The FCC should issue a supplement to its incentive auction rulemaking notice to seek comment on a proposal from the agency’s Diversity Committee for a bidding credit that’s race- and gender-neutral “for those who have overcome substantial disadvantages,” said the Minority Media and Telecommunications Council. “Failing to specifically mention” that proposal “may disable” the commission “from building the record necessary to craft new auction rules” following Section 309(j) of the Spectrum Act’s requirement “to ensure that minority and women-owned businesses have an opportunity to compete for spectrum licenses,” MMTC President David Honig wrote Gary Epstein, an aide to FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski who is a lead official on incentive auction efforts. “The contemplated incentive auctions may present the last great opportunity for minorities and women to acquire a significant foothold in wireless spectrum.” The filing was posted Tuesday in docket 12-268 (http://xrl.us/bn3v6j).
CEA again asked the FCC to change some rules under the 21st Century Communications and Video Accessibility Act so only “video programming players” face Internet Protocol closed captioning requirements instead of all “video player” devices. The association’s “concerns are not limited to narrow classes of camcorders and digital still cameras,” which are “types of consumer electronics equipment [that] are merely examples of the ill effects of the IP Captioning Order’s approach,” a filing said (http://xrl.us/bn3v5t). Digital devices including video baby monitors, security cameras, binoculars and microscopes are among “devices that may be technically capable of playing back ‘video programming’ but are not designed to do so,” CEA Vice President of Regulatory Affairs Julie Kearney wrote. “The Commission cannot properly cure the overbreadth of its current rule by specifically designating the examples identified here as exempt, and it should not be tempted to do so.” The filing posted Tuesday to docket 11-154 is on the association’s April request for the FCC to redo part of this year’s IP captioning order (CD Sept 25 p16).
Comments on requirements to support apparatus like set-top boxes with accessible emergency information for people with problems seeing are due Dec. 18, replies Dec. 28, in docket 12-107, an FCC notice in Wednesday’s Federal Register said (http://xrl.us/bn3v3r). A commission rulemaking notice last month sought comment on accessibility issues for emergency information for subscription-video providers, TV stations and makers of consumer electronics under the 21st Century Communications and Video Accessibility Act (CD Nov 20 p1).
The Copyright Royalty Board adjusted the cost of living adjustment in the royalty rates paid by satellite carriers by 2.2 percent. The new rates will be in effect Jan. 1, the royalty board said in a Federal Register notice (http://xrl.us/bn3r62). The rates for the secondary transmission of broadcast stations by satellite carriers “for private home viewing and viewing in commercial establishments are 27 cents and 54 cents per subscriber per month, respectively,” the notice said.
The CLEC Association of Northern New England asked the Maine Public Utilities Commission to investigate FairPoint’s attempt to “reclassify certain wire centers without complying with the [PUC’s] requirements established,” as the association said in a Monday petition (http://1.usa.gov/UafAES). The telco’s “unilaterally-announced” actions hurt the CLECs’ ability “to obtain unbundled high-capacity loops and transport and dark fiber transport in the reclassified wire centers” under FCC unbundling rules, it said. CLECs would have to pay more for unbundled elements, the association said. It wants the PUC to declare recent FairPoint wire center reclassifications as null and void, prevent FairPoint from increasing rates as a result of that and forbid any FairPoint backbilling based on the reclassified wire center rates. FairPoint declined comment.
Five groups will discuss their opposition to media ownership deregulation in a 1 p.m. Wednesday conference call, asking the FCC to “stop its rush to lift longstanding” limits, one of those organizations said in a news release. Free Press said officials of the group and the Asian American Justice Center, Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, National Hispanic Media Coalition (NHMC) and Newspaper Guild-Communications Workers of America (CWA) will speak. Groups such as those have been asking the commission to seek public comment on broadcast ownership figures released Nov. 14 by the Media Bureau (http://xrl.us/bnzz9y), which show minorities and women own a low share compared to their portion of the U.S. population of radio and TV stations (CD Nov 21 p15). They want such comment solicited before a vote on media ownership rules, subject of a draft order that would allow waivers of a ban on cross-ownership among daily newspapers and TV stations in top-20 markets (CD Nov 23 p5). The bureau data show minorities own 19 TV stations in the 20 largest markets, and none are among the top-four rated that the draft rules would prevent from being cross-owned, nine nonprofits opposed to such waivers reported telling FCC General Counsel Sean Lev and officials from the bureau and office of Chairman Julius Genachowski. “Those stations would be vulnerable to acquisition by newspaper companies not controlled by minorities, just as in the past” when deregulation “resulted inexorably in sales of minority owned stations,” said groups including Free Press, NHMC, Prometheus Radio Project, Media Alliance and United Church of Christ in a filing posted Tuesday to docket 09-182 (http://xrl.us/bn3r64). The National Association of Black Owned Broadcasters said the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals remand last year of the last media ownership order requires the agency to adopt a definition of eligible entities with “a reasonable possibility of improving ownership opportunities for minorities and women before the Commission may relax any of the existing ownership rules.” NABOB Executive Director Jim Winston reported meetings with Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel and an aide to Commissioner Mignon Clyburn (http://xrl.us/bn3r7k). The eligible entity definition in the current draft order targets small businesses (CD Nov 15 p1). Several professors at Howard University are “stunned” the commission will vote on ownership deregulation before there is “adequate review and comment” on the bureau data, they wrote the FCC members. “There was a stated expectation by the Court that future deliberations should involve the use of credible ownership data,” said the letter (http://xrl.us/bn3r7v). Signers included Prof. Carolyn Byerly, who has written the agency before on the Form 323 biennial ownership documents on which the bureau’s data was based.
The Nebraska Public Service Commission no longer wants to opt out of the National Lifeline Accountability Database, it told the FCC. It requested to withdraw its October opt-out petition and certification in a Tuesday filing (http://xrl.us/bn3rzt).
Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, is considering releasing an amendment to reform the Electronic Communications Privacy Act (ECPA) in response to an ECPA reform amendment from Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., which will be considered during a Thursday meeting of the committee. Leahy, who faced criticism last week when a draft of the amendment circulated online with more exceptions on which agencies would need a warrants to access stored communications, released Monday the text of the amendment to be discussed Thursday (http://xrl.us/bn3r5r). “This critical privacy law is significantly outdated and out-paced by rapid changes in technology and the changing mission of our law enforcement agencies,” he said in a statement, and he said he joins “the many privacy advocates, technology leaders, legal scholars and other stakeholders who support reforming ECPA to improve privacy rights in cyberspace.” Grassley is still deciding whether to introduce his own amendment, the senator’s spokeswoman said, because the Leahy “amendment was just released last night and is still being vetted.” “That process takes time, especially when the bill is written behind closed doors,” she said in a statement. “To be clear, Senator Grassley does not support an unauthorized dragnet of internet and email surveillance by law enforcement and believes personal privacy protections need to be in place."
The FCC Public Safety Bureau will start accepting applications on Jan. 17 for licensing of channels surrendered by Sprint Nextel in the 809.5-815/854.5-860 MHz portion of the 800 MHz band, the bureau said. The public notice covers National Public Safety Planning Advisory Committee regions in parts of the country from Northern California to the New York City region (http://xrl.us/bn3r3g).