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FCC asks for opinions on media ownership rules
Mar 13, 2012 11:58 pm
Michael Grotticelli at Broadcast Engineering reports on the variety of opinions in the comments the FCC asked for in regard to media ownership rules. A survey:
• The National Association of Broadcasters, "told the commission that its proposed modifications to the rules don’t go far enough. The broadcast lobby wants the FCC to allow duopolies in more markets, eliminate of the eight-voices and top-four stations tests, scrap local radio ownership limits, scrap the newspaper-broadcast cross-ownership rules, not count joint agreements toward ownership caps if it does preserve those rules and it should not increase disclosure requirements."
• Free Press, the public advocates, disagreed. “'The FCC has no business relaxing its ownership rules when it has shown it can’t even hold broadcasters to the letter of existing law,' said the Free Press in comments. 'The local TV ownership rule is supposed to promote competition between local stations, but some broadcasters are skirting the rules by entering into secret deals to combine local newsrooms and station operations. If it walks like a duopoly and talks like a duopoly, it should be treated like a duopoly under the Commission’s rules,'" Grotticelli reports.
• Gray Television, "noted the FCC’s implicit suggestion that broadband penetration must be 100 percent before the Internet will be included as a competitor to broadcast TV when it comes to ownership rule reviews. The company argued that the Internet is already having a major impact that the FCC has not taken into account," he wrote.
• The American Television Alliance, a coalition of cable and satellite operators, "told the FCC that it should enforce and tighten the media ownership rules because it has to 'prevent broadcasters from exploiting these rules to harm consumers.'
• ATVA, an advocate of retransmission consent reform, "said broadcast network 'interference' in retransmission negotiations hurts localism, that joint sales and services agreements are loopholes in the ownership rules that should be closed and that stations should be banned from affiliating with multiple networks in a market.'" Read the full story at Broadcast Engineering.
• The National Association of Broadcasters, "told the commission that its proposed modifications to the rules don’t go far enough. The broadcast lobby wants the FCC to allow duopolies in more markets, eliminate of the eight-voices and top-four stations tests, scrap local radio ownership limits, scrap the newspaper-broadcast cross-ownership rules, not count joint agreements toward ownership caps if it does preserve those rules and it should not increase disclosure requirements."
• Free Press, the public advocates, disagreed. “'The FCC has no business relaxing its ownership rules when it has shown it can’t even hold broadcasters to the letter of existing law,' said the Free Press in comments. 'The local TV ownership rule is supposed to promote competition between local stations, but some broadcasters are skirting the rules by entering into secret deals to combine local newsrooms and station operations. If it walks like a duopoly and talks like a duopoly, it should be treated like a duopoly under the Commission’s rules,'" Grotticelli reports.
• Gray Television, "noted the FCC’s implicit suggestion that broadband penetration must be 100 percent before the Internet will be included as a competitor to broadcast TV when it comes to ownership rule reviews. The company argued that the Internet is already having a major impact that the FCC has not taken into account," he wrote.
• The American Television Alliance, a coalition of cable and satellite operators, "told the FCC that it should enforce and tighten the media ownership rules because it has to 'prevent broadcasters from exploiting these rules to harm consumers.'
• ATVA, an advocate of retransmission consent reform, "said broadcast network 'interference' in retransmission negotiations hurts localism, that joint sales and services agreements are loopholes in the ownership rules that should be closed and that stations should be banned from affiliating with multiple networks in a market.'" Read the full story at Broadcast Engineering.