FCC's Set-Top Proposal Draws Crowd

Commenters flooded the Federal Communications Commission April 22, the deadline for initial input on FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler's proposal to "unlock" multichannel video programming distributor set-top box info and share it with third-party navigation devices. "No demonstrable market problem exists to justify the kind of intrusive tech mandates proposed by the Commission," said the Free State Foundation. "And it highly doubtful that any conceivable benefit could outweigh the heavy costs that the Commission now ignores - costs which will initially be paid by MVPDs or program content owners, but will ultimately be paid by consumers. The Commission performed no cost-benefit analysis of its proposal prior to its Notice. Nor did it even seek input to conduct such an analysis." Agreeing that it was an unnecessary and counterproductive government attempt to enforce tech policy on an innovative space was California tech advocacy group CALinnovates.

The Writers Guild of America, West, weighed in strongly for the proposal. “For independent content creators, this translates into a great opportunity to reach our potential audiences because it will allow viewers to access the content of their choice – digital or traditional – from a single device that they own," the union said.