The Enforcement Bureau rescinded a pirate radio warning it had issued against a Bridgeport, Connecticut, woman, according to a notice released Wednesday. Shaneka Abdul-Lateef was sent the notice in error, the bureau said. It also issued nine warnings to alleged pirate operators in New York, New Jersey and Florida.
The FCC Enforcement Bureau proposed a $15,000 fine for an alleged Van Nuys, California, pirate radio operator, in a notice of apparent liability issued Tuesday. Juan Carlos Uribe was warned multiple times to cease unlicensed broadcasting in 2016, and switched frequencies after the initial contact with bureau agents, the bureau said. “Mr. Uribe apparently disregarded the warning and continued to broadcast on an unauthorized station.” The bureau also issued nine warnings Monday for unlicensed operation in Florida.
The FCC Office of Engineering and Technology released an updated version of the TVStudy repacking software Tuesday, a public notice said. Version 2.2.4 includes a feature that allows users to "customize records or limit the records to be evaluated in a TV Interference Check study," the PN said. It corrects minor issues, including "one that occasionally caused larger studies to receive a 'leaf count too high' error," the PN said.
A consortium of large TV broadcasters made up of Sinclair, Nexstar, Tegna and Tribune launched an industry work group to develop standard interfaces to accelerate electronic and automated advertising purchases on TV, said the Television Bureau of Advertising in a news release. Called the TV Interface Practices, or TIP, Initiative, the project is intended to help TV ad buying automation systems work together better to facilitate ad sales, the release said. “The goal of the TIP initiative is to accelerate local TV interoperability by creating a coalition of system providers to work with buyers and sellers to develop and implement streamlined transaction workflows using standards-based open APIs [application programming interfaces],” said Nexstar CEO Perry Sook in the release. The group proposed a set of APIs “to support the electronic transfer of ‘buy’ transactional data,” the release said. TVB, headed by Sook, will “provide a repository for the TIP Initiative’s work and open access for industry partners,” the release said. The consortium produced a white paper on best practices, called "Interface Automation Guidelines for Local TV Transactions." Advertising and content “monetization options” will expand with the spread of ATSC 3.0, said Sinclair CEO Chris Ripley in the release. “For our industry to quickly and effectively optimize this opportunity, while ensuring transparency, it is important for us to collaborate on this effort ahead of the adoption of ATSC 3.0.”
The FCC posted a tutorial video explaining how to document repacking expenses on Form 399 for broadcasters seeking repacking reimbursement funds in the post-incentive auction reshuffling of TV channels and other changes.
The Consolidated Database System (CDBS) versions of broadcast ownership forms 323 and 323-E will no longer be available starting Nov. 27, said an FCC Media Bureau public notice. The forms are being migrated to the Licensing and Management System, the PN said. An information session on the new LMS forms will be Nov. 28. Starting that day, users will no longer be able to submit broadcast ownership reports in CDBS, and any users submitting nonbiennial versions of the forms in CDBS must complete that process by Nov. 27, the PN said. The filing window for broadcast ownership reports opens Dec. 1.
The Advanced Warning and Response Network (AWARN) Alliance sees the FCC vote authorizing voluntary deployments of ATSC 3.0 (see 1711160060) as laying "the ground work for major improvements in America’s emergency alerting system,” said Executive Director John Lawson. Recent disasters “provide more depressing examples that our current alerting systems are not adequate,” he said. Using 3.0, the alliance and “public safety partners will begin the technical development” of AWARN next year, he said. But Public Knowledge Senior Vice President Harold Feld blasted FCC Chairman Ajit Pai for the vote, calling it an “action that primarily benefits Sinclair Broadcasting at the expense of consumers.” With Sinclair having “boasted” about the audio measurement tools it will develop and patent royalties it will collect from the next-gen standard, the order “does nothing to protect consumer privacy or protect consumers from the extra costs" of the transition, said Feld. Though NCTA was active in docket 16-142 with filings urging 3.0 not impose costs and burdens on cable companies and their customers, the group declined comment Friday on 3.0's approval.
An item now listed as being on circulation concerns streamlining and improving the process for filing state emergency alert system plans, an FCC spokesman said. The draft on circulation is listed only as a Public Safety Bureau item “On the Matter of Amendment of Part 11 of the Commission's Rules Regarding the Emergency Alert System.” There has also been recent activity under that heading in docket 15-94 concerning Blue Alerts (see 1706220045), the proposed addition of an EAS code to warn of law enforcement officers in danger. Bureau staff queried Sage Alerting (see 1711140024) and AT&T about possible timelines for implementing the alerts. The bureau didn’t comment.
Tribune Media, being bought by Sinclair, said its real estate unit and a developer sold for $65 million 24 acres in Costa Mesa, California, to a joint venture including SteelWave, owner of the next-door Los Angeles Chargers football practice facility. Until it closed in 2010, the property being sold printed the Los Angeles Times, Tribune said Thursday. Tronc now owns that newspaper.
The FCC order letting Gray Television substitute Channel 7 for 5 for KYES-TV Anchorage was to take effect Thursday, said a correction (see 1712060011) in that day's Federal Register to a past FRnotice. "By moving to sister station KTUU[-TV]’s location, and operating with an existing modern broadband antenna on a high-VHF channel, the station will be able to deliver an improved signal," the regulator said in the original notice. Adding the signal to the translator network used by KTUU "will reduce most of the loss of service that would result from the proposed move," it said. Gray committed to improving the station’s service when buying KYES last year under a failing station waiver (see 1707170058).