Encouraging Signs In The JSA-SSA Mess

[Commentary] One of the lessons that I have learned along the way is that you never really know what's going to happen when Congress or the Federal Communications Commission begins fiddling around with the laws and regulations that govern the TV business.

My favorite example is retransmission consent. Congress created the right in 1992 to strengthen local broadcasting. But what retransmission consent did was strengthen cable as multimedia companies like NBC, Fox, Hearst and Scripps used it to secure cable carriage for cable networks that siphoned off broadcast viewers in ever larger numbers. It wasn't until pure-play broadcasters like Nexstar and Sinclair began demanding payments in the mid-2000s that retransmission consent began fulfilling its original purpose.

If Sinclair's response is the most surprising, Nexstar's is the most significant. Its deal with Marshall could set a precedent under which other minorities could team up with established broadcasters and actually bring some new voices into local TV. In announcing the deal, Marshall talked about a "new paradigm."

The Nexstar-Marshall deal is basically something I had proposed recently when it seemed likely that the FCC would move against JSAs and SSAs. It's a potential win-win. The broadcasters get to amortize costs and enjoy extra revenue from close partnerships with other stations in markets and the FCC gets want it has long claimed it has wanted -- diversity of ownership.

The FCC will closely scrutinize the deal and it should. Even the National Association of Black Owned Broadcasters has raised serious questions aimed at making sure that Marshall maintains its editorial independence.