All FCC Members Likely to OK Order Ending Sports Blackout Rule
The FCC likely will approve 5-0 the order rejecting claims by the NFL and other entities in support of maintaining the sports blackout rule, said agency officials in interviews Wednesday. The order is slated for a vote at the Sept. 30 FCC meeting, they said. It would eliminate the rules for all cable, direct broadcast satellite and open video systems, officials said. The commission also will consider a Further NPRM on streamlining Part 25 rules on satellite and earth station licensing and operations. That item also likely will be approved, agency officials said. The tentative meeting agenda was released Tuesday (CD Sept 10 p19).
Sign up for a free preview to unlock the rest of this article
Timely, relevant coverage of court proceedings and agency rulings involving tariffs, classification, valuation, origin and antidumping and countervailing duties. Each day, Trade Law Daily subscribers receive a daily headline email, in-depth PDF edition and access to all relevant documents via our trade law source document library and website.
The sports blackout rule item rejects claims from rule proponents that it’s necessary to ensure availability of sports telecasts to the public, and that the rule is needed in concert with network non-duplication rules to ensure localism and diversity, FCC officials said. The item discusses the issue of gate receipts and claims they're not as important as they used to be for teams, an official said. It also says the NFL can negotiate for sports blackout protections through the private market, an official said.
The rules “make no sense at all,” said FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler in a blog post (http://fcc.us/1uIAjlr). Wheeler pointed out that last week, “every single game was sold out.” The commission “shouldn’t be complicit in preventing sports fans from watching their favorite teams on TV,” he said. The NFL had no comment.
The Sports Fans Coalition praised the FCC’s move toward voting on the item, which it previously petitioned for at the agency. “If the government is supporting an anti-fan practice, it should stop,” the coalition said in a news release (http://bit.ly/WJUgMW).
The FNPRM on Part 25 rules for satellite services is the next phase that follows an order last year that streamlined more than 100 rules, FCC officials said. At first, the FCC proposed “clean-up changes,” and planned to move on to a few more substantive things, an official said. The commission recognized that there were a lot of ideas that were beyond the scope of the initial NPRM, hence the further one, an official said. In the earlier order, the FCC said an FNPRM would address issues like EchoStar’s request to expand the scope of the rain fade compensation rule to include operation in the 28.6-29.1 GHz band, and the Satellite Industry Association’s recommendation to delete certain technical requirements for fixed satellite service space stations (http://bit.ly/1AzwtMX).
Many of the Part 25 FNPRM proposals derive from recommendations in the report on FCC process reform, Wheeler said in the blog post. The proposals would “facilitate international coordination of satellite networks and afford licensees more operational flexibility,” he said. There are proposed revised milestone requirements that would simplify space station licensing “while ensuring scarce orbital slots are only made available to those entities that are truly prepared to build and operate satellites in them,” he said.
The previous NPRM on Part 25 rules was a “clean-up” effort, a satellite industry executive said. Satellite industry members expect the FNPRM to address broader industry-wide issues, the executive said. They may include proposed rule changes that would give satellite operators increased operational flexibility and might better position them internationally, the executive said.