The woman who serves as SVP/Deputy General Counsel for Legal and Regulatory Affairs at the NAB last Friday met with a key advisor to one of the FCC’s two Republican Commissioners to state the association’s case that a Commission-hosted database featuring MVPD notifications of a broadcast TV station “blackout” due to a retransmission consent impasse goes beyond the agency’s statutory authority.
Furthermore, the NAB says it could lead to more service disruptions while failing to provide any meaningful information to consumers.
As noted in Media Bureau Docket No. 23-427, reporting requirements for commercial television broadcast station signal loss due to a carriage dispute would require multichannel
video programming distributors to notify the Commission when a broadcast signal is
unavailable via an MVPD service for 24 hours or more.
The NAB’s Erin Dozier says that’s a plan that establishes nothing more than an “attractive nuisance” that MVPDs “cannot resist, triggering increased disruptions and harming consumers.”
Dozier also shared the NAB’s view that the FCC-hosted database would exceed the Commission’s “very limited statutory authority relating to retransmission consent,” while also offering little of value to those experiencing a “blackout,” by law, in the absence of an agreement between station owner and cable TV service provider. “From a consumer perspective, the proposed database would be irrelevant, incomplete or both,” Dozier argues.
Sharing that she met with Adam Cassady, who advises Republican FCC Commissioner Nathan Simington, on October 11, two days after a meeting with Democratic Commissioner Anna Gómez, Dozier noted, “The Commission’s role with respect to retransmission consent is extremely limited, because Congress intended that arms-length negotiations between broadcasters and MVPDs would dictate the prices, terms and conditions of retransmission consent, subject only to a requirement to negotiate in good faith. Given the Commission’s very limited role and its inability to use information on negotiating impasses to require parties to take any additional steps, it is not clear what lawful purpose this information gathering effort can serve, from the Commission’s standpoint.”
Dozier also argued that consumers wouldn’t naturally go to a FCC database to gain more information about a service disruption, nor would they use it as a comparison tool for MVPD or vMVPD shopping.
Then, there is the issue of the database not including cable TV channels that have experienced service disruptions due to carriage agreement impasses, Dozier points out.
Furthermore, Dozier notes that while the database could list stations available at that time, it fails to note that they’ve been the subject of repeated “blackouts” by MVPDs or vMVPDs — and Dish or DirecTV — as they seek to fight broadcasters seeking increased compensation for content that in recent years has included more local news (with a significant investment in this self-produced product).
Dozier’s comments were also shared on October 9 with Deena Shetler, Commissioner Gómez’s Chief of Staff and Legal Advisor for Media and International.
