Sinclair’s recent acquisitions should boost Q1 revenue about 29 percent from a year earlier, Benchmark Capital analyst Edward Atorino wrote investors Tuesday. “We expect continued strong growth in 2012 which ought to benefit from a hotly contested election year driving potentially record political advertising,” he said. “Auto advertising also appears to be stronger than expected heading into 2Q12 versus easy comparisons last year when Japanese auto production was disrupted."
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., will bring up cybersecurity legislation for Senate consideration after lawmakers return from recess, said Senate Homeland Security Committee Chairman Joe Lieberman, I-Conn. Lieberman told us Tuesday: “I'm glad there is movement, and once the House passes their bill, which I assume they will, it will encourage us to act, which I take from Senator Reid we will do in May.” Lieberman said he was “obviously concerned” about the bills the House is planning to consider this week. “The leadership has asked the Republican committees to leave out the section on making sure the most critical cyber infrastructure that is privately owned is taking steps to protect itself and the rest of us from attack.” Separately, Senate Armed Forces Committee Ranking Member John McCain, R-Ariz., told us he’s keeping a close eye on the House cybersecurity debate this week. “I think they have come up with some very good ideas [which are] far more along the lines of our proposal than the other one,” he said. McCain said he was partial to the House Intelligence Committee’s Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act, which has some “good points to it. … I think it could be a real good area where we might be able to come to an agreement.”
Getting rid of certain FCC must-carry protections for TV broadcasters could put some stations out of business, an economic analysis of the rules by BIA/Kelsey for the NAB said. Some 22 percent of cable households still only receive analog cable service, the analysis said. “While that is not the majority of households receiving cable service, it is still a significant amount representing approximately 11 percent of all U.S. TV households,” it said (http://xrl.us/bm4yre). “Removing that percentage of a station’s audience could well have a profound impact on affected stations.” Smaller audiences means lower advertising revenue and slightly lower costs due to fewer sales commissions to pay, it said. For a must-carry CW affiliate in markets 51-75, that could mean a drop of $323,644 in revenue, a drop that could take a profitable station into the red ink, it said. MyNetworkTV affiliates could also suffer if the rule were changed, with the average must-carry MyNetworkTV affiliate in smaller markets prone to see its profit halved, it said. “Without full access to their local audiences, television stations would be at a severe disadvantage in competing for those advertising revenues,” it said. “Many stations may find it difficult to remain profitable and their service to the public would decrease."
The Alaska Rural Coalition’s assertion that the USF/intercarrier compensation order treats remote Alaska competitive eligible telecom carriers more favorably than remote Alaska ILECs “is pure rubbish,” General Communication said Monday in a letter to the FCC (http://xrl.us/bm4yr9). “ARC simply does not want to compete -- and wants to be paid USF support for not doing so,” GCI said. ARC had requested reconsideration of the order’s “unintended consequence” of “disparate high cost support and regulation” between direct competitors. “The two year delay afforded all CETCs provides a competitive advantage to GCI in the local market while at the same time GCI can and will price its local telephone service as cheaply as necessary to capture customers and the associated high cost support,” ARC said in a letter Thursday (http://xrl.us/bm4ys4).
CTIA’s annual meeting returns to New Orleans starting May 8, at a time when the wireless industry faces significant challenges, especially on the spectrum front. Spectrum “has been our personal focus for two years now,” CTIA President Steve Largent said in an interview Tuesday. “We're going to continue on that battle. Even though we've got the broadcast spectrum teed up we need the government spectrum to come through.” Largent was asked about the level of anxiety in the wireless industry at this stage considering concerns the outlook on spectrum has become more negative in recent months. “I think the variable that’s thrown into the mix now is not where the spectrum is coming from but when it’s going to get here,” he said. “That, more than anything else, is creating the anxiety in our industry anyway. That just speaks to the fact that we're got to keep the fire lit under the FCC moving forward on their broadband plan, keep the fire lit under the president. He has mentioned this as a high priority for his administration. And keep the fire lit under Congress to make sure these different entities are moving forward.” Addressing wireless taxes and fees is “another priority for us,” Largent said. “We're optimistic that the Senate is going to do right by consumers and pass the Wireless Tax Fairness Act, which puts a five-year moratorium on any new wireless-specific taxes or fees,” he said. The House passed its version of the legislation in November. “We're also going to urge the House and Senate to pass the Digital Goods and Services Fairness Act, basically trying to establish a national framework for how digitally downloaded items such as e-books or apps are taxed. We're working hard on those two particular tax bills right now.” Largent said he is looking forward to an exciting meeting, featuring, for the first time, afternoon keynote speeches. Among them, CNBC Mad Money host Jim Cramer is slated to interview the CEOs of the four national wireless carriers May 8 and former President Bill Clinton is to close the show May 10. FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski is to open the show with a morning keynote also May 8. All keynotes are being streamed, Largent noted. Last year’s spring meeting took place in March and was dominated by talk of AT&T’s proposed buy of T-Mobile, announced the weekend before. The meeting is the first CTIA has held in New Orleans since 2005, the year the city was struck by Hurricane Katrina.
Sesame Workshop debuted two new collections of full episodes of Sesame Street available exclusively on iTunes. Twelve episodes from the show’s last season and Sesame Street Classics: Volume 2 are available at www.iTunes.com/SesameStreet.
Good cause exists for the FCC to grant the Alaska Communications Systems Group’s petition for limited waiver of the new call signaling rules, but the commission should limit any relief it grants to “narrowly tailored, appropriate circumstances,” CenturyLink said in reply comments Monday (http://xrl.us/bm4ynz). CenturyLink has also filed its own petition for limited waiver of the same rules.
TiVo changed the name of its Premiere Elite box to the Premier XL4, it said in a letter to the FCC (http://xrl.us/bm4yob). The device is the same in all other ways, therefore “all the conditions specified in the Memorandum Opinion and Order as applicable to the Premiere Elite remain applicable to the Premiere XL4,” the letter said.
The Copyright Royalty Board seeks comment on proposed rates and terms for use of certain works in connection with noncommercial broadcasting. The rates and terms cover the period from Jan. 1, 2013, to Dec. 31, 2017, the Library of Congress said in a Federal Register notice to be published Wednesday. Comments are due May 25, and they can be sent to crb@loc.gov.
The FCC Wireline Bureau seeks comment on petitions by SmartEdgeNet and Millicorp for a limited waiver of section 52.15(g)(2)(i) of the commission’s rules (http://xrl.us/bm4ykn). The waiver would allow SEN and Millicorp to obtain telephone numbers directly from the North American Numbering Plan Administrator and the Pooling Administrator. The companies said the waiver would let them “obtain numbers necessary to deploy new and innovative Internet Protocol enabled services” on a commercial basis, the public notice said. Comments are due May 8 in CC docket 99-200, replies May 15.