By John Eggerton, Multichannel News, 4-1-21In a big victory for broadcasters and the Republican FCC under Ajit Pai, the Supreme Court has reversed the Third Circuit's decision throwing out the FCC's broadcast deregulation under former FCC Chairman Ajit Pai. Current acting chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel had voted against the deregulatory move.In 2017, the FCC had unanimously [...]
By John Eggerton, Multichannel News, 3-25-21 Rep. Yvette Clarke (D-N.Y.) said Thursday (March 25) that she will be introducing her bill next week to protect marginalized communities from harmful advertising practices. The Civil Rights Marginalization Act of 2021 would amend Sec. 230, which provides online platforms immunity from civil liability for third-party content, to ensure [...]
By John Eggerton, Multichannel News, 3-25-21 CEOs from Facebook, Google, and Twitter took their licks Thursday (March 25) from both sides of the aisle in a Hill hearing entitled "Disinformation Nation: Social Media's Role in Promoting Extremism and Misinformation." Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D-Ill.), chair of the Consumer Protection Subcommittee, said that the one thing that [...]
By John Eggerton, Multichannel News, 3-15-21 Signaling it was FCC policies under Republican Chairman Ajit Pai that "secured" leadership in 5G, Republican Commissioner Brendan Carr has unveiled his plan for maintaining that leadership, though with a Democratic chair and, eventually, majority, Carr has only the power to propose, not impose. In a speech to [...]
By John Eggerton, Multichannel News, 3-10-21 Rep. Suzan DelBene (D-Wash.) has introduced the Information Transparency and Personal Data Control Act, which would create a federal data privacy law enforced by the Federal Trade Commission. DelBene said a patchwork of different state laws only leads to confusion and that a national standard is necessary to [...]
By John Eggerton, Multichannel News, 3-10-21 Political opposites Sens. John Kennedy (R-La.) and Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) have teamed up to try and boost the fortunes of news operations. The Journalism Competition and Preservation Act would give "news content creators" – print, broadcast, or digital – an antitrust safe harbor to negotiate collectively with digital [...]
By John Eggerton, Multichannel News, 3-9-21 A bill has been introduced in Congress by a trio of Democrats that would remove "roadblocks" to municipal broadband buildouts by preempting state laws limiting or preventing those buildouts. The Community Broadband Act would "ensure their residents have broadband access by removing roadblocks for public-private partnerships and locally [...]
By John Eggerton, Multichannel News, 3-9-21 Facing the sunsetting of third-party cookies across all browsers in less than a year, cookies have helped power the online advertising ecosystem that supports free web content, the Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) Tech Lab has released for comment proposed standards for "responsible addressability" and "predictable privacy." IAB is [...]
By John Eggerton, Multichannel News, 3-8-21 Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg continues to be a popular pen pal for legislators concerned about its treatment of ad and web content. In a letter Monday (March 8), more than two dozen House Energy & Commerce Committee Democrats called on him for some answers about the social media [...]
By John Eggerton, Multichannel News, 3-8-21 The Biden and Trump Justice Departments have at least one thing in common: Both support opening up the entire 6-GHz band for WiFi, a move pushed by cable operators and computer companies. The Federal Communications Commission, under then-chairman Ajit Pai, voted unanimously last April to allow all 1,200 [...]
