SES seeks authority to expand the coordinated arc, increase power, add emissions and add points of communication for the antenna designated 9M on the E000152 fixed earth station, it said in an application to the FCC International Bureau (http://bit.ly/16RYgwq). SES also seeks to add the 13.75-14.0 GHz frequencies to E000102, it said in a separate application (http://bit.ly/1cFTWWd). It said the company made the request in an amendment to a pending application to modify the E000102 earth station license.

The Enterprise Wireless Alliance offered additional information to the FCC and asked the agency to act on its longstanding reconsideration petition seeking clarification of customer proprietary network information rules. EWA earlier asked the agency to clarify whether non-interconnected Private Mobile Radio Service (PMRS) carriers are telecom carriers under the Communications Act, subject to compliance with CPNI requirements. “The Recon Petition has been pending for over six years and is unopposed. EWA believes the issues raised in it are more than ripe for consideration,” the alliance said (http://bit.ly/13CGngX). “If, as suggested by the intervening FCC action, the FCC does not so classify PMRS carriers, action on the Recon Petition would resolve this issue not only vis-à-vis CPNI but with regard to telecommunications carrier obligations generally. EWA believes the Act is unambiguous in this respect ... but seeks a definitive resolution of this issue so that the obligations of this category of Commission licensee are clearly defined.” More is at stake than just CPNI, EWA said. “This classification has implications as varied as compliance with Accessibility Recordkeeping Compliance requirements and the need to submit the Form 499, Telecommunications Reporting Worksheet. In light of the significance of these requirements and the number of PMRS carriers affected,” the agency should “address this broader issue in response to the Alliance’s Recon Petition or in a separate Declaratory Ruling” and “do so based on the PMRS license classification rather than individualized showings,” said EWA.

California residents shouldn’t opt out of getting AMBER alerts on their cellphones, said Bob Hoever, National Center for Missing and Exploited Children special programs director, in an interview Wednesday. Officials sent out an AMBER alert through cellphones for the first time Aug. 5 (CD Aug 8 p12). When the customers got multiple messages, late messages, messages which later disappeared from their phones or alerts lacking specific information, people wanted to opt out of the service, said Hoever. “Unfortunately, people did not understand what these messages meant and their purpose,” he said. “It’s critically important the public does understand, and we get their eyes and ears if there’s a dangerous situation to help find and rescue that child.” The AMBER alert program relies heavily on public participation, with 676 children rescued to date from the program, said Hoever. Opting out of the system could mean opting out of all emergency alerts for some carriers, which “could be a matter of life or death,” said California Assembly Speaker John Perez during a news conference Monday (http://bit.ly/14EHVKU). The Assembly is in discussions to start an educational campaign with the California Emergency Management Agency to allow the Assembly to fund outreach efforts through savings in its operating budget, said Perez. The Assembly will hold a special hearing this fall to examine additional ways the wireless alert system can “work better in California” and ways the Legislature can “facilitate that happening,” said Perez.

The House Communications Subcommittee will hold a hearing next month on the video market and questions surrounding the Satellite Television Extension and Localism Act, which requires reauthorization by the end of next year. “Whether over the air from local broadcasters, through a paid subscription to a satellite, cable, or fiber provider, or streaming over the Internet, consumers have unprecedented access to view quality video content,” said Chairman Greg Walden, R-Ore., in a written statement Wednesday. “Each of these technologies faces a different regime of laws and regulations that have been developed over the last four decades. The subcommittee will examine whether these laws are still serving the needs of consumers, content creators, broadcasters, and video distributors in the modern communications marketplace.” The subcommittee said it would hold the hearing in September, but its news release (http://1.usa.gov/19ipgFG) didn’t give a date or time. Walden said earlier this summer that he expects a “clean” reauthorization of the act (CD May 24 p8).

The Greater Kansas City Community Foundation created the Kansas City Digital Inclusion Fund, aimed at closing the digital divide, said the foundation in a blog post Wednesday (http://bit.ly/13n7txP). The new fund, with the support of local funders including Google Fiber and the Sprint Foundation, will support local nonprofits and community organizations to help get Kansas City residents online and give them “the skills they need to take full advantage of the Internet’s benefits,” said the foundation. “We hope the new Kansas City Digital Inclusion Fund will spark lots of fresh ideas and collaboration across the community and that digital programs and practices become part of the fabric of various community programs.” Grant applications are due before 5 p.m. CDT Sept. 27, and the recipients will be announced in early November, said the foundation.

The U.K. Office of Communications proposed to authorize the use of earth stations on mobile platforms (ESOMPs) for broadband services on board aircraft, ships and trains. There has been growing interest in the use of ESOMPs in recent years, and several satellite operators are planning to start commercial satellite networks this year and next that support transmitting in the 27.5-30 GHz band and receiving in the 17.3-20.2 GHz band, said Ofcom Thursday in a consultation document (http://xrl.us/bpofb8). It categorized ESOMPs into those mounted on aircraft, those placed on ships and vessels, and those mounted in a land-based vehicle. It proposed to approve all three kinds in U.K. territory that transmit in the frequencies 27.5-27.8185 GHz, 28.4545-28.8265 GHz and 29.4625-30 GHz. The bands aren’t used by terrestrial radio systems in the U.K. and are available for other kinds of satellite earth stations, including permanent earth stations and high-density fixed satellite service, it said. The main proposals are: (1) Radio equipment for land-based ESOMPs should be exempt from licensing. (2) Radio equipment for aircraft and ship ESOMPs should be licensed rather than license-exempt. (3) Aircraft-mounted ESOMPs should be licensed via a variation of the license issued on Ofcom’s behalf by the Civil Aviation Authority, at no extra charge, and licensing of ship-mounted ESOMPs should be done through variation of the ship radio license with no additional fee. Ofcom said it will publish a statement in December, with licensing available for aircraft- and ship-mounted ESOMPs potentially available in early 2014. Comments are due Oct. 10.

The Los Angeles Regional Interoperable Communications System Authority (LA-RICS) will hold a special board meeting Thursday, following FirstNet’s clearance of funding for the program on Tuesday (CD Aug 14 p2). Also Tuesday, LA-RICS issued a request for proposals from vendors to perform and provide work on a public safety broadband network using LTE technology (http://bit.ly/18vyv4t). Proposals must be received before 2 p.m. PDT Sept. 26.

Cablevision’s potential for growth is “permanently and irreparably impaired” by the success of FiOS in its market, said Moffett Research in an email to investors Wednesday. Cablevision’s value is “grossly inflated” and until that changes, it’s unlikely the cable provider could be sold, said analyst Craig Moffett. His conclusions are based on what he said is new data obtained from the U.S. Copyright Office, which shows that FiOS will sustain subscriber growth and have a greater penetration rate than Verizon previously predicted. “Higher penetration for FiOS means bigger losses for its cable competitors,” said Moffett. Because of those higher projections, Moffett compared each cable operator’s overlap with FiOS, and found that Cablevision’s overlap is four times higher than the national average -- “the most overlap with FiOS among publicly traded cable operators.” Charter and Time Warner Cable have the lowest overlap, Moffett said. In markets where cable companies have to compete with FiOS, competition will be “perennially more intense,” and negotiating leverage will be “perennially lessened,” said Moffett.

Microsoft has agreed to launch versions of Seamless’ SEQR mobile payment solution for its Windows 8 and Windows Phone operating systems this year. SEQR will also be integrated into Windows Phone Wallet, Seamless said. SEQR’s inclusion on Windows platforms is “strategically important in order to consolidate the position of Seamless as the leader for mobile payments,” Seamless said. It will also “enable us to reach a larger customer base, said Seamless CEO Peter Fredell in a news release (http://bit.ly/17NTOMr).

T-Mobile’s proposed “dynamic market rule” for limiting bidding in the incentive auction of broadcast TV spectrum won’t work and should not be adopted by the FCC, AT&T said in a report filed at the agency Wednesday (http://bit.ly/19tFy27). AT&T Vice President Joan Marsh explained the carrier’s objection in a blog post (http://bit.ly/1d7U2ni). “The purported advantage of low band spectrum -- that it allows more coverage and better building penetration with fewer cell sites -- has been overtaken by marketplace realities under which capacity not coverage drives network deployment,” Marsh said. “Carriers deploying low band and high band spectrum alike must squeeze as many cell sites as they can into their networks to meet exploding demand for data services.” Marsh also argued that “to the extent this is less the case in rural areas, those areas are not spectrum-constrained and the lower cost of building out low band spectrum in such areas is offset by the higher cost of the spectrum itself.” T-Mobile fired back. “Without adequate competitive safeguards, there is nothing to stop the largest two carriers from walking away with all the 600 MHz low-band spectrum,” said Vice President Kathleen Ham, in an email. “Such an outcome would be bad for consumers and bad for competition in the wireless broadband marketplace. The two dominant carriers already control nearly 80 percent of low-band spectrum. Reasonable spectrum concentration limits at auction, combined with sound auction-design features such as the Dynamic Market Rule, will promote competition, encourage innovation and increase consumer choice, without harming auction revenue.”