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Texas cable operators are bracing for Hurricane Rita by preparing for the worst and hoping for the best as forecasters predict the Category 4 storm will hit the Gulf Coast area Sat. Time Warner, Cable One and Cox are evacuating employees from area likely to bear the brunt and readying supplies and crews in safer locations. Firms with cable systems in the storm’s path already are reeling from Katrina. Washington Post Co.’s Cable One, the No. 1 Mississippi cable provider, said a third of customers in towns including Biloxi and Long Beach have lost their homes -- as have a similar portion of Cable One employees. Cox has some 250,000 subscribers in Louisiana and Texas systems perhaps in Rita’s path. During Katrina, Cox lost service in New Orleans, where some employees are without homes. Cable operators’ experience with Katrina may help them deal with Rita. Time Warner Cable has already set a plan for employees to check with the company after the storm to report their basic needs.
[SOURCE: Communications Daily, AUTHOR: Jonathan Make]
(Not available online)
The Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee approved a measure that would authorize the Homeland Security Department to dole out $3.3 billion over the next five years to enable first responders to communicate better during an emergency. The bill, S. 1725, would authorize $400 million in state grants to strengthen emergency communications systems next year and increase the amount annually to $1 billion by 2010. It also would establish an office of emergency communications, interoperability and compatibility within the Homeland Security Department. The office would replace the department's interoperability and compatibility unit proposed earlier this year by the Bush administration. Lawmakers want the new office to create a comprehensive research and development initiative to solve technology and policy problems that have hindered the government's progress on the issue.
[SOURCE: Technology Daily, AUTHOR: Greta Wodele]
* For more info on the bill, see:
http://hsgac.senate.gov/index.cfm?FuseAction=PressReleases.Detail&Affili...
Panel OKs First Responder Funds
FCC Chairman Kevin Martin told Senate commerce Committee members Thursday that first responders need to be assured sufficient spectrum for a mobile, interoperable, communications system. He proposed a new integrated emergency alert system that includes national, state, and local participation and incorporates various media, including the Internet and satellite. Chairman Martin also pushed for so-called "smart radios" that actively seek out available spectrum.
[SOURCE: Broadcasting&Cable, AUTHOR: John Eggerton]
(free access for Benton's Headlines subscribers)
* Martin Stands Firm On E-911 Rules
FCC Chairman Kevin Martin told the Senate Commerce Committee that his agency could benefit from additional authority to require emergency communications capabilities on the part of telecommunications companies, and held firm on imposing emergency 911 service obligations on Internet telephone companies.
http://www.njtelecomupdate.com/lenya/telco/live/tb-OYTD1127420171260.html
* See full text of Chairman Martin's address at:
http://hraunfoss.fcc.gov/edocs_public/attachmatch/DOC-261219A1.txt
* See links to additional testimony at: http://commerce.senate.gov/hearings/witnesslist.cfm?id=1618
http://www.broadcastingcable.com/article/CA6259226?display=Breaking%20News&refer…
Earlier this month, Senator John Kerry (D-Mass.) introduction The Communications Security Act of 2005 (S. 1703) which would require the Department of Homeland Security and the FCC to work together to develop back-up communications systems that would employ satellites, wireless and terrestrial services. On Thursday, a bipartisan group of Senate Commerce Committee members introduced the Warning, Alerts, and Response Network (WARN), a bill that would allocate a quarter billion dollars to develop a system of geographically targeted alerts across TV, radio, cable, satellite, Blackberries, cell phones, and non-traditional media.
[SOURCE: Broadcasting&Cable, AUTHOR: John Eggerton]
(free access for Benton's Headlines subscribers)
* For more on S.1703 see http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d109:s.01703:
* Stevens To Draft Measure On Disaster Communications
Senate Commerce Chairman Ted Stevens, R-Alaska, said he plans to draft legislation to strengthen communications during disasters. But he did not outline the details of such a measure or specify a timetable for moving it.
[SOURCE: Technology Daily, AUTHOR: David Hatch]
http://www.njtelecomupdate.com/lenya/telco/live/tb-PUUZ1127420558721.html
* Katrina spurs federal action on VoIP
http://news.com.com/Katrina+spurs+federal+action+on+VoIP/2100-7352_3-587...
http://www.broadcastingcable.com/article/CA6259494?display=Breaking%20News&refer…
[Commentary] Culture that lasts, culture that lives, is culture that is close to a spirit of enterprise. In broadcasting, free enterprise has led to more choice and given people access to cultural experiences of every sort. Regulators, like television industry incumbents [in Britan], must learn to accept the new world of choice. At the Edinburgh TV festival Robert Pepper, formerly of the FCC, outlined the regulatory challenges in a world where traditional boundaries between television and the Internet have gone and where data storage and high-speed transmission eliminate Âscarcity. In this world, he asked: “What, if anything, gets regulated? And what does localism, diversity or pluralism mean?†As broadband Internet becomes more able to deliver high-quality video to the home, should we continue to have different regulatory regimes for TV and for other audio-visual content? The European Commission thinks so. Its proposals seek to preserve a more stringent regulatory regime for traditional broadcasting than for on-demand content. This approach is doomed. For a consumer, whether the image on their screen has come through a TV tuner or a broadband connection may soon be irrelevant. Differential regulation is pointless and arbitrary. What is the point of having complete freedom within the law on audio-visual content received through the Internet and strict codes, format controls or production quotas on content received through digital TV? The question then becomes, should Internet audio-visual content be regulated in the same way as television currently, or should TV increasingly be deregulated in the same way as the Internet? The new world also means that the demon of powerful media companies imposing their views on the world belongs to an old James Bond movie. It always was a bit of a myth, but now it is laughable. Nobody can seriously say there is a problem with plurality when there are hundreds of TV news channels, millions of news websites and weblogs, and the ability for citizens to access information in an unmediated way. Technology and the market are delivering the ultimate pluralism.
[SOURCE: Financial Times, AUTHOR: James Murdoch, British Sky Broadcasting]
(requires subscription)
Net Age Has No Place for Archaic TV Regulation
FCC Commissioner Jonathan Adelstein believes courts likely would strike down efforts by the Federal Communications Commission to regulate indecency on cable TV, but Congress might succeed. Speaking to a gathering of radio broadcasters, Commissioner Adelstein said that regulators must "get out of the way" when there are easier ways for parents to protect children. Cable companies seeking to head off content regulation have publicized ways for customers to block channels they find offensive. Critics say the technology is not available to many cable customers, who in any event are forced to pay for channels they find objectionable. Congress is considering a bill to increase fines for broadcast indecency, and may modify the legislation to include regulation of cable programming.
[SOURCE: MediaWeek, AUTHOR: Todd Shields]
http://www.mediaweek.com/mw/news/recent_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1001178988
Could it be? A hard date for a mark-up for legislation aimed at setting a hard date for ending the transition to digital television? During the Senate Commerce Committee hearing on Communications during Disasters, Chairman Ted Stevens (R-Alaska) said that a DTV transition bill will be ready for mark-up by the budget committee Oct. 25. The Commerce Committee will mark-up the bill Oct 19. Actually, there will be two bills, one dealing strictly with spectrum-reclamation -- per rules governing money bills -- and another with other DTV-related issues. Sen Stevens also assured his committee that 24 mHz of that reclaimed analog spectrum will go to first responders.
(free access for Benton's Headlines subscribers)
Stevens Says DTV Bill Markup By Oct. 25
Speaking to a Media Institute audience in Washington, CPB Board Chairman Kenneth Tomlinson said he had "no regrets" about trying to balance public broadcasting by adding conservative viewpoints. Tomlinson said he would not comment until after the report was released -- now scheduled for sometime in late October. However, he vowed that the series of circumstances that turned him into a lightning rod "will one day be understood." Tomlinson said he did not want to be remembered as someone who had damaged public broadcasting. Yet he added, "If I threatened the cozy atmosphere of public broadcasting over the failure to balance the liberal advocacy journalism of Bill Moyers, so be it," he said.Tomlinson said that he thought that the noncom service had been "damaged a lot by that two-year Moyers period because it came to symbolize a total deficit in public broadcasting." He pointed out that he never advocated for liberal shows to be removed from the network, just adding conservative shows to balance them. CPB will elect a new chairman Monday, Sept. 26. Tomlinson says he will remain on the CPB board.
[SOURCE: Broadcasting&Cable, AUTHOR: John Eggerton]
(free access for Benton's Headlines subscribers)
http://www.broadcastingcable.com/article/CA6259417?display=Breaking%20News&refer…
The Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB) and iBiquity Digital Corporation, announced an agreement that will accelerate the conversion of over 800 AM and FM CPB-funded stations to iBiquity's digital HD Radio broadcasting. Under the agreement, CPB will purchase a group license that will allow more than 400 CPB-funded public radio stations to acquire iBiquity's digital HD Radio technology. This group license will also cover costs associated with the technology's advanced services such as multicasting and datacasting. Previously, CPB provided funding to approximately 400 local public radio stations for their digital conversions.
[SOURCE: Corporation for Public Broadcasting press release]
http://www.cpb.org/pressroom/release.php?prn=489
A controversial plan by the Federal Election Commission to regulate political blogging may be short-lived after all. Members of Congress said Thursday that the freewheeling world of Internet politicking should continue to be immune from campaign finance laws, and indicated they may rewrite the law to halt the FEC's proposal. The handful of politicians present at a hearing convened by the U.S. House of Representatives Administration Committee hailed the Internet's power in democratizing politics and breeding grassroots action. They touted the Net's low cost of entry, as compared with media such as television, and threw their support behind a brief amendment to campaign finance law, offered in March in both houses of Congress, that would "exclude communications over the Internet from the definition of public communication." Rep. Zoe Lofgren, a California Democrat whose district covers Silicon Valley, indicated that the proposal enjoyed wide support and could be passed easily.
[SOURCE: C-Net|News.com, AUTHOR: Anne Broache]
Politicos Want to Shield Net from Election Laws