[opendtv] Re: News: Fox Playing Hardball With Balky Affils
- From: "Manfredi, Albert E" <albert.e.manfredi@xxxxxxxxxx>
- To: "opendtv@xxxxxxxxxxxxx" <opendtv@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Sun, 15 May 2011 18:17:42 -0500
Craig Birkmaier wrote:
>> What are they "sucking every dime" from, if they could suck more dimes
>> doing things differently right now? Something's been missing from this
>> repeated analysis of yours. I don't pretend to know what it is, though.
>
> The main thing stopping them is the politicians...
>
> And people like you.
Well then, MVPD subscribers, get a clue and help keep your rates down. At
least, those who have the OTA option, which is certainly a good majority. And
could be an even greater majority, e.g. if apartment dwellers insisted on
having an OTA option.
I wasn't sure that politicians would "not allow" FOTA broadcasting to go belly
up. But if that's true, then we all have it made. Next time Comcast or Cox have
to drop one of the TV networks, why don't these MVPDs encourage, or even help,
people bypass their cable and go direct OTA? Then the subscribers can simply
not care if the MVPD doesn't carry that network, the affiliate would be unable
to demand a higher subscription fee kickback from the MVPD, and ditto all the
way back to the conglom. So, the MVPD has taken some control back.
That's how a self-regulating, competitive industry is supposed to work. (The
MVPDs don't do this for their own greed, of course, but that's no reason for
the subscribers to constantly cave in. Take control!)
> You keep talking about competition (as you did later in this message,
> saying that "This is what SHOULD be happening in OTA TV." Which is
> essentially saying that one broadcaster should slit the throat of
> another to survive as is now starting to happen.
Somewhat graphic, but isn't that what competition is? You either provide
something that customers like more than the other guy, or you fill a niche that
the others guys don't bother with or haven't yet identified. I don't think this
would result in only 3 or 4 of the strongest stations to survive, because
people have clearly demonstrated that they want more variety. But I do think
that it would result in a more efficient use of spectrum. In the sense that you
would never have stations that find it acceptable to not use their multicast
capacity well.
Let's say I own a station that was the ABC affiliate, and that retrains consent
is still the law of the land. Leaving aside issues with FCC local caps, if I
cut a deal to become the NBC affiliate as well as the ABC affiliate, why would
either conglom care? It would still be possible to carry most of their HD
content simultaneously, except for sports. The congloms would get the same
coverage OTA, and at least as much of that retrains consent kickback as before,
no? And with the use of OTA TV PVRs in customer premises, stations could even
fill non-prime time with the programs their prime time dual-HD streams might
have crowded out.
> Amazing. You have just written a convincing justification for reducing
> the spectrum allocated to broadcasters.
Not at all! No one says that carriage of ABC/Fox/CBS/NBC/CW/PBS is by
definition all that OTA should be. What you are implying with that comment is
that if you can carry THOSE program streams in less spectrum, that's all that
matters. Why assume such a thing? Doesn't LA have some 80 OTA TV program
streams?
What I do notice here is that our CBS, MNT, and Fox affiliates find it
acceptable to transmit just one stream each, or at most that plus a weather
radar image. While at the same time, people are bitching about their high MVPD
rates. That is exactly the sort of distorted, greed-driven market situation
that the FCC's reduction of OTA spectrum would ENHANCE. Why would anyone in his
right mind want to perpetuate and exacerbate such a market distortion?
Bert
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