Sen. John McCain may be less popular now than he has been in more than 20 years, but that doesn’t stop the former maverick from doing what he feels is right — at least, when it comes to the wacky, wild world of telecommunications.
Yesterday, May 9, McCain introduced the Television Consumer Freedom Act (you can tell it’s important, because FREEDOM), which would force television providers to split up their growing hordes of tiers and bundling, allowing cable subscribers to pick their channels a la carte — channel by channel — rather than being forced to pay for channels that they don’t watch (meaning that I can FINALLY cast off the oppressive yoke of HGTV and their massive programming blocks of House Hunters).
In good news for sports fans, this would get rid of the absurd blackout rules put in place by leagues whose teams use publicly-funded stadiums (which are becoming increasingly, INCREASINGLY popular) — so suck on that, NFL blackout rule.
From cnet.com:
McCain’s main beef with paid TV providers, sports leagues, and broadcasters that threaten to make their popular content available only to a paid audience is that consumers are being forced to pay more for TV content than they should be paying.
When it comes to the bundles, McCain argues that cable companies and other TV providers force consumers to pay for a bigger bundle of channels than they actually want. So instead of only getting the one or two channels they want to watch, they must pay for 10, 20, or even 50 channels that they don’t watch. As a result, consumers are paying more per month for content they never watch.
“This is unfair and wrong — especially when you consider how the regulatory deck is stacked in favor of industry and against the American consumer,” McCain said.
The cable industry has for years fought against offering a la carte pricing for TV shows or even channels. And in a statement following the introduction of McCain’s bill, the National Cable and Telecommunications Association said it would not benefit anyone, even consumers, to move to such a model.
This article appears in May 9-15, 2013.
Thank you Sen. McCain. I do not agree with you often, but killing the bundle would be great for consumers.
John McCain says nothing or does nothing unless it’s beneficial to John McCain and John McCain only, so beware!
WOW, quit confusing me John. “This is unfair and wrong — especially when you consider how the regulatory deck is stacked in favor of industry and against the American consumer,” – did he lapse on which party he represents? – the party of Corporations are people too. If the senator keeps this up I may have to consider supporting him for the first time in years. A senator actually looking after a consumer for once – blasphemy!
frankly i wouldn’t care if I paid the exact same price i am paying… if i got to see avalanche games which are blacked out here because of the coyotes, and if i could get all the new york football giants games. the idea that i can’t get remote networks because i wouldn’t see local ads is preposterous… i dvr everything and don’t watch commercials anyway. kill the bundle!
Be careful what you wish for and the law of unintended consequences will play a huge part in this if it actually comes about.
Of course thanks to the cowardly Dems, this bill would have to get 60 votes in the (corporate owned) Senate and a majority of the (corporate owned) House to pass…
Great idea, too bad that it can not be passed…
Aside from JM being an anti environmental corporate lackey there are lot of us who do not like watching boring sports drivel, get a job ex sports commentators, talking heads, haters with opinions, endless news regurgitation , pop ins , ticker tape rerun, religious gumbas , reality shows, medical commercials,and last, but not the least: overweight sub intelligent radio shlock jocks who show why toads with mouths interchangeable with their behinds should never show a TV visual of themselves. Whew, if that doesn’t show support JM, for being able to choose, then slap me like a monkey for not liking a banana when offered.
Cable television, using band width presumably controlled by the FCC, is basically a big “shell game” intended to fleece the consumer with unneeded content, limited competition and unlimited commercials. I’ve recently gotten almost all my television/PC streaming from Netflix – heaven, no commercials and programs I can actually choose to watch at my convenience! (Unfortunately, no sports or games, but I can survive without them).
I’ll bet that unless you decline most of the stations, this will not end up being cheaper for many people. The ones who would really benefit the most are those who do not want any sports, because ESPN is the most expensive channel for cable providers.