Big Four Affiliates Bash ABC, NBC, CBS and Fox Networks in Latest Eruption at the FCC
The 700 TV station affiliates say the Big Four broadcast networks are raising affiliation fees, shrinking exclusivity, and imposing 'take‑it‑or‑leave‑it' terms, draining resources from local stations
■ Senate GOP Draft Ag Bill Includes $500 Million for USDA’s ReConnect Broadband Program
■ Amazon, without SpaceX, Forms New NGSO Trade Group Called SpaceConnect
■ NTIA Administrator Arielle Roth Goes Before House Panel on June 30
■ Free State’s Andrew Long Suggests Charter-Cox Undergoing CPUC-Abetted Shakedown
■ NRSC, NRCC: ABC’s The View is a Partisan Platform, Not Bona Fide News
■ Analyst Sam Raus: Free Market Delivering Broadband Affordability Gains for Consumers
■ FCC Boots Effort to Eliminate Agency’s News Distortion Policy
■ FCC’s Anna Gomez ‘Not a Fan of Alexa’ over Privacy Implications
■ Concerned Women for America with a Twist: LGBTQ+ TV Ratings Would Help Those in Search of Such Content
■ Poll: Bipartisan Doubts Big Tech Will Pay Energy Tab for Data Centers
■ People: Angie Kronenberg Joins Public Knowledge’s Board of Directors
Big 4: TV’s best drama isn’t on any broadcast channel. It’s playing out at the FCC, where lawyers for network affiliates say their relationship with ABC, NBC, CBS and Fox networks is unraveling after decades of unity. In June 22 comments with the FCC, the affiliates, some 700 local TV stations in all, warned they now face “a fundamentally different and uniquely destabilizing form of competition: Direct competition from their own broadcast television Networks and from the [direct to consumer] streaming platforms operated by those Networks’ parent companies.” They said rising affiliation fees, shrinking exclusivity and “take‑it‑or‑leave‑it” terms are draining resources from local stations and shifting value to national streaming platforms. “The Networks’ practices of negotiating nearly all deals in the virtual MVPD ecosystem results in Networks taking an unfair share of revenue from increasingly dominant linear television distribution platforms like Google’s YouTube TV and Disney’s Hulu + Live TV,” the affiliates said. (More after paywall)
