Legal challenges of FCC net neutrality rules appear all but certain, but where they will come from remains unclear. Verizon is the leading candidate, industry and FCC officials said. Other industry players, including mid-sized wireline-only carriers, also could challenge. Public interest groups who lost their fight to get the commission to reclassify broadband transmission under Title II of the Communications Act also appear to be considering an appeal.

A coming FCC rulemaking notice on retransmission consent deals may take a broad look at the contracts between subscription-video providers and TV stations, said agency and industry officials watching development of the draft. The notice may not propose many specific remedies to reduce the number of carriage disputes that lead to TV station blackouts on cable, DBS or telco-TV systems, they said. Although styled as a notice of proposed rulemaking (NPRM), the draft may read more like a notice of inquiry (NOI), in that it may ask many questions and not propose many specific rules, said agency and industry officials not involved in writing the item.

An FCC order on Comcast’s plan to buy control of NBC Universal may circulate yet before Friday’s federal holiday, industry and commission officials said. If the order didn’t circulate late Wednesday, and it wasn’t as of 5 p.m., it may go to the eighth floor Thursday, they said. Approval by commissioners is unlikely this year, agency and industry officials have said (CD Dec 21 p5). Comcast said Wednesday the deal won’t be completed by Dec. 31.

Key telecom priorities of Hungary, which assumes the EU presidency Jan. 1, are “strategy, security and spectrum policy,” Information and Communications Minister Zsolt Nyitrai said. The byword for the term will be “continuity” of ongoing work on the Europe 2020 strategy, the country’s foreign minister said at a Tuesday news briefing. That work includes several communications items agreed upon in November 2009 by the then-upcoming Spanish, Belgian and Hungarian presidencies. Industry groups, meanwhile, urged the presidency to focus on fiber deployment and investment in new networks. ISPs said their priorities for coming months include EU-level talks on traffic data retention and ISP liability.

Worldwide factory equipment revenue generated by mobile communications will approach the quarter-trillion-dollar mark by year end, said iSuppli. Global mobile communications factory equipment revenue for 2010 is forecast to be $235.5 billion, up 7.9 percent from last year, on the expansion of mobile broadband worldwide and by sales of 3G phones, the industry research firm said. For 2011, revenue for the segment is projected to hit $271.3 billion. 3G mobile handsets will account for the largest share of revenue at $86.4 billion, up 34.6 percent from $64.2 billion in 2009, the firm said.

Hill Republicans bombarded the FCC with threats to reverse net neutrality rules approved Tuesday by the commission. Democrats said they were happy net neutrality is moving forward, but some said they wished for stronger protections.

Time Warner Cable won’t be required to carry Baltimore Orioles and Washington Nationals baseball games to its approximately 2 million expanded-basic subscribers in North Carolina, after all. FCC members adopted 4-1 an order that overturns an arbitrator’s decision to require the carriage and that undoes a draft circulated by Kevin Martin on his last business day as FCC chairman, commission officials said Tuesday afternoon. Commissioner Michael Copps is the dissenter from the forthcoming order, agency officials said.

Low-power TV stations on channels 52-59 should have to move or stop operations by the end of 2011, if not sooner, AT&T and Verizon Wireless said in FCC comments filed separately. The agency is considering rules for managing the LPTV transition to digital broadcasting, a switch some operators of the stations said last week shouldn’t happen until the agency sets UHF spectrum policy (CD Dec 20 p5). “LPTV stations have been on notice for more than a decade that the 700 MHz band was being reallocated,” AT&T said. The commission’s proposed Dec. 31, 2011, deadline for those stations to stop operating on those channels will give them plenty of time to find other channels to relocate to, AT&T said.

The FCC on Tuesday approved net neutrality rules under Title I of the Communications Act, over scathing dissents by Commissioners Robert McDowell and Meredith Baker. Democrats Michael Copps and Mignon Clyburn also lobbed criticisms at the rules, saying they do not go far enough. The vote, after weeks of negotiations and months of build-up, was anticlimactic, since Copps and Clyburn had announced Monday they would not oppose the order (CD Dec 21 p1).

The FCC adopted a notice of inquiry Tuesday asking for guidance on building the “next generation” of 911. The 5-0 vote was overshadowed by a lengthy discussion of net neutrality rules, but commission Chairman Julius Genachowski said the 911 measure is long overdue. “It’s time to bring 9-1-1 into the digital age,” he said in prepared remarks. “If you find yourself in an emergency situation and want to send a text for help, you can pretty much text anyone except a 9-1-1 call center."