Overnight Tech: Obama heads back to Silicon Valley | FCC meeting preview | Yahoo bans terror content | Zuckerberg on sit-in live streams
LEDE: President Obama is heading back to Silicon Valley.
He’ll appear on Friday at the Global Entrepreneurship Summit, an initiative of his administration that has since produced conferences around the world. He will take part in a discussion with Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg and other entrepreneurs, according to the White House.
{mosads}Don’t expect fireworks, according to Reuters, which said he’ll deliver remarks. The news service reported that Obama will talk about what can be done to help entrepreneurs in new markets — including how they can be linked up with sources of funding. He’s also reportedly going to do an interview on Facebook Live.
The administration has spent the week pushing its record on tech issues in advance of Obama’s trip. It released a list of 100 instances where White House initiatives have had an impact “in building U.S. capacity in science, technology, and innovation and bringing that capacity to bear on national goals.”
FCC PREPS FOR JUNE’S OPEN MEETING: Three items are on the docket for the commission tomorrow. One tweaks the emergency alert system for “extreme high winds and storm surges caused by Category 3 (and greater) hurricanes” and another deals with reporting undersea cable outages. The third is a notice of public rulemaking looking for comments on “changes to streamline and increase the transparency of the Executive Branch review of applications and petitions for national security, law enforcement, foreign policy and trade policy concerns.” Read the agenda details here.
WHEELER’S MONTHLY HOT SEAT: With the meeting comes a press conference for FCC Commissioner Tom Wheeler — so expect questions, including on recent developments in the set-top box debate. The last week brought a statement from Democratic Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel saying there were “real flaws” in Wheeler’s set-top box proposal. Google also put out a statement Tuesday calling an industry alternative plan a “constructive effort.”
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ZUCKERBERG APPLAUDS CONGRESS’S USE OF FACEBOOK LIVE: Mark Zuckerberg on Thursday directed his millions of followers to at least 13 Democratic congressmen who set up Facebook Live videos to capture their over day-long sit-in over gun legislation on the House floor, which was not broadcast through the chamber’s cameras. This is how Zuckerberg described it: “Something interesting is happening with Facebook Live that’s bringing more openness to the political process.”
NET NEUTRALITY – NOW WHAT?: A number of telecom lawyers have speculated that the Supreme Court is unlikely to take up and hear the challenge to the Federal Communications Commission’s net neutrality rules. Andrew Schwartzman, who helped lead a brief defending the rules, is out with a new post explaining why.
YAHOO EXPLICITLY BANS TERROR CONTENT: Following the lead of a number of other major technology companies, Yahoo updated its community guidelines to specifically ban any content “and potentially deactivate accounts, that supports or celebrates terrorist organizations, their leaders, or associated violent activities.” Companies like Twitter, Facebook and recently Microsoft all have similar policies in place.
IN CASE YOU MISSED IT:
If Barack Obama had not become president, he says he might be working in Silicon Valley or the venture capital industry.
Top executives at several major tech companies on Thursday formally endorsed presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton.
Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-Mo.) on Thursday shared part of a 26-minute call with her cable company during a congressional hearing about the industry’s customer service and billing practices.
Senators hate dealing with their TV customer service representatives as much as the U.S. public.
House Republican leadership’s decision to leave early for a break after a Democratic sit-in has pushed a slate of Federal Trade Commission reforms off the docket.
Facebook will train employees to deal with their political biases, Facebook Chief Operating Officer Sheryl Sandberg said at an event Wednesday evening.
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