September 2010

Moonves: Reverse Comp to Grow in 2011 And Beyond

CBS Corp. President/CEO Leslie Moonves said the network has big plans to grow its retransmission consent revenue in the coming years, with the CBS affiliates kicking in a bigger chunk of revenue they've negotiated with pay-TV carriers.

Speaking at the Goldman Sachs Communacopia conference in New York, Moonves said it's not one size fits all when negotiating with the local broadcasters. Moonves characterized CBS' affiliate relationship as "great." While he said CBS had not yet negotiated deals on behalf of its affiliates, he said he expects partner stations to work out fair payment for their signal-and share the spoils. He believes CBS' thriving primetime, especially in the vital 10 p.m. hour that serves up viewers for local news, justifies the network's demands. "It's very important to us that our affiliate body stays strong, and it's important to us that they make very good deals," he said. Moonves was adamant that CBS' retrans revenue has vast growth potential. While CBS has thus far kept its content, which Moonves referred to as "the family jewels," off the Hulu.com platform, the CBS chief suggested he was looking "very carefully" at the Hulu Plus subscription model, announced by Hulu CEO Jason Kilar in June.

Verizon to Move to Tiered Prices in 6 Months

Verizon Wireless, the largest US mobile carrier, will introduce tiered pricing in the next four to six months to take advantage of the growth in data traffic as it rolls out its faster, fourth-generation network.

The company will "feather in" the new pricing as it rolls out new services, Verizon Communications Inc. Chief Executive Officer Ivan Seidenberg said at a Goldman Sachs Group conference. Verizon's 4G network, which uses long-term evolution technology, has been operational in 30 markets, including 50 airports, since June, Seidenberg said. Tiered plans typically give users a wider array of price options for different network usage and eliminate unlimited packages. Dallas-based AT&T Inc., the second-largest mobile carrier, introduced tiered plans this year for its 3G network.

Digital Disability Access Bill Passes Senate

On Sept 22, the Senate passed the Twenty-First Century Communications and Video Accessibility Act (S. 3828), a bill that updates disability access to communications services elements of the 1996 Telecommunications Act.

The bill takes a number of steps to update the Telecommunications Act disability access provisions to reflect the rise of broadband, including reinstating the FCC's video description rules, which were tossed by a court in 1992, and applying closed captioning rules to online video as well as TV. A similar measure already passed in the House.

No FCC Rulemaking Authority on Latest Net Neutrality Bill

Apparently, the latest version of the House network neutrality bill will take away the Federal Communications Commission's rulemaking authority on the issue. Without rulemaking authority on the possible legislation, the commission's ability to enforce compliance is substantially weakened. The bill would also prohibit the commission from reclassifying broadband under title II of the Communications Act, a more stringent regulatory regime, until the measure sunsets in two years. Other provisions of the proposal include a non-discrimination principle for wired networks and for wireless devices, no blocking of websites and competing voice applications. Under that scenario, wireless providers could block peer-to-peer activity and other applications.

No FCC rulemaking authority on the bill "is a huge victory for the carriers," the source said. "I'm stunned the Waxman team is going along with it...If I had to measure this, it's probably slightly worse than the Verizon-Google deal."

Is the MiFi Model the Future of Mobile Broadband?

[Commentary] Some laptop customers want 3G or 4G radios in their notebooks for connectivity nearly everywhere, but nearly two years after the birth of the mobile hotspot, is it time for the embedded model to die off?

From a hardware-maker's standpoint, adding internal mobile broadband radios can be a product differentiator. If Dell opts not to include such connectivity, and Toshiba does, the latter has a value-add feature to advertise. Based on that, I don't expect notebook or netbook makers, for example, to simply stop adding 3G or 4G radios to their devices. But from a consumer's standpoint, such options are likely to find less favor over time because people simply don't want to pay for multiple connections.

Building a better net?

[Commentary] As economists who study network neutrality, we have watched the debate over the future of the Internet closely. The new policy proposal from Google and Verizon opens the possibility that some Websites will be treated better than others. This might not be such good news for Internet users.

In the past, broadband Internet Service Providers have operated according to net neutrality principles, meaning companies providing Internet service treat all content sources equally. Under this rule, the Internet has produced billions of dollars of free value for the US public -- which could be swallowed by Internet Service Providers like Verizon, if net neutrality were lost.

It might also possibly mean a change in the rapid improvements in Internet content, which users have come to expect. The process that led us from Pets.com to YouTube in such a short time may be slowed. In fact, YouTube itself might not have emerged if, 10 years ago, AOL had decided to deliver content preferentially only from, for example, Real Networks. Is that what we really want to see? If ISPs upend that balance by blocking any FCC move to codify the current structure, we can expect changes in the way we use the Internet. And not all change is good.

Virginia TV Station Pulls Ad Targeting Boucher

The local ABC television affiliate in Lynchburg (VA) this week pulled an ad run by the conservative third party group Americans for Job Security after Rep Rick Boucher (D-VA) claimed the ads were false and misleading.

At issue is an often cited study by the Washington Post which assigns a "party voting" score that represents the percentage of votes on which a lawmaker agrees with the position taken by a majority of his or her party members. AJS references the study when it claims that "Rick Boucher supports Nancy Pelosi 96 percent of the time" in its ad, which went on the air Sept. 9. But after Boucher's complaint WSET-TV President Randy Smith reviewed the ad and found that the Washington Post study "does not appear to compare votes by Congressman Boucher with those by Ms. Pelosi nor does it equate Ms. Pelosi with the Democratic Party. Hence the ad appears to be misleading." Americans for Job Security bought $416,000 of air time in the 9th district as part of a $3.5 million effort targeting nine Democrats across the country. The group is expected to spend $9 million on television ads through early October. This is the first time a television station has refused to air an AJS ad this cycle.

FCC Commissioner Copps: Broadcasters lack diversity

Federal Communications Commission member Michael Copps has some concerns with the broadcast industry. Media consolidation, he worries, will stamp out diverse voices on the airwaves. And he doesn't think broadcast stations do a good enough job covering public affairs.

Broadcasters currently reapply for their licenses every eight years. Copps said he wants them to reapply every three years, as was the standard a couple of decades ago. "It shouldn't just be automatic renewal," he said. "In return for being stewards of the public airwaves, their responsibility is to serve the public interest." Commissioner Copps thinks broadcasters should spend more time covering local politics. "What passes as election coverage in this country is just scandalous," he said.

FCC Plans March Auction for New FM Stations - 147 New FM Licenses for Sale

Interested in a new FM radio station? Now might be your chance. The Federal Communications Commission announced an upcoming auction, Auction No. 91, offering licenses for 147 new FM channels in various communities across the country.

The auction will begin on March 29. The public notice merely lists the channels to be auctioned and the proposed minimum bid in the auction to be associated with each channel, and asks for comments on the procedures that will apply in conducting the auction. Expect that applications to participate in the auction will probably be due sometime in or around January 2011.

"A stab in the back": Europe tackles online piracy

A leading European digital rights group describes a just-adopted, non-legislative European Parliament resolution on dealing with intellectual property as "a stab in the back of citizens' freedoms."

The internal traitor envisioned here is a French MEP, Marielle Gallo, the "rapporteur" who lead the drafting of a resolution regarding piracy. The "Gallo report," as the document is known, was drafted earlier this year, passed the JURI legal affairs committee over the summer, and today came up for a full plenary vote in Parliament. Despite the best efforts of opposition groups, the resolution passed 328-245. Jérémie Zimmermann of La Quadrature du Net led the charge against the report, calling it "an illustration of the will of the entertainment industry to try to impose private copyright police and justice of the Net." And it might be. Or not. The Gallo report is a pretty vague document that calls on ISPs and others to use "additional non-legislative measures" to address copyright infringement online. Zimmermann sees this as a move to privatize copyright infringement and take cases away from the judiciary -- a gutting of the rule of law.

Benton

Search