Participated in an amicus brief (with the Reporters Committee and other amici) filed with the New York Supreme Court Appellate Division in Gottwald v. Sebert. The case involves a defamation lawsuit brought by music producer Dr. Luke against artist Kesha over statements made by Kesha and others in her employ about Kesha’s allegations that [...]
By John Eggerton, Broadcasting & Cable Online, 4-9-20 Republican FCC commissioner Michael O'Rielly has asked President Trump to lean on the Department of Defense to free up spectrum for 5G. That came in an April 8 letter to Trump from O'Rielly, who is a fan of the President. O'Rielly praised the President's "extraordinary leadership" on [...]
By John Eggerton, Broadcasting & Cable Online, 4-9-20 The FCC is encouraging TV stations to keep the faith, literally, during the current COVID-19 pandemic. The commission is allowing those stations to preempt educational and informational children's programming for religious programming without having to reschedule it, but only over the next three weeks. FCC chair Ajit [...]
Participated in an amicus brief (with the Reporters Committee and other amici) filed with the Supreme Court of Ohio in Welsh-Huggins v. Office of the Prosecuting Attorney. This case concerns a request by an AP reporter for surveillance camera footage of a shooting targeting a judge outside an Ohio courthouse. A special master of [...]
Participated in a letter (with the Reporters Committee and other media groups) sent to the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts’ Committee on Rules of Practice and Procedure. The letter recommends that Rule 6(e) of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure be amended to make clear that district courts may exercise their inherent supervisory [...]
By John Eggerton, Broadcasting & Cable Online, 4-1-20 FCC chairman Ajit Pai is proposing to open the entire 6 GHz band for unlicensed wireless broadband. He has drafted rules that would make all 1,200 MHz available for some unlicensed devices, which would share with incumbent users including broadcast electronic newsgathering (ENG). Broadcasters had argued that [...]
By John Eggerton, Broadcasting & Cable Online, 3-31-20 Comcast has teamed with Common Sense Media to make free educational content available. There are almost 2,000 hours of titles for its Xfinity customers with kids in K-12 via Xfinity on Demand, the company said. That includes content from Bluprint and CuriosityStream, as well as content from [...]
By John Eggerton, Broadcasting & Cable Online, 3-26-20 The Corporation for Public Broadcasting gets $75 million in emergency funds in the $2 trillion coronavirus bill that passed the Senate late Wednesday night. The money is to keep up facilities of noncommercial TV and radio stations and to help stations, particularly rural ones, keep the lights [...]
Participated in an amicus brief (with the Reporters Committee and other media groups) filed with the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia in In re Juror Questionnaires in United States v. Stone. The case involves a motion filed by a social media activist seeking access to the juror questionnaires in the Roger [...]
Participated in an amicus brief (with the Reporters Committee and other media groups) filed with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit in Tah v. Global Witness Publishing, Inc. The case raises the issue of whether the D.C. Anti-SLAPP Act applies in federal court. The case concerns a defamation action brought by [...]