SAN FRANCISCO -- Prominent state regulators with a deregulatory bent pushed at the NCTA convention here for “cooperative federalism,” in which Washington sets most of the few rules on communications services, and states play a strong role in enforcing them, especially consumer issues. Outnumbered on a panel Mon., an Ia. regulator said he agonized over the fates of his state’s many tiny incumbent carriers and their customers in a world with much less protection and subsidy.

A wireless industry request for reconsideration of the Nationwide Programmatic Agreement (NPA) on tower siting faced strong opposition from groups representing tribal and historic preservation interests. The Tower Siting Policy Alliance (TSPA), whose key members include Cingular, T-Mobile and American Tower, had asked the FCC to revise NPA provisions that diverge from current rules, saying they undermine the goal of streamlining the tower siting approval process and impose burdensome requirements without offering increased protection for historic properties (CD Feb 9 p2). But the National Tribal Telecom Assn. (NTTA), National Assn. of Tribal Historic Preservation Officers (NATHPO) and National Trust for Historic Preservation (NTHP) rebutted such allegations and urged the FCC to deny the petition.

Most of SBC’s 13 home states say they're not planning hearings or reviews of SBC’s proposed acquisition of AT&T, and only 2 have opened review dockets. But some states say they plan to address the merger’s broad implications in comments to the FCC and U.S. Justice Dept. during federal merger review.

Congress returns tomorrow (Tues.) after a 2-week recess, but communication issues seem destined to wait at least another week to be addressed. Despite talk of hearings by several committees, none are set for this week. Universal Service Fund, telecom mergers, and IP- enabled video are all topics sources said would likely be subjects of Hill hearings in coming weeks. Industry and Senate sources said the Senate Commerce Committee seemed ready to begin holding hearings on telecom issues. And new FCC Chmn. Martin could make his official Hill debut soon.

For the first time, industry groups are split over whether a Hague treaty covering choice of law in business- to-business (including e-commerce) contracts should include non-negotiated instruments such as online click- through agreements, Consumer Project on Technology Dir. James Love said Wed. On Tues., the Secy. of State’s Advisory Committee on International Law met to try to resolve intellectual property (IP) issues raised by the convention -- which seeks to harmonize jurisdiction and enforcement of judgments in cross-border civil cases -- before a June 14-30 diplomatic conference. Several groups said their members are uncomfortable with mandatory choice of forum clauses in non-negotiated contracts, particularly in a treaty any country can join, Love said. Movie and software lobbyists were “on the defensive,” he said, with software firms claiming it’s impossible to draft language distinguishing between negotiated and non-negotiated agreements. But other businesses disagreed, Love said, saying drafters could look to the distinction in the Uniform Computer Information Transactions Act or the N.Y. convention on arbitration. They also suggested building in language that looks at whether each party actually can change a contract’s terms. The American IP Law Assn. and the International Trademark Assn. wanted to make sure participants were discussing only negotiated contracts, said Manon Ress, CPT dir.-information technology projects: “The expression ‘contract between consenting adults’ to define what kind of contracts we were hoping we were talking about came back again and again.” Love said he told the group “a convention that combined both negotiated and non-negotiated contracts would end up being weaker for negotiated contracts and have less support overall.” Consumer groups have long pushed to exclude non-negotiated contracts. The current slimmed-down version of the treaty no longer deals with business-to-consumer contracts, but consumer groups worry consumers may be deemed businesses with regard to take-it-or-leave-it contracts in some circumstances (WID March 14 p4). The exchanges at Tues.’s meeting were “very valuable” said a source close to the talks, confirming the industry split: “There was common ground expressed on the approach to IP rights in the convention, even if the details were not all agreed or worked out.” Ress said it was “more or less agreed” that the negotiated-vs.-non-negotiated issue would be on the agenda of a May 9 meeting devoted to a more general discussion of the treaty. Sadly, she said, it’s not on the Hague drafting committee’s agenda for a new draft.

U.S. Supreme Court justices expressed concerns Tues. over the impact on technological innovation of holding file sharing firms liable for illegal copying done using their programs. During oral argument in MGM v. Grokster, the justices engaged in brisk exchanges with attorneys for both sides, treading cautiously on the Sony standard set by the High Court in a close decision over 2 decades ago. Members of both camps agreed the justices asked the questions needed to rule on whether peer-to-peer (P2P) companies should be subject to secondary liability for copyright infringement by their users. The decision is expected before the end of the Supreme Court session in June.

VeriSign is likely to continue to operate .net, ICANN said Mon. The registry, which runs .net and .com, was ranked #1 by Telcordia in a study of 5 applicants vying to manage the top-level domain (TLD). VeriSign edged out Sentan Registry, a joint venture between Japan Registry Services Co. and NeuLevel, which runs .biz. The next 3 rankings were: Afilias (the .info registry), DENIC Domain (Germany’s country-code TLD manager), and CORE++.

U.S. Supreme Court justices expressed concerns Tues. over the impact on technological innovation of holding file sharing firms liable for illegal copying done using their programs. During oral argument in MGM v. Grokster, the justices engaged in brisk exchanges with attorneys for both sides, treading cautiously on the Sony standard set by the High Court in a close decision over 2 decades ago. Members of both camps agreed the justices asked the questions needed to rule on whether peer-to-peer (P2P) companies should be subject to secondary liability for copyright infringement by their users. The decision is expected before the end of the Supreme Court session in June.

The U.S. Supreme Court expressed concerns over the future of American innovation and the impact that the entertainment industry’s crusade against illegal file sharing over peer-to-peer (P2P) networks will have on technological development. During MGM v Grokster’s oral argument Tues., the justices engaged in brisk banter with attorneys for both sides and trod cautiously on the Sony standard set by the High Court in a narrow decision over 2 decades ago. Stakeholders supporting each camp agreed that Justices asked the right questions to frame their decision on whether P2P companies should be subject to secondary liability for copyright infringement by their users. The decision is expected before the end of the Supreme Court session in June.

The FCC issued an expected order granting a BellSouth preemption request involving DSL service (CD March 22 p2), but also sought comment on the larger issue of whether the practice of “tying” is harmful to competition. The decision released late Fri. preempts state rules requiring BellSouth to provide DSL service to customers getting voice service from CLECs using UNE loops. BellSouth has a policy of not selling DSL service to end users who buy voice service separately from such competitors. The March 17 vote, one of the last before ex-FCC Chmn. Michael Powell left, covers all state commissions, not just those in BellSouth territory.