BERKELEY, Calif. -- An FTC commissioner made explicit the iron fist of federal legislation beneath the velvet glove of industry self-regulation that the commission left open in a recent privacy report supporting a Do Not Track system for online information. “We will go to Congress to take up this issue” if industry “doesn’t move quickly and sufficiently,” Commissioner Julie Brill said late Wednesday at a Berkeley Center for Law and Technology conference. The December preliminary report left open whether Do Not Track should be required by law.
A June meeting of an ITU-R study group on spectrum management may consider for possible preliminary approval a draft recommendation on the impact of power line, high-data-rate telecom systems on radiocommunication systems, the Radiocommunication Bureau said in an announcement for the meeting. The group may also consider draft text for a recommendation on frequency bands regionally or globally identified for short-range devices, the letter said. It may also consider the impact of a recently revised ITU handbook on spectrum monitoring on ITU-R recommendations, it said. Unwanted emissions in the out-of-band domain may also be considered at the meeting. Working parties will meet in the preceding days to advance the projects.
The International Trade Administration has issued the preliminary results of the administrative review of the antidumping duty order on wooden bedroom furniture from China (A-570-890) covering the period January 1, 2009 through December 31, 2009. Interested parties are invited to comment on these preliminary results.
The International Trade Administration has issued the final results of its antidumping duty administrative review of 1-Hydroxyethylidene-1, 1-Diphosphonic Acid (HEDP) from India (A-533-847). The period of review is April 23, 2009 through March 31, 2010.
The International Trade Administration is amending its final antidumping duty critical circumstances determination for drill pipe from China (A-570-965) to now find that critical circumstances exist for one mandatory respondent and the separate rate respondents.
Dealing a blow to the active-shutter 3D TV camp, Consumer Reports reported Monday that preliminary tests of a Vizio 65-inch passive 3D TV show that its advantages “allow it to deliver the best overall 3D performance available of any LCD 3D TV we've tested.” Overall resolution of passive technology, however, was a significant drawback, it said in a blog post. Pluses included lightweight polarized glasses that the reviewers said felt “very similar to wearing sunglasses,” the report said. It praised Vizio for bundling four pairs of glasses with the TV and for the price of add-on glasses, $10-$30, compared with $130-$150 for active-shutter glasses. On the technical side, Consumer Reports said the passive glasses dimmed the image less than any of the active-shutter glasses it has tried, producing “the most satisfyingly bright picture we've experienced when viewing 3D.” The VT3D650SV also was largely free of ghosting, “a significant distraction on almost all the 3D LCD TVs we've reviewed,” putting the set on a par with a Panasonic plasma TV, it said. The Vizio didn’t present flicker related to glasses syncing to the TV, Consumer Reports said. In panning the resolution, reviewers noted that the best resolution a passive TV can achieve with a Blu-ray disc is 1920 x 540, and with a cable or satellite signal even less, 960 x 540. The resolution loss resulted in “interlaced-like image effects,” it said, including jaggies and moiré reminiscent of earlier generation 480i- and 1080i TVs. In addition, reviewers said, fine details that fall within a row of pixels tend to “shimmer,” since each eye “only gets half the image.”
U.S. Customs and Border Protection has posted an updated version of its spreadsheet of ACE ESAR A2.2 (Initial Entry Types) programming issues.
U.S. Cellular ended 2010 with some 6.1 million total customers, according to the company’s preliminary financial results. During Q4, the carrier lost 10,000 postpaid customers and 11,000 prepaid customers. It gained 26,000 postpaid and 13,000 prepaid customers in the year-earlier period. The carrier expects to report service revenue for 2010 “just slightly below” the low end of its forecast.
The International Trade Administration frequently issues notices on antidumping and countervailing duty orders, investigations, etc. which Broker Power considers to be "minor” in importance as they concern actions that occur after an order is issued, neither announce nor cause any changes to an order’s duty rates, scope, affected firms, or effective period, etc.
On February 1, 2011, Senator Portman (R), along with Senate colleagues, sent a letter to Secretary of Commerce Locke urging the Commerce Department to enforce existing trade law on the books in order to protect the domestic candle industry from unfair competition.