TV providers are “fast-tracking” new search and discovery products on intense competition and to “maximize viewer engagement,” said Chief Product Officer Simon Adams of Gracenote, which launched such a new product. Recommendation offerings rely on traditional genre descriptors such as action, comedy and drama that lack personalization, Gracenote said Thursday and Adams noted to us: TV content providers are bolstering catalogs of original and licensed TV shows and movies and developing voice-driven capabilities to meet changing technology. Genres have been expanded to include mood, theme, scenario and characters, and structured keyword sets for individual shows and movies describe content in progressively more granular terms.
Roku is adding a “premium subscriptions” option to watch either free advertising-supported content or paid premium programs through one interface, said the company Wednesday: Subscriptions will be available from a “wide variety” of content providers, including Epix, Showtime and Starz. An updated mobile app for iOS and Android will soon let users watch the Roku Channel on smartphones or tablets.
A U.S. District Court's finding that Viamedia didn't show evidence that Comcast conditioned providing its interconnect services to MVPDs on their purchase of Comcast ad rep services doesn't square with testimony from Comcast and independent MVPDs, appellant Viamedia said in a docket 18-2852 reply brief (in Pacer) Thursday filed with the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. The only rationale for Comcast's refusal to deal with Viamedia as a rival ad rep services competitor through Comcast-owned interconnects was to eliminate competition, and the lower court's ruling otherwise was incorrect, the appellant said. The filing was in response to Comcast's appellee brief (in Pacer) this month in which it said the lower court was right to find Comcast's not dealing with Viamedia was motivated by valid business purposes of replacing intermediaries.
If the FCC axes only the requirement that cable operators maintain channel lineups in their local offices, it needs to not put a new regulatory obligation on small cable systems to post their channel lineups in their online public inspection files or other government-run databases, the American Cable Association told Media Bureau staffers, according to a docket 17-105 ex parte posting Thursday. Small systems -- not required to maintain online public inspection files -- provide the channel lineup information on their websites and other publicly available platforms, and shouldn't need to face additional record-keeping requirements, it said.
That one needs access to broadband to get DirecTV Now doesn't disqualify the virtual MVPD service from satisfying the LEC test, Charter Communications told FCC Media Bureau Chief Michelle Carey, said a docket 18-283 ex parte posting Monday. It said Congress specified the LEC test can be satisfied by an LEC or affiliate offering video by any means other than DBS. It said Massachusetts and Hawaii have broadband subscription penetration rates of more than 80 percent -- those being the two states where it's seeking an effective competition determination based on DirecTV Now's existence (see 1809170020). It said the LEC test shouldn't have a penetration requirement since Congress didn't extend that effective competition definition to the LEC test. And it said including physical channels in the definition of comparability under the LEC test would be contrary to the lesser burdens of the LEC test.
Today's leased access rules put big administrative and procedural burdens on cable operators that rarely are recouped by the maximum fees operators can charge under the existing implicit rate formula, the American Cable Association told FCC Media Bureau Chief Michelle Carey in a docket 07-42 ex parte meeting recapped in a posting Monday. ACA suggested several routes to reducing the cost of responding to requests for information about leased access, such as the FCC allowing cable operators to determine the rates they can charge for leased access via a uniform, nondiscriminatory "safe harbor" per channel rate card cable operators can use instead of calculating individualized rates. It also suggested cable operators be allowed to calculate leased access rates on a specific date and use those rates for all leased access agreements for the next three years, and that cable operators be allowed to simply affirm whether there's sufficient capacity to accommodate a time slot sought in a request rather than provide information about the total amount of capacity on a cable system. They also should be allowed to provide rates specific to the details of a request instead of a complete schedule of actual full- and part-time leased access rates, it said.
Disruption in the video industry requires traditional pay-TV providers address “sacred cows” in a new way, Parks Associates reported last week. MVPDs that rely exclusively on video services through their managed network “will be left behind,” it said. AT&T, Sky and Orange launched online offerings to stay ahead of the market, but service bundle elements also need to evolve, said the researcher. Data services are a critical component of over-the-top video services, said Parks. Operators often bundle OTT services with broadband, giving them an advantage over pure-play OTT services. The mobile bundle needs to expand beyond data, with mobile video being a differentiator and incremental revenue generator, it said. Cord cutters look for a branded OTT video-on-demand experience beyond live TV, making new bundles of separate live and on-demand OTT services compelling opportunities, it said. Traditional MVPDs need flexibility and adaptability of OTT video services to “remain relevant,” offering new features and quickly improving where needed, the firm said. Friday, the American Cable Association and NCTA didn't comment.
Cable One said its continuing wait, almost three years, to put a fiber link to Payson, Arizona, which is surrounded by the Tonto National Forest, "is a case study in the difficulties working with Federal agencies to build-out fiber to communities located within or near federal lands." Getting National Forest Service OK to send fiber to the city and through another national forest "has been frustratingly slow," the operator said Thursday in FCC docket 17-84. More than a year after the service indicated the project didn't need a complete environmental assessment under the National Environmental Policy Act, it reversed course, the company said. It then did get NEPA leeway, but "the Forest Service was dragging its feet" on a National Historic Preservation Act report, with four versions needed. More recently, the company was told that report was nearing acceptance, and then staff "pushed the timeline for next action to mid-January 2019 at the earliest, after Forest Service staff returned from annual leave." The company thinks at most 12 months should be enough for the 22 involved Forest Service staffers to do the review. It provided the information after company General Counsel Peter Witty met FCC staff Dec. 6, and an aide to Commissioner Brendan Carr asked for any details of such hurdles. The aide didn't comment right away. Such projects "tend to require thorough research, review, and coordination," a Forest Service spokesperson noted Friday.
Deny Charter Communications' petition that the FCC deem it faces effective competition, the Massachusetts Department of Telecommunications and Cable (DTC) continues to ask the commission. Hawaii also opposes the cable company's request (see 1811280027). Charter wants out of local regulation in some Massachusetts franchise areas and in Kauai, Hawaii, citing DirecTV Now (see 1809170020). The DTC wants to clarify the definition of a channel in this instance remains the same as under the LEC effective competition test. There's "no discretion to apply a new, different meaning of channel to the LEC Test’s comparable-programming requirement," the department wrote Thursday in docket 18-283. That test requires an LEC provide at least 12 channels of video programming as "channel" is defined, DTC added. "Charter has not carried its burden of demonstrating that AT&T’s DIRECTV NOW offers channels." Charter declined to comment.
Lines between segments in the smart home market are blurring, especially for telecom companies and ISPs, Strategy Analytics reported Thursday. Large consumer technology brands will push harder into the smart home market in 2019, with a stronger emphasis on services vs. hardware, SA said. The overall smart home market will need to evolve beyond device-centric roots by taking new roads into existing markets such as hardware-as-a-service sales models, it said. Intelligent home emergence “will take time” as it evolves, said analyst Jack Narcotta. Predictions for 2019: Facebook enters the smart home market through the Portal video calling device; Amazon partners with a major U.S. home insurer; Apple launches a lower cost HomePod; eldercare monitoring becomes an important smart home service; and service providers replace individual offerings by blending entertainment and smart home control packages.