The Copyright Office scheduled virtual hearings April 5-8 and 19-22 for the triennial rulemaking proceeding under Section 1201 of Title 17, it announced Monday. Requests to testify are due Feb. 24. The CO plans public roundtables March 25 for a public study to recommend best practices for the Music Modernization Act’s Mechanical Licensing Collective, the CO said Monday. The best practices are meant to “effectively identify and locate copyright owners with unclaimed royalties of musical works, encourage copyright owners to claim accrued royalties, and ultimately reduce the incidence of unclaimed royalties.”

The Supreme Court's recent decision in Salinas supports the position that the Administrative Orders Review Act (Hobbs Act) requires the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals to independently review the validity of the FCC's junk fax opt-out rule as part of its review of the agency's 2020 order retroactively repealing that rule, said petitioner Bais Yaakov of Spring Valley, New York. It said the 2nd Circuit isn't bound by a previous D.C. Circuit decision invalidating that rule, said Bais Yaakov, which is appealing the 2020 order with the 2nd Circuit (see 2102020030), in a letter Thursday (in Pacer, docket 20-1075). Salinas said there's a strong presumption in favor of judicial review of administrative action and when there's ambiguity in a statute about the scope of such review, the resolution usually should be in favor of the existence of such review, Bais Yaakov said. Respondent FCC didn't comment Friday.

Comments are due Feb. 25 for a proposed settlement “governing royalty rates and terms for the distant retransmission of over-the-air television and radio broadcast stations by cable television systems to their subscribers,” the Library of Congress announced Thursday.

Consumers are benefiting from some tech trends the pandemic accelerated, and while the impact on movie theaters may reduce that sector's societal influence, it could still mean higher prices to go to the movies. Those were among predictions from MoffettNathanson's Michael Nathanson, speaking with us on C-SPAN Wednesday. The analyst noted many can save money by cutting the cord while watching new films at home rather than in theaters, a trend he expects to continue post-coronavirus crisis. The traditional pay-TV bundle "will serve sports, news, live event customers," he said on a Communicators episode to be televised later and posted online here. "If you're a fan of the NFL, the bundle brings all to you," Nathanson said: "It’s the only option for people who are passionate sports fans," though some sports are moving over the top. Older viewers haven't "pivoted away" from MVPDs "as quickly as you might think," while younger people moved to virtual MVPDs for good in a "faster erosion" of traditional subscription video, the analyst said. NCTA declined to comment. Amid new streaming products from companies that also own studios like AT&T, Comcast and Disney, "you’re seeing a real collapse" in some film revenue, Nathanson noted. "There’s going to be less movie theaters in the world." The likes of Netflix and AT&T's HBO Max bring "better and better quality films through streaming," so theaters may need to improve service and raise prices to pay for the better features, Nathanson said: If theaters raise prices and don’t innovate quickly enough, they could face consumer backlash, like MVPDs have over high prices. "Consumers seem to really, really value the optionality of watching a premiere in the living room." Nathanson foresees ‘"generations of people down the road" who "won't experience the joy" of seeing a film on a big screen with an audience. The National Association of Theatre Owners didn't comment. Meanwhile, platform usage keeps rising, even as lawmakers increasingly scrutinize the sector, indicating consumers aren't much worried about content moderation, privacy, election meddling and other hot-button policy issues, Nathanson noted. "I don’t think the average consumer is as concerned" about such topics "as people might think."

Applications to join the Library of Congress’ Copyright Public Modernization Committee must be submitted by March 15, the LOC announced Wednesday. The first meeting will be in early summer, with biennial meetings expected through fiscal 2023.

TiVo extended for multiple years its patent agreements with Sony for technology that simplifies media search and discovery, it said Tuesday.

Warner Music Chief Financial Officer Eric Levin expects it will cost more to stream music, referring to “an enormous gap between the monetization of eyeballs and the monetization of ears.” He sees the gap narrowing with increasing adoption of premium features, such as Amazon Music HD and higher subscription prices. “Ultimately, we think that all of the services over time will increase prices,” and “we encourage them,” he said on the company's fiscal Q1 call Monday. “Our expectations every day grow that the services will begin to raise prices for functionality and features.” In the quarter ended Dec. 31, "robust" digital sales in the recorded music and music publishing segments drove Warner Music revenue up 6.3% year on year to $1.3 billion. They were offset by COVID-19-related declines in physical recorded music, artist services, expanded-rights and performance revenue. Digital revenue grew 17% for 62% of total revenue, up from 56%. The music label is taking advantage of live streaming to promote artists via digital partners that are operating successfully during the pandemic, said CEO Steve Cooper.

Washington state Rep. Shelley Kloba (D) floated an alternative privacy bill Thursday, as expected (see 2101240003). Unlike SB-5062 in the Senate, HB-1433 includes a private right of action and opt-in consent. The American Civil Liberties Union of Washington said it wrote the House bill with the Tech Equity Coalition.

Samsung Electronics for 2021 “will continue to strengthen” its Z Fold and Z Flip foldable smartphone lineup “with the aim of popularizing the foldable form factor” as it looks to more such designs, said President Yoon-Ho Cho on a Q4 call Wednesday. Samsung will work to “solidify” the Z Fold’s “positioning in the super premium segment, especially highlighting the usability it offers with a large screen” for viewing entertainment content and as a “productivity” tool for remote work and learning, he said: Z Flip's goal is “to satisfy and target the needs of the millennials, as well as female users."

The production company behind 2010's I Spit on Your Grave remake is suing a variety of John Doe users of alleged piracy website 1137x for direct and contributory copyright infringement for sharing the film via BitTorrent. In the suit filed this week in U.S. District Court in Denver (docket 21-cv-00239, in Pacer), Family of the Year Productions said it plans to subpoena Google and unnamed ISPs to learn the John Doe subscriber identities and IP address log information.