Netflix and Time Warner Cable reached a paid interconnection agreement in June. Interconnection between the companies’ networks began this month, both companies said in separate statements (http://nflx.it/1oSdg8t). This follows the announcement that Netflix and AT&T reached a paid interconnection agreement in May (CD Aug 1 p8).

Cox is expanding its Connect2Compete offering through 2016, and investing $15 million in the program that helps bring broadband to low-income families, it said. C2C offers discounted high-speed Internet service to low-income families with children who qualify for the National School Lunch program, it said. C2C, which launched last year, began as a partnership with Cox, FCC, NCTA and others in the cable industry, Cox CEO Patrick Esser said Tuesday at the National Press Club. The program can help close the “homework gap,” said FCC Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel. Getting homework done at home takes connecting at home, she said. C2C is important and Cox is “making a big difference in the 18 states where they provide broadband service,” she said. Seven out of 10 teachers assign homework that requires some form of Internet access, she said. FCC and industry must close the gap and “make sure that no child in the 21st century is left off line,” she said. With Connect2Compete, many more students can do their homework, and the service “can mean that their families, too, can participate more fully in a digital world and in modern civic and commercial life,” she said. Rosenworcel also highlighted the FCC’s effort to upgrade the E-rate program and action to begin an initiative to make Wi-Fi more widely available in schools and libraries. Cox and its partners have the power and responsibility “to empower learning beyond the walls of the school,” said Esser. Cox also has a partnership with the Boys and Girls Club of America, he said: Cox has invested in and built “more than 70 Cox technology centers in clubhouses throughout the country.” The program needs more partners to help step up its offering, said Zach Leverenz, EveryoneOn CEO. He urged other companies to “get behind Cox” and push forward toward an “opportunity-to-access provided for every single student.” Connect2Compete is the flagship program at EveryoneOn for K-12 students, Cox said in a news release.

MTV should publicly promise that its upcoming Sunday Video Music Awards show will be rated appropriately and won’t contain “explicit sexual content,” said the Parents Television Council in a recent letter to the network, in a news release Monday (http://bit.ly/1uOoA86). Last year’s VMA show was rated TV-14, but included a performance by singers Miley Cyrus and Robin Thicke that was “sexually charged,” PTC said. “Such a rating was simply unacceptable to the families who depend on the television ratings system to be applied accurately and to the millions of families whose children are marketed to by MTV,” said the letter. Along with not including sexualized content and being rated correctly, this year’s VMAs should also abide by MTV and parent company Viacom’s own standards and practices, to avoid the “public relations kerfuffle” caused by last year’s show, PTC said. Viacom had no immediate comment.

CableLabs representatives sidestepped our questions Wednesday on how 4K.CableLabs.com came together and whether CableLabs thinks the site can help alleviate the lack of available native 4K content. CableLabs launched 4K.CableLabs.com as a dedicated website “to demonstrate the latest in video content evolution and technology,” and give budding 4K content creators a chance at global exposure, said the cable industry’s research and development consortium Wednesday (CD Aug 14 p6). As for how many 4K-resolution uploads 4K.CableLabs.com has the capacity to hold, “at this time, we do not have any estimates as to how much content will be on the site,” a CableLabs spokeswoman told us: “The site will evolve as necessary for the benefit of the cable industry. With regards to space, we will continue to evaluate the space requirements as necessary to support our members relative with our goals for the site.” -- PG

The Society of Cable Telecommunications Engineers added Cablevision, Charter Communications and Cox Communications to its Corporate Alliance Program (CAP). There are now six operator partners in the program, SCTE said Thursday in a news release (http://bit.ly/1paPe7i). CAP enables operators and vendors to address industry issues, develop solutions and prepare for emerging technologies, and expand access to training through SCTE, it said. Comcast, Suddenlink and Time Warner Cable also are CAP members, SCTE said, and Alpha Technologies and Arris have become beta vendor partners and will help the society start a full vendor program in 2015.

The New York Department of Public Service staff’s recommendations for public interest conditions that the state Public Service Commission should include in any approval of the Comcast purchase of Time Warner Cable doesn’t change Common Cause New York’s opposition to the deal, said Executive Director Susan Lerner in an interview. Common Cause New York has said in comments that the PSC should reject Comcast/TWC outright (http://bit.ly/VkBKKy). “Our argument is that this entity would be so large that it can’t be regulated, and its prior conduct raises real concerns about its willingness and likelihood of abiding by any conditions,” she said. Industry observers have seen the DPS recommendations as a sign the PSC is likely to approve the transaction (CD Aug 14 p2).

The FCC review of Comcast’s planned buy of Time Warner Cable should focus on transaction-specific issues rather than general consolidation, Comcast Executive Vice President David Cohen told FCC General Counsel Jonathan Sallet and several other members of the commission’s task force overseeing the transaction, said an ex parte filing in docket 14-57 Thursday (http://bit.ly/1pPNJL5). The combined Comcast/TWC won’t harm broadband and won’t have a 50 percent of the national broadband market as critics maintain, Comcast said. Recent data show that the combined company would have a 35.5 percent share of fixed broadband connections, and 15.5 percent if wireless broadband is included, said Comcast. National broadband market share is irrelevant anyway, because Comcast and TWC serve distinct geographic areas and mostly don’t compete for Internet service, Comcast said. “The transaction will change nothing about competition for such services.” The deal also doesn’t pose competitive concerns in the video programming market, Cohen said. The commission’s review shouldn’t focus on “the claims of programmers intent on using this proceeding to secure new or different business arrangements,” the filing said. Comcast’s per-subscriber programming costs increased more than 120 percent between 2004 and 2013, a sign that content providers have strong bargaining leverage, Cohen said. The deal doesn’t pose a competitive threat to advertising markets where Comcast’s cable systems and NBCUniversal’s stations overlap because “cable spot advertising and broadcast advertising are not close substitutes and, therefore, constitute two separate product markets,” Comcast said. Cable doesn’t have a strong role in the ad market, and only 7 percent of local ad revenue goes to cable, Comcast said. The deal will also have the benefit of facilitating the deployment of addressable ad technology that will be compatible with Comcast’s X1 platform and existing Comcast digital set-top boxes, Cohen said. Comcast has a number of successful initiatives connected to diversity “enhanced over the past three years by a variety of voluntary commitments Comcast made in connection with the NBCUniversal transaction,” Cohen said. “Comcast is a demonstrated leader in this area and stands by its ongoing efforts and partnerships, which will extend to the acquired systems,” the filing said. “Beyond that,” the initiatives connected to Comcast/NBCUniversal should not be linked to Comcast/TWC, Cohen said.

Eliminating the sports blackout rule could have negative impacts on communities with “some of the greatest economic needs,” said Rev. Jesse Jackson, president of the Rainbow PUSH Coalition, in a letter to FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler Wednesday. “In large urban areas, NFL stadiums tend to be located within communities where the unemployment rate is high and the need for jobs is even greater,” said Jackson. Though eliminating the rule could be seen as an adjustment to increasing competition in video, communities without many pay-TV subscribers shouldn’t “bear the brunt of the harm” he said. Though Jackson conceded the rule appears “outdated in the current ecosystem,” he said its elimination could have a “disproportionate impact on the communities and residents that seek to work, and not simply watch an athletic event."

The FCC Media Bureau extended the comment period on Mediacom’s petition for rulemaking to amend rules for video programming vendors. Initial comments are due Sept. 29, and replies Oct. 14, the bureau said Monday in a public notice (http://bit.ly/1opIKCE). Deadlines were extended by one month, it said. American Cable Association requested an extension (CD Aug 5 p8). Granting ACA’s request “is necessary to facilitate the development of a full record,” the notice said.

The New York Public Service Commission shouldn’t seek a voluntary agreement from Comcast to expand its rural service area as part of its review of the proposed Comcast/Time Warner Cable deal, said Stop the Cap Founder Phillip Dampier in a filing posted Monday. The filing repeats Stop the Cap’s opposition to Comcast/TWC. The public service benefit of asking Comcast to voluntarily expand its rural service area “must be weighed against the interests of millions of existing subscribers in New York who are likely to see further rate increases, usage-limited broadband service, and worse service from Comcast,” Dampier said in the filing. “Unless Comcast was compelled to wire the entire state, any proposal seeking a voluntary agreement to expand Comcast’s service area in New York is likely to be insufficient to solve the pervasive problem of rural broadband availability. It would also saddle millions of New Yorkers with a company unwelcomed by consumers, with no alternative choice.” The New York PSC’s review should also include a “careful analysis of exactly what Comcast is proposing to offer New York,” Dampier said, saying many of Comcast’s proposals are expensive. Attempts at behavioral remedies as part of merger reviews have “spectacularly failed to protect consumers from rapacious rate increases after the merger deals are approved,” Dampier said (http://bit.ly/1ujPJiO).