Telecom ministers Friday preliminarily rejected a European Commission call for all EU members to make the 800 MHz band, freed by digital switchover, available for wireless broadband by 2013. The proposal is part of the EC’s first multiyear radio spectrum policy program (RSPP). Government officials -- who discussed the plan but didn’t vote on it during a Telecommunications Council session in Brussels -- said they generally favor the EC effort, but the timetable for rollout of “digital dividend” spectrum is one of several provisions that raise national sovereignty concerns.

Rep. Doris Matsui, D-Calif., hopes to bring certainty to industry next year on long-brewing telecom issues like net neutrality and Universal Service Fund reform, the House Communications Subcommittee member said in an interview last week. Providing subsidies to make broadband more affordable for low-income Americans and addressing fears about lack of privacy online are two important ways to motivate more people to embrace fast Internet service, she said.

Congress shushed loud TV commercials. In a voice vote Thursday night, the House passed the CALM Act (S-2847), which would require TV ads to be set at the same volume as regular programming. “It’s a simple fix to a huge nuisance,” said Rep. Anna Eshoo, D-Calif., who sponsored the original House bill (HR-1084). Associations for advertisers and broadcasters said they don’t believe the new requirement will be onerous.

A wide array of communications technology standards groups is being asked to create a combined brain trust to ensure that cloud systems can work together, an organizer said. Robert Marcus, a consultant on telecom-cloud standards to Chinese equipment vendor Huawei, said he will propose to the representatives of more than 20 organizations Tuesday at the Telecom Cloud Information Workshop in Santa Clara, Calif., creation of a Cloud Experts Working Group. It would advise industry and particularly government, in aid of cloud interoperability. The group would offer advice on cloud technology, open source and reference architecture, he said.

The FCC should focus on helping the buildout and expansion of 4G services, Commissioner Meredith Baker said in a keynote at the Phoenix Center telecom symposium Thursday. She called moving forward on net neutrality rules “a legal and political mistake.”

The first version of the draft FCC net neutrality order cites both direct and ancillary authority as giving the commission purview to bar ISPs from discriminating in the type of traffic they carry on their networks, agency officials said. Ancillary authority was a prominent issue in April’s Comcast ruling by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, which held that the commission was out of bounds in relying on Title I. But some law professors said there are risks to a Title I approach, even if specific sections of the Communications Act are also cited.

TV and Radio broadcast groups are increasingly working with online companies to offer daily coupons, getting in on a craze highlighted this week by Google’s reported $5.3 billion bid for Groupon, industry executives said. “We're not sure if this is white hot for the next six months or the next six years, or even the next six days,” but “we love the space,” said Kerry Oslund, vice president of digital media for Schurz Communications. Radio stations have long offered half-off deals of the sort that have driven sites such as Groupon and Living Social to popularity, but the offers are newer territory for TV broadcasters, Oslund said.

A measure to block net neutrality rules has a very good chance of clearing Congress and confronting the president next year, even with the Senate remaining in Democratic hands, the Republican counsel to the House Communications Subcommittee said Thursday. A resolution under the Congressional Review Act to nullify the rules and bar any similar ones would be filibuster-proof and require only a simple majority vote of each house of Congress, said Neil Fried, the subcommittee’s senior minority counsel. Congress would have 60 days early next year to adopt the resolution, he said on a panel in Washington of the American Bar Association’s antitrust section.

SEATTLE -- Having made its name beating Apple in the desktop wars, Microsoft is now taking cues from its consumer-savvy Cupertino rival in more closely managing the various Windows platforms, tech pundits said late Wednesday on a panel hosted by the Puget Sound Business Journal’s TechFlash blog. They also predicted a steep climb for Google’s Android platform versus Apple’s iOS which is found in the iPhone and iPad. The tech community was gathering for TechFlash’s annual Flashies awards, in which readers voted for “do-gooder” (Northwest Entrepreneur Network), “newcomer” (Founder Institute, a startup and entrepreneur training program), “stunt” (T-Mobile’s designation of its HSPA+ network as 4G) and “debacle” (Microsoft’s short-lived Kin phone) of the year, among other categories.

Verizon Wireless will turn on its LTE network Dec. 5 in 38 markets, Tony Melone, the carrier’s senior vice president, said in a conference call Wednesday. It will offer two 4G mobile broadband plans and will educate and alert consumers about their data usage under the offerings, he said.