NBCUniversal and EverPass Media, a platform for distributing live sports and entertainment to commercial businesses, signed a multiyear agreement giving EverPass rights to distribute Peacock's exclusive sports content to bars, restaurants and other commercial establishments, they said Friday.
Numerous full-power TV stations in the San Francisco area are excluded from carriage on newer virtual MVPDs, and without must-carry rights they're at a huge disadvantage as viewers migrate from traditional MVPDs, One Ministries President Keith Leitch said Friday in docket 14-261, recapping a meeting he and Total Living Network CEO Debra Fraser had with an aide to FCC Commissioner Geoffrey Starks. As long as virtual MVPD operators have a vested interest in promoting affiliated content, smaller independent TV stations -- like One Ministries' KQSL Fort Bragg, California -- inevitably "will be left out" of vMVPD carriage, he said.
The FCC should refresh the record on reclassifying streaming services as MVPDs “in light of many significant developments in the market for vMVPD services and other video marketplace developments,” said NAB in a call Monday with an aide to Commissioner Geoffrey Starks, according to an ex parte filing in docket 14-261. House Commerce Chair Cathy McMorris Rogers, R-Wash., and Communications Subcommittee Chair Bob Latta, R-Ohio, wrote a letter Monday to Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel arguing the matter is outside FCC authority and should be left to Congress (see 2308090065).
The FCC shouldn’t “apply 1990s-era laws and regulations” to streaming services, said House Commerce Chair Cathy McMorris Rogers, R-Wash., and Communications Subcommittee Chair Bob Latta R-Ohio, in a letter to Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel Monday. “If the laws and regulations governing the video marketplace need to be reexamined, it is up to Congress to make updates, not the FCC.” Sen. Maria Cantwell, D-Wash., has written Rosenworcel pressing for the agency to refresh the record on reclassifying streaming services as MVPDs, while Rosenworcel said such reclassification is not within the agency’s authority (see 2306230062. “We agree with your previous statements and urge you to refrain from taking any actions to reopen this proceeding,” said Latta and McMorris Rogers. “Imposing old cable regulations on vMVPDs would ignore the unique characteristics and complexities of the online video ecosystem.” The outdatedness of the current MVPD regulations is “precisely why it is so important for the FCC to refresh the record on how it views [virtual MVPDs],” said a statement from the Coalition for Local News, an advocacy group recently formed by broadcast affiliate groups to press for the 2014 FCC docket (14-261) on reclassification to be refreshed (see 2307180058). “The FCC and Congress cannot effectively understand this new market without the data and perspective a public comment process would uniquely offer,” said the coalition.
ESPN and Penn Entertainment, sports content and gambling company, will launch a sportsbook this fall, ESPN said Tuesday. ESPN said Penn will rebrand and relaunch its current sportsbook as ESPN Bet, launching in 16 states where Penn is licensed. ESPN's finally agreeing to a sportsbook licensing deal "to help stem the growing profitability hole facing ESPN isn’t shocking," Lightfield's Rich Greenfield wrote Wednesday. But the deal raises questions about why ESPN partnered with Penn rather than sports betting market leaders like FanDuel or DraftKings, he said.
Paramount Global will sell its Simon & Schuster publishing arm for $1.62 billion cash to investment firm KKR, the two said Monday. They said Simon & Schuster will be a stand-alone, private company in the deal. The transaction is subject to regulatory approval.
Warner Bros. Discovery's direct-to-consumer business was "roughly breakeven" in Q2 and should reach profitability this year, David Zaslav said Thursday as the company announced Q2 results. Chief Financial Officer Gunnar Wiedenfels said D2C advertising is "a massive opportunity." Customer churn of several hundred thousand due to overlapping HBO Max and Discovery+ subscribers was lower than expected, said Wiedenfels. Zaslav said the company had "some good success" in international markets layering sports into streaming, which could guide its U.S. plans for its sports rights. The company said it had "modest cash savings" of around $100 million during the quarter due to the actors' and writers' strikes. Wiedenfels said the company is assuming an end to the strikes early next month.
YouTube TV is now available throughout WideOpenWest's footprint as its live TV offering, the cable company said Wednesday. WOW said this spring it was dropping its traditional video service for the virtual MVPD service (see 2305150027).
The CW Network and Hearst signed an extended and expanded network affiliation agreement, The CW said Tuesday. Under the multiyear agreement, Hearst will continue carrying CW programming in six markets, and launch The CW on Hearst's KQCA Stockton, California, Sept. 1.
The FCC should classify streaming services as MVPDs to prevent discrimination in their carriage of local TV stations, said One Ministries in an ex parte filing posted in docket 14-261 Friday. Streaming services should be treated similarly to satellite MVPDs such as Dish “where if the provider chooses to offer local-into-local service ... it is required to provide subscribers with all the local broadcast TV signals that are assigned to that [designated market area] DMA, as long as they ask to be carried on the system and are otherwise eligible,” One Ministries said. The broadcaster said it had found that local full-power stations that aren’t carried by streamers “are more likely to have non English programming, be a local independent station, or be a religious station.”