[opendtv] Re: Comcast-owned NBC blocks Sling TV commercials - Business Insider
- From: "Manfredi, Albert E" <albert.e.manfredi@xxxxxxxxxx>
- To: "opendtv@xxxxxxxxxxxxx" <opendtv@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Mon, 12 Oct 2015 23:44:25 +0000
Craig Birkmaier wrote:
This is not a content owner choosing to use or not use a delivery pipe.
It is a content owner choosing to block a competitor from using THEIR
delivery pipe.
Okay, but in truth, this is NBC (Comcast, presumably, which owns NBC) not
wanting to air commercials for Sling TV. No problem. Comcast, has a right to
not run commercials for anything they perceive as competition.
As a matter of fact, Craig, how many commercials for FOTA DTV did you ever see
running on your MVPD? I see a ton of MVPD ads on FOTA TV, but I'll bet you
never see ads for FOTA TV on your cable channels. True? But none of this
qualifies as supply side collusion, so I don't see this as a problem.
This has little to do with it, as the other stations in those
markets are running the ads.
You do not expect to see ads for Giant Food when you're shopping inside a
Safeway store. This is not anti-competitive behavior. If someone else runs ads
for the competition, good for them.
Except when they pull that NBC O&O in a retrans battle.
Sorry, but the only reason "retrans consent battles" even work is that the
MVPDs have an essential monopoly in a given location (i.e. their business model
assumes households only subscribe to one). So I have little sympathy for
retrans consent whining, when the root problem is deliberately overlooked. And
anyway, the main TV nets aren't on Sling TV, so this shouldn't be an issue.
NBC cannot offer a package like Sling.
But even if NBC itself can't make something like Sling TV, the supposed actual
"bad actor" here is Comcast, right? It is that Comcast sees Sling TV as
competition. Are you telling me that Comcast can't compete against Sling TV?
Nonsense, of course they can. And other MVPDs have already started down this
path.
Bert
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