The Motion Picture Association, which today very much includes “Big Tech” behemoths Amazon and Netflix, has asked the FCC to refrain from “intervening” in the video marketplace “in light of increasing innovation, intermodal competition, and viewer choice.”
In an ex parte filing tied to the FCC’s official proceeding for its biennial Communications Marketplace Report, which evaluates the state of competition in the communications industry (GN Docket No. 26-78), the MPA tells the Commission should intervene in the video marketplace “only where it has clear legal authority and unequivocal record evidence of market failure.”
Representing an organization whose members include Sony Pictures Entertainment, Universal City Studios, Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures and Warner Bros. Entertainment as well as Paramount Pictures, the MPA warns, “To do otherwise would hinder, rather than help, innovation and viewer choice.”
That is because, the MPA argues, the marketplace today “shows abundance and intermodal
competition, not clear signs of market failure.”
As such, reclassification of a virtual MVPD with a traditional cable TV services provider such as Xfinity or Spectrum should be avoided.
Those are fighting words for many broadcast TV station ownership groups, which have grown increasingly reliant on retransmission consent fees to combat stagnant core advertising growth. Today, YouTube TV has become a major provider of local and cable television channels, as has “sports first” Fubo, now a sibling to Hulu + Live TV.
“From a competition standpoint, examining intermodal competition across broadcast, cable, satellite, telecommunications, and streaming services remains important,” MPA VP of Media Policy and Regulatory Counsel Kenneth Mallory states in the filing. “These services should not be conflated from a jurisdiction standpoint, however, as each is subject to a different regulatory regime. Importantly, although streaming services compete with all the other video platforms, the FCC and Congress have both observed that the agency lacks authority to regulate online video services.”
Furthermore, Mallory asserts, “Intervening in this vibrant marketplace for in-home and mobile consumption of content would thus jeopardize significant national and local economic benefits,” reiterating comments made in 2024 that the video programming marketplace “will only continue to thrive if the Commission facilitates a light-touch approach to regulating video services.”
At present, retransmission consent accords involving vMVPDs are handled by broadcast television networks, not by the affiliates.
