Extend the 2.5 GHz tribal priority application window beyond Aug. 3, through February, Public Knowledge officials told an aide to FCC Commissioner Mike O’Rielly. COVID-19 means “the vast majority of application workshops were canceled, as were other forms of in-person outreach,” surveys of tribal lands to confirm maps “have been difficult to complete, and requests for waivers based on survey data are time consuming” and “stay-at-home orders have delayed tribal decision making,” PK said Monday in docket 18-120.

The Illinois broadband office urged the FCC due to COVID-19 to expand broadband where it’s unavailable or unaffordable. Immediately fund off-campus connectivity and wireless hot spots, urged the office’s director Matt Schmit in a letter posted Monday in docket 17-287. Increase the $9.25 monthly Lifeline discount, he said. The FCC declined comment.

The public can virtually access four administrative litigation proceedings, the FTC announced in orders Monday, citing COVID-19. The public won’t be allowed inside the hearing room, with in-person access limited to the witnesses, counsel, judicial staff and the court reporter. One such proceeding involves Axon having bought body-worn camera rival VieVu.

Capital Audiofest 2020 will roll over to 2021, Director Gary Gill told us Monday. The consumer high-end audio show reached agreement with the Hilton Washington, D.C./Rockville Hotel & Executive Meeting Center in Maryland “to move the show from 2020 to 2021 without any issues,” said Gill. The 2021 show is scheduled for Nov. 5-7. Last year's show drew about 3,000 attendees; this year's event was to be Oct. 30-Nov. 1. Though Gill didn’t want to cancel, “it’s the direction the industry was going,” he said, referencing other cancellations. “I didn’t want to put people at risk. At a trade show, people sit shoulder to shoulder in small listening rooms.” Virtual vendor additions could be part of the 2021 program, Gill said.

Copyright royalty judges’ initial determination in a webcasting rate-setting proceeding is now due April 15, the Library of Congress said Monday, citing COVID-19. The original Dec. 16 due date was postponed four months, given the “scope and severity of the COVID pandemic and its commensurate disruption of the Web V proceeding.”

That the pandemic showed "we can't imagine a future" with Americans lacking a connection is no reason to regulate broadband service as a utility, USTelecom CEO Jonathan Spalter told C-SPAN's The Communicators scheduled to have been televised this weekend. "To wrap it in the red tape of regulatory strictures, the overhang of bureaucracy that would be required if we were to make it a utility, would take us backward." He's "confident a wise administration that believes in the future of progress in our internet will understand this framework and will continue it." He has seen bipartisan support for keeping the internet open and transparent and for closing the digital divide, and cited predictions it could take $100 billion in government support to extend broadband to all unserved areas. That's adequate, he said, in the context of a broader U.S. infrastructure investment that may approach $1 trillion. Asked about the debate over changes to Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, Spalter said: "The issues concerning content moderation are complex and thorny. It’s not our job, it’s not our business, and we’ll be watching with interest as these discussions take place."

E-commerce experts say COVID-19 boosts e-commerce, often for the big players (see 2007010054). The winners are well-known retail brands Amazon, Target and Walmart that gained new customers who didn’t shop online before the pandemic or had limited experience, said Kaitlyn Glancy, Flexport general manager-Northeast. “The big names are continuing to get bigger.” Electronics are a beneficiary of pandemic stay-at-home trends, said Glancy, citing spending on TVs and gaming devices. Consumers are also upgrading, she said on her freight transportation company's webcast Wednesday. Consumers are responding to “click and collect” options, where they can choose to have products delivered or picked up in store, said Glancy: Some 87% hope, and expect, the model to exist beyond the pandemic.

Registration for the Sept. 3-5 IFA 2020 show opened Wednesday, the same day the EU lifted some travel restrictions, but won't allow residents of the U.S., where COVID-19 isn't contained, to enter its external borders. IFA organizers “very much hope that the travel restrictions for US travelers will be eased” by the beginning of September and that “physical participation” in the show will "be possible -- hopefully without a quarantine,” emailed spokesperson Nicole von der Ropp Thursday. The EU says it will revisit the travel-ban policy every two weeks. IFA organizers said they're confident conditions will permit a vastly downsized in-person event at the Messe Berlin fairgrounds, limited to 4,000 people daily (see 2005190035). Samsung announced Tuesday it was pulling out and will stage its own virtual event in early September.

The FCC Advisory Committee on Diversity and Digital Empowerment and the FCC Media Bureau set a virtual workshop Aug. 3 on “the role of U.S. libraries as community hubs to drive digital adoption and literacy”, said a public notice Wednesday (see 2004280070). The workshop will focus on supporting digital skills education in underserved communities and digital inclusion, the PN said. “The workshop will also address the impact of COVID-19 on advancing digital inclusion, as well as the impact of various local, state, and federal interventions in the last few months.”

The pandemic “accelerated” consumer e-commerce adoption, said Brie Carere, FedEx executive vice president-chief marketing and communications officer, on a fiscal Q4 call Tuesday. E-commerce increased to 27% of U.S. retail in April, from 16% in calendar 2019, partly because “total retail contracted” during coronavirus lockdowns, she said. FedEx expects e-commerce as a percentage of retail will stay “elevated,” said Carere. “This shift has left an indelible mark on the retail industry, causing the bankruptcy of some chains that have been around for decades.” E-commerce helped retailers “with a strong omnichannel strategy flourish,” she said. “Surging” e-commerce sales from large retail customers drove a “sizable mix shift” to direct-to-consumer residential volume from commercial business-to-business transactions in Q4 ended May 31, said Carere. U.S. residential volume was 72% of revenue in the quarter compared with 56% a year earlier, she said. Carere thinks the strong shift to e-commerce was “structural,” not temporary: “We have seen a huge uptick in the categories that people are willing to purchase online.” FedEx saw that trend develop pre-COVID, “but it has accelerated when you think about things like furniture, large packages, high-value electronics,” she said. COVID-19 brought a “huge change in who is buying online,” especially 65-and-older consumers, she said. “I do not anticipate that these buying behaviors will revert back.” Wednesday, the stock closed up 12% at $156.66.