Kaplan Blasts Tech Companies on Reg Fees
Characterizing NAB’s push for regulatory fees on tech companies as a Wi-Fi tax is “plainly false” and “intellectually dishonest,” NAB General Counsel Rick Kaplan blogged Tuesday (see 2110230001). The FCC’s current regulatory fee regime is “sloppy at best” because it…
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requires broadcasters to pay fees to support initiatives that don’t involve broadcasting, such as the USF, he said. “The Facebooks of the world like business plans that rely not only on free, unregulated spectrum, but also Commission resources subsidized from regulatory fees that they are not obligated to pay.” NAB’s request to update regulatory fee payors doesn’t mention Wi-Fi and goes beyond unlicensed spectrum, Kaplan said. “Broadcasters are not seeking to escape paying regulatory fees,” he said. “It should not be controversial for broadcasters to cry foul when being forced to subsidize enormous companies like Microsoft, which generate revenue beyond the GDP of most countries (even after paying groups like Public Knowledge),” Kaplan said. “If public interest groups truly supported what’s best for the public, they wouldn’t simply kick and scream because Facebook, Google, and Microsoft may have to pay their fair share.” Reg fees for unlicensed spectrum is what the FCC sought comment on after NAB's petition, "because those were their words," emailed Public Knowledge Senior Vice President Harold Feld. "Every single trade association that filed read this the same way -- as a tax on WiFi. If there is any intellectual dishonesty here, it is the effort of NAB to avoid admitting they proposed something so stupid." The FCC and Information Technology Industry Council didn’t comment.