​Social media is increasingly important to public safety agencies, FirstNet said in a Friday blog post. “These days, you probably use social media to update your audience on what you are doing, share an interesting article or two, and catch up on the day’s news,” the authority said. “Government agencies -- federal, tribal, state, and local -- are using social media in many ways to keep the public informed and hopefully safer.” FirstNet cited the use of Twitter by many government agencies. “When a natural disaster such as a tornado, wildfire, or hurricane hits,” the National Weather Service, Federal Emergency Management Agency and National Guard “are among many agencies who are communicating key info to the public on social media platforms,” FirstNet said. “Just check out the hashtags #SMEM, #LESM, etc., and you’ll see,” he said, referring to the hashtags for social media emergency management and law enforcement in social media.
The Alliance for Telecommunications Industry Solutions, CTIA and the National Emergency Number Association jointly warned the FCC against mandating backward compatibility for text telephone devices, for nonemergency calls, as it pushes forward on the TTY to real-time text (RTT) transition. Representatives of the groups reported on a meeting with FCC staff working on the issue. The FCC approved an NPRM in April on the transition (see 1604280055). Transcoder overloading is a real threat, the groups said. “Representatives from ATIS explained that, when RTT-enabled phones are configured to accommodate all incoming calls from the circuit switched network as TTY calls, the network must reserve an RTT to TTY transcoder in case it may be needed for the call (i.e., a party activates an RTT session),” the filing said. “Otherwise, a transcoder may not be assigned and calls that begin as voice calls will not be able to transition to an RTT session. However, if an RTT call is initiated as RTT, ATIS noted that the transcoder overloading issue is less of a problem as normal traffic engineering practices can be applied.” ATIS said the backward compatibility requirement proposed by the FCC “could have a significant impact on the industry and could require the industry to upgrade all transcoders to support RTT, or to develop more specific transcoding resourcing with the ability to assign instantaneously.” The filing was in docket 16-145.
Congress has discussed making the Department of Transportation the lead agency on regulating and overseeing any nontraditional space missions, taking no action yet, said George Nield, Federal Aviation Administration associate administrator-commercial space transportation. The FAA, as part of DOT, "would be happy to play sort of lead role -- not take over everything but be the front door," Nield said, saying the private sector "would love to have one-stop shopping." Nield said Friday that House Science, Space and Technology Subcommittee member Jim Bridenstine, R-Okla., has been leading the push. Bridenstine's office didn't comment.
Members of the Federal Aviation Administration 35-member Drone Advisory Committee said Friday that DAC will take a deeper dive into privacy issues for unmanned aircraft and related pre-emption of state and local laws, after a considerable debate emerged. The committee, which held its inaugural meeting in Washington, was formed to give recommendations to the FAA on safely integrating drones into the national airspace. The daylong meeting featured discussions about certification, drones operating beyond visual line of sight, performance standards, cybersecurity and spectrum.
Members of the Federal Aviation Administration 35-member Drone Advisory Committee said Friday that DAC will take a deeper dive into privacy issues for unmanned aircraft and related pre-emption of state and local laws, after a considerable debate emerged. The committee, which held its inaugural meeting in Washington, was formed to give recommendations to the FAA on safely integrating drones into the national airspace. The daylong meeting featured discussions about certification, drones operating beyond visual line of sight, performance standards, cybersecurity and spectrum.
Members of the Federal Aviation Administration 35-member Drone Advisory Committee said Friday that DAC will take a deeper dive into privacy issues for unmanned aircraft and related pre-emption of state and local laws, after a considerable debate emerged. The committee, which held its inaugural meeting in Washington, was formed to give recommendations to the FAA on safely integrating drones into the national airspace. The daylong meeting featured discussions about certification, drones operating beyond visual line of sight, performance standards, cybersecurity and spectrum.
U.S. and European advertising, media and technology organizations announced Thursday the formation of a coalition to develop new global standards for online ads. In a joint news release, the 17-member Coalition for Better Ads -- including the Association of National Advertisers, Google, Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB), Network Advertising Initiative (NAI) and Washington Post -- said it will create "consumer-based, data-driven standards ... to improve the consumer ad experience," develop technology to implement such standards and solicit consumer and business feedback. "Members recognize that there is room for improvement with the current online advertising, as indicated in part by the emergence of ad blocking,” said Nancy Hill, CEO of American Association of Advertising Agencies, another member. She said the ad industry needs to find out why consumers aren't responding to such ads and fix it. In a speech last week, IAB CEO Randall Rothenberg criticized the ad-blocking industry, but conceded the ad industry hasn't responded to increasing consumer dislike and distrust of online ads (see 1609090057). NAI CEO Leigh Freund said in the release that when consumers have a bad experience with ads, it affects publishers, ad tech companies, agencies and advertisers. Fixing the issue "in a structured way" will put consumers first and hold the industry accountable, she said. Other coalition members are BVDW Germany, Digital Context Next, Direct Marketing Association, European Publishers Council, GroupM, IAB-Europe, IAB-Tech Lab, News Media Alliance, Procter & Gamble, Unilever and World Federation of Advertisers.
U.S. and European advertising, media and technology organizations announced Thursday the formation of a coalition to develop new global standards for online ads. In a joint news release, the 17-member Coalition for Better Ads -- including the Association of National Advertisers, Google, Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB), Network Advertising Initiative (NAI) and Washington Post -- said it will create "consumer-based, data-driven standards ... to improve the consumer ad experience," develop technology to implement such standards and solicit consumer and business feedback. "Members recognize that there is room for improvement with the current online advertising, as indicated in part by the emergence of ad blocking,” said Nancy Hill, CEO of American Association of Advertising Agencies, another member. She said the ad industry needs to find out why consumers aren't responding to such ads and fix it. In a speech last week, IAB CEO Randall Rothenberg criticized the ad-blocking industry, but conceded the ad industry hasn't responded to increasing consumer dislike and distrust of online ads (see 1609090057). NAI CEO Leigh Freund said in the release that when consumers have a bad experience with ads, it affects publishers, ad tech companies, agencies and advertisers. Fixing the issue "in a structured way" will put consumers first and hold the industry accountable, she said. Other coalition members are BVDW Germany, Digital Context Next, Direct Marketing Association, European Publishers Council, GroupM, IAB-Europe, IAB-Tech Lab, News Media Alliance, Procter & Gamble, Unilever and World Federation of Advertisers.
U.S. and European advertising, media and technology organizations announced Thursday the formation of a coalition to develop new global standards for online ads. In a joint news release, the 17-member Coalition for Better Ads -- including the Association of National Advertisers, Google, Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB), Network Advertising Initiative (NAI) and Washington Post -- said it will create "consumer-based, data-driven standards ... to improve the consumer ad experience," develop technology to implement such standards and solicit consumer and business feedback. "Members recognize that there is room for improvement with the current online advertising, as indicated in part by the emergence of ad blocking,” said Nancy Hill, CEO of American Association of Advertising Agencies, another member. She said the ad industry needs to find out why consumers aren't responding to such ads and fix it. In a speech last week, IAB CEO Randall Rothenberg criticized the ad-blocking industry, but conceded the ad industry hasn't responded to increasing consumer dislike and distrust of online ads (see 1609090057). NAI CEO Leigh Freund said in the release that when consumers have a bad experience with ads, it affects publishers, ad tech companies, agencies and advertisers. Fixing the issue "in a structured way" will put consumers first and hold the industry accountable, she said. Other coalition members are BVDW Germany, Digital Context Next, Direct Marketing Association, European Publishers Council, GroupM, IAB-Europe, IAB-Tech Lab, News Media Alliance, Procter & Gamble, Unilever and World Federation of Advertisers.
Fake 911 calls to public safety answering points remain a major problem, said National Emergency Number Association officials in a meeting with FCC Public Safety Bureau Chief David Simpson and others from the bureau. The FCC sought comment last year on whether to drop a 1996 requirement that cellphones that are no longer in service must still be able to make calls to 911 (see 1504020047). The FCC refers to these nonconnected devices as non-service-initialized (NSI) phones. “NENA’s representatives reiterated the extreme importance of solving the NSI problem quickly, and urged the Bureau to work with carriers and other stakeholders to develop novel and viable solutions to this ongoing crisis,” said a filing in docket 08-51.