The post-incentive auction repacking’s recent cash infusion, construction process and looming phase deadlines are expected to dominate discussions at the NAB Show, which begins Saturday, broadcasters and their legal representatives said in interviews. NAB expects attendance to approach 100,000, a spokesman said. Exhibitions will feature about 1,700 companies, including 244 first-timers, the association said.
President Donald Trump tweeted in support of Sinclair Monday after the company was widely criticized for requiring anchors to read a script condemning fake news. “So funny to watch Fake News Networks, among the most dishonest groups of people I have ever dealt with, criticize Sinclair Broadcasting for being biased,” Trump tweeted. “Sinclair is far superior to CNN and even more Fake NBC, which is a total joke.”
Broadcast industry officials see the recent seizure of a pirate radio operator’s equipment as a positive sign that the FCC is increasing its enforcement efforts against unlicensed operators (see 1803280049), but the existence of the pirate stations can be a reaction to a lack of diversity and localism in radio, a person affiliated with one of the stations involved in the seizure told us. The listeners of pirate station Big City FM won’t start listening to other Boston-area stations now that Big City is shut down, because those licensed stations don’t offer diverse or local voices, the unlicensed-affiliated person said. “I understand the need for diversity, but there’s other ways to provide that rather than stepping on [the Emergency Alert System],” said Massachusetts Broadcasters Association Executive Director Jordan Walton in an interview.
The FCC could release some basic plans about disbursement of new repacking reimbursement funds approved by Congress (see 1803230038) by the April 7 NAB Show, broadcast attorneys and industry officials told us. The agency will have to create new procedures and issue documents such as cost catalogs for reimbursing radio, low-power TV (LPTV) and translators, so any information would likely be very preliminary, they said. The addition of $350 million could also affect the upcoming second allocation of reimbursement funds for full-power stations, attorneys said.
The FCC’s advisory committee on diversity unanimously approved a broadcast incubator proposal Tuesday based on congressionally authorized tax credits, immediately after Commissioner Mike O’Rielly urged them not to. The Advisory Committee on Diversity and Digital Empowerment also unanimously approved plans for a diversity in procurement workshop with the Office of Communications Business Opportunities, and a series of meetings with tech companies to create diversity best practices for the industry. The committee’s incubator proposal will be filed as comments in docket 17-289, the agency’s incubator proceeding.
The FCC shouldn’t eliminate requirements that broadcasters send hard copies of contract documents to the agency without also requiring that all such documents be posted in broadcasters’ online public files, commented the American Cable Association and said interest groups including Common Cause, the Communications Workers of America and Media Alliance. The comments in docket 18-4 responded to an NPRM (see Notebook at end of [Ref:1801300026]). The NPRM proposed allowing broadcasters to provide in their online public files lists of some contract documents that could be made available on request. ACA and the interest groups said that’s insufficient for documents on ownership. Eliminating the contract rule “without making certain corresponding changes to the public file rules will result in less transparency" on broadcasters’ ownership-related contracts, ACA said. The FCC should require copies of all such documents to be included in broadcaster public files within 30 days of their execution, the interest group filing said. ACA and the groups said broadcasters could redact sensitive data in such filings, but the FCC should allow only data that's confidential or proprietary to be redacted. The agency should allow interested parties to oppose specific redactions, ACA said. The only other comment, from America’s Public Television Stations, CPB and PBS, supported the FCC proposal: “Elimination of the paper copy filing requirement will reduce regulatory burdens on broadcasters (and save paper) without impact on the FCC’s or the public’s ability to review such documents.”
Broadcasters “have made no substantive case” that letting them use vacant channels for the ATSC 3.0 transition would benefit the public interest, Microsoft replied Wednesday in docket 16-142. Broadcaster arguments that unlicensed uses don’t have guaranteed access to spectrum are “a distraction,” Microsoft said. “No prospective user is entitled to use spectrum for which it does not yet hold a license.” The FCC isn’t being asked to give white space users interference protection from broadcasters, Microsoft said. “It is being asked to grant new spectrum to companies that have said they don’t need it,” the company said, referring to the broadcasters. The Dynamic Spectrum Alliance agreed, saying allowing broadcasters to use vacant channels would “diminish” prospects for white space devices “as the uncertainty over the ‘temporary’ nature of the dedicated transition channels will chill large-scale investments.” The FCC should “hold the line” on simulcast rules, NCTA said. With 3.0 authorized, broadcasters “insist on generous waivers of the requirements codifying their promises,” NCTA said. “The simulcasting rules are already excessively generous to broadcasters at viewers’ expense.” NCTA took aim at noncommercial stations’ request for a blanket simulcasting waiver, urging the FCC to deny it. PBS, America’s Public Television Stations and the CPB said the agency shouldn’t delay granting the blanket waiver because NCEs aren’t often located near prospective simulcasting partners. “It is precisely in those areas with few over-the-air options that it makes sense to preserve, not reduce, the number of viewable -- i.e., ATSC 1.0 -- signals,” NCTA said. NAB, One Media, the American Cable Association and interest groups including Public Knowledge also commented (see 1803210025).
Broadcasters seeking to use vacant channels for the ATSC 3.0 transition are attempting to “squat” on free spectrum, said Consumers Union, Public Knowledge and the New America Foundation's Open Technology Institute in replies in FCC docket 16-142 Tuesday on a Further NPRM on the new standard (see 1802210064). Allowing temporary use of the vacant channels “will trigger a lobbying frenzy to make the giveaway permanent,” the groups said. That claim is “nonsense,” said One Media. “The use would be temporary in the same way the second simulcast digital channel provided to broadcasters during the analog-to-digital conversion was temporary.” Special temporary authority process would govern channel provision, ensuring temporary use, Pearl said. Mutually exclusive applications for vacant channels during the switch will be unlikely because broadcasters will coordinate with each other, but would be resolved with auctions as the rules require, NAB said. Giving broadcasters access to vacant channels “is not necessary at this time to protect consumers and it comes at a high cost,” said the interest groups. The vacant channels will let stations maintain signal quality during the transition, NAB said. “Any party claiming to be concerned about consumer protection during the Next Gen deployment should support the use of vacant channels as a concrete step that may help to minimize disruption of service.” Granting broadcasters' vacant channel request will impose costs on MVPDs, the interest groups said. “If the broadcaster‘s 1.0 signal is transferred to a transmitter other than one that is already transmitting a broadcast signal being carried by the cable system, the cable operator would need to purchase and install new receiving equipment.” The broadcaster entities also said the FCC should be flexible in granting waivers of the 3.0 simulcast requirements, and Pearl said the agency should grant blanket waivers for noncommercial and Class A stations. “Implementing this exemption would show the Commission’s support for deployment of ATSC 3.0 across the country, particularly in more remote or rural areas,” said Pearl.
The digital divide is the FCC's “top policy priority” and the Connect America Fund reverse auction is “a milestone” in modernizing a key USF program, FCC Chairman Ajit Pai told an American Cable Association conference Wednesday. Pai slammed Title II Communications Act regulation of broadband service, which he said was the result of “Silicon Valley giants” claiming small ISPs such as ACA's members “posed a greater threat to a free and open internet” than Google, Facebook and Twitter.
The growing importance of internet technology issues such as privacy and cybersecurity means traditional regulatory battlegrounds like retransmission consent matter less and less, said NCTA President Michael Powell Tuesday. He used a Media Institute luncheon to expand on his concerns about tech companies (see 1803060022). Consumers and lawmakers are worried about burgeoning tech issues while the telecom industry is “trapped” in outdated fights, Powell said. The issues that “dominate” the attention of lawmakers and the public “all emanate from the internet,” he said. He doesn't expect action from lawmakers or the FCC on retrans anytime soon.