While the NAB and the “Big Four” network affiliate associations are seeking a two-tiered approach that would loosen the FCC’s current 39% ownership reach cap, Nexstar Media Group argues that the cap should simply disappear.
“Given the overwhelming shift in Americans’ mediaconsumption habits,” the national cap’s elimination is what the company led by the TVB’s Chairman, Perry Sook, wants.
In comments filed Monday (3/19) with the FCC, Nexstar EVP/General Counsel Elizabeth Ryder — joined by Wiley Rein counsel — spoke of the “ever-increasing video competition from a multiplicity of alternative sources for programming and information.”
In what Ryder calls “this vast competitive sea,” she argues that TV broadcasters alone are subject to “an arbitrary restriction on the number of viewers they are permitted to reach with their programming.”
Given “the breadth of diversity and competition present in today’s media market,” this undermines any justification for retaining any limitation on national TV audience reach.
What about localism?
“Localism also does not demand retention of a national cap because the number of viewers
a television broadcaster reaches nationwide has no correlation whatsoever to how a television broadcaster serves its viewers in individual markets,” Ryder contends. “Given the public interest obligations and natural incentives of all broadcasters to consider and respond to the needs and interests of the local communities that they serve, elimination of the national cap will have no effect on localism.”
Moreover, Ryder adds, the “preservation of localism” that underpins the national cap limits has historically been considered to be with respect to balance the power between the national networks and their local affiliates, (i.e., negotiating leverage between networks and their affiliates) not ensuring broadcasters serve their communities.
Ryder notes:
As the NPRM acknowledges, “the video marketplace has changed considerably . . . ” and
television broadcasters now face hurdles never contemplated at the adoption of the national cap in 1941 (or even when last modified in 2004), including (but not limited to) online alternatives to video distribution, direct to consumer video distribution, reverse compensation payable to the television networks, consolidation of broadcast and cable network ownership, and consolidation of the MVPD distribution system.
Now, more than ever, television broadcasters must be permitted to achieve the scale and scope of operations necessary to compete in the current vastly fragmented, distribution system-dominated video marketplace. Elimination of the national cap in its entirety will foster increased competition among broadcasters, as well as provide broadcasters
with opportunities to find innovative ways to serve audiences, thereby promoting competition, diversity, and localism. Accordingly, Nexstar urges the Commission to eliminate the national cap rule in its entirety.
RBR+TVBR
