House Communications Subcommittee Chairman Greg Walden, R-Ore., plans a series of hearings to examine the future of video, data and voice, a subcommittee spokesman confirmed Tuesday. An aide said a video hearing is likely to be next on the schedule. The hearing may take place sometime in June, industry and Capitol Hill officials said.
The House Appropriations Committee proposed trimming the FCC’s FY2013 appropriation to $323 million, $17 million less than the year prior. The committee introduced the FY2013 appropriations bill Tuesday, which will be considered by the Financial Services and General Government Appropriations Subcommittee Wednesday. FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski asked the committee for $347 million in FY2013, a 2 percent increase from the current year, arguing that “few agencies give a better return on investment” (CD March 20 p1). The bill specifically ordered that “not less than $8,750,338 shall be for the salaries and expenses of the Office of Inspector General.” Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Financial Services Chairman Dick Durbin, D-Ill., previously asked Genachowski why the agency’s budget request included a 10 percent decrease in the inspector general’s appropriation. “IG’s are a little more popular around here since the GSA mess,” Durbin said during a budget hearing in May (CD May 10 p1).
Eurosport Group will broadcast live major sporting events in 3D with the Astra satellite system from SES. The French Open and the 2012 Olympic Games in London will be broadcast from the satellite at 19.2 degrees east and available to millions of European homes, SES said.
The FCC released a staff working paper “Using a Market to Obtain the Efficient Allocation of Interference Rights,” by Mark Bykowsky and William Sharkey, senior economists in the Office of Strategic Planning (http://xrl.us/bnae2t). “Their paper examines possible alternatives to the current administrative process for identifying the efficient allocation of signal interference rights,” the FCC said. “The paper shows how the efficient allocation of such rights can arise from a multi-player game embedded into an auction where participants place bids reflecting the benefit or harm they would expect to incur due to signal interference. It also considers how to identify the efficient set of interference rights, as well as the efficient licensee, for yet-to-be auctioned spectrum."
The FCC proposed fining Martin Broadcasting $10,000 for not exhibiting red obstruction lights at night atop an antenna in Beaumont, Texas, and monitoring the lighting daily, said an Enforcement Bureau notice of apparent liability Tuesday (http://xrl.us/bnaexo). Luis Ernesto Rivas, meanwhile, faces a possible $15,000 penalty for running an unlicensed radio transmitter on 89.1 MHz in Miami, another bureau NAL said (http://xrl.us/bnaifc).
The FCC should exempt all set-top boxes made before July 1, 2016, from disabilities accessibility rules for advanced communications services, the NCTA said. “All the ACS rules, including the recordkeeping and enforcement rules, would not apply” to any set-top supplied to cable customers by operators “for the life of the device,” the association said. It asked the commission to invoke a waiver clause that allows the agency to exempt devices capable of ACS but whose primary purpose isn’t such services. CEA (http://xrl.us/bnaeur) and others also have sought waivers (CD March 27 p4). “The primary purpose of set-top boxes is to access video programming services,” the NCTA said in a petition posted Monday to docket 10-145 (http://xrl.us/bnaeup). Because of the six-year development, manufacturing and deployment cycle for the devices, the request “is designed to apply only to set-top boxes that already have been -- or are being -- manufactured today, as well as the generation of set-top boxes currently in development, for the life of each particular device,” the group said.
FCC staff is “reviewing the record” of a December rulemaking notice on media ownership rules and “developing recommendations for the full Commission’s consideration,” Chairman Julius Genachowski wrote May 17. His responses to a December letter from Democratic members of Congress including House Communications Subcommittee Ranking Member Anna Eshoo of California was posted in docket 12-2 Monday (http://xrl.us/bnaetw). Genachowski noted that the comment cycle on the rulemaking has ended.
General Communication Inc. and Alaska Communications signed an agreement to form the Alaska Wireless Network (AWN), a limited liability company that will hold and operate both companies’ wireless facilities. GCI will own two-thirds of the company and Alaska Communications one-third. Under the plan, AWN will design and operate a statewide wireless network in Alaska offering next-generation wireless plans for both companies. Both companies will turn their spectrum licenses, cell sites, backhaul facilities, switching systems and other assets over to AWN, as necessary to operate a statewide wireless network. GCI agreed to buy $100 million of wireless assets from Alaska Communications and contribute them to AWN. AWN is to be managed by GCI, with Wilson Hughes, GCI’s current chief operating officer, to be AWN’s CEO. The FCC must approve the transaction and the companies said they hope it will close by the second quarter of 2013. “The wireless business is capital intensive, requires scale to compete successfully against national carriers, and demands more spectrum than either company individually owns,” the companies said in a joint statement. “By combining our respective wireless assets, GCI and Alaska Communications can provide a state-of-the-art Alaska wireless network owned and operated by Alaskans for Alaskans.” The new, combined network will cover 95 percent of the state’s population, the companies said.
Prepaid wireless carrier Jolt Mobile will offer its customers high-speed mobile broadband using Clearwire’s 4G network, under a deal unveiled Tuesday. “By partnering with Clearwire we aim to give our customers a compelling 4G alternative to higher-priced carriers,” said Avi Yroshalmaine, president of Jolt Mobile.
Informal complaints filed at the FCC in the top five reported complaint categories shot up more than 32 percent in the first quarter of 2012 over the last quarter of 2011, the FCC said Monday (http://xrl.us/bnacku). Leading the increase was radio and TV broadcasting, where complaints increased by more than 62 percent, from 2,406 to 3,903, “due to an increase in complaints regarding Programming issues involving particular broadcasts that drew a number of complaints, as well as complaints regarding CableCards,” the agency said. Wireless complaints increased by more than 41 percent, cable and satellite services complaints by more than 28 percent, wireline complaints by more than 21 percent and bundled VoIP service-related complaints by more than 8 percent. The overall number of inquiries in the top four reported inquiry categories was up almost 29 percent.