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CANADA TV MERGER OK, BUT ROGERS DEAL FOILED
[SOURCE: Multichannel News, AUTHOR: Kent Gibbons]
Canada’s broadcast regulator Friday approved the sale of Chum to CTVglobemedia but with a condition that apparently wipes out a planned sale of some Chum TV stations and other assets to leading Canadian cable operator Rogers Media. The Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission nixed the sale of five Chum-owned Citytv stations in Toronto, Winnipeg, Edmonton, Calgary and Vancouver to CTVglobemedia, owner of the CTV network, citing a policy that bars any entity from operating more than one conventional television station in one language in a given market. The $137.5 million Rogers deal with Chum, struck in April, was based on there being no significant conditions attached to the bigger, $1.4-billion Chum sale.
http://www.multichannel.com/article/CA6450502.html
Canada TV Merger OK, But Rogers Deal Foiled
AFTER 11 YEARS, RELIEF IN STORE FOR BOXED-IN CABLE CUSTOMERS
[SOURCE: Associated Press, AUTHOR: John Dunbar & Deborah Yao]
It has been 11 years since Congress voted to break the cable television industry's stranglehold on set-top boxes -- the devices that consumers need to receive digital programming and change channels. So why are you still paying $5 or more a month for that thing on top of your TV? When Congress rewrote the nation's communications laws in 1996, it envisioned a thriving retail market where subscribers could actually buy their own boxes rather than make monthly payments to the cable company in perpetuity. Things haven't quite worked out that way. The retail market for the boxes has failed to materialize, and the cable industry has filed numerous appeals and continued to press a furious lobbying and public relations campaign to make sure it never does, foes say. Come July 1, the gloves come off. After two years of deadline extensions, that's when the Federal Communications Commission will require cable companies to make hardware changes in all new set-top boxes that it hopes will lead to a competitive market.
http://rhodeisland.cox.net/cci/newsnational/national?_mode=view&_state=m...
* Change in set-top boxes could increase cable bill
http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/chi-sun_settop_0610jun10,0,133729...
VERIZON UNLIKELY TO SUE CABLE ON VOIP
[SOURCE: Multichannel News, AUTHOR: Todd Spangler]
Verizon Communications won big against Vonage Holdings in the first round of their patent-litigation bout, and even the most propitious outcome for Vonage will end up costing the Internet-phone company millions of dollars. Now analysts wonder whether Verizon, if it ultimately prevails against Vonage, would take a swing at its real competitors: cable operators. The short answer? Probably not, according to several industry analysts. But given the expansive interpretation of the patents in question by the court in the Verizon/Vonage case, some said the game may not be completely over yet.
http://www.multichannel.com/article/CA6448592.html
Verizon Unlikely to Sue Cable on VoIP
CONNECTICUT LEGISLATORS APPROVE FRANCHISE-REFORM BILL
[SOURCE: Multichannel News, AUTHOR: Linda Haugsted]
Connecticut legislators, on the last night of their session June 6, approved a franchise-reform bill that will subject AT&T's U-verse TV product to some regulation. The bill will require AT&T to pay the same tax on gross earnings as do incumbent operators. AT&T will also get a three-year exemption from personal property taxes on infrastructure upgrades. Incumbent operators will be allowed to opt into state regulation 30 days after the entry of a new provider. All providers will be relieved of current state customer-service regulations: the state will now recognize the standards set in federal law.
http://www.multichannel.com/article/CA6450378.html
Connecticut Legislators Approve Franchise-Reform Bill
MUSHARRAF RESCINDS MEDIA REGULATIONS AFTER PUBLIC OUTCRY
[SOURCE: New York Times, AUTHOR: Carlotta Gall]
Pakistan’s president, Gen. Pervez Musharraf, has formally withdrawn his decree that imposed new regulations on the news media, government officials said over the weekend. The president made his decision after he met with industry leaders, and after journalists and opposition parties strongly protested the decree, officials said. The independent media channels agreed to prepare a code of conduct to be incorporated into government media regulations, the state news organization reported. The formal withdrawal came after Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz, and his information minister, Muhammad Ali Durrani, said last week that the ordinance had been suspended pending discussions. Commercial television channels, whose numbers have grown during General Musharraf’s rule, have been pressured in recent weeks to stop live coverage of events and live political talk shows, and have had their cable transmissions blocked.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/06/11/world/asia/11pakistan.html
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Musharraf Rescinds Media Regulations After Public Outcry
VIETNAM FREES 'CYBER DISSIDENT' BEFORE LEADER'S VISIT TO US
[SOURCE: Associated Press]
Vietnam has released a prominent government critic convicted of spying against the Communist government, two weeks before Vietnam’s president makes a historic visit to the United States, an official said Sunday. Nguyen Vu Binh, 39, was released from Nam Ha prison on Saturday under a presidential amnesty, said Pham Hong Canh, deputy director of the prison in Ha Nam Province, 40 miles south of Hanoi. Mr. Binh, a former journalist, was one of Vietnam’s first “cyber dissidents,” who used the Internet to spread pro-democracy views. In late 2003, he was convicted of spying and sentenced to seven years in prison and three years of house arrest. The court said he had committed espionage by gathering antigovernment information and documents for overseas “reactionary organizations.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/06/11/world/asia/11vietnam.html?_r=1&oref=sl...
(requires registration)
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/06/11/world/asia/11vietnam.html?_r=1&oref=slogin
TV STATION NEWS CHIEF QUITS AMID CRITICISM
[SOURCE: USAToday]
The head of a U.S.-funded television channel that is supposed to broadcast balanced news to the Middle East resigned amid charges he was airing anti-Israeli propaganda. Larry Register, vice president of news for the Middle East Broadcasting Networks (MBN) and editorial leader of Alhurra television, said in his resignation letter that he was the victim of a smear campaign. Register, a former producer at CNN, said he had been "professionally and personally attacked" in the media, according to his resignation letter submitted Friday. "In good conscience I cannot allow the personal vendettas and attacks to damage the credibility of MBN," he wrote.
http://www.usatoday.com/printedition/news/20070611/a_hurra11.art.htm
TV station news chief quits amid criticism
DTV TRANSITION THREAT THWARTED
[SOURCE: Multichannel News, AUTHOR: Ted Hearn]
A lawsuit that could have derailed both the 2009 analog TV cutoff and a pending $10 billion federal spectrum auction was tossed out of court last week, based on a 115-year-old Supreme Court precedent that tests whether Congress has legally enacted a law. The case boiled down to this: Did Congress legally pass the Deficit Reduction Act of 2005 (signed by President Bush in February 2006) or was the law invalid because the House and Senate approved slightly different versions? The stakes were high because the DRA authorized the shut down of analog over-the-air television on Feb. 17, 2009; required the Federal Communications Commission to sell some of the old TV spectrum, in an upcoming auction expected to yield at least $10 billion; freed up critical spectrum for use by police, fire and rescue units that have been plagued by interoperability problems in disaster zones; and created a $1.5 billion program to subsidize consumer access to digital-to-analog converter boxes. In a 24-page ruling released May 29, a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit held that the Supreme Court’s 1892 ruling in Marshall Field & Co. v. Clark was controlling and required dismissal of suit challenging the law. The D.C. Circuit explained that in Marshall Field, the Supreme Court created the “enrolled bill” doctrine, which states that Congress has constitutionally passed a bill if the version presented to the president has been signed by the presiding officers of the House and the Senate.
http://www.multichannel.com/article/CA6448412.html
DTV Transition Threat Thwarted
MICROSOFT FINDS LEGAL DEFENDER IN JUSTICE DEPT
[SOURCE: New York Times 6/10, AUTHOR: Stephen Labaton]
Nearly a decade after the government began its landmark effort to break up Microsoft, the Bush administration has sharply changed course by repeatedly defending the company both in the United States and abroad against accusations of anticompetitive conduct, including the recent rejection of a complaint by Google. The retrenchment reflects a substantially different view of antitrust policy, as well as a recognition of major changes in the marketplace. The battlefront among technology companies has shifted from computer desktop software, a category that Microsoft dominates, to Internet search and Web-based software programs that allow users to bypass products made by Microsoft, the world’s largest software maker. In the most striking recent example of the policy shift, the top antitrust official at the Justice Department last month urged state prosecutors to reject a confidential antitrust complaint filed by Google that is tied to a consent decree that monitors Microsoft’s behavior. Google has accused Microsoft of designing its latest operating system, Vista, to discourage the use of Google’s desktop search program, lawyers involved in the case said.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/06/10/business/10microsoft.html?ref=todayspaper
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http://www.nytimes.com/2007/06/10/business/10microsoft.html?ref=todayspaper
WATCHDOG GROUP PANS GOOGLE PRIVACY POLICIES AS WORST ON THE WEB
[SOURCE: Associated Press]
Google's privacy practices are the worst among the Internet's top destinations, according to a watchdog group seeking to intensify the recent focus on how the online search leader handles personal information about its users. In a report released Saturday, London-based Privacy International assigned Google its lowest possible grade. The category is reserved for companies with "comprehensive consumer surveillance and entrenched hostility to privacy." None of the 22 other surveyed companies - a group that included Yahoo Inc., Microsoft Corp. and AOL - sunk to that level, according to Privacy International.
http://www.siliconvalley.com/latestheadlines/ci_6103460
Watchdog group pans Google's privacy policies as worst on the Web