Ownership

The Federal Communications Commission told the US Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit that it did consider the impact of its broadcast local ownership deregulation on minority and female ownership and that that consideration and its adoption of a definition of eligible entity meets that court's mandate. "[T]he Commission carefully analyzed whether each of its rule changes would have a “material impact on minority and female ownership," said the FCC's legal team. The FCC told the court it could consider the arguments for or against the rule change in the regular order of challenges to tho

The National Association of Broadcasters and Sinclair have asked a federal court to allow them to weigh in on the request from critics of the Federal Communications Commission's broadcast deregulatory decision that the court block that deregulation.

The boards of CBS and Viacom have formed special committees to evaluate a potential merger, a deal that would reunite the two big pieces of the Redstone family’s media empire. Shari Redstone, vice chairman of both companies, is pushing for a merger. She, along with her 94 year-old father, Sumner Redstone, controls CBS and Viacom, with a roughly 80% controlling stake in each company through their holding company National Amusements. Shari Redstone believes both companies need greater scale to better compete against bigger rivals.

Less time spent on Facebook could deal a huge blow to Facebook’s once-ironclad business. But the company has a plan to counteract that: It is raising its prices. A lot. Even as Facebook reported that users collectively spent 50 million fewer hours a day on the network in the fourth quarter, revenue during that period increased 47 percent to $13 billion. Facebook pulled this off by boosting the average price per ad by 43 percent.

[Commentary] In the wake of ongoing concerns about online harassment and harmful content, continued terrorist threats, changing hate speech laws, and the ever-growing user bases of major social media platforms, tech companies are under more pressure than ever before with respect to how they treat content on their platforms—and often that pressure is coming from different directions. There is a clear need for hard data about specific company practices and policies on content moderation, but what does that look like?Part of the answer to these questions can be found by looking to the growing

Federal Communications Commission Chairman Ajit Pai announced that the following items are tentatively on the agenda for the February Open Commission Meeting scheduled for Thursday, February 22, 2018.

[Commentary] Mark Zuckerberg announced recently that Facebook plans to ask its community to help rate news producers’ credibility. Randomly selected users will be asked whether they are familiar with an outlet, and if so, invited to judge its trustworthiness. The ratio that results — of those who know the source, the proportion that trusts it — will “inform ranking in the News Feed” (though Facebook has remained vague about its relevance compared with other metrics).

[Commentary] Republicans have been largely supportive of the [Sinclair Broadcast Group and Tribune Media mega-merger], not just because of the principle that the government should stay out of business decisions, but also for political reasons: Conservatives are excited about the prospect of a national broadcast giant with a distinct right-leaning perspective. In the short term, they’re right to be excited: The merged broadcaster would have 215 TV stations covering more than 72 percent of U.S. households, an unprecedented reach into Americans’ living rooms.

In mid-January, the US Department of Commerce slapped a tariff on Canadian newsprint, which is used by around 75 percent of US publishers and is particularly prevalent in the Northeast. Even though the duty may yet be reversed, American newspapers—already struggling to go to print in an era of rapidly declining circulation—have to pay it in the meantime. Many publishers fear it’ll add upward of 10 percent to their print costs, and could even result in job losses. The tariff will affect publishers of all sizes, from The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal on down.

The Federal Communications Commission announced a settlement with AT&T’s FiberTower that involves the company returning hundreds of millimeter wave spectrum licenses to the agency. The settlement essentially means AT&T won’t get access to those spectrum licenses, and it paves the way for the agency to reauction those licenses at some point in the future.  Specifically, as part of the agreement, FiberTower is abandoning all of its 24 GHz spectrum licenses (around 121 total) and roughly the same number of 39 GHz spectrum licenses.