FirstNet is kicking off its consultations with state, tribal, territorial and local entities, it said Monday (http://1.usa.gov/18OGlof). The FirstNet board is holding several workshops devoted to consultation and listed the location and dates for several of them on NTIA’s website. Invitations for initial workshops have been sent out, it said. The first will be May 15-16 in Washington, D.C. They'll continue through the end of June. State implementation grant money can go to support these meetings, FirstNet said. “Consultations are an essential step in building working relationships between FirstNet and the thousands of people who are stakeholders in its success,” said FirstNet General Manager Bill D'Agostino in a statement. FirstNet board member Jeff Johnson, a retired fire chief in charge of outreach, described a need to hear from “people on the ground about their coverage and capacity needs” and better determine what assets exist among the states that FirstNet might be able to use. The National Governors Association non-profit Center for Best Practices partnered with FirstNet on the workshops. FirstNet described the first upcoming workshop as a “two-day program beginning with a discussion of the changing nature of public safety since 9/11 and the need for placing next-generation technologies into the hands of first responders,” and said it will feature an update on FirstNet.
USTelecom proposed two additional safeguards that “could be conditions for obtaining Part 32 forbearance,” in a letter to the FCC sent Friday (http://bit.ly/ZLMlgY). On pole attachment agreements under Section 224 of the Communications Act, “any company wishing to avail itself of Part 32 forbearance would commit not to increase overall cost inputs to the FCC pole attachment rate formulae by more than the rate of inflation” for the following three years, the association said. Companies would further “retain the ability to provide financial data depicting existing Part 32 account structures by mapping or deriving such account structures from their GAAP (or successor) financial records,” for the next five years, USTelecom said. More than a year ago, it asked for forbearance from several legacy rules (CD Feb 17/11 p14). Some of the “recent attention” in the proceeding has focused on Part 32, USTelecom said. That’s the commission’s “arcane uniform system of accounting that still applies to price cap carriers even though none remain subject to cost-based regulation,” it said. USTelecom members have committed to file the “same pole attachment cost report” that they do now, and “continue to record or track transactions” in a “reasonable, auditable way,” it said. USTelecom “strongly” disagrees that additional protections are necessary to “ensure a smooth transition” if forbearance relief were granted, it said. USTelecom’s petition gives the FCC an “opportunity to respond to President [Barack] Obama’s directive to eliminate regulations that are ‘outmoded’ and ‘excessively burdensome,'” the association said.
The FCC renewed the license of Fox-owned WUTB Baltimore, over the objections of a group (CD Aug 23 p14) that had asked the agency to deny the petition based on news reports of the News Corp. wiretapping scandal in the U.K. According to the bureau order Monday granting the renewal (http://bit.ly/YAI29y), Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics In Washington had submitted news clippings and other reports about the allegations against News Corp. as evidence the Fox parent company “and Rupert Murdoch, and by extension Fox, lack the character to hold a broadcast license under [FCC] rules and policies.” The bureau said news reports “are not the equivalent of statements supported by affidavits made by individuals with personal knowledge of the facts alleged” and that the accusations against Fox were still undecided and part of an ongoing investigation in another legal system. “The Commission is traditionally reluctant to consider unadjudicated, non-communications matters,” said the order. “We believe this approach is particularly appropriate where, as here, the primary misconduct that has been alleged did not take place in the United States."
FCC Auction 94 has ended. Fifty-five bidders for a total of $4.1 million net won 93 FM construction permits (CPs). FCC figures (http://fcc.us/12NDDzz) showed 19 CPs were held back by the agency, less than the 25 that garnered no bids beyond the minimum earlier in the auction (CD April 30 p1). “Plenty of happy bidders are now presumably basking in the warm auction afterglow,” wrote Fletcher Heald auction lawyer Raymond Quianzon on the law firm’s blog (http://bit.ly/16cv4S9). “Successful bidders in Auction 94 were, in many instances, able to snatch up permits for bargain-basement prices. It’s a buyer’s market out there."
Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., introduced legislation Monday he said would expand a Patent and Trademark Office (PTO) review program and curb abuses by patent assertion entities, which he referred to as “patent trolls.” The Patent Quality Improvement Act would expand and make permanent the temporary Schumer-Sen. Jon Kyl, R-Ariz., program included in Section 18 of the America Invents Act (AIA). The program established a post-patent grant review process conducted by PTO experts and allows a petitioner to request a PTO review of a covered patent. The program, which deals with business method patents related to financial products and services, would expand to include more technology start-up companies. About 20 patents have been challenged through the PTO review system since AIA took effect, the Democratic Policy & Communications Center, of which Schumer is chairman. A spokesman for the center said the legislation has not yet been assigned a bill number, and is likely to be referred to the Senate Judiciary Committee. The PTO review system gives patent holders and accused patent infringers an alternative to the court system, deterring patent trolls by offering a “cost-effective option to knock out bad patents,” the center said in a news release. The legislation would “make it easier for companies to fight back against frivolous lawsuits” by PAEs, said CEA President Gary Shapiro Monday in a statement. “By enabling defendants to seek review of a patent’s validity, the bill creates a quick cost-effective alternative to litigation.” The bill, when combined with the Saving High-Tech Innovators from Egregious Legal Disputes Act (HR-845), will help “drive patent trolls back under the bridge,” Shapiro said.
Perceptions about how stations will be scored in the spectrum incentive auction are keeping them from committing to participate, the Expanding Opportunities for Broadcasters Coalition told agency staff, according to an ex-parte (http://bit.ly/16crSGb) filing Monday. The commission has offered no “objective basis” for deciding the price stations will receive for their spectrum, said EOBC Executive Director Preston Padden. “Many broadcasters continue to perceive the specter of scoring based on some arbitrary factors as a real possibility, and this is driving stations away from the auction.” Padden also spoke against a proposed requirement for stations planning to channel share to “place a city grade signal over their community of license” which he said unnecessarily restricts the stations that would be able to share. Padden said the FCC “should be encouraging stations to surrender their channels and channel share, not erecting barriers to this potentially attractive mechanism for participation.”
LIN Media will use TVUPack mobile cellular uplink technology at its 43 TV stations and seven digital channels, the two companies said Monday (http://bit.ly/10k3HhD). The broadcaster will also use TVUPack’s TVU Grid tech for sharing video between stations and IP-based distribution, switching and routing.
CTIA raised questions about a proposed FCC requirement that public safety answering points must provide bounceback messages for 911 calls in cases where they normally can handle emergency texts but are unable to for a given period. The FCC is set to take up an order at its meeting Thursday requiring all wireless carriers and providers of interconnected text message services to give consumers automatic bounceback messages by Sept. 30 when they try to send a text message to a 911 call center that isn’t capable of handling texts. Major carriers must be able to transmit bounceback messages by June 30 under an agreement reached last year between the four major national carriers, the National Emergency Number Association and the Association of Public-Safety Communications Officials (CD Dec 10 p1). One issue that hasn’t been part of public discussions is the PSAP requirement, the subject of recent meetings between CTIA and FCC officials, said an ex parte filing (http://bit.ly/10CoVpM). The mandate isn’t necessary, CTIA said. “The concept of providing PSAP initiated bounce back messages was not previously considered as part of the Carrier-NENA-APCO voluntary agreement,” the group said. “Even if the Commission does require a PSAP initiated bounce back messages, CTIA and the wireless participants noted that a standard method should be developed in order to avoid diverting critical PSAP resources when such bounce back messages are necessary.” CTIA said the requirement would apparently kick in only when “1) the wireless provider offers text-to-911 services to its subscribers, 2) the appropriate PSAP has requested and is accepting such text-to-911 messages sent from wireless subscribers, and 3) the PSAP, at that point in time, determines that the PSAP can no longer accept or process text-to-911 messages and requests that a wireless provider send a bounce back message to its subscribers.” Commission officials noted in December that it will likely be many years before most PSAPs are capable of handling emergency texts to 911 (CD Dec 13 p12).
Astrium seeks authority to add 3,500 antennas to its call sign KA313 license authorization. It plans to provide earth station on vessel service, it said in its application to the FCC International Bureau (http://bit.ly/18OvHOo). Astrium wants to use seven different models of antennas and is seeking 500 of each model, said the application.
Astrium will offer Yahsat’s military Ka-band service to the U.S. government. The service from United Arab Emirates-based Yahsat allows any U.S. government end user to use the Ka-band capacity “that is compatible with the Widespread Global Satellite constellation for greater global coverage and reliability,” Astrium said in a press release (http://bit.ly/YAyPy5). Astrium will provide end-to-end services in order to meet Defense Department requirements on contract vehicles, it said.