The year of 2018 at the FCC could be considered the year of déjà vu.  Sure, the Commission broke new ground in some areas, but many of the headline-grabbing items rehashed old proceedings.  For instance:

Net Neutrality

The ink was barely dry on the FCC’s net neutrality rules when, in January, the agency released a Declaratory Ruling that largely revoked those rules (see, Vol. XV, Issue 2).  The January Order – which took effect on June 11th – effectively terminated the bright line rules that were central to the FCC’s 2015 rules: no blocking lawful content, no throttling lawful content, and no paid prioritization.

To say this was a hotly-contested proceeding is an understatement: the issue caused a 3,000% spike in the FCC’s web traffic and the agency received about 22 million comments.  In August 2018, the FCC’s Inspector General concluded that the bulk of this was caused by a segment on John Oliver’s TV show.

Citizens Broadband Radio Service

The agency also revisited its rules for the Citizens Broadband Radio Service (CBRS) band (3.55-3.70 GHz).  The proposed rules essentially reopened the CBRS proceeding to make the spectrum allocation more palatable to large wireless carriers.  The Public Notice seeking comment on proposed rule revisions was issued in August 2018 and the agency finalized its revised (again) rules in October 2018 (see, Vol. XV, Issue 44).  This most recent revision clears the way for CBRS networks to begin operating in 2019.  We expect the General Access tier to be available for use in the first four months of 2019 and the auction for the Priority Access tier of licenses likely will be held in late 2019 or early 2020.