FiberTower asked the FCC to overturn a November Wireless Bureau order saying the company had not met the substantial service requirements for 94 of its 24 GHz Digital Electronic Message Service licenses and 595 of its 39 GHz licenses, and that these licenses automatically terminated June 1. Last week, FiberTower asked the bureau for an emergency stay of the order (CD Dec 6 p 18). “The Wireless Bureau erred as a matter of law and policy in denying FiberTower’s request for a brief extension of time or waiver of the Commission’s 24 and 39 GHz substantial service rules,” FiberTower said. “The Bureau’s unfortunate and perplexing decision has forced FiberTower … to commence the wind-down and liquidation of its business and discontinue service to the nation’s largest wireless operators, several local public safety agencies and a large number of critically important federal agencies. It has caused significant disruption throughout the wireless ecosystem, forcing FiberTower, its customers and spectrum lessees to scramble frenetically to find viable alternatives.” FiberTower, which filed for bankruptcy, has already announced plans to discontinue service by April 30.
All of Globalstar’s satellites scheduled for a February launch have reached the Kazakhstan launch site. When they're deployed, the satellites will restore full service to Globalstar’s customers and the company will be positioned to offer “the world’s most extensive lineup of highly reliable and lowest priced mobile satellite services to the broadest range of customers around the globe,” it said in a news release (http://xrl.us/bn5ppn).
Apple offered its views on a further notice of proposed rulemaking on text-to-911 set for a vote at Wednesday’s FCC meeting in calls with staff for the commissioners, according to an ex parte filing. Apple was represented by Paul Margie of Wiltshire Grannis. “I suggested that, in addition to considering the important jurisdictional and technical questions concerning the application of any FCC text-to-911 rules to over-the-top texting mechanisms, the Commission should also make explicit in its forthcoming Further Notice of Proposed Ru1emaking that any proposed definition of covered applications includes only software that: (1) is installed on a device that determines the user’s location using a technology that meets the enhanced 911 requirements set forth in 47 C.F.R. § 20.18(h); and (2) independently enables the user to send text-based messages to and receive text-based messages from any valid North American Numbering Plan telephone number via the short message service protocol,” the filing said (http://xrl.us/bn5phb).
New York’s USF proceedings involving intrastate access charge issues will continue without turning to litigation for now. The state’s Public Service Commission Administrative Law Judge Howard Jack ruled Friday that the PSC will consider a Verizon proposal for resolving issues, with statements in support or opposition due Jan. 4 and reply comments due Jan. 18 (http://xrl.us/bn5pdq). The dispute has centered on whether various stakeholders would be able to resolve what the PSC called “Phase III” intrastate access charge issues in its creation of a $17-million state USF, adopted in August (CD Aug 17 p9). In recent months, AT&T, Sprint Nextel and T-Mobile resisted settling unresolved issues without litigation, and consequently, the PSC set up a litigation prehearing in late November. Verizon and other signatories submitted a joint proposal a little over a week before that conference date (http://xrl.us/bn5pdo). This proposal “would conclude that further action on intrastate access charges in New York is not warranted at this time, pending further FCC action addressing the switched access issues identified” in an FCC further notice of proposed rulemaking, Jack said, nor would it affect New York’s targeted accessibility fund for now. Verizon and other stakeholders want the proposal considered before moving to litigation, but “AT&T continued to insist that the litigation stage of Phase III has been triggered” and suggested a litigation schedule, the ruling said. Jack said he anticipates that a litigation track would mean “further effort to reform access charges will be put off for as much as another year and a half” and opted for direct PSC consideration of the proposal first.
Alaska Communications Systems CEO Anand Vadapalli and others from the company met with FCC officials last week to explain what they see as the competitive benefits of the company’s proposal to merge its wireless assets with those of GCI to form the new Alaska Wireless Network joint venture. “ACS explained that the AWN transaction will promote retail competition by allowing ACS and GCI to maintain their existing brands and expand their respective retail service offerings,” said a filing on the meeting (http://xrl.us/bn5pcx). “At the same time, the AWN transaction will enhance the ability of each party to compete against larger national providers, including AT&T, which currently controls more than 50 percent of the wireless market, and Verizon Wireless, which has plans to enter the Alaska market.” The executives met with commissioners Ajit Pai and Jessica Rosenworcel, as well as aides to Chairman Julius Genachowski, plus Wireless Bureau Chief Ruth Milkman and other FCC staff.
Green Mountain Power asked the FCC for a three-month extension of the commission’s Jan. 1 VHF/UHF narrowbanding deadline for private land mobile radio service operations. Green Mountain, which merged with Central Vermont Public Service Corp. in June, is Vermont’s largest electric utility, with about 250,000 customers. “For more than seven years, Green Mountain has worked diligently and in good faith to move its statewide radio system from wideband VHF to a new narrowband network on the 220 MHz band, but through no fault of its own recently encountered an unexpected delay in completing the transition,” the utility said (http://xrl.us/bn5pb6). “Green Mountain requests only a brief extension to test the new equipment and train more than 300 employees to use the new system, which is considerably more complex than the current VHF system. Extending the deadline would ensure that work crews can communicate and respond to power outages caused by Vermont’s severe winter weather."
MetroPCS has a “unique and particularly compelling case for a waiver” of the interim construction obligations for the 700 MHz A-block license the company bought covering Boston and other nearby cities in Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island and Vermont, executives said in a meeting with FCC staff. “MetroPCS outlined for the participants the substantial extent to which the Market is impacted by the 60-mile exclusion zone that must be afforded to Providence-based Channel 51 broadcaster, WJAR,” MetroPCS said in a filing on the meeting (http://xrl.us/bn5pa5). MetroPCS said the WJAR exclusion zone covers about 30 percent of the geography in the market, plus about 80 percent of the market’s population. MetroPCS said the exclusion of the most densely populated area of the market “presents unique challenges to MetroPCS’ business model, which is generally premised on first serving the dense, urban core in a market, and later expanding outward as its customer base in the market grows."
TV remains the dominant platform for home entertainment, but consumers are increasingly streaming content via various devices, Deloitte Consulting Senior Manager Hanish Patel said a recent survey of more than 2,000 U.S. consumers showed. The survey was conducted for his company by an unspecified third party, he said at the Content Protection Summit in Los Angeles. Streaming usage is most heavily done by members of the millennial generation, he said. But tablets are being used for movie streaming by more older consumers than many might expect, he said. For households cancelling paid TV service, 35 percent cited a shifting reliance on Internet and streaming services as the reason, he said. A “significant minority,” 21 percent, said they were considering or already canceled paid TV service, he said. In a separate recent survey of 1,200 U.S. consumers and 1,800 U.S. businesses, Deloitte found that in head-to-head ratings of importance, tablets ranked well below smartphones and laptops. But tablets are “gaining some ground,” said John Sprouse, Deloitte director-technology, media and telecom. Users of laptops and smartphones said the latter device was more important to them, with 52 percent picking smartphones and 48 percent picking laptops. In similar comparisons, 68 percent of laptop and tablet owners picked laptops, while 74 percent of smartphone and tablet owners picked smartphones. Kids and their parents are a key audience for tablets, with 69 percent of households with kids under five allowing those kids to use their parents’ tablets and 91 percent of households with kids 6-17 allowing those kids to use their parents’ laptops, said Sprouse. A growing number of people are experimenting with using tablets as a primary device for accessing content, he said. Many people, for example, are now taking tablets with them on overnight trips instead of laptops, he said.
President Barack Obama signed a bipartisan bill into law Friday to deter online sharing and possession of child pornography. The Child Protection Act (HR-6063) aims to increase penalties for those possessing child porn, give law enforcement officers tools to combat online child porn, and reauthorizes the Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force for five years. The legislation was authored by House Judiciary Committee Chairman Lamar Smith, R-Texas, and Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, D-Fla. The law is a watered-down version of HR-1981, the Protecting Children From Internet Pornographers Act, which sparked bipartisan furor over the its potential impact on consumer privacy and cybersecurity. HR-6063 differs from HR-1981 by omitting the provision that would require ISPs to retain data about consumer browsing habits.