[opendtv] Re: news: ABC News Now Leaving Airwaves
- From: "Manfredi, Albert E" <albert.e.manfredi@xxxxxxxxxx>
- To: "OpenDTV (E-mail)" <opendtv@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Wed, 26 Jan 2005 12:27:19 -0500
--------------------------
Via Shoptalk
ABC News Now Leaving Airwaves
By Michele Greppi
http://www.tvweek.com
Nearly three months after it had been scheduled to
end, the grand experiment ABC News Now is set to
leave the airwaves and cable operators' digital tiers
at 12:01 a.m. Jan. 29. However, the 24/7 news channel
will continue to be available to tens of millions of
subscribers via ABC News' Web site, America Online,
Yahoo!, RealNetworks and other outlets.
---------------------------
Craig Birkmaier wrote:
> I was a bit surprised about the ABC News Now
> announcement yesterday. Every broadcasters should
> look at this announcement and then the date that
> their affiliation agreement(s) expire.
>
> ABC was using ABC News Now to build credibility for
> the argument that cable systems should carry the
> entire DTV multiplex. Now that it is clear that the
> FCC will not mandate carriage of the entire
> multiplex, ABC is following the money. There is no
> economic benefit to ABC to deliver this news
> network via broadcast affiliates. In fact it would
> be nearly impossible for ABC to create a viable
> 24/7 news channel without cable and DBS carriage.
> With Re-transmission consent, ABC will have NO
> problem gaining clearances for ABC News Now, AND
> the monthly subscriber fees that will help ABC
> build this new service.
Exactly, so I don't understand why you were surprised
by the announcement. This could become the model for
how broadcasters restructure their offerings on cable
systems to make their OTA multiplexes more attractive
to these cable systems.
If ABC's DTT stations carry the ABC News Now as a
multiplex, those DTT stations will attract a higher
percentage of OTA users (until the others try
something similar, ain't competition great). So
ABC OTA stations gain. At the same time, ABC had
to resolve the problem of what to do with cable
carriage of multiplexes.
One solution would have been to continue ABC News
Now on cable as before, not insist on DTT multicast
carriage, and offer ABC News Now to OTA users as a
multicast. That works fine for me. It still works
to attract a greater share of OTA eyeballs. I don't
know if that might create some sort of complaint
from the cable companies, though. Still, that would
have been fine by me.
The solution they chose was to undo the ambiguity
by pulling off the separate ABC News Now channel
on cable systems. So now, the cable companies won't
have any justification for claiming that they don't
have the bandwidth to carry the ABC multicast. They
also won't have any justification for complaints
about exclusive cable rights to a particular
program previously only available on cable.
I don't think cable companies get as much revenue
from ABC News Now when carried as a multicast,
right? Don't more of the ad revenues go to ABC or
affiliates this way? But as far as ABC is concerned,
the logic is inescapable.
As far as the consumer, cable customers potentially
come out ahead, since ABC News Now will be fit in
the local ABC cable band allocation, leaving room
for other programming on the system. And OTA
customers get a 24/7 news station. Is there
anything wrong with this?
Bert
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