Federal regulators want the public’s input.
It seems that the American sports consumer is seeing sports events disappearing from over-the-air TV and even cable TV and ending up on streaming platforms such as Netflix, Amazon Prime, Peacock and Apple TV and that has become a concern of not only politicians but Washington bureaucrats and over-the-air TV networks or syndication services such as FOX. There is a question. Are the streaming services protected by the 1961 Sports Broadcast Act which allowed leagues to bundle their teams into one package and sell those packages to TV networks? The law was intended for over-the-air TV but cable TV networks and streaming services have been protected by the law. Consumers are complaining and FOX lawyers have let the Federal Communications Commission know how the Rupert Mudroch run company feels.
“In a world where Big Tech acquires more and more broadcast sports rights often as a loss leader to support other massive, vertically integrated businesses that primarily profit off of the personal consumption data of its customers fans across the country could be ‘paywalled’ out of the Fall Classic, Thanksgiving football, or Team USA’s victories in the Olympics or the World Cup.” Paywalled out is happening right now for every Major League Soccer game because of an Apple TV deal. Buy the service and get games, don’t buy the service no games. The NFL has deals with Netflix, Peacock, YouTube, Amazon Prime and subscriptions to those services are costly. The FCC has no jurisdiction over the tech companies that have invested billions of dollars into sports streaming. Some Congressional representatives are beginning to notice that sports owners see big money in big tech streaming and are trying to figure out if they can do something about it.
Evan Weiner’s books are available at iTunes – https://books.apple.com/us/author/evan-weiner/id595575191
Evan can be reached at evan_weiner@hotmail.com
