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John McCain Working On Legislation For 'a La Carte' TV Channel Packages
An anonymous reader writes "John McCain, Republican Senator for Arizona and former U.S. presidential candidate, is drafting a new bill that would pressure TV providers to allow customers to select and pay for only the channels they want to watch. The bill will also 'bar TV networks from bundling their broadcast stations with cable channels they own during negotiations with the cable companies, according to industry sources. So for example, the Disney Company, which owns both ABC and ESPN, could not force a cable provider to pay for ESPN in order to carry ABC.' Perhaps most importantly, the bill could 'end the sports blackout rule, which prohibits cable companies from carrying a sports event if the game is blacked out on local broadcast television stations.' This would hamstring the ludicrous practice of blacking out TV broadcasts in order to drive fans to buy actual tickets to a game. The cable and satellite TV industry is expected to push back very strongly against the bill."
Wont pass though.
I have a feeling this will all be moot soon. Youtube are about to unveil subscription channels, and we already have Hulu, Netflix, etc. All we need is an idiot-proof box for the living room so that grandma can surf all these channels with her "clicker" and we'll forget there ever was such a thing as cable tv.
Palin.
Everything is better with chainsaws.
Partly, bad timing: his party's brand was tarnished by George W. Bush. Partly, bad choice of running mate.
Blame the party leadership, not McCain himself.
[Sir Garlon] is the marvellest knight that is now living, for he destroyeth many good knights, for he goeth invisible.
This is too little too late. Forget saving these dinosaurs, I want to see them crash and burn.
I think the man's entirely responsible for his choice of running mates, TYVM.
Hail Eris, full of mischief...
E pluribus sanguinem
I have about a 50-50 chance of strongly liking or strongly disliking legislation he proposes.
I'm sort of assuming that he's going to eventually turn this in a proposal to require unbundling of both cable packages and Constitutional rights.
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I've always been mildly surprised that no one has argued that channel bundling violates Section 3 of the Clayton Antitrust Act. Basically the networks and cable companies are engaged in tying which can in some circumstances be illegal. While it may be legal in this case it seems to exist right on the edge of legality. I've never been convinced of the argument that channel bundling is in the best interest of the consumers and it certainly is only possible due to the market power of the companies involved.
There's another reason McCain is behind this: A la carte cable is a very popular idea with the social conservative faction that holds a lot of influence within the republican party. The FRC has frequently put out a public call for something like this. Their motivation is in obscenity and indecency: They really don't like the idea that good christian conservatives have to pay for the raunchy entertainment and liberal media channels because they happen to be in the same bundle as the Disney channel and Fox news.
Cable has become a joke! It's Springsteen's 57 channels times TEN today. The major content providers are extorting the service providers because they know it's an all-or-nothing deal. Even though maybe only 1/3 of customers watch ESPN, no service provider can reject the entire ESPN suite because they know that's a deal-breaker. And the major content providers use that as an excuse to package 3-4 satellite channels that show the same content and charge more.
It's insane that I can surf through dozens of channels and see nothing but crap on. With a la carte, content providers will HAVE to produce quality and not rely on being a filler dial number. I could care less if 1/2 of the stations go away. And, the bullies like ESPN (I think averaging about $8/mo of your cable bill) won't have service providers by the nuts any more.
I swear to God...I swear to God! That is NOT how you treat your human!
Me neither. I'm hardly a libertarian, except in the sense that everyone is*, but this seems to me to be government overreach.
Cable TV is not a vital public service, in any shape or form. It's not important infrastructure you must have access to or else be significantly disadvantaged. Nobody is any the worse for not having it. In fact, it's actually just awful.
Given that, let the market take care of it.
I will assume you mean the mythical "free market". There is no such thing, of course, and this is especially true where market choice is limited by natural monopolies, as is the case in cable and satellite television service. So your solution fails. It's less than ideal, but only regulation will see to it that the consumers are not getting the short end of the stick, as they are now.
you do know there are many good reasons to not like obama other than his skin color right? The only people I hear talking about his skin color is those on the left trying to attribute it to those on the right. other than a few loons I dont see anyone on the right talking about obamas skin color. We are all more worried about his policies.
have you seen my sig? there are many others like it but none that are the same
Here's the difference between Joe Biden and Sarah Palin:
Joe Biden sometimes says stupid things. He also says smart and effective things. He also corrects himself when he realizes that what he said was stupid. Generally speaking, the smart things outweigh the stupid things, so he is viewed as a basically smart guy who sometimes goofs up and says something stupid.
Sarah Palin, on the other hand, says many many things that aren't only stupid, but indicative of an underlying idiocy well beyond just making mistakes. For instance, the question that really did her in back in 2008 was Katie Couric asking "And when it comes to establishing your world view, I was curious, what newspapers and magazines did you regularly read before you were tapped for this [the vice-presidency] - to stay informed and to understand the world?" Sarah Palin couldn't come up with a straight answer, while Biden would probably have cited Foreign Policy, the New York Times, or the Delaware News Journal.
I am officially gone from