Martin: A Record of 'Picking on' Cable

MARTIN: A RECORD OF 'PICKING ON' CABLE
[SOURCE: Multichannel News, AUTHOR: Ted Hearn]
The cable industry can be certain of one thing as the Bush administration enters its final laps: Kevin Martin has been a huge pain in the coax. After two years in office, the chairman of the Federal Communications Commission has amassed a strikingly large and varied record of hostility toward the cable industry, the leading provider of pay television and high-speed Internet access in the U.S. Time after time, cable operators have come up losers in regulatory battles worth hundreds of millions of dollars. For those setbacks, cable can thank Martin. The record includes Martin's ongoing attempts to force cable operators to carry digital TV-station programming whether they want to or not; to cap Comcast's growth at 30% of pay TV subscribers nationally; and to exaggerate cable rate increases by failing to adjust the data for inflation or the addition of more channels for the money.
http://www.multichannel.com/article/CA6425788.html?display=Top+Stories

NCTA SAYS CABLE CAP IS UNNECESSARY
[SOURCE: Broadcasting&Cable, AUTHOR: John Eggerton]
The National Cable & Telecommunications Association told the FCC Friday it wasn't surprised the Commission hasn't been able to come up with a new horizontal ownership cap in six years, and the association advised the FCC not to start now. A letter filed Friday with the FCC was in response to reports the commission was considering reconstituting a 30% cap on one company's pay subscribers . The cap was previously thrown out by a court for lack of justification. In the letter, NCTA argued that a new cap was an impossible target to hit, and an unnecessary one given growing marketplace competition.
http://www.broadcastingcable.com/article/CA6425758.html?display=Breaking+News