OTTAWA-GATINEAU – Rogers Media has to provide the Rogers Sportsnet signals to Bell Canada under the same terms it gives to Rogers Cable, the CRTC said today.
Bell Canada had filed for dispute resolution with the Commission, complaining how it was being treated in negotiations to carry the regional sports service. Specifically, it was being told by Sportsnet that Bell’s new terrestrial digital TV service can’t offer Sportsnet on basic.
(Bell filed the complaint on September 27th and said, interestingly, according to today’s decision, that it planned to launch the new terrestrial service in mid-November 2006. Bell’s IPTV service has not launched as yet, however. In fact the company has been rather silent on its terrestrial TV plans.)
"According to Bell Canada, while most of RCCI’s cable BDUs in the GTA distribute SportsNet on the basic service, RSI (Rogers Sportsnet) refused to allow Bell Canada to do likewise. It argued that, in order to have a fully competitive service, and in light of RSI’s refusal to allow it to distribute SportsNet as part of the basic service, the Commission should issue an order requiring RSI to permit Bell Canada to distribute SportsNet on the basic service throughout the GTA," reads the CRTC decision today.
Rogers said that Bell’s "request for an order ignored the reality of the competition that exists between SportsNet and TSN. RSI observed that SportsNet must compete for viewers, advertising revenues and rights to sports programming with TSN. It added that TSN, like SportsNet, enjoys distribution on a modified dual status basis, but has a regulated rate when distributed on the basic service that is higher than that of SportsNet."
(NB: Bell Canada is a 20% owner of Bell Globemedia, which owns TSN.)
"RSI also pointed out that, as a modified dual status service, SportsNet must be distributed by BDUs as part of a discretionary tier unless RSI agrees to distribution of the service on basic. RSI submitted that it thus has the ability to refuse a request for basic carriage from a BDU. It contended that, if the Commission upheld Bell Canada’s complaint and granted the relief sought, the Commission would effectively be changing the status of SportsNet to that of a dual status service," adds the release,
The Commission didn’t buy the Rogers argument and directed the company to offer Sportsnet to Bell on similar terms.
