IPTV AND ENTERTAINMENT OVER BROADBAND:
Will the Rules of the Road Get Us Where We Want to Go?

When: Monday, May 23, 2005, at 6 to 8 p.m.
Where: House of the Association, 42 West 44th Street

Internet Protocol is increasingly used to deliver not only voice (telephone) and data (internet access), but video as well, as established telephone companies Verizon and SBC have made major investments to enter this arena and expand the competitive battlefronts with cable and satellite providers. The new technological and business developments present significant legal and public policies issues including:

• Will IPTV require a broad “open access” requirement to the broadband pipe, or will the development of broadband competition provide a market-based solution?

• Is there still a place for local franchising of cable systems and their competitors in a world of globalized IPTV?

• What regulatory impact will flow from the applications that sit on a broadband platform independent of the provider (i.e., the video equivalents of VOIP)?

• Given the inevitability of technological change, what does the current legal framework mean for IPTV content providers? Is there a better regulatory framework that balances the interests of the content players, network owners and users?

Moderator:
Howard B. Homonoff, President, Homonoff Media Group LLC; Associate Professor of Media Law, Drexel University Joint Television Management/MBA program

Speaker:
Randal S. Milch, Sr. Vice President and Deputy General Counsel, Verizon Communications, Inc.

In conjunction with:
Columbia Institute of Tele-Information; Marconi Foundation at Columbia University

About the Association
The Association of the Bar of the City of New York (www.nycbar.org) was founded in 1870, and since then has been dedicated to maintaining the high ethical standards of the profession, promoting reform of the law, and providing service to the profession and the public.