As the wireless industry grabs a bigger chunk of the television dial, the remaining free over-the-air stations are going to be on the move starting next year. More than 900 American television stations will get new channel numbers after the move is complete, all to squeeze signals into the unchanged VHF and diminished UHF dial.

The folks at Rabbit Ears have a handy tool that will guide you through the changes, and they are enormous. Just use the drop-down box next to “Market” and find your city. Here at Stop the Cap! HQ, all but two stations in Rochester, N.Y., are getting new channel positions:

TV station reassignments as a result of the channel repack for Rochester, NY. The first two columns show the new vs. current actual channel number.

Most viewers won’t notice a big difference because the FCC is allowing stations to continue to market themselves with a virtual channel number than usually dates back to before the migration to digital TV broadcasting. But the channel changes can still be important for viewers using an antenna, especially if your local station(s) migrate into the VHF or UHF bands where they might not have been before. Two different antennas are sometimes required to get good reception from both bands. The traditional “rabbit ears” indoor telescoping antenna is usually designed for VHF reception, while small loop antennas work better for UHF. Various other antenna configurations can work for both bands, some better than others. Outdoor aerials can be designed to receive VHF, UHF or both. You may need an antenna upgrade if your antenna isn’t designed to receive the station(s) you want to see after they move.

D.C.’s perpetually revolving door for regulators and lobbyists keeps on spinning.

FCC chairman Ajit Pai today announced he will appoint Charter Communications’ former general counsel as the next head of the FCC’s Consumer and Government Affairs Bureau.

Patrick Webre has taken several trips through D.C.’s revolving door over the last seven years, serving 11 months as an associate chief of that same bureau under former FCC chairman Julius Genachowski. Starting in November 2010, Webre took a position as senior director and senior counsel at Charter Communications. Starting in 2012, Webre was hired by Huron Consulting Group and later as a staff attorney at corporate D.C. law firm Jenner & Block.

Jenner & Block’s profile notes while working for Charter, Webre “was their primary advocate to commissioners and staff at the FCC, the National Telecommunications and Information Administration, the Federal Trade Commission, the Department of Justice, and Members of Congress and their staff.” In short, he was effectively Charter’s lobbyist.

Jenner & Block claims it achieves “excellent results for our clients,” which have included Comcast, AT&T, and Verizon, among others.

“Our lawyers combine broad experience with inside perspective into the inner workings of the FCC, the Department of Justice and other regulatory agencies across the country,” the firm’s website notes. “Our practice includes a former FCC general counsel and senior FCC policy advisor, a former senior counsel to the chairman for Transactions, numerous Supreme Court and Court of Appeals clerks and nationally recognized lawyers who have extensive experience handling cutting-edge telecommunications and media law issues. […] Together, we have tackled numerous important issues before the FCC and the courts, including net neutrality, media ownership, online video and content restrictions on video programming and video games.”

Webre

Jenner & Block does not represent you — the average American consumer. It represents big-pocketed telecom companies interested in getting their corporate agendas through the regulatory and legislative workings of Washington. In its message to clients, the law firm touts its achievements:

AGENCY PROCEEDINGS AND ENFORCEMENT ACTIONS

Jenner & Block represents telecommunications and media clients at the FCC, the Department of Justice and other regulatory agencies across the country.  We have developed particular expertise in matters concerning video regulation, the Internet and other advanced services, spectrum and wireless issues, and telephone competition.  Recent matters include program access and program carriage disputes, media ownership proceedings, proceedings on the status of on-line video providers, net neutrality, spectrum and interference proceedings, universal service and intercarrier compensation.

MERGERS AND ACQUISITIONS

Jenner & Block regularly represents media and telecommunications clients in mergers and acquisitions and other transactions involving license transfers.  Our work includes both securing regulatory approval from the FCC and other regulatory agencies and, with our Corporate practice, negotiating and executing agreements.  Representative transactions include Comcast-NBCU, AT&T-T-Mobile, Verizon-Frontier, Verizon Wireless-ALLTEL and CenturyTel-Embarq.  We have also successfully represented clients in numerous radio and television station transactions.

Mr. Webre’s new job at the FCC is to ostensibly represent the interests of consumers. The Consumer and Governmental Affairs Bureau develops and implements the commission’s consumer policies, including disability access. Its consumer center is directly responsible for addressing consumer inquiries and complaints about some of the same cable and phone companies Mr. Webre used to represent.

Pai issued a statement suggesting Webre would be his perfect choice to replace current chief Alison Kutler, who was originally appointed by former FCC chairman Tom Wheeler.

“Consumers sit at the core of the FCC’s work, and the FCC’s Consumer and Governmental Affairs Bureau serves as our primary liaison to them,” said Pai in a statement. “Whether reviewing consumer complaints or developing policies to stop robocalls, CGB works hard to serve the public interest. Patrick’s skill and experience will enable us to continue this important mission.”

The FCC has circulated a draft rulemaking that proposes to make it easier for phone companies to end landline and DSL service in areas they are no longer interested in maintaining existing infrastructure.

“We propose eliminating some or all of the changes to the copper retirement process adopted by the Commission in the 2015 Technology Transitions Order,” according to the draft, which would allow phone companies to end service “where alternative voice services are available to consumers in the affected service area.”

The proposed new policy would depart significantly from the one put in place during the Obama Administration because it would end assurances that competing providers would have reasonable and affordable access to wholesale broadband and voice services after phone companies mothball their copper wire networks in favor of wireless or fiber alternatives. If the FCC proposal passes, incumbent phone companies like Verizon and AT&T could end rural landline and DSL service and not make provisions for competitors to have access to the technology alternatives the phone companies would offer affected customers.

Verizon immediately praised the FCC proposal, saying it was “encouraged the FCC has set as a priority creating a regulatory environment that encourages investment in next-generation networks and clears away outdated and unnecessary regulations,” wrote Will Johnson, senior vice-president of federal regulatory and legal affairs at Verizon. “This action is forward-looking, productive and will lead to tangible consumer benefits.”

Previous attempts by Verizon to discontinue landline and DSL service did not lead to “tangible consumer benefits” as Verizon might have hoped. Instead, it led to a consumer backlash, particularly in areas affected by Superstorm Sandy in 2012. Verizon elected not to rebuild its copper wire infrastructure in affected coastal communities in New York and New Jersey. Instead, it introduced a wireless landline replacement called Voice Link that proved unpopular and caused a revolt among residents on Fire Island. The wireless replacement did not support data, health monitoring, credit card transaction processing, faxing, and was criticized for being unreliable. Verizon eventually relented and opted to expand its FiOS fiber to the home network on the island instead.

Verizon also attempted to market Voice Link to New York residents in certain urban and rural service areas affected by extended service outages in lieu of repairing its existing infrastructure. Under the proposed changes, the FCC would ease the rules governing the transition away from copper-based services, which include traditional landline service and DSL, in favor of wireless technology replacements and fiber optics.

Because telephone companies like AT&T and Verizon have made mothballing rural wireline infrastructure a priority, the FCC strengthened its rules in 2015 by doubling the notification window from 90 to 180 days, giving more time for affected customers to make other service arrangements or complain to regulators that there were no suitable alternatives. The FCC wants to roll back that provision to its earlier 90-day notification window in response to telephone company complaints that maintaining copper wire infrastructure is expensive and diverted investment away from next-generation networks.

AT&T has been lobbying for several years to win permission from state legislatures to abandon copper wireline infrastructure, mostly in rural areas, where the company has chosen not to upgrade to fiber optic networks. AT&T claims only about 10% of their original landline customer base still have that service.

Both Verizon and AT&T have shown an interest in moving rural consumers to more proprietary wireless networks, preferably their own, where consumers would get voice and data services. But consumer advocates complain customers could lose access to competitive alternatives, may not have a guarantee of reliable service because of variable wireless coverage, could pay substantially more for wireless alternatives, and may be forced to use technology that either does not support or works less reliably with home security systems, medical monitoring, faxing, and data-related transactions like credit card processing.

Other consumer groups like AARP and Public Knowledge have complained that shortening the window for a transition away from basic landline and DSL service to alternative technology could disproportionately affect the customers most likely to still depend on traditional wireline service — the elderly, poor, and those in rural areas.

Reuters is reporting the Republican-dominated Federal Communications Commission has reversed a pro-consumer mandate requiring Charter to overbuild at least one million homes to offer competitive internet service. The requirement was imposed on Charter Communications as part of the FCC’s approval of its merger deal with Time Warner Cable and Bright House Networks in 2016.

The overbuild requirement would have forced Charter to directly compete with incumbent phone and/or cable operators in areas where only one provider now offers service.

Pai

The petition to repeal the condition was personally circulated by FCC chairman Ajit Pai who didn’t feel the FCC should mandate cable companies to compete as part of a merger approval.

Former FCC chairman Thomas Wheeler pushed for the requirement, noting that Charter’s merger offered an opportunity to incorporate pro-consumer deal conditions like increased competition. The overbuild requirement would have required Charter to expand its cable service in areas where only telephone company DSL was available or give an opportunity for consumers to have a choice of cable operators. Pai’s effort gives Charter a big break, now only requiring the company to offer high-speed internet as a de facto monopoly to two million new customers where no internet service currently exists.

It also represents a gift to small independent cable operators and their lobbying arm, the American Cable Association, who feared the overbuild requirement would bring Charter into their service areas as an unwelcome competitor that would have “devastating effects on the smaller broadband providers Charter will overbuild” and could put them out of business.

The Competitive Enterprise Institute has its own pending filing asking the FCC to eliminate other deal conditions, including a prohibition on data caps Charter must adhere to for up to seven years.