The FCC is backtracking on an AllVid proposal it floated (CD March 24 p1) as an alternative to cable and telco-TV providers having to connect to consumer electronics, said agency and industry officials. They said the alternative to a gateway connector approach the Media Bureau floated in recent months, for pay-TV providers to let CE devices connect to their IP streams using application programming interfaces, appears dead. Lobbying by the CE industry against the plan and technical concerns within the bureau and possibly the office of Chairman Julius Genachowski sunk it, said commission officials and executives in the CE and pay-TV industries. AllVid aims to replace CableCARDs.
The FCC is backtracking on an AllVid proposal it floated (WID March 24 p6) as an alternative to cable and telco-TV providers having to connect to consumer electronics, said agency and industry officials. They said the alternative to a gateway connector approach the Media Bureau floated in recent months, for pay-TV providers to let CE devices connect to their IP streams using application programming interfaces, appears dead. Lobbying by the CE industry against the plan and technical concerns within the bureau and possibly the office of Chairman Julius Genachowski sunk it, said commission officials and executives in the CE and pay-TV industries. AllVid aims to replace CableCARDs.
The International Trade Commission announces that a section 337 patent-based complaint has been filed regarding certain flip-top vials and products using the same.
Peer-to-peer currency Bitcoin could be a step toward a more privacy-protective monetary system or the gateway to massive money-laundering and other crimes, observers said. The project, touted as the world’s first completely distributed digital currency, allows users who download the free, open-source software to carry out transactions without banks or payment processors, its website says. Bitcoin project lead Gavin Andresen was unavailable to comment by our deadline. While it’s too early to know whether the idea will take off, it raises potentially troubling legal and regulatory issues and could prompt government action, observers said.
The Government Accountability Office states in a report to Congress that the Food and Drug Administration needs to improve its oversight of the safety of imported seafood from residues of unapproved drugs. It also needs to enhance its import sampling program, better leverage its limited resources and enhance collaboration with the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS).
The International Trade Commission announces that a section 337 patent-based complaint has been filed regarding certain lighting control devices including dimmer switches and parts thereof.
AT&T faces mounting criticism from public, educational and governmental channel advocates (CD March 31 p11) calling anew for the telco to make major changes to how its pay-TV service delivers PEG channels to subscribers so the blind can easily access them. The campaign for AT&T to stop putting PEG channels on a subchannel, and to instead make each one a separate channel as the company’s U-verse service does for other programming, intensified with a letter Thursday to AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson. He was written by American Community Television (ACT) President John Rocco, who can’t see well and said he’s among those that can’t use on-screen menus to choose PEG networks within channel 99.
Pakistani and Turkish moves toward website filtering or blocking have sparked an outcry from rights advocates. The May 13 Lahore High Court ruling that Facebook, Yahoo, MSN, Wikipedia and other sites violate the country’s blasphemy laws and should be banned is a blatant rights breach, the Association for Progressive Communications (APC) said Thursday. Turkey, which enacted and then lifted a ban on YouTube last year (WID Oct 27 p1), is preparing to impose a mandatory filtering system which contravenes the European Convention on Human Rights, said Yaman Akdeniz, associate law professor at Istanbul Bilgi University.
SAN FRANCISCO -- Nevada’s top gambling regulator predicted his agency will be ready within six months to start work certifying operators to take in-state bets online, assuming Congress doesn’t act on the issue meanwhile. Even with federal indictments last month of three leading offshore Internet poker operators, it has become ever clearer the past 12 months that online gambling is here to stay, Chairman Mark Lipparelli of Nevada’s Gaming Control Board said late Tuesday.
The International Trade Commission announces that a section 337 patent-based complaint has been filed regarding certain muzzle-loading firearms and components thereof.