FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler’s plans to increase regulation of joint services agreements are inconsistent with the section of the 1996 Telecom Act that requires quadrennial review of ownership rules, said NAB General Counsel Jane Mago in a post on the association’s blog Tuesday (http://bit.ly/1fSkTHB). The section was adopted as part of a “deregulatory framework,” Mago said. “I find it very hard to understand how one could conclude that reaching back to a docket from 2004 to increase regulation of joint sales agreements (JSAs) without any consideration of the larger picture or change in the marketplace is consistent with the directive.” Mago also found fault with Wheeler’s reasoning that since parent companies claim sidecar companies’ profits in their SEC filings, the sidecar stations should be attributable. “Those filings respond to rules and goals established by the SEC for a very different purpose than FCC licensing. SEC filings are not a part of FCC precedent or law,” Mago said. FCC decisions on attribution should be based on “decision-making authority over programming, personnel and financing,” Mago said. “The FCC is not free to ignore precedent.” The FCC should look at local TV ownership rules “in light of current competitive conditions,” Mago said. “That cannot mean starting another never-ending quadrennial review while tightening restrictions on local broadcast stations alone."

Maine Public Broadcasting Network will deploy a public safety broadcasting service based on Triveni Digital’s SkyScraper DTV content distribution system. MPBN plans to use the system to deliver real-time emergency alert system messages, Triveni said in a news release Monday. The messages will include audio and video originating from the Maine Emergency Management Agency headquarters to every broadcast operation center in Maine, “providing TV and radio stations with immediate information to relay to their viewers and listeners,” Triveni said. SkyScraper offers a highly scalable end-to-end environment “that supports point-to-multipoint digital media content distribution, with targeted point-to-point delivery,” it said.

NHK will use next month’s NAB Show in Las Vegas to demonstrate a closed-circuit over-the-air transmission of 8K Super Hi-Vision content in a single 6 MHz UHF TV channel, NAB said Monday. It will be the first time outside Japan that wireless transmission of Super Hi-Vision is demonstrated over a single 6 MHz TV channel, NAB said. NHK will also present detailed results of a long-distance, single-channel, over-the-air 8K test broadcast recently conducted in Japan, it said. NHK’s booth also will feature a presentation theater with a 350-inch screen for viewing newly shot Super Hi-Vision content, including highlights from the Sochi Winter Olympic Games, it said. NHK has said it’s targeting the launch of Super Hi-Vision to coincide with the 2020 Summer Olympic Games in Tokyo.

The FCC denied two applications for review that sought to overturn license renewals for several Emmis stations in Indiana and Illinois, the agency said in an order Friday (http://bit.ly/1kHUXAu). The applications were filed by David Smith, the Illinois Family Institute and Illinois chapter of Concerned Women for America in 2009 and 2010, and are related to indecency complaints filed against the Mancow’s Morning Madhouse radio show in 2002. Those indecency matters were settled with a 2006 consent decree, said the order. “Upon review of the AFRs and the entire record, and finding no basis in the Applications for Review to modify any of the Bureau’s decisions, we conclude that Smith and Petitioners have failed to demonstrate that the Bureau erred,” said the order. The applications for review concerned WFNI(AM) Indianapolis, WLHK(FM) Shelbyville, WYXB(FM) Indianapolis, WWVR(FM) West Terre Haute, Ind., WTHI-FM, Terre Haute and WKQX(FM) Chicago.

The FCC ordered amateur radio operator Brian Ragan to pay $13,600 for operating a radio transmitter on 104.9 MHz in the San Francisco area without a license. He acknowledged he violated the Communications Act but asked for a lower fine because he had no malicious intent, the Enforcement Bureau said (http://bit.ly/1geMEIZ). Ragan had refused to allow FCC agents to inspect his station. “Under the applicable statute, the Commission need not demonstrate an intent to violate a rule to make a finding that a licensee engaged in willful misconduct,” the bureau said. “The proposed penalty is consistent with those assessed against other operators who engaged in unlicensed operations and failed to allow inspection by FCC agents. As a licensed amateur radio operator, Mr. Ragan is expected to comply with the Rules."

Claims that joint sales agreements create jobs are “absurd” and “not supported by any data,” said Free Press’s Derek Turner in a meeting with FCC Chairman’s Office Special Counsel for External Affairs Gigi Sohn, according to an ex parte filing Monday (http://bit.ly/1fkCcuS). “Because the entire purpose of the use of these agreements is to eliminate independent outlets, they not only result in fewer independent voices, but also reduce the number of broadcast employees that would have otherwise existed absent these arrangements,” Turner said. Sinclair “has a long track record of laying off workers and reducing the number of staff at each of its stations,” said the filing. The commission should “reject these farcical and self-serving attempts to paint the use of outsourcing by the industry’s leading companies as pro-jobs, and move forward to close the outsourcing loopholes.” Armstrong Williams, owner of Howard Stirk Holdings (HSH), expressed opposite views on JSAs in a meeting with Commissioner Mignon Clyburn and her staff, according to an ex parte filing (http://bit.ly/1fkYqBA). “Mr. Williams emphasized that without the ability to enter into JSAs and SSAs, as an African American, he would not have been able to fulfill his lifelong dream of being a TV station owner,” the filing said. Howard Stirk Holdings is involved in sharing deals with Sinclair. Sharing arrangements help HSH in retrans negotiations, to provide local programming and “to survive the competitive marketplace,” the filing said. “Singleton buyers of a TV station, especially in small and medium size markets, simply cannot get financing without these types of shared services agreements,” the filing said.

The full FCC should review the sharing agreements involved in the Tribune/Local transaction, said Free Press in reply comments on its application for review of the deal (http://bit.ly/1kD0JmP). In approving the transaction, the Media Bureau failed to consider the deal’s cumulative effects on the public interest, Free Press said, citing a recent Department of Justice filing on sharing agreements as additional evidence. The Justice filing “focuses, case-by-case, on the function of SSAs over their form -- asking whether their collective effect harms the public interest rather than whether specific contract provisions independently satisfy the attribution standards,” Free Press said. “Failing to account for such effects would otherwise create opportunities to circumvent the Commission’s rules and their underlying goals."

The FCC Media Bureau issued four notices of apparent liability totaling $46,000 against Icicle Broadcasting, for violations of the commission’s public file rule at four Washington state radio stations, according to documents released Wednesday. KOHO-FM Leavenworth (http://bit.ly/1njoqzj), KZAL(FM) Manson, KOZI(AM) Chelan (http://bit.ly/1qciWIY) and KOZI-FM Chelan were missing reports from their public inspection files for various quarters between 2006 and 2012, the NALs said. The violations were “extensive,” meriting upward adjustments on the stations’ proposed fines, the NALs said. The bureau proposed a fine of $10,000 for KOHO and $12,000 each for the other three stations. KOZI(AM), KOZI-FM and KZAL will also have their license renewal applications granted for four years instead of eight, the NALs said.

Chambers Communications sold ABC Oregon affiliates KEZI, Eugene; KDRV, Medford; and KDKF, Klamath Falls; to Heartland Media. The $29 million acquisition expands Heartland’s holdings to four stations, including NBC affiliate WKTV, Utica, N.Y., Heartland said in a press release.

Nielsen’s fourth quarter 2013 cross platform report highlights the dangers of self-reported behaviors in viewing content on mobile phones, TVB said in a press release (http://bit.ly/1e6Wh8j). “It’s clear that consumers do not accurately assess the time they spend with media.” Nielsen changed its methodology for measuring and reporting mobile video based on consumers’ actual behavior as monitored by device meters,” TVB said. Previously, Nielsen relied on claimed behaviors in consumer surveys, TVB said. “The differences are striking not only in comparison to TV, which, based on metered data, reached 155 hours and 32 minutes of Monthly Time Spent, but in the degree of overstatement that consumers report versus actual device monitoring.” This disparity “calls into question many recent studies that have proclaimed the demise of traditional media based on self-reported approximations of time spent with digital devices,” it said.