FCC Advisory Committee on Diversity and Digital Empowerment meets virtually June 24 at 10 a.m., says Tuesday's Federal Register. The meeting will feature reports from the committee’s working groups.

Sony Music Entertainment completed its $430 million buy of Kobalt Music Group’s distribution and neighboring rights businesses for independent artists under a definitive agreement announced Feb. 1. Sony continues cooperating with the U.K. antitrust review initiated before the transaction was closed, said the company Wednesday.

“HBO Max With Ads” is WarnerMedia's new branding for the ad-supported VOD service debuting the first week of June at $9.99 monthly, $5 lower than the ad-free HBO Max. The no-ads version launches across Latin America and the Caribbean in late June, said WarnerMedia Wednesday.

Quick pairing, virtual remote control and digital keys are among Android announcements at Google’s virtual I/O event this week through Thursday. It's working with carmakers to develop a digital car key in Android 12 for select Pixel and Samsung Galaxy smartphones to lock, unlock and start a car from their phones, blogged Android Vice President-Engineering Erik Kay Tuesday. It's also teaming with BMW and others. This operates over ultra wideband, Kay said. Cars with near-field communication can be unlocked with a tap, he noted. And Google is building TV remote-control features into Android smartphones. Google wants to create a sense of “being together” while far apart, blogged Clay Bavor, vice president-virtual and augmented reality. Video conferencing remains “a far cry from actually sitting down and talking face to face,” said Bavor: Project Starline is a “magic window” through which a user can see another person, “life-size and in three dimensions.” The company is doing demonstrations with healthcare and media companies and plans trial deployments this year.

Hi-res music costs will fall, with Amazon and Apple Monday announcements it will be available at the price of standard streaming music subscriptions. Apple Music is adding Spatial Audio with support for Dolby Atmos to a basic subscription, said the company Monday. An individual monthly plan is $9.99, $14.99 for families. Apple Music will also make its catalog of more than 75 million songs available in lossless audio using the Apple Lossless Audio Codec. Amazon adds Amazon Music HD songs remixed in 3D audio formats such as Dolby Atmos and Sony 360RA. It's "key to remain competitive," Futuresource analyst Alexandre Jornod told us. "Apple offering the same features but without additional cost could involve Amazon Music HD subscribers switching to Apple Music if Amazon was not matching the price." Spotify plans a hi-res service in second-half 2021.

A Texas social media regulation bill cleared the House State Affairs Committee 8-5 Friday. The Senate earlier passed SB-12, which would allow private lawsuits against social media companies that moderate content. It’s one of many state bills seeking to rein in social media amid the federal debate about Communications Decency Act Section 230 (see 2104190030).

The first Disney+ subscriber miss since the streaming service’s November 2019 U.S. launch stirred some concern. Disney+ ended fiscal Q2 April 3 with 103.6 million paid subscribers, increasing nearly 9 million sequentially and shy of consensus estimates of 109 million. Disney added the paid subs “at a faster pace in the last month of the second quarter” than in the first two, said Chief Financial Officer Christine McCarthy on a Thursday call. There were “no major market launches” in Q2, she said. And price hikes were the first “since we launched,” said CEO Bob Chapek. “We're extremely pleased with how the market reacted,” he said. “We've not observed any significantly higher churn.” Of sub “drivers,” the “content slate” will be key, he said. “We're spending a lot of money across our variety of franchises.” Disney is sticking with the Premier Access strategy it used for the Disney+ release of Mulan and Raya and the Last Dragon as a $29.99 option, even as theaters reopen, said Chapek. The studio will “try to release things” theatrically and “reprime the pump” for movie audiences, but for consumers who are “a little leery still about going into a packed theater,” Premier Access gives them the option to watch feature films “in the safety and convenience of their home,” he said. Disney+ “should have benefited" from launching the first two TV shows from the Marvel Cinematic Universe franchise and the Premier Access release of Raya, said Cowen Friday.

Maine’s attorney general is “very comfortable” defending a bill calling IPTV operators utilities and raising minimum franchise fees, but that’s no guarantee the state would win, Chief Deputy AG Christopher Taub told the Maine Joint Energy, Utilities and Technologies Committee at a work session streamed Thursday. The committee voted 7-4 to temporarily table the bill and consider it later. Industry opponents say the plan (LD-920) would violate the federal Cable Act, an argument they made against three previous Maine cable laws in cases that went to the 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. "This is definitely a defensible bill," but "there's certainly a possibility that a court would find that either some or all of this bill would be preempted,” said Taub. Such cases are “extremely complicated” and it’s “very difficult to predict on any given issue how it's going to come out,” he warned. Two issues are “thorny,” said Taub: Opponents might argue a proposed regulatory surcharge is an “end run around” the federal 5% cap on franchise fees because the bill also sets 5% as the floor for Maine franchise fees, he said. They might say the Cable Act prevents treating companies as utilities, but Maine could argue that -- other than calling them utilities and applying a regulatory surcharge -- the state wouldn’t be regulating them as utilities, said Taub. A skeptical State Sen. Trey Stewart (R) responded, “If it quacks like a duck.”

The removal of deadline language in FCC retransmission consent rules on good-faith negotiating and exclusivity provisions is effective June 14, says Thursday's Federal Register. The Media Bureau deleted the language for retrans rules last month (see 2104290047).

The FCC 2022 quadrennial review could be a way to try to tackle broadcast diversity and localism items, and auction 109 could help stem the trend of radio stations closing during the pandemic, Commissioner Geoffrey Starks told the Media Institute Tuesday (prepared remarks here). He said his chief policy focuses include broadband access and media diversity. He said lack of an affordable broadband connection is a sizable problem for communities of color. Starks said FCC data shows declines in numbers of radio stations due to the pandemic, but "perhaps the tide will turn" with the agency's July 27 auction of radio construction permits. He said as the nation heads to a post-pandemic time, the radio industry's business fortunes should rebound somewhat. He called the Supreme Court's Prometheus decision (see 2104010067) a win for agency deference, even though it found the challenged ownership rules weren't necessary, giving the FCC space to revisit its rules in the QE with diversity "front and center as consideration." He said media consolidation might be considered a less significant problem due to growing internet and streaming competition to broadcast TV, but broadcast TV's importance during the pandemic reinforces the inherent value of having multiple voices in a public arena. Post-Prometheus, "we should have all ideas on the table," he said, adding he was pleased with Commissioner Brendan Carr's call to reinstate the broadcast incubator program. Starks said the FCC looking into reinstatement of collection of minority employment data from broadcasters (see 2103260038) "is long overdue." He said not having that equal employment opportunity data hampered the agency from fulfilling its statutory duty to monitor broadcast employer practices and ensuring broadcasters provide opportunity.