Monty Tayloe

The reverse portion of the incentive auction is seen as going well for participating broadcasters, according to what information can be gleaned from them, attorneys and analysts laboring under the strictures of FCC anti-collusion rules. The Incentive Auction Task Force (IATF) won't comment on the status of the auction and no broadcaster is likely to know how things are going beyond its own auction assets. Anecdotal information we gathered from broadcast industry officials shows a common trend of stations freezing at higher prices than expected, and a tone of general satisfaction about how the auction is proceeding.

Some pay-TV carriers and programmers offered what they say is a “third-way” compromise on rules designed to create a competitive retail set-top box market. The new proposal is an alternative to both the FCC set-top proposal and multichannel video programming distributors' preferred app system. Though the FCC released a complimentary statement, supporters of the FCC plan say the compromise plan doesn't go far enough.

The FCC has “no support, anywhere” for requiring board members of noncommercial education stations to submit Social Security numbers to be assigned restricted-use FCC registration numbers, said numerous NCE stations in replies supporting their petitions for reconsideration (see 1605040056) of the new RUFRN rules. No comments supporting the rules have been filed, the stations said. The record in docket 10-234 contains “considerable evidence” that the RUFRN rules will harm NCE stations by discouraging donors and participation on their boards, said PBS, CPB, NPR and America’s Public Television Stations in joint reply comments.

The FCC upcoming draft broadcast ownership quadrennial review order is expected to resurrect the commission’s vacated joint sales agreement rules and stick close to a 2014 Further NPRM on media ownership, said attorneys on both the broadcaster and public interest sides of the issues. They said in interviews this and last week that there may be some fluidity on the newspaper/broadcast cross-ownership rule that was specifically targeted in the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals majority opinion that spurred the FCC to action. The item, planned to go on circulation by June 30 (see 1605250073), is expected to contain few surprises, several attorneys told us. The FCC declined to comment Tuesday.

Media General and Nexstar announced agreements to divest 12 stations, to secure FCC Media Bureau approval for their combination. Bigger questions loom about the deal's joint sales agreements, according to FCC filings and attorneys familiar with the deal. The FCC stance on JSA's is up in the air because of 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals Prometheus III decision (see 1605250016) remanding the rules barring JSAs in some circumstances and the upcoming quadrennial review rulemaking which the 3rd Circuit wants the agency to finish soon. Even before the ruling, Nexstar and Media General argued in FCC filings that the JSAs involved in that acquisition should be allowed to continue, despite recent bureau policy. “To the extent that the Commission may have unofficially taken a contrary position, that position is inconsistent with the statutory language, conflicts with the Commission’s own precedent and practices, and even if correct, would still mandate grandfathering the Legacy JSAs here,” said Nexstar and Media General in opposition comments filed in response to petitions to deny the first company's buy of the second.

AT&T, Cablevision and Comcast are violating consumer privacy through their “opt-out” data collection, said Public Knowledge and several other public interest groups in complaints filed with the FCC and FTC Thursday. Despite federal law and FCC regulations that emphasize “the importance of giving consumers control over how their information is being used,” pay-TV carriers have “continued to use large amounts of their customers’ data without properly obtaining customer consent or informing subscribers of the extent of the use of their information,” said the complaints filed by PK, the Center for Digital Democracy, Consumer Watchdog, Consumer Federation of America and The Utility Reform Network. “There isn't anything worse that can happen to a person's data than what the cable industry is doing with it right now,” said Public Knowledge Senior Vice President Harold Feld in an interview. AT&T disagreed.

The FCC will move to a new location if the General Services Administration wins a claim brought against it by the commission's current landlord, said a motion filed in the case by Trammell Crow, a Washington, D.C., real estate development company. Trammell Crow received a letter from the GSA naming it the "apparent successful offeror" to be the FCC's new landlord, but the lease won't be awarded until the bid protest by current FCC landlord Republic Properties is resolved, said Trammell Crow in a motion to intervene in the Republic Properties case filed in U.S. Federal Claims Court. If Trammell Crow wins the lease, the FCC would move to Trammell Crow's Sentinel Square development north of Union Station, reported the Washington Business Journal. The commission's lease at the Portals will expire in October 2017.

The FCC study of Hispanic TV station ownership was generally condemned by public interest groups and got no broadcaster reaction, in filings in docket 14-50 Thursday and Friday. NAB didn't file comments on the study. Public interest groups including the Benton Foundation, Common Cause, Communications Workers of America, Prometheus Radio Project and United Church of Christ filed joint comments that were highly critical. Public Knowledge and Common Cause jointly filed comments denouncing media consolidation. “The Study, while a useful contribution, does not materially advance the task of providing an evidentiary base for evaluating the Commission’s ownership policies,” said the joint filing from UCC and others. The Media Bureau didn't comment.

The FCC is trying to find a way to make its set-top box proposal more palatable to programmers, but they may not be taking the bait, said attorneys on the programming and pay-TV side in interviews this week. The FCC initially wasn’t expecting the amount of pushback against the set-top proposal from content creators, several industry officials told us. Now, supporters of the set-top plan and the commission are looking for ways to assuage the programmer concerns, attorneys and industry officials told us. It’s unlikely the commission can create a set-top plan that will appease programmers and also accomplish the FCC’s goal of making pay-TV content available on third-party boxes, a content company executive said.

The first round of the incentive auction appeared to proceed smoothly Tuesday, said broadcasters, broadcast attorneys, analysts and the FCC's own public auction dashboard. Anti-collusion rules are keeping participants tight-lipped about the proceeding. But by all accounts, the agency's system appeared to work as planned, industry officials told us.