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from: Broadcasting and Cable

Don't Tread on Us, States Tell FCC’s Martin
National Conference of State Legislators: Leave Exclusive Contracts for Cable Service in Apartments, Condos to the Marketplace

By John Eggerton
Broadcasting & Cable, 10/23/2007 3:22:00 PM

The National Conference of State Legislators agrees with top cable company Comcast that the Federal Communications Commission should leave exclusive contracts for cable service in apartments and condos to the marketplace, saying that to ban them from Washington would impinge on the state sovereignty.

from: Multichannel News

AT&T U-verse TV Hit by Nationwide Outages
Subscribers Lose Access to Certain Cable Channels for Most of the Day Oct. 21

10/22/2007 10:54:00 AM

AT&T U-verse TV subscribers across the country were denied access to multiple cable channels for most of the day Sunday, and the telephone company on Monday said it was still investigating what caused the outages.

from: Broadcasting & Cable

Organizations Claim Agency’s Data Collection Is ‘Woefully Substandard’

By John Eggerton
10/22/2007

The FCC is getting an earful on its media ownership studies and ownership rules in general.

A group of women's and minority organizations told the FCC Monday that its recently released media ownership studies failed to target and provide solutions for promoting women's ownership of the media, but that the results they did produce showed that women are underrepresented and that the FCC's data collection is "woefully substandard."

from: FindLaw

Even if You Have Nothing to Hide, Government Surveillance Threatens Your Freedom

October 19, 2007
By John W. Dean

“I’ve got nothing to hide, so electronic surveillance doesn’t bother me. To the contrary, I’m delighted that the Bush Administration is monitoring calls and electronic traffic on a massive scale, because catching terrorists is far more important that worrying about the government’s listening to my phone calls, or reading my emails.” So the argument goes. It is a powerful one that has seduced too many people.

from: Washington Post

Immunity for Telecoms May Set Bad Precedent, Legal Scholars Say

“The unfortunate reality is that once you’ve done it, once you immunize interrogators or phone companies, then it’s easy to do it again in another context.” Retired Rear Adm. John Huston, Franklin Pierce Law Center

from: Wired

Call for Reader Help: Where Does Your Senator Stand on Spying Immunity?

By Ryan Singel
October 16, 2007

Two key Senate committees are working on introducing a measure reworking what powers the government has to wiretap communications transiting phone and internet switches, and the administration and the nation's telecoms are pushing for immunity from lawsuits alleging the companies massively violated the nation's privacy laws by aiding the government's secret spying programs.

from: Broadband Reports

Senator Dodd Fights Telco Wiretap Suit Immunity
And how much does getting immunity from the law cost these days, anyway?

10:00AM Friday Oct 19 2007 by Karl

As we mentioned yesterday, an incredibly well-lobbied Congress has decided to give AT&T and Verizon retroactive immunity for their roles in handing over customer data to the NSA without a court order. The proposed deal would derail cases like the EFF's against AT&T, who has been accused of building entire rooms tasked with shoveling customer voice and Internet data (from multiple carriers) to Uncle Sam without any kind of judicial oversight.

Note: Some quite useful readings and insights to be found here. Pour some coffee, settle in and peruse this site. Yet another reminder that bad communications policy transcends political parties and that media democracy is nothing more than common sense (which is why current partisan political wisdom falls so short). The underlying issues of course, concern the political economy of the corporations involved, but that remains beyond the scope of polite political discourse in the U.S. Salude to MetroNetIQ for daring to think aloud and honestly.

from: Tampa Tribune

City Weighs Cable Company Lawsuit

October 19, 2007
By Ellen Gedalius

The city is laying the groundwork to sue Bright House Networks, the latest attempt by area governments to keep public access, education and government channels at their existing spots on the television lineup.

from: Biz Times

Dear Wisconsin Legislators:
The 35 cities, towns and villages of the Regional Telecommunications Commission oppose the Plale-Montgomery bill. Here are some of the problems we see.

The justification for this bill is to generate competition among cable and video providers. This is a goal that our organization has fought to achieve for years.