the community that is affected - 19 Americans with disabilities -- into how these 20 products are manufactured, so that they're 21 compatible with various issues that people have and 22 so it might have to be a more informal process than 23 a formal one. But if you could help us think 24 through what we could do, both informally and 25 formally, in terms of what the limits are on our Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 24 1 authority with equipment manufactures. That would 2 be really helpful. 3 Ms. Rooker: One more question. Charles, put 4 your hand up so they'll find you. 5 Mr. Benton: Mr. Adelstein, thank you so much 6 for your most thoughtful and helpful comments to 7 us. I'm wondering, last month you gave a speech to 8 the Consumer Electronics Association, the Call to 9 Action speech, where you were pushing them to work 10 on consumer education in the face of the digital 11 transition. 12 Certainly, from the technology standpoint, 13 there needs to be consumer education. But also 14 perhaps, from the content standpoint as well. And 15 so for example, the children's rules that look as 16 though they're going to be approved now and there's 17 been an industry public interest collaborative 18 effort to work this through. I'm wondering if the 19 Call to Action could be enlarged with the Consumer 20 Electronics Association to talk, not just about the 21 technology, but about the content, and about the 22 public interest obligations, the things we talked 23 about earlier. I'm wondering if that might be 24 possible in using some of the federal money that 25 has been set aside for the education of consumers Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 25 1 about all of this to raise consciousness and the 2 opportunities for the more effective meeting of 3 consumer needs through the digital technology as 4 opposed to the analog technology. Perhaps your 5 comments about that, I would love to hear your 6 comments about that. 7 Commissioner Adelstein: Your observation 8 about the children's rules is sort of a model on 9 how we work together in cooperation with industries 10 that are affected. We've worked with the 11 broadcasters, we've worked with the networks, we 12 worked with consumer groups and we reached an 13 agreement that really was a reasonable one that 14 everybody could live with and ensure that children 15 had meaningful benefits out of the digital 16 transmission and that the urgent needs of the 17 broadcasters and the networks weren't basically 18 ignored in ways that would actually potentially 19 undercut the good product that children ultimately 20 would receive. So that was a wonderful cooperative 21 effort and to the degree we can do that, I think we 22 should. 23 The Call to Action specifically, was really 24 about real basics of making people aware that this 25 digital transmission is coming. Now that we have a Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 26 1 hard date, we have a whole different ball game. I 2 mean, it was tough to get all the different groups 3 together to communicate the single message when it 4 wasn't clear when the transition was going to end, 5 because they had different policy interests. Some 6 people wanted the transition later than others and 7 they really couldn't agree on a public message. 8 But on this one, we're really focused on kind of a 9 simple message, your TV is going to go dark in 2009 10 and here's some steps you can take to fix it. If 11 you want to buy a TV, think about going digital - 12 not analog, or here's the cost if you go analog. 13 If you can't afford a new TV or don't want to buy 14 one, you can get this box and the government is 15 providing a subsidy, and how do you educate people 16 about what their different options are, and how you 17 do that in a simple way. And frankly, that 18 particular effort is going to take a consensus 19 between consumer electronics, broadcast industry, 20 public interest groups, the government, both NTIA 21 and the FCC, and it is tough to broaden our two 22 issues that are contentious and divisive sometimes. 24 If we want to get that message across, because 25 we certainly don't want consumers to be surprised Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 27 1 to when they find their TV set in the kitchen going 2 dark because they were getting over the air on that 3 one. If a few million of things even go dark and 4 there's 90 million of these sets out there, we're 5 going to have some pretty angry folks. 6 And so, that's the message that we're -- right 7 now, really trying to, in a sensitive way, bring 8 together a consensus. And ideas include working 9 with CGB to get some outreach done, trying to get 10 at maybe a working group together of industry, 11 public interest advocates, and all the different 12 industry. Because there's a lot. There's 13 retailers, there's the manufacturers, there's the 14 broadcasters, there's the networks. I mean on and 15 on, there's a lot of different interest out there 16 on the corporate side and then there is the public 17 groups and the consumer reps. But everybody's 18 interest is the same on this one. That's the 19 beauty of it. 20 I think we could come up with a unified 21 message and when you talk to like advertising 22 professionals, they want to be simple, and clean, 23 and repeated a lot so that nobody gets surprised. 24 And that is kind of, I think, the goal of that one. 25 But I think there is a need for a broader effort to Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 28 1 work together, maybe not in the context, but in 2 another one to find out, how do we move forward on 3 what you call the consumer interest obligations of 4 broadcasters? And the more consensus we can reach 5 on that, I think it's in everybody's interest. I 6 think it is in the interest of broadcasters and 7 consumers that there be real benefits to the public 8 from this transition. 9 The question is, can we reach a consensus on 10 what those are or how you go about adding the 11 government role in ensuring that those benefits are 12 maximized for consumers? That is a little tougher 13 one. Because again, the policy differences might 14 make it more difficult to have a unified message 15 than they would on the consumer transition - the 16 basics of the transition. But, your thought is 17 well taken and I certainly appreciate your 18 leadership and the leadership of the whole group on 19 consumer interest obligations. 20 Ms. Rooker: Thank you, Commissioner. I'm 21 sorry, we are running late. I'm sorry. 22 Commissioner Adelstein: It's my fault. 23 Ms. Rooker: No. Thank you so much. 24 [Applause] 25 Ms. Rooker: I have a few housekeeping things Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 29 1 I have to do before we can move on to Monica. She 2 is with us and I hope she will forgive me. But I 3 do just need to tell you a couple of things. We 4 have some people who are joining us this morning. 5 Larry Goldberg and Steve Jacobs are joining us for 6 the new --- listen to this, new video conferencing 7 system which I think is partly made possible or 8 made possible by Steve Jacobs. So what you're 9 going to do, is you're not going to see gorgeous 10 pictures of us up on the screen, instead you're 11 going to see the closed captioning. I thought 12 because the two systems -- there's some problems 13 with transmitting. I don't know. Don't ask me. I 14 have no clue. We're working on it. They're 15 working on me, trying to make me understand. I 16 don't understand. 17 So I will put off my other housekeeping items 18 until we have had a chance for Monica Desai to join 19 us. Please join me in welcoming the Chief of the 20 Consumer and Governmental Affairs Bureau. 21 [Applause] 22 STATEMENT OF FCC COMMISSIONER MONICA DESAI, 23 CHIEF OF THE CONSUMER GOVERNMENTAL AFFAIRS BUREAU 24 Ms. Desai: Thank you all. It's so good to be 25 here with all of you again. And Shirley, thank you Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 30 1 so much for all you do for the committee. And 2 thank you, Scott also for just running this 3 committee so efficiently and so well. I know that 4 you all have been working very hard over the last 5 few months and the committee has never had so many 6 complex and challenging issues and recommendations 7 on a single meeting agenda. Congratulations on all 8 your good work in these various areas and I look 9 forward to receiving your recommendations. 10 CGB has been very busy since your last meeting 11 in November, so I would like to start off by 12 highlighting some of our recent efforts on the 13 consumer front, as well as report back to you 14 regarding the status of your recommendations. 15 As you know, the Commission's Disability 16 Rights office is housed within the Consumer and 17 Governmental Affairs Bureau and it's a high 18 priority for the Commission, that people with 19 disabilities get the same access to 20 telecommunications and video programming that 21 people without such disabilities take for granted. 22 I mentioned the last time that we met, that we 23 were working on establishing a video phone at the 24 Commission, a publicly available video phone. I'm 25 very glad to report, that now, we have this video Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 31 1 phone up and running. So if you would like to take 2 a look and use it, it's right outside the door. 3 Take a right up the steps and let me know. Let us 4 know what you think. 5 Last November, the committee addressed the 6 issue of blocking by certain video relay service 7 providers. I know that our Disability Rights 8 office staff found your comments to be very useful 9 and helpful in working on the proceeding. Chairman 10 Martin certainly has said publicly, that he 11 supports action on this issue. 12 And I'm sorry, I'm not able to provide a time 13 table for Commission action at this point, but I 14 know that it is something that all of the -- that 15 the Chairman and the Commissioner's are looking at 16 very closely, right now. 17 On November 30th, the Commission released a 18 Notice of Proposed Rule Making, seeking comment on 19 ways by which IP relay and video relay service 20 providers might automatically route emergency goals 21 to the appropriate public safety answering point. 22 The comment cycle on this issue has ended just 23 recently -- ended on March 8th. Because of the 24 importance of ensuring immediate access to 25 emergency services for all individuals, this is a Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 32 1 very critical issue we're working on. Just in 2 December, the Commission released an order creating 3 a Commission levels certification process for 4 common carriers to offer IP relay and video relay 5 service. This way, we hope this will stir 6 competition and increase consumer choice and 7 quality of service in those markets. 8 Our Bureau, as well as other Bureaus in the 9 Commission, are also working on other consumer 10 related rule making proceedings. The Commission, 11 through the Wire Line Bureau, recently opened a 12 proceeding to determine whether additional 13 restrictions may be necessary to protect the 14 confidentiality of customer proprietary -- certain 15 network information often referred to as CP&I. You 16 may be aware of this. This has been in the news a 17 bit. Comments in this proceeding are due next week 18 on April 14th and reply comments are due May 15th. 19 On April 5th, just two days ago, the 20 Commission adopted rules implementing the Junk Fax 21 Prevention Act of 2005. Specifically, the 22 Commission prettified an exemption to the fax rules 23 to allow fax advertisements to be sent to parties 24 within. The sender already has an established 25 business relationship. In addition, the item also Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 33 1 requires the sender of the fax advertisements to 2 provide clear and conspicuous notice and contact 3 information on the first page of a fax, which 4 allows recipients to opt-out of future fax 5 transmissions from this sender. You can pull this 6 up off the website. 7 We're also working on the issue of early 8 termination fees. As you all know, in 2005, the 9 Commission received two related petitions 10 concerning early termination fees imposed by 11 commercial mobile service -- commercial mobile 12 radio service providers on customers that terminate 13 their service prior to the expiration of a contract 14 term. In coordination with the Wireless Bureau, 15 CBG is reviewing the record and analyzing the 16 challenging issues facing the Commission. I know 17 this issue is part of one of your recommendations 18 on today's agenda, so it's very timely that you are 19 all providing us with your thoughts on this. 20 In November, you were just to take prompt 21 action on three dockets regarding the public 22 interest obligations of digital television 23 programmers. Although I can't give you a time 24 table at this point for Commission action, I know 25 that Shirley filed your recommendations in the Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 34 1 appropriate dockets and sent copies to all the 2 Commissioners. So, thank you for doing that. 3 Regarding the responsibilities of digital 4 television broadcasters however, the Commission 5 recently sought comment on the second Further 6 Notice of Proposed Rule Making, addressing the 7 joint industry advocate proposal, regarding 8 previously adopted requirements of television 9 licensee's to provide educational programming for 10 children. 11 I would also like to address an issue which 12 was raised during your November meeting. You asked 13 us to explain the role of public comments in the 14 Commission's policy making process. Comments from 15 the public are very critical to the process. 16 However, the policy making process is not driven 17 solely by the number of comments on a particular 18 issue and we're well aware that some interested and 19 effected customers may not by comfortable filing 20 comments with us. So although we constantly strive 21 to make the comment process easy and consumer 22 friendly, who for example, our ECFS Express System. 23 I want to make sure you understand that we do value 24 all the comments that we receive. We also pay very 25 close attention to comments from advocacy Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 35 1 organizations which we know represent the views of 2 many individual consumers. 3 As you know, CGB also has an important 4 outreach function. We conduct our outreach 5 primarily through our Consumer Affairs and Outreach 6 Division which focuses on broad issue oriented, as 7 well as constituents, specific consumer education, 8 and also through our office of Intergovernmental 9 Affairs which is committed to strengthening the 10 relationship with state, local, and tribal 11 governments. We collaborate on a variety of issues 12 including homeland security, broadband advance 13 services, deployment, and wireless spectrum 14 options. Since November, our outreach team has 15 continued to participate in outreach activities, 16 designed to educate and inform consumers in making 17 important choices about telecommunications and 18 broadcast services. 19 Most recently, we attended the Consumer 20 Electronics show in Las Vegas, focusing on the 21 digital television transition, and the Delta 22 regional authority information technology, and 23 policy planning conference in Jackson, Mississippi 24 where we focused on broadband deployment. 25 In February alone, we attended three major Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 36 1 tribal conferences including the United South and 2 Eastern Tribes Impact, the Affiliated Tribes of 3 Northwest Indians with Recession, and the National 4 Congress of American Indians winter session. We 5 also just conducted a meeting of our 6 Intergovernmental Advisory Committee. 7 We're also focused on outreach through the 8 web. Since its inception last May, we've had 9 approximately 5,100 subscribers to our Consumer 10 Information Registry. The registry, as many of you 11 are familiar with, allows the delivery of consumer 12 information on whatever topics an individual 13 chooses. As the agency continues to inform the 14 public about important topics such as the digital 15 transition and VOIP/911, the registry will be a 16 good tool in getting consumers information 17 effectively and efficiently. So to the extent you 18 have topics, that you think would be useful for us 19 to send updates on and would like us to send out 20 emails on, please let us know. 21 I know that you recommended that we update our 22 Consumer Education Website, particularly on DTV, 23 www.dtv.gov and so I'm pleased to report that the 24 latest version of this website went live just about 25 a week ago. And as you recommended, we have Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 37 1 included in the news section of the page, 2 information concerning the obligations of digital 3 broadcasters to provide closed captioning. 4 In addition, to get children involved, we have 5 created a DTV Deputy program, where a certificate 6 is issued online to those who successfully complete 7 a DTV quiz. We hope to reach parents with DTV 8 information through their children. We plan to 9 also work with educators in bringing the DTV Deputy 10 program to the classroom on the website. 11 We've also created a Consumer Corner with 12 frequently asked questions about DTV information 13 about what programming is available on DTV and 14 glossary of digital television terms. We've made 15 the Commission's DTV Consumer Education 16 publications easier to access by posting them on 17 the dtv.gov website. In addition, we're now in the 18 process of developing the trainer's material and an 19 outreach toolkit to help government agencies and 20 community organizations run DTV awareness programs 21 locally and provide DTV information to those 22 seeking information and services from community 23 organizations. 24 So to the extent you have suggestions for the 25 toolkit, please let us know or keep an eye out on Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 38 1 the website, once it goes live. And if you see 2 things we should be adding to make it easier to 3 reach organizations, to make the information more 4 useful to organizations, please let us know. 5 As you know, updating the site is a continual 6 process and so our goal is to stay current with the 7 latest technology and information. Again, I invite 8 you to take a look at the new rollout. We're also 9 excited to be partnering with a NARUC on two 10 important outreach initiatives, involving life line 11 linkup, and subscribership, and consumer education, 12 and enforcement of the FCC's VOIP/911 requirements. 13 As you know, that Lifeline Across America 14 initiative was launched at the NARUC summer meeting 15 and on February 7th, the Working Group launched 16 www.lifeline.gov. 17 A website on lifeline linkupthat aggregates 18 important information for consumers with a special 19 section for hurricane victims, consumer advocates, 20 industry, government, and media. 21 As you know, the CGB has a complaints and 22 inquiry function as well. I think several of you 23 took a tour of our Consumer Center yesterday. We 24 are responsible for the Commission's direct 25 relationship with consumers through our Consumer Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 39 1 Center. So I want to highlight some of the 2 Center's work during 2005. 3 The Consumer Center fielded in 2005 over three 4 quarters of a million phone calls, twice that many 5 emails, also faxes, mail and web contacts for a 6 total of 2.4 million consumer contacts. One of the 7 most important rules our Consumer Advocacy and 8 Mediation Specialists -- those are the folks who 9 work in the Consumer Center or CAMS as they're 10 sometimes called, is in resolving disputes between 11 consumers and carriers. And through their hard 12 work, in 2005, over $4 million dollars were 13 returned to consumers by the carriers. 14 Currently, we are in the process of developing 15 a revised operating system that will enable our 16 Consumer Center staff to have more readily 17 available information to assist them in responding 18 to inquiries and complaints. And that should be 19 rolling out very soon, within the next month or 20 two. And as many of you know, you can access the 21 full complaint and inquiry report on the Bureau's 22 website at www.fcc.gov/cgb. 23 Well I know we're running overtime, but I 24 appreciate having had the opportunity to highlight 25 the Bureau's and some of the Commission's recent Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 40 1 activities and the opportunity to give you some 2 feedback on the issues you raised in November. I 3 look forward to continuing to work with you as we 4 implement the Commission's strategic goals. 5 So, thank you. Thank you very much, again. 6 [Applause] 7 Ms. Rooker: Monica has agreed to take a few 8 questions from us. We're running late because I 9 got us started five minutes late today. I'm going 10 to have to be beaten with a whip. 11 [Laughter] 12 Ms. Rooker: That never happens. Debra? And 13 by the way, when you're going to ask a question, 14 please state your name first for the record, so we 15 know who's doing what. Thank you. 16 Ms. Berlyn: Good morning. Debra Berlyn from 17 AARP. Monica, I was just wondering, if now that 18 you've worked on the website for DTV transition, if 19 you've also tried to get links that lots of other 20 organizations that have good access to consumers, 21 can provide a link to your website with the effort 22 that we need to make over the next couple of years 23 towards the transition in getting education efforts 24 out there? 25 Ms. Desai: I know that we've definitely done Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 41 1 that on the dtv.gov website. On that portion of 2 the website specifically, where organizations have 3 come to us. And I'm not sure that we've done - 4 how much we have done that with other parts of the 5 website, but I think that is a good idea and 6 something to look at, especially with our 7 constituents specific -- the different constituents 8 specific efforts we have. 9 And it may make sense and you all may want to 10 think about it, is updating the section of our 11 website that is devoted to the Consumer Advisory 12 committee to make sure we have links to the various 13 organizations that are represented on the 14 committee. 15 Ms. Berlyn: Exactly, but I'm thinking of even 16 a broader reach to organizations that go beyond the 17 typical consumer groups. Social Service Agencies 18 and organizations that reach out to consumer groups 19 that really need to know about the transition that 20 are those analog consumers that really need to 21 know. 22 Ms. Desai: That's a good suggestion. Thank 23 you. 24 Ms. Rooker: Karen? 25 Ms. Strauss: I'm Karen Strauss. Here's my Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 42 1 question. Jim, before, mentioned the need for 2 disability access impact statements, preferably on 3 new technologies coming out. And Commissioner 4 Adelstein indicated, that may be beyond the 5 jurisdiction of the FCC. But one other possibility 6 and I wonder if you've given thought to this, is a 7 disability impact -- disability access impact 8 analysis of new rules coming out of the FCC. 9 Because very often, rules come out that don't 10 directly have obviously, an impact on disability 11 access such as the one's that are obvious, the 12 relay services, and captioning, et cetera. 13 But there are lots of other proceedings that 14 might have an impact, but we don't find out about 15 them necessarily, because they're not on our radar 16 screen. And I wondered whether you've considered 17 or would consider any mechanism for the Disability 18 Rights office to consider to review the proceedings 19 on a regular basis that are being developed at the 20 Commission to determine whether or not they have a 21 disability impact and to capture what needs to be 22 done before they're released? 23 Ms. Desai: That's a very good point. We 24 actually do at the Commission, have what I thought 25 had been a pretty coordination system, but to the Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 43 1 extent things are slipping through the cracks, 2 please flag them to me. Basically, usually when a 3 rule making proceeding is being discussed when 4 we're especially in the kind of embryonic stages, 5 that information is coordinated throughout the 6 Commission and very specifically, through the 7 Disability Rights office, just a flag in case 8 they're disability related issues that we not be 9 thinking about and we usually do get a chance to at 10 least have some input in that process. 11 But to the extent that you feel like things 12 have come out where you would've liked to have had 13 a little more notice, let me know because there may 14 be certain categories of things that we're not 15 thinking about and we also have a coordination 16 process through our legal advisors as well through 17 our Bureau level, legal advisors, that when they 18 meet with each other and talk about issues that are 19 coming up. 20 Ms. Rooker: Well Monica, we do thank you so 21 much for your time and your report. And again, for 22 the affirmation of what we're doing here as a 23 group. It is nice to know we're making a 24 difference and you always help us do that. So, 25 thank you. Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 44 1 [Applause] 2 Ms. Rooker: We're going to take a 10 minute 3 break and I mean 10 minutes, 10:05, back in your 4 seats, all right? And then, we will continue with 5 the order of business. Thank you. 6 [Recess at 9:55 a.m.] 7 Ms. Rooker: I have some things I need to do 8 before we can proceed. First off, there are a lot 9 of people that make this meeting possible and 10 unfortunately Betty Lewis, who is normally working 11 here working on everything, is out today because I 12 believe, she has a child with pneumonia. So we 13 send her our best. But I would like to thank Lois 14 Neeley, Rebecca Corinna , Kelly Jones, the AV 15 staff, the FCC Webmaster, all of those folks who 16 help make all of this possible. And of course you 17 know, that we have to thank Scott 18 [Applause] 19 Ms. Rooker: - for this wonderful food. I 20 hope you had a muffin. Tom Lokowski, we thank you 21 very much for making breakfast and lunch possible. 22 And as I mentioned Steve Jacobs earlier, he and 23 Larry Goldberg are suppose to be on the video 24 conferencing. Is it working? Okay, it's working. 25 Steve, can you talk to us? Well anyway, while Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 45 1 she's doing whatever she needs to do, I also want 2 to tell you that I think the leaders of the Working 3 Groups have been doing an extraordinary job, as has 4 the whole committee. You all have been a very 5 productive group. That is tremendous. 6 We have some new people and I would like to 7 recognize them, Tony Acton is replacing Mike Del, 8 as you know. The National Association of 9 Broadcasters has a sub today. She is not here 10 right at the moment. Marsha MacBride has a sick 11 child. Dane Snowden is going to be the new ACTA 12 Representative, but he's not here today. And Lori 13 McGarry is a substitute. In addition, TCS is Myrna 14 Orlick-Aiello is replacing Dana Marlow. 15 Mr. Jacobs: I wanted to thank all of the 16 technical folks we've been working with at the FCC 17 on the online conferencing collaboration work. 18 We're just conducting a quick experiment to see how 19 it works. So my thanks to Scott Marshall and 20 everybody else. And I will standby. 21 Ms. Rooker: Thank you, Steve. We really 22 appreciate it. Then Jim Conrad, I would like to 23 thank for the effort he took in putting together 24 the visit to the Call Center yesterday. I spoke to 25 the folks there. They enjoyed it very much. So Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 46 1 that was delightful. 2 There's a sign in list passing around the room 3 and I would like to ask you please, please, please 4 to put your name on it. And if you don't sign in, 5 Scott won't know you're here and well, you'll get 6 black marks. Let me tell you, we're going to 7 forego introducing ourselves. We just don't have 8 time to do that today. I'm so sorry. But instead, 9 I will trade that off with having the two 10 Commissioners speak to us and so, I think it is a 11 good trade off. 12 What we have done in the agenda, we've added 13 time to the discussing of the recommendations. 14 After our November meeting, many of you felt that 15 it was too jammed packed and that we did not have 16 enough time to discuss recommendations of the 17 Working Groups and there is no programming for 18 today's meeting. This is all driven by input and 19 output from the Working Groups. So that just goes 20 to show you, how busy we really have been. 21 Does anybody have any -- oh, let me tell you a 22 few more things. The July 21st -- the next 23 meeting, if you have recommendations for meeting 24 for agenda items, they need to be to Scott by 1 25 June. The idea -- not the text. And November the Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 47 1 3rd will be our last meeting of this group as 2 constituted. So I believe that takes care of my 3 housekeeping. Have I forgotten anything? Okay. 4 So we're going to move right along to the 5 recommendations of the TRS Working Group, Dixie 6 Ziegler who's been the Working Group Chair. 7 Yes, Deborah? 8 Ms. Berlyn: I don't know if this is the 9 appropriate time to mention the lunch meetings. 10 Ms. Rooker: Go ahead. 11 Mr. Marshall: Yeah, a couple of the Working 12 Groups are meeting separately over lunch and I 13 wanted to give you the rooms for those two groups. 14 And the rooms would be: for the Consumer Affairs 15 Group, it is here in room B, right down the hall 16 here, to my right, room 40248. It's a straight 17 shot right out of this room. And for the TRS 18 Group, you just go out of this room, to the right, 19 up the stairs, around the corner to room 488 which 20 will be on your right. And we should have lunch 21 here, around 11:30 or so, and you would have until 22 probably 1:00 for your lunch period. 23 Ms. Berlyn: The Competition Working Group is 24 going to be meeting. 25 Mr. Marshall: I'm sorry. Thank you. It is Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 48 1 the Competition Working Group in 488, up the 2 stairs. 3 Ms. Berlyn: So it's the Competition Working 4 Group that is going meet in room 488? 5 Mr. Marshall: Right. Right up the stairs, to 6 your right. 7 Ms. Berlyn: And Jim Conrad and I -- Jim 8 Chairs the Consumer Outreach Working Group and we 9 have overlapping members. So, we're going to try 10 - and our Working Group would like to meet for 45 11 minutes and his group is going to meet for about 30 12 minutes. So that we will give an opportunity for 13 our members to attend both. 14 And Jim, do you want to -- do you mind if we 15 start at 11:30? Is that when we're breaking? 16 Mr. Marshall: Approximately 11:30. 17 Ms. Berlyn: So Jim, should we just do it in 18 one room and that way, we would avoid that mess? 19 So why don't we just meet? We'll meet in this 20 room, the first room you mentioned. 21 Mr. Marshall: Right. Hearing room B, right 22 down the hall here. 23 Ms. Berlyn: We will just meet in hearing room 24 B for everybody at 11:30 and we'll do it that way. 25 I think that works better. So the Competition Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 49 1 Group will start and then, we'll move into the 2 Consumer Group about 45 minutes later. 3 Unidentified Speaker: The TRS Group would 4 actually like to meet for lunch, if we could just 5 meet in here at lunch time. 6 Mr. Marshall: Or you could take the other 7 room if you'd like. 8 Unidentified Speaker: Is there now an extra 9 room? 10 Mr. Marshall: There is now an extra room, 11 488, above the stairs. Do need an assistive 12 listening device in either one of these rooms? 13 Unidentified Speaker: Yes. 14 Mr. Marshall: In 488, okay. Jeff, if you 15 could help make that happen, that would be great. 16 For 488, the assisted listening device. And we're 17 all set then. All right, thanks Karen. 18 Ms. Rooker: Thank you very much. 19 Mr. Marshall: So my mistake wasn't really a 20 mistake then. 21 Ms. Rooker: Okay. Let us proceed. Now, 22 since we're not going to be able to see the text 23 that the Working Group had prepared, Dixie, I 24 think, has passed out a copy. Is that correct, 25 Dixie? Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 50 1 Ms. Ziegler: That is correct. 2 Ms. Rooker: So you have a copy of the screens 3 that you would normally have been seeing. Do bear 4 with us, because we're trying to institute 5 something new and it will be good for us all in the 6 long run. Anyway, let me turn this over to Dixie 7 Ziegler who is the Chair of the TRS Working Group. 8 DIXIE ZIEGLER, WG CHAIR 9 RECOMMENDATION OF TRS WORKING GROUP 10 Ms. Ziegler: Our TRS Working Group has been 11 very busy and I appreciate your time at the meeting 12 in November, to bring you a recommendation and we 13 have several more recommendations for today. And 14 knowing my group, we'll probably have more at the 15 next meeting and we appreciate your taking the time 16 to look at our issues and hopefully, to move them 17 forward today. 18 The first recommendation that we would like to 19 bring forth this morning, is in regards to Speech20 to-Speech. Speech-to-Speech is a type of relay 21 service for those who have some type of a speech 22 disability. And what happens are, there are 23 specially trained communication assistants who are 24 trained in different types of speech disabilities 25 and they basically, re-voice for the speech Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 51 1 impaired person and make that conversation then, 2 happen. So would they re-voice for the speech 3 impaired person for the standard telephone user. 4 And then the speech impaired person with good 5 hearing, can then hear directly the hearing person 6 back on the call. So it is a particular type relay 7 service. 8 One of our members, Rebecca Ladieu and I don't 9 believe she is here today, is a Speech-to-Speech 10 user and brought this to our TRS Working Group. 11 The document that you all received, prior to the 12 meeting, is marked as a Petition for Rule Making. 13 They have since found out that this committee 14 cannot advance Petition for Rule Makings to the 15 FCC. We can provide comments and offer feedback to 16 a petition that is filed, but this group itself, 17 cannot file the petition. So what we'd like to do, 18 is get your approval today and submit what you have 19 in front of you as comments. We will see if there 20 is a member within the TRS Working Group, probably 21 Rebecca, who will actually file the Petition for 22 Rule Making as an individual and then what we will 23 do, is just basically change the heading on the 24 document that you all have. Change it to comments. 25 Then submit those comments in support of this Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 52 1 change. 2 What we're asking for is to increase the 3 amount of time a CA, a Speech-to-Speech 4 Communication Assistant, stays on a call for a 5 Speech-to-Speech call. Today, the requirement is 6 for 15 minutes. All of the types of TRS have a 7 requirement. This is a rule for relay providers to 8 follow in having communication assistants stay with 9 a call for a certain amount of time. The reason 10 we're asking for the change, is that it can take a 11 bit of time for a CA to learn an individual speech 12 pattern and the change can make it very difficult 13 for communication to happen efficiently. It can 14 also interrupt the Speech-to-Speech user's 15 concentration level. It might lead to frustration 16 as a new CA has to be retrained on the Speech-to17 Speech users voice. Changes do not happen that 18 frequently, but they can happen from time to time 19 and we're asking that that time be increased from 20 15 to 20 minutes. 21 At this point, I would be glad to take any 22 questions. We're asking for a motion from the 23 floor to advance the document that you've all had 24 in advance. And again, we'll make it as comments 25 and not a Petition for Rule Making. Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 53 1 Ms. Kelly: This is Brenda Kelly-Frey, 2 representing NASRA. I move. 3 Ms. Ziegler: Do I call for the second or 4 Shirley, do you want to? 5 Ms. Rooker: You can go ahead and do it. 6 Ms. Ziegler: Is there a second? 7 Mr. Tobias: I second. 8 Ms. Ziegler: Jim Tobias seconds. Is there 9 any discussion on the motion? 10 Ms. Rooker: Let's restate the motion just for 11 the record, please. 12 Ms. Ziegler: Brenda, would you like me to do 13 that? I believe that motion on the floor is to 14 accept the comments as written with the change and 15 making it be comments and not a Petition for Rule 16 Making and they would be filed after the petition 17 is filed. 18 Ms. Rooker: Okay. We've not discussed the 19 recommendations and we're trying to take a vote. 20 I'm not sure we can do that. 21 Ms. Ziegler: Well I guess, discussion now, 22 then? 23 Ms. Rooker: Normally, you would have 24 discussion before you ask for a recommendation for 25 moving to accept something. So we need to go Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 54 1 backwards, all right? 2 I suggest, we just table what we have just 3 said and go forward with the discussion. 4 Ms. Bobek: Ann Bobek from NAB. Just having 5 not -- the benefit of not having expertise in this. 6 I did -- there were two errors. Line two, you 7 should spell out what CA means. This is in the 8 Petition for Rule Making. It's in the second line. 9 It says, Speech CA and just spell out that acronym. 10 The second thing is merely an extra period at 11 the end of line C. Line C, Roman Numeral I-C, 12 there's two periods. 13 Ms. Rooker: What about the content, Brenda? 14 Ms. Kelly-Frey: There's also number two on 15 the first sentence where it says, March 6th, the 16 FCC released a report. If you could just add the 17 two before the three zero's there. 18 Ms. Ziegler: Thank you. 19 Mr. Morris: John Morris with CDT. The 20 proposal seems certainly a good proposal to me, but 21 I would like to understand what the other argument 22 is. Would someone be arguing against this, perhaps 23 the facilitators themselves? Do they say that 15 24 minutes is too long, or 20 minutes is too long? In 25 other words, why is this at all an issue? Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 55 1 Ms. Ziegler: Good question, thank you for 2 asking it. As a provider, as my our company is, no 3 we do not see that this is a problem. The number 4 of Speech-to-Speech calls is the volume itself, is 5 rather low. I think that most providers would 6 agree that it's very doable. We don't anticipate 7 that there would be any disagreement from those 8 that are providing the service. A fair question. 9 Ms. Rooker: Linda? State your name. 10 Ms. West: Linda West. Dixie, my question is, 11 as I understand this right now, if a Caller 12 Assistant is working with a person, once that 15 13 minute time limit comes up, they get cut off and 14 they have to start with a new assistant? 15 Ms. Ziegler: No. That is not correct. The 16 rule today, the call does not get cut off and it is 17 not a forced change. And so for example, if the 18 Communication Assistant is available to continue 19 with a call, they will. And that is what I meant 20 when I said initially, that the change in CA's does 21 not happen very frequently. Typically, a CA stays 22 with a call from beginning to end. However, let's 23 say it's the end of a shift, or a break, or 24 something like that for a Communication Assistant, 25 it is possible that a change in CA's would be Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 56 1 needed. And before a change can be made, the rule 2 today says that you must stay with that call for 15 3 minutes before a CA can change. We're asking that 4 that increases to 20 minutes, rather than 15. 5 Ms. West: My question would be, why would 6 they even put a minimum limit on it? It seems to 7 me a CA should just stay with a call. 8 Ms. Ziegler: That is the normal practice. I 9 think these rules were put in place to protect 10 relay providers or relay users, to ensure that they 11 have as much efficiency and continuity in their 12 call as possible. 13 Ms. West: Thank you. 14 Ms. Buck: Deborah Buck. I see that the clock 15 starts ticking on the minimum of 20 minutes, when 16 effective communication has been achieved and there 17 is an attempt to clarify what effective 18 communication is, that between the parties the 19 information is accurately and impartially 20 interpreted, who ascertains whether it's accurately 21 being presented? Is it the CA or the person making 22 the call? Because I could see some challenges 23 there. 24 Ms. Ziegler: There is not clarity on this 25 particular topic within the FCC rules. And one of Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 57 1 the things I think you're going to see our group 2 come back with, is a recommendation to make this 3 area clear. That we took the opportunity and these 4 comments that will relay some groundwork for the 5 issue. To answer your question, both the 6 Communication assistant and the user are able to 7 say, this isn't working. And if it's not working, 8 a change can take place. 9 Ms. Rooker: Okay. Now we've had some 10 discussion. Do we have any other comments? Karen? 11 And say your name, please. Don't forget folks, say 12 your name. Otherwise, the record doesn't know who 13 you are. 14 Ms. Strauss: Karen Strauss. Just to 15 supplement what Dixie just said, effective 16 communication also has some history in the 17 Americans with Disabilities Act and generally, if 18 the individual cannot communicate, there's not 19 going to be effective communication. So even if 20 the CA thinks there's effective communication, if 21 the individual does not feel that there is, they're 22 going to prevail. 23 And in answer to -- I think it was Lois's 24 question, the reason for the original rule and 25 there's also a rule for text base -- TOS, that's Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 58 1 actually 10 minutes. The reason that there's no 2 requirement for CA's to stay on the full amount of 3 time, is if there were some Union and Labor issues 4 for individuals that needed to leave at a certain 5 time. For example, because if you're ready to 6 leave for the day, but you're still on and you 7 happen to get a call, or you're ready to take a 8 break, or you have a certain shift, there are some 9 Labor protections in how long you would have to 10 stay on. I mean, somebody could talk for two hours 11 and you would have to leave and so, that was the 12 origination of some limits. The 15 minutes was 13 extended. It's a little bit longer than 10 14 minutes. Again, because it was a speech disabled 15 population and this is, at this point, a non 16 controversial issue. 17 Ms. Rooker: I understand better. We did have 18 to have some discussion. 19 Ms. Strauss: Absolutely. I just wanted to 20 explain. 21 Ms. Ragsdale: One question, is there an 22 additional cost for the incremental five minutes 23 that someone would incur? And has there been any 24 demonstration that the five minutes is sufficient, 25 as deposed to coming so many years asking for Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 59 1 another five minute increment, or is the 20 minutes 2 a new industry standard? 3 Ms. Ziegler: This is Dixie. Those are good 4 questions. The way that relay service is paid is 5 on a per minute basis. So whether that whoever is 6 processing that five minutes, it is still billed at 7 the same rate. So there is no change in cost. 8 Your second question about is 20 minutes the 9 right number. That's a tough question to answer 10 and the reason that is, is because there's very 11 small volumes on this particular service and so to 12 have enough volume to indicate that 15 is right or 13 20 is right, is a little bit tough for us to do. 14 We do have the leaders and quite frankly I guess, 15 the inventor of this particular service involved on 16 the committee and he thinks that this is the right 17 number as well. So we do have some confidence that 18 at least the user community believes that is the 19 right place to be. 20 Ms. Rooker: Okay. Now we have a motion on 21 the floor to accept this recommendation as it has 22 been. Shall we go ahead and change that? And do 23 you want to add to this, as it's been modified, 24 because we changed it? 25 Ms. Kelly-Frey: This is Brenda Kelly-Frey Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 60 1 representing NASRA. I move that this document, 2 that the comments be accepted by the committee, by 3 the CAC, as modified. 4 Ms. Rooker: That's fine and we have a second 5 to that. We need a second. 6 Ms. Orlick-Aiello: I second. 7 Ms. Rooker: All for the motion? 8 [A chorus of Ayes]. 9 Ms. Rooker: Opposed? 10 [No response]. 11 Ms. Rooker: All right. So it has been passed 12 unanimously that we accept this recommendation. 13 Thank you very much and I believe we have some 14 other things to do. 15 Ms. Ziegler: Thank you. The next item that 16 we would like to bring forth to the committee, is 17 some recommendations to those that write orders and 18 rules for the FCC on language issues as far as, how 19 to ensure that you're including all users of sign 20 language and the different ways that sign language 21 can be used by the community. I've listed several 22 on the slide, that this was kind of a summary and 23 all of you have had, I hope, an opportunity to look 24 over the actual recommendation itself. 25 Judy Viera, on our Working Group, did a superb Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 61 1 job of putting this document together for us. So I 2 would probably turn over any questions to her on 3 this particular topic. But this is a very simple 4 request, certainly non controversial. It is simply 5 a way to make sure that we're including all of 6 those who might be making use of types of relay 7 services. 8 Are there questions or discussion for the 9 recommendation? 10 Ms. Rooker: The floor is open. Before we 11 take a vote -- okay, everybody has the documents in 12 front of them that they need to see, correct? 13 Okay. Then there is no discussion. We call for a 14 motion to accept the recommendation. 15 Ms. Strauss: So move. 16 Mr. Tobias: Second. 17 Ms. Rooker: The motion has been made and 18 seconded. All in favor say aye. 19 [A chorus of Ayes] 20 Ms. Rooker: Opposed? 21 [No response.] 22 Ms. Rooker: All right. It passes 23 unanimously. Thank you. Dixie, we're moving right 24 along here. 25 Ms. Ziegler: The next item that we would like Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 62 1 to bring forth are comments that have been drafted 2 by our Working Group in support of a petition that 3 was filed by 13 consumer organizations, asking for 4 a mandate of Caption Telephone Relay Service and 5 the approval of IP Captioned Relay Service to be 6 funded by the Interstate TRS Fund. That's a lot of 7 words there. I'll try to break it down. 8 First off, what is Captioned Telephone Relay 9 Service? It is a service for those primarily, who 10 have some hearing available, as well as the ability 11 to speak. That sums up, I guess, the majority of 12 those who use Captioned Telephone Relay Service, 13 but it does reach a broader group than that to some 14 degree. 15 Basically, it's an amplified telephone that 16 includes written word for word captions. So what's 17 happening behind the scenes, is that a 18 communication assistant is making use of Speech-to19 Text technology and is re-voicing everything that 20 is said by the standard telephone user. The 21 computer is trained to the communication 22 assistant's voice and that text then, appears for 23 the caption telephone user on a screen on their 24 telephone. So it's very similar to Captioned 25 Television in that sense. So the Captioned Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 63 1 Telephone user, if they have some hearing 2 available, they can hear the portions of the call 3 that they're able to hear. What they can't hear, 4 they're able to read the captions on the telephone 5 in a simultaneous manner. 6 What -- again, what we're asking the group, is 7 to allow us to submit these comments on behalf of 8 the Consumer Advisory Committee to the FCC, in 9 support of the petition that was filed by the User 10 Group. Captioned Telephone Service allows for - 11 it's a very natural conversation. The problem 12 today and the reason for the petition, is that it's 13 not a mandated service and not all states are 14 providing this service to date. 15 And in addition, some states and all states I 16 guess, where it is available, there are limits on 17 the number of people who can use the service. The 18 program is a very new program and as it got 19 started, there were limits each month on the number 20 of people who could participate and make use of 21 Captioned Telephone Relay Service. There certainly 22 has been evidence of individuals and states where 23 Captioned Telephone is not available, that those 24 individuals have been put at a disadvantage. 25 There's been a lot of comment on this petition from Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 64 1 users across the country from those who have the 2 service, who have received great benefit from it, 3 as well as from those who do not have access to the 4 service in their state, really wanting the service 5 and having a great need for this particular service 6 in their state. 7 I think at this point in time, I would be glad 8 to take questions and have discussion on this topic 9 to answer one of the questions as far as who might 10 be against this particular order. We'll just 11 anticipate that the group that pays for 12 telecommunications relay services are typically you 13 and I. We pay a surcharge either on our telephone 14 bill or through the charges that we pay for long 15 distance telephone services. And it would be those 16 programs that would be required to pay for these 17 particular -- for this particular program. 18 It's a very new service. The demand -- it is 19 a popular service. The states that have it and the 20 people that are using it are using it quite a bit. 21 There certainly could become funding concerns and 22 those who have opposed the petition up to this 23 point, have been Commissions, State Utility 24 Commissions, not every single one, but some have 25 stepped up and are concerned about the budgeting Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 65 1 constraint that this service may have in their 2 particular state. So that's the flip side of this 3 argument. 4 We do have several subject matter experts 5 here. Joe Gordon, who's been very active on this 6 particular issue is here and I'm sure, would be 7 willing to take questions, as well as Ron Bibler, 8 who has been very active on this particular issue. 9 Janice as well, and I'm sure that between the group 10 of us, we could offer up any expertise we might 11 have. 12 Ms. Rooker: As a member of the committee and 13 not as the Chair, I'm interested in you telling me 14 how it works. Who does the captioning? Is someone 15 sitting in and listening to the conversation? I 16 mean, I haven't used it, so I need to understand 17 what we're talking about. 18 Ms. Ziegler: Yes. Similar to 19 Telecommunications Relay Service, where a 20 communication assistant is involved in the call. 21 And involved, is maybe not the right word, but what 22 we like to say, is they are the conduit for the 23 communication to take place. Everything the 24 hearing person says is typed to the deaf or hard of 25 hearing person. Everything the deaf or hard of Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 66 1 hearing person types gets -- is re-voiced by the 2 communication assistant back to the hearing person. 3 What Caption Telephone does, instead of the 4 communication assistant typing that communication, 5 they make use of Speech-to-Text technology and they 6 re-voice everything that the hearing person says. 7 So it displays on a computer, which is then 8 transmitted to the CAPTEL phone for the text to be 9 viewed on the phone itself. 10 And so, the CAPTEL device looks very much like 11 a standard telephone, has a key numbering pad, all 12 of that. But then also, has a display on it so the 13 captions can be read and then the person has, using 14 the Captioned Telephone, has good speech and what 15 they're saying is heard directly by the hearing 16 person that they're having the conversation with. 17 Ms. Rooker: So it's through a system and 18 these systems are typically run by the state, by 19 private individuals? 20 Ms. Ziegler: Private and another good 21 question you're asking today. There's a sole 22 provider of this service of Caption Telephone Relay 23 Service and the name of the company is Caption 24 Telephone, Inc. They're based in Wisconsin and 25 associated with Ultratech, for those of you who Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 67 1 might be familiar with that manufacturer of 2 different devices. They are the sole provider 3 today, of this particular service. 4 Ms. Rooker: What has been the cost impact on 5 the state? Since you brought up that issue, I 6 think that might be something of interest to us. 7 Do we know and do we know what kind of volume goes 8 over these calls? 9 Ms. Ziegler: I'm not sure if I have totals, 10 as far as the total amount of captioned telephone 11 phone minutes at this particular time. Obviously, 12 we could get that information. 13 The funding impact, there are 33 states that 14 have chosen to offer this service today. Those 15 particular states have found a way to provide the 16 service. But I think that there will be some of 17 those states that will have funding concerns if 18 mandated and anybody can get the service any time. 19 One of the things that has helped the states be 20 able to implement this program, is that there have 21 been caps on how much, how many units, how much 22 service can be implemented in each month and each 23 state has a different cap to date. So that has 24 provided some funding relief to the states, because 25 they know X amount of people are going to join the Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 68 1 program. 2 I think the average -- it takes awhile to get 3 to this level, but I think the average user is 4 using the service about 150 to 180 minutes per 5 month. Now that takes awhile to get to that level. 6 I think that is over a three to six month period of 7 using this service, doesn't grow to that level. 8 And so having pretty trackable numbers and easy to 9 budget states have been able to do that and make 10 use of that information. 11 Again, I imagine that there were these 12 concerns from states, if mandated and that now 13 anybody can use the service anytime and this is 14 certainly a different market than those being 15 served by TRS today. Although, there are some 16 people who have migrated from traditional relay 17 service over to CAPTEL, but there will be new users 18 of CAPTEL service, who are not using TRS today. 19 Ms. Rooker: I would like to hear, because I 20 don't know anything about it and I'm just curious. 21 I don't mean to take up too much time. 22 Ms. Ziegler: No. You're asking great 23 questions. 24 Ms. Schacter: Janice Schacter. The practical 25 aspects of a CAPTEL service is, somebody who is Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 69 1 using a phone and slowly loses their hearing, 2 they're not suddenly going to learn sign language 3 and be able to use a relay service. So now, 4 imagine you're an older adult, you lose your 5 hearing and you want to talk to your grandchildren. 6 You can't, because you have no way of knowing what 7 they're saying if you can't hear or you might be 8 missing parts of a conversation. You might not 9 have lost all your hearing, so you might get every 10 other word, so the sentence doesn't make sense. 11 With CAPTEL -- well, I should say captioned 12 telephone allows you to fill in that missing part, 13 so if you missed that key part of the sentence, you 14 can figure out what they are saying. So you might 15 be using this to fill in some of the words. You 16 might be using it to fill in all of the words. But 17 you're a person who doesn't know sign language and 18 has basically, no other alternative. 19 I live in a state -- New York State, that has 20 no captioned telephone. So for example, my 21 daughter -- if she needs homework and she calls a 22 friend to ask about a math question, if you miss - 23 and sometimes you can figure out the context of a 24 sentence, but if you miss the plus or the minus in 25 that sentence, you've missed the whole problem. So Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 70 1 if she calls a friend and sometimes she had trouble 2 hearing on the phone, she can't always get her 3 homework because she can't hear. So I have to 4 participate in that phone call. 5 Now all right, maybe if you're young, that's 6 not a big deal. Now, imagine being asked on a 7 date, would you want your parents on the phone as 8 your being asked for a date? I mean, it sounds 9 crazy, but that is what kids have had to do, who 10 have had missing residual hearing and have no other 11 alternative and there's no choice. This is an 12 unbelievable thing. But the funding issue is not. 13 It shouldn't be a concern because no one is raising 14 funding if you sign. This should be no different. 15 It's just an alternative and why are not suddenly 16 - not that I'm looking to take money away from 17 relay services at all, but it should be functional 18 equivalent and that is what we keep needing to 19 remember on everything we look at for people with 20 disabilities is functional equivalent and stop 21 looking at, why the money? Because otherwise, 22 we're not looking for charity, we're looking for 23 equality. 24 Ms. Rooker: Why would you not be able to use 25 a relay service? Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 71 1 Ms. Schacter: You can't sign, my daughter 2 doesn't sign. 3 Ms. Rooker: You don't have to sign to use a 4 relay service. That's why I was asking you. You 5 don't sign for a relay service, right? I mean, I'm 6 sorry. 7 Ms. Strauss: This is Karen Strauss. First of 8 all, as Janice has pointed out, many people using 9 CAPTEL are either senior citizens or children relay 10 services, you have to be able to either type or 11 sign. These people cannot do either. 12 The other thing is, that many people using 13 Caption Telephone are people that have used the 14 telephone their whole lives, especially if they're 15 senior citizens. They're not accustomed to typing. 16 They're accustomed to talking on the telephone. 17 This is the most natural means of continuing the 18 ability to talk the way they're use to. 19 The other thing is, as Janice just pointed 20 out, the Americans with Disabilities Act requires 21 that relay services be provided. There is no 22 exemption for cost. There's nothing in the ADA 23 that says you provide it, unless it's going to cost 24 a certain amount of money. You just provide it. 25 That's it. No if's, and's, and but's. It has to Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 72 1 be functionally equivalent. 2 The incredible thing about captioned telephone 3 is, that it is the most functionally equivalent 4 service for this population of users as exist. 5 Because as I've said, number one, you don't have to 6 type, use your own voice. But number two, more 7 importantly, it's the only relay service other than 8 VRS. That is in real time. When you make a 9 captioned telephone call -- well actually, let me 10 start off with relay -- text relay. When you make 11 a text relay call or a VRS call, you have to call 12 the center -- the relay center. That center, you 13 establish contact with a communication assistant. 14 That CA then, calls out with captioned telephone. 15 It's transparent. You make your call directly to 16 the other party and you're connected right away. 17 The beauty of this is that again, you're 18 having a phone call that is very similar to the way 19 you're accustomed to having telephone calls. It 20 also saves time and because it is conducted in real 21 time, remember the CA is re-voicing a Speech-to22 Text program, is converting that speech nearly 23 simultaneously into text. 24 That too, is saving time because if any of you 25 have ever been on a text relay call, well that's Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 73 1 true of VRS, Video Relay. But if any of you have 2 been on a text relay call, they are interminable. 3 You type to the CA. The CA then, has to speak what 4 you type, and they have to type back what the voice 5 person has said. And by the time -- as a hearing 6 person, and by the time it is your turn again, 7 you're ready to hang up. And in fact, this has 8 been a significant problem in text based relay. 9 This doesn't happen with this kind of relay. It is 10 direct, so that also saves money because it is real 11 time. 12 A few more things. The other thing in terms 13 of cost, is that there's two proposals I want to 14 make clear. There are two proposals on the table. 15 One of them is to ask that the FCC mandate 16 captioned telephone. The second one however, did 17 you already raise this one? 18 Ms. Ziegler: We have not talked about it yet. 19 Ms. Strauss: The second one deals with IP 20 relay. I'll let Dixie introduce that one, but if 21 it goes to IP Captioned Telephone, then the states 22 are not obligated to pay. Basically, it then 23 becomes a long distance service and that is 24 probably where captioned telephone is going to go. 25 So the objections that are now being raised in this Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 74 1 initial proceeding by the states, are probably 2 going to go away when it becomes an Interstate 3 service. But I will let Dixie talk about that a 4 little bit more. 5 Ms. Rooker: We have a number of people who 6 want to make comments. Joe, you had your hand up. 7 Stick your hand up. 8 Mr. Gordon: Joe Gordon. I don't think it was 9 mentioned, but already 33 states have it. I'm 10 sorry, Dixie did mention that. One of the states 11 that doesn't have it is my own state. New York 12 State. I was up in Albany three - four months ago 13 visiting with the Public Service Commission. I met 14 with two Commissioners. They were sort of -- not 15 against it, but didn't understand that well. After 16 we met with them, we sent them many letters. We 17 received communication back from the Public Service 18 Commission saying, we hear you. We're looking at 19 it. It is interesting. It looks good. It looks 20 possible. So it's important that the 17 states 21 that don't have it, in addition to the FCC having 22 this petition, that we also advocate in our own 23 states. 24 As Karen said, I'm use to a telephone. It's a 25 regular desk phone. You could turn the captions Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 75 1 off if you want to, if you're having a personal 2 phone call. 3 Ms. Rooker: So this system would work by 4 going through third person who seamlessly takes 5 what the person is responding to your conversation 6 and puts it into text? 7 Mr. Gordon: Correct. Voice recognition. 8 Ms. Rooker: All right now, wait a minute. We 9 had a hand over here first, John? 10 Unidentified Speaker: The service -- and this 11 is just my ignorance, but all of the relay 12 services, am I right in understanding that the 13 service doesn't require the telephone company to 14 actually do something, it is all a third party 15 provider that is providing that, is that correct? 16 Ms. Ziegler: It is a third party that's 17 providing the service. The telephone is purchased 18 either through an equipment program. The customer 19 has to have the telephone to make the service work. 20 Mr. Polk: But Verizon, or SBC, or whatever 21 does not necessarily need to even be aware that 22 their phone lines are using this? 23 Ms. Ziegler: No. 24 Ms. Rooker: Joel has his hand up. 25 Mr. Snyder: Joel Snyder. I'm the Director of Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 76 1 Described Media which is a service for folks who 2 are blind and low vision on television or film, but 3 I am at the National Captioning Institute, so this 4 is a marvelously interesting conversation. And 5 thank you, Dixie. And I'm very supportive of the 6 concept behind it all. 7 A couple of questions though, what is the cost 8 of the unit itself? Obviously, this is more than a 9 simple telephone. Maybe it's a telephone with 10 obviously, some sort of small screen. That's my 11 first question. 12 Ms. Ziegler: It's similarly priced to a TTY, 13 so $400 -- $500 dollar range, and it depends on - 14 there are equipment programs that make that 15 equipment available. It varies from state to state 16 as to the type of equipment programs that might be 17 available. 18 Mr. Snyder: I would suspect if this is 19 mandated, the cost is going to come way down. 20 Ms. Ziegler: You would think that kind of a 21 mass production would make a difference. 22 Mr. Snyder: And what is the cost right now of 23 the provision of the service? Now you have the 24 sole provider. I don't know what that does to the 25 economics of it all and that is not being -- well I Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 77 1 don't know. In the 33 states, is it being covered? 2 Is it being subsidized by those states? 3 Ms. Ziegler: The 33 states that are providing 4 the service, have funded it through the 5 Telecommunications Relay Service programs and it's 6 similarly priced in TRS. It's been in some 7 instances, it's been a little bit higher than TRS. 8 Mr. Snyder: What is that? 9 Ms. Ziegler: There's different ways to 10 measure it. Anywhere from $1.40 to $1.60 per 11 conversation -- minutes. 12 Mr. Snyder: Okay. And also, I just want to 13 thank you for bringing this up. Certainly and 14 Karen, for the clarification with a respect to the 15 typing. I think I just fully support the notion of 16 functional equivalence, because I think that 17 distinction is key here, that someone has the right 18 to be able to use the telephone in as closely 19 equivalent a manner as anybody else. Not have to 20 type through their conversation, or have to go 21 through something, somebody with a close as 22 equivalent as anybody else. 23 And I'm sorry, one other quick question. 24 They're using speech recognition, so I assume when 25 you say they're re-voicing, they're not -- they're Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 78 1 speaking it and a computer is recognizing the 2 speech. That is why it's being re-voiced and then 3 it becomes text? 4 Ms. Ziegler: That is correct. The CA -- the 5 computer is trained to the CA's voice and so 6 they're re-voicing and changing. 7 Mr. Snyder: So they're not using real time 8 captioner's. 9 Ms. Ziegler: That is correct. 10 Ms. Rooker: Now Joel has one point to make 11 then I promise, we'll move onto the rest of you. 12 Mr. Gordon: Joe Gordon. Joel asked a 13 question about the cost and it was said that it 14 might be a little bit higher on a permanent cost, 15 but I understand that even though it might be a 16 little bit higher at times on a permanent cost, the 17 number of minutes are less. 18 Ms. Ziegler: This is a good point that Joe is 19 bringing up and Karen touched on this too, in that 20 because the calls are more functional equivalent 21 and are faster for all of the parties involved, the 22 average call time on a CAPTEL call is about 2.4, 23 2.5 -- I'm going to use different terms now - 24 session minutes, is different ways in the industry 25 we measure calls. In TRS, the average call length Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 79 1 is about four -- 4.2 session minutes per call. 2 So on a per call basis, because of the 3 technology is quite a bit faster and functionally 4 equivalent, as Janice and Karen have explained. It 5 is more cost efficient. 6 Ms. Rooker: Okay. We're going to go down 7 here, then over here, then over here. So we'll 8 start with you. You got it. 9 Mr. Bibler: I'm Ron Bibler and I'm actually 10 on the Committee the Expertise in Captioned 11 Telephone and everyday, I use the CAPTEL. I use it 12 to receive phone calls and to make phone calls. 13 It's the most natural form of telephone for me 14 because I don't use the TTY and I don't sign. I 15 don't have -- my speech is clearer and so I used 16 captioned telephone and captioned TV all the time. 17 And the problem is, is that the 17 states that 18 don't have CAPTEL, they're going to drag their feet 19 and they will drag their feet as long as they can. 20 And what we're trying to get the committee to do, 21 is to have the FCC put a mandate out so those 17 22 states will get the CAPTEL. 23 Now there will be a cost involved because 24 there's going to be a huge volume going out there. 25 There are 1,000's of people like me that don't have Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 80 1 TTY's. They're elderly people and so forth, who 2 don't have it and with this system out there, this 3 could open up the telephone and make it much more 4 functionally equivalent for them. They're going to 5 be using the telephone at a $1.40 a minute and the 6 volume is going to increase. 7 Now these 17 states, to give you an example, I 8 use my CAPTEL. Okay and everyone that has a cell 9 phone that works in all 50 states and you can 10 imagine taking your cell phone to a state that does 11 not allow cell phones, you have an alternative. 12 You can go to a payphone. That's the same analogy, 13 33 states have CAPTEL and 17 do not and the FCC 14 should mandate it. It's not a difficult thing to 15 do, but these states are not going to move forward 16 unless they're forced to do so. 17 Ms. Rooker: Thank you. John, put your hand 18 up there. 19 Mr. Breyault: John Breyault with the 20 Telecommunications Research and Action Center. I 21 support this motion here, but I did have a 22 question. If you could educate me, I understand 23 the TOS System if funded by line item fees on 24 consumers bills, whether they use the system or 25 not. In states that have gone to the new system, Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 81 1 have those fees increased and how much? 2 Ms. Ziegler: I don't know the answer to that 3 John, because there's a variety of factors that can 4 change those fees. It is not just the CAPTEL 5 service that is funded within that program. Some 6 states use fund equipment programs, some states 7 fund a variety of programs out of that particular 8 surcharge. And so, I don't know if any state has 9 had to raise their surcharge. Karen, do you know? 10 Ms. Strauss: I don't think -- as far as I 11 know, I don't think that has happened and one of 12 the reasons it has not happened is because 13 generally, text based relay is on the decline and 14 that is what those funds generally paid for. 15 Internet based relay, both text and video, are on 16 the upswing. That is where the bulk of the cost of 17 relay are right now. So generally, that has not 18 happened. 19 Just so you know what the surcharges usually 20 are, they average from three to five cents, to 25 21 cents at the most. We're not talking about 22 anything in order of like the subscriber line 23 charge, where it's over $3 dollars and so they're 24 very minimal charges. 25 Ms. Rooker: We have some people down here. Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 82 1 Ms. Buck: Deborah Buck. I first and foremost 2 want to say, our organization supports this 3 servicing concept. It is valuable. It does 4 provide a fundamental right to access to telephone 5 services. We have significant concerns about the 6 administrative and programmatic aspects of a 7 program such as this. 8 I did share with the committee, with some of 9 the members on that committee, a litany of issues 10 that have been brought to our attention about this 11 service. And I feel that the FCC needs to take due 12 diligence in looking at some of the ramifications 13 of this. I think what is going to happen, it is 14 going to backfire. Not to be a naysayer, but there 15 is one consumer who had a phone cost of $75,000 16 dollars in one year. So there are issues that are 17 underlined how this is administered, difficulty in 18 getting information from the service provider. I 19 think we are putting states in a difficult position 20 in terms of running this forward. 21 I generally support the service in concept for 22 individuals, but we need to make sure it provides a 23 quality service. Cost is not the only issue. I 24 agree with you. I'd be the first to say cost 25 should not be the barrier to someone getting Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 83 1 access. There are inherently other programmatic 2 and administrative technological issues with this 3 quality of the services. You are hooked to one 4 relay service. Many states have limitations that 5 they need to use a relay service. In their state, 6 they're going to have to change that to use this 7 one entity to do these services. The actual device 8 is tied to a serial code. The service, the cost 9 are incurred based upon the serial code of that 10 device. 11 There have been instances of people selling 12 devices over eBay and someone in another state, 13 because of the code of the device having the 14 originating state that provided it paying for those 15 phone services. Gather is a level of equity, I 16 agree it is something that should be across the 17 board in every state in the nation. 18 But I feel that the Commission has a 19 responsibility, as does this Work Group, to 20 recommend that they take due diligence and not only 21 due diligence in looking at this program because it 22 is new, but looking at what kind of monitoring and 23 oversight needs to occur. This committee has put 24 forth some other recommendations today, looking at 25 other TRS services, highlighting the need for Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 84 1 monitoring an oversight. We need to be consistent 2 and apply the same standards across the board, so 3 that everyone has quality and equitable access. 4 Ms. Rooker: You put that beautifully, 5 Deborah. Thank you very much so. We're going to 6 have to figure out how to address that when we get 7 around to recommendations. 8 Jim? 9 Mr. Tobias: Jim Tobias, Inclusive 10 Technologies. I'm going to use this as an 11 opportunity to restate what I said before about 12 being able to plan and having enough information in 13 advance. This is a classic example of being rolled 14 over by a technology that came essentially 15 unexpectedly and developed very strong, and 16 accurate, and fully, to be supported by myself and 17 this committee, Consumer Interest. I mean, I think 18 it's the height of idiocy that some many people 19 want to use this service, we've got to limit it. 20 When somebody -- you know, that is what we in 21 business call a good problem --- when so many 22 people want to use your service, you should respond 23 to them as positively and informatively as 24 possible. And certainly, cost should never be a 25 limiting factor here. Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 85 1 However, not having certain amounts of 2 information which really should have been gathered 3 now for many, many years about relay users. Who 4 are the relay users? What are their preferences? 5 What are the current patterns of operation? And 6 especially, as we have seen a decline in text base 7 relay and we know anecdotally an adoption of 8 mainstream technologies to replace or to supplement 9 the use of relay. We don't understand where these 10 users are at of the advance kind of early adopting 11 users and the large bulk of users as well. And 12 there is no reason for us not to have that kind of 13 information and to be able to use it to plan in a 14 policy setting where all stakeholders are 15 available. 16 Just to perseverate a little longer, I think 17 some of the features that were mentioned as unique 18 to CAPTEL, are in fact evidently assimilable by 19 automatic relay and that is the automatic routing. 20 Because see, when you place outbound call or an 21 inbound call, there's no reason why -- and Brittan 22 has this service -- there's no reason why, you 23 can't at the user's choice, have calls 24 automatically routed through relay. So the placing 25 of the call or the receiving of the call is more Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 86 1 natural and more actually, equivalent. So there 2 are those capabilities. 3 I'm more concerned about the sole provider 4 issue and the claims of proprietary information. I 5 think we all should be concerned about that because 6 I agree with Deborah, we're risking a backlash. 7 We're risking the opportunistic Commissioner or 8 public official who says, what is this? Why are 9 we paying a $1.40 for someone to listen to a phone 10 call and talk into a microphone, et cetera, et 11 cetera? 12 There are mainstream transcription services 13 there. Dozens of them available now, not only over 14 IP, but over a plain old telephone service where 15 you can get transcripts of conference calls. I 16 don't know what the per minute charge is on those 17 services are. I doubt that they're a $1.40 a 18 minute. Because I think they would be pricing 19 themselves out of the market. 20 As we migrate into -- and one more little 21 minor explosion as we migrate and our users, -- the 22 users of relay service and CAPTEL, migrate and see 23 these other options for mainstream technologies, we 24 owe the public policy arena, as well as those users 25 and the other stakeholders, the broadest and wisest Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 87 1 vision of how to extend the service and yet, reduce 2 the cost. And I don't see that in the current 3 setting. Mostly, because we happen to be towing 4 around the proprietary nature of the service and 5 the equipment. 6 Ms. Rooker: I think you and Deborah have 7 raised some very interesting questions. It's going 8 to be very challenging for us to put in the form of 9 a recommendation. We have a lot of work to do and 10 we're probably going to have stop taking comments 11 and start working, unless there are some other - 12 totally other perspectives on these comments and we 13 really need to move forward in adopting a 14 recommendation. But I think we'll satisfy the 15 questions as well as the good intent of this 16 recommendation. 17 One more comment, that's it. Janice? 18 Ms. Schacter: Janice Schacter. While I agree 19 that fraud should never be tolerated, the way to 20 deal with fraud is by prosecuting it as fraud and I 21 think that is not basically a reason you cannot do 22 something because of the potential of fraud. Also, 23 I think fraud will be reduced and all of the states 24 have it and what you just described is somebody 25 taking it out from one state to another state to Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 88 1 try to deal with something. But the fraud is not a 2 reason that you shouldn't. And every year that we 3 don't have this, is another year that people are 4 kept in the dark and are basically segregated from 5 society. 6 Ms. Rooker: Janice, I'm sorry. I don't mean 7 to be rude. I understand, you're talking about 8 social issues. It is a social issue, but I'm 9 trying to get this to move forward. 10 Ms. Schacter: I know, but she raised social 11 issues and raised some very specific questions. 12 When you have everybody and you have somebody - 13 Ron Bibler sitting here, saying he's using it and 14 it is picking up. You have to understand what it 15 is like to not have any appropriate access or 16 appropriate choice and you're limited. It's very 17 easy to sit there. And let's explore, we can 18 explore for the rest of our life. But right now, 19 we can make a decision to do this and we can always 20 come back and say, you know what and expand as more 21 companies. But if we don't start an opportunity, 22 we're not giving people an opportunity to have 23 conversations like you and I have on the phone. 24 Ms. Rooker: I don't believe -- we weren't 25 suggesting we not move forward with the Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 89 1 recommendation, rather what we need to do in 2 forming a recommendation is to put in there some of 3 the concerns that have been addressed, which I 4 think are very valid. Let's discuss it. 5 I really am going to stop taking comments, 6 because we're not going to have time to fashion 7 this, if we don't. 8 Joy has a legal issue that we have to hear. 9 Ms. Ragsdale: Just one point, representing 10 NASUCA, I need more information about cost. But 11 what I'm more concerned along with that, we mandate 12 states do something if that would rise to the level 13 of federal preemption. That is not something our 14 organization has historically supported and I would 15 have strong reservations if we were asked to adopt 16 this resolution today. And I also agree with the 17 issues that Deborah Buck has already raised. 18 Ms. Strauss: The obligation would not be on 19 the states at all. The obligations are actually on 20 the common carriers, the ADA title IV places the 21 obligations to provide relay services on common 22 carriers. The states have taken it upon themselves 23 to provide relay services, as basically a favor for 24 the common carriers, but they are not -- they would 25 not be subject to these obligations. Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 90 1 Ms. Ragsdale: This is Joy from NASUCA, again. 2 The language says to mandate the states to have 3 this service used as drafted now. 4 Ms. Strauss: I will check that. If so, 5 we'll have to change it. 6 Ms. Ragsdale: It's not the -- I cannot 7 support that language. Perhaps strongly encourage, 8 but not mandate. 9 Ms. Rooker: I think I'm hearing a sense that 10 perhaps we need to go back and take into 11 consideration some of the issues that have been 12 raised before we move forward. And that is not to 13 say that this isn't very worthwhile, but I think 14 that there have been enough things brought up that 15 need to be considered in drafting something that 16 we're going to feel good about and that is going to 17 help accomplish our goals, which I think we all are 18 in agreement of the need for this kind of service. 19 I think what we are expressing are some concerns 20 that we're not addressing in the recommendations. 21 Is that a consensus of the group? I need to 22 get a feeling from you because I don't want this to 23 be my opinion. This has to be the group opinion. 24 Mr. Gordon: Joe Gordon. Why don't we test 25 your last statement by having a motion made and see Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 91 1 how the reaction to the motion is. May I make the 2 motion? 3 Ms. Rooker: Sure. 4 Mr. Gordon: I think everyone should take a 5 minute and just read these two pages if you haven't 6 done it. 7 Ms. Strauss: I don't see states written on 8 here. 9 Mr. Gordon: Especially on the first page, the 10 last paragraph, on the first page speaks to the 11 point of proprietary ownership, that has been done 12 before by government. So I make a motion that we 13 proceed and do as we request in this paper, to send 14 the comments from this committee to the FCC in 15 support of the captioning telephone mandates. 16 Ms. Rooker: I'm sorry. I don't quite 17 understand. Are you saying we recommend we submit 18 it as written? 19 Mr. Gordon: Correct. 20 Unidentified Speaker: Second. 21 Ms. Rooker: People are going to second that 22 motion, all right. 23 Joel? 24 Mr. Snyder: The sense I was getting from you 25 Shirley, and I would have to speak against the Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 92 1 motion as Joe has proposed it and seconded. The 2 sense I was getting from you Shirley, is that given 3 the discussion and the sense that I expressed 4 earlier, I asked some specific questions to get a 5 sense of some detail that spoke I think, directly 6 to the kinds of questions Deborah raised and were 7 raised by the gentleman that spoke after there -- I 8 don't have your name, I'm sorry -- that I think, 9 yet to the fact that we need some more information 10 about the practical implementation of the mandate. 11 I am absolutely in favor of the spirit of this 12 proposal. But I'm real concerned about how we put 13 forward this recommendation and we need more than 14 just what we have been able to discuss today, in 15 order to put forward a recommendation that has the 16 kind of credibility that the FCC will respect. 17 Ms. Rooker: One of the things and let me just 18 say this as a member of the committee, one of the 19 things that I'm hearing from the committee, is that 20 we're doing to be very divided if we have to vote 21 on this right now. To my mind, and again, this is 22 not as your Chair, but to my mind it is more 23 effective if we can put together a proposal that 24 will have our general support rather than having a 25 large number of people who are not going to vote Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 93 1 for a proposal. 2 Now I don't want to take away Joe's right to 3 make a motion and have it accepted and voted on. 4 That is not what I'm trying to do. I'm talking as 5 the Chair now. But I have a sense that there are 6 so many issues that are not covered in this, that 7 perhaps it would be more effective for us to do a 8 rewrite of it. 9 Ms. Strauss: I have a solution. Let me 10 explain where this is. Procedurally, a Petition 11 for Rule Making was filed, the FCC released a 12 notice asking the public whether or not it should 13 issue a Notice of Proposed Rule Making on this. So 14 the FCC has not even down to the stage of being 15 able to ask the questions that Deborah suggested. 16 I would like to move. I don't know whether 17 the other motion is still open, but if we can once 18 it's closed, I would like to move that at least 19 this committee agree to recommend that the FCC go 20 ahead with a Notice of Proposed Rule Making on 21 caption telephone. 22 It doesn't necessarily ask for an endorsement 23 by this committee of Caption Telephone. That would 24 possibly come later with some of these suggestions 25 that have been raised. But it just asked the FCC Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 94 1 to proceed with a caption telephone rule making. 2 Ms. Viera: Second it. 3 Ms. Rooker: I'm losing my gavel and my law of 4 order. 5 Mr. Gordon: I withdraw my motion. 6 Ms. Rooker: Joe withdrew his motion. So what 7 Karen has on the floor, is that we simply recommend 8 to the FCC that it go ahead with the Proposed Rule 9 Making. We're not making any other kind of 10 statements at this point. Now let me just follow 11 up and ask you would the committee feel that it 12 would be advisable that in fact, we address the 13 other issues in a later proposal? 14 Ms. Strauss: That is what I would recommend. 15 Ms. Rooker: So we're accomplishing, that's a 16 great solution Karen. John, you have a comment? 17 Mr. Morris: I'm very concerned, because as I 18 understand it, we have not even begun to discuss 19 the Internet Protocol, part of this whole 20 recommendation. And I have a very broad number of 21 questions to try to understand that. So I'm not in 22 support of even a recommendation that the FCC 23 should go ahead on that part of this issue. I 24 don't have a position. I don't understand the 25 first issue, but it seems reasonable to me. But Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 95 1 the second issue raises a whole lot of concerns and 2 I don't understand that yet enough to vote for even 3 a recommendation on that. 4 Ms. Ziegler: And maybe just to further this 5 - this is Dixie Ziegler - to further this 6 compromise, maybe what we need to do is simply just 7 forward if we have consensus on the Proposed Rule 8 Making for the CAPTEL piece and bring IP back for 9 another discussion. 10 And I would like to offer, I think it would 11 help our Working Group in a huge way. For those of 12 you that have concerns, Deborah, Jim, and whoever 13 has concerns on these committees, could you please 14 put those in an email and send them to me, so that 15 our Working Group can begin to address the concerns 16 that any member has on this committee in regards to 17 this issue, so that we are prepared to have that 18 information for you at the next meeting? And I 19 think you all have my email address and we would 20 very much appreciate hearing your specific concerns 21 so that we can address them. And as you can tell, 22 we have many consumers who feel so strongly about 23 this issue and we want to be as proactive as we can 24 be in pushing it forward and giving you all the 25 comfort needed to do so. Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 96 1 Ms. Rooker: Jim has a comment. 2 Mr. Tobias: Jim Tobias, Inclusive 3 Technologies. My comment is, it is exactly the 4 piecemeal consideration of the various items that 5 you might consider under the umbrella of relay, or 6 text and speech conversion services, or whatever. 7 It's the piecemeal view on that that holds us back. 8 And I don't mean this in the sense of, I think it 9 is a disservice to all of the stakeholders, the end 10 users, the carriers, the equipment manufacturers, 11 mainstream, as well as assistive technologies not 12 having an ability to plan both for current and near 13 term and long term services for the populations who 14 are currently using any of these services or who 15 may be projected to need to use these services, is 16 exactly what holds us back. So I don't know where 17 to go with that as far as a recommendation. I 18 don't think the FCC wants to set up a research arm 19 on TRS and all other stuff. 20 Ms. Rooker: Is there a way to make our 21 recommendation more inclusive so that we address 22 some of the issues you're raising? 23 Mr. Tobias: I like the word. I don't know. 24 I'm not a wordsmith of those kind of 25 recommendations, but that I think, should be our Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 97 1 goal. If we can communicate that to the 2 Commissioners. 3 Ms. Rooker: Let me ask you, since there is 4 such a divergence of opinion and concerns here. 5 Would it be reasonable for us to delay any kind of 6 decision until the next meeting? At that point, we 7 would be prepared to discuss many of the issues 8 that have been raised and have more details and 9 facts, and it's going to mean Jim, that you and 10 Deborah both are going to have to give a lot of 11 input to the TRS group. I don't know if you're 12 both on it or not, but we need to hear from you. 13 We need to hear from John and his issues, so that 14 we can try to put these into some form. 15 I kind of think you have a point Jim, in terms 16 of it being a piecemeal. That is not a good way. 17 That is not good for us. It doesn't look very 18 organized on our part, so I kind of have that 19 sense. I also know that this is very passionate 20 and very important issue I think, for all of us 21 that we have a common goal here. I think perhaps 22 the way to get there is different. So do we have 23 some thought on this? Daniel, I haven't heard from 24 you yet. Let's talk. 25 Mr. Phythyon: Dan Phythyon. My suggestion Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 98 1 offline to Karen and now my suggestion to the 2 group, is in effect the recommendations should be, 3 the Commission needs to commence a rule making, a 4 broad comprehensive rule making on the very 5 important issue of caption services. In crafting 6 that rule making, the Commission should look at not 7 only the benefits of this, concerns about monopoly 8 providers, all the issues that have been raised, IP 9 services, as well as traditional services. That's 10 the FCC's job is to do comprehensive rule making. 11 I think the recommendation should be, kick 12 that off. this committee. The Working Group should 13 work with the staff in crafting that rule, making 14 to address all of these issues. But I think the 15 message from this group to the Commission should 16 be, it's important. Resolve these issues, examine 17 them, but start the process of making rules on this 18 very important service. 19 Ms. Rooker: Judy? 20 Ms. Viera: I would like to speak in favor of 21 Karen's proposal, her motion that at this time, we 22 ask the FCC to act on the petition that has already 23 been filed I believe, several months ago. And 24 also, a report on a number of data that is 25 available from individual states that's already Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 99 1 established a Telecap service. And also, NECA - 2 the National Exchange Carrier Association be 3 reimbursed for or pay for the inbound services and 4 that they also collect the data on the cost of 5 these services. And I would like to mention also, 6 the addition of possible internet relay regarding 7 CAPTEL and that would encourage or promote 8 competition for service. 9 And I am a caption telephone user myself. I 10 love it when I'm able to speak directly to my 11 grandson and allowing him to hear my voice. I like 12 to be able to make -- to have that option available 13 for everyone. For everyone one who benefits from 14 it and also use VRS and TTY as well. It just 15 depends upon the circumstance for myself. But the 16 point is, the option to match the need of the 17 consumer and I would like to encourage support for 18 the proposal that is currently on the floor. 19 Ms. Rooker: You're not really making a motion 20 Judy, you're simply supporting the motion that 21 Karen made, is that correct? 22 Ms. Viera: I'm sorry, would you repeat that 23 please? Yes. I did second the motion. 24 Ms. Rooker: You're not making a separate 25 motion, now. Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 100 1 Ms. Viera: I'm sorry. I'm seconding Karen's 2 motion and I want to see it get to a vote. 3 Ms. Rooker: All right. Jim? 4 Mr. Tobias: Jim Tobias. I don't want to 5 delay on this. I would like to act on this and 6 whoever I guess, it's Karen's motion, if you would 7 consider Dan's language as a friendly amendment to 8 the motion, indicating that we have the support of 9 the committee to review the positive elements and 10 the potential jeopardies. I'm fully in support of 11 that. 12 Ms. Strauss: I have no problem with that. I 13 just want to note the petition was filed on October 14 31st of last year and nothing's been done with it. 15 Ms. Rooker: I understand. Okay. Let me just 16 make this suggestion, can we have some of you put 17 your heads together over lunch and come up with a 18 recommendation that is using the language that Dan 19 suggested? Would you be willing to do that? 20 Ms. Kelly-Frey: I'm confused. There's 21 already a motion on the floor that has been 22 seconded. I think it is time for a vote. I really 23 do. We've got a motion and we've got a second. 24 Ms. Rooker: All right. Let's restate the 25 motion. You have a good point, Brenda. Karen's Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 101 1 motion was -- can we read that back? Karen, why 2 don't you state it again? 3 Ms. Strauss: That the FCC go ahead in 4 instituting a Notice of Proposed Rule Making on 5 Caption Telephone Services and that my motion be 6 amended. And Dan, why don't you finish the second 7 half? 8 Mr. Phythyon: Dan Phythyon. That the 9 Commission commence a comprehensive rule making to 10 address all aspects of Caption Telephone Relay 11 Services as quickly as possible, or commence a rule 12 making and everyone has their rights to file 13 comments, raise objections, what have you. 14 Ms. Rooker: Okay. That's a good compromise. 15 Do we get that? So we have a motion on the floor. 16 Do we have a second to the amended motion and a 17 vote? Let's take a hand vote, if you don't mind, 18 so that we can be sure we're not missing anyone who 19 is for the proposal. 20 [A show of hands.] 21 Ms. Rooker: Opposed? 22 [A show of one hand.] 23 Unidentified Speaker: I abstain. 24 Ms. Rooker: Okay. So then it will go forward 25 with the language that has just been suggested. Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 102 1 Now, are we about finished? I've got one more 2 person on the agenda. But, you know what? This 3 has been a very healthy discussion and I think it's 4 been very good for us. 5 Ms. Ziegler: We do have one more 6 recommendation that we have brought forth for your 7 consideration today. I would appreciate everyone's 8 feedback on the previous item. 9 The next item is in regard to rules that have 10 recently been released by the FCC. Monica 11 referenced them this morning. Recently, an order 12 has been released allowing VRS and Internet 13 Protocol providers to certify as eligible for 14 reimbursement from the Interstate TRS Fund. 15 Previously, companies had to either be a carrier or 16 had to be certified under a state TRS program to 17 receive reimbursement. Now companies who are not 18 typically common carriers or have certified under a 19 state program, are eligible for funding, pending 20 certification from the FCC. And this particular 21 order released by the FCC, list out ways what you 22 have to do and approve in order to become 23 certified. 24 What our comments are asking, is that the FCC 25 take a stronger role in oversight and enforcement Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 103 1 of their own rules. The recent order did very 2 little. They very little referenced to either 3 topic and today, enforcement begins with a consumer 4 complaint. So it's very much reactive, rather than 5 proactive and our TRS Working Group is wanting to 6 add the FCC take a larger role in that process as 7 far as oversight and enforcement. 8 In the next slide, if you're following with 9 me, what we're asking is that we file these 10 comments so they encourage the FCC to among other 11 things, establish accountability among all of the 12 VRS and Internet Relay providers. And we gave 13 several detailed examples within our comments of 14 what we're looking for. More monitoring, increased 15 reporting, better access to consumer complaints, 16 penalties, increased performance standards, and the 17 like throughout our comments. 18 I think one of the things we have been working 19 with in TRS Working Group, is that the group 20 representing -- the whole group feels very strongly 21 that rules without any type of enforcement, are 22 just really suggestions. And I think that 23 certainly -- I think this is a very proactive, 24 consumer oriented filing to ask the FCC to do a 25 better job of ensuring that the rules are being Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 104 1 followed with pretty quantitative and pretty good 2 suggestions as far as to what we want them to do in 3 an act, or at least offering up in our comments as 4 options on how the FCC might better do oversight 5 and enforcement. 6 Discussions or questions on this item? 7 Ms. Rooker: Okay. If there's no discussion, 8 then do we hear a motion to accept the proposal? 9 Ms. Buck: So moved. 10 Ms. Kelly-Frey: Second. 11 Ms. Rooker: All in favor, say aye. 12 [A chorus of Ayes]. 13 Ms. Rooker: Opposed? 14 [No response]. 15 Ms. Rooker: Okay. That was approved. Okay. 16 Ms. Ziegler: Shirley, thank you. And thank 17 you to all of you. I didn't anticipate we would 18 take that much time. I apologize that we did, but 19 I do appreciate the discussion and do please, send 20 me the concerns you have on caption telephone. 21 It's something we're going to work very hard on 22 over the next few months and the sooner I receive 23 all of your feedback, the more time we have to 24 address it and be prepared for our next meeting. 25 Thank you for your time and consideration. Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 105 1 Ms. Rooker: Thank you, Dixie. You did an 2 excellent job on this and yes, I do think it is 3 important that we keep this communication open, 4 because I think many of you have addressed issues, 5 while we're all in agreement on the end results. 6 So anyway, okay. 7 We have one more agenda item. Gene Crick is 8 going to talk about the Rural Working Group. They 9 don't have a proposal today, but he's going to give 10 us an update on what they have been doing. 11 GENE CRICK 12 REPORT RURAL WORKING GROUP 13 Mr. Crick: In a shameless attempt to 14 ingratiate myself, I want to keep this short. I am 15 the head of the Rural and Under Served Working 16 Group, which is actually a very good group. We 17 have had a lot of interaction. That said, we 18 recognize these are such complex and difficult 19 issues, that we're going to need wider input from 20 all parties concerned to be able to bring forward 21 anything approximating simple solutions. I thought 22 about telling you I had a clear one page document 23 of answers, but I left my only copy on the plane. 24 But I didn't think anybody would buy that story. 25 So anyway, simply put and succinctly put, Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 106 1 we're attempting to identify the challenges and 2 this is a report to the committee on that process 3 because it seems to me, that an important part of 4 resources and solutions brought to bear are 5 outreach, and awareness, and input among all 6 stakeholders. Specifically, including consumers. 7 A third aspect of it is, wider resources 8 available to the consumers in terms of explaining 9 the issues and getting people involved. Then from 10 that, we think that the Working Group, and the CAC, 11 and the Commission as well, will have a much better 12 chance of bringing forth policies that reflect all 13 concerns. Because I think we -- everyone, 14 recognize that to come in and advocate some policy 15 from a strictly advocacy viewpoint, is not our best 16 use of mission. We certainly have to maintain the 17 principles that we advocate. But on the other 18 hand, have to have successful solutions. We're 19 going to have to have an awareness of all the 20 factors involved. That's kind of a biggie. It's 21 not easy for me, because I missed three quarters of 22 it. But in this particular case, I've spent enough 23 time on the street corner. It's been raining a 24 lot. I recognize it might be time for us to try to 25 work for some real cooperative efforts. Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 107 1 So that brings us to two points I wanted to 2 report on today, because this is not a set of 3 recommendations. You'll notice I have in fact, 4 emailed our report to every member of the 5 committee. But that's deliberate. It is not a 6 document to be worked on today, but more correctly, 7 it is a process that we are attempting to use our 8 own tools. The one's which we advocate for more 9 effective use of our time and efforts. So, I've 10 emailed as I said, each committee member, the 11 online location, a URL of a set of evolving notes 12 that is to become incorporated and you see, I want 13 to make it very clear. So there's not 14 recommendation online, there is a set of notes and 15 basis for discussion that are online. As you have 16 a chance, take a look. If you're interested, if 17 there's an aspect of it, give a comment. But I 18 don't expect you to follow the iterative process as 19 we developed small changes and so forth. Instead, 20 just give us your best thoughts on those areas 21 where you see great concern. 22 And another point is, that I have come to 23 recognize based upon a recent teleconferences and 24 within the Working Group, I have come to recognize 25 that I have not fully appreciated the importance of Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 108 1 the evolving universal services role in Rural and 2 Under Served. I mean, I knew it intellectually, 3 but it is fundamental. And so, be looking for a 4 greater discussion of and questions about the 5 actual universal service obligation. 6 I'm not even necessarily going to say what it 7 ought to be. I have my views. You have your 8 views. That sort of thing, we just want to 9 understand what it is more accurately and what it's 10 becoming. 11 And again, trying to shamelessly suck up to 12 Shirley, I will leave it at that, unless any other 13 member of the Working Group Committee has an 14 addition to make. We expect to make a 15 recommendation and in fact, this is our plea for 16 agenda time in the July meeting. 17 Ms. Rooker: All right. So noted. Lunch has 18 not arrived yet. Scott is going to find out why. 19 But in the few minutes that we have, Jim, would you 20 be willing to tell us a little bit about your day, 21 yesterday when you toured the Call Center? 22 Before we do that, Charles, you have a 23 comment? 24 Mr. Benton: Yes. Charles Benton, a member of 25 the Rural and Under Served Working Group, and a Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 109 1 late fan of Gene's here. I wanted to make two 2 quick comments following your remarks, Gene. We at 3 the Benton Foundation and especially now with 4 Gloria Christani who's over here and our new 5 President we're very proud of, are joining us, are 6 going to be working in the Universal Service area 7 as the next priority for us, especially next year. 8 But starting the process now and we want to work 9 closely with Gene and the Working Group on Rural 10 and Under Served populations. 11 If their needs are not about Universal 12 Service, we're not sure what Universal Service is 13 all about. So there's $7 billion dollars now being 14 spent in Universal Service funds and one of the 15 very interesting questions is, is that money being 16 used in the most effective and equitable manner? 17 And so there are some very big questions here and I 18 have to say, I have found the discussion that we 19 just had in the last hour and a half, absolutely 20 fascinating because the TRS and Disability Access 21 folks -- and I don't know much about this, I'm just 22 a real amateur in understanding these issues and 23 problems, but they have been at -- I mean, it's 24 Universal Service for Disabled People, is really 25 what this is about in a sense. And I think the Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 110 1 general population has got to learn a great deal 2 from the Disability Access and TRS folks as we 3 think about Universal Service for everyone. I just 4 think there's a lot of lessons to be learned here 5 and I'm as fascinated by this discussion. I 6 thought it was a really great discussion and a very 7 good resolution. 8 And Shirley, you're fluctuations about 9 postponement and closure, but the way we finally 10 wound up at the end here, I think was wonderful, 11 because it was process. It was a process move. So 12 I just think there are some very exciting 13 opportunities here, and I'm looking forward to 14 working with Gene and the Group on this. 15 Ms. Rooker: It was an excellent one and my 16 fluctuation is what I was hearing from the 17 Committee and not me, personally. But your right, 18 it was fascinating and I think it was very good for 19 all of us. We learned a lot. I certainly learned 20 a lot this morning. 21 Now one other thing, has everyone signed in? 22 Has anyone not signed in? Otherwise, you don't get 23 that huge paycheck we're going to send you. 24 [Laughter] 25 Ms. Rooker: Surprise, it's not April Fool. I Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 111 1 missed it by a few days. Jim's going to take a few 2 minutes, because they have to get -- lunch is here, 3 but it's not set up yet. And tell us, because I 4 think all of us have had an interest in the 5 Consumer Center and we've made recommendations in 6 the past on the way they were doing things, and 7 they've been very receptive, and I think in making 8 a lot of changes in the way they were handling 9 consumer calls and so on. 10 What did you see, Jim? 11 Mr. Conran: I'm Jim Conran. As Shirley said 12 yesterday, nine of us went and met with the 13 Consumer Inquiry and Complaint Division's Susan 14 Perrin who is the Deputy in that particular office 15 and her boss who is the Chief Steve Eber, joined us 16 as well as two of the front line supervisors and we 17 had an opportunity to go through the complaint and 18 take process. Which while we talk about a lot of 19 policy and clearly, the Commission is concerned 20 about setting public policy, kind of where the 21 rubber hits the road, is when a consumer has a 22 problem and they're trying to resolve it and they 23 look to government to provide to them the support 24 that they cannot give themselves, so they help them 25 cut through the red tape of dealing with a large Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 112 1 bureaucracy. Which of course many of the 2 telecommunications companies are mammoth and they 3 sometimes can lose touch with individual consumers. 4 So it was very interesting to see the process. 5 The volume of complaints that come in or 6 inquiries, it's not just complaints and how they 7 process that and track that. I guess a couple of 8 key points that came out of our discussion 9 yesterday and the staff was very receptive. I 10 didn't find them in anyway defensive. They 11 answered a lot of questions. A lot of them were 12 due to our ignorance. Some were things that from 13 our experience, working outside of the Commission 14 and speaking different languages, I think the 15 dialogue was very helpful and they were very 16 receptive. 17 I think our mission, it's changing and at the 18 end of this month, two different computer systems, 19 they've been using two track and they're going to 20 have that as one system, which I think will allow 21 them to capture more information and handle it more 22 efficiently. Clearly over the years, they're 23 seeing greater influx of information coming in 24 online, theirs is through correspondence and direct 25 calls. Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 113 1 For many people, you may not know that 2 probably the least effective way to communicate or 3 at least, the slowest is by direct mail and that is 4 because of security purposes. Direct mail does not 5 come directly to the FCC. It has to go through a 6 sanitation and cleansing process in whether you're 7 writing a Commissioner, a member of Congress, or 8 any federal government agency. Due to the problems 9 of terrorist problems, mail just doesn't make it 10 that quickly. So the best way is to go online. 11 We talked about in language, primarily Spanish 12 is being used, but there is receptivity and in 13 trying to find out how they might use adjunct 14 services to be able to have other non English 15 speaking consumers communicate directly to them. 16 And coming from the state that I do, in California 17 we have so many different languages spoken. And 18 clearly, many consumers that do not speak English 19 or Spanish are using non profits to help 20 communicate on their behalf to the government 21 agency. So how they can, as one of these other 22 issues we're talking about with us and deaf and 23 disabled services, how we can directly communicate 24 to the Commission is something that I found the 25 staff to be very conscious of and aware. Clearly Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 114 1 like any government agency, there are resource 2 allocation problems and they're trying to match the 3 needs with the resources. But the conversations I 4 think, were very fruitful. 5 One of the issues we raised and whether the 6 Consumer Outreach Committee wants to deal with this 7 in a more formal manner was - and Shirley, you can 8 appreciate this, for all the work you've done at 9 Call for Action -- a lot of information is coming 10 in and the Commission is using it, but what about 11 other government agencies? 12 For instance, I would submit to you that 150 13 calls from California probably doesn't mean a lot, 14 but 150 calls coming from Delaware probably does. 15 So in that process of the information the 16 Commission is looking at, is that getting into the 17 hands of other government agencies, whether they be 18 state attorney's general, or a public utility of 19 service commissions, or is information coming that 20 they say you know, this is something the FTC needs 21 to have and the dialogue between those agencies 22 talking to each other, to make sure that 23 information is coming in a timely manner, as they 24 take the same information and share it with 25 carriers. If X, Y, Z carriers all of a sudden, Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 115 1 there's a regional issue where a lot of questions 2 are coming in or complaints. Clearly, the 3 companies would be wise to want to know that as 4 quickly as possible, so they can say, do we have 5 regional problem, is there a systematic problem? 6 And so that is one of the -- I think, things that 7 came out of yesterday's discussion, is how do we 8 take this wealth of information coming in here and 9 get it in the hands of other government agencies so 10 they can be efficient in dealing with consumer 11 inquiries. 12 Then concluded by visiting and watching one of 13 the CAM's, who not only takes information, but can 14 serve as a mediator between different private 15 sector companies and the consumer in dealing and 16 trying to reconcile complaints. And I have to say, 17 I'm use to seeing a lot of intake sweatshops and 18 the conditions that the employees work under was 19 really, I think very complimentary to being 20 productive workers. Nice big work spaces with a 21 level of sound proofing, so you don't hear 22 overlapping conversations as any of us who call and 23 800 number, you can hear sometimes three or four 24 conversations in the background. 25 The CAM that we met with seemed very Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 116 1 conscientious and knowledgeable about what she was 2 doing and her needs. So I thought it was a good 3 dialogue. It was nice to actually see where the 4 rubber hits the road sometimes. The policy issues 5 -and if any of my colleagues were there, had 6 something that I've left out or they would like to 7 add, I think that would be very good. I see Debbie 8 has her hand up over there. 9 Ms. Berlyn: Debbie Berlyn. I have a question 10 Jim. I was only able to stay for a part of the 11 program yesterday and I have a question about the 12 volume of calls at the FCC is currently handling 13 the volume of complaints. I should say not calls 14 because they handle them in different ways. As the 15 FCC and Congress are increasingly moving to a 16 national standard, a national consumer protection 17 rules, and having more and more complaints go to 18 the FCC, rather than to local and state 19 authorities, how is the FCC doing in terms of 20 handling the volume of complaints? Do we have a 21 sense of -- they're sitting there and the phone's 22 not ringing, or is there a large volume, is the 23 volume increasing? 24 And a follow up question, do consumers know to 25 contact the FCC? Are we getting the word out to Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 117 1 consumers? 2 Mr. Conran: Debbie, those are all great 3 questions. I don't have an answer for all of them. 4 When the call volume is pretty significant, I think 5 the number was 7,000 a month. Was it a year? But 6 70,000 was a monthly intake unit. The lag time 7 that was coming in was about 30 seconds for a call 8 to be answered. So I think -- and there were some 9 days higher, some days lower, sometimes the inquiry 10 level is based on stories in the media and 11 orchestrated campaigns which are not negative but 12 an interest group has an issue and that's one of 13 the ways they track to the Commission. So I think 14 there's still significant call volumes and one of 15 the things I've always seen is these calls are not 16 necessarily just complaints, but they're 17 opportunities for either the Commission or the 18 industries being regulated to do a better job by 19 understanding the consumers better. 20 They're working on better ways of tracking so 21 consumers can follow up if they feel that their 22 complaint has not gone into this black hole in the 23 sky. So they're looking at how to constantly fine 24 tune the system and I don't think this will be the 25 only time we'll talk to them, because I think we've Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 118 1 got a lot of food for thought, things that we need 2 to digest and as a committee, probably talk about 3 some more. Call volumes, I think are probably 4 pretty consistent annually. Again, there are these 5 spikes. 6 The Janet Jackson issue, a couple of years 7 ago, raised obscenity to a higher issue. I ask 8 issues like (inaudible) they're being talked about 9 and a lot of media people are calling, just asking 10 about information. So I think they are seeing 11 things all across the board. And if possible, 12 maybe at the next meeting we invite them to come in 13 and do a group presentation to the entire group. 14 Because clearly, we do not ask about a lot of 15 issues about accessibility for people who have 16 difficulty with communications. We did just talk 17 about language types of issues. 18 Ms. Rooker: Okay. We have one more question. 19 Joy? Or comment. 20 Ms. Ragsdale: This is Joy from NASUCA. Deb, 21 you have worked with NASUCA, so I think I 22 understood where your question was going. 23 Specifically, we do not ask if they had staffing 24 resource issues. As the request has been for the 25 FCC to handle more and then that ties back to the Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 119 1 federal preemption issue I have raised before, but 2 they do use contracting services and I believe they 3 gave us a number between 61 and 80, which was a 4 combination of FCC staff, as well as contractors. 5 Yesterday was a slow day, that we happen to 6 have gone upstairs. The calls were coming in a bit 7 slow. But as Jim had said, depending upon what is 8 hot in the public and that generates the volume of 9 the calls that they receive. 10 They also have a lot of valuable tools 11 available to them, where they can push a button and 12 generate letters that go out instantly to kind of 13 record the information and steps that are taken. 14 That is generated and goes straight to the consumer 15 on an immediate basis. 16 And I think they gave us the date of April 17 24th, where they're going to combine their two 18 systems. And with that, consumers will then start 19 to get a tracking number that is automatically 20 populated in the system. So if the consumer needs 21 to call back, they're then able to track the status 22 of their complaint. So they have a lot tools and 23 they were available to meet with more members and 24 they were open to give more tours. And the 25 gentleman that we met with, has replaced Martha Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 120 1 Conti who retired, and so it is a good idea, Jim, 2 to invite Steve. And what's his last name -- Eber, 3 to come here and reestablish that relationship with 4 us. 5 Ms. Rooker: Well that's great. Lunch is 6 here. We will be back at the table at 1:00. Thank 7 you very much for a good productive morning. 8 [Lunch recess at 11:50 a.m.] 9 Ms. Rooker: It's work time. You've actually 10 had five minutes extra and I don't usually do that. 11 Can we please ask you to take your chairs? I would 12 again, like to thank Tom and AOL Time Warner for 13 the wonderful lunch. Sandwiches were excellent. 14 [Applause] 15 Ms. Rooker: Okay. We are moving ahead, we 16 have the recommendations of the Media Working Group 17 and Dennis Moynihan is going to be the presenter. 18 Where are you Dennis? There you are. And he's 19 sticking his hand up so he has a microphone that is 20 live, we hope. 21 DENIS MOYNIHAN 22 RECOMMENDATION OF MEDIA WORKING GROUP 23 Mr. Moynihan: Hello. Welcome back from lunch 24 everyone. Thank you and also, hello to all of 25 those who are listening to the web stream or are Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 121 1 participants who are using this wonderful 2 experimental video stream, today. I want to thank 3 the members of the Media Working Group as well, to 4 invite people to join the Media Working Group. 5 As you will see from our recommendation, we 6 expect there to be a lot of activity in the field 7 of media ownership rule making, in coming months. 8 This advisory, which we hope you've had a chance to 9 review, was principally promoted, written by 10 Charles Benton. I want to thank him for the 11 stellar job. It is a very -- just a great 12 informative read, rich with history and 13 recommendations, very prosaic. So Charles, thank 14 you very much. And I'm sure the collective wisdom 15 here can even improve upon it, if it need be. 16 I won't go too far into it, just to state that 17 in response to the FCC's Rule Making activities in 18 2003, we saw a procedure that essentially left out 19 -- largely left out the public. And as we are the 20 Consumer Advisory Committee and consumers very 21 often identify themselves as the public as well, we 22 want to make sure there is consumer input and 23 public input to this year's coming around of Rule 24 Media Ownership Rule reviews. 25 To that end, this recommendation includes Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 122 1 essentially, procedural recommendations to the 2 Commission. There aren't any specific 3 recommendations on media ownership rules. This 4 very detailed recommendation includes 5 recommendations to the Commission on how to go 6 about involving the consumer and public sectors in 7 the coming around of media ownership rules. 8 We hope that the lessons learned from 2003, 9 where literally millions of people responded to the 10 rules, where federal lawsuits were filed, and 11 Congressional activity was prompted. We hope that 12 we can avoid this kind of unnecessary expense of 13 time energy resources in opposing rules that are on 14 their face, largely unpopular to the public and 15 unhelpful to the consumer. 16 And so with that, we have proposed simply this 17 recommendation, which we would like the Commission 18 to consider a far more open and public transparent 19 procedure, as they embark upon this very important 20 and timely analysis of the media ownership rules. 21 I did want to invite Charles Benton to comment 22 briefly, as he has many decades of experience in 23 this and is its principal author. 24 Mr. Benton: Thank you very much, Dennis. I 25 just want to add that and give credit to Kevin Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 123 1 Tagline who has been on our staff now for coming on 2 10 years and who is the author of the 3 Communications Headlines, which is a daily service 4 which summarizes the consumer press everyday on 5 consumer issues and policy in particular, and that 6 Kevin took the lead in drafting this, essentially 7 process oriented a four page piece on media 8 ownership. 9 And as you will see, on page 2 of this, the 10 four bullet points are really focused on what we 11 felt might be a more constructive procedure from 12 the FCC perspective, learning lessons from 2003. 13 And then, 11 questions that are in the bullet 14 points thereafter in the next two pages, that are 15 related questions and questions that have come up 16 in relation to ownership issues and have been 17 raised by various FCC Commissioners. So this is 18 not doing this ex cathedra. 19 Now we research the questions that have been 20 raised at the Commission and therefor, these are 21 related issues that are all pretty basic questions. 22 So that our effort here, was to in working with and 23 under Dennis' leadership, I tried to put forward a 24 process that would contribute to the FCC's role in 25 leadership on the media ownership issues, which Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 124 1 they most certainly will be addressing in the very 2 near future when there are five FCC Commissioners. 3 Mr. Moynihan: So with that, I would like to 4 open it up to the floor for discussion with your 5 permission, Shirley. 6 Ms. Rooker: Go right ahead. 7 Mr. Moynihan: If anyone has anything to add 8 to that? 9 Ms. MacBride: Marge MacBride with the NAB. 10 Let me begin by saying, that NAB and its members 11 continue to embrace the obligation to serve the 12 public interest, and the service to our local 13 communities, and all members of our local community 14 is the life blood of our business and we look 15 forward to continuing our dialogue with the 16 Commission and with Congress, to review the scope 17 of commitments made by broadcasters to serve the 18 public interest. 19 Let me repeat, broadcasters understand and 20 embrace their responsibility to the viewing and 21 listening public. Indeed, any local station that 22 drifts away from its localism and its strong 23 commitment to community service, does so at its own 24 peril. Because of this commitment to the public 25 interest and it would be not object at all to a Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 125 1 call from this committee to urge the FCC through 2 its rule making process, to commence a proceeding 3 on broadcast ownership that seeks to involve 4 consumers as a part of a transparent process, 5 intended to develop a full and fair record on which 6 the Commission can make reason judgements. Indeed, 7 as your documented acknowledges, two and a half 8 million people gave input in 2003. That strikes me 9 as including a lot of public input. 10 However, NAB cannot support the presentation 11 of the particular recommendations that are made and 12 that are being considered before this committee. 13 Now though, I believe the effort was honest, I 14 think the product here in nonetheless, flawed. 15 As a baseline objection, the document fails to 16 acknowledge the significant service of public 17 broadcasters already undertake, some required by 18 regulation, and many not. Take for example, the 19 heroic response to disasters such as hurricane 20 Katrina, or the more than $9 billion in community 21 service that they provide annually for a PSA time, 22 charitable fund-raising, and disaster relief. 23 In addition, the document contains inaccurate 24 descriptions of the FCC's 2003 ownership decision. 25 The FCC did not modify the network rules and it Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 126 1 actually tightened ownership restrictions as they 2 applied to radio. It did not loosen them. 3 I believe that the report fails to present 4 accurate and balanced sides of the issue and thus, 5 it will not produce a fair record upon which the 6 FCC can rely and upon which this Federal Advisory 7 committee is obligated to provide. 8 Now, NAB would support mutual questions such 9 as, are consumer interests adequately considered in 10 the broadcast license renewal process? How have 11 technological advances and new media changed the 12 way consumers use different media and obtain 13 information? Indeed the current landscape of 14 technology is not even mentioned in the report. 15 Now, NAB would really urge that any 16 recommendation from this committee be very 17 carefully crafted to include fair and accurate 18 statements including, a correct statement of the 19 legal standard. The Commission is required to 20 follow when it evaluates its ownership rules and 21 thus, while we would like to support these 22 recommendations, we unfortunately cannot. 23 Ms. Rooker: Thank you, Marsha. I think we 24 probably need to discuss the issues one by one and 25 to find out if there are ways that we can come to a Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 127 1 resolution. And if that is not possible, then 2 certainly we will make all viewpoints known to the 3 FCC. 4 Would it be useful for us to discuss issues 5 one by one, Marsha and other people who may be 6 expressing some of her concerns? Well certainly, 7 one of the things we have to do, it is a factual 8 concern. Dennis, do you have a comment? 9 Mr. Moynihan: What are the key factual 10 errors? 11 Ms. MacBride: It indicates the FCC modified 12 the dual network rules during the 2003 Ownership 13 proceeding and it did not. Also, there is no 14 reference to the fact that the ownership 15 restrictions with respect to radio, was 16 significantly tightened as a result of the 2003. 17 And I think those are two very important 18 points. When you're trying to find a balance of 19 what it is we think the Commission needs to be 20 looking at, when it is looking at the rules this 21 time around. The one that probably concerns me the 22 most, is the standard that is being used in your 23 comments. The way that it's written, it says, in 24 1996, Congress mandated review of media ownership 25 rules, insisting that the Commission modify or Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 128 1 eliminate a rule only if doing so, is in the public 2 interest. The language actually reads, the 3 Commission shall determine whether any of such 4 rules are necessary in the public interest, as a 5 result of competition and it shall appeal any 6 regulation it determines no longer to be in the 7 public interest. 8 So this has been a point of contention at this 9 Commission. And between this Commission and the 10 courts, for some period of time as to whose 11 responsibility is it to show that it's no longer in 12 the public interest. And the way that Congress 13 read it, it is absolutely the way the Commissions 14 responsibility to show. And I'm sorry, it's 15 actually the individuals responsibility to show 16 that it's not in the public interest, because the 17 Commission cannot retain it as a result of 18 competition. If it's not and the concept of 19 competition, which goes back to the point about all 20 of the other media that are out there is central, I 21 think, to this Commission's decision about what 22 ownership restrictions should be placed on 23 broadcasters. Because broadcasters are just a very 24 small, small piece of a very large universe of 25 video content providers and now, audio content Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 129 1 providers as well. 2 Ms. Rooker: Do we have some comments? 3 Ms. Schacter: Janice Schacter. I have one 4 comment, not as to NAB's, but something that has 5 already been agreed upon, is the addition of 6 another bullet point in key procedural questions 7 not yet answered. And Charles and I have already 8 agreed upon it. How might ownership rules effect 9 the availability of closed captioning in markets of 10 all sizes? 11 Ms. Rooker: Hold that, because that's really 12 not appropriate at this point. You need to make 13 that recommendation later, that we make that 14 change. 15 Right now, we need to discuss the issues that 16 Marsha has raised, both in terms of accuracy and in 17 terms of intent of the document. And so I think - 18 but if you don't mind, we will make an amendment to 19 that later. Dennis? 20 Mr. Moynihan: To satisfy the criticism of the 21 language regarding the 1996 law, we could replace 22 the language with the language that was reported by 23 Marsha and that would hopefully, would settle that 24 issue. 25 Ms. Rooker: Okay. What about some of the Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 130 1 other issues she's raised? Charles, do you have a 2 comment? Stick your hand up. I'm going to make 3 you all learn to ask permission and identify 4 yourself, please. 5 Mr. Benton: Well in these 6 Ms. Rooker: Charles Benton. 7 Mr. Benton: Charles Benton. In the spirit of 8 this morning's discussion, where you clearly were 9 moving to try to bring different voices together to 10 develop a consensus recommendation, I think it 11 would be very interesting and we would certainly be 12 prepared as the Media Working Group to meet with 13 the NAB and see if between now and July, and see if 14 we can't have out something that is more of a 15 consensus document. It doesn't mean we're going to 16 be able to arrive at that point, but if we do not 17 arrive at that point, we will have thrashed this 18 out to the best of our ability in the spirit of 19 compromise, to try to create a one plus one equals 20 three scenario, which is my favorite math. 21 Ms. Rooker: Marsha, how does that sit with 22 you? 23 Ms. MacBride: I think that would be a great 24 opportunity to go through these issues. 25 Ms. Rooker: It makes sense to me. Because Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 131 1 obviously, there's a lot of concern and this is a 2 very sensitive issue. And so it would do well I 3 think, for the parties to get involved in it and to 4 proceed from there. And as you say, if you can't 5 reach agreements, you can always present all sides 6 of the issue to the Commission. 7 Mr. Benton: We can say, here's where we 8 agree, here's where we don't agree and come back 9 and talk about it. In parenthesis we might also - 10 Marsha, when we meet, we might also be able to 11 revisit the public interest issues where the NBA 12 was the one no vote of the entire group. So we can 13 talk about that as well and we'll do that. 14 Mr. Moynihan: I want to encourage folks to 15 join the Media Working Group. We did have the 16 presence of a NBA representative earlier and they 17 withdrew their participation in the Working Group 18 and that might be in part why we're having this 19 conflict here, today. So I would encourage both 20 the NAB and whoever else who like to join the Media 21 Working Group, to do so and I think the procedure 22 is just to let Scott know that you would like to 23 and he will inform me. 24 Also, that the meeting that was proposed and 25 agreed to be conducted under the (inaudible) of our Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 132 1 Media Working Group so that it is reported and that 2 all members of the Working Group. Charles, is that 3 okay with you, Charles and with Marsha? And that 4 this be open to the members of the Media Working 5 Group, at least. 6 Ms. Rooker: Okay. 7 Mr. Benton: Exactly. 8 Ms. Rooker: I have one comment to make to you 9 about broadcasters and their commitment to the 10 public. Call for Action only exists because of 11 commitments, so I have a little prejudice in this 12 area. I guess I may as well tell you up front. So 13 I would like to see you all address this, because I 14 do think there is more commitment perhaps, than 15 what is being put in here. So that would be great. 16 So then what we will do is just table 17 discussion on this to move forward to a meeting, 18 perhaps meetings, between now and July. This will 19 be an agenda item in July and we'll go ahead and 20 put that on the agenda now and we'll take the 21 recommendations, the things you agree on and the 22 things you don't agree on. And that's exactly what 23 we're all about, so that all voices can be heard. 24 That is very important. 25 Now Janice, do you want to go ahead? You said Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 133 1 there was going to be an addition to the bullet 2 points and to the procedural recommendations. Do 3 you think it's a mute point to do that now, or 4 should we just wait? 5 Ms. Schacter: Janice Schacter. Charles knows 6 the paragraph, if we can just get that added in, 7 that would be terrific. And we've already worked 8 out the details. 9 Ms. Rooker: That makes sense. That makes 10 sense to me. Any other comments or concerns that 11 we need to address now, prior to the July meeting? 12 Yes, Dixie? 13 Ms. Ziegler: Dixie Ziegler. I just had a 14 quick question, is there a timing issue on this 15 that waiting until July doesn't disrupt either 16 issue or anyone's side? 17 Ms. Rooker: This is something that would seem 18 to be going on for a long time. It is a debate. 19 Ms. Ziegler: I understand that. 20 Ms. Rooker: Is that an understatement? 21 Ms. Ziegler: It does say 2006. I didn't know 22 if there was a timing thing there or not. 23 Ms. Rooker: Is there? 24 Ms. MacBride: I don't believe from the 25 comments made directly by the chairman, this will Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 134 1 move much before he has a full compliment of 2 Commissioners. And there doesn't appear to be any 3 movement on getting a full compliment of 4 Commissioners, so I do think we have time to do 5 this. 6 Ms. Rooker: Okay. Well I think that's a very 7 good resolution Charles. Thank you very much, I 8 appreciate that. That's great. So well, ha! 9 We've got time. Can you believe this? We're 10 usually so driven. I'm usually so driven by 11 looking at the clock. I cannot believe it. I'll 12 tell you what we can do, is see if we can go ahead 13 and get Steve and Larry. and if they're available, 14 we can just move right into their presentation. 15 Why don't we do that and let's just take our break. 16 Now if you don't mind, I know you just got here. 17 Be thankful I'm being generous. So why don't we 18 take a 15 minute break and be back here at 1:40 and 19 hopefully by then, we will have them on the phone. 20 And if not, we'll find something to talk about. 21 We'll make it up. We can talk about the Universal 22 Service Fund Tax, because I think we may want to 23 add that to the agenda in July. Okay, 15 minutes. 24 [Recess at 1:25 p.m.] 25 Ms. Rooker: We do have Larry Goldberg joining Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 135 1 us via teleconferencing and Steve Jacobs. Thank 2 you, Steve, for making this possible. 3 STEVE JACOB 4 RECOMMENDATIONS OF ADVANCED TECHNOLOGIES WORKING 5 GROUP 6 Mr. Jacobs: It's my pleasure. And by the 7 way, I think that Dave Brugger will be speaking on 8 Larry's behalf, unless Dave prefers to wait until 9 Larry's available at shortly after 2:00. 10 Ms. Rooker: Is that right, are we going to do 11 that? Steve, are you speaking for Dave? Do you 12 know that for a fact? 13 Mr. Jacobs: I don't know that for a fact. 14 You have to ask Dave Brugger. 15 Ms. Rooker: I think Dave Brugger is ready to 16 move. He's ready to talk about anything. It 17 doesn't necessarily have to be pertinent to our 18 meeting, but we hope it is. 19 Mr. Jacobs: I would suggest, Shirley, that 20 Dave go right ahead. 21 Ms. Rooker: Thank you, Steve. All right, 22 we're going to move ahead then with the 23 recommendations from the Advanced Technologies 24 Working Group and David Brugger is going to be 25 filling in. Larry Goldberg, our Chair, was not Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 136 1 able to make our meeting today. He's been very 2 faithful in attendance. But unfortunately, could 3 not be here and is not available right now. Is 4 that right David? 5 Mr. Brugger: That is right. He was not 6 available until after 2:00. 7 Ms. Rooker: We will go ahead and get started. 8 He can join us a little later and jump right in. 9 And we'll have to apologize to Larry, because this 10 was unanticipated that we would be starting on this 11 group so early. So anyway, having said that, I'm 12 going to turn the microphones over to David. 13 Mr. Brugger: Okay. There are three 14 recommendations from the Advanced Technology 15 Working Group. The first recommendation had to do 16 with establishing a consumer disability impact 17 statement process and a checklist for new and 18 emerging technologies. And there were a variety of 19 issues that came up involving the impact of new and 20 emerging technologies and what that was going to 21 do. And after a lot of discussion about not 22 wanting to try and handle all of these separately 23 or come up with very specific recommendations for 24 each new technology, that if there were an impact 25 statement, anytime there was a new or emerging Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 137 1 technology and sort of a checklist of the criteria, 2 that they ought to at least consider, especially in 3 terms of disclosure of what impact they would have 4 on the disabled. 5 We came up with a checklist that would apply 6 to mobile, wireless, media, telephone company 7 entering into new channel video, digital media 8 interfaces, converter boxes, and other new 9 technologies. And I can read them, or if you've 10 got them, you've already read them. 11 Ms. Rooker: Why don't we go through them? 12 Mr. Brugger: The first was to analyze and 13 clearly indicate to consumers any potential 14 degradation of existing or planned services by 15 alternate technologies or providers. And there was 16 some question about new providers coming in. Some 17 of the examples where they were coming in and that 18 If a neighbor or people saying in an adjoining 19 community may have lines changed for different 20 kinds of new services. But by then, removing old 21 lines and so on, it would disrupt or degrade the 22 services available in an adjoining community or 23 even in an adjoining neighborhood. And that people 24 ought to be protected from those kinds of changes 25 in technology being caused by somebody else. And Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 138 1 they ought to be aware if that's going to happen, 2 that A, that it is happening before they buy a new 3 technology, or that there aren't penalties for them 4 for wanting to change or upgrade their technology. 5 The second one was 6 Ms. Rooker: Shall we take them one by one and 7 see if there's any questions or comments? That's 8 probably the easier way to do it. Does anyone have 9 any questions, comments, concerns about that? 10 Mr. Brugger: Does anybody else on the 11 committee want to talk about it on the Working 12 Group? 13 Mr. Price: Ed Price from Georgia Tech. I 14 have a general question, I think this is a great 15 idea in general, but who will do this checklist? 16 Does the FCC do it? Does the manufacturer do it? 17 Does the Disability Rights Group do it? 18 Mr. Brugger: Well it would be within the FCC. 19 Mr. Price: Okay. But the FCC would have to 20 create a new group or the officers of the hearing, 21 I guess would do it. 22 Ms. Rooker: Is there anything like this now, 23 being done within the FCC? I have to say, I don't 24 know. 25 Mr. Brugger: I don't know. Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 139 1 Ms. Kearney: I guess I don't understand, what 2 is the metric for the checklist? Is it section 3 255? 4 Mr. Brugger: I can't answer that question. 5 Ms. Kearney: I think probably, that is 6 something that would need to be answered. 7 Ms. Rooker: Do you think Larry would have the 8 answer to that? 9 Mr. Brugger: He may. But I can tell you, 10 that question didn't come up in our discussion. 11 Ms. Rooker: Julie, do you want to wait until 12 Larry joins us at 2:00? We can ask him that 13 question and then, discuss it then. He is going to 14 join us at 2:00, right? 15 Mr. Brugger: Yes. 16 Ms. Rooker: So he will be coming onboard and 17 he may well know the answer. I'm not sure what 18 exists. Now is -- I guess what I'm asking, when 19 new technology is being looked at, does the FCC - 20 do you know the answer to that, Jim? Does the FCC 21 do this kind of an appraisal of it? 22 Ms. Strauss: The FCC does not. I wasn't 23 involved in this, but it looks like it goes way 24 beyond 255 because the 5th one -- the 5th factor 25 goes into captioning, and video description, and Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 140 1 hearing, and compatibility which is beyond 255. 2 Ms. Kearney: Julie Kearney, CEA. As an 3 equipment manufacturer, a lot of these rely on 4 standards and if it is for future technologies, 5 those standards can be accompanying chip sets 6 haven't been necessarily been formulated yet. And 7 so I think it is hard, at least from my 8 perspective, to apply something to a technology 9 that either may not yet exist, or may not have 10 appropriate standards that have been worked for 11 many months within different industries. 12 Thank you. 13 Mr. Brugger: Jim? 14 Mr. Tobias: Jim Tobias, Inclusive 15 Technologies. I was passing the baton over to 16 Karen, because I think it is exactly parallel to 17 her very valuable recommendation this morning, that 18 there be some overall Commission oversight for all 19 proceedings and what the implications would be for 20 disability and accessibility. And I think this is 21 kind of related to that. 22 My own comment on this is that although I 23 think it is a great idea, and it is certainly in 24 line with what I said before about getting the 25 early warning on things, and to knowing in advance, Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 141 1 it takes an extremely negative view on new 2 technologies. Which, is really counter-intuitive 3 and counter-reality, I might say. 4 Mr. Brugger: You mean, this does? 5 Mr. Tobias: Yes. In other words, it talks 6 about what is going to reduce accessibility, what 7 is going to jeopardize accessibility, and obviously 8 as the regulatory body of the Commission, their 9 first focus might want to be on where there are new 10 jeopardies. But I think, there would be some 11 benefit even within the perspective of serving 12 consumers with disabilities about what new 13 opportunities these technologies offer. 14 So, for example, five -- 10 years ago, when 15 wireless text messaging was first arising, we might 16 have had a recognition, an indication, gee, this is 17 about brand new way of communicating in text and 18 it's a mainstream way with a wide range of 19 equipment. The wide range of network services that 20 essentially duplicates and supplements, and in many 21 ways, surpasses traditional TGY. 22 So is there something that we can do aside 23 from general stakeholder information? Something 24 that the Commission might want to do, to fold these 25 new opportunities into the kind of protected and Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 142 1 regulatory classes that it already has. 2 Mr. Brugger: I don't think it was seen that 3 way. I think the whole idea here, was not to set 4 new standards for technology and so on, but was 5 simply to disclose good and bad degradation 6 enhancements. Opportunities have let any new 7 technology was going to have for the disabled, it 8 wasn't -- I mean, I hear what your saying, and 9 that's to me, 50 percent of it. The other 50 10 percent is well, are there no opportunities? It's 11 just to disclose to the consumer what those new 12 technologies can and can't do, what good they will 13 do, what they may not encompass in terms of the 14 capabilities of the technology. 15 Mr. Tobias: I'm reading your comment to you 16 say you consider that a friendly amendment because 17 I think as written, it only talks about the 18 downside of new technologies. 19 Ms. Rooker: That's an excellent point. 20 Certainly it seems to me, that its something that 21 can be rephrased. 22 Mr. Brugger: It wasn't intended that way. 23 Ms. Rooker: To reflect that there is positive 24 developments there, that the benefits can be passed 25 on to consumers. Yes, Laurie? Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 143 1 Ms. McGarry: Laurie McGarry, CTIA. One thing 2 that might help me a little bit, are there some 3 examples that the group looked at that you could 4 share? It might help illuminate for me a little 5 more, the spirit of what you're trying to get. I 6 know you mentioned technologies that can come into 7 a neighborhood that might have a resulting negative 8 effect in another part of the neighborhood, but 9 whether were there other examples of where you 10 cited a new technology having a negative effect, 11 that might fall into this category? 12 Mr. Brugger: I would have to ask others on 13 the group to speak to that. 14 Ms. Rooker: Okay. Ed, you go first. 15 Mr. Price: Ed Price, Georgia Tech. I was at 16 the meeting last week on broadband over power 17 lines, which they have some in Europe. It 18 interferes with X-10, a lot of cases which people 19 like disabled people, use X-10 for home control. 20 So if your neighbor gets broadband over power line, 21 it may knock out your home control system. So 22 that's just one example of an FCC regulated service 23 that could have an unintended consequence. Of 24 course, that is not a service really coming out in 25 the U.S. yet, but give it a year or two. And I Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 144 1 think the classic example is analog to digital cell 2 phone transition with hearing incompatibility. 3 Mr. Bibler: I think I have two examples of 4 new technology that might not have happened before. 5 The Video iPod. We've seen our kids run around 6 with Video iPod's and now they're downloading and 7 the Video iPod may not support captions. It should 8 be able to support captions. 9 Another example would be, I just got a new 10 high def television and I just got a new DVD 11 player. And so I found out, that my new cable with 12 my new interface -- high definition interface, it 13 erupts the captions. So I can't see the captions. 14 I can see the sub titles. And the comment was, we 15 made a mistake but that they acknowledged it, but 16 the new technology does not support captions. So I 17 think with the Advanced Technology Group, we hope 18 the FCC will have something so the new technology 19 doesn't give us a lower standard than what we had 20 before. 21 Ms. Rooker: Good comment. Let's go to the 22 end of the table. 23 Mr. Salter: Harold Salter. Just with 24 reference to the impacts of new technology 25 Ms. Rooker: I don't think your microphone is Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 145 1 on yet. Stick your hand up. 2 Mr. Salter: With reference to the impact of 3 new technology, I think it is important to know, 4 even on something such as broadband over power 5 line, the FCC already had recognized some of the 6 interference, potential interference aspects of 7 that, with other new technologies such as Ultra 8 Wideband. I think considerable time and attention 9 goes into what the potential interference impacts 10 may be. 11 I just want to address one other remark that 12 was made with respect to the transition from analog 13 to digital wireless. With respect to hearing aid 14 compatibility, the FCC changed the hearing aid 15 compatibility rules. Specifically, to make note of 16 that change for instance, on February 17th, 2008 17 which is the analog transition date, 50 percent of 18 all handsets will have to be hearing aid 19 compatible. So I would just urge that there may be 20 a number of things going on right now that take 21 notice of these issues. 22 Thank you. 23 Ms. Rooker: Thank you, Harold. Claude? 24 Mr. Stout: I'm Claude Stout. I was very 25 excited about the consumer disabled statement there Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 146 1 because of the jammed packed deaf and hard of 2 hearing consumers have exposed a lot of frustration 3 with the new technologies that's been introduced 4 over the last few years. The VRS providers turnout 5 the video. Devices which are not compatible with 6 other providers and then the result is, you get 7 that particular device but you don't have access to 8 other video providers. And then in addition to 9 that, people are using a specific device, could not 10 have peer to peer chat with other people using a 11 different video device or devices. 12 And more interesting is, that one company who 13 provided a specific device had each consumer sign a 14 statement taking ownership responsibility for that 15 device. So a lot of things in the fine print, that 16 consumers were not aware of how restricted some of 17 those agreements are. And so, that consumer device 18 impact statement I think is very important that 19 they're bringing up, so the consumer knows what 20 they're getting into. And that empowers the 21 consumers once you give them the information. 22 So the FCC has responsibility for this kind of 23 thing. I think the office of Engineering and 24 Technology here at the FCC, should be looking and 25 reviewing at all of these new technologies that are Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 147 1 being developed and ask them all the hard 2 questions. Who is the engineer? You know, we get 3 all excited and get carried away with this new 4 technology, but ask, are they disability friendly? 5 Who is going to win? Who is going to lose with 6 this new technology that is being developed and 7 introduced? 8 Ms. Rooker: Karen? 9 Ms. Strauss: Karen Strauss. Ron, can you 10 just get Ron's attention? Ron, the DVD you have is 11 in violation of FCC rules. You should file a 12 complaint. 13 Mr. Harold: The petition to require hearing 14 incompatibility for a digital wireless phones was 15 filed in 1995. It took 13 years for this to 16 happen. As you said 2008, it's going to be 50 17 percent, so that's too long. 18 Another example is, in the 1960's, AT&T's - 19 all of its standard phones were hearing 20 incompatible for analog regular. That's all we had 21 then and they decided to change the composition of 22 their handsets to make them lighter and more tamper 23 resistant. And as a consequence, took away hearing 24 incompatibility for wire line phones and it took 20 25 years to get that back. Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 148 1 So these are all three examples. One more is 2 graphical interfaces blind people. When computers 3 were first becoming popular, they had no problem 4 reading text. Then graphics became much harder to 5 be able to, because screen readers couldn't read 6 graphics. And so, here's four examples, where if 7 somebody had been minding the store at the 8 beginning and checking to see whether something was 9 accessible before it got out, then the design 10 could've been changed at the outset and it would've 11 cost a lot less than retrofitting later on. So it 12 really happens all the time. 13 Ms. Rooker: I'm learning a lot today. We 14 have from our teleconferencing, Steve. It takes a 15 few seconds. We're beaming him in. 16 Mr. Jacobs: I don't think Wayne has a 17 microphone and he is going to have to call in on 18 this line. I will let him know. 19 Ms. Rooker: I'm not sure what that was all 20 about. That was Steve Jacobs speaking. Who is he 21 calling? 22 Mr. Jacobs: This is Steve Jacobs speaking and 23 Wayne Castle does not have a microphone in the room 24 and I will have him call in on this line, so that 25 he can ask his question. Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 149 1 Ms. Rooker: Okay. So he will call in, so we 2 can continue discussion right now. Okay, fine. 3 We've had some interesting comments on this. 4 Probably I think, one of the things I hear you 5 saying, is there is a need for this. But then I 6 also hear you saying, that this statement is so 7 negative that it shouldn't be just reflecting on 8 possible things that could go wrong, but that there 9 are positive impacts from technology as well. So, 10 do we want to make changes to this as we go 11 through? Does someone want to suggest that we put 12 more positive language in there? Or, what is your 13 sense? It's your committee. David? 14 Mr. Brugger: I don't know if Jim can tell me 15 if words will do this? In other words, if you said 16 to establish a consumer disability impact statement 17 on service enhancements, or changes, or degradation 18 so that you take into account the full panoply of 19 what the possibilities are. 20 Mr. Tobias: Jim Tobias, Inclusive 21 Technologies. I think it would be very easy to 22 change these from potential degradation to 23 potential impact. The second one, since you can't 24 just change to impact, because it says if there's 25 going to be impact, how can consumers switch to an Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 150 1 alternate provider at comparable cost and function, 2 et cetera, et cetera, et cetera? So it may be that 3 it just needs to be reduced a little bit. 4 And just something in one of the initial 5 paragraphs, changing degradation to impact, either 6 positive or negative, on accessibility. 7 Ms. Rooker: So taking out the word 8 degradation where it's used and putting impact, 9 because degradation does -- it is a negative. So 10 would that be -- that would be a solution. 11 I believe we have Wayne Castle on the phone. 12 Wayne, are you there? 13 Mr. Castle: Yes. I am here. And I did have 14 a microphone. But anyway, I don't know why it 15 wasn't working. 16 Ms. Rooker: Do you have a comment for us? 17 Mr. Castle: Yes. And I believe I may not 18 have heard quite the last exchange. But I wanted 19 to suggest that one of the things we talked about 20 on this impact statement, was what happens when a 21 particular service that people are relying upon, 22 especially ones where they rely upon for life 23 things like phone service, when any of those 24 services get negatively impacted by some new 25 technology and the example was, cellular phone Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 151 1 service, that degraded horribly when antennas were 2 reconfigured to focus more on a high growth 3 business area and left out the neighborhood, so it 4 got weaker signals. 5 And then at the same time, the increase in the 6 number of new applications on the cell phones, like 7 internet, cameras, music that consume more 8 bandwidth and more irregular patterns which would 9 mean that the person's phone subscription may go 10 from five bars, to one bar, or no bars, and drop 11 calls and be very unreliable. 12 The discussion that we had was, if a new 13 technology maybe didn't anticipate it was going to 14 have that kind of impact, but once it did show up 15 as having that impact, the consumer needed to have 16 some sort of remedy like getting out of the 17 contract without a termination fee, or any sort of 18 penalty. 19 We understand that within the last few weeks, 20 there have been petitions in front of the FCC to 21 remove that requirement, to essentially lock in the 22 consumer to be obligated for those penalties. But 23 anyway, that was one example I wanted to raise that 24 was related to the consumer and disability impact 25 statement. Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 152 1 Thank you. 2 Ms. Rooker: Thank you, Wayne. Does anybody 3 have any comments? Deborah? 4 Ms. Berlyn: I think Wayne is talking about 5 the second point. And our language, we had an 6 ongoing debate about how to word that second point 7 and I'm not sure the language we left with, that 8 there was complete agreement by the Working Group 9 on this second point. I'm sorry to say that it 10 came at a point when I was very busy and I just saw 11 the exchange back and forth, and I don't know 12 whether Larry is on yet or not, but I'm not so sure 13 we had agreed upon this language or not. Maybe 14 someone else in the Working Group could help me out 15 here by saying, was there final agreement on this 16 language or not? Because the last I had seen, we 17 were still debating and I wasn't sure we had 18 agreed. 19 Mr. Brugger: Debbie, there was not final 20 agreement by the committee, because we didn't have 21 time at the point at which this came up. And what 22 Larry said was, it can be amended here as we 23 discuss it, if that was necessary, and if this 24 language was not adequate. 25 Ms. Berlyn: Thank you. Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 153 1 Ms. Rooker: Yes? 2 Ms. Bobek: Ann Bobek from NAD. The basic 3 question, is this checklist something the FCC would 4 post on its website so consumers could access it 5 and say, I'm going to purchase a home system. I've 6 got BPL in my neighborhood and how do I avoid 7 interference? Or is this something that before 8 technology is authorized, the FCC would go through 9 a series of checklists? That's my question, number 10 one. 11 Number two is just kind of a practical 12 concern. The example of BPL was used, but you 13 know, you really don't often know how services that 14 are occupying an adjacent spectrum act with one 15 another until they are actually out in the market 16 place. And I'm not quite sure how effective the 17 FCC, on a prospected basis, is going to look at my 18 technology and say how for example, the Commission 19 is considering unlicenced devices in the unused 20 portion of the TD broadcast bands. We may not know 21 how they interact with each other until they're 22 actually deployed. 23 So I guess, I don't know how checklist -- a 24 prospective checklist would address that or if 25 there are ways we can kind of retool this to say, Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 154 1 how do we empower consumers once technology 2 changes, or evolves, or in maybe ways to mitigate, 3 maybe as BPL is deployed these questions come out, 4 or for unlicenced devices. And how do we empower 5 consumers to know where the current state of 6 technology evolution is? Because let's be candid, 7 it takes the Commission a long time to get through 8 these issues to begin with and to try to keep up 9 with our technologies and how they interact with 10 each other is nearly an impossible task. 11 But if there is some way to even have a 12 central clearing house for the FCC or at least, a 13 line of communication and say, I'm experiencing 14 problems in X, Y, Z. Is someone else having this 15 problem? That would be useful for consumers rather 16 than, just a prior to deployed, did you think about 17 these three things? And I think the more you can 18 empower consumers about what it is they're 19 purchasing and how what benefits and negatives may 20 be out there. 21 But again, maybe six months from now, you have 22 a new -- I don't know about you, but I go through a 23 cellphone about once every eight months, because I 24 keep leaving them out in the rain. 25 Ms. Rooker: We will get you an umbrella for Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 155 1 your cellphone. 2 Ms. Bobek: It's about how do you empower 3 consumers to make the choice as they switch 4 services and I don't know that that necessarily the 5 FCC should take the lead on it at the outset. But 6 maybe there's a way they could facilitate to make 7 sure that all of us have been put into that 8 process. 9 Ms. Rooker: Good comment. David? 10 Mr. Brugger: Again, this had to do with 11 disclosure. We know that there are a lot of 12 engineering tasks, just like they were done with 13 DTV in terms of reception, inner cities, and so on. 14 And the question is, there's a lot of things they 15 do know. We'll never answer all the questions they 16 don't know. That will come through special uses. 17 But the point is, that when they go through all of 18 the engineering, forming new technology, there are 19 things they know that it will do and that it will 20 not do. And the point is, is that if there is no 21 checklist for disability, than is anybody even 22 thinking about it or thinking of making public, 23 what they do know? And the point is, to get 24 disclosure on what is known, so that the consumer 25 can have as much information as possible, to make Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 156 1 an educated choice about whether they are going to 2 purchase one technology or the other. 3 As you say, technology moves so fast. We will 4 never be able to catch up with it. But the point 5 is, there are a certain set of things that they 6 know, based on the engineering testing that goes 7 into it. 8 Ms. Rooker: Ann? 9 Ms. Bobek: Just to follow up and to use the 10 DTV as an example, we've already transitioned to 11 digital in terms of our transmission, it's the 12 receivers and Julie's folks over at CEA that are 13 continually improving that service. So the 14 Commission has sort of already looked at the 15 opportunity to look at the impact on pros and cons. 16 And on our service to the disabled and the entire 17 community, for us, that horse has already left the 18 barn. But if you're looking at how receivers are 19 improving, again, maybe there's a way the 20 commission could be proactive in at least educating 21 consumers. I just sort of think of this as sort of 22 not only what is deployed in terms of new 23 technology, but it is the new devices that are out 24 there. And that's something that -- it could be 25 many years from when the Commission has first Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 157 1 examined it. I think if you're going to have 2 checklist, it has to be a living and breathing 3 document so it is continually empowering the 4 consumer with choice. 5 Mr. Brugger: We would hope that it would be a 6 living document. 7 Ms. Rooker: Judy? 8 Ms. Viera: I just wanted to add that it is 9 almost impossible for consumers to know what type 10 of interference there might be while shopping for 11 equipment, because it doesn't show up in the store 12 and it's not until you take things home and then 13 start to use them, that you find out that type of 14 thing. So I wanted to emphasis that it's important 15 to have an opportunity to make an informed decision 16 when you're out there shopping, so that the value 17 of that type of a statement for the consumer is 18 really pretty significant. 19 Ms. Rooker: Okay. Jim? 20 Mr. Tobias: Jim Tobias, Inclusive 21 Technologies. I'm not sure this is germane to 22 the Commission's work, but I want at least the 23 committee members, to be sensitive to the fact that 24 we should be talking about technologies that are 25 not necessarily restricted or even directed towards Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 158 1 Telecom, or video, or what have you. But that 2 might appear as components within a telecom or 3 video player device in the future. 4 I'll give you an example, talking about 5 electronic paper, like a flexible display, this 6 will certainly show up in devices that are covered 7 by the Commission's rules. But you won't know that 8 it's in one of those devices until the company 9 comes forward with a product that it intends to 10 have certified and that is already too late. 11 So the stand that we need to do, is over the 12 horizon, is beyond the purview of specific 13 Commission actions. And again, I don't know how we 14 have any effect on that, but we have to be 15 sensitized to that rather than waiting for a 16 submission that is looking for licensor. 17 Ms. Rooker: All right, Ed? 18 Mr. Price: Ed Price from Georgia Tech. In 19 our dealings with industry, and particularly with 20 the Telecom industry, and with the cellphone 21 industry, what they're saying is we want our 22 products to be fully accessible. We need more 23 information from consumers, and disabled, and 24 disability groups, and engineers on how to do that, 25 because the 255 rules are relatively vague. There Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 159 1 isn't any kind of a document that you can get that 2 says, these are the features you need to include in 3 your phone to make it fully accessible. There a 4 few. But we need, as consumers, to provide the 5 information early on to manufacturers and help them 6 make their products compatible, because the cost 7 for re-mediation later, are enormous. 8 I'm sure that T-mobile and the other carriers 9 are sort of fortunate adding TTY compatibility to 10 the cellphone network and the manufacturers are now 11 trying to make them hearing aid compatible. If 12 these things that are thought about when the 13 digital telephone systems were being implemented, 14 it could've saved $10's of millions of dollars. 15 Ms. Rooker: Okay. All right. Do we have a 16 sense? Comments have been made about the second 17 paragraph where Debra wasn't sure that was the 18 language that was agreed upon. Do we need to 19 rewrite that now? Should we rewrite it? Should we 20 go back to the committee with it? I'm hearing 21 people saying it should go back to the committee. 22 So does that preclude us? I don't think that 23 precludes us discussing the other issues, then you 24 can come back with another recommendation. 25 Mr. Brugger: It does not. Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 160 1 Ms. Rooker: So have we discussed these roll 2 - of course, we've talked about customer service 3 and choices. I think that has been included in the 4 discussion, has it not in the things we have been 5 talking about? What about number four, the impact 6 on the privacy impacts on consumers? We haven't 7 touched on that issue, so should we go to number 8 four? I think that would make sense, right? I'm 9 trying to keep you all awake. 10 Mr. Brugger: Are there any comments about it? 11 Ms. Rooker: What about number four? Do we 12 have any concerns or questions about that, or 13 comments? Okay. Then we want to move to number 14 five. Number five, we have questions. Yes? 15 Mr. Freiermuth: Scott Freiermuth with Sprint 16 Nextel. I think on number four, it just seems to 17 be -- I'm just curious as to how practically this 18 would work. And in fact, I have concerns about the 19 practicality of most of this but probably four, in 20 particular. 21 Ms. Rooker: Your question is how number four 22 would work in terms of whether you not determine 23 whether how you can determine whether or not there 24 are privacy implications? 25 Mr. Freiermuth: Correct. Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 161 1 Ms. Rooker: David, do you have any questions 2 on that, or maybe what we need is clarification 3 here. I'm not sure. I guess you're asking how it 4 would be done? 5 Mr. Freiermuth: Yes. It's written to say, 6 identification of potential privacy impacts on 7 consumers for all text, voice, and video. Who does 8 this identification? Is the FCC doing it? Is it 9 the technology manufacturer? 10 Mr. Brugger: The assumption here, is that the 11 FCC would do it in terms of asking the question of 12 the manufacturer of the technology and asking 13 questions about the effects on privacy, what the 14 capabilities of the equipment are or are not. 15 Ms. Rooker: I think Larry may have just 16 joined us. Is that you, Larry? 17 [No response]. 18 Ms. Rooker: We heard the little beep, beep 19 that said someone was dialing in. I guess not. 20 Okay. So, do we feel that that needs to be a 21 little more specific, a little clarified, or what 22 is the sense? Perhaps this is something that if 23 we're going to redraft recommendation number one, 24 then perhaps that should also be asked for input on 25 members of the Working Group or the general Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 162 1 committee for comments on number four as well. 2 Mr. Brugger: If there are specific questions, 3 as he had, maybe he could submit those to our 4 committee and ask your specific question so we can 5 deal with them. 6 Ms. Rooker: That's a great idea. And issue 7 number five, identification of support for a lack 8 of accessability for people with disabilities. 9 Again, I guess the question is, how is that 10 accomplished? And perhaps, with the phrasing could 11 be a little bit differently, in that it doesn't 12 indicate a list, but it says -- well, no. I don't 13 want to try to do that, never mind. 14 Mr. Brugger: I think we would need to know 15 more about how those processes work within the FCC 16 in order to come up with that kind of information. 17 Ms. Rooker: So can we just table draft 18 recommendation number one for revision and taking a 19 closer look at it? Tom -- and Tom paid for lunch. 20 We have to let him talk. 21 Mr. Wlodkowski: The question I have in this 22 recommendation from an industry perspective, is 23 it's all well and good to say that the FCC should 24 review these products and identify these issues. 25 But who certifies the reviewers? How do we have Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 163 1 some sort of indication of what the baseline, 2 knowledge, or expertise of these people who would 3 be reviewing the technologies or products would be? 4 I think we've got to get to that level of 5 understanding before making some type of 6 recommendation like this. Because that could be a 7 concern. 8 Ms. Rooker: Tom, perhaps that is one of the 9 questions that should be asked of the Working Group 10 to be considered in terms of drafting this 11 recommendation. Good question. 12 Okay, all right then. Let's move on to 13 recommendation two, to see how we feel about that 14 and whether or not, we want to take action on it. 15 David, do you want to go over that? 16 Mr. Brugger: Again, this had to do with 17 converter boxes and especially since the government 18 is going to make quite an investment in them for 19 basic converter boxes and that is to initiate a 20 proceeding to determine what the capabilities of 21 digital to analog set top boxes will be using the 22 vouchers and the subsidies that the government is 23 going to provide. So that there's some sense that 24 those boxes would at least pass through the 25 captioning, video description, and other kinds of Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 164 1 services that disabled people are now capable of 2 receiving. 3 Ms. Rooker: David, you left off a critical 4 part of this and that is, are the instructions 5 going to be understandable? 6 [Laughter] 7 Mr. Brugger: I won't have any personal 8 comments about instructions you get with 9 technology. 10 Ms. Rooker: This seems fairly straight 11 forward. You're asking the FCC to make sure that 12 what is being bought out there, is going to work. 13 Mr. Brugger: And that they're at least going 14 to get the basic services that are now required of 15 broadcasters and people are doing captioning, or 16 descriptive video, or other kinds of things at 17 least that that will be at least, passed through. 18 Especially since my understanding, is they're 19 looking at a $40 dollar box in terms of the subsidy 20 at least, $40 dollars subsidy. 21 Ms. Rooker: So are we talking about the 22 burden on the manufacturer to prove that what 23 they're doing works? That are making these 24 converter boxes? 25 Mr. Brugger: Well that they will at least Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 165 1 pass through the captioning and other things that 2 are now available for the disabled. 3 Ms. Rooker: That makes sense. Julie? 4 Ms. Kearney: Julie Kearney. Right now, the 5 jurisdiction of the converter box issue resides 6 with the National Telecommunications Information 7 Agency at the Department of Commerce, NTIA. They 8 will be opening a proceeding within the next few 9 months and NPRM to ask the public what the 10 converter box is, what functionality, how do they 11 distribute the coupons, that there are a whole 12 panoply of issues that will be in that NPRM. And I 13 would recommend that this is not a recommendation 14 that needs to go to the FCC, but for this group to 15 be actively engaged in the rule making process at 16 NTIA, at this time. 17 Ms. Rooker: Would that be appropriate for the 18 FCC to be involved with that agency? 19 Ms. Kearney: Individual members of this group 20 can be involved. 21 Ms. Rooker: That's an excellent suggestion. 22 David, what do you think about that? That it not 23 actually -- this is something that is not within 24 the jurisdiction of the FCC. 25 Mr. Brugger: Well we just felt that it needed Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 166 1 to be dealt with and we weren't aware, at least it 2 didn't come up in our discussions, that NTIA was 3 going to be doing this. And as a matter of fact, 4 it was my understanding that NTIA got the money, 5 but they didn't get any of the language they needed 6 instructing them on what they should do either in 7 terms of education or the use of the subsidy. And 8 that there is somebody working on that language to 9 get that in the legislation to try and give NTIA 10 some guidance. 11 Ms. Rooker: Ann has a question. 12 Ms. Kearney: Just to follow up to David's. 13 Julie Kearney. That is why the NTIA is opening up 14 a rule making, because they need direction from the 15 public, the manufacturers, the broadcasters, and 16 all of the interested stakeholders. 17 Ms. Rooker: Ann? 18 Ms. Bobek: Ann Bobek, NAV. Perhaps we can 19 read tool -- the recommendation if it's necessary 20 and you need to go forward. The same curves the 21 FCC to work closely with NTIA. In its proceeding 22 - the NTIA proceeding, on how to go forward in 23 terms of set top boxes and I just want to reiterate 24 that the broadcasters have made efforts to make 25 sure that digital converter boxes are accessible to Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 167 1 all consumers, because you guys are truly our bread 2 and butter for over the air. 3 So we are working with another trade 4 association, the Association of Maximum Service 5 Television and a couple of Julie's members, LG and 6 Thomson to explore this, but should the set top box 7 look like what should be its capabilities is very 8 particular enhancements are that would be good or 9 bad and how that would interface with the NTIA 10 which is frankly, chart with putting a simple box 11 out there. In fact, the Congressional language 12 directing us to go to the DTV transition February 13 17th, 2009 and cut over, really does ask for a 14 fairly simple box. So I encourage all of us to be 15 diligent in looking at NTIA's efforts and to have 16 participation in that. 17 And perhaps, as soon as that comes out, it is 18 incumbent upon us as broadcasters and I'm happy to 19 help spread the word and so is Julie, to let the 20 group know when that set is in play, how we can 21 then go forth and proceed and have participation by 22 all folks here. 23 Ms. Kearney: Julie Kearney, CEA. Thanks Ann. 24 I have one more follow up. I'm not an engineer, 25 but I did want to point out, one of the goals of Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 168 1 the converter box is to maintain the existing 2 functionality of legacy TV's. For it to pass 3 along, the same things you would get it basically 4 squeezes the digital signals and capabilities 5 through analog output. Those are big words for me, 6 but I do want to assure you that the needs of this 7 group, are certainly ones that are not going to be 8 lost by my members and by Ann's members. 9 Ms. Rooker: Thank you, Julie and Ann. Joel 10 had his hand up. 11 Mr. Snyder: I was noting Joel's matter NCI, 12 just emphasizing the last few words of the 13 recommendation, accessibility of the user 14 interface. I just had noted it initially and so I 15 wanted to make that point. When I noted it there, 16 I'm just sort of reemphasizing it. In other words, 17 it is not a matter of simply passing through the 18 captioning and the description, that the box itself 19 has to be accessible. The user interface itself, 20 has to be able to be used by people who are blind. 21 We brought it up at the last meeting with respect 22 to DVD players, which the FCC does not have 23 jurisdiction over, but if we're going to talk about 24 set top boxes, the user interface has to be 25 accessible. Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 169 1 Ms. Rooker: Thank you, Joel. Joe? 2 Mr. Gordon: Joe Gordon. I have a question. 3 I don't think it really can be answered. I have 4 been speaking over the last months -- many months 5 to certain groups of senior people. They already 6 have two boxes on their TV sets. A box for in 7 cable provider and a box for the decoder. They're 8 old television sets, but there's a big population 9 out there that has two boxes. Will they be able to 10 have a third one? 11 Ms. Rooker: Who knows. 12 Mr. Gordon: Just something to think about. 13 Ms. Rooker: That's an interesting comment, 14 exactly. Well since it turns out that in fact, the 15 whole issue of the converter box, this is really 16 not within the FCC venue, should we just -- David, 17 do you have a suggestion on this? 18 Mr. Brugger: To pick up on Ann's suggestion, 19 is it the wish of the group to at least say, 20 encourage the FCC to work with the NTIA proceeding 21 to determine the capabilities? 22 Ms. Rooker: I think that's sound like an 23 excellent suggestion. We're amending this to say 24 that we asked the FCC or suggest that the FCC 25 encourage the FCC and that's a very positive word, Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 170 1 I like that. Encourage. Okay. So we've got a 2 suggestion for recommendation. Number two, do we 3 hear somebody making the motion to accept that, to 4 vote on it? 5 Ms. McGarry: I'll make the motion. 6 Ms. Kearney: I'll second. 7 Ms. Rooker: We have a vote, all in favor say 8 aye. 9 [A chorus of Ayes]. 10 Ms. Rooker: Opposed? 11 [No response]. 12 Ms. Rooker: All right. Thank you very much 13 and we'll move on to draft recommendation number 14 three. 15 Mr. Brugger: As the Commissioner this morning 16 mentioned, he was glad to see that we were going to 17 deal with the clarification of some of the closed 18 captioning rules and a lot of these came from - 19 not only from the group, but questions that Larry 20 says keep coming up, both to his operation as well 21 as to the FCC, and they are basically just asking 22 for clarification from the FCC based on questions 23 that come up where stations and video production 24 people simply don't know how to deal with it, or 25 whether the rules and regulations apply. Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 171 1 And the first one has to do with digital 2 broadcasting in multiple channels of broadcast 3 stations and whether they're going to be considered 4 part of a primary broadcast channel of the station, 5 or treated as separate channels. Especially, if 6 they divided up some stations and they have three 7 or four channels. Instead of the HD in terms of 8 digital. 9 Right now, a person does not have to, or an 10 organization does not have to caption a program if 11 the caption expense is in excess of two percent of 12 the gross revenues and I guess the question is, 13 about two percent of gross revenues apply to the 14 full revenues of the main channel or if it's 15 divided up into four channels and each one has its 16 own revenue source, will that apply to each of the 17 individual channels? 18 And it's just a question out there that 19 stations are asking and do not have an answer for, 20 at this point. 21 Ms. Rooker: Do we have any discussion on 22 this? Ann? 23 Ms. Bobek: Ann Bobek from the National 24 Association of Broadcasters. I think from my 25 perspective, some of these questions are already Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 172 1 answered and they're fairly clear on the rules, but 2 I understand why there is some confusion out there 3 as to what is an individual channel. How do you 4 group stations? Do you do it by the channel? Do 5 you do it by the licensee holder? Do you do it by 6 the group owner? I do hear these questions and so 7 I do recognize that there may be some confusion as 8 to the roles and to the extent the FCC can give 9 further guidance. I think broadcasters are all for 10 that. 11 I don't have an objection. I think it is 12 pretty clear from the rules. It's on a per channel 13 basis, and the two percent applies to each channel, 14 and that is simply how the rule is written now. 15 The question is, you go back to the Commission and 16 say, is that an appropriate measure? I think 17 that's another step. But to the extent that there 18 -- may be perhaps CGB could, they have an excellent 19 closed captioning website portion. Perhaps this 20 could be something we could encourage them to have, 21 a frequently asked questions section and maybe, 22 clarify that way rather than, go through the owners 23 process of rule making and maybe they would be able 24 to clarify this in simply, a frequently asked 25 question provision. Because there's lots of Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 173 1 frequently asked questions. The number one 2 question I got all last fall was, I have a local 3 church service, do I have to caption that or does 4 it fall into the locally produced programming with 5 no repeat value. The answer to that, which would 6 actually be FCC provided is, no and that is what 7 the Commission is vetting through several 100 8 provisions for undue burdens. So maybe pro9 actively, some of these questions could be posted 10 at the FCC's (inaudible) proportion of their CGB 11 website. 12 Mr. Brugger: Is that all of them or just the 13 first one we dealt with? 14 Ms. Bobek: I can't speak to Video on Demand, 15 we don't have that, but perhaps it's something we 16 could ask the CGB who has province of the 17 captioning to take a look at and see if there could 18 be quick answers to these questions. Can we get 19 more information out there and encourage them to be 20 a central clearing house for information? They 21 may already have clearly, ideas on how to answer 22 these questions and I can't speak to their decision 23 making process on yes or no for all of these 24 questions. But certainly, we would encourage them 25 to provide clarification for these. Not Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 174 1 necessarily through rule making, but it may be easy 2 for them to just simply post in a frequently asked 3 question. 4 Mr. Brugger: So is your recommendation to go 5 to Monica Desai with this, as opposed to the FCC? 6 Ms. Bobek: I think we could recast it and 7 say, that we think the FCC, through the 8 Governmental Affairs Bureau could clarify and we 9 encourage them to post such a clarification on the 10 FCC website. It could be as simple as that. They 11 may have a better idea how to clarify it. I'm just 12 throwing that out as one possibility. 13 Mr. Bibler: What I'm hearing, is now I've 14 started getting high definition television, now 15 HDTV is over the air broadcast. NBC, ABC, CBS they 16 are doing 100 percent caption. No problem with 17 that, but the problem when we're picking up the 18 broadcasters like from W Television, and E, and all 19 of those, the question is with these networks 20 because the HD is not being captioned and so we get 21 digital television, we have five more Discovery 22 channels. All of those are captioned but the high 23 def are not captioned. 24 We have approached Discovery and say they are 25 exempt from providing captions because of the three Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 175 1 year rule, which is true. But the broadcasters 2 have been around for years. And so, Discovery 3 comes out as well as USA, the FCC ought to provide 4 them with clarification. The devil is not in the 5 network, they should provide the captions after 6 January 1st, 2006. 7 Now Mark Cuban has two networks out there, 8 NHDTV and up until September, they were exempt 9 because they were three years old. Now, he does 10 understand that as of September, he is no longer 11 exempt. But, as we see more and more cable 12 channels switch to high network, are they a new 13 network and do they get a three year exemption? We 14 say no and the FCC has actually come to our Working 15 Group to ask for some direction, which is what 16 we're trying to give them. 17 Ms. Rooker: Claude? 18 Mr. Stout: I understand what Ann is 19 suggesting here with these questions, that they be 20 moved on to the website. But I have to kindly 21 disagree. If you recall, this is a very advanced 22 technology group and the discussion that they came 23 up with, did not answer these questions. Here as 24 committee, we are here to approve their suggestions 25 or recommendations to the FCC and ask for them to Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 176 1 deal with the CGB, if that is the correct office, 2 the one with the Media Bureau and so forth, to give 3 us answers. We have to refer back to them because 4 we don't have clarification to these questions or 5 clear answers to these questions. 6 I want to know in terms of the FCC, in terms 7 of the petition four or five other national 8 organizations, plus TBI presented questions in 9 terms of caption quality issues, in terms of 10 programming. It's very important, that if the 11 people here at the table, this afternoon, the CAC 12 recommend this to the FCC, that they come back to 13 us, the FCC, at the next meeting and give us 14 answers to some of these questions that we can't 15 sum up to. So that way, we'll be able to advise 16 well. 17 We have questions. We need answers. And I 18 don't want to go through our web posting. That 19 doesn't work well. I want -- because these are 20 policy issues, I want to appropriate FCC people to 21 be here to help us. 22 Ms. Rooker: So are you thinking that what 23 would be appropriate for us to bring some people in 24 from the FCC to address these issues on the closed 25 captioning? Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 177 1 Mr. Stout: It doesn't have to be several 2 people. It just has to be one person and an expert 3 on this issue. Have them come or give us a report 4 with the answers to the questions if they can't 5 come, but just give us the information. It's 6 obvious that the Working Group is needing this 7 information and the person involved with this, Mr. 8 Larry Goldberg is one of the top experts from WGHB. 9 Al Boston has been in the captioning field for 10 years and years. He's a member of that group and 11 if he's raising these questions, we don't need to 12 doubt his expertise or his knowledge. He's raising 13 these questions and it's very clear, he doesn't 14 have the answers. 15 Mr. Goldberg: This Larry here. I'm back. 16 Thank you for those kind words. Who was just 17 speaking? 18 Ms. Rooker: That was Claude Stout speaking. 19 Mr. Goldberg: Thank you, Claude. 20 Ms. Rooker: Are you an expert Larry? Can you 21 answer it? 22 Mr. Goldberg: If Claude says I am, then I am. 23 Yes. I agree with what Claude said and that is 24 many of us and even the FCC staff are looking for 25 clarity on some of the nuances of the captioning Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 178 1 rules. The FCC couldn't answer everything when 2 they wrote their report and order. And their order 3 on reconsideration and so many in the field are 4 asking these questions. 5 Ms. Rooker: So do you think it would be 6 useful, Larry, to have the FCC come in and discuss 7 it? 8 Mr. Goldberg: Yes. Though I wonder if the 9 FCC could even address it sooner than our next 10 meeting. 11 Ms. Rooker: Well perhaps we could submit 12 these questions to the FCC and get them distributed 13 -- answers distributed by email. 14 Mr. Goldberg: Absolutely. There's so many 15 people asking these questions. We all need to be 16 empowered to be able to answer them. 17 Ms. Rooker: Then can we take that on as one 18 of our missions? And David, could we get you to 19 give these -- well, Scott has them. If we would 20 just go ahead and submit them to the FCC for 21 answers and then they come back to us via email. 22 Mr. Brugger: I don't see anything wrong with 23 us. I don't think it's up to us to tell the FCC 24 which department, or which people, and so on should 25 answer these questions. All we're asking for is Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 179 1 clarification. Somebody there has to decide how 2 they want to do that and who the person is to 3 answer them. 4 Ms. Rooker: Okay. That works for me. Ann? 5 Ms. Bobek: Ann Bobek, NAB. I certainly don't 6 have any objection to that or directing the FCC. I 7 was just trying to get at the quickest way to get 8 the answers to the questions. And I often use the 9 example, in the tower construction notification 10 database that the FCC just established for tribes, 11 they're very responsive in terms of giving 12 information via the website, just so it's broadly 13 disseminated and everyone can have access to it. 14 But if it makes more sense to have an email 15 distribution so we can get answers to these 16 questions, I fully support that as well. 17 Ms. Rooker: Well then, let's take that on as 18 our challenge to get the FCC to provide us answers 19 and hopefully within the next few weeks, get the 20 email distributed. Janice? 21 Ms. Schacter: Janice Schacter. Is it 22 possible once we get the email from the FCC and we 23 get clarification, and then there may be some 24 tweaking that is needed and we can post it onto the 25 website, so that is available for anyone who needs Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 180 1 it, but it will allow us to do any tweaking that 2 might need to be done. 3 Ms. Bobek: I can't speak for the FCC since I 4 don't work here, but those are all reasonable 5 requests. And the question is, how expeditiously 6 can they act on our request? But certainly, I 7 think if you say the sooner, the better. I share 8 the same concern. If you wait until July, it may 9 slip until November and here we are, without 10 answers. So to the best that they can answer the 11 questions posed before them in an expeditious basis 12 and get it out to as many as possible, I certainly 13 think we should encourage that. 14 Ms. Rooker: Scott says we will try to do it. 15 Mr. Brugger: Do we need anything formally 16 done to make that happen? Scott? 17 Ms. Rooker: Let's make a recommendation. 18 Let's make a recommendation. Dan, why don't you 19 make the recommendation? 20 Mr. Frohriep: This is Greg Frohriep from CWD. 21 Somebody came in here with a lot of questions, it 22 seems and we're trying to figure out what the rules 23 say and things like that. Like Ann said, like they 24 told her, the three year exemption from the 25 Discovery Channel, but in other ways they're saying Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 181 1 that if you've got a new network that is set up 2 like a PAX network or something, they've got a 3 three year exemption from captioning. So we 4 understand that. 5 But the Discovery Channel, I'm surprised they 6 would say something like that and the HD 7 captioning, a three year exemption until 2009 for 8 captioning for this digital content. That still 9 leaves me hanging, because I have Dish Network and 10 it's 100 percent digital. So does that mean all 11 those programs and (inaudible) those are all new 12 networks just because they're digital? So does 13 that mean I have to call and say, I need to change 14 to analog so I can captions? That seems silly to 15 me. We need to make sure that people are following 16 100 percent captioning rule. Who does it apply to? 17 Only analog people, only digital channels? It 18 needs to be clarified, I think. 19 Ms. Rooker: That's an excellent point. Can 20 we put that in Scott, as a part of the request for 21 whether or not how it impacts? If I understand it, 22 you're saying that for a regular channel that 23 currently provides closed captioning and if you go 24 for an analog and you go to high definition, does 25 that mean that you're not going to get that Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 182 1 captioning? Good question. So then, let's put 2 that as an additional question to add. Can we do 3 that David? Would that be all right? 4 Mr. Brugger: Sure. 5 Ms. Rooker: Joe? 6 Mr. Gordon: Joe Gordon. The way I understand 7 the rules of the digital channel passes through a 8 program that is captioned. On an analog channel, 9 they have to give you the captions. 10 Ms. Rooker: Let's get clarification. Good 11 idea. Good suggestion. Okay. So then what we 12 will do, is we will take draft recommendation 13 number three with the addition of the suggestion on 14 the analog versus digital closed captioning. We'll 15 add that and then submit this to the FCC for 16 answers to be distributed to us by email ASAP, all 17 right? 18 So now we have a recommendation. We're making 19 that recommendation, right? So we've got to have a 20 motion to make the recommendation and a second to 21 it. So you make the recommendation, David. 22 Mr. Brugger: I so move. 23 Mr. Stout: I second. 24 Ms. Rooker: All in favor? 25 [A chorus of Ayes]. Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 183 1 Ms. Rooker: Opposed? 2 [No response]. 3 Ms. Rooker: All right. Karen is opposed to 4 it. 5 Ms. Strauss: Yes. I can't agree to it. 6 Ms. Rooker: You're entitled. 7 Ms. Strauss: I can explain, if you want. 8 Karen Strauss. I know the discussion is already 9 closed, but in my opinion, there is no question 10 that that is not a new station. First of all, also 11 it's a four year exemption, but there is no 12 question in my mind at all, that if you go from 13 analog to digital, that you have to still be 14 providing a service and I'm a little bit afraid 15 that the FCC may decide it the wrong way and that 16 is my only concern. Because I can't fathom a 17 different interpretation. It just would not make 18 any sense. 19 Mr. Goldberg: Karen, this is Larry, I would 20 agree with that. But there's the issue of the 21 multi tasked standard digital services being 22 provided by many broadcasters. 23 Ms. Strauss: That's a different issue. 24 Mr. Goldberg: That is what does need clarity. 25 Ms. Strauss: That part, I do agree, it needs Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 184 1 clarity. But that's okay, it's already been 2 decided. You can move on. 3 Ms. Rooker: All right. So that completes the 4 three sets of recommendations. I believe that is 5 all from the Advanced Technologies Working Group. 6 Is that correct? 7 Mr. Brugger: Yes. 8 Ms. Rooker: Goodness, this has never happened 9 to us before. We are usually running so late and 10 so tight. I don't know, does anybody want to tell 11 war stories or should we go home? Now we do have 12 some people who want to make comments from the 13 public. 14 Jim Tobias wants to make a comment, but he's 15 not in the room right now. All right, we can get 16 rid of him real fast. He left. 17 Let me finish. It's Friday afternoon folks. 18 I can't talk, the committee business. Gene, do you 19 have a comment, or a question, or whatever? 20 COMMENTS FROM THE PUBLIC AND WRAP-UP 21 Mr. Crick: I will amplify an earlier 22 invitation to all the members of this CAC 23 membership, to participate and to share in some of 24 those resources we're building. As I say, the 25 information has been mailed to you. But we would Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 185 1 very much like to get your input whether you're a 2 member of the Rural and Under Served, or the 3 Competition Group, or anybody else. We would like 4 to get membership input from the other groups. 5 It's recognized no person can participate in 6 every group that might be of interest to him or 7 her, but if we can open a little bit by using some 8 of our tools, so we can get some benefit from the 9 expertise of others, who can at least come by 10 online and offer some guidance, than I think we 11 would be the better for it. 12 So again, I'm hoping that each of you who have 13 some thoughts, will help us share on that. 14 Particularly on that issue of making workable 15 recommendations, making recommendations that don't 16 overlook some major factor just because it is one 17 of which we are unaware. So again, that is just 18 an invitation to us all. 19 Ms. Rooker: Thank you, Gene. We appreciate 20 that and again, we would like to say how marvelous 21 it is to see the Working Groups with so much work 22 product coming out of the groups. It's just great. 23 It really is. I think we've had fabulous 24 discussions today. I think we've all learned a 25 great deal and let's move forward and move on. Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 186 1 Now, just a reminder, the July 21st meeting 2 date, if you want agenda items, it doesn't have to 3 be formalized, but if you want to make suggestions 4 to Scott, recommendations for agenda items by 1 5 June. Please, I know that's early but we need to 6 do that. Does anyone have an issue with CAB's or 7 have we determined it's just easier to out front 8 and hail a cab or go to the hotel? 9 Unidentified Speaker: Never having been here, 10 which way is the hotel? 11 Mr. Marshall: I will give you instructions. 12 Ms. Rooker: Do we have any other unfinished 13 business before the committee before we move into 14 the public? No. Okay. I think we've done a good 15 job. We should all pat ourselves on the back. 16 Thank you all, very much. 17 Okay. We're going to open our comment up to 18 the public and I think we have some people who want 19 to comment. We have two of you, okay. 20 Mr. Cotler: Good afternoon. Since I'm 21 standing between you, and cabs, and your hotel, I 22 will be very brief. My name is Andrew Cotler. I'm 23 the Associate General Counsel with the Association 24 of Public TV Stations. Thank you for giving me the 25 opportunity to speak with you today. Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 187 1 You've heard from Commissioner Adelstein this 2 morning regarding the importance of consumer 3 education surrounding the DTV transition and the 4 need for a broader effort and a unified message. 5 And despite a DTV transition that's been ongoing 6 for nearly 10 years, and despite the increasing 7 consumer interest in digital TV devices, there is 8 still considerable consumer confusion about this 9 issue. For instance, who needs to convert, why do 10 you need to convert, when and where does this 11 occur, even what equipment can consumers presently 12 have? 13 For instance, some recent polls indicate that 14 a significant number of consumers think they 15 already have HD, but they don't. And indeed, if we 16 exam the DTV transitions already underway in Great 17 Brittan and in Germany, one of the lessons we 18 learned that there needs to be a unified, 19 consistent, and widely distributed message to 20 consumers that reaches broadcasters and consumers 21 where they are. This bears repeating and I will 22 repeat to you. Unified, consistent, and widely 23 distributed message to consumers that reaches them 24 where they are. 25 Incidently, I've written an article on this Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 188 1 and published it in a legal journal called, A Time 2 Life Perspective. I have a few copies on the red 3 table. It compares Great Brittan and Germany, and 4 draws lessons for what we can do here in the United 5 States for consumer education, among other things. 6 Public TV stands ready to offer it's expertise 7 in local public interest coalition building and 8 outreach to help address this issue and you may ask 9 why public TV? That's a very good question. 10 There's essentially three reasons why. First 11 public TV stations have the historical capacity to 12 build coalitions and to accomplish outreach. We've 13 done this in the past and we're continuing to do 14 this in a variety of issues like Alzheimer's, death 15 and dying, race relations, and literacy, and so on. 16 The second is more public can be as essential 17 to this effort is that they have an effective track 18 record of local outreach through a variety of 19 means. Not just PSA's, Public Service 20 Announcements, and not just website announcements, 21 but convening town meetings, the use of community 22 groups, the use of advocacy organizations, and 23 affinity groups like Rotary clubs for instance, 24 that kind of thing. Schools and educators as well. 25 The key, as I mentioned before, is to reach people Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 189 1 where they are and to invite them to become active. 2 Thirdly we also have an inherent interest in 3 this issue, because over the air viewers are more 4 likely to be public TV viewers, we've discovered 5 this. In fact, I'm one of them. I'm a public TV 6 viewer and an over the air viewer. You will see 7 from the letter that has been distributed to you 8 and if you don't have a copy of that letter, come 9 see me. I have extra copies. That we have in 10 place, a growing coalition of diverse industry and 11 consumer interest ready to work cooperatively with 12 the FCC, and NTIA, and the public sector to get 13 this job done. 14 On behalf of the 355 local community oriented 15 public TV stations in this country, thank you for 16 the opportunity to address this committee. 17 Ms. Rooker: Thank you. And we have another 18 comment. 19 Ms. Tristani: Thank you. Good afternoon. 20 This is a little high for me. 21 Ms. Rooker: We can hear you. 22 Ms. Tristani: My name is Gloria Tristani and 23 I'm now the President of the Benton Foundation, so 24 I'm here with Charles Benton today. For those of 25 you who don't know me, I was also an FCC Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 190 1 Commissioner from 1997 to 2001. 2 So most of the issues you have been 3 discussing, are somewhat familiar to me and 4 actually, a lot of them I feel very passionate 5 about. So it's been very hard for me to sit back 6 there and just listen. But the first thing I 7 wanted to say, is I want to commend you for the 8 work you're doing. It is absolutely critical to 9 the Commission and it is critical to the American 10 people because what I can tell you from my four 11 years on the Commission, is that more often than 12 not, we did not hear from the consumer interest. 13 We were bombarded with lobbyists, well meaning 14 lobbyists, who had every right to lobby us. But 15 consumers don't have the resources to bombard this 16 Commission with information. So that is very 17 critical. So I want to particularly commend the 18 citizen members of this committee. That is the 19 first thing I want to tell you. 20 The second thing I would like to say, is that 21 I was impressed by your level of expertise, 22 knowledge, and interest that you bring to these 23 issues, and your willingness to discuss issues even 24 when they were sometimes very controversial, and I 25 applaud some of the ways you've compromised. But I Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 191 1 do want to say, that don't make the perfect the 2 enemy of the good, because a lot of these issues, 3 if you hold back and you know the FCC takes its 4 time to act, they will never get done. So I was 5 thinking, for example, about -- help me, the 6 captioning and I was thinking the people that I 7 think in my view, from the way you described it, 8 benefit the most are a lot of the elderly who have 9 lost their hearing. Because they're not going to 10 learn how to type. And I'm thinking, well by the 11 time you decided whether this should be mandated, a 12 lot of those people aren't going to be around to be 13 able to use it. I mean, seriously. I'm thinking 14 of my father who's 86, who can't hear very well. 15 He will never admit it. He won't use a hearing aid 16 but he would be able to read the screen. So it's 17 valid that you think about this thoroughly and that 18 you try compromise to the extent you can, but don't 19 make the perfect the enemy of the good. 20 A third point -- I'm sorry, I was an FCC 21 Commissioner, so I have to give you my advice. 22 I'll remind you what Commissioner Copps said this 23 morning, that media is critical to everything you 24 do, so if it's not your first issue, think of it as 25 your second and most important issue. And DTV Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 192 1 transition is very important, media ownership is 2 critical, and public interest is absolutely 3 something that should be in your mind. If all of 4 this DTV transition, with all of the investment 5 that companies and consumers are making, what are 6 we going to get out of it? Some beautiful, pretty 7 pictures that some of us might be watching and 8 understanding? Is that all that it's suppose to be 9 about? I don't think so. 10 A last point and this comes just as again, 11 from observing you today and hoping that it will 12 help your process along. There were times when 13 we're sitting here that I think there was, at least 14 in my mind, there was some questions. I think, a 15 lot of you had questions or what's the state of the 16 law? What can the FCC do or not do? And I would 17 think it would be very helpful and I think this 18 committee should demand that you have the FCC 19 personnel present throughout the day, that can 20 help. You might want to have an engineer here when 21 you're discussing some of the issues, you might 22 want to have a lawyer who is acquainted with these 23 issues. Not to say an opinion, but to give you 24 advice on this is the current process, and this is 25 how the FCC -- I think that would help move along Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6 Meeting April 7, 2006 Washington, DC Page 193 1 some of these discussions, and I think it would be 2 very, very helpful and there are plenty of good 3 experts here at the FCC, that could help you with 4 that. That's just a little bit of advice and 5 that's all I have to say. And again, I commend 6 you. I commend you for doing this work. 7 [Applause] 8 Ms. Rooker: Okay. Do we have any other 9 comments from the public? 10 [No response]. 11 Ms. Rooker: Well if not, then I think we are 12 about ready to stand to adjourn. Do I hear a 13 motion that we adjourn? 14 Mr. Crick: So moved. 15 Unidentified Speaker: Second. 16 Ms. Rooker: Anyone opposed? 17 [No response]. 18 Ms. Rooker: I take it we're all in agreement. 19 Thank you all so much. It's been a wonderful day. 20 [Whereupon at 3:00 p.m., the meeting was 21 adjourned] 22 23 24 25 Alderson Reporting Company 1111 14th Street, NW Suite 400 1-800-FOR-DEPO Washington, DC 20005 c8f21bc6-9155-440d-aaba-f151da0ef9e6