Sony Computer Entertainment (SCE) last month ended a long court fight with touch-feedback technology company Immersion (CED March 5 p6) but Consumer Electronics Daily learned Wed. that a 3rd party in the case vowed to fight on, seeking its share of the settlement. Immersion and SCE America (SCEA) didn’t respond to requests for comment by our deadline.
A Utah law that makes comparative advertising based on search keywords illegal raises questions of constitutionality, the Electronic Frontier Foundation said. The bill’s House sponsor, Utah Rep. David Clark (R-Santa Clara), disagreed: “I appreciate those who feel the Wild West is still emerging over the Internet,” he told Washington Internet Daily, but “if you value trademarks, then I think there’s a positive in looking to allow adequate protection of those trademarks.”
Webcasters clamoring for a rehearing of the rate proceeding at the Copyright Royalty Board (CRB) have precious little evidence to support their claims -- and they failed to introduce the data when it counted, SoundExchange said in a slew of lightly-redacted oppositions made public Tues. The group repeated its acknowledgment that some webcasters will probably go out of business if the CRB rates are upheld. But SoundExchange called that an outcome of the market, not of regulation.
According to the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative (USTR), on April 1, 2007, the U.S. and South Korea (Korea) successfully concluded a free trade agreement (FTA).
A federal court in Va. ruled that a condition FCC imposed on the 2005 merger of Verizon and MCI regarding special access pricing doesn’t preempt a stricter Va. state condition that addresses the same concern. The U.S. Dist. Court, Richmond rejected Verizon’s appeal of a Va. Corporation Commission condition compelling Verizon to keep offering special access at the same rates and terms MCI provided before the merger. The FCC required Verizon to extend MCI pricing on DS-1 and DS-3 special access services to MCI’s former customers for 30 months. The Va. commission required MCI pricing extended for all special access customers and services, past and future, until there’s enough competition to restrain Verizon’s monopoly pricing power. Verizon said the state condition obstructs its compliance with the federal condition, and the FCC meant its condition to be the only answer to special access pricing concerns raised by the merger. Not so, the court (Case CA 3:06CV740) said, noting Va. acted 3 weeks before the FCC, so if the FCC saw problems with the state action, it could have preempted Va. expressly. The court also said that nothing in the state condition barred Verizon from fulfilling the federal condition. It said the major differences between the 2 orders were that the state order covered more special access customers and services, and could have effect longer. The court noted the FCC in reading the Telecom Act has recognized the blurring of jurisdictional lines, with national rules covering historically intrastate matters, and state rules covering traditionally interstate issues. The court said the FCC “is generally not shy about defending its territory. Its continued silence in the wake of this litigation, therefore, is quite telling.”
U.S. Dist. Judge Emmet Sullivan’s Tunney Act merger review (CD March 30 p1) not only upheld DoJ consent decrees leading to 2 major Bell mergers but also sought to define what such reviews require of judges.
ICANN directors killed Internet red-light zone .xxx Fri., definitively rejecting the application by ICM Registry for failing to meet sponsored community criteria and putting ICANN at risk of involvement in content regulation. The 9-5 vote, with Pres. Paul Twomey abstaining, came after several extensive and often passionate statements. ICM Pres. Stuart Lawley promised to pursue the matter “energetically.”
The House Committee on Oversight will consider a measure that would mandate access to all wireless carriers, not just Verizon Wireless, on the subway system run by the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority (WMATA). Sprint users can roam while aboard Metro, but don’t have access to data. AT&T and T-Mobile subscribers can’t make or receive calls. The Committee will take up the measure after Easter recess.
Many questions remained Fri. after a dissident group of shareholders took control of videogame publisher Take-Two Interactive and ousted CEO Paul Eibeler. The company’s shareholders voted late Thurs. for the move; early Fri., Take-Two shares were up. But later that day shares fell, possibly after analysts offered a mixed take on the change’s impact; they were down 2.61% at $20.55 in late afternoon trading.
Bowing to Qwest and Verizon concerns, the FCC revised a special access condition in the AT&T-BellSouth merger agreement. The change eliminated a ban on other Bells getting access to reduced AT&T special access prices unless they offered similar prices to their own customers.