Having failed to break into the European legislature, at least for now, the ‘fair share’ debate has arrived in the US Senate, in a bill sponsored by three senators that proposes to enable the FCC to extract cash from ‘Big Tech’ providers. Ostensibly, the funds will be used to shore up the withered Universal Service Fund, but this is a landgrab – make no mistake. Some history is in order. The Universal Service Fund (USF) was set up in 1997, in the wake of the Telecommunications Act of 1996. It is funded by contributions from ISPs and has an annual budget of between $5 billion to $9 billion. The money is intended to support the 1996 Act’s target to provide…