Monty Tayloe

The consent decrees that govern music rights are out of date and artists should be able to enjoy the free market, said Antitrust Division Chief Makan Delrahim in the opening address Tuesday of DOJ’s teleconferenced two-day workshop (see 2007240067). Consent decrees “don’t conduct music, but the market for music is conducted by consent decrees,” said Delrahim. The pacts need to be justified by either the current landscape or a future one, and shouldn’t be kept to serve the status quo, he said.

The FCC will allow workers who are teleworking now to continue doing so until at least June 2021, and delayed its move to new headquarters until September 2020 over concerns about staff being infected with COVID-19 during the packing process. That's according to interviews with staff, the employee union, and a memo emailed to workers Friday by Chairman Ajit Pai’s Chief of Staff Matthew Berry. (Our earlier news bulletin on this is in front of this publication's pay wall here and the other one is at 2007240038).

Radio giants such as iHeart and Cumulus are united with low-power FM and public interest entities such as REC Networks and Prometheus Radio Project in opposition to a proposal to allow originating programming on FM translators (see 2006260029), in comments posted Friday in RM-11858. This responds to a petition from the new Broadcasters for Limited Program Origination. BLPO includes Miller Communications, Cromwell Group and Finger Lakes Radio Group.

The FCC will allow staffers who are teleworking to continue doing so until at least June, regardless of location, said a Friday emailed memo to staff from Chairman Ajit Pai’s Chief of Staff Matthew Berry “We want to provide those with concerns ranging from childcare to their own health with the peace of mind that they will have the flexibility they need over the coming months.” The decision was made “in light of recent announcements by school districts as well as the ongoing nature of the pandemic.”

The Supreme Court doesn’t need to intervene in FCC ownership rules because the ongoing 2018 quadrennial review is a mechanism for updating them, wrote respondents Tuesday to the agency’s attempted appeal of the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals’ Prometheus IV (see 2005260052). “The sky will not fall if this Court allows the Commission to do its job without weighing in,” said respondents including Prometheus Radio Project, Free Press, Common Cause and the National Association of Broadcast Employees and Technicians-Communications Workers of America. By “looking in the rearview mirror,” further judicial review “might only make matters worse,” the filing said.

The newly formed Independent Broadcasters Association (see 2007100040) is intended to let independent radio stations cooperate to get some of the financial advantages the largest station groups enjoy, not as a lobbying group or alternative to NAB or RAB, said the group’s members in interviews last week. The IBA will be a buying group and one-stop shop for national advertisers, not a lobbying organization, said founder Ron Stone, CEO of Adams Radio Group. NAB and RAB “do an outstanding job,” said IBA member and Renda Broadcasting CEO Tony Renda. “Why reinvent the cow?”

Broadcast entities and white space devices proponents accused one another of attempting to seize control of spectrum they don’t own, in replies posted in docket 20-74 Tuesday in the FCC ATSC 3.0 distributed transmission system proceeding (see 2006150060). Microsoft’s opposition to relaxing interference rules to allow DTS systems is “a back door spectrum grab,” said One Media. The proposed changes “will only benefit a subgroup of broadcasters pursuing their vision of Broadcast Internet by allowing them to extend their respective coverage footprint,” Microsoft said. Though a broadcaster, PMCM also argued that DTS supporters’ motives aren’t pure. “The proposal is essentially a grab for new territory at the cost of decades of Commission adherence to community values,” PMCM said. "The only opposition to this proposal comes from parties with secondary or non-existent spectrum rights that ask the Commission to provide them with unprecedented and unwarranted protections,” said NAB and America’s Public Television Stations. Rule changes are premature because broadcasters have “yet to deploy ATSC 3.0 services in any widespread manner” and they aren’t aimed at improving TV broadcasting, said the New America Foundation’s Open Technology Institute and Public Knowledge. Assertions that broadcasters aren’t seeking those changes to improve over-the-air TV and would heavily invest in single-frequency networks only to compete in a datacasting market that doesn’t yet exist are naive, BitPath said. Revenue and public service benefits from datacasting won’t justify those sorts of investments on their own “for the foreseeable future,” said the company. “While the Commission does not propose granting the DTS spillover area any protection or rights today, based on the history of ATSC 3.0, we know such a request will be forthcoming,” Microsoft said. “It is only a matter of when.”

Radio's future remains unclear, said BIA Advisory Services Chief Economist Mark Fratrik in a Tuesday webinar his firm hosted. The economy and local advertising showed signs of improvement in May and June as states and localities reopened, but recent surges in COVID-19 cases could “put a stop sign on recovery,” Fratrik said. Ad trends tend to lag slightly behind the broader economy, said BIA Managing Director Rick Ducey. Pandemic economic issues also affect regions differently, so a station’s outlook can depend on its market, Fratrik said. Radio is slowly reclaiming its audience reach, Fratrik said. Its audience reach numbers are overall 95% of March, he said. Drive-time listening numbers are down because of a drop in commuting, but midday numbers are up from listeners working from home, he said. Stations shouldn’t expect much of a boost from political commercials because radio traditionally isn't a main outlet for political spots, Fratrik said. That could change this year as campaigns look for replacements for in-person political rallies, said Mark Levy, president of Revenue Development Resources. Money that would have gone to campaign branded merchandise for such rallies or for donor luncheons could get snapped up by radio, he said.

The broadcast incentive auction and repacking are among the biggest challenges the FCC undertook, and could inspire “the next seemingly crazy idea for spectrum reallocation, scribbled on the proverbial cocktail napkin,” said Chairman Ajit Pai in remarks at an American Consumer Institute Center webinar on the repack’s official end Monday (see 2007100035). "We have accomplished our objective,” said Pai. “All of the valuable low-band airwaves sold in the ground-breaking broadcast incentive auction are now available for wireless broadband service.” He praised staff, carriers, tower crews and broadcasters for making the complicated process successful.

The 39-month repacking officially ends July 13 and the vast majority of TV outlets have switched channels. That doesn't mean the job is finished.