The FCC network overbuild requirement on Charter Communications hurts agency and congressional goals of closing the digital divide by undermining the incentives of smaller operators to invest in expanding their broadband networks to unserved or underserved areas, American Cable Association representatives are telling Chairman Ajit Pai's office. An ACA ex parte filing posted Tuesday in docket 15-149 said the overbuild condition -- required as part of Charter's 2016 buys of Time Warner Cable and Bright House Networks -- has Charter spending resources on providing a second option to subscribers who already have 25 Mbps-or-better service, diverting resources from serving consumers with no broadband or slower speeds, ACA said in a meeting with Pai's acting wireline adviser, Jay Schwarz. ACA is one of several parties that petitioned for reconsideration of New Charter conditions (see 1606100043).

With the broadcast TV fees and regional sports fees Comcast charges subscribers being disclosed in advertisements, pop-ups and hyperlinks during the ordering process, confirmation emails, and rate cards and itemized bills sent to subscribers, no one can credibly claim they're hidden, it said in a motion to dismiss (in Pacer) filed Tuesday in U.S. District Court in San Francisco. It responded to a second amended complaint (in Pacer) from Comcast subscribers in seven states filed last week that said those add-on fees earn Comcast more than $1 billion annually and "are a deceptive way ... to double-charge for channels that Comcast has already promised are included with the basic service price." The lawsuit -- with lead named plaintiff Dan Adkins -- alleges the add-on fees Comcast charges lets it falsely advertise a flat monthly rate that's lower than it actually charges, even though programming costs are a standard expense. The plaintiffs also cite customer conversations with telesales agents and Comcast retail store staff telling prospective customers the only additional charges are taxes and government fees. Comcast said the illegitimacy of the suit is illustrated by plaintiff's counsel taking two years to recruit plaintiffs, coach them into opting out of arbitration, and choreographing conversations "in order to elicit sound bites" for the complaint. It said the California court lacks jurisdiction since Comcast is based in Philadelphia, its subsidiaries provide Xfinity services to the named defendants in California, and other named defendants live in other states. It argued plaintiffs haven't shown any breach of contract evidence with parent company Comcast since their subscriber contracts were with subsidiary Comcast Cable Communications, nor have they shown breach of implied duty since the fees charged are addressed and permitted by the parties' contracts.

TV ratings measurement firm TVSquared raised an additional $6.5 million from West Coast Capital, the Scottish Investment Bank and other investors, it said in a news release Monday.

The Cable & Telecommunications Association for Marketing completed its takeover of the Association of Cable Communicators, CTAM said in a Tuesday news release. In October, the groups said they were combining (see 1611030018). In the consolidation, CTAM Senior Vice President Anne Cowan, who worked on communications and marketing and was at the group for almost 18 years, was promoted to chief communications officer.

Between the price and the New York divestitures that would be required, a Verizon/Charter Communications deal is not likely in the cards, Raymond James analyst Frank Louthan emailed investors Friday. The asking price could be "well north" of $400 per share, Raymond James said; the stock trades at about $320. "Recent conversations in DC with industry participants and regulators showed little enthusiasm for the deal" because of the divestitures and "a lack of strategic focus," he wrote. Charter more likely is interested in investing in its business, Raymond James said. The operator has been the subject of rumors of a combination with and possibly purchase by Verizon (see 1701260032).

Comcast's evidence in its motion for summary judgment on its counterclaims against Clear Connection shows Comcast didn't meet its obligations to Clear, Clear said in an opposition (in Pacer) to Comcast's motion for summary judgment on the counterclaim filed Thursday in U.S District Court in Sacramento. It also said Comcast isn't entitled to defense costs since Clear had offered a joint defense of the two in a wage and hours lawsuit brought against them by a former Clear employee. The counterclaim is part of an antitrust complaint Clear brought against Comcast for the operator's decision to drop Clear as one of its preferred cable installation service providers in parts of California. Clear said Comcast isn't entitled to summary judgment on its breach of contract, indemnity and declaratory relief counterclaims -- all of which try to hold Clear liable for the defense costs in the worker suit -- because Comcast hasn't shown its own full performance of the contract, such as paying Clear everything it was owed, and that its attorney fees are reasonable. Comcast didn't comment Friday.

A judge's awarding legal fees and costs to BMG Rights Management should be seen as a message to ISPs about meeting their safe-harbor obligations under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, Rightscorp said in a statement Friday. In a memorandum opinion (in Pacer) Tuesday, on BMG, Round Hill Music and Cox Communications motions for costs and attorney fees, U.S. District Judge Liam O'Grady of Alexandria, Virginia, granted BMG's motion for attorney fees but cut the request by 20 percent to $8.38 million and denied BMG's motion on nontaxable litigation expenses. The judge granted BMG's bill of costs but excluded some costs and cut it by 10 percent, and rejected Cox's motion for attorney fees and costs since it wasn't a prevailing party under the Copyright Act's Section 505. O'Grady said that "to continue to promote the vindication of individuals' copyrights ... BMG (and others like it) should be rewarded for facing up against willful infringers with deep pockets." Rightscorp CEO Christopher Sabec said there's no evidence repeat copyright infringers are being terminated by ISPs, putting them at risk of third-party liability, and that copyright holders hurt by ISPs' lack of safe-harbor implementation "can expect to have their costs covered." Rightscorp wasn't a party in the BMG litigation. Cox didn't comment.

Sony’s new line of smart TVs incorporating Google Assistant “is a harbinger of things to come,” and the TV industry will have to figure out its stance in a world where Amazon, Apple, Google and Microsoft dominate the voice-controlled visual assistant market, The Diffusion Group (TDG) Senior Adviser Joel Espelien said in a TDG blog post Wednesday. TDG said the Sony/Google partnership puts TV original equipment manufacturers and multichannel video programming distributors “in a difficult position,” with three options: develop their own voice search capabilities, coalesce around Google as the industry standard search engine, or divide up teams and align with one or more of the voice assistants. TDG was dismissive of Comcast’s development of voice search capabilities for its X1 platform: “Voice search limited to a single service (or device) is a classic stovepipe solution” since consumers want to “search for anything across any service.” Coalescing around Google levels the search playing field among legacy participants but hands Google “the keys to the $70 billion US TV advertising market,” TDG said. Teams of OEMs and multichannel video programming distributors aligning with various voice assistants seem inevitable, it said, with one result being content providers would have big incentives to provide application programming interface support to all the voice assistants.

Discovery Communications and Snap will jointly develop short-form mobile video programming exclusively for Snapchat, they said in a news release Thursday. The programming will debut in the U.S. in coming months, they said. The two also will partner on advertising-related efforts, they said.

Comcast plans to launch its TV Everywhere Xfinity Stream app later this month as a successor to its Xfinity TV app. In a news release Tuesday, the company said that, through Xfinity Stream, Xfinity TV customers will be able to watch more than 200 live channels and more than 40,000 on-demand titles on mobile devices, and access and program their DVRs. The Stream app also will let users switch to a Spanish-language guide, filter their favorite channels and access Common Sense Media reviews and ratings, the cable operator said. Comcast said the app will be available for download on iOS or Android devices starting Feb. 28, and people with the latest Xfinity TV app on their devices will see it transition to Stream through an app update that day.