‘We need the Einstein of the Internet Age’: Interview with Steven Wildman, FCC Chief Economist

Abstract

With the digitisation of all forms of media content, and the convergence of media industries, platforms and services, many of the longstanding assumptions of media policy and regulation are thrown into question. In particular, the idea that one can pursue platform-based regulation, and enact laws and policies related to the content delivered through that platform, is now becoming less relevant as content is accessed across multiple platforms and devices, and as content users are themselves increasingly content creators. For policy makers throughout the world, new questions are being raised about how to transform laws and regulations for twenty-first century media, if we assume that the ‘public interest’ principles that have traditionally informed media regulation remain relevant. These issues are discussed in an interview with Professor Steven Wildman, who was from 2012–14. Wildman was at this time the Chief Economist of the United States Federal Communications Commission (FCC). Professor Wildman was interviewed by Terry Flew at the FCC offices in Washington, DC in September 2013.

Keywords:

• media economics’ media policy
• convergence
• Internet
• media regulation
• public interest

Acknowledgements

This research was supported by the Australian Research Council Centre of Excellence for Creative Industries and Innovation (CCI), as part of the Convergent Media Policy research program.

Notes

1. Cross-elasticity of demand is a term used in economics to describe the effects of a change in price for one type of good or service for the demand for another, usually related, good or service. For example, when a cable channel such as Home Box Office (HBO) offers direct content steaming to computers or tablet devices for a small subscription fee, this can be expected to reduce the demand for full service cable to the home, as some consumers will prefer to access a single channel at a lower fee to paying a significantly larger fee for a larger bundle of channels and services. The extent of the change is what is measured through the cross-elasticity of demand.

2. User flagging refers to the process where the user of a service such as You Tube can report content that they consider to be inappropriate by clicking on a ‘Flag’ icon and reporting that content. Site moderators then receive that report, and decide whether the content in question is in breach of the Terms of Service for use of that site. This can lead to content being taken down from a site, or possibly to particular users being blocked from using the service.

3. The concept of ‘Net neutrality’ refers to a core principle of the Internet’s development, which has been that the Internet infrastructure is itself indifferent to the type of content that it carries, and to who was the original sender of the content. Concerns about the end of ‘net neutrality’ are concerns that particular providers, such as telecommunications companies and internet service providers, may be able to reconfigure networks in order to give preferential access to some types of content, such as that of commercial partners of the telecommunications service or ISP, over other types of content (Wu, 2011, 310-17).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Terry Flew

Terry Flew is Professor of Media and Communciation in the Creative Industries Faculty at the Queensland University of Technology, Brisbane, Australia. In 2011-12, he chaired the National Classification Scheme Review undertaken by the Australian Law Reform Commission, whose Final Report, Classification: Content Regulation and Convergent Media, was tabled in the Australian House of Representatives in February 2012 (ALRC, 2012). He was an advisor to the Convergence Review conducted for the Department of Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy (DBCDE), whose Final Report was released in April 2012 (Convergence Review, 2012). He has also undertaken research into the implications of convergence for media policy in Australia and internationally (Flew, 2012, 2014a), and is the author of the following books: New Media: An Introduction (OUP, 2014, 4^th Edition), Understanding Global Media (Palgrave, 2007), Creative Industries, Culture and Policy (Sage, 2013), Global Creative Industries (Polity, 2013), Key Concepts in Creative Industries (Sage, 2013), and Media Economics (2015, Palgrave, co-authored with Stuart Cunningham and Adam Swift).

Steven Wildman

Steve Wildman is a Professor of Media and information and the Founding Director of the Quello Center at Michigan State University. In addition to numerous articles and book chapters on economics and policy for communication industries and technologies, he is an author or editor for the following books: International Trade in Films and Television Programs (Ballinger, 1988); Electronic Services Networks: A Business and Public Policy Challenge (Praeger, 1991); Video Economics (Harvard University Press, 1992); Making Universal Service Policy: Enhancing the Process Through Multidisciplinary Evaluation (Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 1999); Rethinking Rights and Regulations: Institutional Responses to New Communications Technologies (MIT Press, 2003); and Handbook on the Economics of the Media (Edward Elgar, in press).