Sinclair, NAB Slam Pay-TV Interests at FCC Over Their Attacks Against ATSC 3.0

The American TV Alliance, AT&T and Dish Network have “either misunderstood or ignored the very clear message” in the broadcast petition asking the FCC to approve the transition to ATSC 3.0, Sinclair told Media Bureau Chief Bill Lake in a meeting Friday, said an FCC ex parte filing posted Wednesday in docket 16-142. The petition didn't ask the FCC to require multichannel video programming distributors to carry any ATSC 3.0 signals, said Sinclair. Pay-TV transmission equipment and set-top boxes are incapable of carrying ATSC 3.0 signals, it said. “Broadcasters have no interest in delaying implementation of Next Generation TV until MVPDs are technically capable of carrying it,” said Sinclair. “Therefore, broadcasters are prepared to deliver their program streams to MVPDs in the current standard (ATSC 1.0), so as to maintain the operational status quo.” Because FCC approval wouldn't change what MVPDs are carrying, “there should be no change to the underlying carriage arrangement, be it must carry or retransmission consent,” the company said. It isn't in broadcasters' interest to demand carriage of programming streams that MVPDs can't carry, the broadcaster said. “In light of this, we can only conclude that ATVA, AT&T and DISH persist in their ruse to delay implementation of Next Generation TV because they see it as a competitive threat to their service offerings.” The FCC should not “broaden this very narrow, technical rulemaking into a comprehensive inquiry on competitive industry business relationships,” Sinclair said. “Rather, the FCC should limit the NPRM to questions about Next Generation TV technology and its broadcast implementation plan.” ATVA and AT&T didn't comment Wednesday. AT&T and Dish "appear to be seeking to further their own interests by asking the Commission to dictate terms and conditions of future retransmission consent agreements" in the guise of airing their concerns about ATSC 3.0, NAB said in a separate letter. "AT&T is a company with a market capitalization of more than $250 billion. The notion that any local broadcaster could force AT&T to do anything is comical." The pay-TV concern over ATSC 3.0 is "nothing more than an effort to accomplish in this proceeding what they could not accomplish in the Commission’s good faith negotiation proceeding earlier this year," NAB said. "They are asking the Commission to intervene in retransmission consent negotiations for their narrow, self-interested benefit."