Oregon Public Utility Commission staff updated the FCC on recent state developments, as required by the FCC’s waiver of certain Lifeline reform requirements in Oregon. The state commission sponsored a bill in the Oregon Legislature to address relevant “conformance requirements,” it said in a filing to the FCC (http://bit.ly/Z3r6Go). This bill was introduced in January, passed out of the Senate and is now being considered by the Oregon House. Staff is “confident” the bill will pass into law but worried it might not be in time to meet the terms of the limited waiver, which expires April 1. The PUC asked the FCC for “guidance” on whether it should petition for two more months of time to ensure the bill has become law by the time the waiver expires.
A small cable operator in Schuylkill County, Pa., asked the FCC to let it out of Common Alerting Protocol requirements for EAS participants. The cable operator, JB Cable TV, which does not provide Internet service to its subscribers, said it can’t receive a DSL connection at its headend facilities. The company said it will continue to provide traditional EAS alerts (http://bit.ly/YQCmnB).
The FCC Media Bureau is committed to making sure conditions that the agency places on mergers are followed, said Michael Perko, chief of the bureau’s office of communications and industry information, in a letter to Rep. Steve Israel, D-N.Y., released this week (http://bit.ly/14lGDRq). The congressman wanted to know what the FCC is doing to assist the Aloha Station Trust, which was set up when Clear Channel went private in a leveraged buyout to handle its required divestitures and find buyers for the 20 remaining stations it controls. “Please be assured that the Bureau will continue to monitor AST’s efforts to market the stations to potential buyers and, if necessary, will initiate appropriate measure to ensure AST meets its obligations to divest the remaining stations held by the Trust,” Perko wrote.
Outdoor Channel Holdings said it got an unsolicited bid from Kroenke Sports & Entertainment to buy all its outstanding shares for $8.75 a share. If an agreement were to be reached it would be considered a “superior proposal” to the one the company already agreed to on Nov. 15 with InterMedia Outdoor Holdings, it said. “Accordingly, Outdoor Channel’s board has authorized discussions with Kroenke regarding the Alternative Proposal,” it said. Meanwhile, it advised shareholders to take no action. “The board is not withdrawing its recommendation with respect to the InterMedia transaction or proposing to do so, and is not making any recommendation with respect to the Kroenke proposal,” it said. The company’s board also reaffirmed its recommendation that shareholders vote to approve the InterMedia agreement, it said. Outdoor’s shares increased more than 14 percent Monday to $8.65.
Pressure appears to now be off President Barack Obama to appoint the first woman as chair of the FCC after Chairman Julius Genachowski leaves the agency. Obama on Monday nominated two more women to prominent positions -- Gina McCarthy as administrator of the EPA and Sylvia Mathews Burwell to head the Office of Management and Budget, both cabinet-level appointments. Last week Obama designated Edith Ramirez as chair of the FTC. Numerous industry officials told us in recent days former CTIA President Tom Wheeler has emerged as the consensus front runner for chairman, with Karen Kornbluh, ambassador to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, the likely choice if Wheeler’s nomination falters. NTIA Administrator Larry Strickling still remains in the mix, officials said. A top communications lawyer said Wheeler does seem to be the likely choice. “I think there’s some legitimate feel [to the rumor] but sort of with the grain of salt it could just be head fakes,” the lawyer said. “I think there’s a lot less pressure now because [Obama] has appointed more women, there’s no question about that,” said another industry lawyer. Wheeler is the former president of NCTA and CTIA and current chairman of the FCC Technological Advisory Council. He became managing director of Core Capital Partners, a venture capital firm, after leaving the FCC advisory group and is widely considered to be close to Genachowski. “Where, as here, the process is very secretive, there is a tendency to overdo the psychoanalysis,” said communications lawyer Andrew Schwartzman. “Sure, having made a number of female appointments, there may be less pressure to appoint a woman to the FCC. But there are much more important considerations at play, so that may not mean too much.”
The U.S. and U.K. had the heaviest users of mobile data, in the results of an Arbitron survey published Monday. Arbitron said the results were based on data from users in five countries during Q4 -- the others were China, France and Germany. U.S. users averaged nearly 1.5 GB of transmitted data per month over mobile and Wi-Fi networks, while U.K. users averaged almost 1.2 GB per month. Users from Germany came in third with an average of 861 MB per month; users from France averaged 730 MB per month, while users from China averaged 719 MB over that period, Arbitron said. More than half of the data transmitted by users in each nation was sent via Wi-Fi -- users from China transmitted 70 percent via Wi-Fi, the most of any of the surveyed nations; U.S. users transmitted 61 percent of their data via Wi-Fi. Users on iOS-based phones used the most data in each of the five surveyed nations, with an average of between 1.2 and 2.5 GB of transmitted data per month; Android users averaged between 347 and 821 MB per month, Arbitron said (http://bit.ly/15tEW6V).
Broadcasters continued to oppose an FCC plan that would require licensees to report information about their owners and investors that could be tied to a Social Security number. In reply comments to a rulemaking proposal that would change the information the agency collects on its Form 323, broadcasters said requiring stations to report standard FCC Registration Numbers (FRNs) for a broader category of investors would put the industry at a disadvantage to competitors in terms of its access to capital. Moreover, collecting information on individual investors in “single majority shareholder entities” will skew the FCC’s picture of minority ownership in broadcast licenses, the NAB said, endorsing a position taken by other broadcasters earlier in the proceeding. “Compiling data about non-attributable investors as if they were attributable will only muddy the ownership data waters the FCC wishes to clear,” the NAB said (http://bit.ly/163Tmfc). More public broadcasters also lodged their opposition to the proposals. The Detroit Educational TV Foundation said it joined other public broadcast licensees in opposing FRN requirements for noncommercial and educational stations (http://bit.ly/14lA3u6), as did the licensees of the country’s four regional public radio organizations (http://bit.ly/ZaGMEe). The Alabama Educational TV Commission, the Board of Trustees of the University of Alabama, Idaho State Board of Education, and several other universities also opposed the FCC’s proposals (http://bit.ly/ZaH4ed). They said the commission could require a special-use FRN instead of a standard FRN if it wanted to track trends in broadcast license ownership and investment and such FRNs could be “used without creating a disincentive for non-profit board members to serve,” they said.
The FCC should add all Broadband Radio Service/Educational Broadband Service spectrum to the list of bands included under the commission’s spectrum screen, Verizon Wireless said in a letter to the commission. “BRS/EBS spectrum easily meets the Commission’s standard for inclusion in the mobile services spectrum screen: not only is it available, but it is in use,” the carrier said. Verizon pointed to a statement in a recent FCC white paper “The Mobile Broadband Spectrum Challenge: International Comparisons,” released by the agency last week (http://bit.ly/XSgExP). “The White Paper confirms that the full 194 MHz of BRS/EBS spectrum is available for mobile broadband services and thus should be added to the spectrum screen,” the letter said.
The combination of T-Mobile and MetroPCS will be good for competition, a T-Mobile spokesman said in response to a letter by 62 members of Congress asking the FCC to consider the effect on jobs (CD March 4 p6). “The combination of T-Mobile USA and MetroPCS will create a stronger company with the goal of emerging as the country’s leading value carrier, providing much needed competition against the larger established players in the wireless business,” the spokesman said. “While we respect the opinion of the Members of Congress, we believe the record at the FCC clearly demonstrates our transaction is in the public interest, allowing the new company to grow and providing substantial benefits to both U.S. consumers and employees. Importantly, no one opposed our transaction at the FCC on any grounds, and the Commission should move expeditiously to approve our merger."
Comcast, doing limited testing of prepaid broadband, detailed standalone ISP service products as part of complying with an FCC order allowing it to buy control in 2011 of NBCUniversal. The filing posted Friday to docket 10-56 (http://bit.ly/XOPo6J) came a day after the cable operator reported to the agency on steps it’s taking to sell NBCUniversal’s content to online video distributors (CD March 4 p12). And this Tuesday, the company said separately that Executive Vice President David Cohen will discuss at 11 a.m. with reporters Comcast’s Internet Essentials $9.95-month product for poor households to get broadband, and the so-called digital divide. Speeds for some Comcast standalone products, meanwhile, as of Feb. 1 had risen at a quicker rate than their prices, versus their listings in the cable ISP’s 2012 disclosure filing (http://bit.ly/Z3aw9o). In the Washington market, the monthly cost for the Blast service rose 11 percent to $61.95, while the downstream speed doubled to 50 Mbps and upstream more than doubled to 10 Mbps. A 6 Mbps downstream service continues to cost $49.95 monthly, the filings show. Other standalone Internet access products are sold “at reasonable market-based prices, with speeds that correspond to those offered in its retail multi-product offerings in the relevant service area,” the newer filing said. It said Comcast’s “limited” test of a prepaid product in the Philadelphia market has speeds of 3 Mbps/768 kbps and can be bought in 7- or 30-day increments.