Christian programmer The Word Network's viewership is growing as religious network audiences wane in general, so when Comcast decided to curb TWN carriage while expanding poorly performing affiliated networks, it becomes obvious discrimination, TWN said in an FCC docket 17-166 filing posted Tuesday. It responded to Comcast's reply earlier this month (see 1708080031) to TWN's carriage complaint. It said a straightforward reading of the Comcast/NBCUniversal order and its conditions clearly show the nondiscrimination condition is "additive" to program carriage rules, and thus the programmer has shown MVPD discrimination by reducing TWN distribution in a way it would never apply to its affiliated programmers. It said Comcast never showed that digital distribution rights aren't a form of affiliation, and disputed Comcast's assertion that TWN can't bring Comcast/NBCU condition violation complaints under program carriage complaint procedures, saying the NBCU order doesn't require these complaints be brought under any specific procedure. Comcast didn't comment.
Showtime hurried its streaming service to market without enough networking bandwidth to support the number of subscribers who paid to watch Saturday night's Mayweather vs. McGregor boxing match, said Portland, Oregon, resident Zack Bartel in a lawsuit (in Pacer) filed Saturday in U.S. District Court in Portland. The Oregon Unlawful Trade Practices Act suit, in docket 17-1331, seeks class-action status for everyone who paid $99.99 to stream the fight live on the Showtime PPV app only to be unable to watch the fight due to grainy video, error screens and buffer events. Showtime didn't comment.
Viacom will launch its Paramount+ subscription VOD service, offering Paramount movie and Viacom TV content, Oct. 1, it announced Friday. It said Paramount+ will be part of the user interface for a variety of pay-TV services in Denmark, Sweden and Norway and available for premium subscribers. The company didn't comment on a time frame for North American availability.
Comments and data on the 19th FCC video competition report are due Oct. 10, replies Nov. 9, the Media Bureau said in a public notice in docket 17-214 and in Friday's Daily Digest. The report will focus on 2016, and the bureau said it will follow a similar analytical framework as the 18th, categorizing video programming delivery into three groups -- MVPDs, TV stations and online video distributors -- and looking at intergroup and intragroup competition.
The American Cable Association is pushing to amend program access rules so the National Cable Television Cooperative would qualify as a buying group. ACA President Matt Polka -- in a meeting with Chairman Ajit Pai's chief of staff, Matthew Berry, and aide Alison Nemeth -- said a 2013 program access amendment order tentatively concluded the buying group definition should be updated as ACA is asking, recounted a filing posted Friday in docket 12-68. Thus the agency should update its buying group definition so NCTC would qualify, it said. ACA periodically has lobbied the FCC on the buying group request (see 1410240046 and 1507020018) and faced programmer pushback (see 1509210047).
Comcast will market residential solar services company Sunrun's offerings, they said Thursday. Under the 40-month agreement, Sunrun is Comcast Cable's exclusive residential solar provider and Comcast will do marketing campaigns in some markets starting later this year. They said the agreement follows a one-year Comcast/Sunrun pilot. Comcast also can earn a warrant of up to 10 percent of Sunrun's outstanding common stock.
Broadband speeds will continue to ramp up in coming years and consumer price per megabit will continue to drop, NCTA blogged Thursday. It said online traffic is expected to quadruple over the next four years, with 4.6 billion global Internet users and the number of connected devices outnumbering people three to one. It said numerous cable ISPs are pursuing gigabit projects now, continuing a decades-old industry trend that has seen top speeds grow 700 percent over the past five years.
Charter Communications and Missouri settled the state's 2015 telemarketing sales rule lawsuit, said an order (in Pacer) denying all pending motions posted Wednesday by U.S. District Judge Ronnie White of St. Louis. The suit claimed Charter and third-party telemarketing firms regularly called Missouri residents even after being told to quit calling (see 1612200011). Charter and the state didn't comment Thursday.
Being bought by Liberty Interactive will put General Communication Inc. on more stable financial footing, making it easier for GCI to raise the money needed to meet its Alaska Plan fixed broadband commitments, though it won't change the market realities GCI looks at when determining whether an investment is economically viable, the companies said in a docket 17-114 filing posted Wednesday. The filing included answers to a series of FCC staff questions on Liberty/GCI. They said the Liberty/GCI deal wouldn't let GCI make additional Alaska Plan commitments. On how the deal would affect mobile wireless customers, Liberty/GCI again cited expected better GCI financial stability and said that would let it participate more meaningfully in the Alaska Plan reverse auction. Liberty's $1.12 billion buy of GCI is expected to not face major regulatory challenges (see 1704040048).
A variety of Viacom channels began returning to legacy Suddenlink lineups Tuesday in markets including areas of Texas and Oklahoma, Suddenlink parent Altice told us Wednesday. It said channels will continue to launch throughout the Suddenlink footprint over the coming months. Suddenlink dropped Viacom channels in 2014 (see 1501140012), but Viacom and Altice in May announced a content distribution agreement that would see Viacom's return (see 1705250042).