Calling it "an after-acquired systems provision on steroids," Mediacom said "additional stations" provisions in retransmission consent negotiations are something the FCC should scrutinize in updating its totality of circumstances test for good faith retransmission negotiations. In a letter to FCC Media Bureau Chief Bill Lake posted Wednesday in docket 15-216, Mediacom said it and other cable operators in retrans talks are running into proposed broadcaster provisions whereby terms agreed to with the broadcaster automatically apply also to any stations that later grant that broadcaster authority to negotiate retrans consent on its behalf. The result is the existing retrans agreement with those stations immediately terminates, to be replaced with the agreement with the broadcaster. "In practice, what this provision would do is give the broadcaster a 'hunting license' to seek proxies from any other [local] station ... in which the cable operator provides service," Mediacom said. "This is a far cry from the typical 'after acquired' systems provision" covering any stations broadcasters buy and "flies in the face of the fundamental principles underlying the notion of market-based, good faith retransmission consent negotiations," it said. "If the Commission allows this kind of arrangement to stand, there is every reason to expect that within a few years, a mere handful of stations will dictate the terms of retransmission consent for hundreds of unrelated stations in which they have no other material interest [and] all but write the concept of competitive market considerations out of the retransmission consent process," Mediacom said. In a separate filing Wednesday in the docket, the American TV Alliance pointed to Nexstar Broadcasting's potential blackout of Cox for Sunday's Super Bowl as further evidence of the need for totality of circumstances test reform. "This ... is not a case where agreement between the parties is impossible, or where the parties maintain irreconcilably different views of the value of Nexstar's programming," ATVA said. "It is a shakedown." ATVA has made a variety of proposals for test changes (see 1601140026). Nexstar didn't comment. But TVFreedom in a statement said ATVA "needs to be renamed the American Deception Alliance," pointing to Cox having been involved in 23 blackouts of local TV service since 2013 and that the Super Bowl will be available both online and over the air in affected markets.“The ATVA/Big Pay-TV game plan is clear: Rather than negotiate a fair rate for popular broadcast programming, it seeks to force a few disruptions of service in hopes the FCC will bail them out of a ‘crisis’ of their own making," it said.

Comcast plans to roll out DOCSIS 3.1-powered gigabit Internet service in Atlanta, Chicago, Detroit, Miami and Nashville later this year, it said in a news release Tuesday. Comcast installed its first DOCSIS 3.1 modems in Atlanta and Philadelphia earlier this year, it said. "Combined with all the upgrades we have already put into our advanced fiber optic-coax network, [DOCSIS 3.1] will not only provide more gigabit speed choices for customers, it will also eventually make these ultra-fast speeds available to the most homes in our service areas," Comcast Central Division President Bill Connors said in a statement. Comcast said DOCSIS 3.1 modems have been tested, but their use in Atlanta, Chicago, Detroit, Miami and Nashville is their first wide deployment.

The FCC’s draft proposed changes to set-top box rules could help “loosen the stranglehold” cable companies have over program guide information, the Alliance for Community Media said in an ex parte filing in docket 15-64 Monday. “PEG organizations are systematically prevented from providing program guide metadata by cable providers which control access to the navigation systems on their set-top boxes,” ACM said. “This means that local governments are unable to direct citizens to program guides to find vital civic information.” The group said it intends to file comments in support of the coming (see 1601270064) FCC proposals.

The purchase of The Weather Co.'s (TWC) nonprogramming assets is complete, IBM said in a news release Friday. IBM didn't buy TWC's The Weather Channel, but said the programmer will license weather forecast data and analytics from it under a long-term contract. IBM said last year when announcing the deal that it expected to complete the buy in Q1 (see 1510280018).

Sky will be the first user of Roku's hybrid set-top box that allows TV services to offer both linear and streaming programming, Roku said in a news release Friday. The Roku Powered set-top will be part of Sky's Now TV service in the U.K., Roku said.

Massachusetts Department of Telecommunications and Cable arguments that a Time Warner Cable analysis of the state of cable competition in Adams, Massachusetts, are flawed are in themselves wrong, TWC said in an FCC reply posted Friday. It responded to MDTC opposition (see 1601190068) to the company's petition seeking a declaration that Adams is subject to effective competition. Each of the eight additional ZIP codes missing from MDTC's analysis of Adams represents a residence, and should be counted for purposes of calculating competing provider penetration there, TWC said. MDTC's proposal to discount Adams' direct broadcast satellite numbers because of seasonal homes in Adams goes against FCC precedent, TWC said. Even if that subscriber count were discounted, TWC said, Adams would still reach the 15 percent of DBS subscriber penetration that's the statutory threshold for determining effective competition exists, TWC said. MDTC didn't comment.

Unless pay-TV companies show concrete steps for how they'll address service and billing woes, "Washington’s policymakers should take action" by requiring greater transparency about any such quality control measures being instituted, TVFreedom said in a blog post Thursday. Pointing to various cable and satellite advertisements that take a light-hearted tone on such issues as wait times for technicians and competitors' service quality, the group of broadcasters its website noted include NAB said pay-TV companies themselves at times acknowledge improvements need to be made, but "positive industry changes to improve the customer experience are slow to materialize." It said "anti-consumer tactics ... can’t simply be fixed or laughed away with humorous commercials ... a commitment to dramatically improving customer service would be a positive start." NCTA didn't comment Friday.

A settlement conference is scheduled for March 1 between Time Warner Cable and Cableview Communications of Jacksonville, a cable installation company. In an order filed Thursday in U.S. District Court in Jacksonville, Florida, Magistrate Judge James Klindt ordered Cableview and TWC to submit confidential memoranda by Feb. 22 "setting forth their respective positions on settlement and the ultimate settlement position to which each party would be willing to agree." Cableview sued TWC in 2013 (No. 1:13-cv-306-J-34JRK), claiming TWC interfered in FTS USA's 2012 purchase of Cableview.

Any regulatory approval of Charter Communications' buying Bright House Networks and Time Warner Cable should come with conditions regarding broadband adoption and deployment, including expansion of eligibility for Charter's $14.99 per month broadband offering, the California Emerging Technology Fund said in an ex parte filing Friday in FCC docket 15-149. CETF said it neither opposes nor backs regulatory approval for the deals, but it does support broadband-related conditions if the FCC gives approval. New Charter should have a goal of broadband adoption by 696,000 to 960,000 low-income California households as a public benefit of the acquisitions, it said. CETF also listed a variety of suggested broadband conditions, including setting of performance goals for New Charter's low-income broadband service with its adoption rate being at 45 percent of eligible households within two years, with the eventual goal of 80 percent adoption. Conditions also should include establishment of an independent fund to aid community-based organizations in increasing broadband adoption, and infrastructure-building plans for 10 unserved and underserved broadband areas "with a particular focus on the Inland Empire, San Joaquin Valley, Salinas Valley (Monterey County) and Modoc County," CETF said. Charter pledged to start a low-income broadband offering open to families with students taking part in the National School Lunch Program and/or senior citizens who receive Supplemental Security Income program benefits (see 1512170070), but eligibility for the $14.99 per month service should "include all low-income households (particularly people with disabilities and veterans)," CETF said, and a wireless router should be included with the program's modem. Charter didn't comment. The filing recapped a meeting between CETF and Commissioner Michael O’Rielly.

Comments on the transfer of control of Wide Open West (WOW) to private equity firm Crestview are due Feb. 10 in docket 16-12, replies Feb. 17, the FCC said in a public notice Wednesday. Crestview is buying an ownership interest in Racecar Holdings, of which WOW is a wholly owned indirect subsidiary (see 1601120072), the FCC said.