feed on feeds - 2019/10/25 - items 0 to 15

The rise of streaming services could give cable companies an excuse to raise rates under a Federal Communications Commission order handed down on October 25th. From a report: The order, which comes in response to a petition by Charter, finds that AT&T's TV Now streaming service qualifies as reasonable competition for conventional cable, opening the door to a massive deregulation in monopoly cable markets. Under the Cable Act of 1992, local regulators are permitted to regulate cable prices in markets with only one provider. The provision is meant to prevent cable companies from leveraging that monopoly power to set unfairly high rates. When a new cable company comes to town, providers can file a petition to have those regulations removed. Charter's case centered on a small group of territories in Massachusetts and Hawaii, but Charter's new competition wasn't coming from a competing cable TV service. Instead, Charter argued that AT&T's streaming service, combined with the company's existing broadband offering, made up a close enough substitute for cable TV that Charter no longer counted as a local monopoly. Despite opposition from both Massachusetts and Hawaii state governments, the FCC ultimately agreed, leaving Charter free to raise its cable rates.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Turkish government denies claims as 'untrue and imaginary,' adding that it sticks to its policy of 'non-refoulement'.

Thousands also wounded by security forces as renewed protests erupt in Baghdad and several southern cities.

Forecasters issue tornado watch for Mississippi and Alabama as downpours lash southern United States.

In the turbid, frigid waters roaring from the glaciers of Canada's high Arctic, researchers have made a surprising discovery: for decades, the northern rivers secretly pulled carbon dioxide from the atmosphere at a rate faster than the Amazon rainforest. From a report: The findings, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, flip the conventional understanding of rivers, which are largely viewed as sources of carbon emissions. "It was a total surprise," said Dr Kyra St Pierre, a biologist at the University of British Columbia and lead researcher on the project. "Given what we know about the rivers though ... the findings are intuitive when you think about it. But we were initially very surprised to see what we did." The discovery came from time spent collecting meltwater samples on Ellesmere Island, in Canada's Nunavut territory, where several glaciers flow into Lake Hazen. The team of researchers also gathered samples in the Rocky Mountains and Greenland. "We have a pretty good understanding of the state of glaciers globally," said St Pierre. "One thing we don't know much about is the meltwaters and what happens when it ... flows into rivers and downstream lakes." In temperate rivers, a bounty of organic material -- plant life and fish -- results in higher levels of decomposition, meaning the bodies of water emit a far greater amount of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere than they absorb. But glacial rivers, with their milky appearance and silt-laden composition, are not very hospitable to aquatic life, leading to far less organic decay -- and little carbon output.