House’s Fried Skeptical of Need for AllVid Rules; Kerry Aide Doesn’t See NPRM Soon
CHICAGO -- Some House Commerce Committee members are skeptical of the need for AllVid rules the FCC has been aiming to propose, its Republican counsel said. The rulemaking notice being worked on by the commission doesn’t seem likely to be finished soon, said an aide to Senate Communications Subcommittee Chairman John Kerry, D-Mass. Both aides, who spoke at the Cable Show Tuesday, said an earlier panel demonstrated that cable operators and programmers are trying to make content more accessible to subscribers. (See separate story in this issue.)
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It’s been more than a year since the FCC laid out in the National Broadband Plan its AllVid vision for all pay-TV providers to connect to consumer electronics sold by retailers, without using CableCARDs, said Senior Vice President Tom Simmons of Midcontinent Communications, who moderated the Capitol Hill panel. The Media Bureau has been backtracking on an AllVid plan it floated earlier this year (CD May 24 p4). A bureau spokeswoman declined to comment on the aides’ remarks.
The prospect of AllVid rules raises questions of whether they're necessary and feasible, said Neil Fried, the House Commerce Committee counsel, who works for its Republicans. “There’s a certain amount of skepticism if it’s necessary” among some on the committee, he said. The FCC seems to be having a hard time figuring out “if it’s feasible,” Fried said: “We don’t know what happens next” or if the commission’s approach to the issue again changes.
It’s not that consumer needs aren’t now being met by industry, but that they're evolving, Fried said of the earlier panel at the NCTA convention. “They're all competing to meet them as they develop.” That panel illustrates rules may not be necessary, said Danny Sepulveda, who works on telecom issues for Kerry. “I don’t see it as an issue we'll be dealing with” soon on the Hill, he said: “It’s up to the FCC” to see “if the market is meeting that goal” of video device competition, the aide said.
FCC flexibility in how to set up an incentive auction of spectrum the broadband plan seeks to reallocate from TV stations for mobile broadband was sought by both Hill aides. “We're going to try to find a balance to give the FCC the flexibility to design the auction,” Fried said. “But we are going to want some amount of security about what the outcome will be,” so that what broadcasters seek to be a voluntary opportunity to participate is indeed so, he said. The goal is to “to try to preserve as much flexibility within that as possible,” Fried said.
"There’s a general consensus that incentive auctions are a good idea,” Sepulveda said, and that the commission should have the “flexibility to use its expertise” in designing the auction. It’s important to ensure “that you have swaths of spectrum that are national enough in scope and wide enough to be used,” he continued. “There’s a growing consensus that you want to give the FCC as much flexibility as possible.” Fried said even if spectrum legislation isn’t passed this year, “it will have legs” in 2012.
Both aides said there’s reason to think the FCC will be able to meet its goal of finishing the first part of a Universal Service Fund overhaul this summer. They both cautioned that paying for broadband deployment, as a USF overhaul may entail, may have hurdles. Sepulveda said “there is a feeling across the commission that USF monies could be both collected and distributed in a better manner.” There’s “a whole ecosystem of firms” with a stake in the money, he said. “I think you'll see some significant action.” Fried is “cautiously optimistic” of USF changes happening this summer, in advance of Commissioner Michael Copps departing by the time Congress adjourns for the year. “It doesn’t hurt that Commissioner Copps is leaving at the end of the year,” Fried said: “I think he would like to get this done before he goes, and the other commissioners want to work with him” to that end.
There are complications to passing online privacy legislation in 2011, the two aides said. “There’s concern we not stifle innovation, we not stifle jobs,” Fried said: It’s unclear what role the FCC and FTC would play in regulating online privacy, and “that’s going to be part of the conversation. … I don’t think we have the answer yet.” The point isn’t to “force the bill through,” said Sepulveda. “When you have a bill that’s this big, that involves this many private actors, a little bit of regulatory humility” -- as NCTA CEO Michael Powell sought earlier Tuesday -- “is warranted,” Sepulveda said. Yet every other developed country has a privacy law, and “there’s [a] push from the states, given the recent data breach situations,” for such legislation, he said. “But it’s really, really hard and these are really, really complicated issues. There’s a lot of money at stake” and other important issues, Sepulveda said, which will “lead to very-emotional discussions, and to get to `yes’ is going to need many more discussions.”