• E-mail
• Print
• Comment
• Font Size
• Digg
• del.icio.us
• Discuss article

RCN Responds to FCC Ruling on Comcast & Time Warner's Acquisition of Adelphia Communications Cable Systems; Order Imposes Conditions to Ensure Access to ''Must-Have'' Sports Program Content

Posted on: Thursday, 13 July 2006, 18:00 CDT

RCN Corporation (NASDAQ: RCNI), a leading provider of triple play cable, high-speed internet and phone services, today praised the Federal Communications Commission's decision on the sale of Adelphia Communications to impose conditions to ensure viewer access by competitors to "Must-Have" local, regional and national sports programming owned or controlled by Comcast or Time Warner.

"We congratulate FCC Chairman Kevin Martin and other Commissioners for their diligence in recognizing the need and imposing conditions to ensure that this transaction doesn't enable Comcast and Time Warner to preclude competitive access to sports programming," said RCN President & CEO Peter Aquino. "The FCC's ruling on sports programming will prevent Comcast and Time Warner from entering exclusive and anti-competitive carriage agreements and will provide that contract negotiations be subject to arbitration. These conditions will go a long way toward preventing Comcast and Time Warner from using 'must have' local and regional sports coverage as a way to harm competition."

Aquino said FCC Commissioner Jonathan Adelstein has been a tireless and ardent champion of viewer access to 'must have' sports programming, as has Commissioner Robert McDowell. He added that while his company is disappointed that the Commission chose not to close the "terrestrial loophole" provision in the federal law that Comcast has used to claim exclusivity over local and regional sports coverage in the Philadelphia market for satellite providers, he is pleased that the Commission has extended its conditions to assure continued access to Philadelphia sports programming by competitors who have had access to such programming pre-merger.

This will mean that Comcast cannot deny such programming once existing contracts expire. Aquino explained that "As a result of the Commission's action, subscribers who signed up for RCN service in Philadelphia with the understanding that regional sports would be available will not have that service placed in jeopardy by Comcast when our contract is up for renewal later this year."

"We also appreciate the leadership efforts of FCC Commissioner Deborah Taylor Tate that motivated Comcast to offer a 2-year extension before competitors like RCN are compelled to purchase PBS Kids programming through a wholly owned Comcast subsidiary," said RCN Senior Vice President of Strategic, External and Regulatory Affairs Richard Ramlall. "But Comcast's actions to date clearly disclose its intent after that brief extension to use publicly-funded PBS Kids programming as a way to compel other providers to use its affiliated distributor.

Ramlall explained that control over such programming by Comcast has already given it leverage to interrupt service, increase costs, and otherwise harm its competitors who 'must have' such programming to compete effectively, and that RCN is disappointed that the FCC did not use this opportunity to foreclose such actions for more than a mere two years.

"We also thank FCC Commissioner Michael Copps for his strong statements and recognition of the dangers that the economic power over programming distribution and content that this merger threatens and we are confident that he will be vigilant in closely monitoring Comcast and Time Warner's performance to ensure that they are not using their control over programming to impede competitors from providing their customers with access to affordable family and children's program content," Ramlall said.

About RCN Corporation

RCN Corporation, http://www.rcn.com, is one of the largest facilities-based competitive providers of bundled cable, high-speed internet and phone services delivered over its own fiber-optic local network to residential customers in the most densely populated markets in the U.S. RCN Business Solutions is a growing business that also provides bulk video, high-capacity and voice services to business customers. RCN provides service in the Boston, New York, Eastern Pennsylvania, Washington, D.C., Chicago, San Francisco and Los Angeles metropolitan markets. (RCNI-G)

Source: Business Wire

More News in this Category