Comments on and oppositions to Charter’s request for a waiver of FCC CableCARD rules (CD Nov 5 p10) are due Nov. 30 and replies are due Dec. 10, a public notice released by the Media Bureau said (http://xrl.us/bnyhyx). Ex parte meetings on the proceeding will be permitted, but they must be disclosed, the notice said.
The FCC Wireless Bureau denied FiberTower’s requests for waiver for its 24 GHz Digital Electronic Message Service and 39 GHz waiver extensions. The backhaul provider told the agency it needs the waivers to comply with a bankruptcy court agreement or it will face an auction and dismantlement (CD Nov 7 p8). But the company “failed to demonstrate substantial service for the licenses in question,” the bureau said in a Wednesday order (http://xrl.us/bnyhxy). It denied the waiver requests and said FiberTower its licenses had terminated June 1. The order “does not affect any of the licenses that FiberTower uses currently to provide service to customers,” the bureau said. But FiberTower “put most of its 24 GHz and 39 GHz licenses at risk by making the business decision not to build them out,” the bureau said.
HD Radio and analog FM reception will find their way into smartphones next year through an app called NextRadio that’s now undergoing final beta testing, said Emmis Communications, which developed the app. Emmis will market NextRadio to wireless carriers so consumers can listen to local radio without using their data plans for Internet streaming, the company said. HD Radio developer iBiquity Digital for months has said it would try to convince carriers to build HD Radio functionality into smartphones and tablets before the end of 2012 (CD May 1 p3). To enable a smartphone for HD Radio reception, a “discreet chip” must be built into the phone, Emmis Chief Technology Officer Paul Brenner told us. ZTE demonstrated the first integrated HD Radio smartphone at the NAB Show in Las Vegas last spring, Brenner said. NextRadio is currently focused first on bringing FM analog radio to smartphones in the commercial market, he said. “HD Radio requires additional resources, which need some further justification of listener demand. We will use the NextRadio app and the FM analog existing chip to activate a market and demonstrate demand to the carriers and handset makers. From there, we can work on HD Radio potential integrations.” Confidentiality agreements bar Emmis from releasing details on which smartphones and which wireless carriers will offer analog FM and HD Radio in their products, he said. “Like any consumer technology business, a launch is a long tedious process. Milestones must be met. Technology must work as promised. If the broadcast industry cannot deliver a consistent experience the project can be scrubbed at any time. This is different than the way broadcasters usually think about technology but the only way the wireless industry operates.”
AT&T agreed to pay $700,000 as part of a consent decree to resolve complaints that the company switched certain consumers to its mandatory monthly wireless data plans even though it had promised they could retain their existing pay-as-you-go data plans (http://xrl.us/bnyhsx), the FCC said. “AT&T has agreed to refund excess charges paid by individual customers, which could be as much as $25 to $30 a month, depending on data use,” the agency said. “The transfers began occurring in November 2009, shortly after AT&T required first-time smartphone subscribers or those who upgraded their phones to enroll in monthly data plans. Consumer complaints prompted the FCC to launch an investigation last year."
Harlin McEwen, one of the leading public safety advocates of a national wireless network for first responders, will be chairman of FirstNet’s Public Safety Advisory Committee, FirstNet Chairman Sam Ginn said Wednesday. McEwen was chairman of the Public Safety Spectrum Trust and is the longtime chairman of the International Association of Chiefs of Police Communications Committee. The February spectrum law, which created FirstNet, also required the appointment of a standing public safety advisory committee. “I've asked him to work closely with my FirstNet Board colleague, Jeff Johnson, to assist him in getting the final membership and organizational structure of the Advisory Committee in place,” Ginn said. “FirstNet is eager to begin our crucial dialogue with these governmental and first responder leaders on how we can best deploy and operate the nationwide public safety broadband network.” FirstNet also announced the dates of the next meetings of its board -- Dec. 11, April 23, Aug. 13 and Oct. 15, from 9 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. Eastern (http://xrl.us/bnyhsi). All meetings in Washington are to be at the Commerce Department.
Gannett asked the FCC Media Bureau to reverse its first-of-a-kind ruling that a candidate on the ballot in an area not reached by a TV station’s coverage, as determined by one mathematical model but based on another model the agency prefers, is guaranteed the right to buy political spots. The bureau last week sided with the campaign of Randall Terry. The order said the unaffiliated candidate for president, whose ads depict aborted fetuses in criticizing President Barack Obama, could buy ads on Gannett’s WUSA in Washington because he was on the ballot in West Virginia (CD Nov 5 p2). The commission’s Longley-Rice model that Gannett said was more accurate than the agency’s now-preferred noise limited service contour (NLSC) means “a candidate could have a right of forced access to a broadcast station whose signal does not even reach the state in which the candidate is running,” the company wrote. The filing was posted Tuesday in WUSA’s online public file (http://xrl.us/bnyhru). “Hypothetical service to a mere 3,436 individuals in West Virginia should not entitle a West Virginia candidate to forced access to reach millions of D.C., Maryland and Virginia households,” it said. The “simplistic NLSC” instead “vastly overstates the Station’s actual service area” by not considering “intervening terrain,” the broadcaster said. It said the bureau’s order was “clear abuse of Section 312 of the Communications Act” that gives candidates “reasonable access” to purchase airtime.
Political ads “disguised” as news should be a thing of the past, Radio-TV Digital News Association Chairman Vince Duffy wrote on RTDNA’s blog Wednesday (http://xrl.us/bnyhok). “As a newsperson, I hate” such ads, whether he agrees with their policy positions or not, he wrote the day after the election. He cited an ad for Michigan Proposition 5, a ballot measure about gas taxes (http://xrl.us/bnyhor). “The ad is perfectly legal,” he said. Because Section 315 of the Communications Act barring broadcasters from changing what candidates say in their own ads and in their voice doesn’t apply to third-party ads (CD Nov 2 p3), “stations can tell the producers of political ads that they won’t accept ads that sound like newscasts or news stories,” Duffy said. “The RTDNA Code of Ethics is (unfortunately) silent on this issue, but the SPJ Code clearly states news outlets should,” he said of the Society of Professional Journalists.
The FCC International Bureau granted special temporary authority to SES Americom, EchoStar and Dish Operating LLC. SES was granted an STA from June 22 to June 29, to permit earth station E970336 to continue to provide telemetry, tracking and control of the Ciel 2 satellite at the 128.85 degrees west orbital location in the 17.3-17.8 GHz and 12.2-12.7 GHz bands, the bureau said in a public notice (http://xrl.us/bnyho3). EchoStar 77 and Dish Operating got an STA from Oct. 27 through Nov. 25, to operate their blanket-licensed earth stations “to receive communications from the foreign-licensed QuetzSat-1 satellite,” at the 61.5 degrees west orbital location in the 12.2-12.7 GHz band, the bureau said.
EAGLE-Net has now generated upwards of 200 jobs, including those of more than 170 construction contractors, CEO Randy Zila said in a November update. The Broadband Technology Opportunities Program (BTOP) grantee is making great progress throughout the state of Colorado, he said Wednesday, describing available service in more than 55 of 234 community anchor institutions outlined in the BTOP grant award as well as 1,600 miles of dark fiber leased and nearly 1,100 miles of fiber cable it’s in the process of installing. EAGLE-Net has 39 construction crews working now, the company said, and more than 670 miles of conduit in the ground. It still hopes to complete its network by August 2013, it said. “Our network core is active and carrying customer traffic!” EAGLE-Net said. The November update also described different meetings with regional stakeholders and recent editorials and letters of support.
The FCC is seeking comment on proposed changes to rules governing licensing and operation of space and earth stations. The proposed amendments are designed “to reflect evolving technology, eliminate unnecessary technical and information filing requirements for applicants, and reorganize and simplify existing requirements,” the FCC said in a Federal Register notice to be published Thursday. Comments will be due 45 days after the publication in the Federal Register, with replies due 75 days after publication, the notice said.