According to news reports, cable TV operator Cablevision has filed suit in federal court against Viacom because Viacom will only sell access to the channels that it owns in packages rather than individually. The Cablevision complain is not available to the public yet, but according to the press release put out by Cablevision, Viacom will only allow cable tv providers like Cablevision to carry popular channels like MTV and Nickelodeon if those companies also carry unpopular channels like Logo and Nick Jr. In fact, Cablevision states that Viacom links 14 weak and unpopular channels to eight strong and popular ones in order to force customers to take unwanted channels. Cablevision says that this conduct is a violation of the anti-trust laws.
So here is my question: why does Cablevision think this conduct is a criminal violation of the anti-trust laws when Viacom does it, but perfectly proper when Cablevision does the same thing? For those of you who are not Cablevision customers, you should know that Cablevision only sells most channels in packages. If you want two particular channels, you may need to pay for 60 others that you do not want but which are part of the package. I know that in my house we have a great many channels that no one has ever watched. Let me be clear: I do not mean that we rarely watch these channels; rather, no one has EVER watched them. If Cablevision is correct, then this conduct is, logically, a criminal violation of the anti-trust laws. Now that Cablevision has recognized the impropriety of this conduct, will it start to sell channels to customers a la carte? It certainly ought to do so. Otherwise, some enterprising attorney will soon bring a class action against Cablevision on the basis of Cablevision's own admissions made in the Viacom lawsuit.
So here is my question: why does Cablevision think this conduct is a criminal violation of the anti-trust laws when Viacom does it, but perfectly proper when Cablevision does the same thing? For those of you who are not Cablevision customers, you should know that Cablevision only sells most channels in packages. If you want two particular channels, you may need to pay for 60 others that you do not want but which are part of the package. I know that in my house we have a great many channels that no one has ever watched. Let me be clear: I do not mean that we rarely watch these channels; rather, no one has EVER watched them. If Cablevision is correct, then this conduct is, logically, a criminal violation of the anti-trust laws. Now that Cablevision has recognized the impropriety of this conduct, will it start to sell channels to customers a la carte? It certainly ought to do so. Otherwise, some enterprising attorney will soon bring a class action against Cablevision on the basis of Cablevision's own admissions made in the Viacom lawsuit.
1 comment:
Whats' good for the goose is good for the gander.
Let's start a class action suit against Cablevision.
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