Congress Turns Up The Heat on FCC's Chairman

Fletch writes "FCC Chairman Kevin Martin could be in for an uncomfortable spring, as House Energy Committee Chair John Dingel (D-MI) has requested a truckload of FCC paperwork relating to some controversial decisions Martin has made. Those include the FCC's reversal on the a la carte cable issue and newspaper-television cross-ownership restrictions. 'This request has got to be turning the FCC completely upside down. Significantly, it appears to reflect a bipartisan discontent with Martin's performance. Democrats and some Republicans are upset over his recent move to relax one of the agency's key media ownership rules, as well as the rushed manner in which he handled the matter late last year. Other Republicans dislike what they see as Martin's persecution of the cable industry, especially Comcast.' The Committee originally announced its intention to investigate the FCC in January."

he should refuse to testify

[Adult film producer]

just ignore congress and shred every last document. Why not? Everybody else on Bush's team does this and gets away with it. Democrats in congress make a lot of noise but always bend over and take it when Bush gets angry.

Persecution of those who deserve it? Oh My!

[Jane Q. Public]

Comcast deserves all the examination it has gotten, and more. They have been terrible.

And "a la carte" cable is the obvious and fair thing to do. The claims of "undue burden" and "technically infeasible" are just so much crap. If they have the tecnical capability to do "On Demand", then they have the technical capability to do a la carte. Q.E.D.

Plain and simple: they just don't want to. Because then they can't charge exhorbitant rates for their bundled "packages".

Re:he should refuse to testify

[Adult film producer]

thats not a troll, its a statement of fact. Sorry that it hurts your feelings.

A re-energized House flexes their muscle....

[postbigbang]

And Martin is a great target, because communications decision-making is so controversial. However, there's still a huge number of telco/carrier contributions to various political campaigns and funds that are being ignored here. What of the millions of dollars used to influence policy and legislation? What of congressmen that shill for MPAA/RIAA and the cable/comm companies? It's all PR. Nothing but media blasts and putting Martin on the hotseat (which he richly deserves, for so many reasons).

Re:Persecution of those who deserve it? Oh My!

[w.p.richardson]

I thought the packages were set up to cover the high cost of certain channels, e.g., ESPN. I mean, in addition to being designed to fuck over subscribers.

It is called "Sheeple".

[Jane Q. Public]

Not all people are as independent-thinking as you are. The Iraq "war" -- and the continued presence of Gworge W. Bush -- are excellent examples, demonstrating that an awful lot of people in this country believe what they are told by the media, no matter how ridiculous it is.

Actually...

[Jane Q. Public]

The relaxation of ownership rules, today, is by itself an issue that well warrants investigation. It is, plain and simple, a dangerously BAD IDEA.

Re:Persecution of those who deserve it? Oh My!

[Captain Splendid]

That may be true, but why does the consumer have to pay for it? Either ESPN (or whoever) lowers their prices to be competitive, or understands that for that kind of pricing, they'll have less orders.

Not "only" a symptom...

[Jane Q. Public]

It is also part of the cause. The argument "I did it because I could" is not morally or ethically defensible. Unfortunately, it might be legally defensible. But that's not good enough for me.

Re:Go congress! (did I just say that?)

[Sandbags]

This is because cable and satellite companies fill the pockets of congressmen with continual loads of fresh green cash... These companies have powerful lobyists. They understand that under a la carte they will no longer be able to charge people $49 for basic cable when all people want is 15-20 chanels. they also understand that if they value certain chanels too highly under a la carte, then those chanels will fall dramatically in ratings as people switch to watching programming on less expensive cable networks. Cable companies will loose money under a la carte, I have no doubt about it, and they have no intention of letting it happen. The millions they blow in kickbacks and other funding given to congressmen is nothing compared to what's at stake under a la carte.

Re:Congress turns up heat?

[dgatwood]

Yeah, this is a really rather disturbing abuse of Congress's oversight authority. For the first time since I was born, we finally have an FCC Chairman who actually stands up for the general public. What happens? Republicans and Democrats freak out because serving the public interest is not in the interest of either party. God forbid that the FCC Chairman might actually do his job and regulate scarce resources in a way that promotes fairness and equal access, provides maximum public utility, and preserves the viability of those resources for future generations....

Some of the things this Chairman has done include:

• Standing up to Comcast for their egregious abuse of the TCP/IP protocol to cause downloads to disconnect after a few seconds. This breaks lots of protocols, not just BitTorrent.
• Standing up to cable companies and satellite providers, pushing for a la carte availability of channels.
• Removing antiquated ownership rules whose only effect in a modern, online world is to drive ailing newspapers out of business for lack of the abilitty to consolidate with anyone.
• Taking a stand in favor of network neutrality, ensuring that ISPs can't hold the traffic of clients of other ISPs hostage and ensuring that providers cannot give preferential treatment to their own VoIP services over those of their competitors.

I'm sure there are others. I can't believe I'm saying this, but Bush actually got something right. Judging by the backlash from Republicans, I'm assuming it was an error on his part, but still, we as a community need to rally behind this guy.

Re:Go congress! (did I just say that?)

[RKBA]

As a fifth generation American, I find it bizarre that most people seem to be aware that we are being governed by hired prostitutes, and yet everyone seems to think it's "normal".

Re:This is not troll!!!

[Jane Q. Public]

I completely disagree with you, which was my point.

Satire is NOT trolling. Even if he trolls a lot, a comment presented as satire (as this appeared to me) is not trolling.

I have seen MANY cases of satire marked (incorrectly) as "troll". I would appreciate it if people would take the trouble to learn the difference.

Re:Persecution of those who deserve it? Oh My!

[monxrtr]

No, monopolies only exist because of government interference in the market place, without exception. Government regulation *requires* that consumers be shackled to corporate tentacles, such as in the form of power lines and cable lines.

Homeowners could have easily paid market rate for power grid connector nodes, cable nodes that connect just like plumbing to a centralized neighborhood or city node, at which point businesses can compete to connect to that node and deliver. Thus, many individual companies could compete to deliver content/power while taking on the servicing of individual user lines as part of the service contract. Government kickbacks, bribery by corporations, resulted in government interference in the free market and the resulting corporate monopolies. And as the private home owners all paid for their "last mile" lines when their homes were built (with switches that can allow an infinite number of possible companies to hook their lines individually to all choices of consumer lines) the bargaining power and incentives for competition would constantly grow with more infrastructure rather than shrink the way it does now.

Power never had to be delivered by tentacles tied between consumers users and corporate deliverers. Giant batteries could have easily been recharged at competitive power stations similar to where gas is bought, or it could have been serviced and billed like private corporation garbage pick up. And it likely would be a helluva lot cheaper to not have to maintain thousands of miles of lines as well (not to mention far more terrorist and hacker proof as it was decentralized). The lines are only there so corporations can charge monopoly rates because government regulations required power to be delivered that way.

If you socialists would drop your outdated government interference ideology, which by definition causes poverty through higher prices and lower quality at every instance of interference with free trade, we could work to dissolve the government interference in the free market which is granting corporate monopolies.

Any other government monopolies or interferences in the free market you need me to solve, such as government interference in the health care and education markets resulting in ever higher prices and lagging quality?

Re:How it reads to me...

[chortick]

With apologies to Humbert Wolfe:

You cannot hope to bribe or sway,
The Congress of the U.S.A.
But given what this lot will do
Un-bribed, there's no occasion to.

Re:Not to defend the Cable companies but....

[dubbreak]

So explain to me how legislating à la carte programming doesn't solve this issue?

If all carriers are forced to provide à la carte programming then Disney loses it's heavy weight bargaining chip. If Disney tries to charge a particular carrier more per customer, the carrier responds, "Fine, but less of our customers will subscribe."

There is no, "You must put these on the base tier." As there is no base tier, or at least the customers aren't forced to order it. Pricing becomes priced by consumer price elasticity (plus a margin of profit for the carriers). This is exactly as it should be.

One question for an American versed in sales and consumer laws: Do American laws allow selling the same service or product to different customers at different rates with little or no restrictions? I am all for bulk discounts, but in my experience if you offer one customer a bulk discount another customer purchasing the same quantity must get the same rate... different laws though.

Re:This is not troll!!!

[Anonymous Coward]

Since moderators are registered users and are themselves moderated by registered users, moderation loosely reflects the opinion of the average registered user. The moderation of the post in question is divided on the issue; a division which is reflected within the thread.

Whether something is satire or troll or both is largely in the eyes of the beholder; therefore, it is hard to claim any particular moderation of a possibly satirical post is 'inappropriate'. It is almost easier to blame the writer, since writing good satire depends on a very good understanding of one's audience. In my own opinion, the best satire does not intend to provoke an emotional response, but a thoughtful one.

I humbly and without malice suggest that this really boils down to a matter of opinion and you are merely frustrated because you hold a minority opinion. I believe meta-moderation would help promote your opinion far more than marginalizing yourself as a "potty-mouthed moderation complainer".