today's the last day to file federal income taxes and national taxpayer advocate dan olson testified about trying to resolve taxpayer problems and improving customer service. then on c-span2 vice president joe biden talks about sexual assaults on college campuses. later russian president vladimir putin's annual televised call-in program.

posted this week on the communicators a discussion of the fcc's proposal to open up the set-top box market to competition and what that might mean for consumers and businesses. joining us are two guests on both sides of this issue. george ford is a chief economist and mark cooper is research director for the consumer federation of america. mr. cooper what do you think about what they have proposed? >> guest: competition the set-top market. we want competition, competition, competition. we think consumers would have lower prices and more choices if we got bigger as competition to. >> host: george ford. >> guest: they asked the question whether the set-top docsis competitive.

actually the first question this is their market for set top docsis and the answer really in terms of what is delivered over cable network, no because the set-top boxes are a component of the network as opposed to delivering cable television service so it's the cheapest way to do it in the most efficient way to do it. >> host: let's bring lydia beyoud into the conversation. she's her guess reported this weekend she's with bloomberg dna where she covers tolkien education. >> guest: to follow up on both of your questions kevin wheeler wants to open up a closed market with mobile phones and tvs and all sorts of other electronics. do either of you think there's something similar or different

to that analogy that would make it to not work? >> guest: you have an interface between a device in the network. it's impossible for people to sell across that interface. just like computers or motors or the microsoft case is about the interface and open the interface and you get competition. we have seen that time and time again. remember the old market? at&t used to say no one can plug up piece of phone equipment to my network, will blow it up and of course they were wrong. we opened it up like a charm and is competition. that's the purse -- perfect analogy. you work with the set-top box

and make the judgment about whether it is or is not like the new thing. look at it and say it's not behaving like the new things. a link from the cables head into the householder secures the property delivered over that which is copyrighted content and also prohibits the signal because it scrambles. so it's not the same thing by name stretch of the imagination. it's also a very important part of managing the quality of the network and cable operators predict a call that cable operator for service the first thing they say is let me look at the box and see what's going on so it's a different thing. think it's worth asking yourself that rather than trying to convince you of that. why is this different from other things and wisest different from

a cable modem -- modem where you are perfectly able to buy one in the store and use it even though 50% people do. >> host: mr. cooper what is your response? >> guest: that's what they always say. you have to be able to protected and the answer is the way the order is written in the way the laws written you will protect the quality. you will protect privacy radio protect the advertising stream and letting people connect which is exactly what's been the issue with the home recording industry. they want to stop dvr and they want to stop mp3 players. under the copyright laws they can defend themselves. they have won all those cases. the court has never let them dictate technology to did protect their copyright and for us that's a critical point. they win the court cases in the marketplace just opens the system up because there is a lot of value in consumer choice. this is exactly the same thing. it has worked so many times that

the question is should we experiment and they answer is absolutely yes. if the go fund me can close the door. they honestly believe it won't go wrong because of that experience. >> guest: it has gone wrong and the telephone marketing edge remember the reason the cell phone companies were opposed to the cell phone was the whole system is regulated on the scene and it created an incentive. there are significant differences between that. you also have to look at who is really opposing the chairman's proposal and that is copyrighted. they are very concerned that this program is going to threaten their livelihood. also what's interesting about this case is that normally when a new company comes along and wants video content, for example when the phone company begins

operating in the cable business, the copyright industry -- i sat down these guys and we created these things. they had an expanded customer base for the copyright products. now what the fcc wants to do is say no comcast will buy it and whoever wants access to that can have it. no conversation. you don't have to pay a whole lot of attention to the contracts that are written. so the programmers or the program content people go wait a minute, this isn't really right and fair and its confiscation of our property. i think really what happens with this whole program as it runs squared to the copyright law. the fcc has no authority to implement copyright law. >> guest: that's absolutely wrong. when someone puts an independent third-party set-top box there it

does not erase the relationship within the cable company. you don't get it for free. you still have to pay your cable bill. you are paying your cable bill to the cable company. you don't just have to pay the cable company for the set-top box so there's the same compensation after an an independent set-top boxes from the line as there was the day before. >> that's not true at all. with the company wants to do is to take the content that make money with it. you make profit with copyrighted content you have to compensate the content owner, the copyright owner for that. they are going to be in the business to deliver service for free. they want to be in a business where they can monetize whatever information they gather from what the customer is doing. where does the copyright owner gets to play in this game of monetizing bees for this video content so it's not the same thing. there's something else going on otherwise nobody also be adjusted and doing it.

>> guest: to allay the concerns that the content providers have to either of you view away that has an alternative to the rule, google or any third-party could negotiate character contracts directly with the content providers? why do they have to go to the ptb? >> guest: they may do that too but that stream coming through the set-top box today is going to continue. it's going to be almost impossible for anybody to monkey with that scheme because that would require rebuilding an entire network to replicate what exists. would they put a piece of advertising in front of the show? maybe. they all that. they have all the advertising in the show. read a give people the ability to move around more quickly, absolutely. they will own that ability. they have their stream of

revenue. now anytime someone else thinks of a neat way spread it around, they hate that. to think of it another way they will do the content exactly like they would provide. that's my money. it's not. other people are innovating and may be gaining rewards for how they move the content around. also this is a marketplace where there is money to be made and manufactured. that has been monopolized by the cable market power. >> guest: so we are already scene providers skip over ever tysons in the shows now and is that a concern to consumers that they would have this as well as copyright? >> they have a right to defend there and just under the copyright but what they can and shouldn't do is use the

copyright act or the communications act or even the copyright act to dictate technology. this debate about should consumers be allowed -- consumers can turn the sound off and now we have technology that automates that. is that a radical change? should that be? the telecommunications commission has no business being in the middle of copyright. they have been to court numerous times to battle against technology. the irony is they win their court cases but they lose the economic war because the courts will not let them take date the nature of technology in order to protect. now streaming music is a perfect example. they make less money than they did before, they have much more smaller cost than they did before. that's the process under the copyright act. copyright is a balance between

the consumer interest in the creative arts and the copyright holder interested in getting enough revenue revenues to continue to create. that's a different thing. fcc is about communication. >> guest: i think you pretty much made my point rates when you make money using copyrighted content than you owe the copyright owner money. if you use advertisement in addition to the ones that are there are you must be for that right. that's what a broadcaster is. a broadcaster gives copyrighted content sells advertising around it and makes money doing that and the copyright owner comes in and takes his fair share of that money. so that's exactly the point. you can't do anything, you reorganize the channels, put a nicer front end on it. the only thing you do is make money in a violation of somebody else's right if you don't pay them for. that's what copyright law is. >> host: wouldn't opening up

the market benefit the consumer by having competition by box a, p or. >> the box is a cost to the industry. it provides no profit. you can't take a product like video and add to it a set-top box that nobody want to become more profitable. that's insanity. this has to be there and they are trying desperately to get out from under which comes back to your question which is by moving to an app based law. the industry was all good with happy the fcc had two choices. they could do a choice of the copyright industry and the cable industry and the rest of the video providers were onboard with which would laminate the box for all practical purposes. it's very complex and up will experience significant resistance. the fcc is always saying the reason cable -- didn't work

because there was significant resistance. what are they think they're going to did not? not only are they doing the cable right industry but the copyright people. what if the copyright industry says you can't give this information to third-party? you can't. what is the fcc program going to do, mandate that you can give it to a third party is a video provider? is that really legal to do that? i don't think it is. you are going to run into that. on the other hand the chairman could have gone the other route and done it but at a time when we are trying to eliminate the set-top boxes it's almost like waldmack, wow we can to learn it the set-top talks because the statute says i have to have a market for the set-top box so i'm going to convince you to keep it. so we have competition which is just a crazy idea. >> you reference that cable card. what is that? the first time they did this was a total failure.

they had a security card basically. this cable signal comes in lisa's attendance scrambled. here's the set-top oxen against the scrambled so the viewer can see it. we can pullout the security piece of it and move it around. then you could actually have a tv that has a slot and it any good slide this in and it would be scrambled the signal. you go by a little card and everything would be fine. you go get your market ox from the store and plug this thing in it was a mess. i think maybe half a million were put into service. people just quit making that technology really because consumers aren't that interested in it. they could buy a cable modem in and they just don't predict them by cable modem for 60 bucks and they choose instead to rent it for four or five bucks a month. it's pretty out his that they're

really not that keen on it but that costs billions of dollars to implement that program. nothing came of that. he was a disaster. this is going to be a disaster too. this is the third try. the dog returns to its boxes the scripture says and the fcc is coming right into this. this is under the soviet unions fail. this is never going to work in the copyright industry comes in. >> guest: the copyright owners when i buy a book they won't charge me every time i read it and they certainly don't allow me to read it to a roomful of kids. guess who they want to get a quarter for every kid who listens to that luck. instead of covering their costs in the sale of the book or in this case in a subscription fee they get back from the cable operator. if they want to have a copyright fight let's have a copyright

fight in the courts. the mp3 player, file-sharing we have had those fights and the world has moved on and technology has moved on. they said look let's get rid of the set-top boxes way. it was a way to preserve their bilateral monopoly. the cable guys have a way to power the signal and there would be no competition. they defined the way that the programs come through. they defined the way you search the programs. that's what at&t said about the telephone. it's exactly the same argument. if you plug it in is going to blow the system up and the answer is it's just a way, while they put up to defend their market power. the commission has looked at the statute. they say we have commuted 20 years later. the cable card is a physical thing.

i believe tivo uses cable cards that may no longer have that so we have to have flexibility and we can control these interfaces. that's much more efficient way to do it. we can have security, protection of copyright and also competition. that's what we as consumers care the most about getting some competition in this space. >> guest: i think that was a gross misstatement of the copyright industry taking on books. they never tried to charge me for reading it to my children and we have read the same books many times. the question is is there such a thing and this is fundamental, is there such a thing as a market for set top -- set top ox is or is it part of the network quickly can job at atari distinctions about how the cable industry lives inside of her house and all the insides of the

sewers but that's a regulatory extension. is that separate and apart from a network and it's really not. the other thing is that we have we have actually got the realistic possibility to move to a software-based solution and get rid of this thing altogether but that's not that enough for the fcc. i think the reason is pretty obvious. that's a very valuable piece of information that traverses that cable wire and comes into somebody's house particularly when you know when they're watching and when they are not. there's a huge opportunity to commoditize and the industry is not going to let that go. it was somebody else in there which of course is the problem the copyright industry people have because they should be able to charge somebody who makes money with their product raid there's nothing illegal or wrongheaded about that. it's their property. there is a software solution that can be implanted here. why is that not good enough? why can't we get rid of the set-top box altogether? i already hat.

i got routed to cable boxes because they provide a nap that i can use. >> host: let's get the next question from lydia beyoud. .. >> that's what you can do. they want to be able to manipulate and reorganize. >> one of the most criticized aspects is that

it is not clear how copyright holders will be able to enforce that copyright if the 3rd party were to either change the program. certain types of content, nonfamily friendly comment -- content and that they enforce through the contract so could you describe a little bit about what has been proposed, self certification regime and how that would work. if is a violation, they can choose to break her turn off the device, but the cable industry, so that is not a solution. >> the fcc, you have to have permission was innovation.

you know there going to make my life miserable. they've been doing it for 15 years. we use this for all the cell phones in your pocket, a simple certification procedure with the device was intended to do certain things, and they would certify that. you know what, they will know pretty quickly if someone has violated those obligations. they have given the ability of the cable operator to say, if you can show that there violating thosethey are violating those obligations you can turn them off. there is the enforcement. but if you have to have a misuse of the cable operator before it gets to the customer, and so we have to cut through that. we cut through that by giving them the protection. if you see something that violates that you think violates our rules, you can stop it and then we are

unmitigated. willing to litigate on their side. so that is the mechanism. innovation 1st, litigation later. >> is that not harmed consumers? the consumer is more likely to hold the pay-tv provider responsible even if the chokepoint was at the third-party. >> the consumer will be harmed if the consumer really want that to happen. a lot of consumers would complain. they are not shy about sending the fcc letters. someone put something on top of it, the fcc will hear about that in the blink of an eye. and the cable operator will be authorized to stop it in the blink of an eye. and then we will sort the facts out. the point is, i don't see the harm in allowing the

innovation and competition to take place. and then let's see if there are abuses. it had to be popular, but they have been out there for a while. the only people who complained about it, lost the stream of income. so that is what this is about. capturing the stream of income and making up stories that is supposed to scare somebody and not allowing open competition. >> capturing the income from somebody else's product is exactly what this is about, and doing it without having to compensate the middle. if you really break it down that is what it is about. your question drives the point home as to why the box market looks like it does today. these are very complex contracts between distributors and copyright

owners. copyright, and something they own, property. big, complex contracts. i don't know how the signal is being treated at all times, then i don't have the confidence that it is being treated properly. that is really what it is about. that is why you see it look like it does. you have to maintain tight control. how in the world am i going to know if somebody is distributing boxes over ebay that allow you to do things you shouldn't be able to do like plug a thumb drive in the back of the thing and copy an entire movie to post on the internet. how are they going to know? i mean,, god knows what will come out of china that can translate this stuff. and you can imagine this wonderful world where all the stuff gets sorted out.

the somebody's going to figure out a way around it. and we used to see this underlying everything. open is good, closed as bad. that is not true. some things are better closed, some things are better closed, some things are better open. the market is pretty darn good at sorting out which is which. >> i believe in market. >> control, control, control. everything you touch, there is no fair use. they want to say, you can't use it that way. every time we have opened one of these markets, 50 years from where we let people plug in modem into the telephone network, every time we open one we get consumer friendly choice. the industry moves on. sometimes industry has to restructure. america's listen the more music at one 3rd the price

than they did 20 years ago. but that is exactly, they don't want you to listen to singles. they want you to buy albums. that is exactly what they want to do with the video. we believe in competition. and we don't believe in this control, control, control. >> show me one monopoly in this business. >> set-top box. >> time for one more question. the only one who is not jumping in. >> neither of you have really directly addressed one of the other big issues, the idea that tech companies would be able to capture this sort of consumer information and develop very tailored, detailed profiles of behavior and combine it with google or apple or amazon all the other information that they have in that cell and monetize it.

do you view that is any sort of problem? >> the fcc to ongoing. >> let's be clear, the fcc has authority over communication devices. they don't have authority, and i guarantee you the minute i say they should regulate the internet they will be screaming like crazy. interesting thing is, there is a chokepoint that is really potent. when i buy something from netflix, netflix knows what i'm doing. the 1st doesn't know when i go over here and buy something from you, but the telephone communication network did. all of those signals passed through the hands of the network operator. that work operator has the greatest potential to abuse that information. when netflix does it have to

go out. all comes to the hands of the telephone company. that is with the fcc is working on. this privacy issues can and will be dealt with. there may be other privacy issues on other sections of title three and title six, but those are separate issues. the biggest threat is the guy who sees everything i do. >> final word. >> i disagree. that is the whole basis of this, getting to that information to monetize. that is the only reason. not going to make money selling boxes. is the only reason this is going on. they will monetize people's viewing habits. that's it. underneath it all, there it is.

>> chief economist for the phoenix center for advanced legal and economic public policy. formally at the fcc. and mark cooper is the research director for the consumer federation of america. he's also follow a stanford law school center for internet and society. thank you. >> c-span created by america's cable-television companies and brought to you as a public service by your cable or satellite provider. apple's general counsel, the fbi science and technology department testify about computer encryption and criminal investigation. technology and law enforcement officials will offer their perspectives on

the use of encryption and tech products. the house energy and commerce subcommittee hearing starts tomorrow at 10:00 a.m. eastern on c-span three. >> the campaign 2016 fund continues its travels. a bus recently visited the high school and sparks nevada her 3rd prize documentary titled wild horse management. i'm bussing crew then headed to california to meet with winners in that state. recognizing kristen cooper and jackie power for their winning documentaries. congresswoman judy chu joins friends, family, and classmates for their winning documentary on social security. the special thanks to our

cable partners are helping to coordinate. remember, every weekday be sure to watch one of the top 21 winning entries before watching the journal. >> next we will hear from that of an independent office within the irs that aims to resolve taxpayer problems and improve customer service. national taxpayer advocate to questions about the annual report to congress. she testified last week before house oversight and government reform subcommittee chair by congressman mark meadows. >> the subcommittee on government operation will come to order. without objection that shares authorized to declare recess at any time. i want to thank you both for coming.