The Utility Reform Network (TURN) filed a complaint with the California Public Utilities Commission Friday asking the PUC to put a stop to AT&T’s “unreasonable” rates (http://bit.ly/1bsKeTJ). Since Jan. 1, 2011, AT&T’s basic service rates have been deregulated, and AT&T’s flat and measured service rates have increased 40 percent and 73 percent, said the TURN complaint. Since the PUC granted major increases to the price caps of ILEC basic service rates on Jan. 1, 2009, AT&T’s flat and measured service rates have increased 115 percent and 222 percent, it said. “Competitive forces are not imposing sufficient constraints to ensure that AT&T’s basic service rates meet the requirement of Public Utilities Code Section 451 that ‘all charges demanded or received’ by a public utility such as AT&T ’shall be just and reasonable,'” said the complaint. TURN’s complaint was signed by 35 California customers. The complaint calls for the PUC to order a reduction in AT&T’s rates to make them comparable to other carriers, at $20 for flat service and $14 for measured service. AT&T did not comment.

WikiLeaks released more documents that it said came from the ongoing negotiations for the Trans-Pacific Partnership. This marks the second time it’s released documents related to the negotiations (CD Nov 14 p21). The “secret TPP documents” show “the state of negotiations as the twelve TPP countries began supposedly final negotiations at a trade ministers’ meeting in Singapore this week,” it said. WikiLeaks said one of the documents describes work by the U.S. to get other countries to adopt U.S. stances, while the other document lists, “country-by-country, the many areas of disagreement remaining.” The U.S. Trade Representative’s office had no comment.

Global patent filings in 2012 increased at their highest rate in 18 years, said a World Intellectual Property Organization news release Monday (http://bit.ly/1krVXnn). Patent filings increased by 9.2 percent last year to 2.35 million, while those for trademarks rose 6 percent, a lower growth rate than in recent years. China’s State Intellectual Property Office was primarily responsible for the growth in patent filings, with that office’s filings up 24 percent in 2012, said WIPO. It said the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office had a 7.8 percent filing increase.

The Inmarsat-5 satellite sent initial signals from orbit, Boeing said Monday in a news release (http://bit.ly/1breLhh). “After reaching final orbit, it will complete several additional maneuvers and tests before officially beginning service for Inmarsat.” The Boeing-built satellite launched Sunday from Kazakhstan on an International Launch Services rocket, it said. The satellite is the first to launch for Inmarsat’s forthcoming Ka-band network (CD Dec 4 p16).

Verizon FiOS, Bright House Networks and Verizon DSL had slight increases in Netflix speeds in November, said the online video distributor’s monthly speed index (http://nflx.it/1fdy6Ya). The OVD said Google Fiber, Cablevision Optimum, Cox Communications, Suddenlink and Charter Communications remained at the top of the list, followed by Verizon FiOS at 2.2 Mbps. Time Warner Cable and Comcast had slight decreases at 2.07 Mbps and 1.82 Mbps respectively, it said. Bright House had an increases to 1.91 Mbps and Verizon DSL to 1.23 Mbps, said Netflix. AT&T DSL slipped to 1.2 Mbps, said the speed index. It’s based on data from more than 40 million Netflix subscribers who watch more than 1 billion hours of TV shows and movies streaming from the OVD each month.

The Dec. 20 deadline for Form 323 biennial ownership reports conflicts with a planned power outage at the FCC mandated by the Washington, D.C., Fire Code, said the Media Bureau in a public notice Monday. The power outage will start at 7 p.m. Dec. 20, and take down all of the commission’s online filing systems, which means all biennial ownership reports must be received before the outage begins, the bureau said. Filers are encouraged “to submit their Form 323 filings well in advance of the deadline whenever possible,” said the bureau. The commission offers guidance on completing the forms at www.fcc.gov/form323.

Smartphones, tablets and e-readers can now be switched on in “flight mode” throughout an entire airline journey without a risk to safety, said the European Commission Monday. Updated guidance from the EU Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) allows, for the first time, the use of personal electronic devices in flight mode from gate to gate, the EC said. This is the first step toward safe expansion of the use of in-flight electronics during taxiing, take-off and landing, said Transport Commissioner Siim Kallas. The next step will be to look at how to connect to the network on-board, he said. He asked EASA to speed up its review of the safe use of transmitting devices on planes, with new guidance expected within the next year. It’s up to each airline to update its operating rules, the EC said. In the U.S., the FCC is to vote Thursday on an rulemaking that would allow airlines to authorize cellphones to be used during flights (CD Nov 22 p6).

Economist papers on retransmission consent filed by NAB have “assorted deficiencies, flaws and problems,” Mediacom said in comments in docket 10-71. The notion that there are 565 separate and distinct national networks “that could serve as substitutes for the popular programs of a Big-Four network carried by a station that is shut off during a negotiating impasse is ridiculous on its face,” it said in reference to a 2010 study by Navigant Economics for NAB. Many of the networks are unavailable on most cable systems and describe themselves as “national” only because they would like to be nationally, rather than locally or regionally, distributed, “but that dream has not been realized and is unlikely to be in the foreseeable (or even unforeseeable) future,” it said. Many of the channels offer highly specialized programming “that would not be considered by the typical viewer as a substitute for popular broadcast network shows,” it said. The Navigant paper’s conclusion “that market conditions preclude broadcast station owners from charging supra-competitive retrans fees is intellectual snake oil,” it said. Mediacom also referred to NAB’s letter last week as “just another instance of spin-doctoring.” Cable interests have distorted NAB’s arguments “and largely reiterated discredited claims and calls for government intervention into the retransmission consent market, even where the commission has no authority to act,” NAB said in that letter (http://bit.ly/J7XXX0).

House Transportation Committee Chairman Bill Shuster, R-Pa., planned to have introduced legislation Monday to stop people from talking on their cellphones on airplanes, he said, delivering on a threat other lawmakers have made in recent weeks. Shuster calls his bill the Prohibiting In-Flight Voice Communications on Mobile Wireless Devices Act and posted online a bill copy (http://1.usa.gov/19wPeDy). The legislation focuses on domestic commercial flights and forbids any phone conversation when the plane is in flight. Shuster’s office cited the FCC draft NPRM to review whether, from a technical perspective, such phone conversations should be allowed. “For passengers, being able to use their phones and tablets to get online or send text messages is a useful in-flight option,” Shuster said in a statement (http://1.usa.gov/1ktm4uo). “But if passengers are going to be forced to listen to the gossip in the aisle seat, it’s going to make for a very long flight,” he said. “For those few hours in the air with 150 other people, it’s just common sense that we all keep our personal lives to ourselves and stay off the phone.” The bill doesn’t mention the FCC or the Federal Aviation Administration, and directs the secretary of transportation to issue rules banning inflight conversations.

EU lawmakers and governments should make it easier for telecom companies to operate across borders, said Digital Agenda Commissioner Neelie Kroes Monday. She’s pushing for action on key proposals in the European Commission’s “connected continent” telecom overhaul package, one of which is the creation of a one-stop shop for authorizing e-communications services. The proposed regulation eases telecom service expansion in several ways, the EC said. It replaces 28 different registration requirements with one single point of authorization and notification in the EU, lowering entry barriers for new companies and costs for service provision. The rule also ensures that multi-territory telecom companies get more consistent treatment from regulators, and makes it easier for smaller players to cross borders by ensuring that operators below a certain size don’t have to pay regulatory administrative costs or pay into universal service funds, it said. The European Parliament is about to begin discussion on possible amendments to the draft package.