Bidding slowed in the C-band auction Friday, with provisionally winning bids closing at $80.6 billion after five rounds Friday, up from $80.5 billion Thursday. "Bidders seem to be finalizing their demand,” wrote Wiley’s Ari Meltzer and Rick Edelman: “Bidders have placed bids on all licenses, and average prices for the blocks in the largest US markets seem to have been determined.”
President-elect Joe Biden's transition ethics rules governing the FCC, FTC and other agency review teams are relatively weak, some observers said in recent interviews. They pointed to the rules' relatively lax limits on "revolving door" movement of industry officials into the temporary roles that could influence the incoming administration's actions. The landing teams have been working with the FCC, FTC (see 2011250059) and other agencies since late November, when the General Services Administration began allowing the federal government to begin the transition process.
The FCC has struggled for years to retain women, promote African Americans, hire Hispanics, and attract diverse engineers and economists, according to government data. Annual reports to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission show the communications regulator is below the average of the U.S. workforce by such measures. President-elect Joe Biden is expected to make diversity a focus and to name the first permanent female FCC chair. Only one woman, then-Commissioner Mignon Clyburn, has been acting chair.
The FCC has struggled for years to retain women, promote African Americans, hire Hispanics, and attract diverse engineers and economists, according to government data. Annual reports to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission show the communications regulator is below the average of the U.S. workforce by such measures. President-elect Joe Biden is expected to make diversity a focus and to name the first permanent female FCC chair. Only one woman, then-Commissioner Mignon Clyburn, has been acting chair.
One lawyer recalled not getting assigned to a project because the attorney making the assignments said “the client didn’t like working with women.” Another woman remembered a senior attorney telling her, “You don’t seem like a lawyer to me.” Other women pointed to articles placing the female co-author’s name after the male co-author’s, although the submission listed the woman first.
One lawyer recalled not getting assigned to a project because the attorney making the assignments said “the client didn’t like working with women.” Another woman remembered a senior attorney telling her, “You don’t seem like a lawyer to me.” Other women pointed to articles placing the female co-author’s name after the male co-author’s, although the submission listed the woman first.
The Supreme Court heard Facebook v. Duguid Tuesday (19-511), a case expected to provide long-awaited clarity on the definition of what's an automatic telephone dialing system under the Telephone Consumer Protection Act (see 2011100052). Consumer groups hope the court will do nothing to narrow the ATDS definition. In September, the administration supported Facebook. Lawyers for companies facing TCPA lawsuits hope the court will resolve a split in the federal circuits.
“The profusion of crystal-clear, widescreen digital HDTV sets in almost every American home and office, we just take for granted today,” former FCC Chairman Richard Wiley told a commemorative industry Zoom call Monday. Wiley chaired the FCC Advisory Committee on Advanced Television Service for 12 years. Saturday was the 25th anniversary of ACATS' final report to the commission, recommending adoption of the Grand Alliance HDTV system as “better than any of the four original” DTV proposals and “superior to any known alternative system.” Wiley doubts ATSC 3.0 “would be possible were it not for the work of the Grand Alliance and the advisory committee,” he said. What “really surprised” Wiley about the Grand Alliance proposal “was how much opposition we got from government and business leaders,” he said. “It all seems still very odd to me,” he said: “Yet all the credit” should go to ACATS and Grand Alliance members “who just continued to plod along and do your work, criticism notwithstanding, and stayed the course and made HDTV a reality.”
Backers and some critics of Ajit Pai agreed he was a particularly effective FCC chairman, leaving behind a legacy of major accomplishments and changes. Pai announced Monday he will step down on Inauguration Day, Jan. 20 (see 2011300020). Supporters said his scorecard includes enacting policies that accelerated broadband deployment and steering the agency through the pandemic.
Democratic leaders of the House Commerce Committee asked FCC Chairman Ajit Pai and FTC Chairman Joseph Simons Tuesday to stop working on major items in light of Joe Biden's election as president (see 2011100066), which President Donald Trump continues to fight through legal challenges. Trump’s legal fight could slow the overall transition, stakeholders say. The House letters (see here and here) were expected (see here). Such requests are known colloquially as "pencils-down" requests.