Fergie's Tech Blog

Comcast Challenges FCC's Ownership Limits

Eric Bangeman writes on ARS Technica:

Comcast has decided to challenge the Federal Communications Commission's "unofficial" cap on cable system ownership. In a filing earlier this month, Comcast criticized the FCC's 30 percent horizontal ownership cap, saying that limits on how many subscribers a given cable operator can service are no longer necessary.

In 1992, the FCC tweaked its cable-ownership regulations in response to a law passed by Congress. Concerned that cable networks would have too few distribution outlets if there was insufficient competition among cable providers, the FCC ruled that a cable company could serve no more than 30 percent of homes passed by cable companies in the US. Later that decade, the FCC changed its measurement metric, deciding to drop the homes-passed measurement and decreeing that no single cable operator could serve over 30 percent of all cable subscribers in the US.

The FCC's limit was challenged in court, and in 2001, a federal court overturned the limit and directed the FCC to come up with a new set of metrics. Instead of coming up with new criteria, however, the FCC has continued to enforce the 30 percent limit for mergers.

Comcast is hit hardest by the FCC's rules, as its 26.2 million subscribers account for just over 28 percent of the 96.8 million US residents with cable or satellite TV service.

posted by Fergie @ 2/27/2007 01:22:00 PM