The FCC seems to almost daily be issuing orders in the incentive auction proceeding, looking to the filing of applications in December by TV stations ready to give up their spectrum to the FCC so that it can be repackaged and resold to wireless users. In the last two days, the Commission has issued orders… Continue Reading
but the new rule still won’t be effective for some time. Last September we reported on the FCC’s decision to (finally) allow broadcasters to post on their websites the rules to contests they promote on the air. The Commission’s Report and Order has now made it into the Federal Register. That’s the good news. The … Continue Reading
Here’s your chance to let the FCC know how to assess the “good faith” of parties to a retrans negotiation. While many (if not most) television licensees are likely trying to sift through the several hundreds of pages of FCC materials laying out the fast-approaching incentive auction process, it’s important not to lose sight of … Continue Reading
Import declaration rules waived for second half of 2016 Regular visitors to CommLawBlog know that the FCC maintains technical rules for radio transmitters and certain other equipment. These rules typically specify power, bandwidth, frequency stability, out-of-band emissions – that sort of thing. They’re intended to minimize the likelihood that a device will cause unwanted interference … Continue Reading
TV stations have in the past few years been hit with many requirements for making their programming – especially emergency information – accessible to all people within their service areas. Two deadlines loom in the very short term that stations need to remember – the requirements for converting text based emergency information aired on their… Continue Reading
Last week, I conducted a webinar on the FCC’s EEO rules for 19 state broadcast associations, explaining the issues that broadcasters need to keep in mind to comply with those rules. The slides from my presentation are available here. On the same day, the FCC issued a Public Notice announcing another of their random EEO… Continue Reading
At the end of last week, the FCC took the expected steps of releasing its public notice setting out the specific procedures for broadcasters interested in participating in the incentive auction by selling their spectrum back to the FCC to be repurposed for wireless broadband, and a notice setting out the specific opening prices that… Continue Reading
Two weeks ago we let everybody know about a Federal Register notice officially announcing the deadline for responses to petitions for reconsideration in the Citizens Broadband Radio Service proceeding. Usually such notices provide a second deadline – for replies to any responses that might get filed. In this case, however, the published reply deadline happened … Continue Reading
The FCC today announced the application procedures to be used for broadcast stations wishing to participate in the spectrum auction, as well as application procedures for those wishing to purchase that spectrum in the forward auction. Of particular interest to broadcast stations wishing to participate in the reverse auction is the announcement that the window […]