Political Discussion: FCC uses its Twitter account to update blacked out Cablevision customers!

[MrPogi]

Unbelievable, but true...



The FCC used its Twitter account to update blacked out Cablevision customers on the Phillies-Giants playoff game...

The American Television Alliance, a coalition including Cablevision, Time Warner Cable, DirecTV, Dish Network and Charter among its members, issued the following statement:

Instead of using its authority to protect Cablevision's customers from the News Corp blackout, the FCC tweeted updates from the Phillies-Giants playoff game last night to fill in 'the baseball void for those without Fox-Cablevision.' The only solutions the FCC has offered to this problem so far have been suggesting consumers turn back the clock and install rabbit ears, or that they switch TV providers despite offering no guarantee that blackouts won't happen to another provider or in any other part of the country in the near future. And now this? Twitter updates of baseball games? The FCC needs to step up to the plate and create a real solution by reforming retransmission consent rules immediately.

 

[n2rj]

If the FCC does anything, it will likely be challenged successfully in court.

Must carry rules were already successfully challenged in court. And it wasn't by the networks, it was by the cable companies who didn't want to carry every station within a 50 mile radius.

The FCC simply needs to stay out of this one, except advising customers how to install an antenna to get their networks OTA. Of course their cable and wireless broadband lobbyist buddies won't be too happy about that.

 

[Yes616]

The problem is with people who settled in very rural VALLEY locations. Many Cablevision subs are in such places with no hope of OTA reception. I am a bit lucky as I am on a hill and have decent OTA signals coming from Scranton, PA so Fox will not be much of a problem when it gets dropped from Dish on November 1st. I will still have Fox56 WOLF-TV to replace WNYW Fox 5 and WOLF 56.3 (WQMY-TV) for MyN to replace WWOR MyN 9 both from New York City.

Most people in my town do not have this luxury as they are down in the hole.