Former NTIA Administrator Larry Irving, a Democrat, said Wednesday the Obama White House needs to provide a bigger push to get various government agencies, from the Department of Defense down, to come to the table to discuss clearing government spectrum for wireless broadband. Irving, the longest-serving NTIA administrator, who worked for President Bill Clinton, said just talking about spectrum isn’t enough. Irving was the lead speaker at an event sponsored by the New America Foundation’s Open Technology Institute, Public Knowledge, and the Rutgers School of Law/Camden: Institute for Information Policy & Law.
BOSTON -- State telecom regulators took a largely dim view of the FCC’s ability to regulate state and local policy matters, as they grappled with the potential components of a prospective 2013 Telecom Act. Speaking on a Cable Show panel on public utility commissions late Tuesday, state regulators generally agreed that any proposed broad new telecom law should have the FCC set fewer specific rules while allowing them more leeway to regulate local issues as they see fit. Speaking earlier at the conference, aides to legislators had said the 1996 Telecom Act may be updated, though it could take years (CD May 22 p5).
Verizon Wireless defended its track record on the 700 MHz A and B block licenses it bought in a 2008 auction, but has yet to build out, responding to a series of questions posed by Wireless Bureau Chief Rick Kaplan in a May 15 letter (CD May 16 p1). Verizon has said it will sell the licenses, but only if it’s permitted to acquire AWS licenses from SpectrumCo and Cox (CD April 19 p1). Kaplan noted that the build out deadline for the licenses is June 2013 and asked what steps Verizon has taken and about the company’s timetable.
The White House pushed a new federal initiative Wednesday to make government information more accessible through open source mobile applications that deliver federal data to citizens’ mobile devices. Led by federal Chief Information Officer Steven VanRoekel, the administration’s digital government strategy (http://xrl.us/bm865p) will require each federal agency to make at least two of its services available to citizens on mobile devices within 12 months.
BOSTON -- Cable technologists are pushing operators to keep accelerating the pace of change and innovation to cope with rapidly shifting consumer trends and match moves by rivals. Top technologists from Comcast, Cox Communications, Mediacom, Rogers Communications and Time Warner Cable urged cable operators to continue developing and deploying new video products and apps quicker to keep pace in the emerging multi-screen universe. Speaking at The Cable Show this week, they urged operators to build out their new video platforms quicker to attract fresh funding, partners and subscribers.
Media companies are willing to bet on the long-term value of sports programming rights, a testament to their belief that such programming will remain valuable even as TV viewing habits change, programming executives told the Cable Show in Boston Wednesday. “Anybody who thinks they understand how to figure out what the rights are going to be worth in 2026 or 2022 really has no idea,” said John Skipper, president of ESPN and co-chairman of Disney Media Networks. “But what we will make a bet on is the value of sports rights will continue to appreciate,” he said.
A VoIP provider in Florida filed the first formal complaint at the FCC over what the company claims is a violation of the commission’s 2010 net neutrality rules, which took effect late last year. The complaint was filed by L2Networks against the Albany Water Gas & Light Commission, a municipally owned utility in Georgia.
Money in politics, corruption, misinformation, and legislation “with ominous titles” have all acted as barriers to effective municipal broadband, panelists said Tuesday at the Freedom to Connect conference in Silver Spring, Md. The result is limited speed and adoption, and higher prices, keeping the U.S. out of the top echelon of developed countries with ubiquitous and speedy broadband, they said.
The term “second screen” means many different things to different people in the TV industry, Matt Murphy, senior vice president-digital video distribution for Disney and ESPN Networks, said at the NCTA convention Tuesday. That fact could not have been more apparent during the series of presentations webcast live from the trade show in Boston, as executive after executive gave his or her own take on the technology. For some it’s delivering traditional TV programming to new devices, such as iPads and smartphones. For others, it’s using those devices to let viewers interact with TV programming and ads without interfering with the programming on a main TV. For others still, it seemed to mean allowing media companies to tap into the vast stream of data being created by users talking about TV on social media.
Low power FM entities clashed with full-power broadcasters on second-adjacent waivers and LPFM proposals for a 50-watt LPFM service and high-powered 250-watt LPFM stations, in reply comments filed in docket 99-25. Replies on the report and order aimed at implementing the Local Community Radio Act were due Monday.