Broadcasters may be dissuaded from participating in the incentive auction unless they get answers to their widely held questions (CD April 10 p9) from the FCC, said many industry executives. Among questions most frequently discussed by respondents to our informal survey is in what markets the agency seeks to reallocate some frequencies now used by TV stations for wireless broadband. Even some economists unaligned with any industry, who think the commission has done almost all it can to provide clarity to stations, agree such IDs would help. Without such details, some stations that might otherwise sell the right to some or all of their 6 MHz allotments may sit out the first-of-its-kind auction the agency hopes to hold next year (CD May 22 p1), said broadcasters who don’t expect to participate.

The media ownership study that prompted a pause in approving FCC rules may be done soon, said the head of the group paying for the research on cross-ownership’s impact on minority ownership. The research has been completed and is being peer-reviewed, Minority Media and Telecommunications Council Executive Director David Honig told us Tuesday. “We're hoping to get it finished and published before the end of this week, but you never know,” he said. “It’s that close to done.” Then-FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski in February paused a vote on ownership rules to give time for MMTC to do the study, and Friday the agency released a study design on barriers to entry, research that a public notice said relates to ownership rules (CD May 29 p2). MMTC had expected the research to be given to the agency Wednesday, said a May 2 filing in docket 09-182 (http://bit.ly/12iVzVE). It said the reviewers are professors Philip Napoli of Fordham University, Allen Hammond of the Santa Clara School of Law and Jannette Dates, ex-dean of Howard University’s School of Communications. NAB continues to think “modest reform of media ownership rules -- many of which stem from the 1970s -- are warranted,” an association spokesman told us. “As the events of Superstorm Sandy, the Boston Marathon bombing and the Oklahoma tornadoes have proven, local broadcasting still matters, and it’s time to adopt ownership rules that allow radio and TV stations to remain competitive with national pay media providers.”

The FCC, having contracted for $208,799 of preliminary research on barriers to entering businesses it oversees like owning radio and TV stations, may spend as much as $917,823 for studies acquiring new data including on new media. That’s according to documents the agency released to Communications Daily’s publisher under Freedom of Information Act requests. As the commission prepares to receive a new privately funded study on media ownership for which a vote on new rules was paused in February (CD Feb 27 p1), it’s embarking on what officials inside and outside the agency called the next phase of barriers-to-entry research.

Old and new methods of distributing emergency alert system warnings need improvement, said a new GAO report. It recommended the FCC and Federal Emergency Management Agency work to get an Internet-based EAS message system rolled out by states. “Weaknesses” in the traditional broadcast-based method of distributing warnings from government agencies to radio listeners, TV viewers and multichannel video programming distributor customers persist after a GAO report found problems in 2009, said the study. It said the FCC and FEMA have taken limited steps to improve traditional EAS after a first-of-its-kind nationwide test of the system in 2011.

Views on government indecency policy appear to vary among TV broadcasters, our survey of industry executives and lawyers found. Whether and to what extent differences will be on display when the industry begins commenting next month on a first-of-its-kind FCC request for comment on its indecency policy (CD April 2 p1) remains to be seen. Broadcasters of all stripes remain mostly united in opposing a since-discarded tack of censuring brief on-air nudity or cursing. Yet even on that issue, President Robert Prather of Gray Television, which owns 40 stations, said he supported that policy of former FCC Chairman Kevin Martin of fining broadcasters or censuring them for fleetingly indecent content.

News Corp. Chairman Rupert Murdoch, a prolific user of Twitter (https://twitter.com/rupertmurdoch), doesn’t have any rivals among executives at Comcast, Time Warner Cable, Time Warner Inc.’s TBS or Univision, judging by their spokeswomen’s comments. “We don’t have any Ruperts in our midst yet,” said Comcast Chief Communications Officer D'Arcy Rudnay. “It’s pretty brave of him.” It’s “easy for tweeting to go amiss,” she said. “Plus, what am I going to say? I'm on the Acela and it’s 30 minutes late?” But “most everyone on my team does” use Twitter, said Rudnay.

Signs of optimism in the radio industry’s prospects are found among some winners in the just-completed FCC auction of FM construction permits, which included a first-time bidder and a company that owns several other stations. Auction 94 ended Monday (CD May 7 p15) and netted $4.1 million, 7.7 percent more than the last auction of FM CPs (http://fcc.us/ZABCaf), held last year as the same number of permits -- 93 -- received greater-than-minimum bids. Some executives had said the radio industry remains challenged amid a 29 percent decline in terrestrial ads to $14.2 billion last year since their zenith before the Great Recession (CD April 30 p1).

All replies backed the FCC allowing waivers of foreign ownership caps of 25 percent on U.S. radio and TV stations. Several comments from broadcasters and their lawyers pointed to the agency’s order last month streamlining some policies for non-American ownership of some other types of licenses (CD April 19 p17). That commissioners Ajit Pai and Jessica Rosenworcel in approving that order mentioned the petition to allow waivers on which the replies commented is one reason to be optimistic that the request will be approved, a lawyer who backs the relief told us. That attorney, David Oxenford of Wilkinson Barker, said the agency can without engaging in a further rulemaking deem that ownership above 25 percent meets the public-interest threshold for such holdings in Section 310(b) of the Communications Act.

U.S. radio stations face challenges improving their perception amid declines in on-air ads now versus before the Great Recession, and online and other initiatives with potential not fully realized, said some industry insiders we surveyed. They said an ongoing FCC auction of commercial FM-station construction permits points up the economic hardships of running stations in small markets, where many of the CPs are. Increasing competition in markets of all sizes from streaming media and online ad rates lower than stations charge per over-the-air listener are challenges, said executives and analysts. Some were optimistic that, between terrestrial and digital spots, ads will return to pre-recession levels. Others said that won’t happen.

The FCC should “issue the maximum possible forfeiture against Amazon,” which isn’t captioning every TV program on its Instant Video service even after seven groups representing the hearing impaired made an informal complaint, the groups said. They said the company’s explanation of why 47 previously recorded programs weren’t captioned when the groups did a spot check late last year (CD Dec 21 p2) doesn’t mean it’s in compliance with the Internet Protocol captioning order. The order required prerecorded programs to be captioned when delivered in IP starting Sept. 30. A Consumer and Governmental Affairs Bureau official said it’s looking at the situation.