Worldwide sales of mobile phones slipped 2.3 percent in Q2 to 419 million units, according to Gartner Group. The smartphone segment jumped 42.7 percent during the period, and now comprises 36.7 percent of total mobile phone sales, Gartner said. Slowing demand for the overall category is due to the challenging economy and users postponing upgrades in anticipation of high-profile product launches such as the iPhone 5, Gartner said. Chinese manufacturers are pushing 3G and preparing for major device launches in the second half that will propel the smartphone market further, while the feature phone market will continue to weaken, said analyst Anshul Gupta.
A top aide to FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski unsuccessfully suggested this spring that some major U.S. cable networks could add parental content ratings to all TV shows placed on their websites, several industry executives said in recent interviews. Shortly before Josh Gottheimer stepped down as senior counsel to Genachowski and left the commission in late June, he’s said to have asked the major broadcast-TV networks if they'd be willing to expand program-length linear shows’ parental ratings to those episodes when they go on the Internet. The broadcast networks acceded to the suggestion in a joint June 11 (CD June 12 p4) announcement that seven will, for new programs put online after Dec. 1 on websites they control, put ratings at the start of videos and in descriptions on the Internet.
Whiffletree filed reply comments directly responding to objections by AT&T, Verizon Wireless and Sprint Nextel opposed to its petition seeking a waiver of commission rules for its Seareka maritime survivor locating device (MSLD). MSLDs are transceivers attached to life vests or other survival equipment, designed to help locate survivors of incidents at sea. But the Seareka system operates in the 869.4-869.65 MHz band, already used by U.S. carriers for cellular communications, raising carrier objections. Whiffletree responded that use of the device is a matter of life or death.
The National Public Safety Telecom Council began a working group to explore questions raised by public safety’s pending loss of the T-band, which was part of the February spectrum law. Public safety got the 700 MHz D-block in the legislation, but had to give up the T-band, heavily used in 11 major metropolitan areas. NPSTC sent out a questionnaire (http://xrl.us/bnkk2a) to gather information as the group prepares a report, targeted for release near the end of the year. Among the major cities where public safety uses the band are Los Angeles, Chicago, Boston, New York, Houston and Washington, D.C. The legislation required public safety users to clear the band within nine years so it can be resold in an FCC auction.
Hulu isn’t exempt from the Video Privacy Protection Act, the U.S. District Court in San Francisco ruled Friday, letting proceed a privacy lawsuit seeking class-action status (http://xrl.us/bnkk3o). The company, whose owners include Disney, Comcast’s NBCUniversal and News Corp., argued that because the website that streams video from cable and broadcast networks offers no physical product in a brick-and-mortar store, the VPPA, which dates to 1988 and covers providers of “prerecorded video cassette tapes or similar audio visual materials,” does not apply. U.S. Magistrate Judge Laurel Beeler ruled that the statute “is about the video content, not about how that content is delivered.”
The FCC’s mandatory annual survey of cable programming and equipment rates found that average cable rates increased at more than three times the Consumer Price Index (CPI) during 2010, the most recent year for which it has survey results. The commission’s report, a congressionally mandated look at average cable prices, was released Monday (http://xrl.us/bnkkuv) and follows a March 2012 release of the 2009 survey (CD March 12 p7). It also brings the agency closer to releasing more current price data. The results once again showed that cable rates broadly went up, even in regions where the FCC has found cable operators to be subject to effective competition.
FCC Commissioners Robert McDowell and Ajit Pai are expected to dissent on two items set for a vote in the next week at the agency, commission officials said. The first of the Republicans’ expected dissents will be on an interim rule change for the commission’s special access rules. The second is on the FCC’s Section 706 broadband competition report.
Last week’s Asia-Pacific Telecommunity meeting did not end with a formal set of proposals for the upcoming World Conference on International Telecommunications (WCIT), potentially damaging the region’s influence in the lead-up to the conference, said David Gross, former State Department international communications and information coordinator. But the general consensus coming out of the meeting bodes well for the U.S. position on whether the conference, led by the ITU, should adopt controversial proposals to change how the Internet is regulated, he said. Gross said he attended the Asia-Pacific meeting in Bangkok as chair of the Ad Hoc World Conference on International Telecommunications Working Group, which represents 15 major multinational telecom and Internet companies.
Maine’s contended with what municipal officials believe to be a radio jammer who repeatedly distorts public safety channels, apparently intentionally. The FCC has acknowledged and is investigating the problem, which lasted for what some say is years. The investigation is ongoing and focuses on Lebanon, a town of about 5,000 people in Maine’s southern York County.
The FCC’s review of the Verizon Wireless/cable deals has reached its final stage, agency officials said Friday. An order approving the deals could circulate as early as this week, agency officials said Friday. Meanwhile, Reps. Jerrold Nadler and Brian Higgins, both New York Democrats, urged federal regulators to give Verizon Wireless’s proposed buy of AWS licenses from SpectrumCo and Cox extra-close scrutiny. That’s especially so given accompany marketing and other agreements, they said during a call with reporters Friday sponsored by the Communications Workers of America. A Verizon Wireless spokesman questioned CWA’s motives in turning up the heat on the deal as an order nears.