An FCC spokesperson affirmed that the vote won’t be in November, and we can expect 3 weeks of notices before any such action.
That doesn’t mean big things aren’t on the docket. Here are the things the FCC, now at full strength with five members, will be voting for next period:
Combating robocalls and other phone-based texts
Availability 1,700 more megahertz of spectrum for 5G networks
Official adoption of the enhanced ATSC 3.0 broadcast standard
Ignoring historic security review on following utility poles
“Common-sense measures” to ease change from copper to fiber
Revamping the Lifeline connectivity support program
Updating cable operative reporting rules
“Modernizing our media buying rules”
Many of the other areas are either routine or easy to support; the FCC does, in fact, do a lot of real work that goes undocumented by major holes, a fact often forgotten in the heat of controversy. But that last item is clearly going to stir the pot.
The FCC will be discharging rules limiting cross-ownership of performance and newspaper outlets, and of TV and radio stations. It would also reduce the “eight voices” rule that protects independently owned locations, and ease TV joins sales agreements.
Don’t worry, all this has blank to do with the Sinclair-Tribune merger the FCC is holding, and which many worries will produce a problematic concentration in the broadcast world of just the type enabled by the proposed rules. “This event is in no way the catalyst for FCC action on these issues,” wrote agent O’Rielly last week.
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