the HOT List

Sadly, this trip to the Sunshine State won't involve Mickey Mouse, Harry Potter or any "toes in the sand." FCC Chairman Ajit Pai and Democratic Commissioner Mignon Clyburn will be in Florida on Monday to jointly inspect the damage caused by Hurricane Irma. Meanwhile, JVC Media is dealing with outages and issues in three different markets, CEO John Caracciolo tells RBR+TVBR.

The FCC's Media Bureau has handed down a memorandum opinion and order regarding a dispute between Ellington Broadcasting and MVPD entity Cable One over the latter's decision not to air two low-power TV stations serving two small cities in Mississippi. The decision is a victory ... for both parties, in a sense. We've broken it down for you.

The TV station airing the Spanish-language Azteca América broadcast network in the nation's No. 1 Hispanic DMA — Los Angeles — is trading hands. How is this possible, as the station participated in the FCC's Spectrum Auction? The party that holds its Channel-Sharing Agreement just sold the CSA to a Wisconsin-based player, making this a "zombie" deal that sees the transfer of programming rights, and not an actual broadcast TV facility.

A U.S. Senator's term of office is six years. It's therefore fitting that a former senator who now serves as President/CEO of the NAB will be staying on for another six years, thanks to a contract extension announced this morning by NAB Joint Board Chair and Beasley Media Group CEO Caroline Beasley.

A quartet of station affiliation agreements that were set to expire at the end of 2018 have been extended, keeping programs such as The Big Bang Theory on four Sinclair Broadcast Group stations.

The company filed an 11th hour appeal that headed off having its Class A common stock on NASDAQ suspended on September 11, 2017. The appeal is with regard to a September 1, 2017 notification the company received from the Listing Qualifications Department of NASDAQ relating to Cumulus’ previously disclosed failure to comply with the minimum stockholders’ equity requirement.

When it comes to modernization, some may think of the coolest new digital gadgetry coming from Silicon Valley. Or, they may consider a shopping spree in Adams Morgan at Hudson & Crane. For the FCC and its Chairman, Ajit Pai, modernization means regulatory weight loss, and trimming the fat. 

The six noncommercial TV stations licensed to Maryland Public Broadcasting have entered into a Consent Decree with the FCC's Media Bureau to resolve an EEO investigation, which on Sept. 5 was formally terminated.

Radio deregulation seems to be on the fast track with the new FCC. That seemed to be the biggest takeaway from a Thursday morning 2017 Radio Show breakout session at which the FCC's Peter Doyle, Chief of the Media Bureau's Audio Division, seemed to reiterate FCC Chairman Ajit Pai's remarks made during his Wednesday luncheon keynote address. 

Of the six individuals speaking this morning at a House Energy & Commerce Committee Subcommittee on Communications and Technology hearing focused on the post-FCC Spectrum Auction repack process, the choice of the GM of The E.W. Scripps Co.'s O&O in Nashville to testify may be a smart one. After all, the Subcommittee Chairman's district includes much of the station's DMA.

In an announcement made at exactly 7:18pm Eastern on Wednesday, a potentially ugly battle between Cox Communications and Hearst Television over retransmission fees that led to the 12:01am Eastern removal of the broadcast company's stations from the MVPDs lineups has ended.

One of the first things FCC Chairman Ajit Pai said in his keynote address during the 2017 Radio Show luncheon had nothing to do with regulation, or government. He immediately congratulated Entercom President/CEO David Field for "the well-deserved honor of receiving the National Radio Award." That set the tone for an address that was well-received by all.

A new era for Saga Communications has officially begun. As of today, it's a radio industry pure-play. And, that seems to be good news for investors, based on its Wednesday activity on Wall Street.

While Cox and Hearst have reached an impasse in negotiating a renewal retransmission consent agreement, leading the MVPD to drop all Hearst stations at 12:01am today, Raycom Media has successfully won a second reprieve with AT&T-owned DirecTV as the two parties continue to hammer out a new retrans deal.

Say goodbye to Retirement Living Television. The cable and satellite offering will now become home to Newsy, the until-now "over the top" news and information network targeting millennials. The shift is the result of The E.W. Scripps Company's acquisition of RLTV carriage contracts, and will surely raise questions regarding millennials as "cord-cutters," and not MVPD subscribers.