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The Discovery Network has joined a legal challenge to a longstanding FCC ruling forcing cable systems to carry local broadcast TV channels. Read it here. Discovery and the cable systems are right.
The FCC’s claims that the “must-carry” rule increases competition are ludicrous. If you decrease the number of available slots available to a cable system’s discretion, you have reduced the company’s choice and therefore that of its viewers. If local channels don’t have to compete for space on cable TV, they have less incentive to listen to those potential customers than the nonbroadcast channels have.
That’s not competition, it’s coercion. The must-carry rule should be stricken down.
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