 voipguy
join:2006-05-31
Forest Hills, NY
1 edit | reply to nothing00
Re: #OccupyTimeWarner ESPN is not a broadcaster, but ESPN's owner is ABC/Disney, which is a broadcaster.
Broadcast station carriage agreements are very often tied to cable network carriage.
Something to note - Broadcast networks used to pay their affiliate stations to carry them. Now, because of all the money the stations are bringing in from Cable and Satellite retransmission agreements, the networks demand the stations to pay them!
One day, the Broadcast networks may realize they can get a better deal by going directly to the cable operators and then the station owners will be left with nothing but their local news to pay the bills.
I used to think the fair thing to do was allow the cable operator to carry out-of-market stations instead of the local ones to get network programming if they wanted to. Now, I realize that the network would just charge that remote affiliate more to compensate, or void their affiliation just to punish them.
The simple way to fix it? END retransmission consent. If a broadcaster wants to negotiate carriage like a cable network, they should return their FCC license and get off the public airwaves, and give the license to someone that wants to BROADCAST (or better yet, save it for broadband use). Without the fees from cable subscribers, the broadcast networks and stations would rely upon advertising only again. With today's multichannel capabilities, they have more than enough resources to make this pay for them. (Although must-carry for the subchannels could be a reasonable demand to ask from the cable operators).
Now, some are even talking about paying the broadcasters to voluntarily turn-in their frequencies for cellular broadband use. That would be like paying Exxon to stop drilling off the coast, or paying Wayerhouser to stop cutting trees in a national forest. TV spectrum is a public resource, GIVEN to the broadcasters FOR FREE. They used to have public service responsibilities. Not any more. Insanity. |
