FCC flooded with opinions for STB review

Over the holidays, the Federal Communications Commission received a large volume and wide variety of opinions from cable TV, telco TV and related parties on how to handle its review of the set-top box market. The agency had asked the industry for comment on the review, with a comment-filing deadline of Dec. 21. Last week, Light Reading's Cable Digital News took a closer look, via multiple, related stories--at the comments filed by various parties.

The notable ones we'll mention here (you can follow the links below for more details), include comments by Verizon Communications and TiVo. Verizon said it supported the review's efforts, and asked the FCC to rescind the mandate for CableCARD STB security technology in favor of a more technology-agnostic approach from the Alliance for Telecommunications Industry Solutions.

TiVo, for its part, took issue with the cable TV industry's control over the STB sector, saying cable companies discriminate against independent STB vendors by unduly influencing and controlling STB design and functions. It will be interesting to see how TiVo's comments go over with service providers, since the DVR pioneer has been interested in wooing service providers as partners, but also has legally challenged the DVR offerings of some of them.

For more:
- LR CDN has multiple stories (one, two and TiVo) on the comments filed

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