FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski probably had no choice but to...

Executive Vice President David Cohen. “This chairman has been very clear ... that he is going to make decisions based upon the data and that he’s going to apply the law,” Cohen said on C-SPAN. “If you do that in this case, there’s no reasonable justification for a continuation of the exclusivity ban.” To the extent that advocates of the ban think it needs to be retained, they should seek new authorization from Congress, Cohen said in a videotaped interview to run on the Communicators Saturday. “The current legislation simply does not support the exclusivity ban in the current competitive posture in the market.” Advocates for retaining the exclusivity ban continued to make their case at the FCC this week, filings show. A group including representatives for Verizon, Public Knowledge, Dish, AT&T, DirecTV, the Sports Fan Coalition and Centurylink met with Media Bureau officials to push for retaining the ban, especially for networks that carry live sports programming, an ex parte notice said (http://xrl.us/bnriqi). “The legal case for extending the exclusivity ban in the case of regional sports networks is particularly strong,” and would be allowed under D.C. Circuit precedent, the notice said. The American Cable Association also argued for retaining the ban, but suggested some changes to the draft order should the commission let the ban expire. The order should adopt a rebuttable presumption that an exclusive contract involving satellite-delivered cable-affiliated programming is unfair, regardless of whether it’s a regional or national network “if the network carries the same minimum amount of sports content as an RSN as previously defined by the Commission,” ACA said. The commission should adopt a rebuttable presumptions that such an exclusive contract, if the subject of a successful complaint under Section 628(b) of the Communications Act, would also be unfair “and have the purpose or effect of significantly hindering any other MVPD’s ability to provide satellite-cable programming,” the association said. And the order should adopt a rebuttable presumption that the four elements required to support relief in a standstill petition under FCC rules “are satisfied in cases involving renewal of an existing contract,” it said. None of those changes would be as good as keeping the ban, the notice said, but “in the absence of an across-the-board rule of conduct pertaining to exclusive agreements, it is imperative that these measures be adopted,” it said. The Coalition for Competitive Access to Content met with aides to Commissioner Ajit Pai to make the case for keeping the ban, an ex parte notice shows (http://xrl.us/bnrisi). Dish Network officials discussed the ban separately with aides to Commissioners Mignon Clyburn and Jessica Rosenworcel, a notice shows (http://xrl.us/bnrisp).