Charter Communications shouldn’t act on reported plans to use its broadband subscribers’ Web surfing habits to deliver more targeted online ads via the firm NebuAd, House Telecom Subcommittee Chairman Ed Markey, D-Mich., and House Commerce Committee Ranking Member Joe Barton, R-Texas, said in a letter to Charter CEO Neil Smit. “Any service… that can result in the collection of information about the web- related habits and interest of a subscriber, or a subscriber’s use of the operator’s service, or the identification of an individual subscriber, without the ‘prior written consent or electronic consent of the subscriber’ raises substantial questions related to Section 631 [of the Communications Act of 1934],” they said. Charter is open to talking with Barton and Markey, a spokeswoman said. “Our goal is to bring an enhanced Internet experience to our customers while meeting all privacy requirements,” she said. “We believe we have done this but are pleased to discuss this matter with the Chairman and the Congressman.”

The House and Senate have both passed the conference version of H.R. 2419, the Food, Conservation, and Energy Act of 2008 (Farm Bill), by greater than two-thirds majorities.

STANFORD, Calif. -- A California appeals judge warned the Internet industry not to trust the courts to maintain what until recently had been seen as near-complete immunity regarding users’ contributions. Anthony Kline, the presiding justice of the 1st Court of Appeals in San Francisco, said judges in recent months have weakened the protections of section 230 of the federal Communications Decency Act and created uncertainty for ISPs and Web sites. Speaking late last week at a conference on Legal Frontiers in Digital Media, he advised the industry to go to Congress, where he said it would certainly win favorable changes in the law.

Five cable operators, CompTel, a state regulator and others want to lobby the FCC on a complaint that Verizon violated FCC porting rules. The proceeding involves allegations about actions by the Bell before moving a customer’s phone number to a new provider. The lobbying would depart from FCC practice and be inappropriate, Verizon said. The dispute is over whether those interested apart from formal parties may visit commissioners, their aides and Enforcement Bureau officials to weigh in on an action. Here, it’s the bureau’s April 11 recommended decision and the parties are the Bell and three cable operators. Verizon said it broke no rules, and the agency should say so and issue a notice on whether video and broadband customers can switch companies by having their new provider ask the old one to cut off service (CD April 15 p5).

Sen. Sam Brownback, R-Kan., offered and then withdrew an Internet radio amendment to an intellectual-property bill at a Senate Judiciary Committee markup Thursday. The amendment, which large webcasters had expected (CD May 15 p3), would give Internet radio services “parity” with cable and satellite platforms on royalty rates by reducing obligations set last year by the Copyright Royalty Board. “If something isn’t done a lot of these folks are going to be driven out” of business, Brownback said. “There’s not much… of a payment stream” for Internet radio to pay the higher rates from, he said, alluding to webcasters’ theme that intrusive advertising on streams would alienate listeners. Chairman Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., endorsed the amendment’s aims but asked Brownback to wait for a “better place to raise this” -- namely a proposed hearing for Leahy’s Performance Rights Act (S-2500), which would end terrestrial broadcasters’ exemption from paying performance royalties. That bill hasn’t been touched since it was introduced (CD Dec 19 p12). Brownback said Internet radio deserves its own hearing. Leahy agreed, saying “we will try to find a way.” Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., asked Leahy to include her PERFORM Act in the hearing. That bill, inactive the entire 110th Congress, would set parity between platforms, use a “fair-market value” standard to set rates, and most controversially require manufacturers to use “readily available and cost-effective technology” to stop unauthorized distribution, such as by recording songs on satellite radio players ( (CD Jan 12/07 p8).. Leahy said he may want to handle the royalty-related bills in a subcommittee hearing first.

The Senate Judiciary Committee agreed not to burden an orphan works bill with unrelated provisions and approved it at a Thursday markup. Sen. Sam Brownback, R-Kan., offered an Internet radio amendment to the bill, S-2913, as expected (WID May 15 p1). But he withdrew the measure after getting a promise that it would be considered in another hearing. Several uncontroversial bills, including one to add federal resources to fight child porn, passed in quick succession so senators could attend a police memorial service.

A senior Google lawyer asked Monday whether Internet companies and others should push to change their Communications Decency Act immunity for users’ comments. Nicole Wong, the company’s deputy general counsel, raised the question from the audience of a Media Access Project forum in San Jose, Calif., on “The Future of Content and Control.” Wong told us afterward that Google’s interest stems from recent appeals rulings on section 230, Chicago Lawyers’ Committee v. Craigslist from the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Chicago in March and Fair Housing Commission v. Roommates.com in the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in May 2007. These decisions “seem to carve a little out of that immunity,” she said. Panelists warned against seeking changes. Copyright Alliance Executive Director Patrick Ross said an effort like that would provide a vehicle to members of Congress who want to regulate the Internet. Mike Godwin, general counsel of the Wikimedia Foundation, which publishes Wikipedia, said, “I think we shouldn’t,” because of the risk that reopening the provision could produce unwanted results. Under the immunity, “individuals can say pretty much anything online” because Web site operators don’t fear being held legally responsible for the comments, he said. There’s a tendency for those angered by comments online to mutter that “there ought to be a law” allowing them to sue the forum operator as well as the person who makes the statements, Godwin said. But “it’s going to be very culturally damaging” if site operators get new incentive under a changed law not “to provide fully free-speech-capable platforms.” Former FTC Commissioner Mozelle Thompson said of the CDA proposals that might be raised, in Washington, “no bad idea ever goes away.” European and Asian governments whose laws aren’t as protective as the CDA have been influenced by the U.S. law to leave Web sites alone, he said. Putting the immunity in play “could send a signal” to those governments “to reopen that hands-off policy,” he warned. Before Wikimedia moved its headquarters to San Francisco from St. Petersburg, Fla., over the winter, it considered destinations including London. “There’s absolutely no way we could operate Wikipedia out of London,” Godwin said he advised the foundation. In fact, it seeks “as small a footprint as possible in the U.K.,” because of unfavorable rules including the defamation laws, he said. Wikimedia has no servers in the country and it advises Wikipedia editors there to avoid connections with each other that could make them more vulnerable to legal action, Godwin said. But law Professor Mark Lemley of Stanford University said from the audience that Google presumably is concerned not with the main section 230 immunity rule but with the “rather bizarre patchwork of intellectual property ISP immunity” in exemptions to the provision. Godwin said he hadn’t been thinking about those exemptions in his initial comments, and “obviously there is still a lot of work to be done” on section 230.

The FCC might not have authority to set emergency backup power rules for carriers, Judges David Sentelle and Raymond Randolph suggested in oral arguments on CTIA’s appeal in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. CTIA, Sprint Nextel, T-Mobile and USA Mobility challenged the rules, adopted after Hurricane Katrina (CD March 16 p10).

Wilmington, N.C.’s PBS affiliate decided against cutting off its analog signal early in the nation’s first market test for digital TV, said Mayor Bill Saffo. A station spokesman cited public safety and technical reasons. Four commercial stations will take part in the test, in a market unique by many standards, FCC Chairman Kevin Martin, broadcasters and Saffo officials announced Thursday.

Wilmington, N.C.’s PBS affiliate decided against cutting off its analog signal early in the nation’s first market test for digital TV, said Mayor Bill Saffo. A station spokesman cited public safety and technical reasons. Four commercial stations will take part in the test, in a market unique by many standards, FCC Chairman Kevin Martin, broadcasters and Saffo officials announced Thursday.