The FCC Media Bureau and Mountain Broadcasting Corp. reached a $17,500 settlement over violations of public file rules, kids’ TV rules and the requirement that stations display the E/I (educational-information) symbol on core programming, said a consent decree released Thursday. The violations happened between 2009 and 2015 at WMBC-TV Newton, New Jersey, which also didn’t disclose the violations on its license renewal application, the consent decree said. Mountain Broadcasting said Christian Global Network provides most of the station’s core programming, and as “a worldwide network,” CGN supplies programming to countries “that may not follow the FCC’s model for identifying children’s programming,” and that may have contributed to the issue, according to the consent decree. Mountain Broadcasting will educate its employees about FCC requirements and “implement a consumer education program on the meaning of the ‘E/I’ symbol for their foreign language viewers and report to the Bureau regarding its efforts,” the pact said.

More than 1,000 AM stations took advantage of the FCC’s application window for new FM translators, which closed Wednesday, said FCC Chairman Ajit Pai in a news release Thursday. “These translators will enable many of these AM stations to broadcast local programming to their communities at night for the first time.” The most recent window was only for class C and D AM stations that hadn’t taken advantage of earlier windows (see 1707280059). The FCC said a second window for all AM stations that hadn’t applied in previous translator windows will open later this year. With this window closed, the agency will now determine which applications are mutually exclusive, blogged Wilkinson Barker broadcast attorney David Oxenford. After the FCC releases a list of mutually exclusive applications, applicants resolve their conflicts, but such discussion is prohibited under auction rules until then, he said. Mutually exclusive applications that can’t be resolved will go through an auction process, Oxenford said. “One would think that this will happen principally in spectrum-congested markets where there are multiple AM stations eligible for the auction, but few available channels for translators.”

The BBC is working with Microsoft to build an “experimental version” of its iPlayer internet-streaming catchup service that uses artificial intelligence “to allow individuals to sign in to BBC services using their unique voiceprint and to talk to their TV to select what they want to watch,” Cyrus Saihan, the broadcaster’s head of digital partnerships, blogged Wednesday. A voice print is matched “to a sample of your voice stored in the cloud,” he said: AI software then “checks that you are who you say you are and then signs you in."

Commercial radio stations “should be happy” about the reduction in their royalties caused by arbitration between the Radio Music Licensing Committee and the Society of European Stage Authors and Composers (see 1708010043), Wilkinson Barker radio lawyer David Oxenford blogged Wednesday. Other music users also may find the arbitration decision “to be instructive” in future music license negotiation. he said. Since the SESAC rates last until the end of next year, the radio industry likely will soon begin negotiating again, Oxenford said.

FCC implementation of a Blue Alert program should include a training program for message originators similar to that used for Amber Alerts, NAB commented in docket 15-94 (see 1708010065). The training associated with Amber Alerts improved “investigative responses” of law enforcement agencies in incidents involving abducted children, NAB said. It also weighed in on whether the FCC should create a new code or use the existing Law Enforcement Warning code: “A dedicated BLU code may more accurately alert the public regarding police-related incidents.” NAB supports voluntary Blue Alerts with clear criteria for use, and a six month implementation timeframe with a waiver process. NCTA also indicated support for the Blue Alert proposal. The commission should consider that implementation of a new emergency alert system code could take longer than the NPRM suggests, and take a longer time frame into account in any final proposal, NCTA said. The FCC also should ensure the criteria for a Blue Alert are firm, to cut down on overuse of the code, NCTA said: "The issuance of Blue Alerts outside the federal government’s specific guidelines risks desensitizing the public to their significance through unnecessary interruptions of television programming."

When Univision and Northwest Broadcasting in June joined the ATSC 3.0-based broadcaster spectrum consortium started by Sinclair and Nexstar (see 1706200084), it brought the consortium’s “reach” to 90 percent of the U.S., said Sinclair CEO Chris Ripley on a Wednesday earnings call. “The consortium’s mission is to promote spectrum aggregation, innovation and monetization, and we are continuing to invite other broadcasters to join, as we enhance our industry’s ability to compete in the wireless data transmissions sector.” Sinclair also is working with Nexstar to “coordinate the transition” to 3.0 in 97 designated market areas, he said. That work is “an important step to ensuring a speedy rollout of the next-generation advanced services for our viewers and advertisers,” he said. “More broadcasters will be added to this planning process” as they join the spectrum consortium, he said. Sinclair is “quite excited” about the prospects for FCC "relaxation" of local media ownership rules, Ripley said in Q&A. “Overall, we think the industry needs to consolidate to two or three large broadcasters and really just one to two strong local players in each market,” he said. “In some of the larger, and even medium-sized markets, you’ve got anywhere from three to five local players,” and that “doesn’t make sense,” he said. “If there’s relaxation, there’ll be a consolidation at the local level, greater scale at the national level, and there’s significant savings to be had putting local content players together on a local level.” That will give way to “stronger local content producers, which will be able to spread their content and their resources across multiple platforms,” he said. “We see that as the evolution of the industry as dereg sets in here, and you end up with more consolidated, stronger local content players that are more efficient, and so the economics will be great and the strategic output will also be great.”

Tegna completed its sale of CareerBuilder to investment funds managed by affiliates of Apollo Global Management and the Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan Board (see 1706190068), Tegna said in a release Monday. Tegna’s proceeds from the sale were about $250 million, it said. Tegna said it will remain a partner in CareerBuilder with 12 percent ownership and two seats on CareerBuilder’s board. Tribune Media also sold most of its stake in CareerBuilder in connection with the deal, that broadcaster said. Tribune gets about $158 million in cash and retains 7 percent ownership, that release said.

E.W. Scripps Co. bought Katz's four broadcast networks for $292 million, the buyer said in a news release Tuesday. “Bounce, Grit, Escape and Laff" all reach more than 80 percent of all U.S. households, it said. “A growing number of viewers are consuming content from new over-the-air networks as a complement to over-the-top services,” said Scripps CEO Rich Boehne. Scripps was a 5 percent owner of the business before the deal, which is expected to close in October, the release said. Katz founder Jonathan Katz “will continue to lead the Katz networks business” and the 130-employee company will remain in the Atlanta area, Scripps said. The Scripps move is confusing "when investors have growing concerns on the overall network TV industry" and "further M&A opportunities are likely to come up in broadcast with deregulation on the horizon," Wells Fargo analyst Marci Ryvicker emailed investors. Monday, Scripps Networks Interactive, which also has been partly controlled by the Scripps family, agreed to be bought by Discovery Communications (see 1707310062).

Stations represented by the Radio Music License Committee (RMLC) got a discount of more than 60 percent of the Society of European Stage Authors and Composers (SESAC) radio station license rate card, RMLC said in a news release. The fee reduction applies for the license period Jan. 1, 2016, through Dec. 31, 2018, Monday's release said. The discount is the result of arbitration stemming from RMLC’s antitrust case against SESAC, it said. “Arbitrators’ decision is a significant favorable step in the right direction for the radio industry, bringing SESAC’s license fees and rate structure more into line with the rate formulas used by ASCAP [American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers] and BMI,” RMLC said. “While we believe that the value of our music substantially exceeds the amount of the award and the nature of the arbitration process made it inevitable that we would see a reduction in our fees for terrestrial radio, the panel’s decision is a resounding affirmation of the fact that ASCAP rates in radio do not reflect fair market value,” said SESAC CEO John Josephson in a news release. ASCAP didn’t comment Tuesday.

Comments on proposed waivers of the channel substitution freeze and contour extension freeze for Gray Television’s KYES-TV Anchorage are due in docket 17-187 Aug. 15, replies Aug. 25, said Monday’s Federal Register. Gray acquired KYES under a failing station waiver and seeks to move it to another site to be broadcast from an existing antenna shared with three other stations (see 1707170058).