A glimpse at the merger conditions?
Monday, February 25, 2008 at 12:14 PM
Tags: FCC, Merger, Merger Support, Satellite Radio, Sirius, XM
The ex parte filing by Public Knowledge, which was made public late last week, disclosed that representatives from the non-profit group (including its President Gigi B. Sohn), met with Michelle Carey (the Senior Legal Advisor on Media Issues for Chairman Kevin Martin).
The purpose of their meeting was to reiterate Public Knowledge's support for the Sirius-XM merger.
Public Knowledge has supported the merger, but with 4 conditions:
- A La Carte tiered programming packages be made available (done)
- Sirius-XM dedicated 5% of capacity to educational/informational programming
- Price freeze for 3-years after the merger is approved.
- Sirius-XM make its devices "open" to allow any manufacturer to develop compatible products
But the most interesting part of the filing is that the FCC asked Public Knowledge about Georgetown Partners' proposal.
Here's a snippet from the filing:
"Ms. Carey asked us whether we supported the proposal of Georgetown Partners L.L.C. that the Commission require the merged company to lease 20% of its channel capacity and a portion of its infrastructure to a minority owned corporation. I replied that the Public Knowledge 5% set-aside proposal was likely to lead to greater program diversity and to programming that would not otherwise be heard on a national satellite radio service. However, we would be open to the Georgetown Partners proposal to the extent that it was conditioned on a requirement that part of that capacity be dedicated to noncommercial programming over which the lessee has no editorial control."In other words, if Georgetown Partners' proposal is approved, PK asks that Georgetown also should dedicate 5% of their own broadcast infrastructure to educational/informational programming. A sound request.
(emphasis added)
What's interesting is that Public Knowledge was even asked the question to begin with, and that their proposal was being discussed in-depth at this point in time (PK suggested these concessions nearly a year ago).
To me, this is an indication that we're nearing the final stretch (let's hope) and that the FCC is seriously considering Public Knowledge's suggestions. And this is a good thing. I've always found PK's requests to not only be reasonable, but also squarely in the public interest (as opposed in the special interest).
The Washington, D.C.-based public interest group punctuated their filing by pointing that the FCC's denial of DirecTV-EchoStar merger was actually not in the public interest, stating that "as separate companies, the DBS providers have not been able to compete against cable in a way that has lowered the latter's prices."
[Read FCC Filing (PDF)]
Thanks to everyone who sent this in!
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Comments
I have said from the very beginning that Public Knowledge has been on of the very few voices of impartial reason throughout this entire affair, and for that I applaud them.
I think the FCC should truely focus on PK's alternatives as opposed to Georgetown Partners. You hit the nail right on the head when you said it is a suggestion based on the PUBLIC interest instead of the SPECIAL interest.
And if you read PKs actual filing, they go into great detail about how the bandwith should be treated and how the applicants for that bandwith should be chosen. It is very interesting, and an excellent proposal.
Posted by: Brian R. | February 25, 2008 1:50 PM
Sounds more reasonable than most requests, and as said twice above, much more objective than turning the merged entity into a mouthpiece for a decidedly non-objective group.
Posted by: TVGenius | February 25, 2008 2:04 PM
I'm confused, how is this blackmail legal?
Posted by: Anonymous Coward | February 25, 2008 2:21 PM
tick, tock.
Posted by: RonAndFezNoonTo2:40 | February 25, 2008 2:23 PM
Sirius and XM paid good money for the spectrum amd shoul;d not have to share it with anuone. They should not have to share satellites with anyone. Go get your own satellites and see what it costs to do satellite radio and pay Sirius for the spectrum.
Posted by: John | February 25, 2008 3:17 PM
Will the $ 6.99 Family Plan be continued ?
Posted by: Anonymous Coward | February 25, 2008 4:18 PM
Open Hardware = Win.
Posted by: Pinwiz | February 25, 2008 4:23 PM
Ditto -- open hardware is good. 5% is good.
Anything that deviates from their plan is less than reasonable.
Georgetown = leeches.
Posted by: Mat | February 25, 2008 4:53 PM
I think the Georgetown Partners should be given the twenty percent bandwidth and told to develop the satellites and radios and see who gives a crap to have their service.. on the approval side of things what if...
What if the merger has in fact been denied and they told Mel and co. such.. and they have agreed not to go public with this until after the first of March so that Mel can release a statement saying that Sirius radio is backing out of the merger because of the fact that it has and is taking too long to pass.. conspiracy?? whatever...
Posted by: Anonymous Coward | February 25, 2008 6:05 PM
I think 15% with the same conditions would be more than reasonable for Georgetown Partners. And they should take more time negotiating rather than being bamboozled by race.
Posted by: sunshine | February 25, 2008 6:23 PM
I think 15% with the same conditions would be more than reasonable for Georgetown Partners. And they should take more time negotiating rather than being bamboozled by race.
Posted by: sunshine | February 25, 2008 6:23 PM
sunshine: So you think that after spending BILLIONS of dollars in developing and launching satellites, paying distributors for installing radios, maintain the largest most diverse programming known to radio, that Georgetown Partners should be able to persuade the FCC to allow them a PERMANENT lease of 15% of the combined spectrum, allowing them approximately 60 channels of content, when Georgetown has stated that they will use those channels for "commercial advertising supported diverse programming" for an undisclosed dollar amount?
Apparently providing 5% of the spectrum to educational and informational programming to nonprofit organizations is not your idea of public interest? You would rather give 3 times the programming to a for-profit commercial based leeching company. Interesting.
Posted by: Brian R. | February 26, 2008 5:49 AM
between jesse and georgetown this is ludacris. I say off with their heads |o| P.S. I know that Mr. Kevin Martin will lead because he is a leader. So whatever he decides sirius and xmsr better listen!
Posted by: dean | February 26, 2008 7:12 PM
Great. More politically correct propaganda that I'll get to pay for at the cost of bandwith that could bring me more music or more HD sound. It's this type of extortion that helped to create the subprime lending mess. Politicians extorted the banks to make high risk loans to their cronies in the worst neighborhoods. Then when the banks get zapped with the foreclosures, the politicians rail about the greed of the banks in making those loans to their cronies. How is this any different?
And does anyone want to be that no matter what tier you get (music or everything), you'll still have to get these PC channels because it'll be for our own good.
Posted by: LenS | February 26, 2008 11:43 PM