SO WILL WE SEE fee-for-carriage, or not?
A blizzard of issues were discussed, argued and dissected in the over half-a-million words spoken (seriously, we counted…) six months ago in Gatineau during the CRTC’s hearing into the policies governing broadcast distribution undertakings and specialty & pay TV channels.
But the most buzz-worthy question during the 12 hearing days was one that wasn’t fully related to either. It was the question of whether subscription fees will have to be paid to conventional over-the-air broadcasters by those BDUs (cable, satellite and telco TV).
Of course, we’ll have to wait until 4 p.m. today for the official word (I’ll be in the media “lock-up” beginning at 2 p.m. here in Gatineau and will have something for readers at four o’clock), but there have been largely few solid leads on what will be in the decision.
I ran into the senior regulatory counsel for one of the major broadcasters Wednesday afternoon on the plane on my way to Ottawa who told me that the Commission has never been so tight-lipped about a decision. This is a common sentiment among cable company and broadcast executives I’ve spoken with over the past weeks and months.
Often, those companies or industries affected by an upcoming decision get some information (nudge-nudge, wink-wink) from the Gatineau bunker but there has been precious little of that on this massive – and massively important – proceeding which got under way well over a year ago.
While I knew I wasn’t going to get anywhere with my question, I quickly asked CRTC chairman Konrad von Finckenstein at Wednesday evening’s Telecom Hall of Fame Awards at the Museum of Civilization, just blocks from the Commission in Gatineau if he could give me any hints.
“Everyone will be happy,” von Finckenstein said with a knowing smile. (That is, he knows what the decision is – and knows that not everyone is likely to be happy…)
We’ll see about that – but just for fun, here are some very interesting guesses we’ve heard on just what might be in the decision.
On fee for carriage:
1. Broadcasters will actually get an official “okay” for such a fee, but the amount of which will be determined during their license renewal hearings in 2009. And – some strings will be attached to any new monies at those license renewals. For example, they won’t get to splurge any more than they already do in Hollywood.
2. CBC won’t get a fee because they already get a billion dollars every year from taxpayers.
3. Mindful of the holy hullabaloo any new mandated fees would bring down on the Commission and the federal government for that matter, the Commission will mandate that the fee can not be passed along to consumers by BDUs.
4. In return though, cable companies will be allowed to sell local advertising on the U.S. cable channels’ local availability ad time – that two minutes per hour which American cable channels like CNN and A&E make available to their cable company clients in the States. It’s a multi-billion-dollar business down there. Right now, Canadian BDUs are not allowed to make money on that time, spending 25% of it on their own products and offering the rest of the time to Canadian programmers “at cost.”
On genre protection:
1. The border will absolutely stay closed to American services than infringe on Canadian genres. So no ESPN, no Showtime. No Sportsman Channel.
2. Competition in Canada will be opened up in the genres – with some kind of protections for small specialty broadcasters.
On dynamic advertising:
1. Restrictions against advertising in the video on demand stream will disappear.
2. The Commission will give tacit approval to dynamic ad insertion (new ads into PVR streams, demographically targeted ads, etc.) but will ask for more detailed information on it, due to privacy concerns.
On small BDUs:
1. The expansion of the exemption order they wanted will come to pass, finally, meaning some of the changes – like fee-for-carriage – won’t apply to them anyway.
On Michel Morin’s plan to help small broadcasters:
1. He’ll have a colorful dissent written…
Please bear in mind we have no special insight into what today’s decision might say, the above are just conjecture.
And, there are many other issues – access to carriage, distribution and linkage, the construction of basic service, distant signals (look for a fee there, actually) and so on – but we haven’t heard as much informed speculation (or good guesses) on those as the ones above.
So enjoy your day on pins and needles and we’ll get the news out to you as quick as we can.
