The Association of Public Television Stations (APTS), the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and the Public Broadcasting Service are analyzing what steps to pursue at the FCC to address its decision not to restrict incentive auction bids based on potential loss of TV service, said an APTS executive. APTS, CPB and PBS bemoaned the FCC’s rejection of the proposed restriction in its order outlining the framework of the auction. NAB also argued that the order doesn’t ensure that commercial and public TV stations won’t have to pay out of pocket for forced relocations. The order was released last week (CD June 3 p1).

The tenor of Congress’ debate over NTIA’s transition of the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA) could be shifting, said Internet governance experts in interviews last week. A separate “manager’s package” of amendments to the Senate Appropriations Committee’s Commerce, Justice, Science and Related Agencies (CJS) bill FY 2015 was approved Thursday. One amendment (http://1.usa.gov/1kAApKu), introduced by Senate Appropriations Committee member Mike Johanns, R-Neb., seeks quarterly reports from NTIA on the IANA transition and a seven-day notice period before NTIA transfers IANA. The amendment could have a moderating influence on what has become a partisan struggle over if and how IANA is transferred, said experts.

An April 23 FCC-approved item making much-anticipated changes to the Connect America Fund (CAF) remains stuck inside the commission and has yet to be released. FCC officials tell us that commissioners approved the order six weeks ago, but they're still fighting over edits. The order was approved over a partial dissent by Commissioner Ajit Pai and partial concurrence by Commissioner Mike O'Rielly. The order does away with the much-criticized quantile regression analysis formula and makes other tweaks to the 2011 CAF order, which was aimed at part on refocusing USF on broadband deployment (CD April 24 p2).

The FCC would bolster its statutory authority to regulate net neutrality, and help undergird the ability to parcel out USF money for broadband, by deciding for another year that Web service isn’t being sufficiently deployed, said agency and industry officials. They said in interviews last week that a negative finding over reasonable and timely deployment of broadband service in the annual Communications Act Section 706 report wouldn’t likely be required for net neutrality and USF broadband authority. That’s under last month’s 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruling upholding FCC authority over broadband USF (CD May 27 p1) and January’s D.C. Circuit remand of net neutrality rules.

The FTC Office of the Inspector General (OIG) investigated eight instances of fraud, waste, abuse and employee misconduct over the past five years, according to documents disclosed to Communications Daily under a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request. Six investigations covered relatively small-scale individual misconduct -- using or selling commission equipment for personal benefit, misusing company funds, unpaid loans between employees. This is the first part in an occasional series on federal agencies’ IG investigations.

Comcast and Charter Communications filed applications with the FCC for approval of Comcast’s divestiture of 3.9 million subscribers to Charter in connection with Comcast agreeing to pay about $66 billion for Time Warner Cable (http://bit.ly/1kNJ1Yp). As expected (CD April 29 p1), the deal will involve 2.5 million Comcast subscribers being transferred to a newly created Charter affiliated company known as SpinCo, 1.5 million subs going to Charter, and a swap of subscribers among the companies to allow geographic concentration. The filings made public Thursday include Comcast’s listing of the public interest benefits of the deal and SpinCo details. Since the delay will leave Comcast shareholders owning parts of all three companies, regulators could pay special attention to the viability and independence of the spinoff company, said James Stenger, a mergers and acquisitions attorney at Chadbourne & Parke.

Dueling claims from Netflix and Verizon about the true reason for Netflix’s buffering issues are inherently policy posturing, but they also highlight underlying questions about data transparency and whether stakeholders have effectively explained the issue to the public, industry observers told us Thursday. When videos buffer, Netflix has begun including messages on some users’ screens claiming that an ISP’s network “is crowded right now,” including for users on Verizon’s network. Netflix said it is phasing those messages in for users on all ISPs, regardless of the type of connection or agreement the company has with a particular broadband provider (CD June 5 p11).

Verizon pushed back against “the inappropriateness” of outsourcing surveillance activities to telecom companies. Assistant General Counsel Michael Woods testified Thursday before the Senate Intelligence Committee in favor of the House-passed version of the USA Freedom Act, HR-3361.

Signs are that not only will SoftBank proceed with its buy of T-Mobile to merge it with Sprint, but the deal could force the FCC to delay the TV incentive auction, industry officials, including former regulators, tell us. Analyst Craig Moffett of MoffettNathanson Thursday gave the merger only a 10 percent chance of success, especially since the Department of Justice and FCC have both raised red flags (CD Feb 6 p1).

The proposed AT&T takeover of DirecTV is an opportunity for the FCC to impose conditions on the telco requiring it to change how it provides public, educational and government channel programming, said PEG channel advocates in interviews this week. Groups like the Alliance for Community Media are still waiting for the FCC to act on its 2009 petition urging it to declare AT&T’s offering of PEG channels on its U-verse platform inadequate. The Media Bureau had no comment on whether it’s continuing to review the petition. The benefits of viewing PEG channels on AT&T U-Verse include viewing channels in one convenient location, a spokesman said.