The FCC Enforcement Bureau was right to deny some material sought in a Freedom of Information Act request by Skybridge Spectrum Foundation President Warren Havens, but FOIA requests for other material will be remanded for further examination, commissioners ordered. Commissioner Ajit Pai approved in part and dissented in part. Havens is no stranger to run-ins with the FCC over document and other issues some bureaus have deemed baseless. In one instance, the Wireless Bureau barred him from making further filings without advance permission (see 1203130063). Pai's dissent also slammed Havens' document-seeking.
The FCC will consider this month whether to set new rules limiting most-favored-nation (MFN) and alternative distribution method (ADM) provisions in program carriage agreements. The tentative agenda released Thursday for its Sept. 29 meeting includes consideration of an NPRM on independent and diverse programming. In a blog post Thursday, Chairman Tom Wheeler said the MFN and ADM prohibitions are meant to promote "the availability of diverse and independent programming from which to choose."
Univision's distribution contract with Time Warner Cable remains operative, even though TWC is now part of Charter Communications, since Charter's contract with Univision expired in June, Charter said in a motion to dismiss in New York State Supreme Court in Manhattan. Univision is suing Charter, claiming license fees in its TWC agreement apply only to the legacy systems and through this year (see 1607080022). Charter said Friday the structure of New Charter and the language of the TWC contract back its argument the TWC contract applies to all of New Charter. Univision didn't comment Tuesday. Typically, such contractual disagreements settle before becoming litigation, a sign numerous such programmer/New Charter disputes may have come up since the close of the TWC and Bright House Networks deals in May, one cable lawyer who has been active in retransmission consent and program access negotiations told us Tuesday. The language in programmer/cable distributor agreements is sometimes unclear on merger/acquisition transactions, and language in such agreements can vary significantly by deal, the lawyer said. Charter undoubtedly pursued the TWC deal in part because of the acquired company's lower-priced programming agreements, with TWC having been an effective procurer of programming rights, the lawyer said. Charter didn't comment Tuesday. Its reply in a similar suit brought by Fox News Network (see 1607200065) is due Friday in the Manhattan court. Charter said Univision's twin breach of contract claims -- that it applied the wrong rate to the legacy Charter systems after the Charter contract expired and it hasn't negotiated a new contract or agreed it can't apply the TWC contract to any New Charter cable system starting in 2017 -- fail to state a contract claim as a matter of New York law. Univision hasn't pointed to any part of the New Charter contract entitling it to negotiate a new contract, Charter said. Charter said it wasn't seeking dismissal of Univision's declaratory judgment claim. While acknowledging it and Univision disagree about when the TWC contract ends -- end of this year or in 2022 -- Charter said Univision showed no breach of contract: "If Univision does not want to accept payments pursuant to that contract after year-end, then it can terminate the signal on Defendant's cable systems at that point."
In addition to hiking regulatory fees charged to satellite-TV operators, the FCC left the door open to further DBS fee increases. Saying Media Bureau oversight and regulatory work over direct broadcast satellite and cable/IPTV is similar, the FCC order setting the 2016 regulatory fee structure said it "remain[s] committed as a goal to regulatory fee parity for all MVPDs paying into the cable television/IPTV fee category." One multichannel video programming distributor official told us that language indicates the agency is considering future DBS fee hikes. The FCC didn't comment Tuesday.
Opponents of OneWeb's planned non-geostationary orbit (NGSO) satellite constellation are continuing their criticisms before the FCC. Thursday was the deadline for reply comments to OneWeb's petition, and parties cited conflicting orbits and spectrum coordination. The petition already was opposed by parties such as SpaceX and Telesat Canada (see 1608160051) and the radio astronomy community (see 1608090037). Processing round applications in the proceeding are due Nov. 15 (see 1607180006).
Telephone Consumer Protection Act litigation -- which skyrocketed in the past half dozen years -- shows no sign of abating, TCPA experts tell us. But the targets of such suits are shifting, often to smaller companies, said Thomas Cunningham, a Locke Lord class-action practitioner. “The low-hanging fruit has all been picked.”
Many major cable distributors have almost crossed the finish line on full digital conversion of their analog signals, but digital transition progress for smaller operators is more of a mixed bag, said companies and industry experts. Most small to midsize cable operators will go digital, or even transition to IPTV, within a decade, American Cable Association President Matt Polka told us. "We want to get there," he said. "We need to maximize our networks to be more efficient so we can reclaim more bandwidth [for broadband]. The issue becomes one of complexity, size, technology and available resources."
Program carriage rules clearly didn't extend to broadcasters, and the FCC decision Friday to reject Liberman Broadcasting's carriage complaint against Comcast makes it "especially clear," one lawyer with cable clients told us Friday. Liberman's complaint -- alleging Comcast dumped the broadcaster's Estrella TV network in favor of Spanish-language networks in which it had a financial stake -- was seen as facing tough odds (see 1604080013).
Battling for each other’s customers, telcos and ISPs increasingly are warring over each other’s advertising claims. Telco-related ad cases before the Council of Better Business Bureaus' National Advertising Division (NAD) are up. That growth could point to an increased emphasis on comparative advertising on the differences among options for consumers, now that two-year commitments and early termination fees have given way to more flexible contracts and even competitors paying customers’ early termination fees, said Alysa Hutnik, a Kelley Drye attorney with advertising expertise.
Ligado -- under fire from segments of the aviation and aeronautics industry worried about effects of its proposed LTE network on aviation GPS receivers (see 1608010036) -- agreed with some of their assertions. The company in a filing in FCC RM-11681 Tuesday said it had regular talks with Federal Aviation Administration staff about "performance-based conformance" conditions, such as the FAA and FCC requiring the company assess technical parameters of each base station before deployment to set power limits that would ensure conforming with FAA requirements. Ligado said the FAA is reviewing a Ligado-proposed model and compliance plan. The FAA didn't comment Tuesday. The company agreed with a process being pushed by the aviation industry that needs to be at least partially implemented before any granting of the firm's license modification or issuing of a related NPRM. Ligado said the conformance condition it's discussing with the FAA "is similar in many respects" to an aviation industry-backed three-step process outlined in an ex parte filing last week, which involves an FAA-headed theoretical investigation of possible Ligado interference to certified GPS receivers, field testing using real-world Ligado equipment, and deployment of Ligado's network -- with FAA- and FCC-imposed license conditions; rollout would be suspended if any interference issues manifest. At a meeting with Phil Verveer, aide to FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler, aviation groups complained Ligado didn't provide sufficient procedural and technical information, saying Ligado's push for approval should be shelved. Representatives of Aviation Spectrum Resources, Helicopter Association International, Airlines for America and the Aerospace Industries Association attended the meeting. They didn't comment Tuesday. The plan Ligado said it pitched to the FAA would have that agency -- with input from the Radio Technical Commission for Aeronautics -- OK a theoretical model the firm would use to predict signal propagation from proposed base stations. Field testing would follow to validate compliance of actual emissions with those modeled limits if the FAA and RTCA deem it necessary, to be followed by tower-by-tower assessment of the network deployment to ensure each base station follows power limits that would ensure received power from Ligado operations falls below FAA guidelines. Ligado said since it would have to satisfy all FCC conditions before bringing any part of terrestrial low-power service online, "there is therefore no reason to delay modifying Ligado's licenses subject to the conditions." The company said conditions suggested in its license modification application (see 1512310016) cover GPS interference protections, including some for certified aviation receivers. Those conditions would have the company reduce power in transmitters in the 1526-1536 MHz band to a level that would protect certified aviation receivers.