Communities across the Empire State should look to Philadelphia’s model of offering municipal broadband access to citizens, N.Y. Attorney Gen. Eliot Spitzer (D) told the Personal Democracy Forum conference in N.Y.C. Mon. The gubernatorial candidate said the problem “isn’t a lack of resources, it’s a lack of imagination and a lack of leadership.”
Communications networks taken down in Hurricane Katrina didn’t succumb to wind and rain but floods and power outages, according to the FCC’s Hurricane Katrina Independent Panel. The body, poised to summarize its 5 months of work in a report due June 15, will tell the Commission a commonly heard analysis: That things really weren’t that bad -- until the levees broke.
The FCC could lose big when the Court of Appeals, D.C., hands down a ruling later this year in a court case filed by the American Council on Education, CompTel and various Internet and education groups, to judge from oral arguments heard Fri. They're challenging how the FCC has applied CALEA to VoIP and other Internet communications.
The satellite industry hailed language deep in a telecom bill by Sen. Stevens (R-Alaska) that would strengthen the satellite industry’s hand in 2 arenas where it claims unique utility: disaster communication and rural broadband deployment. If the bill’s satellite provisions survive conference, “it’s a big win for the satellite industry,” Satellite Industry Assn. (SIA) Exec. Dir. David Cavossa.
Despite widespread publicity after last year’s major storms, on the eve of hurricane season the 8 hurricane-zone states “remain dangerously unprepared for another disaster,” the First Response Coalition said in a report. The document sharpens the focus on the individual states, reviewing efforts of each to build interoperable networks. The report comes as the FCC’s Hurricane Katrina Independent Panel also finishes its report.
Questionable laws and rules bar satellite firms from pursuing market share in dozens of nations, the Satellite Industry Assn. (SIA) said last week. SIA spoke in response to a 2005 Congressional request for a list of nations that sap satellite competition. The FCC is compiling data for a report to Congress on satellite market competition, mandated by a 2005 ORBIT Act amendment. Satellite competitors responded to the query by accusing one another, terrestrial competitors and unnamed foreign nations of anticompetitive behavior -- though EchoStar was blunt enough to take a shot at Canada.
As hurricane season nears, Inmarsat and Mobile Satellite Ventures are flooding the FCC International Bureau and 8th floor with arguments over L-band spectrum where they operate. Recent weeks have brought a flurry of filings and ex parte meetings over authorization of new Inmarsat mobile satellite broadband service BGAN and even provision of some existing Inmarsat services. At issue is the extent to which BGAN and earlier-generation Inmarsat services might affect MSV’s next- gen mobile satellite broadband service, slated for the end of the decade. Debate between the operators has been heated and prolonged. Ultimately, the public may be who pays for the discord, both sides say.
Better data reporting by industry on the state of telecom infrastructure, launch of a national repository for the data and development of federal guidelines for credentialing telephone repair crews are among preliminary recommendations of the FCC’s Hurricane Katrina Independent Panel, disclosed at a meeting of the group Wed. The task force is to file a report on its recommendations at the FCC by June 15.
Courts likely won’t uphold recent FCC indecency rulings, contested by the 4 major networks and affiliates, veteran media attorneys and industry observers said. NBC, CBS, Fox, ABC and affiliates late last week filed actions in multiple federal courts, arguing the Commission violated the First Amendment in labeling certain broadcasts of profanity as “obscene” in a March 15 ruling (CD March 17 p1) in which it also issued a wide variety of fines.
Public TV’s digital emergency alert system (DEAS) is poised for a national rollout, with the “success” of the 2nd phase of a joint pilot by the Assn. of Public TV Stations and the Dept. of Homeland Security (DHS), officials said. After first-phase testing of a national EAS, the pilot is testing how public TV stations can provide “support and enhancement to state and local activations of the alert and warning system,” APTS said. APTS has provided DHS with a national rollout plan that includes cost and schedule estimates and technical options for implementation, an APTS spokeswoman said.