The FCC’s October meeting has been changed for at least a third time as Chairman Kevin Martin failed to get any other commissioner to support a DTV-related notice that drew internal controversy (CD Oct 8 p6). No items will be voted on Wednesday, at what was to have been a regular monthly meeting in Nashville, agency officials said. Instead, four FCC members will gather at Vanderbilt University’s medical center Wednesday morning for an en banc hearing on obesity, while Commissioner Michael Copps will participate by phone, agency officials said.
FCC members could hear from a half-dozen low-power TV executives and face more than 100 station employees, including many minorities and women, at Wednesday’s Nashville hearing, broadcast executives said. But the low-power crowd may not get a chance to press commissioners in person on behalf of a rulemaking notice backers claim would help small stations survive the analog cutoff. It remained unclear late Friday whether the meeting would occur (CD Oct 10 p2), given scant commissioner support for the notice, several agency officials said.
Wednesday’s FCC meeting has been moved to Nashville from Washington, D.C., so commissioners can attend an event on childhood obesity that morning, agency officials said. The FCC meeting is set for 10 a.m. Central time, an FCC spokeswoman said late Thursday. Commissioners may not meet if the seven agenda items disclosed late Wednesday are approved earlier, an agency official said. The matters include a DTV-related rulemaking notice and several telecom orders, including one on a deadline for Sprint Nextel to leave 800 MHz interleaved spectrum. But the DTV item continues to draw skepticism from most commissioners (CD Oct 8 p6), FCC sources said.
The FCC is seeking estimates on costs to hire event planners to organize DTV outreach events attended by commissioners and senior staffers, and to have civic groups install DTV converter boxes and otherwise help consumers. A request for quotations, due Oct. 21, “seeks grass root organizations” and community groups “including faith-based organization location” offers to help people get and install converters and other DTV equipment. Another RFQ, with a closing date of Monday, seeks 10 event planners to organize town-hall style meetings, workshops and other events for regulators to attend in 82 areas where the FCC is stepping up viewer education (CD Aug 19 p1).
A revived FCC rulemaking notice to pave the way for low- power stations to demand cable carriage (CD Sept 26 p2) could trigger commissioners’ concern about its must-carry implications, said agency officials. Some FCC members balked earlier when Chairman Kevin Martin made a similar proposal, they said. As of midday Tuesday Neither Martin nor colleagues had voted on the further rulemaking notice. Martin has said he wants a final vote by next Wednesday’s commission meeting.
Broadcasters’ fears of more regulations on how to serve their communities (CD Sept 4 p4) won’t be realized in 2008, if comments by two FCC members -- one supporting new rules, the other opposing -- are a guide. Both Commissioner Michael Copps, long an advocate of localism rules, and Commissioner Robert McDowell, a foe of such rules, said Monday in separate interviews that the FCC is running out of time to address the issue this year. But Copps still wants comprehensive rule reform.
Cable operators, incumbent telcos and network overbuilders are increasing broadband speeds to meet rising consumer demand for video streaming, content uploading, multiplayer gaming and social networking, executives told us. Prices at most companies we surveyed generally stayed the same or rose slightly as ISPs have promoted higher speeds in recent years to lure new customers and keep current ones. But analysts said few broadband subscribers seem to need the companies’ fastest broadband packages, because computers in some homes can’t process information quickly enough to make use of them and few people use online applications needing the speeds.
Mobile video will transform broadcasters the next five to 10 years, shaking up the industry in ways no one can foresee, Ion Chairman Brandon Burgess said Wednesday. TV stations face high debt and vigorous competition for customers as cable, satellite and telco TV sellers vying for market share, he said. “There’s a lot of turbulence in the distribution side” that isn’t likely to abate until 2011, he added. To prosper, broadcasters must sort out their balance sheets and make fuller use of spectrum, Burgess told a Media Institute lunch.
A draft rulemaking notice asks if the FCC can prevent carriage disputes between broadcasters and pay-TV operators from leading to the cutoff of stations’ signals around the time of the digital transition (CD Aug 13 p1), said agency officials. Chairman Kevin Martin on Sept. 23 circulated the notice, on which the four other commissioners have voted, said an FCC official. The Media Bureau document can be publicized once Martin votes for it, which he hasn’t done, the person said. An FCC spokeswoman declined to comment.
Media companies are feeling the credit crisis, industry executives said: Deals are up in the air and banks are tightening access to loans. Broadcasters face an additional threat to advertising revenue, and deals to buy and sell radio and TV stations are in a major slump, they told us. Cable, broadcast and other companies not seeking loans or investments are in much better shape than those needing money, media executives said.