Communication Systems Management 304

Some Potentially Useful Websites


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The following are some websites that you might find to be useful resources as you research some of the topics we will be discussing this quarter.

The FCC's website can be accessed at http://www.fcc.gov

The Ohio Public Utilities Commission can be accessed at http://www.puc.state.oh.us

To see what the attitudes of state regulatory commissions in general are, you can access the website for National Regulatory and Utility Commissioners at http://www.naruc.org

The Department of Commerce's National Telecommunications and Information Administration is involved with spectrum management and with promoting the development of an information infrastructure.  Documents regarding their activities are available at http://www.ntia.doc.gov  

The Department of Justice maintains a site at http://www.usdoj.gov

If you are interested in issues dealing with universal service and universal access, the website of the Benton Foundation can provide some useful information at http://www.benton.org and also at the Digital Divide Network (www.digitaldivide.net).

If you are interested in accessing information about legal documents, or congressional proceedings, you might check out the following sites:  http://thomas.loc.gov and  http://www.senate.gov/~commerce/hearings/hearings/htm

There are several organizations whose websites provide useful information about their involvement and attitude toward various regulatory issues:

    The National Exchange Carrier Association was created by the FCC in 1983 to deal with access charges;  their website is http://www.neca.org.  An offshoot of NECA is the Universal Service Administrative Company (USAC), which administers federal universal service programs.  Their website is http://www.usac.org.

      The United States Telecommunications Association is a trade organization represents local exchange carriers, now including competitive local exchange carriers as well as incumbents.  Their website is http://www.usta.org

    There is also a trade organization that represents small local telephone companies; their website is http://www.opastco.org

    The cellular industry is represented by the Cellular Telecommunications & Internet Association at http://www.ctia.org.

    The cable industry is represented by the National Cable and Telecommunications Association at http://www.ncta.org.

There are several consumer advocacy organizations that deal with telecommunications issues.

    In Ohio, there is the Ohio Consumer Counsel (http://www.pickocc.org) and the Ohio   Community Computer Network (http://www.ohioccn.org).

    Nationally, there is the Consumer Federation of America (http://www.consumerfed.org) and also the Consumer's Union (http://www.consumersunion.org).

    On issues of privacy and free speech, there is Electronic Privacy Information Center (http://epic.org). and the Electronic Freedom Federation (http://www.eff.org).

Some good sources for studies and articles about telecommunications and information policy issues are:

The Federal Communications Law Journal which can be accessed at http://www.law.indiana.edu/fclj/index.shtml

The RAND Journal of Economics which can be accessed at http://www/rje.org

The National Regulatory Research Institute conducts studies in regulatory issues and has several of those studies available through their website at http://www.nrri.ohio-state.edu

A good source regarding wireless issues is at http://www.wireless-communication.org/