Reaction Mixed on News Corp./DirecTV OK at FCC

[Gregg Lengling]

There were supporters and dissenters with the regulatory approval of News Corp.'s takeover of DirecTV and Hughes, granted by both the Federal Communications Commission and Justice Department's antitrust staff late Friday.


FCC Chairman Michael Powell, who voted in favor of the transaction along with the FCC's two other Republican commissioners, said the deal and its conditional OK is good for competition.

"News Corporation has a history of taking significant risks and introducing new and innovative media services," Powell said. "Enhanced competition will increase pressure to improve service and lower prices for both cable and satellite television subscribers. This is a particularly compelling public interest benefit in light of continued cable rate hikes."

Powell pointed out the FCC has reviewed two separate license transfer applications involving DirecTV. "Unlike the proposed (2002) transaction with EchoStar - the first major transaction blocked by the commission in decades - this transaction between the News Corporation and General Motors (parent of Hughes) as conditioned will yield significant benefits to the public," he said.

The FCC's two Democratic commissioners voted against the deal.

"Deciding whether a fox should guard a hen house is a far more serious exercise than this order reflects," said FCC Commissioner Jonathan Adelstein. "Granted, the birds in this case are not hens but valuable satellites with a national footprint from which nearly 12 million people receive video programming through DirecTV. And the Fox in this case is already one of the world's largest media conglomerates, with a vast array of global content and distribution assets."

Among Adelstein's concerns is with DirecTV's local TV service. The FCC approval requires the satellite TV service to offer local TV in an additional 30 markets by the end of 2004. Adelstein said the commission should've required DirecTV to provide local service for all 210 U.S. TV markets by 2006.

Others are not happy with the FCC decision.

The Center for Digital Democracy, a consistent voice of opposition to the deal, said the commission's "failure" to reject News Corp.'s takeover of DirecTV is a blow to program diversity, competition and consumer rights.

"At the very least, they should have imposed stringent safeguards that would have ensured unfettered opportunities for new and competing programmers on DirecTV," said Jeff Chester, the center's executive director. "But because the Bush Administration's favorite son, Rupert Murdoch of Fox News and The Weekly Standard fame, wanted this deal so badly, the FCC have had their 'eyes wide shut.'"

[foxeng]

Originally posted by Gregg Lengling
"At the very least, they should have imposed stringent safeguards that would have ensured unfettered opportunities for new and competing programmers on DirecTV," said Jeff Chester, the center's executive director. "But because the Bush Administration's favorite son, Rupert Murdoch of Fox News and The Weekly Standard fame, wanted this deal so badly, the FCC have had their 'eyes wide shut.'"

I am a Democrat and I am GLAD Chester DOESN'T SPEAK for me! What an idiot. :drink:  He is always AGAINST anything that might make TV better just because it is the way it always was. GEEZ!