The Wisconsin-Educational Communications Board (ECB) urged the FCC Media Bureau to deny two applications for new digital low power TV stations. Paul Donner filed an application for an LPTV station in Eau Claire, Wis., the petition said (http://xrl.us/bnb5yo). Operation of the station proposed by Donner “will cause impermissible interference to the reception of ECB’s co-channel full service DTV signal,” ECB said. It filed a second petition along with Duluth-Superior Area Educational Television Corporation against an application for a new digital LPTV station in Duluth, Minn.(http://xrl.us/bnb5zi). The station would cause severe interference to the reception of ECB’s TV stations, WLEF, Park Falls, Wis., and WDSE Duluth, Minn., it said.
The FCC International Bureau accepted an application from EchoStar Broadcasting for authority to operate a new transmit/receive earth station in Winchester, Va. The bureau also accepted DirecTV’s application to modify its authorization for the DirecTV RB-2A satellite at 102.7 degrees west, the Satellite Division said. DirecTV also requested a partial waiver of the FCC’s rules on reverse-band operation in the 17.3-17.8 GHz band, it said.
Growing telecom competition has caused what the National Regulatory Research Institute calls “deregulation fever” among American states. In a 52-page report called “The Year in Review: The Status of Telecommunications Deregulation in 2012,” released Saturday, Sherry Lichtenberg identified how 21 state legislatures curtailed the abilities of public utilities commissions in the last two years (http://xrl.us/bnb5su). Nine states “severely limited or completely eliminated COLR [carrier of last resort] obligations and the requirement that carriers provide a tariffed basic local service product,” wrote Lichtenberg, the report’s author. The report concludes that the deregulation trend “will not subside” and points to examples in Florida, North Carolina, and Maine of commissions consolidating and adapting to the new order. The report said commissions will need to find new ways of protecting consumers as regulation lessens. As of late April, deregulation legislation was pending in 14 additional states, according to the report. Despite these changes, the deregulation affects only retail services, not wholesale.
T-Mobile filed a second amended petition at the FCC asking to be designated as an eligible telecommunications carrier under the Lifeline program in Alabama, Connecticut, Delaware, the District of Columbia, New Hampshire, New York, Tennessee and Virginia. “The requested ETC designation will promote the public interest by providing eligible low-income consumers a choice of a significant new facilities-based competitor in the marketplace for Lifeline services,” T-Mobile said (http://xrl.us/bnb5kk). “T-Mobile’s entry into the Lifeline market will create competitive pressure on all Lifeline providers, resulting in a higher level of service quality and more competitive pricing and advantageous service options for Lifeline service for eligible consumers ... .”
Google fielded more than 1,000 requests to take down online content in the second half of 2011, the company said in its latest transparency report (http://xrl.us/bnb5h2). They include 467 court orders and 561 requests from governments and others, the company said. The company started releasing the reports in 2010. In the U.S., Google received 117 court orders and it complied with about 40 percent of them, it said. Of the 70 requests from governments, police and other sources, its compliance rate was 44 percent, it said. The number of content removal requests in the U.S. increased 103 percent over the first half of 2011, it said. Among requests for removal was one from the Canadian passport office to “remove a YouTube video of a Canadian citizen urinating on his passport and flushing it down a toilet.” Google did not comply, it said. Overall, Google complied with 65 percent of the court orders and 47 percent of the “more informal requests,” Dorothy Chou, Google senior policy analyst, said in a blog posting.
The FCC Wireless Bureau sought comment on a request by the Arizona Water Co. for a 12-month extension of the commission’s Jan 1, 2013, narrowbanding deadline. Comments are due June 26, replies July 6 (http://xrl.us/bnb5jf).
U.S. Trade Representative Ron Kirk announced an agreement with Mauritius on a set of non-binding trade-related principles for information and communication technology (ICT) services. The U.S. and Mauritius will jointly promote the adoption of these principles by other countries. If the principles become widely adopted, Kirk said they would support the global development of ICT services, including Internet and other network-based applications that are critical to innovative e-commerce, Internet search and advertising, data storage, and other services. The principles are without prejudice to the policy objectives and legislation of Mauritius and the U.S. in areas including protection of intellectual property, privacy and confidentiality of personal and commercial data, USTR said. The agreement says Mauritius and the U.S. will cooperate with each other and third-party countries to enhance national regulatory capacity and support the expansion of ICT networks and services.
Worldwide machine-to-machine (M2M) device connections will increase from 100.4 million to 2.1 billion over a 10 year period from 2011-2021, and the associated revenue will increase from $5.7 billion to $50.9 billion , Analysys Mason said in a report (http://xrl.us/bnb4ye). ARPU rates from M2M connectivity will decline, however, from $4.71 per month per connection to $1.98 in the same period due to price pressure and growth of M2M connections in emerging markets while connections in developed markets will see a 10 percent decrease, it said. Worldwide connections in developed markets will decline from 69 percent to 59 percent, shadowed by developed markets’ share of revenue decreasing from 76 percent to 64 percent, it said.
*June 18 American Consumer Institute panel on “looming spectrum crunch,” noon, 2103 Rayburn building -- steve@theamericanconsumer.org
Fisher Communications said its KXPI-LD and KIDK-TV Idaho Falls stations will affiliate with the Fox network. KIDK will carry Fox on its digital multicast channel, it said. KXPI has been a MyNetworkTV affiliate and will continue to air MyNetworkTV prime-time programming weeknights beginning at 10 p.m., Fisher said.