The FCC issued a $233,000 forfeiture against Cumulus and some subsidiaries for violating a 2016 consent decree by allegedly breaking FCC sponsorship ID rules, said an order Thursday. The FCC didn’t reduce the amount of the fine despite Cumulus’s arguments it should, but Commissioner Geoffrey Starks dissented from the order and Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel concurred. Neither FCC Democrat provided a statement with the order, but Starks’ office said he dissented for the same reasons expressed in his dissent from the original August 2019 notice of apparent liability (see 1908060068). Starks, a former Enforcement Bureau staffer, said then the fine amount was too low, “does not follow well-established Commission precedent” and the "system only works if noncompliance with our consent decrees is strongly punished.” According to the NAL and forfeiture order, seven stations owned by Cumulus subsidiaries violated a 2016 consent decree 26 times by airing ads in 2017 and 2018 without proper sponsorship ID, and waiting eight months to report the violations, the NAL said. The consent decree required violations to be reported in 15 days. The 2016 consent decree was also for sponsorship ID violations, and was part of a $540,000 settlement between Cumulus and the FCC under then-Chairman Tom Wheeler. Cumulus argued the $233,000 forfeiture for the more recent ads is excessive, because it has gone through a bankruptcy and restructuring since the 2016 violations, and that as a large broadcaster the violations represent a small percentage of the ads it airs. The agency didn’t agree. “If a corporate entity chooses to acquire many stations, it must ensure that it scales up its compliance efforts accordingly,” the forfeiture order said. “The Respondent’s implication that it is a drastically different organization post-transfer is belied by the fact that its core senior management remained unchanged by the transfer of control,” the order said. The attorney who signed the consent decree is Richard Denning, who's still Cumulus general counsel, and the CEO remains Mary Berner, the order noted. “Our interest in ensuring compliance with consent decrees and deterring the recurrence of violations of the very same rule at issue supports the upward adjustment in this case,” the order said. Cumulus didn’t comment.

NextGenTV can “evolve over time,” said ATSC President Madeleine Noland. “It’s not something that’s so static, like today’s television system.” ATSC 3.0's framers decided to “design it for 4K right now, knowing that we can upgrade to 8K basically at any time,” she told the virtual CES Tuesday. South Korean broadcasters recently started “field trials” delivering 8K over 3.0 using the existing H.265 video codec, she said. Noland predicted consumers who adopt NextGenTV will “get addicted” to the platform's HDR and wide color gamut capabilities. Executives also discussed 8K. Fox Sports used three 8K cameras when it televised Super Bowl LIV Feb. 2, said Michael Davies, senior vice president-field and technical operations. “It paled in comparison, somewhat, to the 102 other cameras we had, yet we did do the whole thing in HDR." Davies last visited Japan just before the pandemic, “and I was embarrassed to say we were still producing shows in 720p SDR,” he said. The Japanese "weren’t even talking about 4K at that point," he said. "They were talking about 8K.”

The FCC Media Bureau seeks comment on two proposed TV channel substitutions in Tulsa and in Jefferson City, Missouri, said Tuesday public notices. KTUL Licensee wants to substitute channel 14 for channel 10 for KTUL Tulsa, and KRCG Licensee wants to swap channel 29 for channel 12 for KRCG Jefferson City. The dates will be after Federal Register publication.

Comments on an FCC proposal to change FM booster rules to allow geotargeted radio broadcasts (see 2012010059) are due Feb. 10, replies March 12, said a Media Bureau public notice in Monday’s Daily Digest.

Sony will build NextGenTV compatibility into five lines of Bravia XR TVs for 2021, said the company Thursday. Preloaded on all the sets will be a new streaming feature called Bravia Core, developed with Sony Pictures Entertainment. It’s capable of achieving “near lossless” quality equivalent to that of Ultra HD Blu-ray, with streaming up to 80 Mbps, Sony said.

SoundExchange will audit Cumulus, Emmis, Pandora and Urban One to verify royalty payments for online music, said the Copyright Royalty Board. Other Friday Federal Register notices indicated audits for Music Choice and Rockbot. “The decision to audit a company is not necessarily any indication that SoundExchange considers something amiss with that company’s royalty payments -- instead they audit a cross-section of services each year,” blogged Wilkinson Barker's David Oxenford. Outside accounting firms do the analysis, issuing a report that's reviewed by the audited parties before being given to SoundExchange, which can collect underpaid royalties, the broadcast attorney wrote, adding that results aren’t usually public.

The draft ATSC 3.0 distributed transmission system order “will adversely impact the availability of television white spaces (TVWS) spectrum in rural areas and undermine the expansion of rural broadband access,” said Microsoft in a call with aides to FCC Commissioner Nathan Simington Tuesday, per a filing posted Friday in docket 20-74. “The current DTS signal spillover standard should be maintained,” and any more than “a minimum amount” should be permitted via a case-by-case waiver process, the filing said. The DTS has sufficient votes to be approved (see 2101050063).

LG Electronics is “very pleased” with its NextGenTV launch, said John Taylor, senior vice president-communications and public affairs. “It was not what we anticipated a year ago at CES 2020, but kudos to the broadcasters for keeping the foot on the accelerator” to roll out 3.0 services to 20 markets in 2020, despite the pandemic, he told a Pearl TV NextGenTV media briefing virtually Thursday. LG plans a broad assortment of 3.0 TVs for 2021 in screen sizes from 55 to 88 inches, he said. “We expect more from the industry, too. We know we’re not going to build this market alone.” LG expects “many more models from more manufacturers as the stars align in 2021 with the majority of Americans being able to receive the NextGenTV.” BitRouter is entering the market with its ZapperBox set-top (see 2101070063).

The FCC Incentive Auction Task Force increased the repack reimbursement fund allocation for low-power TV and translator stations from 85% of verified estimates to 92.5%, bringing them into line with full-power stations and other entities that receive repacking reimbursement, said a public notice. “This will result in a total allocation for LPTV/Translator stations of $91,782,921 and a total allocation from the Reimbursement Fund for all eligible entities of over $2.028 billion.” The reimbursement program has received over 93,000 invoices in more than 31,000 submissions, and all full-power TV stations have vacated their pre-auction channels, Thursday's PN said. As of Monday, over 95% of the repacked stations are operating on their final facilities, the PN said. The task force is “optimistic” the 41 stations remaining on interim facilities will meet their revised deadlines.

E.W. Scripps completed its $2.65 billion deal to buy Ion Media from Black Diamond Capital Management, divesting 23 stations to the newly formed Inyo Broadcasting, it announced Thursday. The FCC approved Dec. 15 but announced the OK only in the brief listing of broadcast actions three days later (see 2101070039). No petitions to deny were filed, and no conditions were required, a Scripps spokesperson said. Scripps is holding on to 48 of the stations and plans to combine Ion’s content with its Katz networks and Newsy for a “full-scale national television networks business,” the release said. “Bringing our networks together with ION will create a formidable national television business focused on connecting with audiences and advertisers in the rapidly evolving media landscape,” said Scripps CEO Adam Symson. Inyo is headed by interim CEO John Chachas and Chief Operating Officer Louis Zachary, the managing principals of Methuselah Advisors, a media broker that worked with Scripps in the past and on this deal (see 2011050024). The FCC didn’t comment.