IP Democracy: The FCC is The Worst Communicator in Washington
The AP’s John Dunbar owes a seriously big tip of the hat to Multichannel News’ Ted Hearn, but more on that later. Dunbar has this piece today about just how ironically bad the Federal Communications Commission is when it comes to communicating its policy decision-making process.
An exemplar of how the FCC informs stakeholders of what it is planning is the recent spectacle surrounding the 700 MHz auction. Potential spectrum bidders, including AT&T, Google and a host of Silicon Valley companies, were up in arms over plans by Chairman Kevin Martin to make way for “open access” in new broadband wireless services made possible by the freed-up airwaves.
The problem was: Martin never made his proposal public and everybody was working off of press reports and rumors. Even when the FCC finally voted out a set of auction rules, they weren’t available in writing, at least initially.
This ridiculous situation is part of parcel of how the FCC functions. Clear answers are rare and, indeed, FCC rules dictate that agenda items — those issues to be voted upon by the Commissioners — are “non-public” information. Employees can get fired if they disclose anything the FCC is planning.
But the AP’s Dunbar is merely picking up on a pair of great articles by Multichannel News’ Ted Hearn that ran in the trade pub during early August under the headline “Federal Incommunicado Commission.” Hearn’s first piece focused on how reluctant FCC Commissioners are to answer press questions. Kevin Martin, in fact, has held only two press conferences since assuming the Chairman’s position in 2005.
As Hearn notes, Martin won’t even let people know too far in advance when the next Commission meeting will be held, a departure from previous FCC practices.
Hearn’s second piece discusses how FCC staff are tight-lipped about the public appearances of the agency’s commissioners. This veiled behavior is not limited to the Republicans at the FCC. Democrat Michael Copps has not met with reporters since 2006. His fellow Democratic commissioner Jonathan Adelstein can’t remember when he last held a press conference.
The FCC’s poor communications skills are evident all the way down to the agency’s website, that most public and constant of communications tools. Have you ever tried to search filings or decisions at www.fcc.gov? I’ve been conducting research at the Commission’s web site for years and years and my heart sinks every time I have to do so.
Let me put it this way: without a “Docket Number,” the average user can’t find anything on the FCC’s website. Even with a Docket Number, users have to choose from among eight different types of databases and if, by chance, the right database is selected, the results can be a garbled, gargantuan mess. Getting a hold of the Docket Number is not the easiest thing in the world for the uninitiated, either.
On top of the searchability problems (and they are vast, vast, just trust me), nothing at the FCC’s website is in HTML, beyond the basic informational, static shell. Everything is published in Word (!) or Acrobat, and sometimes .txt, so even if a user finds the relevant document, it has to be downloaded or viewed in just plain text format. A real nightmare.
In any event, what all this adds up to is that the FCC, the independent regulatory agency charged with regulating our nation’s communications industries, is one of the worst communicators in all of Washington.
Posted by Cynthia Brumfield on September 5, 2007 9:17 AM to IP Democracy