MediaBiz

Once upon a time, back in the mid-1990s when many fairy tales were circulating about satellite (it will never work! no one will willingly put a dish on their roof! etc.), the cable guys were the only game in town with "cable" programming. The smarter cable guys – those who had kept their eyes on digital advances with satellite – knew that this programming was a critical ace in the hole. They knew that satellite in the form of DBS would work ... and that people would happily accessorize their houses with little pizza pie dishes if they could get the programming.

So it passed that cable operators built as many walls as they could around said programming. They issued white papers explaining why they shouldn't sell it; they cited laws and statutes to prove they didn't need to sell it. The FCC did not agree: In December 1994 it opened the gates for DBS services to carry cable programming.

Now here we are, coming up on 20 years later, and the same story has the same folks, plus their competitors in satellite and telco, in the same group panty twist. Of course this time we have some slick new acronyms ... think M.V.P.D ... and a new rallying cry: NO! YouTube, Netflix et al are NOT M.V.P.D's and therefore they should have NO guaranteed access to M.V.P.D. (ever try to type that three times in a row?) channels! (That "channel" is another key word but explaining it all gets my panties in a twist.)

The FCC, which has grown fatter and slower with time, responded to the whole to-do by asking for public comment ... which, of course, is a nifty way to not decide for a while. Now, however, the public comment is in. It really doesn't say anything that you wouldn't expect with the exception of one service (Synback from Jack Perry, who is known for his Geneva technology and Antennaweb/Decisionmark etc. roots) which claims the ability to fulfill all the obligations of a full fledged M.V.P.D while also enhancing the "local" in local broadcast programming.

Whether that will sway the FCC we don't know. But that isn't the point of this piece. The point, rather, is that a potentially huge ... make that HUGE ... change is in the wind. And knots of worried lawyers can be found from New York to L.A. discussing the definitions of "M.V.P.D." and "channel" and, most problematically, the law of unintended consequences.

Suggests our good friend John Hane of Pillsbury Law (who, as usual, is deep into the fray), the way the FCC rules could reach into all sorts of pockets: Not just those of online video distributors (OVDs to you acronym addicts) but also into those who would retransmit programming via iPads, Xboxes and all those other new techno tools touted as 2nd, 3rd or 4th screens for "cable" programming. "There is so much going on here, on stage and behind the scenes, politically, economically, competitively, in FCC regs and copyright law," he notes. "In legal strategy planning sessions, people have to be thinking they'd better be very careful about what they ask for, because, well, the wheel's still in spin."

So do be careful what you wish for ... and keep a close, close eye on the FCC wheel of fortune.•