The FCC should establish procedural protections to prevent broadcasters from abusing the retransmission consent complaint process against small and medium-sized cable companies, ACA said in comments responding to the FCC’s notice of proposed rulemaking in the Satellite Home Viewer Extension & Reauthorization Act (SHVERA). The protections would include 30 days’ written notice to the cable operator of the broadcaster’s intent to file a complaint, and an extended, 30-day period in which to respond to the complaint, ACA said. The Commission should make it clear that the good-faith negotiation requirement applies equally to all broadcasters, both in-market and out-of-market. The FCC also should clarify that it’s not a violation of the good faith negotiation requirement for a cable operator to decline to carry programming streams other than primary video, ACA said. NCTA said in its comments that the FCC shouldn’t impose reciprocal good faith negotiation rules for multichannel video program distributors (MVPDs) that “essentially nullify the market- driven role of retransmission consent.” The Commission’s rules should make it clear that if an MVPD is prohibited from refusing to engage in retransmission consent negotiations with a broadcast station, its refusal to pay for carriage may not be construed as “bad faith,” NCTA said. In addition, the rule shouldn’t interfere with an MVPD’s right to exercise its business judgment or editorial discretion not to carry a particular broadcaster who opts for retransmission consent instead of must carry, NCTA said.
Sale of Adelphia to Time Warner-Comcast wouldn’t be in the public interest of cities and local franchising authorities that oversee cable rates, advocacy groups warned mayors Wed. in a letter to cities within the deal’s radius. “We ask you to join us in opposing the sale of Adelphia Corp.’s cable systems to Comcast and Time Warner Cable and the transfer of local Adelphia cable franchises to those companies,” the letter said.
The FCC should extend the same relief to all broadband and IP platform services, including cable, if it grants an SBC petition for forbearance from applying Title II common carrier regulation to IP platform services, NCTA said an ex parte filed April 14 with the FCC. The Commission might find granting SBC’s request “premature,” given the pending Brand X decision and other FCC rulemakings relevant to the SBC forbearance petition, NCTA said. The Commission should make clear that any decision to forbear from applying Title II’s requirements to SBC’s broadband/IP platform services has no bearing on whether those services come under Title VI requirements -- an issue not raised by SBC’s forbearance petition, NCTA said. The points are similar to those in NCTA’s reply comments on forbearance petitions by BellSouth and Verizon.
Cablevision’s reported $17.1 billion bid for Adelphia could prolong an Adelphia deal with Time-Warner-Comcast, expected to be completed in the next 2 weeks, analysts said. “We continue to believe that the reported Time Warner-Comcast joint bid is the most logical scenario for Adelphia,” said cable analyst Aryeh Bourkoff with UBS Investment Research. According to sources familiar with the deal, the joint bid totals $17.6 billion, comprised of $12.5 billion in cash and $5.1 billion in equity. “The reported new bid for Adelphia and possible divergence from its clustered strategy create uncertainty regarding the eventual strategic direction of Cablevision and any potential asset sale,” Bourkoff said. John Malone, who joined Cablevision’s board a month ago, could play a yet- unknown role, Bourkoff said: “It is unclear what Cablevision’s intentions are as to whether it is interested in cable property expansion or has other motivations.” Meanwhile, the FCC is in a wait-and-see mode with regard to the long unresolved cable ownership rule, which could become more urgent if the acquisition goes through, Commission sources told us. The proposal floated on the 8th floor before former Chmn. Michael Powell left may or may not be a starting point for a new notice of proposed rulemaking, one source in Chmn. Martin’s office said. “We're looking to Chairman Martin to see what he'll do,” another source said. Some analysts think the FCC would approve an Time Warner-Comcast acquisition of Adelphia: “The FCC has not had cable ownership rules in place for more than 4 years, making it highly unlikely that they could be used to block Comcast’s acquisition of 2 million subscribers from Adelphia. The FCC is expected to approve the deal by determining it is in the public interest.”
CEA has downgraded its 2005 projections on DTV product shipments to 15 million units from 20 million because the earlier forecast overstated “the full-year effect” of the FCC’s DTV tuner mandate and its potential to invigorate DTV sales, the assn. said Fri.
An FCC list of stations granted “significantly viewed” status for satellite carriage under the Satellite Home Viewer Extension & Reauthorization Act (SHVERA) excludes some stations that qualify, Sinclair Bcst. told the FCC. “Many stations that are home to a given market are not included on the list,” Sinclair said in comments filed on SHVERA. Station and programmer groups promoted their own changes to the Commission’s proposed rulemaking to carry out SHVERA, announced in Feb. (CD Feb 8 p13).
Comments filed by satellite, cable and telephone firms urge imposition of an expansive, unjustifiable regulatory scheme for broadcast retransmission consent negotiations with multichannel video programming distribution (MVPD), broadcast network affiliates said. ABC, CBS, Fox and NBC TV affiliate associations, replying to comments on the SHVERA rulemaking, said the joint cable commenters’ attack on the retransmission consent process ignores the full marketplace, misrepresents history and is flawed. “Stripped of their rhetoric, the arguments of the MVPD commenters are, in effect, arguments to protect and insulate themselves against competition from each other,” the affiliates said. The MVPDs provide no evidence that in the past 12 years the retransmission consent process has failed. Fewer than 10 retransmission consent process complaints - less than one per year - have been filed with the FCC, and the Commission never has found an instance in which a broadcast station has abused the FCC process or violated retransmission rules, the affiliates said.
The FCC has opened a 30-day comment file on ACA’s petition for rulemaking to reform retransmission consent rules (CD March 7 p17). The rule would remove network nonduplication protection for broadcasters that elect retransmission consent and give cable operators and cable the “right to shop” for carriage of other network stations, said ACA Pres. Matthew Polka. “The fact that they [FCC] opened this up for comments shows that this issue needs scrutiny,” Polka said. ACA members are feeling the pinch from increasingly bitter retransmission negotiations with broadcasters, with cash-for-carriage the latest tactic that some broadcasters are using in test market cases. “We have kicked up a storm with this rulemaking, now it’s time to pull the curtain back on Oz,” he said.
SAN JOSE -- An extensive order addressing some issues in the IP-enabled services rulemaking should be ready for FCC consideration at the end of May, Wireline Bureau Chief Jeffrey Carlisle said at the VON Conference “town hall” here with Policy Development Chief Robert Pepper. The order will deal with jurisdiction over and classification of VoIP and “give indications” on VoIP players and regulatory social obligations such as E-911 and disabled access, Carlisle said. He told the audience he hoped the Commission would issue the order in the next several months. But he added that it depended on the FCC’s composition, since Chmn. Powell is leaving this month and Comr. Abernathy is thought likely to depart soon.
The federal govt.’s firm commitment to broadband over power line (BPL) is demonstrated by the “unprecedented” attendance of 2 key officials at the FCC meeting at which rules for the technology were approved, said Bruce Franca, deputy chief of the Commission’s Office of Engineering & Technology. Franca said having NTIA Administrator Michael Gallagher and Federal Energy Regulatory Commission members at the meeting was a strong statement. Franca said the FCC worked especially closely with Gallagher, and when it got him on board “we really did take that to heart… That is not NTIA’s traditional position on Part 15 devices.” That agency rarely “finds a Part 15 device they like,” Franca told an FCBA BPL seminar last week in San Francisco. All in all, “We're in pretty good company with our enthusiasm for BPL.”