Regulation

A senior judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit said that liberal media bias — “nearly all television — network and cable — is a Democratic Party trumpet,” for example — has resulted in such abuse of the landmark Times v. Sullivan requirement that speech relating to public officials has to show actual malice to be actionably defamatory that the longstanding precedent should be overturned.

NAB President Gordon Smith says the organization is shifting into offense with the new Democrat-led FCC, pairing with newspaper publishers for an antitrust exemption in dealing with Big Tech along with pressing for a relaxation of antiquated TV ownership rules. Note: This story is available to TVNewsCheck Premium members only. If you would like to upgrade your free TVNewsCheck membership to Premium now, you can visit your Member Home Page, available when you log in at the very top right corner of the site or in the Stay Connected Box that appears in the right column of virtually every page on the site. If you don’t see Member Home, you will need to click Log In or Subscribe.

A bipartisan group of senators is looking to bring the Supreme Court to television, aiming to have the high court reach a new technological frontier after nearly a year of hearing arguments via teleconference due to the coronavirus pandemic. Senate Majority Whip and Judiciary Committee Chair Dick Durbin and Sen. Chuck Grassley, the committee’s top Republican, introduced a bill on March 18 that would require the Supreme Court to allow public court proceedings to be televised.

Advocates for video accessibility for the deaf and blind communities want the FCC to seriously consider how to apply captioning and audio description mandates to video streamers.
That came in meetings earlier this month between acting FCC Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel and groups including the National Association of the Deaf and the American Foundation for the Blind, according to a document filed with the FCC.

A claim that the company illegally prohibits employees from discussing pay has been added to a lawsuit accusing it of paying women less than men. Disney has aggressively pushed back.

The FCC has voted unanimously on how to open up a swath of high-value midband spectrum in the 3.45 GHz band — currently used by DOD for key radar applications — for commercial wireless broadband (5G) and, separately, approved proposed application and bidding processes for the auction (auction 110) of that 100 MHz. It is seeking comment on those auction processes.

Last week, the FCC’s Enforcement Bureau issued an advisory reminding broadcasters about their obligation to provide sponsorship identification information to their audiences whenever they receive something of value in exchange for airing any programming. It also highlighted two other issues: (1) that broadcasters have an obligation to exercise reasonable diligence to make sure that any third-party program providers also include sponsorship identification when they are paid to include material in programs that they provide to the station and (2) the FCC can impose substantial fines on stations that do not live up to these obligations.

Democratic Sen. Brian Schatz and Republican Sen. John Thune on Wednesday rolled out a bipartisan bill that would increase “accountability” for Big Tech companies and enhance transparency regarding content moderation for users, in an effort to reform Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act. The bill, titled the Platform Accountability and Transparency Act and also known as the “PACT Act,” would preserve the benefits of Section 230 — a rule that shields social media companies from being held liable for content on their platforms while allowing them to moderate that content — while making “significant reforms” to protect Americans using the platforms.

Connecticut is the latest state to take aim at the big pockets of Big Tech with a proposed digital ad tax, and it is not sitting well with advertisers. The Association of National Advertisers has come out strongly against SB 821, a bill that would levy a 10% tax on digital ad services in the state on any business with annual gross revenues (worldwide) of more than $10 billion.

While the Biden administration has been slow to appoint the key decisionmakers at agencies overseeing technology issues, a handful of people are on the inside track to lead them. By and large, these likely appointees do not have direct ties to Big Tech companies and have advocated for tougher measures against the industry. Many also previously served in the Obama administration and fall in the progressive camp.

Lawmakers on Friday debated an antitrust bill that would give news publishers collective bargaining power with online platforms like Facebook and Google, putting the spotlight on a proposal aimed at chipping away at the power of Big Tech. At a hearing held by the House antitrust subcommittee, Microsoft’s president, Brad Smith, emerged as a leading industry voice in favor of the law. He took a divergent path from his tech counterparts, pointing to an imbalance in power between publishers and tech platforms.

Facebook and Google’s market power, especially over digital advertising, has translated to a potential “extinction level event” for local news operations, broadcast, online and print. That was the underlying message of House Antitrust Subcommittee chairman David Cicilline (D-R.I.) at a hearing Friday on “Saving a Free and Diverse Press.”

Lobbyists for Facebook and Google threw their weight against new U.S. legislation that seeks to aid struggling news publishers by allowing them to negotiate collectively against the tech companies over revenue sharing and other deals. Google, which declined comment on the proposal, launched a website on Thursday asserting it is “one of the world’s biggest financial supporters of journalism” by virtue of the ad revenue and content licensing fees it provides to media.

A bipartisan pair of legislators has introduced the Modern Television Act of 2021 that would eliminate some “outdated” regulations including the must carry-retransmission consent regime that broadcasters use to secure payments from MVPDs for their local programming/signals and the compulsory copyright license. Broadcasters were not happy, while MVPDs were pleased with the prospect of must-carry going away, which they have long argued was a thumb on the scale for broadcasters, who can demand carriage, though it means they can’t negotiate payment.

As advertised, House Majority Whip James Clyburn (D-S.C.), joined by Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.), has reintroduced a bill to close the digital divide by connecting everyone to the internet at high speeds — 1 Gig is the goal.

Facebook is asking a D.C. federal judge to dismiss two government suits that allege its acquisitions of Instagram and WhatsApp gave it a monopoly on the personal social networking market in violation of antitrust laws — arguing that such a claim “utterly ignores the reality of the dynamic, intensely competitive high-tech industry in which Facebook operates.”

Don’t look now, but in the past few weeks, libel lawsuits are failing left and right in New York state. On Tuesday alone, the New York Times beat Donald Trump while the New York Post prevailed over a bad photo choice. The former suit got most of the attention, but it’s the latter that provides the best example why the world’s media capital is suddenly more hospitable — at least, legally — for media companies.

In a rare case, Andrea Sahouri, a Des Moines Register reporter, was prosecuted after she was arrested while covering a protest against racism and police violence last May.

The FCC has officially approved requests from CNN, Fox News, MSNBC and ESPN to be exempt from audio description rules that are required of top national non-broadcast networks, based on the amount of non-live linear programming the networks offer per calendar quarter. However, there is an exception available for networks that don’t air at least 50 hours per quarter of primetime programming that is not live or near-live.

With the tournament about to begin, broadcasters, publishers and other businesses need to be wary about potential claims arising from their use of terms and logos associated with the tournament, including the well-known marks March Madness^®, The Big Dance^®, Final Four^®, Women’s Final Four^®, Elite Eight^® and The Road to the Final Four^® (with and without the word “The”), each of which is a federally registered trademark.

President Biden has decided to nominate Lina Khan, a Columbia University legal scholar championed by anti-Big Tech activists, to the Federal Trade Commission. Along with the recent hiring of Tim Wu as an economic adviser inside the White House, the addition of Khan signals that Biden is poised to pursue an aggressive regulatory agenda when it comes to Amazon, Google, Facebook and other tech giants.

The Biden administration has tapped Columbia University law professor Tim Wu — known both as a leading critic of Silicon Valley and a prominent net neutrality proponent — to serve on the National Economic Council. Wu — who coined the term “net neutrality” almost 20 years ago — will advise the administration on technology and competition policy. He previously worked in the Obama administration, as well as for the Federal Trade Commission, and the New York Attorney General.

Silicon Valley giants are drawing battle lines over personal data collection practices and targeted ads as the threat of regulation looms. As Apple presses ahead with plans to give users greater control over their privacy, companies like Facebook and Google have aligned themselves over the latter’s more measured approach to scaling back tracking features.

The $1.9 billion American Rescue Plan COVID-19 relief bill that passed the Senate Saturday night (March 6) also had some rescue funding for public broadcasting. The bill included $175 million in emergency assistance to public TV and radio stations.

The media giant and a law firm hired to probe sexual-misconduct allegations against former CBS chief Les Moonves are said to have paid millions to someone who claimed a breach of confidentiality after The New York Times revealed explosive details from a draft report on the investigation.

The Senate has voted 84-15 to confirm Rhode Island Gov. Gina Raimondo as President Joe Biden’s new secretary of Commerce. Commerce incorporates the National Telecommunications & Information Administration, which is the White House’s chief policy advisory arm and oversees government spectrum use. Over the past couple of years it as been in a bit of a battle with the FCC over sharing government spectrum or freeing up spectrum too close, at least for NTIA’s comfort, to GPS spectrum.