An ownership discount for VHF TV stations could encourage participation in the incentive auction, said a broadcast attorney and a broadcast engineer in interviews Thursday. Such a discount is among the items the commission would seek comment on in a draft NPRM on eliminating the existing UHF discount for calculating the 39 percent national ownership cap (CD Aug. 14 p1). Since UHF stations became more desirable for broadcasting than VHF stations following the DTV transition, and freeing up UHF spectrum is one of the incentive auction’s goals, a VHF discount might be intended to encourage more stations to participate in the auction, said Fletcher Heald broadcast attorney Frank Jazzo. An ownership discount for VHF stations “could make it a lot more desirable for stations to move to VHF,” said Bob du Treil, president of engineering firm du Treil Lundin.

The FCC Wireline Bureau decision to not “automatically” grant Verizon’s Communications Act Section 214 petition (CD Aug 15 p1) to discontinue domestic phone services indicates that it wants to review the application more closely, likely pushing a decision until after Tom Wheeler is confirmed as chairman, said industry observers and interested parties in interviews Thursday. Some applauded the FCC decision because it allows more time for the New York Public Service Commission to make its own judgment and for others to act in the public interest.

The FCC Wireline and Wireless bureaus “blatantly violated competitive neutrality” when they denied a USF waiver petition by Adak Eagle Enterprises and its subsidiary Windy City Cellular based on a promise by General Communications Inc. to serve Adak Island, the companies argued in an application for review Thursday. The bureaus last month rejected the request of the Alaskan carriers, finding they had “not shown good cause for a waiver,” and their plans to reduce costs failed to address, among other factors, “disproportionate executive compensation relative to the size of the companies” (CD July 17 p14). The companies had sought waivers of rules establishing a $250-per-line monthly cap on high-cost universal service support, arguing the island could lose voice service if not granted.

Carriers that filed supported for the most part some form of additional identification requirements as proposed in June by the Lifeline Reform 2.0 Coalition, but raised some questions with other proposals from the group. USTelecom questioned whether the proposals made by the coalition would do any good. Comments were due Wednesday on a Wireline Bureau public notice (http://bit.ly/18h9p9K) as the FCC continues its examination of curbing Lifeline fraud.

Coming from two different angles, Showtime and LG joined forces to deliver an automatic content recognition (ACR)-based interactive TV experience that runs on smart TVs rather than second-screen devices. For LG, it could be seen as a way to preserve the vitality of the TV -- and LG’s proprietary LivePlus platform -- when its turf is increasingly threatened by anytime/anywhere connected devices. For Showtime, the new platform could be seen as a way to broaden the reach of interactive TV by bringing it to a larger, more mainstream audience.

The White House is in a “tough space” when it comes to finding a way to make cybersecurity standards effective without making them mandatory, said Andy Ozment, White House senior director of cybersecurity. The administration’s plan has been based on an understanding that “there is reasonable concern that a top-down approach to regulation will be harmful rather than helpful,” he said Thursday. Ozment outlined the White House’s existing priorities for cybersecurity and discussed the legislation the White House has pushed for, at a keynote address to network security professionals at a conference organized by an association called USENIX. He also emphasized to the audience that though the administration was doing all it could to prioritize cybersecurity, real progress could only come through their individual efforts.

The FCC intends to ask Verizon for further information about the scope of its wireless services on Fire Island, N.Y., according to an Excel spreadsheet that was posted Wednesday on the commission’s EDOCs site. After a Communications Daily reporter contacted the FCC Wireline Bureau regarding the item, it was removed from the site. Verizon has sought FCC permission to discontinue its copper services after Superstorm Sandy destroyed much of Verizon’s infrastructure there.

The Communications and Technology Task Force unanimously approved a resolution to oppose intermediary liability for Internet providers under the Communications Decency Act. The resolution was in response to a National Association of Attorneys General letter asking Congress to change Section 230 of the CDA to open Internet providers to possible liability, said John Stephenson, task force director. The resolution next goes to the American Legislative Exchange Council board. The task force plans to discuss interconnection agreements more in the upcoming months through presentations and panel discussions, said Stephenson in an interview. The resolution was approved at last week’s ALEC conference in Chicago.

Telecom and other companies should retrain workers whose jobs are affected by technological change, much as AT&T has done for nearly 30 years, said the president emeritus of a telecom industry union. The job training alliance begun in 1986 between the telco and the Communications Workers of America has been fruitful in paying for employees to get extra education at both the secondary and university level, and benefitted companies too with increased staff loyalty, said Morton Bahr. In answering our question at a speech at a Washington temple and a follow-up interview, Bahr also said he supports changing the E-rate program to provide faster broadband to schools as a good use of USF money.

U.S. homes that tune into family network programming or subscribe to premium movie channels are 20 percent more likely than other viewers to have their TV connected to the Internet, said research from NPD. Family network viewers are 22 percent more likely to have a connection to the Internet via TV, followed by premium movie channel subscribers at 19 percent, found a survey of Internet homes, NPD said.