March 2014

Univision Asks FCC for Retransmission Exemption

Univision Communications is asking the Federal Communications Commission to allow the company to continue negotiating retransmission consent deals for all Entravision Communications TV stations -- even though most broadcasters could soon be barred from negotiating retrans agreements for multiple stations in the same market. Univision is seeking special relief from the FCC because the agency is expected to adopt a new regulation on March 31 that would generally bar broadcasters from joint TV station retransmission consent negotiations.

The proposed regulations could throw a monkey wrench into Univision and Entravision’s existing negotiations, because Univision currently negotiates retransmission deals for Entravision and each of the companies currently owns non-top 4 ranked stations in six of the same markets. “A negative presumption with respect to joint negotiations by separately owned, same-market, non top-4 stations would have the effect of preventing UTG (Univision Television Group) from negotiating on behalf of some, but not all, of the Entravision stations, thereby diminishing the efficiencies of group negotiations,” Univision said in its FCC disclosure letter, adding that an unnamed but major pay TV provider has asked that Univision negotiate retrans deals in Entravision’s behalf. We urged the commission to address this anomalous situation by creating an exemption from the negative presumption where group-wide negotiations by one broadcaster on behalf of another involve a subset of collocated non top-4 rated stations,” Univision said. “Alternatively, we proposed that this sort of unique circumstance be deemed sufficient to overcome the negative presumption.”

Don’t Listen to Google and Facebook: The Public-Private Surveillance Partnership Is Still Going Strong

[Commentary] It may seem like the public/private surveillance partnership has frayed -- but, unfortunately, it is alive and well. The main focus of massive Internet companies and government agencies both still largely align: to keep us all under constant surveillance. When they bicker, it’s mostly role-playing designed to keep us blasé about what's really going on. These companies are certainly pissed that the publicity surrounding the NSA's actions is undermining their users' trust in their services, and they're losing money because of it. These companies are doing their best to convince users that their data is secure. But they're relying on their users not understanding what real security looks like.

Senate Secretly Considered Alternate Ways For NSA To Collect Phone Data, Officials Say

Apparently, the Senate Intelligence Committee three years ago secretly considered -- but ultimately rejected -- alternate ways for the National Security Agency to collect and store massive amounts of Americans' phone records.

One of those options, outlined in a classified 2011 NSA analysis and reviewed in detail during closed committee meetings, was similar to what President Barack Obama is now advocating: that the government stop the bulk collection of Americans' phone records and instead ask phone companies to search their own business records for terrorism connections. After reviewing the 2011 NSA analysis, the Senate overseers decided not move forward with any alternate arrangement, according to two government officials familiar with the review. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the classified report.

How alleged social media leaks are shaping politics in Ukraine and Turkey

In Turkey, critics say Prime Minister Recep Tayyup Erdogan engineered a possibly illegal Twitter ban in an attempt to quiet or discredit leaks that allege political corruption in his party. In Ukraine, some prominent officials and political figures have blamed Russia for a series of leaked audio recordings posted to Youtube.

Yes, debit cards make our streets safer. But they make the Internet more dangerous.

Cash means crime. It's as attractive to street thugs as it is to Bond villains. You can spend it anywhere, on anything, and it's almost completely anonymous. Scientists have long suspected that reducing the role of cash in American society might reduce the incidence of physical crime. A new economic study shows switching people from paper welfare checks to electronic debit cards is linked to a drop in assaults, burglaries and robberies. The findings suggest a cashless society would indeed be a more peaceful one. But even as fewer people use cash for everyday transactions, that creates opportunities for new kinds of theft that involve very different players, wielding a very different playbook. The question now isn't whether electronic payment methods reduce crime. It's whether they're changing the criminal landscape in a way that reduces some crimes and facilitates others. Instead of assault and burglary, we're seeing a rise in malware and botnets.

Don’t overlook potential of unlicensed spectrum

[Commentary] As the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) prepares for the world’s first incentive auction to provide more spectrum for mobile broadband services, we have a unique opportunity to fuel a new generation of unlicensed innovation, supporting rural broadband, connected hospitals, and smart grid networking. The FCC should ensure that when it issues the rules for the upcoming incentive auction, it balances the needs for unlicensed and licensed spectrum by structuring it to include nationwide bands of spectrum dedicated for unlicensed use and innovation. This will produce enormous economic benefits and could yield untold technological discovery.

Sen Graham, Rep Chaffetz push online gambling ban

Sen Lindsey Graham (R-SC) and Rep Jason Chaffetz (R-UT) introduced legislation that would ban most forms of online gambling, ratcheting up a lobbying battle that pits casinos and state lotteries against GOP mega-donor Sheldon Adelson.

“To have gaming on every smartphone on the country, I just think it’s a bad idea," Rep Chaffetz said. Their bill would reverse a 2011 Department of Justice decision that opened the door for online gambling. That decision reinterpreted the Wire Act -- a federal statute that had prohibited Internet betting -- by limiting its reach to sports. The push to ban Internet gambling is being fueled in part by the advocacy of Adelson, who owns the Las Vegas Sands and opposes online gaming on the grounds that it would be harmful to children. Sen Graham, who is running for reelection this year, pushed back on the notion that he is getting involved in the online gambling fight to court Adelson, who has given millions of dollars to Republican candidates in recent years. “The fact that Sheldon is on board is a good thing, but I'm doing this because this is ... what I feel like I should do," Sen Graham said.

Candidates, Outside Groups Getting 'Increasingly Bold' With Campaign Videos

Sen Mitch McConnell (R-KY) grins ear-to-ear while shaking hands with a Vietnam veteran. In casual T-shirt and sweater, Sen Mark Begich (D-AK) chats up Alaska fishermen as they fix netting. Rep Bruce Braley (D-IA) walks past bales of hay in a field. The high-quality footage is just sitting on their campaign websites, available to anybody -- say, friends who run super PACs and outside groups -- who might want to make it part of a campaign commercial in this year's high-stakes Senate elections. The law prohibits any candidate from coordinating with these groups, which may share the goal of winning an election to Congress this year. But nothing says a group like the Kentucky Opportunity Coalition can't use the public footage of Sen McConnell in a campaign commercial that could help the Senate's minority leader win a sixth term. So the Kentucky Opportunity Coalition has done just that. Such non-coordination reflects the fierce competition of this year's elections, in which Republicans need to gain only six seats to win control of the Senate and have a profound influence over the last two years of President Barack Obama's presidency.

Broadcasters: End the March Toward Retransmission Reform Madness

Broadcasters that have coalesced into the TVFreedom.org effort to push back on retrans reform proposals are using March Madness to make their point. In a new campaign, “Pay-TV’s Bracket Scheme: Stop the Pay-TV Madness,” that is more hardball than roundball, the group takes aim at MVPDs who it says "gouge" customers and "manufacture" blackouts by "saddling" them with early termination fees. The ad was being touted the same day National Association of Broadcasters TV board chair Marci Burdick was making the same argument in a Hill hearing on satellite legislation, pointing out that an impediment to cord cutting during retrans impasses was the high cost -- $400-plus she suggested -- of some pay-TV termination fees.

Members of Congress Ask FCC to Maximize Revenue in AWS-3 Auction

The bipartisan team of Rep Doris Matsui (D-CA) and Rep Brett Guthrie (R-KY) have asked the FCC to make sure that it puts maximizing revenue top of mind when it outlines rules for the AWS-3 auction, which it plans to at its March 31 meeting.

That is the second of three spectrum auctions (the first was H Block, the last the broadcast incentive auction) to free up wireless spectrum while raising money to pay for first responder broadband network, FirstNet. The legislators said they recognized that the FCC has to balance interests like band plans, license areas and block sizes, but stressed the importance of "creating strong incentives for wireless carriers to compete in the auction."

Benton

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