A federal judge in Miami ordered ACES 09 show promoter Justin Finocchiaro to show why he shouldn’t be held in contempt for ignoring a July 2 preliminary injunction against using a trade name mimicking the CES brand (CED July 18 p2). U.S. District Judge Ursula Ungaro Thursday denied a motion by Finocchiaro for a 60-day stay of the injunction so he could find a new lawyer. Finicchiarro learned of the injunction only days ago because his lawyer dropped the case without his knowledge, he told the court. He must explain in writing why he shouldn’t be held in civil contempt. Finocchiaro didn’t reply right away Friday to our inquiries about why his ACES 09 logo remains on his company’s Web site despite the injunction and why his attorney dropped the case.
Paul Gluckman
Paul Gluckman, Executive Senior Editor, is a 30-year Warren Communications News veteran having joined the company in May 1989 to launch its Audio Week publication. In his long career, Paul has chronicled the rise and fall of physical entertainment media like the CD, DVD and Blu-ray and the advent of ATSC 3.0 broadcast technology from its rudimentary standardization roots to its anticipated 2020 commercial launch.
IBM won’t comment on its negotiations with the NTIA to set contract terms for mailing more coupons than the program’s original 33.5 million, spokesman Fred McNeese told us Thursday. The IBM contract allows NTIA to increase the number of coupons distributed at the price stated in the contract, unless IBM or the NTIA disagrees (CED July 14 p1). The NTIA also won’t comment on the substance of the negotiations, spokesman Todd Sedmak said. IBM had mailed 19.1 million coupons through Tuesday, the NTIA reported. After 20 million, IBM will be paid nothing for mailing the last 2.5 million coupons in the program’s “initial” phase, the contract said. After those run out, a “contingent” phase will release 11.25 million coupons for households that get TV by antenna alone. The contract pays IBM $3.60 for each of the first 5 million contingent coupons it mails, and $2.84 for each of the remaining 6.25 million.
CEA wants the Miami-based promoter of a CE technology trade show found in contempt on grounds it has defied a July 2 preliminary injunction barring its use of trade names and service marks that mimic the CES brand.
Best Buy still takes phone orders on coupon-eligible DTV converter boxes, a spokesman told Consumer Electronics Daily. Sen. Claire McCaskill, D-Mo., last week wrote the FCC and NTIA to complain that a staff member phoned Best Buy’s DTV hotline and was told the chain no longer takes converter box orders by phone (CED July 14 p1). Best Buy is “actually having a period of tight inventory right now as we transition from our first Insignia box to two new boxes” with analog passthrough, the spokesman said. “As we go through the product transition, we are experiencing some shortages in stores. We are still definitely selling boxes through the phone channel, but the stores have been our first priority right now in terms of in-stock levels, so there have been times when the phone channel can’t take orders. So we have never discontinued the phone channel. We just couldn’t take orders when we were low on stock.”
Philips TV sales grew 14 percent in Q2 on a currency- adjusted basis, Philips said Monday. It credited “strong growth in emerging markets,” bolstered “somewhat by demand from soccer’s Euro 2008 championship.”
Funai must pay only 4.3 percent of the $7.7 million fine it once faced to settle FCC charges of violating V-chip rules by shipping DTV sets that won’t accept updates from new parental-control ratings systems, said a consent decree adopted July 3 and released Thursday at the commission.
Panasonic met last month with FCC Office of Engineering and Technology officials on plans to introduce low-power 60- GHz WirelessHD devices, an ex parte shows. But Panasonic gave the FCC no more specific product plans than when it showed WirelessHD at the last CES, a spokesman told Consumer Electronics Daily. The Digital Transmission Licensing Administrator is “in the final steps” of approving Digital Transmission Content Protection for WirelessHD, the ex parte said. Panasonic told the agency it thinks WirelessHD will gain wide consumer and CE industry acceptance because it transmits uncompressed HD video throughout the house “without quality deterioration,” the ex parte said. Since WirelessHD avoids cable clutter, “users can enjoy greater freedom in design and positioning of their home theater” equipment, Panasonic said. For example, a Blu-ray player can go anywhere in a room, feeding a wall-mounted flat-panel TV, with intrusive wires showing, it said. Panasonic fears that in densely populated areas implementation of an FCC proposal to raise radiation emission limits for high-speed, point-to-point unlicensed digital broadband devices could cause harmful interference to WirelessHD products, the ex parte said. “Panasonic suggested that such interference might be mitigated by requiring the high-power-link receiver to use a high-gain antenna, permitting lower transmitter power for equivalent communication reliability,” it said. “A further requirement to stipulate that transmit power should be no higher than needed for link operation would implement power control at the transmitter.”
Some coupon-eligible DTVPal converters may have bugs, but Dish Network is working to fix them, a spokeswoman told us. The DTVPal’s event timer can be set to activate the box and tune to a desired channel before a favorite show runs. But bloggers have complained that the boxes don’t always come on and that programmed settings change or vanish. A programming search feature on the DTVPal also has malfunctioned, bloggers said. Dish acknowledges the bug, and “the fix for this is going into effect almost immediately,” the spokeswoman said. Another complaint has been that the DTVPal goes on with little warning. That’s probably because “the NTIA requires all converter boxes to enter a low-power mode when the box has not been used for a period of time,” the spokeswoman said. “The DTVPal resets itself while entering into the low power mode.” Of a complaint that the DTVPal TV Guide mode hasn’t worked for anyone who has bought the box, Dish said it thinks this refers to the TV Guide Legacy mode, now available on the DTVPAL, she said. “The only problem is, TV Guide has not rolled out their service yet.”
Struggling Syntax-Brillian -- whose many problems include $1.27 million in FCC fines for DTV tuner mandate violations (CED April 14 p1) -- has filed for Chapter 11 protection, the company said Tuesday. Filing for reorganization will help Syntax-Brillian close on an agreement to sell its assets to a new holding company controlled by TCV Group, which supplies plastic injection- molded parts for Olevia TVs, it said.
Now that the Microprose MPI-500PT analog-passthrough converter box has won NTIA certification (CED July 7 p3), the maker needs a retailer other than the Microprose online store to sell it. NTIA has booted Legacy Engineering from the program, the agency confirmed Monday. Legacy ran the Microprose Systems online store under license from maker Microprose. Legacy, though certified for the program, never made the grade as a participating retailer. It got into hot water with NTIA in late May when it took orders for the MPI- 500PT. But the only certified Microprose box was one lacking analog passthrough. The breach prompted the NTIA to issue an unusual “DTV consumer alert” warning the public not to order the MPI-500PT (CED May 23 p1). The MPI-500PT gained notoriety after low-power TV’s Community Broadcasters Association steered visitors to its KeepUsOn.com site toward buying the uncertified box at the Microprose store. On Monday, the CBA hailed word of the MPI-500PT getting NTIA certification in a reply to a query we posted at KeepUsOn.com. “What great news to know that yet another quality DTV converter with analog passthrough is going to be made available to the public,” the CBA said. “All efforts to increase the supply of DTV converter boxes with the much- desired analog passthrough capability are beneficial to all.” We asked the CBA if it plans to revive the Microprose cross promotion that the NTIA’s action against Legacy killed. “We have continued our discussions with Microprose and hope they will achieve success with their product when it ultimately becomes available,” the CBA said. With Legacy decertified, a cross promotion would have to be run directly with Microprose.