Slashdot Mirror
FCC Moves To Regulate Cable TV Competition
explosivejared writes "The Federal Communications Commission is likely to impose a new regulation on the largely unregulated cable television industry, the first of what may be more to come. Under a proposed rule circulating at the FCC, cable companies such as Comcast and Time Warner Cable would have to slash the price they charge smaller television programmers to lease access on spare cable channels, a move the FCC says would open up cable viewers to a wider diversity of shows. In addition, the FCC is contemplating a national ownership cap that would prevent one company from having more than 30 percent of all cable subscribers." TechDirt has a jaundiced view of FCC chairman Martin's animus against the cablecos.
The problem is that individual municipalities have been selling cable monopolies for decades... and in the old days, it used to be the case that no one cable company would get all of a particular large city, to ensure at least some semblance of competition. These days, they've all merged into one (in Philadelphia, at least).
What I think might be interesting is to decouple the wire from the service provider. Think about electricity deregulation: the transmission is seperate from the generation, and while everyone has to pay for the transmission (since we don't want overly redundant infrastructure), individuals can choose their generation source. The disadvantage here, as seen in the electrical case, is that there are more places to nickel-and-dime consumers. However, done with cable systems, we might actually have enough diversity of service offerings that it makes sense.
--
Educational microcontroller lab kits for the digital generation.
Is that a euphemism for not raping their customers?
"To those who are overly cautious, everything is impossible. "
http://www.metacafe.com/watch/174231/family_guy_fcc_song/
Possibly NSFW
I would be the first one to applaud the break-up of the cable-company monopolies. They seem to make the companies, at least Comcast which I have had experience with, cocky to the point of not caring about customer service, pricing, or competition in general. However, I am having difficulty seeing how the FCC can advocate for the end (or at least modifications) to this monopoly, while allowing heating, water, and electric utility companies to maintain theirs. Is there a differentiation that I am missing?
Excuse me for having missed the memo, but why is anti-monopolistic regulation in general or in this particular case a bad thing?
The grass is always greener on the other side of the light cone.
Shit, Piss, Fuck, Cunt, CockSucker, MotherFucker, and Tits
09F911029D74E35BD84156C5635688C0
+2 Troll is Slashdot's way of saying groupthink is confused
1. Start cable company
2. Get regulated.
3. Raise prices.
4. Profit.
5. Get unregulated
6. More Profit.
7. GO to 2.
The endless money cycle.
I am looking forward to the price increase.
( So far, it has NEVER failed )
Wait, wait... the FCC is *thinking* of imposing an ownership cap on cable companies? How can you "think" of an idea you already had?
My understanding was that in the late '90s, there basically already *was* an ownership cap on cable. AT&T's entire strategy through that period was to obtain as much of the cable industry as possible and then to use those facilities as a new local-calling infrastructure, so they could take on the Bells head-on again. I was developing at Bell Atlantic in '99, and we were working on creating CLEC interfaces - I was working directly with the AT&T staff that were trying to establish local competition with BA in New York. AT&T's local services were all facilities-based (i.e. cable), nothing leased from the Bells.
Then they ran into a roadblock. They had been promised by the FCC in merger after merger that nobody would stand in their way. This was AT&T's whole gameplan - to build a brand-new local calling empire based on the cable infrastructure. But once they passed 33% share (I forget who they were going to merge with), the FCC suddenly stood up and said no. AT&T was billions and billions in the hole, and suddenly their whole gameplan was in the garbage thanks to the FCC. It was effectively the end of real competition for the telcos, at least at that time.
At least that's my recollection; I could be wrong. Anyway, it doesn't matter one hill of beans one way or the other whether they limit ownership of cable. Until they start forcing competition to be allowed in each metro market, it's all meaningless. My cable/phone bills are more expensive than ever, with even less choices than I had in the late '90s. It seems like the FCC has been *useless* to the American consumer over the past 10 years.
If the FCC, or the government in general, were serious about regulating these cablecos in the public interest, they'd just revise all the laws to treat cable "TV", "phone" and "data" networks all the same. What makes them different is no longer their content, as each of those three kinds of companies deliver the "triple play" of video/voice/data, and therefore the same customers. There might be distinctions among networks that cross state lines, or that have either government contracts specifying special liabilities (eg 911 service operators) or market status (eg monopoly or some subsidy for growth or competition), or perhaps even provided by a government.
But they're all networks. They all have directly comparable service levels, competition requirements, public interest requirements, consumer protections. The distinctions by their content type, even if their media mix is somewhat different, is largely irrelevant. They should all be regulated to ensure they offer the same levels of service in their products, especially as they market those products to the same consumers as being "the same" as their competitors, like TV from the "phone company" or phone from "the cable company" or all of it from "an ISP". And of course the content should be regulated separately from the network access/connection - perhaps even regulated to break up vertical monopolies that currently bundle content and network together.
After the basic rules they can make whatever smaller exceptions are appropriate. Radio broadcasts, including TV and "wireless networks", that use the public airwaves, all can get their special treatment different from that distributed on private wires/fibers. Private wires/fibers that use public rights of way (like in most cities) can have their concessions to the public in exchange for their right of way access. And purely private networks can have their protection from regulation, where that's appropriate, specified. Unrestricted content, like pure broadcast (eg open websites, basic cable) can be distinguished from content requested by adults - which should be largely unrestricted, except where production of that content might violate (non-telecom) laws in force where the content is produced (eg pornography or defamation).
The sum total of all the regulations, even in the "deregulated" modern environment, is now a huge mass that raises operating costs (and therefore prices) by requiring lawyers and bureaucrats at every turn. A reformed legal basis could be much shorter, simpler, and appropriate to the modern age, where tech and marketing has leveled the playing field in a way that is not at all recognizable in current law.
--
make install -not war