CHICAGO -— Comcast plans to introduce a Web-connected, personalized TV program guide and content navigation platform to its Xfinity TV digital cable subscribers. That’s part of its effort to put video content on multiple screens and stave off competition from telco TV, DBS and over-the top (OTT) video providers.

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., sent the White House a letter asking President Barack Obama to nominate Ajit Pai for the Republican seat on the FCC vacated by Meredith Baker. Industry and government officials we spoke with Friday said Pai is likely to be nominated and should face a relatively easy time being confirmed, barring unforeseen complications. Pai’s nomination is likely to be paired with that of Jessica Rosenworcel, an aide to Sen. Jay Rockefeller, D-W.Va.Rosenworcel is expected to be the nominee to replace Democrat Michael Copps on the commission. Copps must leave the FCC when the current session of Congress ends.

The FCC shouldn’t require those lobbying it to disclose their ownership as the agency seeks to further update ex parte filing rules, said the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, NAB and the Fixed Wireless Communications Coalition (FWCC). They sought exclusions if there are new rules for associations and coalitions, so such entities don’t need to list every member that participated in an issue. The Chamber was among those also raising constitutional concerns about more disclosure. Free Press and the Media Access Project backed additional ownership details. A rulemaking notice sought ways to collect additional information in ex parte filings, without overly burdening those making them (CD Feb 4 p2).

A House panel approved a fiscal-year 2012 appropriations bill banning the FCC from using government funds to carry out the agency’s December net neutrality order, and trimming the commission’s budget to $319 million, down $17 million. Earlier Thursday, the House saved the Rural Utilities Service broadband loans program from the chopping block by voting for a surprise amendment to the FY 2012 agriculture appropriations bill by Reps. Chris Gibson, R-N.Y., and Bill Owens, D-N.Y.

The FCC is considering launching a new proceeding that would eventually create formal rules designed to crack down on bill “cramming,” an eighth floor source told us Thursday. The announcement could come as early as next week: The Center for American Progress issued a news release saying that Chairman Julius Genachowski will make a “cramming” announcement on Tuesday. Efforts to reach the chairman’s spokesman for comment were unsuccessful, but an FCC official said Thursday that staff had promised a proceeding on cramming several weeks ago.

The Obama administration is fully committed to getting legislation through Congress funding a national wireless broadband network for first responders, Vice President Joe Biden said Thursday during a speech at the Old Executive Office Building. Biden shared the stage with Attorney General Eric Holder and Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano, among other top officials, in a high-profile push for public safety broadband.

CHICAGO -- Comcast and Time Warner Cable have settled their months-long dispute over a prospective next-generation access architecture for the cable industry, clearing the way for cable operators and equipment vendors to develop denser, more powerful networks for broadband and IP video use. In a release pointedly issued during the Cable Show, CableLabs said it will consolidate the various technical and operational differences between the two dueling next-gen architectures: Comcast’s earlier Converged Multiservice Access Platform (CMAP) and Time Warner Cable’s later Converged Edge Services Access Router (CESAR) project. CableLabs said the new compromise standard, known as the Converged Cable Access Platform (CCAP), will incorporate the main features of the proposed architectures of both cable operators.

CHICAGO -- Some of the nation’s leading cable operators, cable programmers, cable tech vendors and consumer electronics retailers said they were pleased and relieved by the initial results from last week’s global test of the Internet’s next-generation protocol, IPv6, which apparently went off without any major problems. Appearing on a special Cable Show forum on IPv6 this week, cable, CE and other officials said World IPv6 Day generated surprisingly few user glitches during the 24-hour period that stretched over parts of June 7 and 8 in North America. They also said IPv6 traffic climbed strongly on the world’s data networks that day and, while it still remains at relatively low levels, has continued to run much higher than its previous mark.

Discussions within the cellular subgroup have been some of the most complex and difficult to work through, as the larger GPS Working Group wraps up its report on interference issues, said officials involved in the discussions of whether LightSquared’s proposed terrestrial network would interfere with GPS. The full working group was required to submit its report to the FCC by the end of the day Wednesday. But in a late development, LightSquared sought a delay in the filing deadline until July 1.

Local online news is dominated by traditional media outlets such as TV, radio stations and newspapers, a study commissioned by the FCC said. The study by George Washington University Assistant Professor Matthew Hindman was one of five FCC-commissioned studies about media ownership released by the agency Wednesday. The FCC commissioned a total of 11 studies, the rest of which have yet to be released. It will take comments on the studies after it issues a notice of proposed rulemaking on its media ownership rules, the FCC said. That could be as soon as July, depending on when the 3rd U.S. Court of Appeals rules on challenges to the last FCC ownership proceeding, an attorney following the proceeding said.