Category Archives: AllVid

Second Circuit Debunks FCC’s Set-Top Box Arguments

Posted on by

Last February, the FCC launched yet another attempt to excise itself from (in the immortal words of former FCC Commissioner Robert McDowell) the “Valley of Unattained Goals” of Section 629.  To justify its aggressive regulatory intervention, the Commission argued that (1) there is a separate market for set-top boxes over which MVPDs allegedly exercise market power; and, as such, (2) the rates consumers pay to rent set-top boxes, to put it colloquially, are “too damn high.” While such arguments make for great populist fodder, the problem is that the Commission’s foundational arguments underlying their set-top box proposal simply are not Continue Reading »

What is Past is Prologue: Lessons to be Learned Before Any New #CommActUpdate…

Posted on by

Last week, the House Energy and Commerce Committee held its kick-off hearing on a potential update of our nation’s communications laws with no less than four former FCC Chairmen.  As was appropriate, the hearing did not focus on specific items for change, but rather facilitated an excellent discussion of broad themes on how Congress should approach the complex task ahead.  I commend the Committee for holding this discussion, because it is very important, in the words of Congressman John Dingell, for Congress to “legislate properly” in order to minimize the inevitable unintended consequences.  Indeed, while Congress has had its share Continue Reading »

Thoughts on the 15th Cable Competition Report…

Posted on by

Two weeks ago, the Federal Communications Commission released its Fifteenth Report on the assessment of competition in the market for the delivery of video programming.  As both George and I were members of the core team of FCC staffers who wrote the very First Cable Report (and its insightful Appendix H) way back in 1995, I could not help but marvel at the growth and development of the industry over the last eighteen years. Of particular note to me were the FCC’s findings that not only do nearly 131 million (approximately 99%) of American homes have access to three multichannel Continue Reading »

Professor Susan Crawford and the Looming “Cable Monopoly”…

Posted on by

Next month, a new book entitled Captive Audience:  The Telecom Industry and Monopoly Power in the New Gilded Age (Yale University Press 2012) from Cardozo Law School Professor Susan Crawford will hit the bookshelves.  According to her publisher’s blurb, Professor Crawford’s book will examine how the United States has “created the biggest monopoly since the breakup of Standard Oil a century ago.”  But what is this “monopoly” to which Professor Crawford refers?  While the publisher’s promotional blurb is silent on this question, according to a 2010 paper authored by Professor Crawford in the Yale Law and Policy Review, it appears Continue Reading »

What is the Effect of Regulation on Investment?

Posted on by

What is the effect of regulation on investment?  At a high level of abstraction, it is impossible to say.  Rate-of-return regulation, for example, is criticized by economists for possibly encouraging too much investment—a principle known as the Averch-Johnson Effect.  On the other hand, if a firm fears that the regulator will alter the rules in a way that reduces the ability to earn profits on large, long-term capital investments, then the incentive to make such investments is reduced.  Importantly, the issue is not, as some claim, just about “regulatory uncertainty.”  There could be great uncertainty about future rule changes, but Continue Reading »

More Observations From CES…

Posted on by

One of the major stories that came out of CES last week was (in the words of the Wall Street Journal) the “flood” of new Internet content and mobile devices reaching consumers’ living rooms.  In fact, this has been the story coming out of CES for the past few years.  Given such developments, it continues to puzzle me not only that the FCC refuses to announce, at least formally, that it intends to drop its ill-conceived AllVid paradigm, but that it also refuses to announce that it intends to seek to sunset Section 629 of the Communications Act altogether. By Continue Reading »