LAS VEGAS -- It was easy to find NAB show attendees skeptical about mobile DTV’s prospects, asking around at the Las Vegas convention that concluded on Thursday. Some said they're frustrated about what they perceive as the lack of progress toward starting a viable business. Executives working on just that said they remain optimistic and that doubters need to be patient. “In less than a year, there have been some truly concrete steps to move the ball forward,” said Fox Senior Vice President Erik Moreno. Along with NBCUniversal’s Salil Dalvi, he runs the Mobile Content Venture (MCV), a joint venture between Fox, NBC and several top station groups. “It’s going to be incremental progress for some time, but it’s real progress,” Moreno said.

The FCC should allow an “appropriate transition” before implementing Universal Service Fund and intercarrier compensation regime reforms, Frontier Chief Legal Officer and former commissioner Kathleen Abernathy told staff in meetings earlier this week. “This transition would ensure stability during the reform and ensure that Frontier can continue investing hundreds of millions of dollars to achieve the Commission’s goal of deploying broadband to rural America,” Abernathy told Commissioner Mignon Clyburn’s adviser Angela Kronenberg, according to an ex parte notice filed on dockets 09-51, 07-135 and others.

OAKLAND, Calif. -- The FCC is co-sponsoring a contest to develop mobile applications based on state and local information to potentially fuel broadband adoption, Chairman Julius Genachowski said Thursday. The Apps for Communities challenge, offering $100,000 in prizes put up by the cosponsoring Knight Foundation, is the first joint government and private contest that aims to convert those not on the Internet into users, through software programs making use of this public information, the sponsors said.

A Belgian court order forcing ISPs to use filtering or blocking to prevent unauthorized downloads violates in principle fundamental rights, European Court of Justice Advocate General (AG) Pedro Cruz Villalon said Thursday in an advisory opinion. Restrictions on Internet users’ rights are permissible only under laws that are accessible, clear and predictable, he said. The opinion isn’t binding, but the ECJ usually follows its advisors’ recommendations. Meanwhile, a French parliamentary panel recommended that the government avoid blocking as much as possible because of its negative side effects.

The House Oversight Committee will call in the FCC for a hearing related to the committee’s investigation into White House visits by FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski, said committee Chairman Darrell Issa, R-Calif. At a book party Wednesday for CEA President Gary Shapiro, Issa told us that the committee would first have a “proper discussion” before moving forward with the hearing. In a letter last month, Issa alleged that Genachowski made 81 visits to the White House between January 2009 and November 2010, timed near events in the FCC’s net neutrality rulemaking.

Dish Network CEO Charlie Ergen likely is still very interested in purchasing bankrupt S-band licensee TerreStar, according to recent filings and interviews with satellite industry executives. Dish outlined its plans to use DBSD’s mobile satellite service (MSS) assets for a mobile spectrum offering in a FCC license transfer application last week (CD April 12 p7). Dish spent a considerable amount of time on how the combined S-band spectrum of DBSD and TerreStar would effect the status quo. Dish is in the process of purchasing DBSD, which is in bankruptcy, and sister company EchoStar holds most of the first lien debt of TerreStar, also in bankruptcy.

Four commenters weighed in on the Paperwork Reduction Act implications of the FCC’s net neutrality order. USTelecom, CTIA, NCTA and the Independent Telephone and Telecommunications Alliance (ITTA) raised questions about the transparency requirements in the rules, saying they should be rejected by the Office of Management and Budget as too burdensome and expensive. A split commission approved the order in December, but it hasn’t been in the Federal Register because of the act’s comment cycles. The Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit has already turned aside a court challenge because the rules have not formally been posted (CD April 5 p1).

Landline services in Florida would no longer come under the state Public Service Commission’s authority if S-1524 becomes law. The bill reflects technological changes and has gained wide industry support, supporters said. But Florida regulators worry that the measure could prevent the state from meeting federal obligations.

The FCC offered clarity on how utilities can show their poles are full and so can’t be used by cable operators, telcos or others to attach equipment at low rates. An order approved by the commissioners and released Wednesday sided with four cable operators in a challenge to an administrative law judge (ALJ) ruling that was brought by a utility in Florida. It resolved a case dating to a 2000 complaint the operators filed against a unit of Southern Co. over whether the company’s Gulf Power utility can charge rates above what cable companies usually pay to use space on thousands of poles in the state. A 2007 ruling by Chief FCC ALJ Richard Sippel, in favor of the cable operators, was upheld by the commission.

A House budget compromise is a victory, not an end to the battle for public broadcasting, facing legislators’ threats to yank all federal funds for it, industry executives said in interviews. The House maintained funding for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting in its final continuing resolution. The final draft of the CR was released Tuesday. While the CPB will receive the remainder of its $445 million for fiscal 2011, $80 million was cut from additional programs. During the last fiscal year, CPB was appropriated $420 million.