ASPEN, Colo. -- The impending spectrum auctions and electronic communications privacy are likely to be issues this Congress tackles, former members said during a Monday panel hosted by the Technology Policy Institute at its Aspen Forum. The panel included former Reps. Rick Boucher, D-Va., now a partner at Sidley Austin; Cliff Stearns, R-Fla., now a senior adviser at APCO Worldwide; and Thomas Tauke, R-Iowa, formerly an executive vice president at Verizon.
By a 2-1 vote, the FCC adopted an interim prison phone rate cap of 21 cents a minute for debit and pre-paid calls, and 25 cents a minute for collect calls -- reducing the cost of a 15-minute call from as much as $17 to less than $4. “A change has finally come,” said acting FCC Chairwoman Mignon Clyburn. Rates weren’t made as low as the petitioner sought, and the order had aroused controversy within the agency before it was adopted, with Commissioner Ajit Pai dissenting, as expected (CD Aug 9 p1).
Two of the FCC’s three members are concerned about the retransmission consent blackout of CBS programming on Time Warner Cable systems, they said after Friday’s monthly meeting where a satellite streamlining item was adopted. The commission is “actively monitoring the status of this particular dispute” and is in touch with both parties, said Acting FCC Chairwoman Mignon Clyburn at a news conference. “But this is day seven and, quite frankly, I'm deeply disappointed that the parties seem to be unable to reach a retransmission agreement.”
The larger ILECs sparred with smaller companies and associations in reply comments before the FCC this week on the proper classification of Internet Protocol interconnection agreements and how they should factor into any potential technology transition trials. AT&T argued against the need for IP interconnection trials, as did the joint filing from Verizon and Verizon Wireless. Verizon advocated for commercial negotiations of IP interconnection agreements, in contrast to the strong advocacy for the Communications Act Sections 251 and 252 oversight that the CLECs of Comptel backed in their reply comments posted Wednesday (CD Aug 8 p10), as did many other parties in comments posted Thursday.
Groups that support an FCC order that would effectively lower prison phone rates made a last pitch Thursday that the FCC move forward on the order. Commissioner Ajit Pai indicated Wednesday that unless changes were made to the order he would feel compelled to dissent (CD Aug 8 p1). FCC sources said Thursday it appears unlikely there will be a deal with Pai before the Friday meeting. The order effectively caps interstate calling rates at 10-30 cents per minute while teeing up limits for intrastate calls in a further NPRM (CD Aug 2 p4).
Senate Communications Subcommittee Chairman Mark Pryor, D-Ark., said the FCC’s spectrum incentive auction “may slide into 2015,” in an interview for C-SPAN’s The Communicators scheduled to be aired over the weekend. “I'm totally fine with it happening in 2014,” said Pryor, “but I'm hearing rumors that it may not be ready by 2014.” This year both acting FCC Chairwoman Mignon Clyburn and former FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski said publicly that the commission is “on track” to run the spectrum incentive auction in 2014 (CD March 13 p1 and CD May 22 p1). The FCC had no comment Friday.
The White House announcement Thursday that Mike O'Rielly would be the nominee as the next Republican member of the FCC, replacing Robert McDowell (CD Aug 2 p1), was welcomed by most industry associations Friday. In a twist, some industry lobbyists told us they now believe the Senate could move more quickly than expected to confirm O'Rielly and Democrat Tom Wheeler, designated to be the next chairman of the agency. Industry officials also said they're hearing that acting Chairwoman Mignon Clyburn may move the scheduled Sept. 27 FCC meeting to the previous week, which would give her a final meeting as head of the commission and save Wheeler from having to chair a meeting in what could be his first few days at the agency.
Rovi said it restarted patent licensing discussions with Netflix after an International Trade Commission administrative law judge ruled the video streaming service didn’t violate one of four patents at the heart of a 2012 case. But Rovi is prepared to take the case to a federal trial, said CEO Thomas Carson on an earnings call.
The House Commerce Committee plans to mark up an FCC reporting bill beginning at 4 p.m. Tuesday and resuming at 10 a.m. Wednesday. HR-2844, the Federal Communications Commission Consolidated Reporting Act (http://1.usa.gov/1e0uGp8), would require the commission to file quarterly reports to Congress on the state of the telecom marketplace, describe the commission’s two-year agenda to address challenges in the marketplace, and consolidate many of the commission’s other reporting requirements. The House Communications Subcommittee voted to pass the legislation last week along with a revised version of the FCC Process Reform Act (CD July 26 p1). A markup for that bill hasn’t been scheduled. Both bills are similar to FCC reform legislation (HR-3310, HR-3309) that failed to advance last session (CD March 27/12 p1).
Before opening the 5.850-5.925 GHz band for Wi-Fi, as proposed by the FCC in February, the commission should first assemble an advisory panel to look at how unlicensed use of the spectrum will affect dedicated short range communications (DSRC) technologies, said the American Association of State Highway Transportation Officials (AASHTO) in reply comments filed at the FCC. The Intelligent Transportation Society of America said in its comments that the Department of Transportation and original equipment manufacturers have spent hundreds of millions of dollars to make crash-avoidance technologies a reality.