Now That Uncle Sam Is Back, What's Next for the FCC, FTC?

Within minutes of President Barack Obama signing the deal that reopens the government through Jan. 15 and raises the debt ceiling to Feb. 7, the Federal Communications Commission's website came back online. The Federal Trade Commission took a little longer to get back up to speed. Its website came back online around 9:15 a.m. So what's next?

For a while longer, the FCC and FTC will chug along and tackle the backlogs that mounted up during the 16- day shutdown with less than five commissioners. The FCC was already forced to postpone its Oct. 22 monthly meeting because of the shutdown. There is also plenty of fretting that the auction of wireless spectrum could also suffer a delay, pushing it to 2015. With less time to prepare, many wonder if the FTC will decide to delay upcoming workshops on the Internet of things (Nov. 19) and native advertising (Dec. 4), a new issue for the agency. Now more than ever, the advertising lobby will need to keep up the work to preserve the advertising tax deduction. The next big date is Dec. 13 when the Congressional negotiating committee is supposed to issue budget recommendations for funding the government beyond Jan. 15.