Supporters of a Tex. communications piracy bill ran out of time in the last regular legislative session before 2005 and are pinning their hopes on a special session, MPAA Senior Vp Vans Stevenson said Wed. The group will keep fighting for the 5-10 years it could take to put such legislation on all 50 states’ books, he said: “We're not deterred at all. We are not going to rest or stop until they are enacted.”
Country of origin cases
Fredrick Wentland, NTIA dir.-Spectrum Plans & policies, named assoc. administrator-spectrum management; he has been acting dir. since former head William Hatch retired last year… Nate Davis will step down as XO pres. & COO… John Ramsey resigned as exec. dir., Assn. of Public Safety Communications Officials… Elected at Assn. of Communications Enterprises: Ron Harden, exec. vp, Grande, as new chmn.; ComoreTel Vp Gail Jones vice chmn.; InfoHighway CEO Joseph Gregori secy.; Joseph Leuci, senior vp-sales, FiberNet, and Dave Thomas, dir.-carrier relations, MCI, to board… David Peed named vp-govt. services, Qwest… Patrice Carroll, ex-MCI, appointed vp-business, McLeodUSA… Changes at Clear Channel: James Cook promoted to vp-creative services; Thea Mitchem, ex-Infinity, named dir.-urban programming, Philadelphia… Richard Barber, exec. dir., Pacific Telecommunications Council, named senior adviser- external relations… Craig Plestis appointed vp-alternative programs, NBC…Bill Luehrs, ex-GE, joins Advanced Digital Broadcast as exec. vp and pres.-Americas… Rick Rodriguez promoted to vp-gen. mgr., Travel Channel… Changes at Comcast: Gary Traver advanced to senior vp-COO; David Higgins, ex-Systems Group, named vp-engineering; Leslie Colacello-Russell promoted to vp-sales; Jon Rees advanced to dir.-network origination; Susie Tomenchok advanced to dir.- strategic customer solutions… Mahmoud Wahba, pres., Champion Teleport, elected to ePhone board… Henry Dubois, DigitalGlobe COO, promoted to pres.
NextWave and Cingular Wireless reportedly are in talks for latter to acquire 20% of NextWave’s PCS licenses in a deal that’s still coming together but is expected to be close to $1.4 billion. Reuters reported Tues. the transaction wouldn’t include NextWave’s valuable N.Y.C. spectrum. The deal apparently would allow NextWave to keep a national wireless footprint by offering for sale 10 MHz of the bankrupt carrier’s 30 MHz C-block licenses in more than 30 markets, a source said. In Jan., the U.S. Supreme Court upheld a U.S. Appeals Court, D.C., ruling that reversed the FCC’s cancellation of NextWave’s PCS licenses for nonpayment. NextWave has been expected since that ruling to file another plan of reorganization with the U.S. Bankruptcy Court, White Plains, N.Y., and it told the court earlier this year that it was in discussions with 3rd parties on financing and strategic relationships. The potential $1.4 billion price tag would be the latest indication of what NextWave’s spectrum was worth now. A Jan. 2001 re-auction of the NextWave spectrum generated nearly $16 billion from carriers such as Verizon Wireless for licenses for which the carrier originally had bid $4.7 billion. The Commission had returned the licenses to NextWave after the D.C. Appeals Court in June 2001 reversed the agency’s decision to cancel those PCS licenses for nonpayment. Some analysts had estimated earlier this year that the spectrum could be worth close to $6.45 billion based on recent wireless transactions such as the Verizon Wireless-NorthCoast PCS deal. NextWave Deputy Gen. Counsel Michael Wack declined comment and a Cingular spokesman wasn’t available for comment.
Judge Lourdes Baird in U.S. Dist. Court, L.A., late Thurs. rejected and narrowed claims in a lawsuit involving DirecTV and Pegasus, the National Rural Telecom Coop. (NRTC) and some of its members, each said in separate releases Fri. DirecTV Asst. Gen. Counsel April Ammeter said that of 5 separate claims in litigation, 3 remain following the judge’s decision, none of which would result in damages for Pegasus or NRTC. Both companies praised the judgment as an indication of progress in litigation that has been going on since 1999. “As a result of today’s summary judgment ruling by Judge Baird, Pegasus and NRTC have reached the objective they have sought for 4 years -- a jury trial on their claims that DirecTV has breached obligations to provide premium programming, launch fees and advanced services to NRTC and Pegasus,” the latter said. The judge set the trial for June 3.
A state court in La. issued an injunction to block a PSC decision to remove newspaper publishers from the list of business entities exempt from the state’s 2001 no-call telemarketing law. The La. Press Assn. and the Denham Springs Publishing Co. filed suit in La. Dist. Court, Baton Rouge, seeking reversal of the PSC’s April decision. Plaintiffs contend the PSC violated their right to due process because it failed to provide notice and opportunity to be heard on the change in the no-call exemption affecting newspaper publishers. Dist. Court Judge Curtis Calloway agreed to the request for an injunction and set a May 30 date for a preliminary hearing. The PSC , which administers the no-call list, originally had included newspapers on the exemption list because of their relationship to political activity but later reconsidered that decision and reversed it.
The FCC should dismiss the must-carry complaint filed by the NBC station WNEU-TV, Merrimack, N.H., which is licensed in the Boston designated market area (DMA), said EchoStar. WNEU was originally owned by Paxson Communications (PC) under the call sign WPXB and was purchased by NBC in October, the company said. PC elected to exercise its must-carry rights but chose to waive rights until EchoStar reached a 15% market penetration in Boston, EchoStar said. Now, WNEU wants to rescind the waiver and demand carriage, which EchoStar has refused, the latter said: “The change of ownership does not give WNEU a new ‘bite of the apple’ when it comes to demanding carriage -- as a regulatory matter, the new owner inherits the carriage decision of its predecessor.” If electing carriage were as easy as changing ownership, the company said, “there would be nothing to stop owners from assigning licenses in order to gain a regulatory advantage.” EchoStar said WNEU has claimed that new Spanish-language programming from Telemundo qualifies it for carriage, too, suggesting that “Telemundo programming is more in the public interest than the Pax network programming previously aired on WNEU.” Making a decision based on content is “something the Commission has sworn it cannot do” and is a violation of EchoStar’s first amendment rights, the company said.
The FCC’s Media Bureau sent a flurry of letters to all of the industry players involved in the digital TV transition seeking more specific details on their efforts to move the transition forward. Bureau Chief Kenneth Ferree asked the major TV networks -- ABC, CBS, Fox, NBC, PAX, PBS, UPN and WB -- to describe in detail their digital programming being fed to affiliates, including the time period of the programming, the source of the material and the format in which it was transmitted.
Broadband expensing won’t be part of the congressional economic stimulus package, a spokeswoman for Senate Communications Subcommittee Chmn. Burns (R-Mont.) told us (CD May 19 p5). After Burns’ measure, originally S-160, was added as an amendment to the Senate version of the tax-cut bill, it was removed Tues. after House-Senate conference negotiations, she said. Advocates said the bill would spur broadband deployment to rural areas by allowing companies to expense both standard and “next generation” broadband.
Original programming and providing consumer resources are the keys to successfully launching a new cable channel in a crowded multi-channel universe, speakers said at the Bcst. Cable Financial Management conference. Fine Living’s Ken Solomon said the marketplace was receptive to channels for underserved lifestyle categories: “There’s too much sameness on TV so you have to be unique… And you have to get your message out quickly. There’s not much patience on Wall St. when it come to building new product.” In order to build the brand and to capitalize on brand awareness, it’s imperative to develop nontraditional business strategies, he said: “You must drive your brand across multiple platforms.” Solomon said Fine Living had also found it profitable to “integrate advertising into the content without traditional product placement. That way we can keep the line between advertising and editorial content clear.”
Community Bcstrs. Assn. (CBA) and National Translator Assn. (NTA) usually are together on FCC matters, but a split emerged in latter’s request that Commission establish a new rural translator service (CD May 20 p9). CBA told the Commission “it makes more sense to encourage” the startup of more low-power TV stations -- which offer localism and public service programming -- rather than “to give priority to repeaters that never originate programming.” CBA said “NTA’s proposal almost surely would lead to abusive practices” by attracting “speculators.”