Legislation to keep down the volume of TV ads applies to all spots on TV stations and multichannel video programming distributors, not just what broadcasters and MVPDs originate, the bill’s sponsor and a nonprofit group told us Tuesday. Last year’s Commercial Advertisement Loudness Mitigation Act ought not to be interpreted by the FCC as having such a wide exemption that the industries it’s targeted to aren’t responsible for all ads they carry, said the office of Rep. Anna Eshoo, D-Calif. It pointed to replies from Consumers Union, which made that point.

The FCC gave “adequate notice” it might require cable systems to carry independent programmers while indies’ complaints of discrimination based on nonaffiliation with operators were pending at the agency, the commission said Monday. A program carriage order on which Commissioner McDowell partially dissented as expected (CD Aug 1 p7) because of concerns over that standstill provision, contained a section on such notice. Comcast and the NCTA said again that they disagree that a 2007 rulemaking notice signaled that such rules could be adopted. The Media Access Project and Public Knowledge supported the new rules.

The FCC was asked to delay further the emergency-alert system deadline for all multichannel video programming distributors and radio and TV stations to be capable of transmitting EAS warnings in a format developed by the Federal Emergency Management Agency. Associations representing cable operators big and small and commercial and public radio and TV broadcasters asked for another delay in the effective date of common alerting protocol (CAP) rules. The commission has been taking longer than industry and some agency officials anticipated in finalizing gear certification rules so that broadcasters and MVPDs can comply with CAP. In seeking comment on the Part 11 equipment certification rules, the commission asked about a further delay (CD May 27 p4). A major maker of EAS equipment told us it still opposes a further delay.

The FCC didn’t back down on new program carriage rules whose prospect had spurred opposition from major cable operators, agency officials said Friday. They said Chairman Julius Genachowski, the Office of General Counsel and the Media Bureau, the latter of which wrote the order and further rulemaking notice, decided against changing the item to accommodate Commissioner Robert McDowell. His concerns had dovetailed with those of the NCTA and members including Comcast. And in another program carriage case, an independent programmer withdrew allegations that its complaint was dismissed in an atmosphere where FCC officials left to work for the cable industry.

There seems to be little momentum now at the FCC for an AllVid rulemaking proposing how consumer electronics can connect to multichannel video programming distributors and get online content without using CableCARDs, agency officials said Friday. The day before, a 10-page letter from CE companies, groups and nonprofits that have been seeking the rulemaking was posted to docket 10-91. It remains to be seen whether the letter and lobbying of the commission by AllVid advocates will lead to the rulemaking being circulated soon, and it very well may not, some commission officials watching the proceeding said.

Comcast and the Justice Department may revisit terms of a consent decree clearing the cable operator’s multi-billion-dollar purchase of NBCUniversal (CD Jan 19 p1) after a judge who must approve the settlement expressed concerns, antitrust lawyers predicted. Judge Richard Leon of U.S. District Court in Washington, in a fairness hearing Wednesday afternoon, criticized an arbitration clause in the antitrust pact for online video distributors (OVD), The Wall Street Journal reported. Such rebukes are extremely rare, and all antitrust lawyers we interviewed said they couldn’t recall a single instance where that happened in such a hearing. Comcast and Bloomberg, meanwhile, continued to trade filings at the FCC on the first company’s adherence to one of the agency’s deal conditions.

Broadcasters may be limited in the amount of leverage they can apply on Capitol Hill to stop the FCC’s quest to auction TV channels in a way the industry contends will harm almost all stations (CD July 26 p4), some executives said Wednesday. They told us it will be challenging for broadcasters, or any industry, to successfully exert much influence over how legislators deal with the debt ceiling and deficit reduction before Tuesday’s deadline to raise the cap. Spectrum is likely to be part of any long-term solution to cut the U.S. deficit and to let the country issue more IOUs, executives said: If there’s a short-term solution, which right now seems more likely than a longer-term plan, spectrum may not be part of the immediate fix. That would give TV stations more time to get the interference and other protections they seek.

Phone companies aren’t the only industry group divided by potential Universal Service Fund change proposals. With a group convened by USTelecom poised to give the FCC on Friday a plan to make USF pay for broadband (CD July 26 p1), large and small cable operators also have different views on that framework. Just as major phone companies like AT&T and Verizon are expected to back the plan, with some mid-size telcos also joining in, the biggest U.S. cable operators also may support many if not all parts of the plan. As with small telcos that are net recipients of USF money and intercarrier compensation funds, cable operators that get such money also may back few if any aspects of the framework. That’s according to interviews with cable executives Tuesday.

The FCC wants to know about the ease of signing deals to carry regional sports networks on multichannel video programming distributors. The Media Bureau asked about a dozen questions on RSNs in a public notice. It’s part of work on a report due Jan. 13 on access and carriage issues for those channels. That’s six months before the expiration of RSN conditions imposed by the commission in 2006 on Comcast and Time Warner Cable as part of letting them buy Adelphia Communications. “After issuing the report, the Commission, in its discretion, may determine if further action is warranted,” the bureau said Tuesday. The Adelphia order barred the top two U.S. cable operators from withholding access to RSNs they deliver without using satellites, other than Comcast’s SportsNet Philadelphia.

Cutting the number of TV channels in major markets by 42 percent, as the FCC’s plan for spectrum auctions entails, would be a major barrier to the nascent service of broadcasting terrestrial programming to mobile devices, NAB executives said. There was some variation in executives’ assessment of the threat from voluntary incentive auctions the commission may get congressional authority to hold as part of a deal between the White House and Congress on lifting the debt ceiling (CD July 20 p1). The executives of the association, who spoke to reporters Monday in an effort to raise awareness about what they consider to be the shortfalls of the spectrum auction plan, agreed the mobile DTV hurdles would be major. And President Gordon Smith said the commission is withholding from the NAB and legislators a mathematical model that shows how stations’ coverage areas would be impacted by the repacking of TV channels to free up other frequencies to be auctioned for wireless broadband.