DirecTV and KNWS 51

[Brett]

DirecTV refuses to carry KNWS 51 because the station submitted its mustcarry carriage election one day late.

http://www.multichannel.com/index.asp?layout=story_stocks&articleid=CA185503

Then, DirecTV goes and adds low power stations into packages in Cincinatti and Miami - new addition was http://www.skyreport.com/skyreport/feb2003/022103.shtm#five

but refuses to carry KNWS station that has plenty of sports and good syndicated selection? Anyone from Houston inquire about this channel and why its missing from DirecTV today? How did they land expensive sports programming?


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:rant:
About the stupid mustcarry law,

Full power broadcasters want mustcarry. Fine. Do they have to be "significantly viewed" in their city grade? No, that would be too much pressure for the NAB bandits that need to be profitable from their free spectrum. The public service requirements are so small, its not funny.

Locally, channels 51, 60 and 69 could not secure network affiliations as Philly O&O didnt want it, nor did Harrisburg or Scranton markets want a nearby closer market.

WTVE, WBPH and WFMZ ended up being owned by Christians or targetting Christians and home shopping network fans running content primarily on this only for Lehigh Berks region. What happened to FCC protections regarding content. They surely didnt want ABC and NBC to merge as people's source of information (from news) would be limited. Because of the situation, the stations became: 3 christian stations rimshotting to get Philadelphia carriage from the Northern Western tier of the market. WFMZ atleast is heavy into news, and is significantly viewed.

But, WTVE and WMGM(another station from my market) submitted their mustcarry election forms on time (E* panicked had to put all Philly mustcarry on 129), but these idiot broadcasters never sent their "quality" signal yet they are given their channel reservation for four years, while KNWS has to wait 4 years to be added on Directv - How idiotic is this? If a station tries retransmission but fails, it loses carriage altogether? Another dumb provision.

Question: Will PAX be bothering Dish in the next mustcarry cycle? I dont think Dish will be happy!

The principle of mustcarry is to keep multiplicity of broadcasting and making sure people who cant afford cable/sat have many access to information and programming. PAX owning and operating a station in each market, lacking original programming, originally locally produced programming should not be given mustcarry. IMO, the station should be able to meet "significantly viewed" in its Grade B region and at the city the DMA is, which should include the POP. And the public service requirement to serve the city of license should be increased.

A full power station should be able to get carried within a decent time when it delivers its quality signal to DirecTV or Dish. Dish and DirecTV should have time to test the channel, allocate space, of course such as they do now.

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DISH carries KNWS on 119 (no second dish required) in Houston. Also, I think the 2 dish solution by Dish is fine, I prefer it over the big dish solution for Philly.

[Mark Holtz]

The FCC has made it quite clear that the July 1st, 2000 deadline for filing must-carry petitions was a hard deadline EVEN IF IT WAS A SUNDAY (a non-business day) because of the huge time window (six months). Why all these stations submitted the forms at the last minute boggles me beyond the fact that the DBS providers would be bogged down with the must-carry requests and won't have enough time in the six-month window that followed to perform the necessary signal tests to determine quality of signal.

As for PAX, if it keeps going down the path it is now, in four years, PAX will be no more than a noble experiment. especially with the amount of paid programming carried on Pax.

[Brett]

Z'Loth, what about stations that fail to deliver a quality signal or are not "significantly viewed"? If a station isnt "significantly viewed" (even after being available cable and OTA for many years) why should mustcarry protect these stations?

Some of the gutter stations have 4 years to deliver a quality signal but never do, but a station like KNWS that sends a Grade B to the POP cannot get mustcarry because they didnt submit their mustcarry election on time.


The principle of mustcarry which Congress and Supreme Court affirmed is getting defeated. FCC made a big issue over this mustcarry deadline but no comment is given on a timeframe for these stations sending a signal to the POP or even being "significantly viewed." If these stations are going to take up valuable bandwith and increase the LIL costs for DBS, they should be "significantly viewed" and be given a date to send their signal or have their channel reservation dropped. But the FCC considered the mustcarry deadline far more important!

And DirecTV seems pretty dumb not adding this station in general given the sports content the station carries. I can tell you this, DirecTV and Dish added WTBS far after the election process. Goes to show how dumb the mustcarry election process really was.

[Mark Holtz]

See http://ekb.dbstalk.com/19#MC for what qualifies as a "must-carry" station. The only part that TNG Tony didn't put in was the part that the initial election period deadline was July 1st, 2000.

There are some points in SHIVA that are inheriently flawed. As an example, while Univision ventinueve (19) in Sacramento is carried as well as a national feed, the station also produces a newscast, and should be carried. However, some religious stations simply rebroadcast a national feed of a channel that is already carried on one of the provider's regular packages, but requested must-carry.

[Greg Bimson]

Dish Network recently added KNWS. The owner of the station thinks that once one provider added it, the other will.

See link (http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/story.hts/sports/barron/1672619) for details.