Many of the same music labels suing cable ISPs Charter Communications (see 1903250004), Grande Communications (see 1802080001) and Cox Communications (see 1808020009) turned their attention to RCN. In a U.S. District Court copyright infringement complaint Tuesday in Trenton, New Jersey (in Pacer, docket 19-17272), the labels made similar complaints as they have against the other cable ISPs -- that RCN failed to terminate accounts of repeat copyright infringers using its network and operated RCN "as a haven for infringement." The suit seeks a permanent injunction barring RCN from direct or indirect infringing of the labels' copyrights or enabling or facilitating any such infringement, plus unspecified damages and an order that RCN promptly send infringement notices to its infringing subscribers. The company didn't comment Wednesday. Plaintiffs include Capitol Records, Sony Music, Arista, Atlantic, Bad Boy Records, Elektra and Warner Records.

Altice, Charter and Comcast should have residential broadband market share gains, said Wells Fargo's Jennifer Fritzsche in a series of notes to investors Tuesday. Charter, adding such share in recent years, is expected to continue gaining from legacy telco competitors with slower speeds. The analyst expects video subscriber declines in excess of 500,000 in Charter's FY 2019 and 2020, accompanied by more customers moving into higher-speed broadband tiers. She said Altice's fiber-to-the-home strategy "should 'future-proof' its network" via higher-speed tiers and lowering future operating and capital costs: Its residential broadband revenue growth has come from pricing, and growth can likely be sustained by featuring its speed offerings in Suddenlink markets where it often competes with DSL-based telcos. Fritzsche wrote that Comcast, with roughly 26 percent of the U.S. residential broadband market, should get further gains from network and customer experience investments.

Amended local cable franchise authority rules approved 3-2 at the FCC's Aug. 1 meeting (see 1908010011) take effect Sept. 26, per Tuesday's Federal Register.
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FCC Media Bureau rejection of beIN Sports' Comcast carriage complaint (see 1907020056) paves the path to distributors dropping unaffiliated networks willy-nilly and leaves customers defenseless, the Sports Fan Coalition said in a docket 18-384 filing Monday. It makes vertically integrated companies like Comcast both "referee and player in its own game," SFC said. It said even if an indie programmer can match bids of cable-owned sports programmers for sports rights, the programmer has the advantage by being able to offer better distribution, promotion and other treatment of its programming service. Also backing beIN's petition asking the agency to review the bureau order, Public Knowledge said discrimination against indie programmers by vertically integrated cable operators, a focus of the 1992 Cable Act, is an increasingly pressing issue due to consolidation. It said the bureau shouldn't have denied beIN's case before it was allowed to engage in discovery and make a case accordingly. BeIN said the bureau has never found a complainant made a prima facie case and then immediately denied the complaint, and its resolving the proceeding without a hearing while agreeing with the complainant’s prima facie case "is arbitrary and capricious." Comcast didn't comment Tuesday.

Grain Management expects to close on its buy of Ritter companies by year-end, said an application Monday seeking FCC approval for transfer of Telecom Act Section 214 authorizations to a subsidiary of private equity firm Grain. Ritter Telephone, Tri-County, Millington, Ritter Cable and MTel will operate under the same names and terms, and there will be no change in customer service or billing contact information, the application said. Ritter is a cable ISP and telecom serving Arkansas, Tennessee and Texas.

Charter Communications is selling its managed cloud services business Navisite to RDX, it said Monday. The move is part of "prioritization and refinement" of its portfolio. The deal is expected to close within weeks.

Fox Sports Regional Networks and Cox signed a long-term renewal for distribution of the Fox Sports regional sports networks, Cox said Wednesday.

The FCC Media Bureau should reject beIN Sports' emergency appeal of the bureau’s dismissal of beIN’s carriage complaint against Comcast, the MVPD said in an opposition filing posted Monday in docket 18-384 (see 1908020007). The bureau “acted well within its discretion in ruling on the merits based on the written record, which beIN itself had urged the Bureau to do,” Comcast said. “It was not a close call.” BeIN's argument that the case should be referred to an administrative law judge is incorrect, Comcast said. “The Commission’s program carriage rulemaking orders vest the Bureau with discretion to dispose of cases on the pleadings,” Comcast said. The beIN application for review mischaracterizes the law and the factual record, Comcast said.

The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals decision to remand a lower court decision throwing out claims of racial discrimination in Comcast's programming decisions (see 1811190023) conflicts with the plain meaning of Section 1981 of federal anti-discrimination law. That's the argument of docket 18-1171 amicus briefs filed Thursday with the Supreme Court on behalf of Comcast. Section 1981, saying all people have the same rights to make and enforce contracts regardless of race, is most naturally read to require but-for causation, and background common-law principles confirm that a but-for rule applies, DOJ said. Other appellate courts have adopted a burden-shifting framework where a plaintiff can make a prima facie case of a Section 1981 violation by showing race played a role in a challenged decision and the defendant has the burden to show the same decision would have been made regardless of race, but the section doesn't authorize a shift in the burden of persuasion and a plaintiff must prove all elements of a claim including but-for causation, it said. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce, National Federation of Independent Business and National School Boards Association said the 9th Circuit decision turns Section 1981 into a tool for plaintiffs who weren't discriminated against to impose litigation burdens and settlement demands on businesses, local governments, school districts and other contracting entities merely by alleging race was a factor in the challenged decision. They said the 9th Circuit's "mixed-motive standard" that even if racial animus weren't the but-for cause for not getting a contract but a factor in the decision would "invite tenuous allegations of discrimination" that would be tough to resolve on summary judgment, putting pressure on defendants to settle even claims that lack merit just to avoid litigation costs. Limited government public-interest law firm Washington Legal Foundation said the 9th Circuit's conclusion that Section 1981 allows an exception to the but-for standard is a misread of the statute's text and history. The text focuses on conduct and not motives implies a but-for causation standard, and Congress wasn't interested in looking at the many motivations that were part of a defendant's decision-making, it said. The Center for Workplace Compliance said SCOTUS reasoning in other cases suggests but-for causation applies to Section 1981 claims the way the court has ruled it applies in Title VII retaliation claims.

A 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals rejection of Comcast's appeal in a fight over compelled arbitration in a complaint about advertised cable-TV pricing conflicts with Supreme Court precedent, said CTIA in a docket 18-15288 amicus brief Friday (in Pacer). The group backed a Comcast ask for rehearing en banc (see 1908120009). A practical effect of the 9th Circuit decision is it could bar enforcement of millions of consumer contracts "including virtually all cell phone contracts," the association said. It said that because many companies rely on standardized contracts, the ruling could affect those companies' operations nationwide, not just in California. Consumers would face higher prices and "lose the benefit of an inexpensive and efficient forum for resolving disputes," it said. Outside counsel for the plaintiff-appellee didn't comment.