NAB and the News Media Alliance appealed the FCC’s 2014 quadrennial review and accompanying media ownership rules in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, according to an NMA news release and court filings. “It makes no sense at all to prevent newspapers from helping to fund this essential activity by receiving capital and collaboration by an aligned industry such as broadcasting,” said NMA President David Chavern in the release. The orders violate the Administrative Procedure Act and the Communications Act, since the FCC retained rules against newspaper/broadcast cross ownership “with only minimal change” despite “substantial" evidence that the rule no longer serves the public interest, said the NMA appeal (see 1608250063). NAB also filed its own appeal of the quadrennial review in the D.C. Circuit Monday, as expected (see 1611090061). Like NMA, NAB also challenged the FCC's action as a violation of the APA and agency discretion. "The broadcast ownership rules are relics of a long-gone era," NAB said in its appeal. "Many have not been updated in several decades, despite dramatic evolution in the communications landscape that has eroded the rules' original public-interest justifications and fundamentally altered the nature of competition." Prometheus Radio Project filed an appeal in the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. Though NAB and NMA filed in time to be part of an expected lottery to determine where the case should be heard, both associations said they wouldn’t object if the case is transferred to the 3rd Circuit, as many expect it to be. The FCC didn't comment.

The FCC Disability Advisory Committee will meet Dec. 6 from 9 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. in the Commission Meeting Room, said a public notice Thursday, covering a variety of issues from IoT accessibility to video description. The gathering will hear reports on video mail-to-text services for video relay services for consumers who are deaf-blind; mobile device support for USB connectivity to Braille displays; best practices for development and testing of augmentative-alternative communication devices; portability of phone numbers between IP-enabled relay providers; IoT accessibility; and video description services. The event also will hear a presentation on the future of TV, the PN said. The meeting also will be webcast with open captioning.

FCC Commissioner Mignon Clyburn invited further "pitch" submissions by Nov. 28 for her "#Solutions2020 Call to Action Plan" she intends to release by year-end. "Pitch submissions should propose a specific solution to an issue facing the communications sector and be a maximum of 350 words in length," a Clyburn release said. Parties are "encouraged to submit a 'pitch' that falls within one of the six categories" she outlined recently for dealing with communications challenges: "Ensuring Affordable Communications, Empowering Communities, Broadband as a Driver of Improved Health Services, Promoting a More Diverse Media Landscape, 5G and Beyond for All Americans [and] Enhancing Consumer Protections." The senior-most FCC member has been conducting a listening tour as part of her action-plan effort (see 1610190044 and 1610040020).

Law firms Arnold & Porter and Kaye Scholer will combine to become Arnold & Porter Kaye Scholer beginning Jan. 1, Arnold & Porter said in a statement on its website Thursday. The combined firm will have around 1,000 lawyers working at nine domestic and four international offices, it said. The new firm will have close to 400 lawyers in Washington, D.C., A&P said. “Arnold & Porter's focus aligns with Kaye Scholer's critical strengths in bankruptcy, corporate, finance, intellectual property, litigation, real estate, and tax,” the release said. Current Arnold & Porter Chairman Richard Alexander will chair the combined firm.

The transition team for president-elect Donald Trump has staffers tracking different government agencies, according to a chart circulating among industry officials. Jeffrey Eisenach, a visiting scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, is the staffer listed as tracking the FCC, as expected (see 1611090034 and 1611090038). Eisenach defended Trump’s telecom stances on C-SPAN’s The Communicators this month (see 1611040057). Bill Walton and David Malpass are the transition staffers listed as overseeing the transition’s advisers on economic issues, including Eisenach and Ray Washburne, a Texas investor who’s tracking the Commerce Department. Washburne has been vice chairman of The Trump Victory Committee. Michael Torrey is the transition staffer eyeing the Agriculture Department, which includes the Rural Utilities Service, and Kevin O’Connor is tracking the Justice Department. The Trump transition didn't confirm the authenticity of the circulating chart. “My No. 1 priority in the coming two months is to try to facilitate a transition that ensures our president-elect is successful,” President Barack Obama said Thursday after meeting with Trump. Trump has created a website and Twitter account for his transition effort. “We’ve got a lot of really great priorities,” Trump told reporters Thursday at the Capitol, expressing interest in “big-league jobs.” Great speculation has surrounded Trump’s leading advisers and surrogates and what positions they could receive in the incoming administration. “I’d love to be the person that comes up with a solution to cybersecurity,” Trump backer Rudy Giuliani, former mayor of New York City, told Fox News Thursday, declining to comment specifically on a possible administration role as attorney general or Homeland Security chief. “Now, I’d like to invent the real overall holistic solution to cybersecurity.” Giuliani, who chairs the cybersecurity practice at Greenberg Traurig, is listed as taking a leave of absence currently.

The FCC again is looking at possible additional uses for the 4.9 GHz band, which is set aside for public safety, the commission tells us. An NPRM began circulating Thursday regarding use of the band. The agency didn't elaborate. The FCC issued an NPRM on 4.9 GHz use in 2012 (see 1211020061) and a public notice in 2013 (see 1311010052).

The FCC Task Force on Optimal Public Safety Answering Point Architecture (TFOPA) will meet Dec. 2, the agency said Wednesday. It starts at 1 p.m. EST in the Commission Meeting Room at FCC headquarters. The gathering is to be the last under TFOPA’s current charter. TFOPA is to take up reports from its three working groups on optimal 911 service architecture, cybersecurity and resource allocation, a notice in the Federal Register said.

While required to build fiber to 12.5 million homes by 2019 as one of the conditions of its purchase of DirecTV, that fiber buildout size could be a floor rather than a ceiling, AT&T Chief Financial Officer John Stephens said Wednesday during the Wells Fargo investor conference. "We would be willing to do more." Stephens also said DirecTV integration is ahead of schedule regarding cost management. "We kept [revenue generation] expectations tempered," he said. "We thought it would take a year to get things going, and it has." AT&T revenue expectations also have been hampered by a tepid U.S. economy, he said. While the carrier has announced a $35 price point for its upcoming DirecTV Now streaming service (see 1610250053), the company plans to subsequently add features and content that will result in other price points, he said. Stephens also said one aim of DirecTV Now is as an entry point to the market of 20 million or so U.S. households without pay TV, letting AT&T then try to bundle broadband or other services with it.

CenturyLink and Frontier Communications said a draft FCC business data service order would "unduly affect mid-size ILECs ... in ways that would be deeply harmful" to investment in broadband connections and jobs. The commission must "carefully consider the current state of market competition in how it implements any reform to existing grants of Phase II pricing flexibility, noting the particularly competitive nature of the transport market," said the two telcos in a filing posted Wednesday in docket 16-143 on a meeting with an aide to Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel. In a meeting with the same aide, BT Americas asked the FCC to strengthen enforcement of packetized BDS rates offering data speeds of 50 Mbps or less, it wrote. "The Commission should require carriers filing price caps for TDM services to also file proof with the Commission that the weighted average of their posted Ethernet service rates 50 Mbps and under -- each carrier’s Actual Price Index (API) -- is below a Price Guideline Index (PGI) set by the Commission." Although the mechanism wouldn't constitute price-cap regulation and carriers wouldn't file tariffs for those services, BT said, "in a complaint proceeding, if a complainant could show that the API exceeded the PGI for the Ethernet services at issue, then there would be a presumption that these Ethernet prices charged by the seller were unjust and unreasonable." An Ad Hoc Telecommunications Users Committee filing said the FCC "must treat low-speed Ethernet services" (under 100 Mbps) "no differently than TDM-based DS1 and DS3 services," which the draft proposed to subject to price-cap regulation and cuts. In a filing on meetings with aides to Commissioners Mike O'Rielly, Mignon Clyburn and Ajit Pai, Consolidated Communications said that proposed BDS rate cuts should be prorated for ILECs that have been price-cap regulated for only a few years under an FCC order adopting an industry CALLS (Coalition for Affordable Local and Long Distance Services) access-charge proposal. Commissioners tentatively plan to vote on a BDS item Nov. 17 (see 1610270054).

Comcast, Charter Communications, Cox Communications, Mediacom and many smaller cable companies and others challenged areas where CenturyLink plans to offer broadband using incremental Connect America Fund Phase 1, Round 2 subsidy support, according to filings in FCC docket 10-90. Competitors had until Monday to tell CenturyLink they provided unsubsidized service in the 9,703 census blocks where the telco plans to offer the subsidy-supported broadband (see 1609230056). The phone-service provider didn't comment Tuesday.