The Q3 inflation adjustment factor for cable operators using FCC Form 1240 is 1.3 percent, similar to the 1.42 percent of Q3 2014, the Media Bureau said in a public notice Wednesday. Cable operators can use the factor to adjust the nonexternal cost portion of their rates for inflation, the bureau said. The adjustments are based on changes in the Department of Commerce’s Gross National Product Price Index, the PN said.

A private equity firm is buying more of cable company Wide Open West (WOW), the two said in a joint application posted Tuesday seeking FCC approval of transfer of control. WOW has more than 782,000 subscribers in 11 states, they said. The private equity firm, Crestview, bought a minority stake in WOW parent company Racecar Holdings in 2015, and was granted a right to buy up to 50 percent interest, the two said. On FCC approval, they said, Avista Capital Partners -- which today owns a majority of Racecar -- will have four seats on the board, while Crestview will have another four and the Racecar CEO will be the ninth. Financial terms of the transaction weren't made public in the filing.

The Supreme Court opted not to hear an appeal of a 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals decision that Cox Communications had waived its right to compel arbitration in a class-action antitrust suit on allegations the company tied its premium cable service to rental of a Cox set-top box. The three-judge panel in its June ruling agreed with a U.S. District Court decision that Cox's move to compel arbitration -- shortly before the trial was set to begin and after discovery and class certification -- was "overly late." The Supreme Court without comment Monday denied Cox's petition. Cox ultimately won in the set-top box litigation, with U.S. District Judge Robin Cauthron of Oklahoma City in November overruling a $6.31 million jury verdict against it, saying the class-action complainants failed to prove that tying a Cox Premium Cable subscription to renting of a Cox set-top box meant sizable losses of sales by third-party set-top box distributors (see 1511130005).

Time Warner Cable is challenging a Massachusetts Department of Telecommunications and Cable (MDTC) request to certify that the town of Adams doesn't have effective competition so TWC is subject to rate regulation there. The state agency's argument that direct broadcast satellite penetration is less than 15 percent in the town -- which is just east of the New York state line -- is flawed in that it didn't include all the relevant ZIP codes for the town, TWC said in an FCC filing posted Friday. When those ZIP codes -- and the DBS subscribers in them -- are added to the mix, satellite penetration hits the 15 percent statutory threshold and confirms the town has effective competition, TWC said. MDTC didn't comment Monday. It's seeking certification that more than 100 communities across the state lack effective cable competition (see 1601080019).

Forget TV genres; scene-level metadata that would allow for recommendations based on such criteria as a program's dialogue or the viewer's mood are part of the data insights available to TV service providers, Andy Aftelak, Arris director-advanced technology, said in an introduction to a Videonet report, "Boosting Television Prospects With Enriched Data Analytics," that Arris announced on its blog Monday. Data about how people do their over-the-top viewing needs to be wed to customer demographic profiles, which can lead to better recommendation engines, which in turn reduce churn and optimize content acquisition, the report said. That metadata, gleaned from set-top boxes and server logs, also could better monetize niche channels, since those data sources are more reliable than audience measurement panels and thus would account for streams that traditionally get overlooked, it said. And such data could be used in making the "joins" of commercial breaks in an attempt to counter ad blocking, Videonet said.

The FCC Media Bureau is asking Level 3 for more information about its interconnection agreement with Bright House Networks as the agency reviews Charter Communications' proposed acquisitions of BHN and Time Warner Cable. In an information and data request to Level 3 released Friday, the bureau said it wanted a copy of Level 3's most recent interconnection agreement with BHN, including paid peering, settlement free and transit agreements. It's the second information request to Level 3 from the bureau, after a request in October (see 1509220057) that covered such issues as Level 3's plans to provide service to online video distributors and whether Level 3's interconnection agreements differed between ISPs that have an Internet backbone and those that don't.

Sony Music video programming will be available through Verizon's Go90 mobile video platform under a deal the two companies announced in a news release Thursday. Along with new original programming being developed, the agreement extends to previously announced programming from Astronauts Wanted, a Sony Music joint venture, they said.

Cox Communications expanded its 1 Gbps residential Internet service to Oklahoma as part of its goal to have the service available across its footprint by year's end, it said in a news release Thursday. Cox late last year also increased the speed of its High Speed Internet Ultimate package to 200 Mbps, it said.

Galavision, UniMas and Univision are available streaming to RCN digital TV subscribers via the UVideos app or on UVideos.com, RCN said in a news release Thursday. The Spanish-language network offering includes more than 1,000 hours of on-demand programming and live stream of Univision, RCN said.

As many as 320,000 Time Warner Cable customers' email addresses and account passwords likely were stolen either via malware downloaded in a phishing attack or indirectly in a data breach of another company that stored TWC customer information, TWC said Thursday. In a notice sent to customers this week, TWC said it had been notified by the FBI about the possible data compromise and recommended that customers change their account passwords. The company in a statement said it also was notifying customers via direct mail, and that customers whose account information was stolen are being contacted individually "to make them aware and to help them reset their passwords."