Multichannel News

Reverend Jesse Jackson is the latest fan of the sports blackout rule to write Federal Communications Commission Chairman Tom Wheeler about keeping the rule.

Rev Jackson argues the issue is about backs and hands, not just eyeballs, and paychecks, and not just pay TV.

Broadcasters interested in putting their spectrum up for auction at the right price says that there is a potential issue with the way the Federal Communications Commission is calculating interference that could artificially decrease the value of stations and could lead to spending funds on relocating stations that might have been able to stay on their channel.

They are urging FCC to fix the problem before it creates problems for the issues.

Broadcasters not interested in selling are also concerned about the FCC's TVStudy software for calculating station interference as the FCC repacks stations into smaller space to make room for wireless broadband. In a filing at the FCC, the Expanding Opportunities for Broadcasters Coalition, which represents 77 stations eyeing the auction, said the use of the TVStudy program was resulting in inconsistent results that could hurt both the incentive auction and station repacking after the auction.

T-Mobile has asked the Federal Communications Commission to reserve more low-band spectrum for companies competing with Verizon and AT&T for wireless spectrum in the upcoming broadcast incentive auction, arguing that the current system does not insure the four competitive carriers the FCC has signaled it would like to see.

It also wants the FCC to modify the revenue trigger for reserving that spectrum.

Some veteran fans of a la carte and retransmission reform are getting behind "Local Choice," a Senate Commerce Committee proposal to allow multichannel video programming distributor (MVPD) subscribers to decide which TV stations they want to include in their tier of cable service.

That proposal would upend the retransmission negotiation process, turning cable operators into fee collectors for broadcasters, but eliminating the requirement that all cable operators deliver retransmission stations to all customers, and on the so-called "must buy" tier.

Dish, which is part of a coalition pushing for retransmission reforms to try to keep those fees in check, praised the plan as a part of the must-pass Satellite Television Extension and Localism Act legislation.

Parents Television Council President Tim Winter, while he conceded there would be more work to do on the a la carte front, said he sees Local Choice as a good start in ending blackouts and giving consumers more choice.

Federal Communications Commissioner Ajit Pai will be joining House Communications Subcommittee member Rep Bob Latta (R-OH) during the latter's August visits back in the district.

Neither the House nor Senate are in session, with house members scheduled for district work weeks until Sept 8, when they are scheduled to get back to work in Washington.

According to Rep Latta's office, FCC Commissioner Pai will be in Toledo Aug 14 for a roundtable discussion on rural telecommunications as well as a tour of Buckeye Telesystem there. Commissioner Pai, who grew up in rural Kansas, has made rural telecom a signature issue of his tenure on the commission.

AT&T flurry of GigaPower announcements continued with word that it will bring its fiber-based, 1-Gig-capable network to parts of Miami, where Comcast is the incumbent cable operator.

Per its recent string of GigaPower market announcements, AT&T said it will announce pricing and specific target areas at a later date. In addition to the city of Miami, AT&T is also considering GigaPower deployments in several nearby areas, including Hialeah, Hollywood, Homestead, Opa-Locka, and Pompano Beach.

Netflix posted its Internet service provider (ISP) Speed Index for July 2014, and there was not much shuffling among the top 16 US providers that the streaming giant measures.

In fact, there was just one change in that grouping -- AT&T U-verse dropped one spot, to number 14, delivering an average Netflix streaming speed of 1.44 Mbps. That allowed Clearwire (1.48 Mbps), the only US wireless provider measured in that group, to rise one spot, to number 13.

The final rankings of Verizon FiOS (No. 12/1.61 Mbps) and Verizon DSL (No. 16/970 kbps) were unchanged from the Netflix index for June 2014.

Doctor On Demand, a healthcare service that provides “video visits” with board-certified physicians, announced that it has landed a $21 million “A” round and signed on Comcast as a customer.

Comcast has signed on to offer the service to all of its US employees and will integrate Doctor On Demand into its health and wellness offerings. For certain plans, Comcast will also fully subsidize employees’ visits with Doctor On Demand physicians.

The American Cable Association wants the Federal Communications Commission to prevent television stations from swapping affiliations in a market so that one station owner programs two of the Top Four networks and to disallow a Top Four network-programmed station in a market from carrying a second Top Four net on a multicast stream. ACA argues broadcasters will subvert the FCC's new prohibitions on coordinated retransmission consent. Swaps and multicast moves, it argues, would result in the same undue leverage and potential harms the FCC's recent rule changes were meant to prevent.

AT&T said it will offer broadband speeds of up to 1 Gbps to parts of Greensboro (NC) and Houston (TX) through the deployment of its new fiber-based “GigaPower” network.

As it’s been with recent, similar commitments in other markets, AT&T said specific locations of availability and pricing for GigaPower services in the Greensboro and Houston markets will be announced at a later date.