EchoStar Loses Distant Network Appeal

[JohnH]

DiSH Network does not have to provide DNS to anyone. The law does not say that. It says they may with certain restrictions.

 

[Clancy]

No I think it has to do with socialist disregard for private property.

Can you tell me when the last time in Canada that the Federal Government was a Socialist Government?
Get your facts right.
As far as disreguard for private property goes, the Canadian station owners or the equivalent of the NAB want their signals broadcast across the country.
The same way that a radio station or newspaper company wants as large an audience as possible.
When you have a good product, you are not afraid of open competition.
You should encourage it.
Protectionism in this case for a select few is counter to the general public.

 

[Derwin0]

No I think it has to do with socialist disregard for private property.

Has nothing to do with private property.
Almost all affiliates in Canada are network O&O. Therefore there in no "private property" being stepped on.

 

[Greg Bimson]

Can you tell me when the last time in Canada that the Federal Government was a Socialist Government?

Hmm.

"The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC), a Canadian crown corporation, is the country's national radio and television broadcaster."

"As a Crown corporation, the CBC operates at arm's length (autonomously) from the government in its day-to-day business. The corporation is governed by the Broadcasting Act of 1991, and is directly responsible to Parliament through the Department of Canadian Heritage."

Those excerpts are from Wikipedia. The CBC is a government entity. To me, that means the television in Canada is following a much more socialist movement.

And, considering the fact that the government owns the CBC and most of their station affiliates, of course they'll timeshift and allow for out-of-market rebroadcasting. This of course forces Global and CTV to follow the leader and do the same.

It's amazing how the free market will find a way to sort itself out.

 

[micklewhite]

Can you tell me when the last time in Canada that the Federal Government was a Socialist Government?
Get your facts right.
As far as disreguard for private property goes, the Canadian station owners or the equivalent of the NAB want their signals broadcast across the country.
The same way that a radio station or newspaper company wants as large an audience as possible.
When you have a good product, you are not afraid of open competition.
You should encourage it.
Protectionism in this case for a select few is counter to the general public.

July 27, 2006. The problem is that you think Socialist=Communist and any non-totalitarian regime cannot possibly be socialist. But if you look at the role the central government plays in Canadian life and its control over and/or interference in the economic system, it has socialist written all over it. Now a lot of Canadians may like the system but that does change its nature.

 

[dlsnyder]

The Canadian government is socialist in the same way that most European governments are socialist. That is to say that the government owns some industries, provides many free or very low cost services to its citizens, and controls many aspects of its citizens' everyday life. It can be argued that within these limits the US has many socialist programs (welfare, public schools, etc). There are varying degrees of socialism, but socialism and representative democracy are not antithetical. From my experience, the higher the overall taxation level the more socialist a government is.

That being said, it really has little to do with whether or not it is legal to sell distant networks to someone. It is all about the money - even with PBS, which can for most purposes be considered a socialist enterprise. The current system of local broadcasting was devised to protect the territorial rights of station license holders and their ability to sell advertising. If those rights are taken away then broadcast licenses lose their value. I doubt that anyone in Congress wants to get on the wrong side of multi-million dollar TV broadcast groups. Canadian satellite systems have different rules about carriage of US stations because they eminate from a foreign country. US retransmission rules do not apply in Canada, and US stations are not licensed to serve Canadian viewers. Therefore US broadcasters do not have the same legal standing in Canada as they do here as long as the transmissions are in the clear and received on Canadian soil. US broadcasters are not hurt financially (officially) by Canadian viewers watching or not watching their broadcasts.

Where there could be a problem is in the infringement of exclusive broadcast rights on behalf of Canadian TV stations for US programs. I wonder how long it will be before Canadian TV stations start fighting carriage of US stations along those lines?

 

[Greg Bimson]

And as I recall, part of the issue in Canada is that copyright law was somehow changed so that rebroadcasters are not infringing on copyrights. It is why the superstations, as well as the neighboring American affiliates are rebroadcast.

Where there could be a problem is in the infringement of exclusive broadcast rights on behalf of Canadian TV stations for US programs. I wonder how long it will be before Canadian TV stations start fighting carriage of US stations along those lines?

Oh, that is called sim-sub. If a local Canadian station is broadcasting the same programming as an American network, the feed of the American network is replaced with the Canadian stations. It is called a SIMultaneous SUBstitution. Saw a bit of that when I was in Niagara Falls earlier in the month.

 

[Clancy]

Hmm.

"The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC), a Canadian crown corporation, is the country's national radio and television broadcaster."

"As a Crown corporation, the CBC operates at arm's length (autonomously) from the government in its day-to-day business. The corporation is governed by the Broadcasting Act of 1991, and is directly responsible to Parliament through the Department of Canadian Heritage."

Those excerpts are from Wikipedia. The CBC is a government entity. To me, that means the television in Canada is following a much more socialist movement.

And, considering the fact that the government owns the CBC and most of their station affiliates, of course they'll timeshift and allow for out-of-market rebroadcasting. This of course forces Global and CTV to follow the leader and do the same.

It's amazing how the free market will find a way to sort itself out.

Greg, the Government of Canada owns the CBC and some of its TV stations but not most of their TV station affiliates as you point out. The majority of the CBC TV stations are privately owned.

You will get a huge argument in your statement that CBC is the leader in Canadian TV . CTV and Global do not follow the CBC. Ratings and finances have shown for years that CTV is the clear leader over CBC.

While the CBC owns 22 TV stations in Canada, they have to accept revenue from advertisers just the same as the privately run TV stations.
This is not a definition of following a socialist movement as you have stated.

 

[Clancy]

July 27, 2006. The problem is that you think Socialist=Communist and any non-totalitarian regime cannot possibly be socialist. But if you look at the role the central government plays in Canadian life and its control over and/or interference in the economic system, it has socialist written all over it. Now a lot of Canadians may like the system but that does change its nature.

Would you be kind enough to point out to me where I have stated that I think Socialist=Communist.

You mention what you think the role the central government plays in Canadian life.
Surely you are not suggesting that the US government does not control its citizens in similar ways.
This whole thread is about too much control by the NAB and lack of freedom of choice.

 

[micklewhite]

Would you be kind enough to point out to me where I have stated that I think Socialist=Communist.

You mention what you think the role the central government plays in Canadian life.
Surely you are not suggesting that the US government does not control its citizens in similar ways.
This whole thread is about too much control by the NAB and lack of freedom of choice.

You didn't explicitly state the equivalence. I am relying on my experience on dealing with Canadians and other liberals who consider the Democratic Party as "center-right." What do you think socialist means?

The US governments despite the best efforts of some is still far less intrusive into the lives of citizens (particularly in economic aspects) than Canada.

This thread is about the right for the owner of property (tangible or otherwise) to control how it is used. To that end, the NAB is no different from you deciding to whom you sell a used car. I think it was Greg Bimson who pointed out that absent the SHVA and its progeny, there would be no such thing as DNS (at least as we know it). Understand that the programming belongs to the network and/or affiliate. The only way for another party to distribute it in another market (which adversely impacts that local affiliate) is through a license to do so. This can either be a negotiated license or a statutory license as SHVA/SHVIA/SHVERA provides. You can manufacture children's clothing as you like. You cannot manufacture childrens's clothing with Disney copyrighted characters on it without a license from Disney. At least not after Disney's legal team beats you senseless in court. What is so difficult about the concept?

 

[stone phillips420]

dish bring us nhl network and maybe everyone will forget about your blatenet disregard for the dns laws.

 

[micklewhite]

The consumers have an alternative. It is DirecTV. Of course, grandfathering would be a thing of the past as perhaps it should be.

Except those of us who just re-upped for another 2 years to get a 622.

Start hammering those Congressmen with emails. Unless the Supreme Court agrees to look at it (good luck), we're screwed.

The only saving grace is that it is an election year. We need a few people stuck in white areas (or areas with less than 4 network affiliates) to raise holy hell about this.

Given Justice Thomas' philosophy, I doubt he would be interested in any action.

 

[andrews777]

I would argue that the idea of intellectual property is socialist at its core - that the government can decide who owns information.

The fact that many people think Canada is not socialist (or the U.S. for that matter) shows the incredible ignorance of economic things in our age.

Brad

 

[Greg Bimson]

Greg, the Government of Canada owns the CBC and some of its TV stations but not most of their TV station affiliates as you point out. The majority of the CBC TV stations are privately owned.

The majority of CBC TV stations are owned by the CBC. This is especially true for the largest cities. Most of the privately-owned affiliates are in hard to reach spots, like Brandon, Manitoba, and Thunder Bay, Ontario.

You will get a huge argument in your statement that CBC is the leader in Canadian TV . CTV and Global do not follow the CBC. Ratings and finances have shown for years that CTV is the clear leader over CBC.

I think you're missing my point. The "leader" is the implication that since the CBC didn't care if their affiliates were uplinked and redistributed, of course Global and CTV would follow suit. I suspect it has more to do with Canadian copyright law than CBC signing blanket carriage agreements with StarChoice or Bell Expressvu.

While the CBC owns 22 TV stations in Canada, they have to accept revenue from advertisers just the same as the privately run TV stations.
This is not a definition of following a socialist movement as you have stated.

Socialism is when the government owns or operates a business. Socialism occurs much more in Canada than the US; why is it that when it comes to health care we always talk about Canada's socialist system of health care?

Sure, Canada has their free-market, capitalistic tendicies. But the Canadian government is much more involved in running businesses than our government here in the US.

 

[stone phillips420]

Guys this is about Dish's blatent disregard for the law, not Canada goverment vs Us government
Canada rocks nuff said
Us just has crackrocks

 

[Mr Tony]

Thanks Stone for putting this back on topic

 

[Greg Bimson]

They're out there; those misconceptions. Can't let them slide, else others will read and believe that the Canadian Government doesn't have socialist tendencies, or that Distant Network Service is a privilege, not a right.

Either way, according to an article on Multichannel.com, Dish Network has three choices:

1) have the Appeals Court issue a stay in the ruling while Dish Network goes to the Supreme Court
2) have the District Court wait 45 days before issuing a ruling (this is in conjunction with the broadcasters to try and hammer out an agreement)
3) file a writ to the Supreme Court immediately

I tend to believe the Supreme Court will not look at this case.

 

[stone phillips420]

Mr. Bimson, no disrespect intended if you wish to spew your political rhetoric please do so in the pit

Lets keep to topic
Dish didn't follow shriva and now all their customers will foot the bill for it.
I wish dtv will come up with an ad campaign saying they have distant feeds and dish doesn't as they did earlier this year with oln.

 

[micklewhite]

I would argue that the idea of intellectual property is socialist at its core - that the government can decide who owns information.

The fact that many people think Canada is not socialist (or the U.S. for that matter) shows the incredible ignorance of economic things in our age.

Brad

Umm, please substitute land or a house or just about any valuable thing for "information" and you will see how silly your comment is. We have the concept of personal property (meaning owned by individuals, not as opposed to real property) and one of the legitimate government functions is to protect such property from interference by others. I come into your house without permission, you call the sheriff. We have a boundary dispute - we go to court for a decision. I am assuming that you mean specific nontangible property when you use the word "information" - things like a tv show, computer program, speech. We are not talking about anybody owning an address (you can't copyright 123 Main Street), personal name (John Smiths are everywhere), calendar or other such things. The fact that you cannot see or hold something (modulated RF wave) doesn't make it any less protectable under the law.

 

[stone phillips420]

come on guys
political views belong in the pit

Dish screwing thier customers again has nothing to do with the state of politics.

Dish intentionally did not follow shriva for one reason or another now us customers will suffer