LGBT Tech Partnership Reaches Out to FCC, FTC

The LGBT Technology Partnership has reached out to FCC Commissioner (and former chairwoman) Mignon Clyburn as a possible keynote speaker for its upcoming second annual Fall Policy Forum, which will deal with net neutrality and Big Data, among other issues.

That is according to executive director and co-founder Christopher Wood, who says the email invite to Clyburn just went out Thursday for the Nov. 12 forum in Washington. Wood said they would love to have FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler participate as well, and has reached out to Federal Trade Commissioner Maureen Ohlhausen, though he concedes it is a busy time of year in terms of being able to line up officials.

The goal of the forum is to discuss technology issues of the day and how they impact the LGBT community, which is the focus of the partnership.

"LGBT individuals are some of the earliest adopters of technology, which makes conversations around net neutrality and the future of Internet, eHealth regulation and privacy implications associated with Big Data extremely important to our community," the group said in announcing its first panelists for the forum.

Participants so far include Wood; Allyson Robinson, VP, knowledge and impact, LGBT Technology Institute; Christopher Wolf, Partner, Hogan Lovells LLP (which is hosting the event) and co-founder, Future of Privacy Forum; Emily Eckland, director of digital strategy and awareness campaigns, National Cyber Security Alliance; Nicol Turner-Lee, VP and chief research and policy officer, Minority Media and Telecommunications Council; Berin Szoka, president of TechFreedom; Mary Gray, senior researcher, Microsoft Research; and James Turner, VP and senior policy counsel, Health IT Now.

John Eggerton

Contributing editor John Eggerton has been an editor and/or writer on media regulation, legislation and policy for over four decades, including covering the FCC, FTC, Congress, the major media trade associations, and the federal courts. In addition to Multichannel News and Broadcasting + Cable, his work has appeared in Radio World, TV Technology, TV Fax, This Week in Consumer Electronics, Variety and the Encyclopedia Britannica.