Amended Cases Against Cablevision May Lead FCC to Act

Bureau staffers reviewing the complaints and another one by AT&T against Cox Communications had been studying how a January commission order on program access, which allowed AT&T and Verizon to amend their complaints under the new rules, affected the cases (CD April 8 p3). The revised complaints ought to revive the bureau’s look at the cases, and perhaps get action following responses from defendants Cablevision and MSG, industry and commission officials said. A bureau spokeswoman declined to comment.

"Hopefully, the Verizon and AT&T filings will encourage the Media Bureau to quickly begin enforcing the new program access rules for terrestrially delivered programming,” said pay-TV lawyer Paul Feldman of Fletcher Heald, not involved in the cases. A spokesman for AT&T couldn’t say right away if Cablevision had begun good-faith talks for the two regional sports networks at issue in complaints from that telco and Verizon: MSG and MSG Plus. Earlier this month, Cox said it was offering AT&T and other pay-TV companies access to its channel in San Diego featuring San Diego Padres baseball games, which was the subject of a complaint by the telco at the FCC (CD June 17 p14). The bureau earlier found in favor of Cox, a decision AT&T appealed to the full commission.

Cablevision and MSG told Verizon April 19 they'd continue withholding the HD feed of the two channels, the telco’s supplement said. “While it has been more than a year since Verizon filed its original complaint in this proceeding, more than five months since the Order was issued, and nearly three months since the Order took effect, consumers continue to be denied the full benefits of meaningful choice” since Verizon can’t sell to its customers HD versions of the channels, it said. “This harm to Verizon and consumers is ongoing and poised to increase over the next several months as the new seasons of professional basketball and hockey approach. … Cablevision’s further refusal to provide Verizon access to the HD-feed will prevent consumers from viewing this must-see sports programming on FiOS,” Verizon’s pay-TV product.

"It should be clear by now that whatever problems Verizon is having in the marketplace has nothing to do with a lack of HD programming,” a Cablevision spokeswoman said. “The idea that a phone company more than 10 times our size needs a regulatory bailout is absurd.” An MSG spokesman said it follows federal regulations and noted Verizon is a customer. Its FiOS subscribers have access “to every single game on MSG and MSG Plus,” he continued.

"Cablevision continues to refuse to provide Verizon access to the HD feeds of MSG and MSG Plus on any terms, even though it is required to do so and to do so on non-discriminatory terms,” the telco said Monday. “Cablevision continues to provide such access to itself, to a limited number of its direct competitors (RCN and Dish Network), and to other cable incumbents against whom Cablevision does not compete -- including Time Warner Cable and Comcast. Indeed, Cablevision’s advertising still touts its exclusive access to such programming as a reason to choose Cablevision over Verizon, highlighting that regardless of what it says here, Cablevision recognizes that withholding access to the HD feeds of MSG and MSG Plus impacts consumer choice in a meaningful way."

A separate complaint against four cable operators that had been getting attention from the bureau and officials in the FCC Office of General Counsel doesn’t seem poised to be dispatched soon, commission officials said. An agency administrative law judge who heard WealthTV’s program carriage case against Bright House Networks, Comcast, Cox and Time Warner Cable had recommended the full commission deny the complaint. An order responding to that recommendation doesn’t seem imminent, commission officials said.