The FTC is requesting public comment on a proposal to study the agency’s effectiveness when it ordered a divestiture or other remedies in merger cases from 2006 to 2012, an agency news release said Friday. “Successful divestitures and other forms of relief are central to the Commission’s merger enforcement efforts,” FTC Chairwoman Edith Ramirez said in the release. “Building on prior Commission efforts, the proposed study seeks to provide valuable information to ensure that our remedies continue achieving their primary goal -- maintaining competition in the affected markets,” she said. The proposed study would expand on a similar report by the agency from 1999, the release said. The FTC would review 92 related orders. (See the notice for public comment here.)
The FCC extended the deadlines for comments on its incentive auction rulemaking to allow commenters to incorporate “lessons learned” from the AWS-3 auction, said a public notice released Wednesday. Comment deadlines are extended to Feb. 13, and replies to March 13, the notice said. The extension was requested by CEA, CTIA and TIA. Commissioner Ajit Pai's Chief of Staff Matthew Berry said the deadline extension is an “example of how the Commission is being run in a partisan manner.” Pai asked for an extension of the comment deadline before the commission vote on the item but was “told 'no' in no uncertain terms,” Berry said. “This is just more evidence that the Chairman's office dismisses good ideas out of hand simply because they are offered by Republicans.” Chairman Tom Wheeler's office declined to comment.
A series of webinars on the details of the incentive auction has been rescheduled, the FCC Incentive Auction Task Force and Wireless Bureau said in a public notice Wednesday. The webinar on the forward auction phase will be Jan. 15 at 10:30 a.m., the webinar on the reverse auction phase will be Jan. 20 at 10:30 a.m., and the webinar on the integration of the two phases of the incentive auction will be Jan. 23 at 10:30 a.m. “Additional details about the webinars, including how interested parties can attend, will be released soon,” the PN said.
TechFreedom will support a legal challenge if FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler “short-circuits” a “legislative compromise” on net neutrality, TechFreedom President Berin Szoka wrote in a blog post Monday. A concern, he said in an email, is that the FCC will adopt reclassification before Congress acts. Wheeler plans to circulate a net neutrality order in February with the aim of a vote at the Feb. 26 commission meeting (see 1501020035). Wheeler could be “bluffing,” Szoka said in the email. Thinking he “held a weak hand legally” with a Title II approach, Wheeler could be advancing the prospect of a February decision to push Congress to come up with a legislative solution, Szoka said. A “legislative compromise” would focus “on real threats to competition while constraining the FCC’s discretion,” the post said. Meanwhile, two recent studies, considered together, “provide theoretical and empirical evidence that Title II regulations would depress broadband investment,” the Free State Foundation said in a blog post Tuesday. The post cited a November study by Kevin Hassett, director-economic policy studies and resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, and Sonecon Chairman Robert Shapiro, predicting a Title II approach would reduce broadband investment by 12.8 to 20.8 percent. The post also cited a Progressive Policy Institute study that said reclassification would lead to $15 billion more nationally in state and local taxes (see 1412150053). Title II proponents have disputed the PPI study (see 1412190040). The commission shouldn't rule out any legal options, including supplementing Title II with Section 706, the Internet Association wrote in a letter to the agency, posted in docket 14-28 Tuesday. If the commission takes a Title II approach, it would be legally defensible because circumstances have changed since the agency classified broadband as an information service, the letter said. Consumers no longer see broadband as part of a bundle of information services, but as a way of “accessing content of their choosing without impediment or discriminatory treatment.” The commission also has learned it doesn't have sufficient authority under Section 706, the association said.
A new FCC Consumer Help Center announced by the agency Monday will make several changes to the previous online complaint system, including giving consumers the ability to track the status of their complaints, an agency official told us. The site operates on its own cloud-based platform instead of on the agency’s server, the official said. As before, the complaint system is separate from the Electronic Comment Filing System, though both appear on the agency's homepage. In addition to new functions, the official said, the $1.1 million cost of launching and then maintaining the new system over the next five years will be less than the estimated $2.3 million cost of maintaining the aging old system. Among the changes, online complaints will be forwarded to carriers daily instead of weekly, and cumulative tallies of complaints by type and state will be available on the site, the official said. The system guides consumers through filling out complaints, and provides information on common issues about service, and the commission’s jurisdiction over them, the official said. The system was praised by the Consumers Union, in a release. “This site will make it easier for people to file and track complaints about problems like annoying robocalls and fraudulent charges, and it will help the FCC spot emerging trends in the marketplace,” said Delara Derakhshani, the organization’s policy counsel. “This is a one-stop shop for consumers, and it’s a real improvement over the old system, where forms and information were spread out and hard to find.” The site was also praised by Danielle Kehl, a policy analyst at New America’s Open Technology Institute, in a release. “The new system will enable greater transparency about the type and volume of these complaints, and the system is a critical component of two broader goals: modernizing the FCC’s infrastructure and improving data collection practices,” Kehl said. "This is something that should help consumers better hold companies accountable," Sen. Bill Nelson, D-Fla., said in a statement.
The content companies challenging FCC release of video programming contract information in filings on Comcast's planned buy of Time Warner Cable want something “that has never happened, and it cannot lawfully happen,” said Dish Network and the American Cable Association in a joint intervenor brief Friday. “Under applicable law, interested parties must be provided reasonable access to decisionally significant material in the FCC’s party-based proceedings.” The brief in support of the FCC was filed to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit. “Failure to provide such access would be grounds to overturn any FCC decision approving either merger,” it said also of AT&T's planned buy of DirecTV. The programmers, which include CBS, Disney and Viacom, can’t show that the FCC hasn’t tried to accommodate them, Dish and ACA said: “The FCC has bent over backwards to accommodate Petitioners’ own interests, and imposed additional burdens on Intervenors in the process.” The content companies’ petition for review should be denied, Dish and ACA said.
Marriott released a statement further explaining its position on controlling Wi-Fi at its hotels. In August, Marriott, joined by the American Hospitality and Lodging Association and Ryman Hospitality Properties, asked the FCC to clarify the extent to which companies can manage networks on their properties without violating FCC rules, and the FCC sought comment. CTIA, Google, NCTA and other commenters said such network management is a clear violation of FCC rules (see 1412220055). “To set the record straight it has never been nor will it ever be Marriott's policy to limit our guests' ability to access the Internet by all available means, including through the use of personal Mi-Fi and/or Wi-Fi devices,” Marriott said in a statement. “As a matter of fact, we invite and encourage our guests to use these Internet connectivity devices in our hotels. To be clear, this matter does not involve in any way Wi-Fi access in hotel guestrooms or lobby spaces.” The question is merely “what measures a network operator can take to detect and contain rogue and imposter Wi-Fi hotspots” in meeting rooms and otherwise on hotel property, Marriott said. The company cited the growing use of wireless technology to launch cyberattacks and “purposefully disrupt hotel networks.” That's why it and others are seeking clarity, the company said: “We feel this is extremely important as we are increasingly being asked what measures we take to protect our conference and meeting guests and the conference groups that are using Wi-Fi technology in our hotels.”
The FCC asked DirecTV to turn over information about its VOD and TV Everywhere services and how they interact with other ISPs, as part of the commission’s review of the Comcast/Time Warner Cable transaction, said a letter to DirecTV from Wireline Bureau Chief Julie Veach. “In order for the Commission to complete its review of the applications and make the necessary public interest findings under section 310(d) of the Communications Act, we require information and data from other commercial wireline carriers against which the applicants compete,” said the letter. The 19-page information request asks DirecTV to turn over by Jan. 30 information including its interconnects with numerous ISPS, the effect of cord-cutters on the business, its negotiations for video programming, and the download speed needed to view its content. DirecTV’s response will be treated as confidential under the protective orders already issued in docket 14-57, the letter said.
The FCC Public Safety Bureau released certification and registration instructions for public safety answering points that request delivery of text-to-911 service from wireless carriers and interconnected over-the-top text providers. The FCC approved an order in August (see 1408110031) requiring both to have the capacity to transmit emergency texts to 911 call centers by the end of the year. Under the Tuesday notice, a PSAP is required to certify it's “technically ready” to accept texts and must demonstrate that the state or other 911 service governing authority has authorized it to accept texts. A PSAP must also notify covered text providers of its status, the bureau said. “At the Commission’s direction, the Bureau will maintain a centralized database that will list those PSAPs that have registered and certified their readiness to receive texts to 911, and will list the date of each PSAP’s request,” the bureau said. The FCC also posted the form PSAPs must fill out to become certified.
Members of the Expanding Opportunities for Broadcasters Coalition shouldn’t be mischaracterized as spectrum “speculators” and the group hasn't highlighted speculator issues in its advocacy on the TV incentive auction, Executive Director Preston Padden said Monday in a blog post. The group doesn't disclose its member roster. Padden said he has had many discussions in which the other party suggests the issues that group raises are “not issues for real broadcasters,” he said. “It is unfair and inaccurate to describe our members as ‘speculators’ simply because they have expressed an interest in participating in the auction under the appropriate terms.” Coalition members include owners of big-four network-affiliated stations, affiliates of smaller networks and independent stations, he said. “Every Station in our Coalition has viable business options other than participating in the auction,” he wrote. “But these broadcasters recognize that, in many instances, the market value of their spectrum as repurposed for wireless use may be greater than the amount they would be willing to accept to relinquish that spectrum. If this makes them ‘speculators,’ then I guess so too are Lin, Meredith, Tribune, CBS and Fox -- all of which publicly have indicated that they are evaluating the potential benefits of auction participation.” The issues the coalition raises, including the importance of a fair and transparent process as well as that of pricing that will get many broadcasters to take part, aren't speculator issues, Padden said. They're “issues that should be important to any broadcaster interested in the auction, and, as a result, to anyone interested in the success of the auction.”