A lower court erred in granting Comcast and programmers a preliminary injunction on First Amendment grounds enjoining enforcement of a state law requiring cable operators to offer programming à la carte, defendant-appellants Maine Gov. Janet Mills (D) and Attorney General Aaron Frey said in a docket 20-1104 brief Wednesday with the 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. "The law does not implicate the First Amendment [as it] neither stifles nor requires speech." Outside counsel for appellees Comcast, A&E, C-SPAN, ViacomCBS, Discovery, Disney, Fox and New England Sports Network didn't comment Thursday.

As of March 31, 437,965 CableCARDs were in service across the Comcast, Charter Communications and Cox footprints, NCTA reported. It posted Wednesday in FCC docket 97-80. In Q1 2019, there were 474,032.

Radio.com is available to Comcast Xfinity customers on the X1 and Flex platforms, said the broadcaster Wednesday. Last week, Entercom announced its digital platform will be available on Sonos Radio (see report, April 24). Xfinity customers can get hundreds of Entercom-owned radio stations; in the future, they can see video.

Charter Communications defended its petition to exclude from the Rural Digital Opportunity Fund phase I auction any New York census blocks where it's obligated by a 2016 Time Warner acquisition agreement to expand broadband. In replies posted through Wednesday in docket 19-126 (see 2004220022), some towns agreed with the company. Charter said commenters who raised concerns that it might not connect every household in the census blocks at issue "are attacking the Commission’s decision to fund wholly unserved census blocks" in RDOF's first phase and partially unserved census blocks in the second. The Wireless ISP Association wants to reject the petition. WISPA didn't favor suggestions to "apply RDOF non-compliance measures to Charter, which is not an RDOF recipient."

COVID-19 confinement rules led to a drop in music streaming consumption for some services, reported Futuresource, because subscribers spent less time in places where they typically listened, including cars and gyms. “Consumers’ routines have been disrupted," blogged analyst Alexandre Jornod. The type of content being consumed has adapted to become more home-friendly, "lean-back" and mood-inspired; podcast listening about news, fitness, cooking and kids has also grown, said Jornod Monday. Subscriptions haven’t been affected, with some services reporting an uptick, and video streaming services such as Netflix and Disney Plus grew, reflecting homebound entertainment trends. Futuresource expects streaming music subscriptions to be “unaffected” by COVID-19, growing 19% in 2020 to 371 million globally. The research firm expects VOD subs to exceed one billion by midyear. The lockdown is encouraging more TV viewing and a change in behavior, as gaps in live TV scheduling encourage consumers to “look elsewhere for entertainment,” said analyst David Sidebottom.

Comcast's petition for writ of certiorari would have the Supreme Court reverse itself on the Federal Arbitration Act, letting courts withhold enforcement of arbitration agreements only in cases where there are contract-formation issues, respondent California Comcast subscribers said in a docket 19-1066 filing Friday. They responded to Comcast's cert petition arguing the 9th Circuit effectively precluded bilateral arbitration of consumer disputes in California and that SCOTUS review is warranted to bring the 9th Circuit back in line with established precedent. The 9th Circuit in 2019 rejected Comcast's appeal of a U.S. district court denying Comcast's motion to compel arbitration of a complaint alleging false advertising of cable TV pricing. A mandate in the 9th Circuit's decision was stayed pending a cert petition (see 2001230048).

Comcast’s xFi internet service had a 57% daily usage rise since before the COVID-19 pandemic, the company said Thursday. XFi had a 27% uptick in parental control activation, and a 43% bump in parents activating filters for web content during browsing and searching on devices. The ISP had a 213% spike in Wi-Fi “pause” during the 11 a.m.-2 p.m. lunchtime window. More families staying home during the day has shifted rules “typically applied to dinnertime to lunchtime,” said the company, referencing Xfinity’s pause Wi-Fi feature that had an overall 75% usage hike. The median active time alert set on weekdays for kids rose an hour to four hours a day.

U.S. peak broadband growth downstream and upstream "has essentially plateaued," NCTA said Wednesday, citing data from cable ISPs. It said some state or regional peak demand trends might vary, but there's a consistent national pattern. Our reporting has shown the same. Others have also seen plateauing in data usage trends (see 2004060038).

Those seeking more broadband deployment in New York state objected to a Charter Communications petition that the FCC Rural Digital Opportunity Fund Phase I auction exclude census blocks where the cable operator is obligated to upgrade and expand broadband as part of its 2016 Time Warner acquisition (see 2004140015), in comments posted through Wednesday in FCC docket 19-126. "Charter’s failure to participate in the RDOF proceeding means that it cannot comply with the standards for reconsideration, and it should not be permitted to use the waiver process to circumvent Commission procedures," the Wireless ISP Association said. Granting the petition would "undermine the certainty needed to inspire robust auction participation," said ISP Starry Inc. NCTA defended Charter's petition, saying the waiver is needed to satisfy RDOF's policy of "targeting support to areas that would not otherwise be served." The New York State Public Service Commission wants the FCC to "ensure that New York State is not harmed and declare that if Charter’s petition, or other similar requests, is granted for Phase I, New York will remain eligible for future phases of RDOF auctions."

Traditional video ratings are “solid (for now),” Cowen analysts wrote investors Tuesday, but unit losses could have “further downside” from a COVID-19 recession. Though linear TV ratings are “up meaningfully” during the crisis, Cowen expects “heightened cord-cutting pressure due to a COVID-19 driven recession” as linear TV’s price-value becomes top of mind for subscribers vs. over-the-top video, said analyst Greg Williams. In this macro environment, traditional video is a “2-sided coin”: Live local news is leading higher ratings for traditional TV, though sports cancellations and delays could affect the value of traditional video, noted Williams and colleague Colby Synesael: Cord-cutting trends should continue, as hourly employees look for ways to shed personal expenses, and streaming services provide cheaper video options. Cutting the cord involves sacrifice, but the wide selection of options in this OTT era makes that decision “more tolerable in a recession,” said the analysts, forecasting a 4% drop in cable subscriptions this year. OTT and pay-TV services are riding the wave of sheltering at home: Since the week of March 14, the Starz app has had a 44% bump in average viewership and a 142% increase in new customers, and Disney reported April 8 it had passed 50 million paid subscribers globally, noted analyst Doug Creutz. The coronavirus outbreak has driven a “significant linear ratings tailwind” for most cable network groups “other than Disney," he said, whose ESPN network was slammed by the shutdown of live sports.