The FCC is seeking comment on how to use the remaining $185 million in 2012 Connect America Fund Phase I money that was not accepted by ILECs, it said in a further notice of proposed rulemaking released Monday (http://xrl.us/bn2ptg). One option is to combine the money into any future rounds of Phase I funding, revise the Phase I rules to expand the definition of eligible areas, adopt a process to update the National Broadband Map and alter the metric used to measure buildout, the commission said. The other option would add the unused Phase I funds to the budget for Phase II. The commission sought comment on potential modifications to the rules that will govern any future incremental support, such as how to ensure the FCC has the tools needed to monitor compliance with existing obligations for support that’s already been accepted, and whether certain Phase I data should be afforded confidential treatment. The FCC proposed that each carrier provide “geocoded latitude and longitude location information along with census block and wire center information, for each location the carrier intends to count toward its deployment requirement,” the further notice said. Comments are due in docket 10-90 30 days after publication in the Federal Register.
Critics of the U.S. patent system are misinformed, said U.S. Patent and Trademark Office Director David Kappos during an address at the Center for American Progress on Tuesday. “Now that we've got the America Invents Act, we're empowered to do a lot more” he said. “Many of its provisions are extremely well suited to software patents.” Kappos said that the Act’s provision that third parties can submit prior art is a major step forward for the patent system. “For the first time in the history of our patent system, third parties can submit prior art to our examiners,” he said. “Now anyone can participate in the patent system and contribute to higher patent quality.” He asked that critics “give the America Invents Act a chance to work. Give it a chance to even get started.” Kappos said the patent system and the USPTO still have work to do, including working on “deciphering ownership.” It “can be a real challenge … to find those who own patent rights” when someone is looking to use a patented technology, he said. The USPTO would also look at the “fresh legislative suggestions,” he said, including the Saving High-Tech Innovators from Egregious Legal Disputes (SHIELD) Act (HR-6245), which would deter unwarranted infringement claims by requiring the loser of an infringement case to pay the court fees. “The administration has no position at this point” on the SHIELD Act, Kappos said.
Video relay service (VRS) provider CSDVRS agreed to pay nearly $1.4 million to settle two FCC investigations into allegations of improper payments from the federal telecommunications relay service fund that supports VRS, an FCC spokesman said Tuesday. The 2011 investigations by the Enforcement Bureau looked at whether the provided improperly billed the fund for VRS calls that were actually generated by its own employees, whether the company routed calls through uncertified providers, and whether a broadband application used by the company failed to fully transmit calls. According to the settlement (http://xrl.us/bn2pq4), CSDVRS will repay the TRS fund more than $480,000 in overpayments and interest, and make a $900,000 voluntary contribution to the U.S. Treasury, the FCC said. “This settlement is the latest in the Commission’s efforts to ensure the continued integrity of the Fund and the reliability and quality of TRS service,” said Bureau Chief Michele Ellison. “We urge all TRS providers to take note and toe the line, as we expect strict compliance in this area."
The FCC must do more analysis of minority media ownership before adopting the quadrennial review order circulating for a vote, a few dozen groups said in two filings to docket 09-182 (http://xrl.us/bn2pqq) released Tuesday. The Media Bureau last week released such data (http://xrl.us/bnzz9y). A draft bureau order would allow waivers of cross-ownership rules barring a company from holding a daily newspaper and TV station within the same top-20 market, and end a ban on a radio station owning a daily in a market (CD Nov 20 p13). “While the completion of the 2010 Quadrennial Review is long overdue, the passage of time is no excuse to rush to completion of a flawed decision,” Common Cause, Communications Workers of America, the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, National Hispanic Media Coalition (NHMC), NAACP, United Church of Christ and several others wrote (http://xrl.us/bn2ppr). They asked the agency to “move with deliberation and seek further comment before taking action.” The Center for Media Justice and NHMC sought a “court-ordered” analysis of the impact deregulation would have on minorities and women. The commission doesn’t plan such an analysis applying the Adarand standard from the 1995 Supreme Court decision of that name for the current quadrennial review, after the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals sought more data in remanding the last quadrennial review order, and will do one for the review due in 2014 under the Telecom Act (CD Nov 19 p1). A “complete analysis of broadcast ownership data” and nonprofits having a chance for “substantive and thoughtful review of the findings” is needed, said the letter. Human Rights Defense Center and Institute for Local Self Reliance were among those backing the letter (http://xrl.us/bn2pqf). A future commission Adarand study “would be rendered moot,” because under the draft order “markets will be even more consolidated,” Free Press officials reported (http://xrl.us/bn2pq2) telling Commissioner Mignon Clyburn and separately an aide to Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel.
Time Warner Cable urged the FCC to overturn its decision to deny its petition to modify the designated market area (DMA) of KLEI-TV, Kailua-Kona, Hawaii. Some of the communities in the KLEI DMA are served by TWC’s systems in Honolulu, Kauai, Kalawao and Maui counties, TWC said in its petition for reconsideration (http://xrl.us/bn2pir). TWC said KLEI is “geographically removed from the communities, and clearly does not provide local programming service to them, in contrast to the local stations carried on the systems.” The Media Bureau denied the petition Oct. 19 (CD Oct 23 p14). The bureau order violates TWC’s First Amendment rights, it said: It relies on “content-based determinations to require TWC to carry KLEI far outside its natural economic market.” In the order, the bureau also directed Hawaiian Telcom Services to carry KLEI on HTS’s Oahu system, HTS said in a separate reconsideration petition (http://xrl.us/bn2pki). HTS’s customers are only located on the island of Oahu, and therefore, aren’t able “to view KLEI’s over-the-air signal in any event,” HTS said. The government’s mandate that HTS carry KLEI “is not narrowly tailored to achieve the government’s interest promoted by the must carry statute,” it said.
Mobile data roaming revenues will grow by 21 percent per year through 2017, Juniper Research said Tuesday in a report. At that rate, annual revenues will reach $35 billion in 2017 as an increasing number of customers use roaming data services while abroad, Juniper said. Data roaming is now a key growth driver for operators, “albeit with cost-effective packages coupled with subscriber control over usage,” Juniper said. A majority of mobile customers used voice services while roaming abroad, which does not give operators much opportunity to add value, Juniper said. Data roaming gives operators an opportunity to convert ‘non data’ roamers into active data roamers through data bundling and roaming plans, Juniper said. SMS roaming adoption and revenue growth will be modest by comparison, Nitin Bhas, the report’s author, said in a news release. “As data roaming costs are further reduced and smartphone owners find so-called [over-the-top] services -- such as eBuddy and Whatsapp -- a cheaper alternative, the average spend per SMS roaming will decline over the forecast period” (http://xrl.us/bn2phj).
Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., urged FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski in a letter made public this week to address the failure of communications services during Superstorm Sandy. Schumer called upon Genachowski to convene telecom stakeholders to develop a national plan to ensure the reliability of communications services in future national disasters. “At the height of the storm and in its immediate wake, thousands of New Yorkers were effectively cut off from communication,” Schumer said. “While we cannot prevent natural disasters, we can vastly improve our preparation in order to mitigate the damage they inflict.” Schumer said the commission should spur telecom stakeholders to identify weaknesses in the existing infrastructure and develop a plan to keep telecom services operational during the next natural disaster.
The BBC requested an exemption from the closed captioning requirement regarding its Spanish-language channel CBeebies. The channel is available on multichannel video program distributor platforms, BBC said in its petition to the FCC (http://xrl.us/bn2ozh). Grant of the petition is warranted “because compliance with the closed captioning requirement would result in significant difficulty and expense for CBeebies, and thus would be economically burdensome to the channel while providing no countervailing benefit to preschool-age viewers,” it said. The strictures of British law and BBC policies prevent CBeebies from seeking sponsorship sources for captioning, BBC said. Requiring closed caption programming could force the channel’s Latin America and U.S. Hispanic operations “into the unenviable position of potentially having to make program cuts and/or ceasing its 24-hour operation,” it added.
Rep. Ed Markey, D-Mass., urged House Commerce Committee Chairman Fred Upton, R-Mich., in a letter sent Tuesday (http://xrl.us/bn2pbu) to help secure the nation’s energy infrastructure from cyberattacks. Markey asked Upton to take “immediate action” to pass the GRID Act (HR-5026), a bill that the pair co-sponsored in the last session of Congress. The legislation, which aimed to amend the Federal Power Act to secure the U.S. bulk power system and electric infrastructure from cyberattacks, passed the House in the 111th Congress but died before receiving a vote in the upper chamber. Markey said Superstorm Sandy “has shown us our electric grid is too fragile and its disruption is too devastating for us to fail to act. Given this urgency, it is critical that the House act immediately in a bipartisan manner to ensure our electrical infrastructure is secure.”
Senate Commerce Committee Chairman Jay Rockefeller, D-W.Va., asked FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski in a letter made public on Tuesday to detail the commission’s work to review payphone policies. Rockefeller said Superstorm Sandy served as a “wake-up call” to impacted residents on the East Coast who found that public payphones continued to work even as other more modern communications systems failed. “Despite their continued vitality, payphones are a vanishing feature of the American communications landscape,” wrote Rockefeller. “I understand that you have worked toward resolution of several pending payphone compensation petitions and I commend your efforts on this front. Yet there is still work to be done,” he said. Rockefeller asked Genachowski to provide the committee with an update on what the commission has done and plans to do to review its payphone policies “in order to prevent the loss of this vital communications service.”