House Communications Subcommittee leaders are at odds over the right approach to unlicensed spectrum as the subcommittee continues negotiations on spectrum legislation, without a clear picture of when a markup will happen. Ranking Member Anna Eshoo, D-Calif., pushed Wednesday for more unlicensed spectrum to be released. But Chairman Greg Walden, R-Ore., questioned giving spectrum away for free. Unlicensed spectrum is “one of the most important issues in the continued negotiations over spectrum” in the committee and the Joint Select Committee on Deficit Reduction, a Democratic House staffer said.

International harmonization of spectrum is critical, but difficult to achieve, and the U.S. so far has only a “mixed record” aligning its allocations with those in the rest of the world, said FCC Office of Engineering and Technology Chief Julius Knapp Wednesday in a keynote speech at The Americas Spectrum Management Conference. Knapp cited in particular spectrum allocated to PCS, a different use than in most of the world. Knapp also said the outlook for widespread use of TV white spaces spectrum remains positive.

A draft policy allowing cellphone service shutdowns on BART only over “extraordinary” risks of injury, damage to the San Francisco regional rail system, or “substantial” disruption of service will be taken up by the governing board Oct. 27, its president said Wednesday. The board could vote on the policy then, but changes resulting from suggestions in public comments at the meeting or otherwise could put the decision off to the next meeting, scheduled for Nov. 17, President Bob Franklin told us. He said Bay Area Rapid Transit heard Monday from the FCC that it hasn’t decided whether to put out for public comment a petition challenging a July shutdown ordered to forestall a political demonstration in a downtown San Francisco station.

Industries and disabled advocates seek changes to what the FCC proposed for rules requiring broadcast and pay-TV videos to be captioned when they're delivered by Internet Protocol. Wireless carriers, makers of consumer electronics, multichannel video programming distributors, broadcasters and advocates for those with trouble hearing sought changes to a rulemaking notice. The notice is on implementing the 21st Century Communications and Video Accessibility Act, under which the commission must complete rules for IP captions by Jan. 12 (CD Sept 21 p12). Comments are in docket 11-154 (http://xrl.us/bmgjgj).

Media General isn’t planning to break up the company, CEO Marshall Morton said during the company’s Q3 earnings call. The vote of confidence in Media General’s business from its CEO was in response to questions from Mario Gabelli, whose investment funds own about 35 percent of Media General’s shares, according to SEC filings. “Where are you in your thinking about taking your bad assets and good assets and dividing them up and assigning debt to those,” Gabelli asked.

Apple is “confident” that it “will have a large supply” of the iPhone 4S for consumers to buy, but CEO Timothy Cook said in an earnings call late Tuesday that he wouldn’t “predict when supply and demand might balance because the demand is obviously extremely high right now.” The company said it sold more than 4 million units of its new smartphone in the device’s first three days available. Apple is “confident that we will set an all-time record for iPhone” in Q1 that started Sept. 25, he said.

The Internet radio company Pandora is only now ready to make a successful run at radio stations’ bread-and-butter advertising, particularly outside the largest markets, the company’s founder said. “We can actively attract the interest of local advertisers … historically the largest part of revenue for radio,” said Tim Westergren, Pandora’s chief strategy officer. Previous efforts concentrated on national advertisers, and, Westergren indicated Tuesday at the Web 2.0 Summit in San Francisco, didn’t make the desired dent. “I wouldn’t be surprised” if broadcasters “weren’t far more efficient at monetizing at this point” than Pandora is, he said.

The public media industry must work to be more innovative and inclusive to expand its influence in the digital world, public media professionals said Tuesday at a Free Press event. One of the biggest challenges for public broadcasters is defining what public media looks like in the digital age, said Josh Stearns, Free Press associate program director. The need for public media couldn’t be bigger and support couldn’t be broader, “but we're still spending pocket change,” said Craig Aaron, Free Press president.

Telecom customers would pay up to $30 per month as an access recovery charge under proposed rules in FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski’s pending Universal Service Fund order, telecom lobbyists told us Tuesday. They said the charge would be “a benchmark” and structured similarly to the price cap-carrier-backed ABC plan. The charge would not officially come with a subscriber line increase fee, but would also not be a separate line item on customers’ bills, the lobbyists said.

Dish’s proposed waiver that would clear the way for the company to launch wireless broadband service in the 2 GHz band is meeting resistance from wireless carriers, led by CTIA. In a further demonstration of how difficult it will be to bring any new band online for wireless broadband, CTIA said in light of questions that have arisen over LightSquared’s network, the FCC should look closely at interference issues before granting a waiver.