The FCC has reason to decide that cable operators have passed a t...
The FCC has reason to decide that cable operators have passed a threshold beyond which the agency can subject them to additional rules, three consumer and public-interest groups wrote Friday in a letter to Chairman Kevin Martin. The groups…
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agreed with an FCC filing last week in which the Media Access Project (CD Nov 19 p11) said more than 70 percent of homes served by systems with 36 or more channels subscribe to cable. That filing said homes-passed and subscriber data from the Televison & Cable Factbook, published by Warren Communications News (which publishes Communications Daily), were used correctly by the FCC to find 71.4 percent penetration. Free Press, the Consumer Federation of America and Consumers Union said they used different data but still found the 70/70 levels exceeded. Meanwhile, Rainbow Push Coalition President Jesse Jackson Sr. called it “deeply disturbing” that the FCC is “considering using an antiquated legal rule to advance what is widely seen by civil rights leaders as an anti-diversity agenda.” Jackson seems concerned that a determination that the 70 percent subscriber level was exceeded could be used by the FCC to make cable operators sell channels individually. “There is virtually no political support from either progressives or conservatives for such pet policies as a la carte pricing,” Jackson said in a news release. Martin said last week that he hasn’t asked other commissioners to vote on a la carte rules. Jackson didn’t comment at the request of the cable industry or anyone else, said Kimberly Marcus, executive director of Rainbow Push’s Public Policy Institute. “We think this is another way to keep minority owners from breaking into the industry,” she said. “The reverend has been speaking out on this topic for a couple of years.”