One power company hopes to share its fiber-based alert system to prevent the theft of copper. Adapt IP will help Southern Co. sell its technology, which involves installing multimode fiber cable to safeguard the master ground bar and sound alarms if necessary, it said in a Wednesday release (http://xrl.us/boa4do). Southern Co. is responsible for and uses this system in various parts of its network sites, said Adapt IP. It’s partnering with Southern Co. subsidiary Georgia Power to monetize this non-metallic alarm system, which awaits a patent. Copper theft poses a huge financial and safety threat for everyone from power companies to cell tower operators, Adapt IP said: “Theft deterrents (e.g., painting copper grounds, tin-coated copper, motion sensors, tracing) have been ineffective, and with economic pressure increasing, there has been no sign of the thefts subsiding.” Alarms sound when fiber is broken, it said. Adapt IP can sell the idea as “service/installation product, provide monitoring or simply sell the hardware as a catalog item,” the release said.
Lobbying on FCC media ownership rules continues, as what’s expected to be the final comment cycle (CD Dec 29 p1) before a draft order is recirculated ended Jan. 4. Those seeking more deregulation than is in the draft circulated Nov. 14, including the Newspaper Association of America, reported in docket 09-182 visiting the agency in recent days (http://xrl.us/boa4d8). Meanwhile the National Association of Black Owned Broadcasters and Independent Telephone & Telecommunications Alliance continued seeking more regulation than is in the draft. Commissioner Robert McDowell said Wednesday (http://xrl.us/boa4d4) that the agency shouldn’t limit joint sales agreements, something the draft does for JSAs. (See separate report above in this issue.) Media General wants exemption from any restrictions on JSAs where the station brokering ads for the other broadcaster in the agreement provides local news and information to its partner, CEO George Mahoney wrote in a handwritten letter to an aide to Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel, a copy of which is in the docket (http://xrl.us/boa4va). With the agency “poised to conclude” JSAs “should be deemed attributable ownership stakes,” the commission should “take the additional step of ensuring” that those and any other sharing deals that allow coordinated retransmission consent negotiations for multiple stations in a market don’t “harm competition and consumers,” ITTA told (http://xrl.us/boa4gz) the aide to Rosenworcel. There’s a “complete lack of any potential harm” that “liberalization of the newspaper-broadcast cross-ownership rule” would have on ownership diversity, a lawyer for NAA reported telling an aide to FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski. NABOB Executive Director Jim Winston told Genachowski’s aide of its continued opposition to ownership-rule relaxation without developing a record on the potential impact on ownership opportunities for minorities and women, and said doing so wouldn’t meet the requirements of the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals’ 2011 remand of the last media ownership order (http://xrl.us/boa4f8). It would “be very difficult for a standalone radio station to compete with a radio group of multiple stations in a market if that radio group owner also owned the daily newspaper,” Winston reported a month late that he and other NABOB directors told Commissioner Mignon Clyburn. The draft order has been said to allow common ownership of radio stations and daily newspapers within a market. Because auto advertisers like to buy ads in the automotive sales supplements that dailies run weekly, “it would be very difficult for a standalone station to compete with a combined daily newspaper-radio combination,” Winston and executives from Access.1 Communications, Inner City Broadcasting and Taxi Productions told Clyburn. The notice covered no arguments not made in previous on-time filings by the association, so its lateness didn’t prejudice any party, Winston wrote (http://xrl.us/boa4gt).
Former Reps. Cliff Stearns, R-Fla., and Ed Towns, D-N.Y., will co-chair the New Telecommunications and Internet Policy Taskforce, said the Minority Media and Telecommunications Council (MMTC) Wednesday. Stearns and Towns both were on the House Commerce Committee and its Communications Subcommittee; Towns didn’t run for re-election in 2012 and Stearns lost his primary. The task force will design and advocate for telecom and Internet policy reform, MMTC said. Comprehensive telecom policy reform is “overdue,” Stearns said in a statement. “Since the Telecommunications Act of 1996, technology has evolved rapidly and has converged. On the one hand, technology has been beneficial while our archaic telecom laws are further dividing the nation and preventing a substantial number of Americans from fully participating … in the communications industry.” Congress should be more proactive in updating its telecom laws and infrastructure, Towns said in a statement. “Our taskforce will work … for much-needed communications infrastructure to better serve our citizens when disaster strikes, eliminate the digital divide in communities of color, and eliminate the barriers to entry facing small businesses in the rapidly increasing and lucrative field of telecommunications,” he said. The task force planned its first meeting Wednesday evening as part of an MMTC telecom policy summit in Washington, D.C.
Spectrum experts at T-Mobile, Ericsson and Qualcomm said Tuesday they are open to the idea of sharing spectrum with federal users but said clearing is the best way to alleviate the demand for greater spectrum, during an event hosted by the Federal Communications Bar Association. Steve Sharkey, director of government affairs for technology and engineering policy at T-Mobile, said he is “hopeful” that the company will be able to work out ways to share spectrum with federal agencies. But there “has to be spectrum for the assured and reliable access that customers demand,” he said. Mark Racek, Ericsson’s director of spectrum policy, said he thinks there is a role for spectrum sharing, but “ultimately the clearing and auctioning of spectrum is the clear spectrum policy.” Racek said the government should strive to provide greater clarity for access rights to spectrum use, particularly when it comes to sharing. The spectrum that is most “suitable” for carriers is below 3 MHz, Racek said. “The problem is that that spectrum [band] is most congested [since] the primary user of the band is the federal government.” John Kuzin, senior director of regulatory affairs at Qualcomm, said there are three distinct paths that spectrum policy makers should pursue: first, clear more spectrum for wireless use; second, allow licensed users to share federal spectrum; and third, provide large additional swaths of spectrum at 5 GHz and above for unlicensed use. Financial incentives to relocate or share spectrum are less persuasive to federal users like the Department of Defense, said Peter Tenhula, a senior adviser at NTIA. Agencies “have missions that Congress has authorized them to do, fight wars, make sure planes land safely, catch criminals, fight fires. That is what drives them to do their job. … Until the federal folks get a clear understanding about what is in it for [them] from a mission standpoint … there’s no incentive.” Recent budgetary demands on federal agencies might encourage some federal users to seek spectrum sharing or relocation scenarios, said John Leibovitz, chief of the FCC Wireless Bureau. “You have to think about the cost not in pure dollars but the procurement cost they have to go through.” Leibovitz said the commission is focused on three sharing opportunities, the 1.7 GHz band, the 5 GHz band and the 3.5 GHz band.
NARUC revealed more of its winter meeting agenda Wednesday. Speakers at the Washington, D.C., event Feb. 3-6, include Rep. Greg Walden, R-Ore., chair of the House Commerce Subcommittee on Communications and Technology. “The cross-cutting agenda will feature discussions on cyber security, the state of the electric utility industry, telecommunications legislative policies, electricity and gas interdependencies, restoration of telecommunications services after Hurricane Sandy, and much more,” said the association of state regulators in a release (http://xrl.us/boa4cc). The agenda shows that panel topics will include the access recovery charge, the transition to Next Generation 911 as well as to IP and boundary mapping of the Connect America Fund.
The Q3 2012 inflation factor for cable operators using FCC form 1240 is 2.65 percent, the Media Bureau said in a public notice (http://xrl.us/boa4b8). The inflation factor is calculated based on the Gross National Product Price Index.
AT&T will no longer block use of the FaceTime video calling application for customers with any tiered data plan using a compatible iOS device, the company said Wednesday. In September, public interest groups complained that AT&T was blocking customers from using FaceTime unless they subscribe to one of AT&T’s “Mobile Share” plans (CD Sept 19 p1). “This means iPhone 4S customers with tiered plans will be able to make FaceTime calls over the AT&T cellular network,” the carrier said. “AT&T previously made FaceTime over Cellular available to customers with a Mobile Share plan and those with an LTE device on tiered plans. Of course, FaceTime over Wi-Fi remains available for all customers who have a compatible iPhone or iPad.” “AT&T’s announcement is another step in the right direction,” Free Press said. “It shows once again that the FCC’s Open Internet rules can create more consumer certainty, as they work to give people more choices and freedom in use of their data. Yet as we've made clear all along, the company has no right to block the application in the first place. Until AT&T makes FaceTime available to all of its customers, it is still in violation of the law and the broader principles of Net Neutrality."
The FCC Enforcement Bureau issued a $22,000 fine against Inter Tech FM for marketing FM broadcast transmitters and radio frequency power amplifiers without FCC authorization, an order released Wednesday said (http://xrl.us/boa4a5).
Google is still the top online video destination. It drew nearly 153 million unique viewers to YouTube and its other sites in December, comScore said in its monthly online video rankings. Facebook followed with 58.8 million unique viewers. During the month Americans saw 11.3 billion online video ads -- Google provided almost 2 billion of those, comScore said. BrightRoll delivered another 1.5 billion, though it delivered longer ads than Google, comScore said.
Sprint Nextel said Wednesday it’s expanding its 4G LTE coverage to an additional 28 cities in “coming months.” Those cities are: Albany, Ga.; Anderson, S.C.; Bay City, Mich.; Branson, Mo.; Bremerton/Silverdale, Wash.; Columbus, Ga.; Columbus, Miss.; Decatur, Ala.; Florence/Muscle Shoals, Ala.; Gadsden, Ala.; Gaffney, S.C.; Gettysburg, Pa.; Glasgow, Ky.; Homosassa Springs, Fla.; Hot Springs, Ark.; Lake City, Fla.; Lake Havasu City/Kingman, Ariz.; Midland, Mich.; Nacogdoches, Texas; Opelousas/Eunice, La.; Oxford, Miss.; Paris, Texas; Pittsfield, Mass.; Saginaw, Mich.; Spartanburg, S.C.; The Villages, Fla.; Waycross, Ga.; and Winona, Minn. Sprint’s 4G LTE service, introduced in July, is currently available in 49 cities. The carrier said it plans to expand the service into 200 additional markets as part of its Network Vision plan (http://bit.ly/X8hKUK).