The Corporation for Public Broadcasting is investing $1 million in an Application Programming Interface called the Public Media Platform, it said. The platform, to be used jointly by American Public Media, NPR, PBS, Public Radio International and the Public Radio Exchange, will allow public media partners to share a variety of content across a digital distribution network. Pubmedia leaders hope it will lead to more innovations in mobile applications, third-party sites, blogs, mashups and widgets.
Though little is known about key LTE patent holders and their asset values, companies like Ericsson and Nokia are already projecting how much essential intellectual property rights they will have for LTE. Meanwhile, the fate of Canadian vendor Nortel’s estimated large LTE patent assets is still pending, making the 4G patent ownership landscape even more unclear, experts said.
CTIA said the FCC should “reject outright” Mobile Internet Content Coalition (MICC) arguments that net neutrality principles should be applied to SMS text messaging services and wireless carriers’ review of content providers’ marketing proposals. CTIA “misses the point” of the MICC arguments, Public Knowledge Legal Director Harold Feld told us Monday in response to the CTIA filing.
Before Cablevision’s acquisition of Bresnan Communications can proceed, approval from various local video franchising authorities in Montana, Utah, Wyoming and Colorado will be needed, industry attorneys said Monday. Cablevision agreed to buy the western cable operator for $1.4 billion and is putting less than $400 million in equity into the deal. The rest will be financed with debt, Cablevision said. The deal is structured in a way that its shareholders and bondholders won’t be on the hook for the debt should Bresnan’s operations falter, the buyer said.
No opposition cropped up against mobile DTV devices without analog tuners, and industry remains united behind them, replies Friday and Monday in docket 10-111 to two waiver requests before the FCC show. Replies were due Friday. Industry executives have said such consensus augurs for quick approval of the requests, either by the Media Bureau or full commission (CD June 8 p4). It’s unclear if an order exempting the devices from requirements that they also have analog tuners will be forthcoming from the commission soon, agency officials said Monday. None appears to be ready for imminent release, they said.
The personnel and data needs of the effort to contain the Gulf of Mexico oil leak have increased reliance on satellite communications in what is usually a very low-density region, said executives of major providers of satellite services there. But one of the two providers has had a much larger increase in demand than the other.
NTIA will start announcing round-two awards under the Broadband Technology Opportunities Program in July, Administrator Larry Strickling said at Pike & Fischer’s Broadband Policy Summit. With about $1.2 billion having been awarded to 82 projects in round one, there’s still $3 billion to be awarded by Sept. 30. In the first round, NTIA learned that “when we're talking about unserved and underserved areas in this country, there’s a huge difference between the needs of the anchor institutions and the needs of families and small business,” Strickling said. The need for much higher speeds is greater for the anchor institutions, like libraries and schools, he said.
AT&T, CTIA and TIA endorsed an FCC proposal to launch an online clearinghouse for information-sharing about products and services that promote access to devices tailored to people with disabilities. In a post May 17 to the FCC’s Blogband, the Consumer and Government Affairs Bureau asked for comments on the clearinghouse by Thursday. The post followed up on a recommendation in the National Broadband Plan.
BRUSSELS -- ITU members have focused on modest improvements in the international regulatory framework for some terrestrial services in WRC-12 preparations, an official said Thursday at a workshop on European objectives. A Canadian proposal suggests bigger changes but requires additional study of the effects on other provisions, according to a May impact study by the Radiocommunication Bureau. Participants in ITU-R and the European Conference of Postal Administrations are settling on making no changes in satellite service definitions in the conference preparatory talks.
Wall Street panelists underscored what they said would be the chilling effect broadband reclassification could have on investment, during a panel Friday at Pike & Fischer’s Broadband Policy Summit. Meanwhile, Broadband for America (BFA), organized to oppose net neutrality rules, also flagged during a call with reporters the financial risks posed by FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski’s “third way” proposal.