The FCC’s net neutrality regulations would impose monopoly-era common carrier-like regulations on Internet providers operating in a generally competitive environment, Free State Foundation President Randolph May said in a Washington Times op-ed Thursday (http://xrl.us/bnj8fe). The net neutrality mandates are “likely unconstitutional,” he wrote, arguing they violate the First Amendment rights of ISPs. “The FCC has a view of the First Amendment that turns the free-speech guarantee on its head,” he wrote. “The FCC’s regulations compel Internet providers to convey messages and content they would rather not. In other contexts, the Supreme Court has held that this is just as much a free-speech infringement as it is to prevent a speaker from conveying messages he wishes to convey. But the Obama FCC, with its pro-regulatory mindset, doesn’t really consider Internet providers like Verizon to be speakers or their networks to be private property.” May compared the regulations to the Fairness Doctrine that had a chilling effect on the speech of broadcasters, he said. “There is no justification in today’s digital age, with its abundance of media outlets and diversity of viewpoints, for infringing the First Amendment rights of Internet providers."
Samsung Mobile will help develop Small Cell network infrastructure for Sprint Nextel’s Network Vision improvement program. Samsung began working with Sprint on the Network Vision program in December 2010, and also supplies Sprint customers with 4G LTE devices like the Galaxy Nexus and Galaxy S III, Samsung said in a news release. Sprint said it plans to use a heterogeneous network (HetNet) for the small cell rollout that will target high-traffic and high-capacity indoor areas, including stadiums and airports (http://xrl.us/bnj8em).
Correction: Kim Baum, chair of Informal Working Group 3, space services, for World Radiocommunication Conference-15, is vice president-spectrum management & development Americas, at SES. Her affiliation was incorrectly listed by the FCC on its website (CD Aug 10 p2).
The FCC denied requests by Healinc Telecom and its subcontractors for waivers of the rules requiring that only eligible Video Relay Service providers hold themselves out as offering VRS; rules regulating VRS providers’ use of names, brands, sub-brands and URL addresses; and rules prohibiting eligible providers from subcontracting with ineligible providers for interpretation services and call center functions (http://xrl.us/bnj8d9). The rules were implemented as an anti-fraud measure, and the petitions “have not shown good cause for the requested waivers,” the Consumer and Governmental Affairs Bureau said Friday.
Nine Louisiana lawmakers urged the FCC to grant a waiver that enables state and municipal first responders to deploy a broadband wireless public safety network, in a letter released last week. “As Representatives of one of the states most vulnerable to large disasters, both natural (Hurricanes Katrina and Gustav) and manmade (the Deepwater Horizon oil spill), we are acutely aware that our constituents need a robust, interoperable wireless broadband network to ensure that first responders can communicate during critical emergencies,” said Louisiana Sens. Mary Landrieu, Democrat, and David Vitter, Republican; and Republican Reps. Rodney Alexander, Charles Boustany, Steve Scalise, Bill Cassidy, John Fleming, Jeff Landry, and Democrat Cedric Richmond. While the commission works to develop FirstNet, Louisiana’s first responders continue to lack an interoperable broadband network to communicate in times of crisis, the letter said.
An ex-FCC Media Bureau chief criticized academics’ draft report to the FCC on barriers to Americans getting information under Section 257 of the 1996 Telecom Act, which was presented earlier this summer at a commission workshop (CD June 27 p7). Donna Gregg said the study done by the University of Southern California’s Annenberg School for Communication & Journalism, after the bureau and Office of Communications Business Opportunities solicited research, departed from the commission’s report on the future of media. The Section 257 review wasn’t as comprehensive because it only reviewed other studies, while the report on media’s future did original interviews and other work, said the bureau chief under Chairman Kevin Martin. “The Barrier Study’s link to Section 257 of the Communications Act may involve the Commission in media ownership issues that have proven challenging in the past and already appear to be generating some controversy,” she wrote in a Free State Foundation brief Friday (http://bit.ly/OQ3oGb). “On the questions of entry barriers and ownership diversity, the Commission will need to proceed with caution.” Representatives of the bureau and office had no comment.
CEA President Gary Shapiro reacted negatively Friday to reports that Senate staffers plan to meet with broadcasters Sept. 14 to discuss putting radio chips in mobile devices (CD Aug 10 p14). NAB has claimed it doesn’t want a mandate for device makers and carriers to include FM tuners, Shapiro said in a written statement. “But the fact that broadcasters keep lobbying Congress is telling,” he said. Trade publications recently quoted Emmis Communications CEO Jeff Smulyan as saying he thinks that putting FM chips in mobile devices will boost radio listenership by 30 percent, Shapiro said. “So, if this FM chip business is about raising stock prices and not about public safety, then we encourage broadcasters to create demand and make deals with carriers to include FM chipsets,” Shapiro said. Of the Sept. 14 meeting, NAB thinks “it’s encouraging that policymakers are beginning to better understand the public safety value of having activated radio chips in cellphones,” spokesman Dennis Wharton told us in a statement. “We understand that from a business perspective, wireless carriers prefer selling a streaming service rather than voluntarily lighting up free radio chips already installed in the phones. We're hopeful the carriers will ultimately conclude that public safety trumps profits, and that denying mobile phone customers a lifeline radio option in an emergency situation represents an untenable longterm strategy.” To “be clear,” Wharton said, broadcasters are “not seeking a mandate” on FM chips in mobile phones. “Activated radio chips are standard features in mobile phones all over the world, except the U.S.,” he said. “The reason this is important” from a public safety perspective “is that cellphone networks crash in times of emergency,” he said. “Radio uses a different transmission architecture and would still work in a crisis situation.” CTIA thinks that any solution to what broadcasters seek “must be driven by consumer preference,” Jot Carpenter, vice president-government affairs, told us in an email Friday. “To the extent that consumers don’t choose the multitude of FM-capable devices that are already available, then I would recommend the FM radio stations look to see how they can better compete with the on-demand and customizable apps such as Pandora, Spotify and TuneIn,” he said. “As far as the Wireless Emergency Alerts, it’s important to remember that CTIA, FEMA, FCC, NOAA, The Weather Channel, Texas Association of Broadcasters, Florida Association of Broadcasters, Michigan Association of Broadcasters and the Association of Public TV Stations -- for a total of 42 entities -- were a part of the decision making process when WEA was created.” NAB said that the emergency alert system and wireless emergency alerts “can co-exist as complementary components of a National Alert System as envisioned by the President.'”
Three Alaskan lawmakers urged the FCC to approve a waiver to provide USF funds for a telecom company operating on the remote Adak Island of the Aleutian chain. “Adak is arguably the most remote community in the United States,” and its residents’ dependence on telecommunications is “enormous,” said the letter which was made public last week. Without the support of USF funds, Windy City Cellular, which serves the Adak community, can continue to operate “for only a couple of weeks” and if its service is discontinued the negative impact to the people of Adak “will be most severe,” the letter said. It was signed by Alaskan Sens. Mark Begich, a Democrat, and Lisa Murkowski, Republican, and Republican Rep. Don Young, chairman of the House Subcommittee on Indian and Alaska Native Affairs. In June the FCC granted Windy City Cellular limited interim relief of the USF/ICC Transformation Order to provide the company with $40,104 per month for a period of six months beginning in June 2012, or until the commission resolves the company’s pending waiver petition. In the relief order the commission noted that it needed additional time to “compile a full record regarding the nature and level of WCC’s costs” and complete its evaluation of WCC’s petition (http://xrl.us/bnbocq).
The New Hampshire Public Utilities Commission denied FairPoint’s petition for rehearing, in an order issued Thursday. FairPoint wanted to retain a temporary surcharge to help cover the cost of utility pole and conduit property taxes, which the telco had to pay starting in 2010, the commission said. FairPoint asked the PUC for a surcharge in November 2011 and received permission for a temporary surcharge of $0.99, but in June, the commission “concluded that property taxes are an operating expense of the utility that should be recovered through rates, rather than as a surcharge,” according to the latest order upholding the June ruling (http://bit.ly/P3n1Lu). The initial order called for the surcharge to end Thursday and that FairPoint “seek any recovery of the expense through its rates on and after August 10.” The order’s timing is tied to a recent state law, which the commission said would kill its authority over “certain of FairPoint’s retail rate settings.” SB-48, a New Hampshire law deregulating the commission’s oversight of VoIP providers, fixed and nomadic, in addition to Internet Protocol-enabled service providers and pole attachments (http://xrl.us/bnb8iy), became effective Friday. The law establishes the date “after which FairPoint may adjust its rates with greater flexibility than it has had in the past, and after which FairPoint is, in large part, no longer subject to the Commission’s general rate-setting practices,” the commission said. FairPoint had petitioned for a rehearing in a belief the PUC had “retroactively” applied SB-48 and acted inappropriately but the commission disagreed, it said. The PUC used it as a “guidepost,” according to the order. It denied FairPoint’s request for a rehearing and stood by the earlier June commission order. FairPoint declined to comment on the latest order.
The New Mexico Public Regulation Commission will meet with CenturyLink Aug. 20 to “address service issues on the Navajo Nation and for residents south of Gallup,” the PRC said (http://xrl.us/bnj79e). PRC Vice Chair Theresa Becenti-Aguilar is hosting at the Gallup Community Service Center in Gallup, N.M., it said. “I am bringing CenturyLink, the BIA [Bureau of Indian Affairs] and my constituents together in this process so that together we can achieve what has been long overdue,” she said in the announcement. It’s a followup to two meetings the PRC vice chair held in 2011 at which CenturyLink answered questions on “service problems and future plans to connect more people in the Gallup area to its network,” the PRC said.