Genachowski Seeks Subscriber Notice in Retrans Impasses
FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski wants more subscriber notice of contractual disputes between TV stations and subscription-video providers, he said as Cablevision and News Corp. continued to negotiate carriage rights for Fox’s TV stations set to expire Friday night. Cablevision said it would submit to binding arbitration, but Fox declined. Genachowski, Chief Bill Lake and others in the Media Bureau and the commissioners’ offices have been kept informed about the talks by Cablevision and Fox, agency officials said. They said it’s unclear whether the sides will reach a new deal before carriage of several New York and Philadelphia area stations is cut off. Talks remain stalled, company officials indicated.
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"We continue to be concerned about the potential effect on consumers” and the FCC works in “all of the different negotiations that come up” with parties to the contract to “try to encourage deals” to be done “in a timely way,” Genachowski told reporters Thursday. “We've also been working over the last couple of months to push for more notice to consumers.” The efforts haven’t led to a push for new rules yet, other agency officials said.
"While we would rather come to terms directly with News Corp., binding arbitration may be the best and fairest way to resolve this matter,” said a Cablevision spokesman. He said the cable operator would accept an invitation from New York Reps. Steve Israel, a Democrat, and Republican Peter King for arbitration. “We will work around the clock to reach a new agreement and have appealed to News Corp. not to pull the plug,” the spokesman said. Fox shares the concerns of King and Israel, but binding arbitration would only “reward Cablevision for refusing to negotiate fairly,” a Fox spokesman said. “Direct business-to-business negotiation is the only way to resolve this issue, while also preserving the long-term stability of the broadcast industry."
Fox has made “multiple proposals” to Cablevision and “we're looking for them to respond to one of them,” the spokesman for the broadcast and cable programmer said. News Corp.’s Fox stations will be exhibiting some high-profile sports events this weekend, including Major League Baseball’s National League Championship Series featuring the Philadelphia Phillies and San Francisco Giants, and football games featuring the New York Giants and Philadelphia Eagles. The Fox-Cablevision contract expires at midnight Friday. Fox is counting down the hours remaining in the current agreement at www.KeepFoxOn.com.
At midnight on Oct. 31, News Corp.’s Fox and MyNetworkTV stations will come off Dish Network if the companies fail to reach a carriage agreement. “We've presented them with a proposal, but we have not heard back from them on that,” said the Fox spokesman. A Dish spokeswoman said Fox is tying carriage of regional sports networks that already have been pulled by the programmer to carriage of News Corp.’s TV stations.
Genachowski said of carriage spats around New Year’s Day, one of which involved Fox and Time Warner Cable, that “some compelling programming was aired” without consumers “knowing what their options were” to get TV from alternative sources. “More and more, I think the need for better consumer notice and information about their options is getting out there,” he said. “I think the parties understand there are greater risks to not reaching a deal and we are optimistic we will see a deal."
"In every retransmission consent negotiation, there are strong incentives for each side to reach an agreement that is fair and market-based,” said an NAB spokesman when asked about Genachowski’s remarks. An NCTA spokesman declined to comment. Some broadcasters have sought more subscriber notice of looming retransmission consent battles, while cable operators have said they already must provide 30 days’ notification under FCC rules.
The commission should take a more active role in all retransmission disputes when consumers face losing programming, Free Press wrote Genachowski. The agency should require companies to disclose the cost of each channel involved in a dispute and give subscription-video customers the right to opt-out of paying for channels if they don’t want them, the letter said. “Such measures would shift the balance of power to consumers and give them the freedom to choose and pay for only those channels they want.” The agency should also adopt an arbitration process for disputes that result in service disruptions, it said.
It’s doubtful the FCC will step in this time, but more high-profile disputes like that between Cablevision and Fox could prompt the agency or Congress to act, Stifel Nicolaus analysts wrote investors. They wrote that the Fox-Dish Network dispute involving regional sports networks could stoke government concerns about program access issues in the context of the Comcast-NBC Universal transaction.