Most politicians only speak up about inadequate tech policy when there’s an overly complicated bill up for a vote. Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), however, is not one of those politicians.

Wyden spoke at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas today, outlining the topics in tech policy that we need to discuss in 2013 and beyond. He focused on data usage and policy: two themes that have carried over from 2012, and will likely remain under scrutiny for years to come.

Wyden is known for his opposition to SOPA, a bill that attempted to protect copyright laws but could have impeded freedom of speech and led to the wholesale shutdown of websites accused if copyright infringement. He is also known for submitting an amendment to the FISA bill, which allows the government to listen in on Americans’ conversations with those overseas in the name of national security and foreign intelligence. In his amendment, Wyden suggested the government be more transparent and reveal how many people have been affected by the Bush-era bill.

The amendment was shot down.

Now in 2013, Wyden believes we need to get more serious about making sure Internet service providers — wireless and wired alike — are held responsible for making sure no specific types of data are discriminated again. That is, he believes that an Internet Service Provider, such as Comcast, must not slow down speeds if someone is attempting to access streaming content from competitors, while providing great data speeds for its own streaming services. This, of course, is just an example, but you can see the problem.

He also believes we need to look at patents. Last year showed us just how far companies are willing to go to prevent competitors from using their patented technology without paying up. Wyden explained that we need to think of software as “building blocks” and allow people to improve on it.

He also reached back to FISA and CISPA, saying we need rethink how much access to our data the government should have. He suggested we rework the Electronic Communications Privacy Act and put more protections in place that stop law enforcement from checking out Americans’ email communications.

via Ars Technica; Ron Wyden image via his website

July 9-10, 2013
San Francisco, CA

Early Bird Tickets on Sale

Parents: I hope you bought your teen an unlimited texting and data plan to go with that new cell phone, otherwise you’re in for a scary surprise come bill time.

The average teen now sends and receives seven messages, of the SMS or MMS variety, for every hour that she is awake. That’s a total of 3,417 messages a month, according to new data from analytics firm Nielsen.

And it is mostly girls, as the females are the worst text offenders: The young ladies are now sending and receiving 3,952 messages per month. Compare that to the boys, who exchange just 2,815 messages per month.

Nielsen collected mobile data during the third quarter of 2011 from the monthly cell phone bills of more than 65,000 folks who agreed to participate in its study.

Ready for a panic attack? Nielsen also found that data usage is up 256 percent from last year with the average 13- to 17-year-old teen now consuming 320 MB of data per month. Should the trend continue — and we think it will — teens will easily get up to 1 GB of data usage a month by next year. Alas, gone are the days of getting your kids the cheapest plan available to cut mobile costs.

The cell phone’s primary purpose (i.e. to make calls), according to the data, is quickly becoming lost on teens. Voice usage dropped from 685 to 572 minutes in one year. This is a no-brainer. Ever watch a teen use a phone? The phone part is almost always all but ignored.

Before you write this off with a “teens these days” comment, remember that these youngsters are merely following the give-me-more-mobile-data demands of their older (and wiser?) role models.

[Teens texting image via Shutterstock]

July 9-10, 2013
San Francisco, CA

Early Bird Tickets on Sale

Facebook is aiming to boost international usage with the debut of a new “Facebook for Every Phone” app, which offers full access to the social network on over 2,500 mobile phones across the globe. The company’s mobile team announced the new app in a blog post today.

While the company is estimated to have 750 million active monthly users, some speculate that user growth in North America is slowing or even in decline. However, Facebook usage is growing in other countries, which could be why the company is focusing on this new app for feature phones.

The new Facebook for Every Phone app gives users access to the news feed, contact lists, messages and photo sharing. The photo sharing functionality is particularly robust — allowing users to upload, comment on and edit photos straight from their phones. Right now it’s only available on Java-enabled phones, but support for more devices will be provided in the future, the company said.

The app is also optimized to use a minimal amount of data to keep the Facebook experience inexpensive in areas where high-speed data plans are either expensive or not readily available.

To give people an added incentive to try it out, Facebook is working with 20 different wireless carriers in 13 different countries to provide free data consumption for the first 90 days that the app is in use. The company is hoping three months on the social network will be enough to keep people using it, despite the added cost.

If Facebook can provide an attractive communication experience that uses as much data as SMS and e-mail messages, it will have succeeded in making its social network indispensable to a whole new market of consumers.