Comcast updated the FCC on the amount of news and independent programming carried in Q1, and advised the commission of some errors in a previous quarterly statement. The quarterly cable and reports were one of the requirements created by the commission’s order approving Comcast’s 2011 buy of control in NBCUniversal. The report said 31,346 hours of independent content appeared on the cable networks and the TV stations last quarter, as the stations aired 6,766 hours of informational shows and news. The amount of indie content dropped 13 percent and the amount of news by just over 9 percent from the reported totals from Q4. Tuesday’s filing also included several corrections to the previous quarter’s report. Their latest filing said that in the Q4 report, NBCUniversal overreported its independent programming by 21 hours, while Sprout overreported by 109 hours. However, mun2 underreported 9 hours, meaning a net overreporting of 121 hours. Tuesday’s filing also said Telemundo Houston and Telemundo San Antonio underreported their news and information programming by a total of 54 hours and 45 minutes. The new filing is in docket 10-56 (http://bit.ly/17EJEAN).
KHSL-TV and KNVN-TV, both of Chico, Calif., jointly filed a petition for a waiver of the FCC’s “significantly viewed” rules that limit cable operators from deleting duplicate network programming from nearby stations. CBS affiliate KHSL and NBC affiliate KNVN asked the commission’s Media Bureau to remove KCRA-TV Sacramento and KOVR-TV Stockton from the significantly viewed station list for Chico. According to the petition, KCRA and KOVR are no longer “significantly viewed in the community of Chico” (http://bit.ly/YVdzCy).
Bandwidth.com and Level 3 warned that the “eleventh hour bilateral discussions” between Vonage and the FCC “appear to be focused on developing a Vonage trial geared toward serving Vonage interests,” they said in a Tuesday letter to the FCC (http://bit.ly/17oS5wZ). The FCC is scheduled to vote on an order Thursday that would give Vonage and others a trial period of direct access to numbering resources. Vonage spoke with FCC officials during the Sunshine period, but said the meeting was permitted by statute (CD April 17 p14). “Making last minute calls to the intended recipient of a special waiver is not a transparent manner in which an administrative agency should arrive at reasoned decisions,” said Bandwidth.com and Level 3. Rather than considering “last-minute condition requests by Vonage for its own waiver,” the commission should “set aside the trial concept and conduct an equitable rulemaking,” they said. The CLECs urged the commission to delay the vote “in order to allow concerned parties to fully participate,” because “transparent process has not been followed."
Beltship Management deployed Inmarsat’s FleetBroadband Unlimited service across its fleet of bulk carriers. The product provides Web-based applications “to meet operational requirements and crew communication needs,” Inmarsat said in a news release (http://bit.ly/17FW0bQ). It’s based on AND Group’s IPSignature software platform, which provides full control and visibility of each vessel’s communications and data usage, it said.
Norsat acquired certain business assets and assumed certain liabilities of a U.S. satellite communications systems company for about $530,000. The acquired assets include new products and associated IP, Canada-based Norsat said in a press release (http://bit.ly/17GVhqK). The purchase will allow Norsat to enter new and additional areas within the satellite markets “with solid state power amplifiers, high power block upconverters, SATCOM baseband kits and microsatellite terminals,” it said. The press release did not identify the U.S. company that is selling the assets.
Verizon Wireless has initiated text-to-911 service to eight public safety answering points, and “working with over a dozen others with the objective of voluntarily initiating service in those markets over the next several months,” Verizon said in an FCC filing. The carrier reported on a call between Verizon representatives and FCC officials, to update the commission on the company’s text-to-911 progress (http://bit.ly/Z3mUY3). “Verizon also explained that it has received several inquiries from other PSAPs that have opted not to pursue the matter further this time,” the filing said.
Consumer Electronics Association President Gary Shapiro commended the introduction of the Border Security, Economic Opportunity and Immigration Modernization Act, said a news release Wednesday. The legislation is a “major step forward to address our nation’s shortage of high-skilled workers,” Shapiro said. “CEA believes that enactment of the following policy principles are vital and central to strategic immigration reform: address the current shortage of high-skilled workers by increasing the number of H-1B visas available for high-skilled foreign workers; allow foreign-born, U.S.-educated immigrants to remain in America upon graduation with a science, technology, engineering, or math (STEM) graduate degree; and grant visas to foreign-born entrepreneurs who want to start businesses in the United States, provided they raise sufficient capital and hire American workers,” he said.
Senate Commerce Committee Chairman Jay Rockefeller, D-W.Va., offered an amendment to the Senate gun control legislation to authorize a study of the impact that violent videogames and video programming may have on children, a committee spokesman said Tuesday. The measure mirrors legislation Rockefeller introduced in January called the Violent Content Research Act (S-134). If passed, the amendment would direct the FTC and the FCC to work with the National Academy of Sciences to determine if violent programming and videogames have any harmful effects on children. Rockefeller introduced similar legislation less than a week after the deadly elementary school shooting in Newtown, Conn., but it did not advance before the end of the last Congress. The legislation differs slightly from President Barack Obama’s executive order, which directed the Centers for Disease Control to conduct research into the relationship between videogames, media images and violence (CD Jan 17 p3).
EU governments and lawmakers compromised on new financing and governance rules for satellite navigation systems Galileo and the European Geostationary Navigation Overlay Service (EGNOS), the European Council said Wednesday. The package still needs formal approval by the European Parliament and council, and the amount allocated to the programs can’t be settled until the EU finalizes its next budget, it said. The compromise includes: (1) Adding as an objective the development of applications based on the satellite navigation systems such as chipsets and receivers. (2) Giving the European Commission responsibility for the security of the programs, and for setting the necessary technical specifications and other measures, subject to endorsement by national administrations. (3) Making changes to some other governance provisions, including use of best-practice management techniques. (4) Placing more emphasis on the possibility of extending EGNOS coverage to other regions of the world. The draft regulation sets a budget for 2014-2020 of 6.3 billion euros ($8.3 billion), to be fully funded by the EU, the council said. It defines the satellite navigation systems and programs and the services they will provide, as well a new governance regime that sets strict divisions of tasks among the EC, European Global Navigation Satellite System Agency and European Space Agency. It also establishes rules on public procurement to ensure the widest possible participation throughout the EU and fair competition conditions. Galileo will be an independent European global satellite navigation system that provides five services, the council said. There will be an open service free for users that offers timing and positioning; a commercial service for applications for professional or commercial use requiring higher performance than that of the open service; and a public regulated service that uses strong, encrypted signals and is restricted to government-authorized users. Galileo will also contribute to international search and rescue services by detecting emergency signals, and help integrity monitoring services aimed at users of safety-of-life applications, in cooperation with the U.S. Global Positioning Service. Initial services are expected to be available by 2014-2015, with the entire system fully operational by 2019-2020, the council said.
Ready Wireless, a mobile virtual network operator (MVNO) enabler that powers a multi-carrier wireless platform for resale to wholesale private label customers, said Tuesday it’s now offering real-time smartphone data metering to its MVNO partners through Telespree Communications’ Active Session Monitoring service. The Telespree service monitors a smartphone’s total data usage by time and megabytes, Ready Wireless said. Ready Wireless’s wholesale partners will be able to use the service to better manage their plans and control data usage. When a subscriber’s data plan expires, the service redirects him to a webpage that gives instructions for the purchase of additional data service, Ready Wireless said. Such services are essential given that mobile data traffic is expected to increase 13-fold by 2017, Ready Wireless said (http://prn.to/14tTDdm).