Mobile is driving most global spending on telecom services and pay-TV services, a segment expected to reach nearly $1.7 trillion this year, IDC reported Monday. Mobile spending, projected to be 52 percent of the total market in 2017, is forecast to have a 2 percent compound annual growth rate (CAGR) through 2021, driven by growth in mobile data usage and machine-to-machine applications, offsetting spending declines in mobile voice and messaging services, IDC said. Fixed data service spending, at 21 percent of spending this year, is seen growing by a 4 percent CAGR over the period, driven by higher-bandwidth services. Spending on pay-TV services -- cable, satellite, internet protocol and digital terrestrial -- is projected to be flat over the five-year period, but they're an increasingly important part of the multiplay offerings of telecom providers worldwide, IDC said, with spending forecast to grow 9 percent this year and 7 percent in 2018. Spending on fixed voice services, meanwhile, will drop at a 6 percent compound annual growth rate over the forecast period, to less than 10 percent of the total market by 2021. An increase in IP voice isn't offsetting "rapidly declining” time-division multiplexing voice revenue, it said.

The Entertainment Software Association's petition for extension of a waiver of FCC rules requiring advanced communication services (ACS) access by people with disabilities (see 1711010056) should be its last, disability advocacy groups said in docket 10-213 filings posted Friday, the deadline for replies. The National Federation of the Blind said the pattern of waiver extensions and delays in access to ACS features in videogames for people with disabilities "is a distressing trend" that hopefully ends with this last request. An array of groups support ESA on condition it be the final extension, to be followed by "large-scale compliance." Those groups said the FCC should make clear it will "skeptically" scrutinize claims that making ACS components of future videogames accessible isn't achievable. Signers include Telecommunications for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing, the National Association of the Deaf, the Hearing Loss Association of America, the American Foundation for the Blind, the American Council of the Blind, the National Association of State Agencies of the Deaf and Hard of Hearing, and Deaf and Hard of Hearing Consumer Advocacy Networks. The Arc of the United States said in a filing posted Monday the petition is "problematic" in not showing usability and accessibility steps for people with cognitive disabilities, so approval should be conditioned on ESA submitting a progress report next year detailing steps members have taken to include people with cognitive disabilities in user research, product design and testing and online community curation. Arc said the report should cover insights ESA members generate about such needs and any changes the members make. The requested extension would go until Jan. 1, 2019.

CTIA opposed a proposal to replace "international bearer circuit" (IBC) regulatory fees with a fee on all holders of international Section 214 authorizations under the Communications Act. The group supports FCC efforts to ensure regulatory fees reflect agency work, but criticized a Submarine Cable Coalition proposal to replace the IBC fees as unfair and inefficient. "The proposal would exempt non-common carrier submarine cable licensees and non-common carrier operators that own international circuits -- a category of operators the Commission included earlier this year -- while imposing new fees on resellers of international services who own no facilities but hold Section 214s, creating additional unnecessary administrative burdens and failing to reflect the work of Commission staff," said CTIA comments, which along with others were posted Friday and Monday in docket 17-134 responding to a Further NPRM (see 1709060050). The Satellite Industry Association "strongly opposes using a tier-based system developed to address extremely high-capacity submarine cable facilities to calculate fees for the tiny proportion of IBCs offered via satellite," it said. "Instead, the Commission should replace the satellite IBC fee with an assessment on international section 214 authorizations or simply retain the current assessment method for satellite IBCs." Addressing submarine cable fee tiers, CenturyLink's Level 3 said "revised fee tiers proposed by the Commission represent a reasonable update to the submarine cable fee assessment methodology. The proposed tiers maintain the balance of interests struck in 2009, while reflecting the upgrades that have been made to many of the cables that were in service in 2009 and the increased capacity of new and proposed cables." NCTA and the American Cable Association urged the FCC "to retain a current voluntary methodology for determining the number of subscribers" in a multiple dwelling unit, "but not restrict operators from using an alternative method of calculation." ITTA said the FCC should retain the MDU "bulk rate calculation, without modification."

North American Portability Management updated parties on various issues in the ongoing local number portability administrator transition from Neustar to iconectiv. Transition oversight manager PwC provided "supplemental information regarding transition testing, readiness, reporting, and rollback to ensure all stakeholders have an accurate view of transition status and plans," and are aware of "communications channels and reporting mechanisms" it's using, said NAPM's November report Friday in docket 09-109. The information is included in a three-page appendix of the report. Neustar complained recently that NAPM was failing to inform parties of key "readiness" elements in its monthly reports (see 1711200040).

Five FCC Enforcement Bureau draft orders were sent to commissioners Thursday, said the agency's circulation items list, which was updated Friday. The agency didn't comment.

FCC Chairman Ajit Pai went on The Joe Pags Show "to clear up confusion on net neutrality and his proposal to Restore Internet Freedom," tweeted FCC spokesman Brian Hart Friday. He noted Pai, when asked what net neutrality is, responded: "Part of the problem is that it is a very successful marketing slogan and that it sounds good and that it's also incapable of being defined. ... Ultimately what it means here at the FCC is government control of the internet. And the question is, do you want the successful, free market approach that we had from ... 1996 until 2015 where consumers and engineers and entrepreneurs decided how it would be governed? Or would you want bureaucrats and lawyers here in Washington to do it as happened after 2015?" Parties lobbied the FCC against Pai's draft order, according to filings posted Thursday and Friday in docket 17-108. The Computer & Communications Industry Association urged the FCC to keep its open internet rules and detailed concerns about relying on FTC oversight of broadband consumer protection, which Pai and others have touted, said a CCIA filing on meetings with aides to every non-chairman commissioner. Pai is proposing the FCC "abdicate its responsibilities" and allow broadband providers "to block, throttle, and force websites, applications and services to pay ... to avoid the slow lane" that providers will institute, Incompas said on a meeting with aides to Commissioners Jessica Rosenworcel and Mignon Clyburn. "This fundamental policy shift takes control of the internet experience from each American and hands it over to AT&T, Comcast, Verizon, and Charter." NARUC criticized the draft's proposed pre-emption of state broadband regulation. "Even where the order purports to preserve State’s 'traditional role in generally policing such matters as fraud, taxation, and general commercial dealings' the order provides an obvious opportunity for any bad actor to allege that -- whatever the state law or enforcement action is -- its 'administration . . . interfere[s] with federal regulatory objectives.' This is a prescription for wasteful and counter-productive litigation," NARUC said. Comcast, however, backed "a clear, affirmative ruling on federal preemption of state and local regulation" of broadband, said a company filing reporting a call with an aide to Commissioner Michael O'Rielly. Akamai urged a footnote tweak to help distinguish content delivery network services from paid prioritization, given "global regulatory implications." Among others criticizing the draft were the Writers Guild of America, East, AFL-CIO (here) and the California Association of School Business Officials (here).

Reports DOJ will require Sinclair to spin off very few stations in its acquisition of Tribune were met with scorn by former FCC Commissioner Mike Copps Thursday. “Lipstick on a pig! No conditions can make this work,” tweeted Copps, with transaction opponent Common Cause. The New York Post reported Wednesday night Sinclair is nearing an agreement with DOJ that would require divestiture of 13 stations. The parties didn't comment.

FCC Commissioner Mignon Clyburn said Chairman Ajit Pai was wrong in many predictions about the 2015 net neutrality order. As a commissioner, Pai predicted courts would reverse the Democratic majority's open internet decisions, and the order would lead to regulation of broadband pricing and plans, when none of that has occurred, Clyburn said Thursday "debunking" various Pai claims as "false." A Pai spokeswoman didn't comment. Republican Commissioner Brendan Carr in a Washington Post opinion piece responded to criticism of the draft order to undo Title II regulation: "Mad Max Fans, this is no Thunderdome. The FCC is not killing the Internet." AT&T Senior Executive Vice President Bob Quinn offered a similar view in a blog titled, "Reports of the Internet's Impending Death are Grossly Exaggerated." CTIA Vice President Scott Bergmann blogged the draft is "good news" for wireless consumers, as its members will be able to "get back to doing what they do best: delivering what their consumers want: an open internet that meets their needs." Free Press said people are protesting Pai's plan "to kill net neutrality" in Congress, at the FCC and at Verizon stores, with 600,000 people using BattlefortheNet.com's tool to call lawmakers.

In technologically changing times, the Cable & Telecommunications Association for Marketing is trying to increase input from stakeholders from outside the core cable industry, with a new category of members and by including tech companies in some gatherings, CTAM executives told reporters at its headquarters Wednesday. One challenge industrywide, they said in National Harbor, Maryland, is how to buttress relationships through in-person meetings, with NCTA's INTX show no more (see 1610070023) and CTAM's Summit ended several years ago. No one event took INTX's place, and some are grappling with CES' big size and other meetings not incorporating more aspects of what was once the National Show, executives said. With CES "too big, it's too overwhelming," and CTAM is trying new strategies to serve members, CEO Vicki Lins​ said. "In our industry, it peaked a couple years ago, where your CMOs felt they needed to be there" annually, she said of chief marketing officers. Senior Vice President-Advanced Products Angie Britt, who has done a biennial CES tour, said in this "off" year she will do livestreaming and recorded interviews and perhaps demos of video and IoT products. "In a tour, you're taking 40 people through 150,000 of your friends" and that takes time, she said. "The conference is making it more and more challenging to get people on and off the bus at a place where you can let people on and off." CES is committed to ensuring "attendees and exhibitors have a quality experience," responded a spokeswoman for show producer CTA. It restricts attendance to ensure the show "remains easily navigable and that our attendees can find the distinct communities of their choice while experiencing the value of having the full industry represented," she said. "We work closely with the city of Las Vegas and transportation vendors to ease commute times from venue to venue to make the show experience as productive and streamlined as possible." For face-to-face gatherings generally, Lins thinks "the pendulum has swung very far." While "great stuff happened as a result" of past events, she said, "it's harder to have those relationships when you're not together with people." It was good to "right size," she said, but one still needs "those quality moments where you can build relationships, and I don't think you've found it yet." Yet post-INTX, "there wasn't the appetite for finding another big conference," said CTAM Chief Communications Officer Anne Cowan. "The marketplace was weighing in." Though her association had some INTX sessions, she said "the loss of that has been our gain" in some ways, with more coming to CTAM business meetings. In the first year without a major cable show, CableLabs and NCTA put on "The Near Future" event in April in Washington (see 1704270040). An NCTA spokesman declined to comment.

Warren Havens -- once subject of an administrative law judge order asking the FCC to determine whether he was qualified to hold licenses -- is scheduled to begin a five-day jail sentence Wednesday in Alameda County, California, on a contempt charge for interference with the receivership appointed to hold onto licenses in which he had a stake. In a docket 17-cv-6772 order (in Pacer) denying stay of sentence issued Tuesday, U.S. District Judge Phyllis Hamilton of Oakland said Havens' contentions the contempt of court finding was unlawful are "too general and insufficient to warrant such an extraordinary remedy" as a stay. Alameda County Superior Court Judge Robert Friedman, in the 2016 contempt of court order, said it sprung from ALJ Richard Sippel's 2015 order inviting the FCC to issue a hearing designation order on whether Havens and his companies qualify to hold licenses, and a business partner of Havens' subsequently moving to appoint a receiver for the licenses they jointly held. Havens filed a petition for involuntary bankruptcy of that receivership, which violated court orders restraining him from interfering with the receivership, said the contempt of court order. Sippel's 2015 order said Havens had a "history of disruptive disregard of orders and otherwise contemptuous behavior" that barred Havens and his companies from future participation in a proceeding due to "their contemptuous and disruptive conduct," including harassing emails, "dumping" more than 444 unscreened exhibits of 17,000-plus pages on the Office of the ALJ, the Enforcement Bureau and other parties and multiple instances of taking conflicting positions in successive pleadings. Havens couldn't be reached for comment.