Standardized Gateway Device Panned by Pay-TV Companies

A wide range of pay-TV companies panned FCC standards for what the agency calls gateway devices to let all subscribers connect consumer electronics devices bought at retail to multichannel video program distributors (MVPD). Cable, satellite and telco filings posted by the FCC Wednesday in docket 97-80 sought flexibility in their services connecting to what are also called AllVid user interfaces. Google, Intel and major CE companies including Sony backed the commission proposal for an AllVid device, which also could get online content.

Consumers often can’t choose from all available video on any platform because of “significant obstacles” to video convergence and “greater regulatory oversight and direction is needed to spur competition,” Google said. “Consumers would be well-served by having such an inexpensive universal adapter available at retail, which would feature an easy-to-use common interface, and employ nationwide interoperability” to connect TVs, DVRs and other smart video devices, the company said. AT&T, Dish Network and sister CE company EchoStar, DirecTV and Verizon were among those saying regulation isn’t needed.

Dish and EchoStar asked the FCC to heed the Hippocratic oath to “first, do no harm” as “the relative infancy of the online content market means that the retail market for truly innovative devices that combine traditional MVPD viewing with online content is still young.” DirecTV said it’s “gravely concerned” that AllVid rules would hinder development of new devices and services. The commission’s desire for quick resolution of the matter is understandable, “but seeking to achieve this through blunt regulatory force would be ill advised,” AT&T said. Verizon said the regulator’s proposal is based “on a false premise” since “competition in the video device market has already been unleashed."

CEA was among those seeking government-set minimum functions for gateways regardless of what form they take. Nonprofit groups including Free Press, Media Access Project, New America Foundation and Public Knowledge backed such devices. “The case for AllVid has been made, and the Commission has accepted it,” said the latter two groups. Free Press called the model “long overdue.” Some nonprofits also sided with the CE industry in recent comments on fixes to CableCARDs, meant to be a stop-gap before gateways are mandated (CED June 16 p6).

Both subscription-video and CE comments on the inquiry said industry will have a large role in developing gateway devices and other new products capable of delivering over-the-top Internet video to pay-TV customers. CEA and the CE Retailers Coalition (CERC) said the FCC should follow precedent from the DTV transition in which the government set “minimum, optional, and reserved functions and capacities” -- as was done in this case by the NTIA with commission assistance for DTV receivers. The NCTA was among pay-TV filers saying the FCC ought to help industry develop solutions instead of imposing technology mandates.

Industry standards and certification, referenced as needed in regulations, can undergird FCC action in the area, said joint comments by CEA and CERC. The commission should mandate basic functions for any gateway device that will be included by a pay-TV provider on its service and network, the filing said. “Define optional capacities that an MVPD may choose to include in some or all models” and don’t specify the physical format of adapter versus gateway, it said. “There seems little or no argument” MVPDs ought to provide gateways specific to the company, the two groups said. “The most challenging role for the Commission will be to decide when some choice or specification is necessary, and when the ‘market’ can be relied upon to make these choices. It should not be necessary, in any case, for the FCC to undertake to invent, or cause to be invented, any enabling technology."

NCTA deems it essential that the FCC “leave industry with the flexibility to test and use diverse solutions that can adapt to rapid changes in technology, competition, and consumer demand,” the group said. “The Commission would be running a high risk of immediate obsolescence if it again picked a particular technical solution that will be rapidly overtaken by changes in marketplace demand and by innovation” and shouldn’t “seek premature standardization,” it continued. To an extent, the inquiry “suggests unworkable (and unlawful) elements of disaggregation and disintermediation of the cable business,” going beyond Section 629 of the Communications Act, which mandated creation of a retail market for CE devices for cable programming, NCTA said. The American Cable Association asked the agency to move “cautiously” in finding a replacement for CableCARDs that doesn’t “disproportionately burden smaller operators.”