The FCC rejected an NCTA request to extend comment deadlines in the rulemaking aimed at overhauling its telco-oriented special access regime for business data services (BDS) (see 1604280057). That leaves initial comments due June 28, replies July 26. "Further delay now is unnecessary," said the order in Thursday's Daily Digest and in docket 16-143 that was signed by Wireline Bureau Chief Matt DelNero. "The Commission has set similar comment deadlines in comparably complex proceedings, and we see no need to deviate from that precedent in this instance."

A federal court pushed back the briefing schedule for AT&T challenges to two FCC orders from December 2014 and December 2015 on price-cap telco USF duties (see 1601110036). An order (in Pacer) issued Wednesday by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit granted an unopposed AT&T motion to extend a previous timetable (see 1605170061) due to deadline conflicts faced by the company's counsel. An initial joint brief from petitioners and supporting intervenors is now due July 12; a brief from respondents FCC and DOJ is due Sept. 2; and a joint reply brief from petitioners and supporting intervenors is due Sept. 19. Petitioner AT&T is joined in the challenges by CenturyLink as a petitioner/intervenor and USTelecom as an intervenor. The consolidated case is AT&T v. FCC, No. 15-1038.

USTelecom backed NCTA's request for an FCC extension of comment deadlines in a business data service (BDS) rulemaking, and agreed with the cable group's questioning of commission motives (see 1605130039). "Similar to our own requests for additional time to address the complex and important issues in this proceeding, NCTA’s Motion reflects valid concerns with compressed pleading cycles that seem designed primarily to meet an arbitrary deadline for completing the next phase by the end of the year," said USTelecom's filing Thursday in docket 05-25. "We agree with NCTA that this lends credence to the suggestion that the outcome of this proceeding is predetermined." USTelecom said it and others also need more time to do an independent review of a consultant's white paper that was commissioned by the FCC and attached to a Further NPRM. "Although we are grateful for the FCC’s prompt response to USTelecom’s request for access to additional information used for the analyses in the White Paper, we have since learned that not all of the requested information was provided," the group said. "Our consultants have explained that without the same access to the underlying raw data, they will not be able to replicate the results in the White Paper. Specifically, due to the FCC’s masking of bandwidth for connections of over 1 Gbps, they lack the bandwidth information used in some of the White Paper’s regression specifications. These specifications cannot be replicated. Additionally, they lack the 'proprietary Tom-Tom' data relied upon for certain controls at the ZIP Code level. They do not have adequate information to identify what Tom-Tom data were used or whether these data can be obtained at a reasonable cost." USTelecom also said a comment extension is justified by recent cable company modifications to data they previously submitted. Sprint and other ILEC critics oppose NCTA's request for extending the initial June 28 comment deadline by at least 45 days and a July 26 reply comment deadline by at least 30 days (see 1605180028 and 1605200061).

Cable is lining up behind a joint NCTA/American Cable Association FCC petition seeking approval for emailing customers such information as instructions and services offered (see 1603080052). The proposal is "a no brainer," one lawyer with cable clients told us. The attorney said it remains to be seen whether the FCC moves on it quickly -- perhaps as a bone to throw the cable industry, which has heavily criticized Chairman Tom Wheeler of late (see 1605200037) -- or slowly -- because it has so much else on its plate.

The FTC said having separate privacy rules for broadband providers is not an “optimal” situation, in comments filed as expected (see 1605260051) at the FCC Friday. The comments were written by the staff of the Consumer Protection Bureau. Meanwhile, CTIA, NCTA and USTelecom jointly filed a study attacking the agency’s privacy proposal. Written by constitutional scholar Laurence Tribe, it said the rules would violate First Amendment protections of free speech.

The FCC released the Connect America Fund Phase II auction item Thursday that it adopted Wednesday on a 4-1 vote, with Commissioner Mike O'Rielly partially dissenting (see 1605250046). The 164-page text spells out complex details of its order setting a framework for the subsidy auction and a Further NPRM on certain specifics to be decided later, including the "weights" to be assigned different broadband service tiers that could be offered by bidders. "All things considered, we value higher speeds over lower speeds, higher usage allowances over lower usage allowances, and lower latency over higher latency," the commission said.

Telecom relay service providers objected to proposed changes in their compensation, particularly a possible shift from market-based to cost-based rates. Meanwhile, USTelecom voiced renewed concerns about the TRS contribution system funding the communications program for people with hearing and speech disabilities. Parties filed comments Tuesday in docket 10-51 responding to an FCC notice on the recommendations of TRS administrator Rolka Loube Associates for the funding year beginning July 1 (see 1605100030).

The FCC approved revised network outage reporting rules and a Further NPRM that would extend reporting requirements to broadband providers (see 1605050053). Commissioners Mike O’Rielly and Ajit Pai partially dissented. Pai said the FCC is bent on imposing “regulation for its own sake.”

The FCC should ensure that efforts to streamline international licensing and other authorizations actually accomplish that, said industry parties reacting to an NTIA letter suggesting commission process changes to facilitate executive branch reviews (see 1605120035). Parties voiced concern that the administration's proposal for the FCC to require certain applicants to provide more information upfront is overly broad and could add to industry burdens. They said the FCC should issue an NPRM that proposes specific time frames and other steps to streamline its international reviews, which are coordinated with the executive branch's "Team Telecom" on national security, law enforcement and other issues. Comments on an FCC public notice teeing up the NTIA letter were posted in docket 16-155 Monday and Tuesday.

The FCC is overlooking and even undermining broadband network investment that spurs "real" competition and improvements in business data services (BDS), USTelecom said Monday. "More regulation to promote fake competition may be coming," wrote Diane Holland, vice president-law and policy, in a blog post headlined "What About Investment, Investment, Investment?" Holland said questions in a Further NPRM in docket 05-25 (see 1605030001) focus on the quantity and type of regulations needed to achieve the commission's stated objectives regarding competition, a technology-neutral framework, technology transitions and flexible regulation. "But there’s a glaring omission from that list: ensuring that providers keep investing in broadband infrastructure. Only facilities-based competition is real, sustainable competition," she wrote. Noting the FCC decision over a decade ago to focus on facilities-based competition in limiting wholesale "unbundling" discounts, Holland said the current commission had "seemingly all but abandoned increasing investment as a primary goal." She acknowledged the FNPRM mentions investment and technology transitions that implicate investment. "But the FCC’s tepid nod to increasing investment as if it would be a nicety rather than a central and essential component is alarming, and disheartening to the scores of providers that have prioritized investment over short-term profits," she wrote. Holland said "fake" competition is "built on a subsidized leasing house of cards" that is unsustainable. She said the FNPRM made "stunning prejudgments" suggestive of that course, "doubling down on accommodating competitive providers" relying on others' facilities rather than their own, which "removes incentives to invest." And she wrote the FCC finding that "best efforts" cable doesn't seems to be a competitive BDS substitute "sets the stage for finding a widespread lack of BDS competition, a necessary precursor to more regulation." She said "real competition and increased investment" are interdependent, not mutually exclusive. An FCC spokesman emailed: “The proposed framework envisions minimal regulation in markets where competition for broadband data services exists, which will preserve incentives for facilities-based investment. In markets where competition does not exist, the goal would be to ensure that businesses and institutions that rely on business data services -- including wireless providers -- can still compete and innovate, which will in fact encourage investment.”