Broad CVAA Waiver Standards Sought by CEA; NCTA Seeks Broadband Exemption
Industry groups seek carve-outs for broadband and other advanced communications services (ACS) from disabilities accessibility legislation passed last year, while advocates for those with trouble seeing want exemptions to be few and narrow. Replies posted Tuesday in FCC docket 10-213 picked up on the theme of initial comments on the 21st Century Communications and Video Accessibility Act (CD April 27 p7), where industry sought flexibility. The CEA, NCTA and others said the commission must not further regulate services whose primary function isn’t ACS, while the videogame industry’s lobbying group sought a blanket exemption for its products. Seven advocacy groups for the deaf and others said the act shouldn’t be curtailed, regardless of calls to do so.
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"Some commenters suggest overly broad definitions that would impose burdensome obligations on services -- such as network providers that merely transmit ACS -- that fall outside of the categories subject to the CVAA,” the NCTA said. “Other commenters propose to cover under Title I of the CVAA services that Congress intended to address in Title II.” Section 716(e)(1)(B) of the act applies to information content, not defined yet “understood to mean Internet content,” not pay-TV programming, the association said. It asked the FCC to reject calls for network providers to be required to prioritize accessible services such as video relay over other, similar types of traffic. Suggestions to expand the electronic messaging service’s definition to include broadband service “would impermissibly extend the reach” of the legislation, the NCTA said.
CEA said the legislative history argues for excluding social media messaging functions, and the definition of electronic messaging service means the FCC should exclude machine-to-machine and human-to-machine communications. The association asked the regulator to say that non-interconnected VoIP and other services don’t constitute ACS if they're a “purely incidental” component to advanced communications. “Contrary to some suggestions in the record, the Commission should ensure that the scope of covered products, services, and entities is consistent with Congress’ intent” and “reject the overly inclusive interpretation of the ACS definitions” from some commenters, CEA said.
Many commenters “forgot” the act is meant to ensure the disabled can fully use communication services and gear and better access video, Telecommunications for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing, National Association of the Deaf and five others said jointly. They criticized requests that the FCC wait two years before imposing all CVAA requirements -- which CEA seeks -- and those desiring “broad and permanent waivers to reduce the burden on industry.” Any “curtailment in the scope and timing of the CVAA will only exacerbate the problems faced every day by the disabled community,” the advocates said: The agency “should ignore efforts to do so and retain the integrity” of the law.
Rules should cover ACS resellers and aggregators, though that may have a “deterrent effect” among those who don’t develop equipment, the American Foundation for the Blind said. “The efforts to ensure accessibility exerted by retailers may be considerably less than those of the per se manufacturers, because of the relative control over the product that a reseller has. Nevertheless, resellers make choices about the equipment and services they offer, and they certainly can and should make access expectations of those businesses with which they interact.”