The U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit has set an expedited schedule for briefs in the various challenges to the FCC's new net neutrality rules, giving cable and wireless ISPs 30 days to come up with their opening brief (July 30), not to exceed 20,000 words.
Both sides of the challenge had sought a speedy process. Final briefs in the case will be due Oct. 13.
The court said that oral argument will be scheduled on "the first appropriate date following the completion of briefing," which could mean argument before the end of the year.
And in what may be a tough limitation in a world of MVPDs, OTTs and OVDs, the court has urged the parties "to limit the use of abbreviations, including acronyms."
Wired and wireless ISPs are not challenging the bright-line rules against blocking, throttling or paid prioritization. Instead, they are challenging the FCC's reclassification of Internet access under Title II, as well as including interconnection agreements for the first time in the net neutrality enforcement regime. They are also taking issue with a broad general Internet conduct standard meant to get at conduct that does not fit neatly within those bright lines.
The complete schedule, announced Tuesday, is below:
Joint opening brief of Petitioners United
States Telecom Assoc., et al., and
CTIA - the Wireless Ass’n
(not to exceed 20,000 words) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . July 30, 2015
Joint opening brief of Petitioners Alamo
Broadband Inc. and Daniel Berninger
(not to exceed 4,000 words) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . July 30, 2015
Joint opening brief of Petitioners Full
Service Network, et al.
(not to exceed 9,000 words) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .July 30, 2015
Joint opening brief of Intervenors in
support of Petitioners
(not to exceed 7,000 words) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .August 6, 2015
Opening brief of Respondent
(not to exceed 33,000 words) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .September 14, 2015
Joint brief of Intervenors in support
of Respondent in No. 15-1151
(not to exceed 5,625 words) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . September 21, 2015
Joint brief of Intervenors in support
of Respondent in all other petitions
(not to exceed 15,000 words) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .September 21, 2015
Joint reply brief of Petitioners United
States Telecom Assoc., et al., and
CTIA - the Wireless Ass’n
(not to exceed 10,000 words) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .October 5, 2015
Joint reply brief of Petitioners Alamo
Broadband Inc. and Daniel Berninger
(not to exceed 2,000 words) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .October 5, 2015
Joint reply brief of Petitioners Full
Service Network, et al.
(not to exceed 4,500 words) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .October 5, 2015
Joint reply brief of Intervenors in
support of Petitioners
(not to exceed 3,500 words) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .October 5, 2015
Deferred appendix . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . October 8, 2015
Final briefs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . October 13, 2015
(Photo via Tori Rector's Flickr. Image taken on June 30, 2014 and used per Creative Commons 2.0 license. The photo was cropped to fit 3x4 aspect ratio.)
