FCC Chairman Kevin Martin is thought to be close to circulating a broad item on wholesale deals for video channels that also may revamp how independent programmers’ complaints against cable operators are dealt with. Agency and industry officials said they expect Martin to have circulated an order or rulemaking notice late Wednesday, or to soon do so, with an eye toward getting a commissioner vote at the Dec. 18 open meeting. Officials also believed the chairman may soon circulate an order on movie studios’ request for a waiver of selectable output controls. An FCC spokesman declined to comment.
Ion Media and the billionaire who started Black Entertainment Television made an ambitious proposal to the FCC seeking guaranteed pay-TV carriage for 42 multicast stations they'll run separate from the broadcaster’s existing properties. “Urban TV” would be aimed at African-Americans and other minority viewers and be 51 percent owned by Robert Johnson, who sold BET to Viacom for about $3 billion in 2000. Ion would hold the other 49 percent, the companies said in an FCC filing last week.
FCC Chairman Kevin Martin’s top adviser prepared early for the change in presidential administrations by getting a job that could protect him from being let go after Jan. 20, said commission and industry officials. Dan Gonzalez, Martin’s chief of staff, in the summer got a designation that was civil servant, rather than a political employee, slot, they said. Such job switches have taken place before previous commission chairmen stepped down, in a practice known throughout the government as burrowing.
Meredith Baker should have the option of staying on as acting NTIA administrator at least through the Feb. 17 analog TV cutoff, said government and industry officials involved in the transition. The Obama administration would be wise to let Baker, a Republican appointed under President George W. Bush, to stay on. Baker is focusing on the conversion to digital broadcasting (CD Nov 22 p3) OR (CED Nov 22 p4), not the future of her job, she said.
The switch to DTV is on the radar of the current and incoming presidential administrations (CD Nov 12 p2), acting NTIA Administrator Meredith Baker said. Speaking to media executives Thursday in Washington, she supported plans floated by lawmakers to let broadcasters use their analog signals to run a fixed image with information on DTV for a brief time after Feb. 17. (See separate report in this issue.) Baker also said at a Media Institute lunch that the Bush administration doesn’t support several cable-related policies pushed by FCC Chairman Kevin Martin.
Representatives of a maker of optical fiber and a group of university IT managers agreed that there’s a role for government incentives to promote super-fast broadband. But Corning executive Stan Fendley and Telepoly President John Windhausen, who consults for the Educause group, disagreed Tuesday at the first Broadband Breakfast Club event how best the government can help. NCTA President Kyle McSlarrow, who’s critical of the broadband loans made by the Agriculture Department’s Rural Utility Service, said any direct government subsidies should go only to rural areas.
The FCC didn’t get complete data on wholesale programming costs from many of the 13 pay-TV companies whose responses were recently due to the Enforcement Bureau (CD Nov 13 p5), said several industry officials. Many of the companies declined to provide the cost of each channel moved since November 2006 from analog to digital programming tiers, they said. Responses were due Thursday. An FCC spokesman said it’s reviewing the documents.
An impasse continues over two FCC items on barring broadcasters from pulling their signals from cable operators and other pay-TV companies in the lead-up to the DTV transition, agency and industry officials said. Not all the commissioners have voted on an order forbidding for a brief time signals from being pulled over contract disputes, or on a rulemaking notice (CD Oct 2 p3) on whether the commission has authority to impose the so- called quiet period, they said. That leaves in limbo cable and satellite-TV companies’ hopes of getting action on a quiet period, which they have said they need to avoid consumer confusion about the digital transition.
As the new administration jells, changes are said to be occurring to the roster of those advising President-elect Barack Obama (CD Nov 12 p1) on who to pick for key agency posts. Among recent changes is said to be the apparent departure of broadcast lawyer Henry Rivera, a former FCC member, from a lead role in commission transition planning efforts, according to about a dozen media and telecom lawyers observing the transition. Transition team members themselves are forbidden to discuss any personnel moves.
Cable programmers and operators are objecting to FCC requests for information that they usually keep confidential on channel costs, industry executives said. The companies believe the agency is overstepping its authority by asking Comcast, Time Warner Cable, Verizon and eight other pay-TV companies to disclose by Thursday what they pay for channels they've moved from analog to digital tiers (CD Nov 6 p10), they said. Some of the 11 companies that received Enforcement Bureau letters of inquiry may not answer them fully. In a letter to FCC members Wednesday, NCTA President Kyle McSlarrow called the inquiry “unlawful.”