Broadcasters, Cable Square Off Over Competition

NAB, NCTA SQUARE OFF OVER COMPETITION
[SOURCE: Broadcasting&Cable, AUTHOR: John Eggerton]
The National Association of Broadcasters and the National Cable & Telecommunications Association traded blows in reply comments filed at the FCC on the state of competition in the video marketplace. Using recent FCC cable rate data as ammunition, broadcasters preached to the FCC choir about the 93% rise in cable prices since 1996, and pointed out that, for the most part, stations don't get money for their signals and so couldn't be blamed for rising prices. The "real culprit" in rising cable prices, said the NAB, is limited competition in the cable marketplace, pointing to a General Accounting Office study that prices are lower in communities that have wireline competition. The cable industry said that the video marketplace is so "drenched in competition" that no credible case can be made that "further government intervention is necessary," though it was referring more to the telephone company's attempts, with some success, to gain a clearer regulatory path to video and broadband competition to cable.
http://www.broadcastingcable.com/article/CA6403538.html?title=Article&spacedesc=news