Posted on 05/09/2013 12:34:44 PM PDT by Teflonic
John McCain wants to unbundle cable and to stop broadcasters like CBS and Fox from moving their stations to pay TV. The Arizona senator right now on the Senate floor is introducing The TV Consumer Freedom Act of 2013 (read it here). The legislation is intended to “allow the consumer, the television viewer who subscribes to cable, to have à la carte capability. In other words, not required to buy a whole bunch of channels that that consumer may not want wish to subscribe to,” McCain said moments ago. The former GOP Presidential candidate also went after broadcasters like CBS and Fox who have said that they could move to cable if they lose in the courts against Barry Diller’s Aereo streaming service. “We’ll also establish consequences if broadcasters choose to downgrade their over-the-air service,” McCain told the Senate. His legislation would also eliminate the sports blackout rule “in events that are held in publicly financed stadiums.”
The proposal is expected to meet heavy resistance among the cable companies. ”Only Dish and Cablevision have been for a la carte and smaller bundles because we think it’s consumer-friendly”, Dish Network chairman Charlie Ergen said during his company’s conference call today. “Having said that, there are five big groups that probably have enough clout in Congress to stop that legislation today. He added that “the marketplace is going to determine” if the price is too high. “There’s an awful lot of people who don’t consume (200 channels)”, he said, “and most of us would like to look for creative solutions”.
“This is unfair and wrong — especially when you consider how the regulatory deck is stacked in favor of industry and against the American consumer”, he said. “You can only do that when you have a monopoly”, he added.
(Excerpt) Read more at deadline.com ...
Right now, I’m sitting here in Las Vegas and Cox has Fox and HLN knocked off the air. Mighty strange! MSNBC is, though!
Yes I dont need to pay for,3 network, 4 hispanic,2 religious and 15 others for the 2 or 3 I watch.
I only have CATV for a decent signal
Let McCain dick with this instead of getting into any gun legislation
...and LOGO!
I have no doubt you are correct. Anything McCain proposes screws the citizens.
What was the giveaway in the 1996 Act?
I’m all for it. We had to fight to get Fox on in Las Vegas.
Exactly.
Well as I said I haven’t had a cable bill for over 5 years now. If somethinmg like this were implemented I imagine there would be a flat fee for the connection then a separate varying charge for each channel you wanted. Some channels would be as expensive as HBO while others would only cost pennies. We’d see a lot of “free” promotions as well.
Cheap hero legislation. Not his business.
How about dropping the damn taxes/fees?
If they would pass a law banning CNN from being displayed at airports, I’m all for it!
I wish I could pick and choose what channels I pay for, aside from the obvious solution of not paying for any of them.
However, it is deeply insidious for us to continue down the path of dictating what services private companies must offer.
I like this so far.
Might even consider subscribing to cable if it passes.
I don’t like the government over reach aspect of it, but since the cable companies got their monopolies through government power, it serves them right to have the terms of their service dictated. Lose the monopolies and they can bundle to their little hearts’ content, IMHO.
Not sure I’d apply it to satellite though.
>> If the gov’t hadn’t stepped in and forced the split up of AT&T, we’d still be living with their 1960s style of monopoly.
Doubtful. Furthermore, this is not about monopolies.
This is an attempt to help broadcast/cable industry. Too little, too late.
They are losing customers everyday to hulu, netflix, amazon, and so on.
The major holdback for most people is live sports. Eventually, this will be available via streaming.
I’ll weep tears of sorry for TimeWarner when it happens. Not.
Can count on one hand the ones I watch—Fox (less lately), HGTV, two Christian channels, HLN right now with the Arias murder trial. Get most of my news from FR and other like web sites.
I would NOT be in favor of eliminating the Sports Blackout for publicly financed stadiums. When taxpayers pony up 1/2 $billion or more, they should be able to get their money back, and only have events shown with a 100% sell out game. That provision in the bill is a big WIN for the big money crowd.
So this is the most important thing on McCain’s plate right now? Cable bundling?
That is what would probably happen, or they might even just delete what you don't watch but charge you the same. However, this is what I have long hoped for, if it could be done economically; I only watch 5 channels and I pay for 200.
And while we're talking about pay TV, why do I pay $100 a month for cable and yet I STILL have to watch 20 minutes of commercials an hour?
He’s only slightly behind the technology curve, but legislators don’t let reality stand in their way.
The FCC runs cable/sat . We need to have States take this over. Allow for feq sales at the state level would be the only option.
Being in Telecommunications this is para dine shift.
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