Industry is “seeing the dilemma between push and pull,” cinematographer Pierre Routhier said when we asked him at SMPTE's conference in Hollywood (see 1710240073) to reconcile his findings that 8K has no place in the living room, even as NHK rushes to start 8K broadcasting services in 2018 and TV makers talk increasingly of introducing 8K product in the U.S. next year. “We are pushing forward with increased spatial resolution, but I’ve not seen the pull from the clients.” The Korean Broadcasting System, meanwhile, successfully implemented a “basic” closed-captioning system for the ATSC 3.0-based Ultra HD broadcasting services that debuted to the South Korean public in May, said Yunhyoung Kim, KBS research engineer. Implementation had its “difficulties,” most having to do with building the crucial “timing” mechanisms into the closed-captioning feeds, he said. ATSC’s A/343 document defines required technology for closed caption and subtitle tracks, but contains “no explicit expressions” of how to use the timing mechanisms in a practical implementation, so KBS improvised, he said. That prompted an audience questioner who said he was involved in 3.0's framing to approach the mic and declare: “Unfortunately, the structure of the ATSC 3.0 document set is not implementer-friendly.” Framers “argued repeatedly in a number of meetings about that,” said the questioner, who didn’t give his name, and our attempts to talk to him were unsuccessful. “All of the shell statements are present that you absolutely need, but they’re spread over about 20 documents,” he said. ATSC’s supervisors told 3.0's framers they would draft a “recommended practice to tell people how it all fits together,” said the questioner: “They haven’t done that.” To Kim, who stood onstage listening to the remarks with no visible expression, the questioner said: “Unfortunately, you’re the first guy that had to do it. I feel sorry for you, but congratulations on getting a working implementation.” ATSC President Mark Richer in a Wednesday statement told us, “Certainly ATSC will develop a Recommended Practice for closed-captioning with ATSC 3.0, just as we have done with the current digital TV standard." More than 20 different standards "will comprise the full ATSC 3.0 system, and we have drafts of several Recommended Practices that are now in development,” said Richer. An order on ATSC 3.0 is expected to be voted on by FCC members Nov. 16.

FCC Chairman Ajit Pai proposed to assist hurricane-affected schools and libraries in restoring connectivity through the E-rate USF subsidy program. “Yesterday, I shared with my colleagues an emergency order that would help schools and libraries recover from the devastation of hurricanes Harvey, Irma, and Maria," he said in release Wednesday. "This order would provide targeted financial support to these institutions through the FCC’s E-rate program and give them maximum flexibility as they try to restore connectivity. It would also make available additional funds to schools that are serving a substantial number of students displaced by this season’s hurricanes. Once my fellow commissioners have had the opportunity to review this proposed order, I hope they will be able to quickly vote to support this relief.” The Schools, Health & Libraries Broadband Coalition lauded Pai's announcement. "While we have not seen the Chairman's proposal, the SHLB Coalition is very pleased that Chairman Pai has proposed to offer flexible E-rate support to schools and libraries in the areas devastated by the recent hurricanes," said Executive Director John Windhausen. "Fully functioning schools and libraries can help communities get back on their feet and bring hope to struggling families. Restoring Internet access to the schools and libraries can connect teachers, students and families to the world, allowing them to obtain access to essential information to aid the reconstruction effort."

The FCC has no bigger issue before it than bridging the digital divide, particularly in rural communities, Chairman Ajit Pai told National Grange President Betsy Huber in a Grange Radio interview, the group said Tuesday. According to the transcript, Pai cited FCC actions to that end, such as establishing the Broadband Deployment Advisory Committee, of which Huber is a member, and reorienting USF priorities to focus on unserved areas. Pai said the agency is trying to modify regulations to encourage deployment and urging Congress to do likewise.

It's “absurd” to suggest a company the size of Verizon could be forced into carrying ATSC 3.0 by much smaller broadcasters, said NAB in docket 16-142 Tuesday responding to the carrier (see 1710200025). Verizon “undoubtedly has a motive to hamstring such innovation by imposing needless and unreasonable regulatory burdens on broadcasters,” NAB said. “Verizon has begun testing the delivery of 4K television service. It is thus understandable why Verizon is concerned about a free over-the-air 4K competitor.” In a letter to the Media Bureau, the Advanced Television Systems Committee said recommended practices on MVPD redistribution of 3.0 signals are expected to be completed in 2018. The practices concern conversion of 3.0 services into 1.0 services “so that hardware or software products can be built to implement conversions to formats suitable for ATSC 1.0 redistribution systems or ATSC 1.0 over the air broadcast,” the group said.

AT&T released Q3 results after market close Tuesday, assuring investors its acquisition of Time Warner remains its top priority. “We look forward to closing” the acquisition “and bringing together premium content with world-class distribution to deliver a better entertainment experience for consumers and more effective targeted advertising,” AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson said. Stephenson said AT&T is pleased with its progress on FirstNet. “Already 27 states and territories have opted in, and we’re working closely with them as we prepare to deploy the FirstNet network,” he said. AT&T said it had 3 million total wireless net adds, including 2.3 million in the U.S. -- combining connected devices and prepaid and postpaid phones. It reported nearly 700,000 net adds in Mexico. Revenue fell to $39.7 billion vs. $40.9 billion in the year-ago quarter, “primarily due to declines in legacy wireline services and consumer mobility,” the company said. Net income attributable to AT&T was $3 billion v. $3.3 billion. AT&T expects to complete its buy of TW this year, Chief Financial Officer John Stephens said on a call with analysts. “The financing is set and we’re ready to close once we receive DOJ approval,” he said. "In the meantime, Time Warner continues to perform well, even better than our expectations." AT&T said it took a 4 cents-per-share hit Q3 from merger-related interest expenses and 2 cents hit as a result of natural disasters. The carrier also said it has already spent $200 million on its FirstNet build. AT&T’s strong response to the recent storms bodes well for the future of FirstNet, Stephens said. “It’s still a long road ahead" for the people of Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands, "but we plan to be there every step of the way,” he said. "Recovery is progressing with additional equipment arriving daily. We are seeing traffic growing daily on our network as service is restored." Daily call volume is now about 75 percent of pre-storm levels, he said. The company is pleased with changes in Washington, especially the likely end of 2015 net neutrality rules and pending tax reform, Stephens said. “We see a change in the mindset across D.C. in promoting lighter-touch regulation and pro-growth initiatives.”

The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals rejected an FCC request to "correct" the record in litigation over an AT&T challenge to FTC authority to regulate some services of common carriers. An en banc panel of the court Tuesday denied without comment an FCC post-argument motion to submit a letter disputing AT&T assertions at oral argument that the FCC could impose structural separation on common carriers to facilitate FTC regulatory authority over their noncommon-carrier services (see 1710230057). The en banc panel heard argument Sept. 19 on an appeal of a three-judge panel reversal of a lower court ruling that denied AT&T's motion to dismiss a 2014 data-throttling lawsuit in FTC v. AT&T Mobility, No. 15-16585 (see 1709180061 and 1709190025). The FCC and AT&T didn't comment.

The Supreme Court's new electronic filing system will begin operation Nov. 13, it said Monday. Under the system, "virtually all new filings" will be publicly accessible for free, it said. Paper still will be the official form of filing, but parties represented by counsel also will have to submit most documents through the system, and lawyers who expect to do so will need to register in advance for the system, it said. Filings from parties appearing pro se won't be submitted through the electronic filing system but will be scanned by court personnel and made available on the e-docket, it said.

The FCC should investigate the possible impact on emergency communications of doing away with the main studio rule before voting it out, said Common Frequency in a letter filed in docket 17-106. The repeal of the rule is on the agenda for commissioners’ meeting Tuesday. In Puerto Rico, “it was local origination capacity and a live human broadcast staff relaying local emergency information that made the possibility of saving thousands of lives possible,“ Common Frequency said, calling the proposal to eliminate the requirement “troubling.” The rulemaking “aims to turn the nation’s outlets for news, public affairs, and emergency information dissemination into internet streams from centralized sources,” Common Frequency said. “It is imperative for the Commission to investigate the impact of the local main studio prior to voting upon the R&O [report and order],” the filing said. The Wireline Bureau should waive the recertification process for some Lifeline customers of the Puerto Rico Telephone Company until April 1, PRTC said in an emergency petition Monday. The customers in question are being affected by network and power outages and “significant displacement,” the petition said. “This limited suspension and waiver will protect consumers who are unlikely to receive and respond to USAC’s [Universal Service Administrative Co.] recertification notifications, which would cause their Lifeline service to be discontinued at a time when it is most needed,” the filing said. The bureau should grant the petition “expeditiously,” said PRTC.

AT&T and Time Warner are extending the termination date of their merger agreement "for a short period" while they continue to seek DOJ regulatory approval, AT&T said in an SEC filing Monday. AT&T said it still expects to close on the deal by year's end and the merger agreement included the right to extend if government reviews of the deal went beyond Sunday, which was the termination date. The deal got Brazilian antitrust OK last week (see 1710180038), leaving only DOJ approval outstanding. Meanwhile, the fourth independent compliance officer report on AT&T/DirecTV conditions, posted Monday in docket 14-90, said the company "demonstrated its commitment to satisfying" the conditions. It said AT&T has offered 1 Gbps fiber to the premises service to E-rate eligible schools or libraries in its fiber to the premises FTTP and contiguous footprint. AT&T was required to deploy FTTP service to 12.5 customer locations within four years, but its FTTP deployment numbers were redacted in the report.

U.S. District Judge James Boasberg of Washington, D.C., having in September granted (in Pacer) a motion by FCC Chairman Ajit Pai for summary judgment dismissing a discrimination suit brought by a former agency engineer, on Monday denied (in Pacer) six subsequent motions by the plaintiff. Boasberg in the docket 16-398 order said the motions seemed aimed at altering or amending the summary judgment but brought no new arguments or legal theories. Plaintiff Qihui Huang of Bethesda, Maryland, in her 2016 pro se complaint (in Pacer) against former Chairman Tom Wheeler alleged a hostile work environment at the agency involving her age, race and that she's foreign born. Huang didn't comment.