Some small carriers are notifying the FCC they will sit out a new program for sending emergency alerts to cellphones and other wireless devices. Participation in the program, whose existence is mandated by the WARN Act, is voluntary, but carriers must give customers “clear and conspicuous notice” if they elect not to take part. Filings are due Sept. 8, with many more carriers likely to opt out of the alerts, industry sources said Tuesday.
Hurricane Gustav didn’t pack the wallop of Katrina three years ago, and preparation by the government and communications carriers was better than during the earlier storm, officials said Tuesday. So Gustav probably won’t lead to the calls for hardening the communications system that followed Katrina.
Proposed changes to e-communications rules could harm Europe’s satellite sector, European Satellite Operators Association Secretary General Aarti Holla-Maini said Monday in an interview. Amid European Parliament debate over European Commission (EC) plans to revamp the framework for telecommunications regulation, the ESOA has been lobbying “heavily” on several issues, she said. So far, lawmakers appear receptive to only one, she said.
CBP has issued a CSMS message stating that Hurricane Gustav, which came ashore on Monday, September 1, 2008, has affected most of southern Louisiana and coastal areas of Mississippi. Due to the evacuation of CBP personnel in these areas and subsequent damage as a result of the storm, the ports of Gulfport, Mississippi and Gramercy, Lake Charles, Morgan City, and New Orleans, Louisiana were closed on Tuesday, September 2, 2008.
1. LB/LA Ports Notice on Intermodal Container Facility Board Meeting
Creation of internationalized country-code domains could fuel repression of Internet users, Public Interest Registry (.org) CEO Alexa Raad said this week. A worldwide rise in nationalism and a lack of checks on how governments use internationalized domain names (IDNs) could fragment the Net and increase state control of end-users, Raad wrote Tuesday on CircleID, a Web site that tracks Internet infrastructure issues. ICANN is moving toward a process for fast-tracking a limited number of “non-contentious” IDNs (domains in non- Roman script) in country-code top level domains (ccTLDs). But Raad and others said individual users have been left out.
Streaming video provider Move Networks got funding from Microsoft, a new “strategic investor,” as part of its Series C round, Move said without giving a figure. The companies had already agreed to make Move’s platform interoperable with Microsoft’s Silverlight multimedia platform, an emerging rival to Adobe’s Flash and other technologies. Move’s “adaptive streaming technology,” which adjusts video quality based on a user’s available bandwidth, will be available to Silverlight users, and Move customers can use Silverlight “to place unique branding, navigation and other rich interactive elements in and around their Internet television video streams,” said the companies. The companies’ first collaboration is this week’s Democratic National Convention in Denver. They are powering the live streams. Move also supports Windows Server-based encoding, Microsoft codecs and Silverlight DRM through the partnership.
The FCC shouldn’t allow relay providers to forward 911 calls to other providers, Sorenson and other Internet relay providers said in reply comments. Earlier this month, in initial comments on a rulemaking about the FCC 10-digit numbering plan for Internet relay, the National Emergency Number Association said the FCC should require relay providers to forward 911 calls to other providers if they don’t answer in a set period (CD Aug 12 p6). In a reply, AT&T opposed imposing slamming and other new customer privacy rules on relay providers.
The FCC shouldn’t allow relay providers to forward 911 calls to other providers, Sorenson and other Internet relay providers said in reply comments. Earlier this month, in initial comments on a rulemaking about the FCC 10-digit numbering plan for Internet relay, the National Emergency Number Association said the FCC should require relay providers to forward 911 calls to other providers if they don’t answer in a set period. A forwarding requirement would “absolve” understaffed providers “of any responsibility for complying with the rules, and could result in a ‘round robin’ where 911 calls are shuttled multiple times to different providers before being processed,” Sorenson said. Forwarding “goes beyond functional equivalency” required by the Americans with Disabilities Act, GoAmerica said. AT&T opposed a forwarding obligation, too, but for technical reasons. To implement the process, providers “would need to develop a system to exchange information in real-time that will assess the CA [communications assistant] availability of each provider,” the carrier said. “While such a system may be technically feasible, it would be difficult to develop, test, and implement the system” by Dec. 31, the date by which providers must implement the 10-digit numbering system, it said. Meanwhile, AT&T opposed adoption of slamming rules for Internet relay. The rules, endorsed only in initial comments, would protect relay users from unauthorized default provider changes. The FCC didn’t adopt slamming rules on voice carriers until it developed a “substantial record of complaints from consumers,” AT&T said. The FCC hasn’t done the same for Internet relay, it said. “Extending all of the slamming rules to Internet-based TRS providers would be a solution without a problem to resolve.”
Streaming video provider Move Networks got funding from Microsoft, a new “strategic investor,” as part of its Series C round, Move said without giving a figure. The companies had already agreed to make Move’s platform interoperable with Microsoft’s Silverlight multimedia platform, an emerging rival to Adobe’s Flash and other technologies. Move’s “adaptive streaming technology,” which adjusts video quality based on a user’s available bandwidth, will be available to Silverlight users, and Move customers can use Silverlight “to place unique branding, navigation and other rich interactive elements in and around their Internet television video streams,” said the companies. The companies’ first collaboration is this week’s Democratic National Convention in Denver. They are powering the live streams. Move also supports Windows Server-based encoding, Microsoft codecs and Silverlight DRM through the partnership.