Comcast-NBCU Web Conditions Getting Close Scrutiny from FCC Members
Draft FCC conditions on Internet video and network management in Comcast’s planned purchase of control in NBC Universal are the subject of close scrutiny from some commissioners, agency officials said Tuesday. They said Internet conditions in the draft Media Bureau order on the deal are getting significant attention in general on the eighth floor. The two Republican commissioners seem skeptical about whether all the Internet conditions are needed, said FCC and industry officials. Commissioners are also giving attention to arbitration conditions, the subject of a filing Tuesday by the two U.S. DBS companies, a commission official said.
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It’s too early to say whether any commissioners will pursue changes to the Internet provisions or others, but members are starting to consider what edits they may propose, agency and industry officials said. No changes had been formally proposed by midday Tuesday, agency officials said. Chairman Julius Genachowski hasn’t indicated exactly when he wants the draft approved, and he still hasn’t voted for it (CD Dec 27 p1), an agency official said. The source said that may indicate that he’s keeping open the option of seeking a vote on the order at the Jan. 25 commission meeting, if the order isn’t approved before then, a possibility that other agency officials have raised.
An FCC decision is “expected very soon,” Comcast Executive Vice President David Cohen wrote on the company’s blog. “It has been two and a half weeks” since Genachowski “initiated the final procedural step in granting approval” to Comcast-NBC Universal, Cohen said. He said there has been a “positive reaction” to the cable operator’s plan to offering broadband for $9.95 monthly to the homes of children who get free school lunches.
One of the Internet conditions getting attention at the FCC would bar Comcast’s broadband service from giving preferential treatment to its own content over others’, agency officials said. Some have said such a condition could be seen as a form of net neutrality (CD Jan 7 p3). Also getting attention is a part of the draft that would require the cable operator to strike deals to give online video distributors such as Netflix access to some online content from Comcast-NBC Universal that it sells to other pay-TV providers, agency officials said. A bureau spokeswoman declined to comment.
Some think deal conditions could come up in hearings on Capitol Hill. House Commerce Committee Chairman Fred Upton, R-Mich., has promised vigorous oversight of the FCC, and he and other GOP leaders have opposed net neutrality rules. It’s a safe bet that “House Republicans will grill Chairman Genachowski on expected merger conditions and net neutrality generally at the earliest possible opportunity,” said analyst Jeff Silva of Medley Global Advisors. “Because Republican members will probably be unable to do much about net neutrality policy or Comcast-NBC Universal merger conditions in the near term, you can expect them to vent their anger and frustration all the more when the first oversight hearing of the year is held.”
Also getting commission attention is how to apply a program access condition requiring Comcast-NBC Universal’s national cable channels and regional sports networks to be available to pay-TV rivals, an agency official said. Some consideration is being given to whether there should be changes to the order, which says that in some instances Comcast-NBC Universal must give subscription-video rivals access to their individual channels, the official said. The draft also would require that in some cases such programming be offered as an option to rivals in the same bundles that are available to other pay-TV companies, the official said.
DirecTV and Dish Network said they're concerned that the order may depart from FCC precedent in three other major deals. They want it to require Comcast-NBC Universal and a rival pay-TV provider, when in a carriage impasse, to submit to an arbitrator an offer for an individual national network. “The record in this proceeding clearly establishes the need for arbitration” for such channels, the DBS companies said in a filing to docket 10-56. “Requiring arbitration of stand-alone carriage agreements provid[es] a safeguard against” the combined company forcing subscribers of other pay-TV companies to buy “unwanted programming” to get access “to marquee programming,” the filing said. Dish said an executive had conversations with aides to Commissioners Mignon Clyburn and Michael Copps about the company’s concern that any condition on the deal would allow pay-TV providers to make use of program access and arbitration conditions only when “Comcast/NBCU national programming channels are offered as a bundle.”