Economist papers on retransmission consent filed by NAB...
Economist papers on retransmission consent filed by NAB have “assorted deficiencies, flaws and problems,” Mediacom said in comments in docket 10-71. The notion that there are 565 separate and distinct national networks “that could serve as substitutes for the popular…
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programs of a Big-Four network carried by a station that is shut off during a negotiating impasse is ridiculous on its face,” it said in reference to a 2010 study by Navigant Economics for NAB. Many of the networks are unavailable on most cable systems and describe themselves as “national” only because they would like to be nationally, rather than locally or regionally, distributed, “but that dream has not been realized and is unlikely to be in the foreseeable (or even unforeseeable) future,” it said. Many of the channels offer highly specialized programming “that would not be considered by the typical viewer as a substitute for popular broadcast network shows,” it said. The Navigant paper’s conclusion “that market conditions preclude broadcast station owners from charging supra-competitive retrans fees is intellectual snake oil,” it said. Mediacom also referred to NAB’s letter last week as “just another instance of spin-doctoring.” Cable interests have distorted NAB’s arguments “and largely reiterated discredited claims and calls for government intervention into the retransmission consent market, even where the commission has no authority to act,” NAB said in that letter (http://bit.ly/J7XXX0).