By John Eggerton, Multichannel News, 9-14-21 A pair of powerful senators have launched a bipartisan congressional investigation into Facebook's alleged "coverup" of the impact of its platforms on teens and children, tapping a Facebook whistleblower in that effort. Sens. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) and Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.), chair and ranking member, respectively, of the Senate [...]
By John Eggerton, Multichannel News, 9-13-21 President Joe Biden has nominated Alvaro Bedoya as commissioner of the Federal Trade Commission. He will replace Democratic Commissioner Rohi Chopra, who has been named to head the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. If he is confirmed, Bedoya, who has been critical of facial recognition tech and is a [...]
By John Eggerton, Multichannel News, 9-9-21 The Federal Trade Commission continues its move to more aggressively vet mergers in general and tech mergers in particular, signaling it will be releasing some data next week on tech mergers that have heretofore flown under the antitrust enforcement radar, and proposing other steps to boost its regulatory [...]
By John Eggerton, Multichannel News, 9-8-21 The FCC has released its fifth report on broadcast ownership, according to FCC Commissioner Geoffrey Starks, and there is some slight improvement in the number of women and minority-owned stations, but the emphasis is on “slight.” The number of women who owned full-power TV stations in 2019, the [...]
By George Winslow, TVTech, and TMI Staff, 9-7-21 Nine former chairs of the FCC – including Richard E. Wiley, Chairman of the Board of The Media Institute – have come out in favor of legislation that would reinstate a tax certificate program to encourage investment in TV and radio broadcast station ownership for women [...]
By John Eggerton, Multichannel News, 9-1-21 Locast, the local TV station streaming services, said late Wednesday (Sept. 1) it was suspending interruptions to its programming, which it does to ask those who have not contributed to the service to do so. Locast has argued since its inception that it is eligible for a nonprofit [...]
By John Eggerton, Multichannel News, 8-30-21 Cable operators want the FCC to reconsider whether broadcasters should be able to use carriage of their primary ATSC 1.0 TV station signal to leverage carriage of new ATSC 3.0 signals, as is the case under current FCC rules. That came in a meeting between NCTA representatives and [...]
By John Eggerton, Multichannel News, 8-27-21Apple said Aug. 27 that it will “clarify” that app developers don’t have to use its App store to accept payments, and will also give qualifying news outlets a cut of subscription revenue from Apple News.The tech giant said that and other changes – including boosting “rigorous journalism and a [...]
By John Eggerton, Multichannel News, 8-26-21 The Federal Communications Commission said it has approved a first tranche of 62 telehealth applications for $41.98 million in its second round of funding for COVID-19 telehealth services. In round one, the FCC allocated $200 million of CARES Act funding for 539 applications from 47 states, as well as [...]
By John Eggerton, Multichannel News, 8-17-21 A diverse group of journalism organizations has called on Congress to pass the Local Journalism Sustainability Act (S. 2434). The bill would help local stations and newspapers staff up their newsrooms, citing, in part, Big Tech’s “devouring” of their local ad market. “For local and underserved communities, local [...]