May 2015

Comcast CEO: 'We're not feeling the need to rush out and do something' after TWC deal collapse

Continuing to hammer away at the "we're moving on" messaging campaign adopted after the collapse of his company's attempted acquisition of Time Warner Cable, Comcast chief executive Brian Roberts told a group of investors that the No. 1 cable operator is in no hurry to propose another megadeal. "We're not feeling the need to rush out and do something," Roberts said. Roberts said his company isn't gun-shy about entering another merger agreement. Asked if he is concerned that federal regulators will reject any pact the conglomerate makes, Roberts said he was assured recently by a regulatory official that each deal is unique and evaluated on its own merits. "You can't draw conclusions off this one deal," he said.

The BBC braces for the fight of its life

A majority Conservative government was the outcome that Europe’s largest public broadcaster dreaded most. And Prime Minister David Cameron had not even finished announcing his new Cabinet when the British press declared his government at war with the BBC. The appointment of John Whittingdale, a Conservative stalwart and former adviser to Margaret Thatcher, as the minister overseeing broadcasting policy was, to hear the UK media tell it, the opening barrage in what will be a brutal fight about the corporation’s future over the next 18 months. The extent of the new Culture Secretary’s hostility to the BBC was, in some cases, comically overstated. But the stakes for the BBC are higher than ever. The negotiations will be rough. Britain’s public broadcaster may emerge from five years of Tory government looking drastically different. Although the corporation is editorially independent of the British state, it relies on the public purse for £3.7 billion (€5.1 billion) of its £5 billion (€6.9 billion) annual budget. And it now has to wrestle an agreement about its funding and remit for another ten years from a party whose members frequently accuse its journalists of left-wing bias and promised voters that there will be no increase in the £145.50 (€203,30) that they pay annually to fund the BBC.

“Tories go to war on the BBC,” thundered the front page of The Daily Telegraph after Whittingdale’s appointment was announced. “Cameron’s shot across the bows to the BBC,” proclaimed The Times. The BBC, whose programming includes nine TV channels, 16 radio stations and one of the world’s most-trafficked news websites, is fighting to retain a universal, compulsory license fee, which it argues is the fairest and best mechanism for funding its services. It claims that it has already slashed around £1 billion in costs in response to financial constraints imposed by the previous government and warns that, without an increase in its annual public funding, the quality of programs will suffer. At risk, BBC executives say, is nothing short of their ability to provide free, universally accessible journalism and entertainment that is used, in some form or other, by around 96 percent of the UK population every week.

CBO Scores DHS Social Media Improvement Act of 2015

The DHS Social Media Improvement Act of 2015 (HR 623) would direct the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to establish a working group to provide guidance and best practices on the use of social media technologies, specifically during a terrorist attack or other emergency. The groups would prepare guidance for the emergency preparedness and response community. The working group would be required to submit an annual report on emerging trends and best practices for emergency response through social media.

Based on the cost of similar activities carried out under the DHS Acquisition and Accountability Efficiency Act and the Critical Infrastructure Research and Development Advancement Act of 2013, CBO estimates that the new DHS responsibilities and the annual report required by HR 623 would cost less than $500,000 annually, assuming the availability of appropriated funds. Enacting the legislation would not affect direct spending or revenues; therefore, pay-as-you-go procedures do not apply.

House Judiciary Committee: More time needed for Internet domain transition

More time is needed for the US government to hand over its oversight role of the Internet domain name process, most panelists at a House Judiciary Committee hearing said on May 13th. Rep Darrell Issa (R-CA) noted language was inserted into the Commerce Department's 2016 budget that would bar the agency from appropriating funds for the transition. "In other words, until the end of the fiscal year 2016 this transition would not be allowed to go forward," he said. The House Energy and Commerce Committee is also debating legislation that would put off a transition until the Government Accountability Office can review the move's implications. The appropriations language was added to the department's 2015 budget as well. When that happened, the National Telecommunications and Information Administration, housed in the Commerce Department, said it would adhere to the ban, but would continue to monitor discussions and participate in meetings about the transition with other stakeholders.

While many of the eight panelists said more time would be needed, at least one hinted at concerns about Congress's appropriations move. "Possibly the earliest is next spring of 2016. It might well likely leak into much later in 2016," said Steve DelBianco, the executive director of NetChoice. "And yet Commerce needs to have enough leeway to spend the resources necessary to answer your questions, and to make sure the stress tests have been applied and to make sure their conditions have been met."

House Speaker Boehner: It's not the time to use a 'wrecking ball' on NSA bill

House Speaker John Boehner (R-OH) acknowledged that some Republicans want to tweak a national security bill headed for a vote on the House floor on May 13, but said it's the wrong time to "bring out the wrecking ball." The House is poised to pass the USA Freedom Act, which would overhaul the National Security Agency program that collects Americans' phone records in bulk. The legislation also would extend expiring portions of the Patriot Act. "This is a very delicate issue. I know members would like to offer some amendments but this is not a place for people to bring out the wrecking ball," Speaker Boehner said.

On May 13, the House Rules Committee, which is controlled by allies of Speaker Boehner, blocked efforts by Rep Justin Amash (R-MI) and other civil-liberties advocates to offer amendments to the bill. But Speaker Boehner noted that the underlying bill had broad support and was very similar to one the House passed in 2014 with nearly 300 votes. The White House has signaled support for the bill, but Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) favors a "clean" reauthorization of the Patriot Act before provisions expire on June 1. Asked how the House and Senate would resolve their differences, Speaker Boehner demurred. "I'm not going to speculate what the Senate will or will not do," he said. "All I know is that these programs expire at the end of [May]. They are critically important to keep Americans safe. The House is going to act and I hope the Senate will act soon as well."

Charter Still in Active Talks to Buy Bright House Networks

Apparently, Charter Communications continues to work on a takeover of Bright House Networks, seeing the deal as a precursor to a bid for Time Warner Cable. The companies are in active discussions to reach a new deal, during an exclusivity period that lasts through most of May. Apparently, the talks may continue even after that exclusivity ends. Charter and Bright House had agreed on a $10.4 billion acquisition, which they announced in March. That was contingent on the closing of Comcast’s purchase of Time Warner Cable. The agreement included a provision that Charter would renegotiate with Bright House for 30 days if the Comcast-Time Warner Cable deal was called off, which it was on April 24. Locking down the purchase of Bright House, the sixth-largest US cable company, would bolster Charter’s ability to finance an eventual Time Warner Cable takeover. Apparently, Charter and Time Warner Cable are discussing the potential structure of their own deal.

How Google’s Top Minds Decide What to Forget

On most Wednesdays, Google’s top minds in Europe get together and decide what to forget. The meetings are a new -- and potentially precedent-setting -- routine for a group of senior lawyers, engineers and product managers at the tech company, after Europe’s top court ruled that people could ask Google to remove links in search results for their name. The European Court of Justice ruling, a year old on May 13th, places Google in the uncomfortable position of having to vet take-down requests itself, and make a call. The decision making requires weighing a host of considerations, including weighty ones like how to balance people’s individual rights to privacy against the public’s right to know. The court gave little guidance on how requests should be decided, beyond saying that search results should be scrubbed if they include links to information that is inadequate, irrelevant, excessive or outdated. That largely left Google on its own to figure out where to draw the line. The case, which established what is informally known as the “right to be forgotten,” has prompted more than 250,000 requests covering more than 920,000 links.

Google has agreed to remove 35 percent of the links submitted and declined to remove 50 percent, with 15 percent still under review. Peter Fleischer, Google’s global privacy counsel, gave a rare glimpse of the mechanics of its decision making. He said the company was doing its best “to play a role that we never asked to play -- and don’t want to play.” The approach -- leaving it to Google to sort out -- sets one example for how Europe may choose to enforce any future broadening of the right to be forgotten.

Comptel Backs FCC in Title II Fight

Comptel, which represents competitive communications carriers -- Internet service providers, backbone providers and others -- is putting its legal money where its mouth is, asking a DC federal court for permission to weigh in on the Federal Communications Commission's behalf in the legal challenges to the Title II reclassification order. Comptel on May 12 filed a petition to intervene with the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia which, barring some last-minute legal maneuvering, will be hearing the appeals by cable and telecommunications company associations and others.

Comptel, which supported reclassifying ISPs as telecoms under the Title II common carrier regulations, told the court that the rules "will ensure that consumers and businesses can access a competitive network of online content, applications, and services." The rules, which passed on a pure party line vote Feb. 26, are scheduled to go into effect June 12, unless the court grants stays being prepared by cable and telecommunication company operators and likely to be filed by week's end. The FCC denied stay requests from the same folks, prompting the next step of seeking the court stay.

FCC Ponders Extending Emergency Alert Accessibility Rules to “Second Screens”

At its Open Meeting scheduled for next Thursday, May 21, 2015, the Federal Communications Commission will consider extending emergency information accessibility rules to “second screen” devices such as computers, tablets, and smartphones. The contemplated Second Report and Order and Second Further Notice of Proposed Rulemaking would expand the class of entities subject to the FCC’s accessibility rules (adopted in April 2013) to include multi-channel video programming distributors (“MVPDs”) providing linear video programming on second screen devices. Such a change could have far-reaching implications for both MVPDs and device manufacturers.

By way of background, the FCC released a Report and Order and Further Notice of Proposed Rulemaking on April 9, 2013, adopting some, and proposing other, emergency information and video description rules to implement Sections 202 and 203 of the Twenty-First Century Communications and Video Accessibility Act of 2010. Among other requirements, the Order adopted new rules mandating that video programming distributors (“VPDs”) present aurally on a secondary audio stream (“SAS”) any non-newscast emergency information that it presents visually. The emergency information provided on the SAS must be read at least twice in full and preceded by an aural tone to alert blind and visually impaired audience members that emergency information is available and to differentiate audio accompanying the underlying programming from emergency information audio. Although the FCC’s announcement in the tentative agenda for the meeting mentions only proposed rules related to accessibility of emergency alerts, the FNPRM also opened the door to extending video description rules to second screen devices. Notably, the FCC has remarked that, “as a technical matter, once the [SAS] is received by a device, that stream can be made available regardless of whether it is used for emergency information or video description.” Soon, we’ll hopefully learn how far the FCC intends to go on both of these requirements.

Will Multistakeholderism Prevail By September 2015?

Since the formation of the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) in the late 1980’s, the US Government and Internet stakeholders envisioned that the United States' stewardship role in the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA) functions would be temporary. Public Knowledge welcomes this transfer as a fulfillment of many years of US promises to the international community. Although there has been some talk to extend the September 30th deadline and offer the respective working groups more time to complete their work to set up a new system for oversight and proper accountability measures, the multistakeholder community is continuing to operate with this deadline in mind.

A successful transition by the set deadline would be a big step forward in showing that the Internet is not only in the domain of national governments, but that users around the world also have an essential role in shaping its future. Furthermore, the development of the Internet, driven by technical standards organizations, governments, private corporations, and civil society groups, has always been conducted through a multistakeholder process, and therefore, it is important that its governance continue to be reflective of this reality. A successful transition of IANA functions from the purview of the United States to the global community would demonstrate a vote of confirmation and trust on the multistakeholder model that the US advocates internationally.

Benton

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