By Cat Zakrzewski, washingtonpost.com, 7-4-23 A federal judge on July 4 blocked key Biden Administration agencies and officials from meeting and communicating with social media companies about “protected speech,” in an extraordinary preliminary injunction in an ongoing case that could have profound effects on the First Amendment. The injunction came in response to a [...]
By John Eggerton, Multichannel News, 6-28-23 Video streamers and other edge providers are fighting a multi-front war in Washington lately, as Congress applies pressure on the FCC to apply good-faith negotiation rules to over-the-top content providers, as it does traditional video providers, and as hundreds of rural broadband providers and associations call on the [...]
By John Eggerton, Multichannel News, 6-26-23 The Biden Administration has figured out where it will be allocating $42.45 billion in Broadband Equity, Access and Deployment (BEAD) program subsidy money among the states and territories. Legislators were already touting their states’ shares even as the funding allocation was being announced. Congress provided $65 billion in [...]
By John Eggerton, Multichannel News, 6-22-23 Anna Gomez, President Joe Biden's nominee for the open Democratic seat on the Federal Communications Commission, told a Senate Commerce Committee nomination hearing panel June 22 she supports reclassifying internet access as a Title II telecommunications service. Currently, the FCC classifies internet access as an information service under [...]
By John Eggerton, Multichannel News, 6-22-23 Congress continues to press the Federal Communications Commission on the issue of regulating streaming services as it does MVPDs, and it looks like a majority of commissioners and potential commissioners support at least a new look at the issue. FCC Chair Jessica Rosenworcel suggested at a House oversight [...]
By Ted Johnson, Deadline Hollywood, 6-15-23 The Senate Judiciary Committee revived the prospects for a long-proposed bill that would bolster print and broadcast news outlets in their negotiations with tech giants. The Journalism Competition and Preservation Act cleared the Senate Judiciary Committee on June 15 in a 14-7 vote. The bill would create a [...]
By Cat Zakrzewski and Cristiano Lima, washingtonpost.com, 6-14-23 European Union lawmakers on June 14 took a key step toward passing landmark restrictions on the use of artificial intelligence, putting Brussels on a collision course with American tech giants funneling billions of dollars into the burgeoning technology. The European Parliament overwhelmingly approved the E.U. AI [...]
FOR RELEASE: May 23, 2023 Contact: Richard T. Kaplar The Media Institute 703-506-8030 Vienna, Va., May 23, 2023 – Media Institute President Richard T. Kaplar issued the following statement in response to President Joe Biden’s announcement that he intends to nominate Anna Gomez as an FCC commissioner and to renominate FCC Commissioners Brendan Carr [...]
By John Eggerton, Broadcasting & Cable, 5-22-23 President Joe Biden has nominated Anna Gomez to fill the long-unfilled third Democratic seat on the Federal Communications Commission. Gomez is a veteran communications attorney and policy adviser who has been on the corporate and government sides of policy debates. The nomination comes as a package deal [...]
By John Eggerton, Broadcasting & Cable, 5-22-23 After more than a year of trying to get the deal done, TEGNA said that as of May 22, its merger agreement with Standard General has been terminated and it can collect a $136-million breakup fee. May 22 was the deadline for Standard General’s financing of the [...]