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.
FCC Commissioner Jonathan Adelstein questions the wisdom of asking questions about dual-mode phones, he said in a statement on an FCC rulemaking aimed at implementing the Net 911 Act. Adelstein reminded the agency that T-Mobile sought guidance on its dual-mode phone service three years ago. “I note that while there are a number of E911 compliance and policy questions raised by dual-mode mobile commercial mobile radio service/VoIP handsets that use Wi-Fi technology, these issues are more appropriately addressed in a separate proceeding,” he said. Meanwhile, APCO and the National Emergency Number Association said Tuesday in a joint statement that they are pleased with the rulemaking. “We applaud the Commission for its work to ensure that VoIP/911 calls are properly routed to the correct [public safety answering point],” said APCO President Chris Fischer. “We also greatly appreciate the efforts of all of the Commissioners to find solutions for 911 calls from wireless VoIP devices.”
The National Emergency Number Association, APCO and AT&T together proposed revised E-911 location rules. In a Monday letter to FCC Chairman Kevin Martin, the parties said they “worked together to develop technologically feasible compliance measurements that improve the ability of providers to locate customers making calls to 9-1-1 from wireless phones.” The proposal doesn’t compete with a similar one (CD Aug 22 p2) made last week by Verizon Wireless, NENA and APCO, but covers different technologies. AT&T’s proposal relates to tracking via cellphone tower triangulation, whereas Verizon’s involves GPS tracking. The AT&T plan would measure wireless 911 location accuracy at the county level, said AT&T, NENA and APCO. However, “it is not technically feasible for carriers to meet the current accuracy standard in all counties using location accuracy technology currently available,” they said. “Any location accuracy rules that the Commission adopts for carriers that employ network-based solutions must be limited” to metrics and schedules in the group’s proposal, they said. AT&T and other carriers using network-based location solutions “may be expected to deploy handset-based solutions as an overlay to existing network-based solutions in order to meet the more stringent county-level requirements,” the group said. Their proposal would allow network-based carriers to “elect to use a system of blended reporting for their accuracy measurements,” or to report “based solely on the handset-based accuracy standards,” the group said.
The International Longshore & Warehouse Union caucus delegates voted unanimously on August 21, 2008 to send the proposed contract to the membership for their review and vote. (ILWU notice available at http://contract2008.org/.)
Republican conventiongoers will get a “crash course” in social media and mobile Internet platforms Democratic foes have used to “run circles” around them, a convention organizer told us. Debi Jones, a former Netscape, Palm and Microsoft executive, will produce GOP Unconventional, a social media workshop track and Web site focused on the Republican convention in Minneapolis.
The National Emergency Number Association, APCO and Verizon Wireless together proposed revised E-911 location rules with new targets and a new timetable. The rules would apply the same standard to GSM and CDMA networks and allow an exception for heavily forested counties where systems wouldn’t work as well as elsewhere. Industry sources said the plan emerged in talks between public safety groups and the two largest carriers - AT&T and Verizon Wireless -- held at the urging of FCC Chairman Kevin Martin. AT&T didn’t sign on to a letter that Verizon Wireless and the associations filed at the FCC. AT&T is expected to submit a separate letter on the proposal.
The fun and games of previous national political conventions hosted by the TV networks and telecom companies will be lacking next week at the Democratic gathering in Denver and the week after at the Republican get-together in St. Paul, Minnesota. Cited as the reason, besides the economy: Tough new congressional rules on accepting gifts. “We're not doing shit,” said a lobbyist for a Fortune 500 communications company when asked his organizations plans for both conventions. He said his company will send only two executives to each city.
Nearly 100 members of the International Longshore & Warehouse Union Caucus are meeting in San Francisco from August 18 to August 22 to review the Memorandum of Understanding for the new contract that covers longshore workers and marine clerks that ILWU's Negotiating Committee reached with the Pacific Maritime Association on July 28, 2008. At the end of the week, delegates will decide on whether to send the proposed agreement to the rank and file for their consideration and a vote in September. (ILWU notice, available at http://contract2008.org/.)
The Bureau of Industry and Security's Under Secretary of Commerce Mancuso gave a keynote speech on July 30, 2008, in which he discussed the BIS agenda for the final six months of the Bush Administration.
The Food and Drug Administration is announcing the availability of a draft guidance for industry entitled "Control of Residual Solvents in Drug Products Marketed in the United States." To ensure that the FDA considers comments before it begins work on the final version of the guidance, comments should be submitted by October 6, 2008. (FDA notice, D/N FDA-2008-M-0208, FR Pub 08/07/08, available at http://edocket.access.gpo.gov/2008/pdf/E8-18127.pdf.)