Media coalition: Comcast merger to create power 'unknown' in U.S. history - The Hill's Hillicon Valley: Via .
A new group opposed to the merger of Comcast and NBC Universal says regulators need to consider whether the size of the proposed deal represents a threat to the public interest.
“It is important to recognize the sheer scope of the proposed acquisition,” the group wrote in a letter to Congress Thursday. “The merged entity will exert a degree of power unknown in our nation’s media history.”
Addressing House Communications Subcommittee Chairman Rick Boucher (D-Va.) and Commerce Trade and Consumer Protection Subcommittee Chairman Bobby Rush (D-Ill.), the Coalition for Competition in Media points to Comcast’s status as the country’s largest Internet service provider and cable company, and NBC’s ownership of “some of the most heavily-visited websites on the Internet," to make the argument that the merger could stifle competition in the media. read more... »
FCC Lets Hollywood Turn Off Your Output Jacks: Via Threat Level.
Hollywood will soon have the power to remotely disable the analog outputs on your set-top box, under a decision by federal regulators on Friday intended to prevent home recording of new movie releases.
The move by the Federal Communications Commission grants cable and satellite providers the power to block consumers from viewing just-released movies in an analog format through a process known as Selectable Output Control. Hollywood requested SOC powers as a condition of allowing providers for the first time to release movies to their in-home customers while the film is in theaters.
The Motion Picture Association of America said its member studios would not authorize the early movie releases unless it won the ability to deploy Selectable Output Control. The reason: Analog video signals can easily be recorded, while digital video standards include a copy protection scheme that lets providers set a no-copy flag on the signal.
Digital rights group, Public Knowledge, said millions of older televisions, including 11 million HD sets, would be affected, a number the MPAA disputes. Owners of those devices would not have the luxury of being able to view the latest theater blockbuster at home through video on-demand services.
“The FCC is allowing the MPAA to control your television,” John Bergmayer, Public Knowledge staff attorney, said in a telephone interview. read more... »
FCC to "improve" CableCARD rules this month: Via Law & Disorder Section - Ars Technica.
The FCC's new National Broadband Plan made it clear that the agency has had it with CableCARD's failings and wants to try something else. Specifically, the FCC wants a new "gateway" device that would apply to all TV providers (cable, satellite, IPTV). Like a broadband modem, the gateway device would take its inputs from the different TV systems, but output a signal in a standard format that can be used by DVRs, TVs, and set-top boxes.
The changes start this month. The FCC has just announced plans for its April meeting, and they include these two juicy items:
Read Original Article:(Via Law & Disorder Section - Ars Technica.)
Will your big-screen Super Bowl party violate copyright law?: Via Law & Disorder Section - Ars Technica.
An offhand comment the other day by a friend caught my attention—"Did you know that you can't watch the Super Bowl on a TV screen larger than 55 inches? Yeah, it's right there in the law."
With the Colts and Saints set to do battle in Super Bowl XLIV, this seemed worth looking into as a public service. Could it be that some of those giant flat panel TV sets now finding their way into US living rooms are actually violating copyright law?
Read Original Article:(Via Law & Disorder Section - Ars Technica.)
TV Everywhere: Collusion Anywhere?: Via Freedom to Tinker.
FreePress and the National Cable and Telecom Association (NCTA) are talking past each other about TV Everywhere, a new initiative from the cable TV industry. FreePress says TV Everywhere is the cable industry's collusive attempt to limit competition; the NCTA says it's an exciting new product opportunity for consumers. Let's unpack this issue and see who might have a point, and who is blowing smoke.
We're at a critical point in the history of television. In recent years, most people have gotten TV shows from a traditional cable or satellite service. Now more and more people are getting shows on the Internet. Cable companies need to adapt, somehow, or become dinosaurs.
Which brings us to TV Everywhere. The idea, according to the NCTA, is for cable companies to offer their residential subscribers online access to the same shows they get at home. Existing consumers get more, at no extra charge -- who would complain about that? -- but only if they keep buying traditional cable service.
FreePress tells a different story, in which cable industry companies have agreed among themselves that this is their sole Internet distribution strategy. If such an agreement exists, it is problematic -- it looks like a classic market division agreement, which is bad for consumers and (as I understand it) presumptively illegal. read more... »
SOC's slippery slope: good enough for movies, why not sports?: Via Law & Disorder Section - Ars Technica.
Back when we had our debate with cable's top lobbyist Kyle McSlarrow over whether to let Hollywood block analog streams to your home theater setup, I asked a worried question. If the Federal Communications Commission does give movie studios and cable companies the green light to implement Selectable Output Control (SOC) on "premium" early run movies, who else might petition for it next? read more... »
Satellite TV to FCC: we're special, don't make us open up: Via Law & Disorder Section - Ars Technica.
If you've tried to pump your fully-paid-up cable connection into, say, a computer running Windows Media Center, you've probably come up against the closed nature of pay-TV and the severe limitations of CableCARD. And what about satellite TV? Don't even think about it.
The FCC wants to blow open the market for third-party video devices, scrapping some of the current (failed) CableCARD rules and adding satellite providers to the list. read more... »
MPAA to FCC: critics of video blocking proposals are lying: Via Law & Disorder Section - Ars Technica.
The movie studios have a new Holy Grail, it seems: Federal Communications Commission permission to cable companies to shut down the analog streams on video-on-demand movie programming. As Ars readers know, we've been covering this issue for a while. But the Motion Picture Association of America's latest letter to the FCC pulls out all the stops, rhetoric-wise, calling criticisms of this scheme "complete and utter nonsense that only can be intended to stir up baseless fears among consumers that their equipment will suddenly go dark and be unusable for any purpose." read more... »
DRM by any other name: The latest from Hollywood: Via Freedom to Tinker.
Sunday's New York Times had an article, Studios' Quest for Life After DVDs. To nobody's surprise, consumers want to have convenient access to "their" media, wherever they happen to be, without all the annoying restrictions that come into play when you add DRM to the picture. To many people's surprise, sales of DVDs (much less Blu-ray) are in trouble.
In the third quarter, studios’ home entertainment divisions generated about $4 billion, down 3.2 percent from a year ago, according to the Digital Entertainment Group, a trade consortium. But digital distribution contributed just $420 million, an increase of 18 percent.
Given that DVDs are really a luxury good (versus, say, food or electricity), the 3.2 percent drop seems like Hollywood is getting off easy. read more... »
Cable: Let us lock down your TV (we'll offer movies sooner): Via Law & Disorder Section - Ars Technica.
The movie studio crusade to take over your home theater system just got an endorsement from Time Warner Cable, whose top staff visited the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) last Wednesday to ask, yet again, for permission to let cable operators limit video streams to HDTVs and DVRs. At the meeting, representatives of TWC and the National Cable and Telecommunications Association (NCTA) backed the scheme being pushed by the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA): read more... »