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Media Bits and Bytes - Prison Call Edition

Fighting for $14 phone calls; Soaking prisoners' families; Internet have-nots; Bye-bye Quirky; What trolls get away with


Prison phone companies fight for right to charge inmates $14 a minute

by Jon Brodkin
October 23, 2015
Ars Technica

The Federal Communications Commission is about to face another lawsuit, this time over a vote to cap the prices prisoners pay for phone calls.
Yesterday's vote came after complaints that inmate-calling companies are overcharging prisoners, their families, and attorneys. Saying the price of calls sometimes hits $14 per minute, the FCC has now capped rates at 11¢ per minute.
Those are the kinds of prices that the two major inmate calling companies, Global Tel*Link (GTL) and Securus Technologies, want to keep charging. Both vowed to take the FCC to court over the decision.

Inside the Shadowy Business of Prison Phone Calls

By Eric Markowitz
July 2, 2015
International Business Times

Over the last decade, the prison phone business has become a scandalous industry, characterized by lawsuits, exorbitant fees,  high phone rates and monopolistic relationships between public jails and private companies that openly offer kickbacks to local sheriffs. In May 2015, Foster Campbell, the Louisiana Public Service commissioner, described the prison phone business in his state as “worse than any payday loan scheme.”  
“Regardless of what they’re using the money for, this is about shifting the cost of the police state onto the backs of the poor people being policed,” says Paul Wright, executive director of Human Rights Defense Center and a longtime advocate for more affordable prison phone rates.


Who’s Off the Internet — and Why

By Brian Fung
October 22, 2015
Washington Post

As many as 10 million U.S. households without Internet access say they might be convinced to sign up for Internet service if they received a government subsidy, according to Federal Communications Commission estimates. But if that sounds like a lot, it pales in comparison to the two-thirds of non-Internet users in the United States who say they don’t intend to sign up for broadband — at any price.
A recent study by the Pew Research Center found that only 19 percent of the 51 million people without Internet access blame high prices, and only 7 percent cite the availability of broadband. Those who aren’t on the Internet today are saying they lack something else: the guidance that would make it an object of value to them.


The Rise and Fall of Quirky — the Start-Up That Bet Big on the Genius of Regular Folks

By Jessica Silvester
September 13, 2015
New York Magazine

Back in 2009, a small-time-invention start-up called Quirky built a community that really acted like one. It told the first-world-problem solver in all of us — the one who thought up single-serve French-fry-makers and foldable coffee mugs and musical footballs while out walking the dog — that she no longer had to innovate in a vacuum. Anybody could join. On Quirky's website, users would assess and workshop each other's inventions. The most successful ideas, as determined by a vote, would be designed and built by the company. In some cases, the inventors made a lot of money. And it is for that tiny dreamer that the company’s recent death spiral feels like a true loss.

How Trolls Fooled the Media with #BoycottStarWars
by Fruzsina Eördögh
October 21, 2015
Motherboard

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On Monday, the day of the long-awaited Star Wars: The Force Awakens trailer, three malevolent tricksters were able to convince media all over the world that people were boycotting the newest Star Wars film because the cast was too racially diverse.
Trolls—not to be confused with cyber bullies, but actual self-identified trolls that hang out in hacker-Anonymous-4chan-Reddit circles—are going to keep trying to trick not just regular internet denizens, but members of the press, they’re going to keep using hot button issues to do so.