The FCC dropped from the Aug. 9 meeting agenda a controversial foreign ownership rule change opposed by Verizon Wireless, Vodafone and Telefonica Internacional USA. Chairman Julius Genachowski pulled an order and declaratory ruling on the International Bureau’s Foreign Ownership Guidelines and the application of section 310(b)(3) of the Communications Act to foreign ownership of common carrier and aeronautical licensees. The item had been circulated two weeks ago for a vote at the meeting.

The House sponsors of last year’s Universal Service Fund overhaul bill support the FCC acting on the industry USF agreement brokered by USTelecom. Rep. Lee Terry, R-Neb., no longer plans to move USF legislation, aide Brad Schweer told us Wednesday. He said that Terry “will now be encouraging the FCC to produce details that reflect suggestions” proposed by the industry group. Terry’s former co-sponsor Rick Boucher agreed that the commission should move forward on its own.

TV stations, having dodged one spectrum bullet, now face longer-term prospects for Congress to pass legislation for the FCC to voluntarily auction some channels. Industry executives said they avoided having Congress authorize the incentive auction (CD Aug 2 p1), in debt-ceiling legislation that President Barack Obama signed Tuesday, through several means. Lobbying on Capitol Hill by state associations, NAB and its corporate members, House Republicans’ concerns about auctioning TV spectrum but not the D block, and GOP legislators’ focus on deficit reduction and not adding government revenue each played a part.

Comcast could offer online TV products to consumers outside its physical footprint through wholesale arrangements with other multichannel video programming distributors, CEO Brian Roberts said on its earnings call Wednesday. Asked whether Comcast would consider introducing new consumer-targeted online video products outside its physical operating footprint, he at first downplayed the idea. “I don’t think there is yet a business model that we have seen that returns to our shareholders where you have relationships with customers in that way outside of our footprint, that we can make money with,” he said.

Regulators should not discount the benefits of the AT&T/T-Mobile deal, House Judiciary Committee Chairman Lamar Smith, R-Texas, said in a letter that circulated Tuesday. Smith sent the letter Monday to Attorney General Eric Holder and FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski. The top Republican on Judiciary disputed recent opposition by Senate Antitrust Subcommittee Chairman Herb Kohl, D-Wis., and some other members (CD July 21 p1). “Unfortunately, they provided you with only one side of the story,” Smith wrote.

The FCC’s E-Rate program needs better rules to define eligibility, improve efficiency and transparency, State E-Rate Coordinators Alliance Chairman Gary Rawson told us. The program is successful, but in a minority of cases, the process is “significantly more complex, frustrating, and ultimately self-defeating,” the group said in an ex parte filing at the FCC.

Charter said it will again court customers most prone to cancelling service and not paying bills, and put more money back into direct-response marketing, after abandoning both strategies for several quarters led to worse-than-expected subscriber results. It will approach those higher-credit-risk customers with a less-expensive and simpler version of its product bundle designed to get them to remain customers and not run up bills they can’t pay, CEO Mike Lovett said on its Q2 earnings teleconference. “The goal is really to drive connects from the high-credit-risk segments” of Charter’s addressable market, he said.

Fiber-to-the-home broadband services well exceeded advertised speeds during peak hours ,and cable and DSL services met advertised speed at least four-fifths of the time, an FCC-sponsored study reported Tuesday. The long-awaited report from broadband speed consultant SamKnows, as expected (CD July 19 p14), found that the 13 Internet providers in the study were meeting or exceeding their advertised speeds: “On average, during peak periods DSL-based services delivered download speeds that were 82 percent of advertised speeds, cable-based services delivered 93 percent of advertised speeds, and fiber-to-the-home services delivered 114 percent of advertised speeds,” SamKnows said. The study was the most extensive broadband speed study the commission ever undertook, it said.

BEVERLY HILLS, Calif. -- As more cable channels opt for reality shows in their lineup, PBS is reasserting its importance as the U.S.’s primary TV and Internet destination for cultural and educational programming, said PBS President Paula Kerger at the summer press tour: “Channels that were supposed to replace PBS by offering history, drama, and arts programming have increasingly turned to reality television and the trend is only accelerating. If the rest of the media continues on its current trajectory, PBS and our stations will be the only enterprise whose sole purpose is to provide content of consequence both nationally and locally to all Americans."

Legislation to keep down the volume of TV ads applies to all spots on TV stations and multichannel video programming distributors, not just what broadcasters and MVPDs originate, the bill’s sponsor and a nonprofit group told us Tuesday. Last year’s Commercial Advertisement Loudness Mitigation Act ought not to be interpreted by the FCC as having such a wide exemption that the industries it’s targeted to aren’t responsible for all ads they carry, said the office of Rep. Anna Eshoo, D-Calif. It pointed to replies from Consumers Union, which made that point.