Media ownership and retransmission consent are separate issues with different FCC dockets and shouldn’t be examined in the same proceeding, many broadcasters said in filings on the congressionally mandated 2010 quadrennial ownership review. NAB, the Fox network and companies that own TV stations affiliated with other networks, including Gray and Nexstar, rejected comments earlier this month by the likes of the American Cable Association (ACA) and Time Warner Cable linking arrangements where stations jointly negotiate carriage deals to ownership (CD July 9 p6). One mid-size broadcaster said such deals can violate ownership rules.

The FCC and/or Congress may have to address a law that prohibits the FCC from using competitive bidding for satellite spectrum before moving forward on mobile satellite service incentive auctions, said industry executives and the NTIA. The Open-market Reorganization for the Betterment of International Telecommunications (ORBIT) Act of 2000 outlawed such auctions to facilitate international coordination of satellite spectrum. While the spectrum in question refers to the reuse of satellite spectrum terrestrially, a 2005 lawsuit on somewhat similar reuse concluded the Act’s language is ambiguous on the auction of the spectrum, officials said. The FCC recently opened a proceeding on how best to encourage mobile broadband investment in the MSS bands, through incentive auctions and other means (CD July 16 p1).

With the lower unit cost provision stripped from the Senate version of the DISCLOSE Act, broadcasters’ concerns that the bill would sap political ad revenue this year have largely been put to rest, industry officials said. As the Senate considers a vote for cloture on the bill Tuesday, some in the industry and Congress question its effectiveness and purpose. The Citizen’s United Supreme Court ruling, which the bill was introduced in response to, probably won’t lead to any huge influx of corporate spending on political ads, industry officials said. “You don’t see necessarily a flood now as a result of this decision,” said Kyle Roberts, president of Smart Media Group, a political media planning group: “What you see is an industry that’s probably going to spend 10-20 percent more than it did last cycle, just like it has been trending."

The FCC and Food and Drug Administration signed a memorandum of understanding aimed at improving information exchange between the two and streamlining collaboration, the agencies said. The MOU was unveiled at the start of two days of discussions at the commission during a joint meeting with the FDA on mobile health (mhealth) issues. The two agencies also released a joint statement on wireless medical devices. The FCC National Broadband Plan, released in March, dedicated a chapter to healthcare issues. At its July meeting, the FCC began a rulemaking on a program that would provide up to $400 million per year on health connectivity.

The Senate may hotline a disabilities communications bill in a unanimous consent vote as soon as Tuesday, a Senate staffer told us. The House was expected to pass its own version Monday night, industry officials said. The House considered HR-3101 in the afternoon, but postponed votes until after our deadline. Monday was the 20th anniversary of the Americans with Disabilities Act.

Career FCC staffers don’t support a wide-ranging deal between the two most active filers in a 2003 auction of translator stations to resolve a dispute between many operators of the facilities and low-power FM (LPFM) stations, said commission and industry officials. They said Media Bureau officials recently said they won’t move to codify a memorandum of understanding in an existing draft order on Auction No. 83. The agreement was submitted this month by Prometheus Radio Project, representing low-power FM stations, and Educational Media Foundation (EMF), which runs several hundred translators, with the support of two other major applicants for translators in the filing window (CD July 12 p10). Representatives of Prometheus and EMF said they will need to take another look at the agreement if the bureau doesn’t codify it.

The Copyright Office exempted “ripping” short snippets of video for remixes and “jailbreaking” cellphones from the Digital Millennium Copyright Act’s ban on circumvention of rights-protection technologies. The Electronic Frontier Foundation, which had requested the exemptions, called the decision Monday a victory for fair use. The law requires a review every three years of uses that should get three-year exemptions.

Internet Protocol networks are the way forward for emergency-services providers, said IPv6 Forum President Latif Ladid. Though some in public safety consider additional spectrum the answer, that would merely add access and connectivity without making it easier for services to talk to each other, he said in an interview Monday. But Jeppe Jepsen, Motorola’s director of international business relations and a board member of Europe’s Terrestrial Trunked Radio Association (TETRA), said wireless networks aren’t resilient or secure enough to deliver the required services.

Wireless issues have gotten some of the most attention at various meetings held by FCC Chief of Staff Eddie Lazarus with industry to discuss a possible legislative proposal for giving the commission authority over broadband, said people who attended the meetings or spoke to others who did. There seems to be more agreement among agency officials and meeting attendees on applying net neutrality rules to wireline broadband, though some issues remain unresolved, they said. Net neutrality advocates and opponents appear to agree on ISP privacy conditions and transparency on network practices, industry and public-interest group lawyers said.

Rural wireless carriers didn’t endorse but some may be open to Universal Service Fund overhaul legislation by House Communications Subcommittee Chairman Rick Boucher, D-Va., and Rep. Lee Terry, R-Neb. The bill (HR-5828) is backed by major wireline associations, the cable industry and AT&T and Verizon (CD July 23 p1). Some expected a competitive bidding rule to alienate rural wireless carriers that compete for USF dollars as competitive eligible telecommunications carriers. Wireless CETCs have concerns, but believe Boucher and Terry listened hard to all stakeholders and came up with a “solid compromise,” said Rural Telecommunication Group General Counsel Carri Bennet.