Federal Communications Commission (FCC)

Refusing to accept money from individual companies, the Federation for Economically Rational Utility Policy (FERUP) leaders expects to emerge as a strong voice in key telecom debates at the state and federal levels, members told us. An organization of reform-minded state commissioners, also members of NARUC, was officially launched this year and is made up of at least 14 commissioners from 12 states. FERUP held a D.C. Summit last week (CD Sept 15 p2). An IRS filing for 501(c)(3) non-profit status is in process, officials said.

LONDON -- The U.S. and U.K. see eye-to-eye on many telecom and Internet issues despite differences in their respective infrastructures, NTIA, FCC and State Dept. officials said Wed. “Technology doesn’t recognize any borders,” said NTIA Dir. Michael Gallagher. Given their common heritage and common approach to difficult issues like spectrum and broadband, he said, it’s not surprising the countries’ positions are in alignment. Investment challenges associated with broadband deployment exist in every country, said FCC Comr. Kathleen Abernathy. Neither the U.S. nor the U.K. directly subsidizes deployment, she said, meaning “we're all looking at the same things to spur investment” through regulatory approaches. Their comments came during an interview with Communications Daily.

FCC Chmn. Powell said the Commission will be very active with indecency complaints in coming weeks as many broadcasters licenses come up for renewal. “This is why we are so active with our indecency complaints,” Powell told reporters at a press briefing Wed.

CTIA indicated it will likely take the FCC to court over the National Programmatic Agreement (NPA) on tower siting, which was released by the Commission Fri. (CD Sept 13 p1). Sources said CTIA has been looking for some time for an opportunity to file an appeal on the federal “undertaking issue” - which involves the ability of the govt. to assert authority over an issue, and has implications for other issues as well. The NPA case presents CTIA with the chance to raise the issue, they said.

Election year politics and the fight over intelligence reform could doom legislation introduced Tues. by Senate Commerce Committee Chmn. McCain (R-Ariz.) and Senate Govt. Affairs ranking Democrat Lieberman (Conn.) that would clear 700 MHz spectrum for emergency communications by expediting the DTV transition, sources said Wed.

Echoing concerns expressed by VoIP providers in the U.S., parties told the European Commission (EC) in comments it shouldn’t harm the growth of IP-based communications by imposing unnecessary regulations. The EC -- which has generally kept the Internet free of traditional telecom regulations -- has launched a proceeding to examine issues related to IP-based communications, asking for comments on the appropriate regulatory framework for VoIP services that utilize numbering resources and provide access to or from the PSTN.

Comcast and NAB weighed in against DBS comments for the annual FCC assessment of competition in video programming delivery. Comcast said in reply comments “any fair-minded observer would have seen abundant additional evidence” of growing competition. It noted DirecTV and EchoStar reported 2nd quarter results that exceeded most analysts’ expectations. DirecTV said it added a record 944,000 gross operated subscribers and reduced its monthly churn to 1.4% to yield 455,000 net operated subscriber additions, Comcast said. EchoStar said it added about 340,000 net subscribers in the quarter.

ASPEN, Colo. -- The Telecom Act is a failed document in the broadband age and VoIP will be the “stalking horse” that forces change in Congress and at the FCC, Chmn. Powell said here. VoIP is “the killer app not only for the broadband economy but for legal policy change,” Powell said Mon., referring to how it rocks regulatory structures spelled out in the 1934 Act and the 1996 rewrite: “It’s going to shoot right into the core of the past.” Powell also vowed to press for final UNE-P rules by year-end. Asked by reporters after his speech whether he planned to be at the Commission when they were completed, whenever that might be, he replied: “You betcha.”

The FCC’s new Wireline Bureau Chief Jeffrey Carlisle said the agency ought to deal with state vs. federal jurisdiction over VoIP before tackling other issues in the FCC’s broad IP Enabled Services proceeding. “I don’t know if we can get a comprehensive order done by the end of the year because the record’s so huge and there are so many issues,” Carlisle said in an interview with Communications Daily. “I do believe we should try to decide the jurisdiction issue by the end of the year.”

Senate Judiciary leaders disagreed with an MPAA characterization of their work on broadcast flag, they told the FCC. In a Aug. 3 letter to FCC Chmn. Powell, Senate Judiciary Antitrust Subcommittee Chmn. DeWine (R-O.) and ranking Democrat Kohl (D-Wis.) said the subcommittee didn’t “decline to act,” but instead determined the FCC had its review of broadcast flag well in hand. Writing on behalf of MPAA, attorney Bruce Boyden said the FCC shouldn’t delay or deny approvals of broadcast flag technologies based on “claimed anticompetitive effects of non-assert provisions.” The letter was written for 3 open proceedings the FCC has on broadcast flag. “We believe that when licenses grant any ‘necessary’ or ‘essential’ rights to licensees to practice the technology’s specification, it is reasonable and hardly anticompetitive to seek to reduce transaction costs, clear blocking positions, and avoid costly infringement litigation by having adopters agree not to assert any ‘necessary’ claims they hold within the scope of the specification against any other participants in the system,” the letter said. The letter then said the Senate Judiciary Antitrust Subcommittee examined the issues and “declined to act.” But DeWine and Kohl said that shouldn’t be interpreted as a formal position by the subcommittee. “Rather the Subcommittee, while considering the positions of all sides, explored this issue with the staff of the Federal Communications Commission and determined that the FCC staff had a solid grasp of the competitive implications raised by the proposed licenses,” the DeWine and Kohl letter said.