The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is required by the 1992 Cable Act to produce an "Annual Assessment of the Status of Competition in the Market for the Delivery of Video Programming," otherwise known as the "Annual Video Competition Report." These annual reports are eagerly awaited not...

Should taxpayers finance government entry into an increasingly competitive, but technologically volatile, business market? The city of Philadelphia has just released a blueprint to provide a taxpayer-backed city-wide wi-fi service, under the rationale that broadband should be treated as a vital...

Online privacy, child safety, free speech and anonymity are on a collision course. The 1998 Children's Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA) already mandates certain online privacy protections for children under 13, but many advocate expanding online privacy protections for both adolescents and...

Public policy debates about online child safety have raged since the earliest days of the Internet. Concerns about underage access to objectionable content (specifically pornography) drove early "Web 1.0" efforts to regulate the Internet, and it continues to be the topic of much discussion...

Debates continue to rage about how to shield kids from the potential negative effects of various types of media or communications technologies. Is government intervention and regulation really needed to quell concerns, or do parents have access to constructive tools to control what their child...

Comments of Adam D. Thierer (Mercatus Center at George Mason University) to the Federal Trade Commission in its proceeding on “the consumer privacy and security issues" associated with the “Internet of Things.” The filing argues that the Internet of Things -- like the Internet itself --...

The effects of mergers on the media marketplace have historically failed to live up to dire predictions. Mergers are often a response to technological upheaval and turbulence in the media industry and firms should be allowed to experiment with such alternative business models with the intent on...

The Federal Communications Commission should refrain from regulating technical standards in the cable industry. Among two competing proposals currently before the FCC concerning ways the FCC can facilitate development of two-way cable services, such as pay-per-view and video-on-demand, one...

In recent years, federal policymakers, state legislators, and state Attorneys General have all shown renewed interest in regulating commercial advertising and marketing. Several new regulatory initiatives are being proposed, or are already underway, that could severely curtail or restrict...

Are information sectors sufficiently different from other sectors of the economy such that more stringent antitrust standards should be applied to them preemptively? Columbia Law School professor Tim Wu responds in the affirmative in his book The Master Switch: The Rise and Fall of Information...