Opinion
Legislature’s approach to BTN indicative of policy stagnation
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Also by Harry Waisbren:
- Climate change hits home (April 9, 2008)
- Kagen gives hope to health care crisis (March 25, 2008)
- Assembly passes on chance to effect real change (February 29, 2008)
- For Bush, cohorts, the world is not enough (February 1, 2008)
- Legislature's approach to BTN indicative of policy stagnation (December 3, 2007)
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How could it have come to this? How broken and inept must our governmental and corporate institutions be that, within the span of only a month, both Packers and Badgers fans were unable to get access to two of the most important games of the season? On the surface, this appears to be merely a petty, short-term issue. However, its root cause helps to expose how both serious and simple issues in our local and national governments never seem to be solved.
This issue recently appeared to come to a head with the introduction of a bill last week that aims to prevent blackout areas for important games such as Thursday's Packers-Cowboys matchup and last month's Badgers-Buckeyes game. Legislators proposed the Fair Access to Networks Legislation — or FAN legislation — which would create third-party arbitration to help solve the ongoing disputes that led to the blackouts between cable providers and both the NFL Network and the Big Ten Network. Both channels believe that their programming should be included in basic cable packages instead of more expensive and exclusive sports tier packages. This basic cable placement would mandate increases in already sharply rising subscription rates for all customers — whether they want the added football programming or not — and prevent the cable companies from receiving an added fee.
On the surface, this seems like a quality initiative for the government to take on. However, in an interview with The Badger Herald, University of Wisconsin telecommunications professor Barry Orton ridiculed the effort as nothing more than political posturing. "The bill can't force arbitration on either part; if one doesn't want to, then the bill has no impact."
But why, in the face of a myriad of angry students, customers and citizens, would the government engage in political theater as opposed to a reasonable effort to solve the problem? The dilemma stems from the fact that the government lifting up the rock of cable regulation would reveal a litany of corruption underneath. This is perfectly exemplified by Madison's current cable regulation that forces would-be competitors to pay for a multitude of services and fees that only a company planning to obtain a monopoly would agree to. It is the removal of such competition that has prevented Charter from being compelled to stop raising its prices or improve its awful customer service. It is the constituents of these government officials who fall prey to what is essentially an undeclared governmental tax on cable usage.
It is this corruption that allowed University of Wisconsin officials to hold the Badgers-Buckeyes game hostage. They tried to focus student anger toward Charter for not including the Big Ten Network as part of its basic cable plan, yet they did not address the fact that the rise of everyone's cable prices is not justified for such a niche channel. The Big Ten Network encompasses only 11 Midwestern schools and includes just a few premier matchups, yet UW officials still tried to glean an absurd profit at the expense of all cable subscribers merely by scapegoating Charter, as opposed to changing the price to one the market would support. Charter's indifference to customer concerns has made the university's scapegoating tactics possible, while the role of the Legislature remains in the shadows.
This chain of corruption is paralleled almost exactly by the NFL Network, which allowed access to last week's highly anticipated Packers-Cowboys game to less than 40 percent of the country. The only recourse it suggests is for fans to switch to a satellite provider, yet it ignores the multitudes who either cannot set up a satellite where they live or who cannot afford to have separate cable and Internet providers. All of this occurs without an acknowledgement of how the Federal Communications Commission continues to refuse to more tightly regulate the cable industry, with FCC Chairman Kevin Martin waving off a recent attempt just last Tuesday by claiming that more study is needed.
Collusion between special interest groups and all forms of government hurt everyone except the companies and politicians, yet this infestation of corruption in democratic government continues unabated. It has long since become clear to me that propaganda events like our local FAN bill are but a small part of a national trend that allows for the obfuscation of nearly all real issues. Corruption runs rampant among all levels of what is supposed to be our democracy, yet our local and national governments merely continue a shell game of name-calling and bouts of righteous indignation.
Until the issue of special interest groups making secret deals behind closed doors is adequately exposed and quashed, all sorts of politicians will be able to get away with holding loyalties that harm their constituents. And just think, if they are willing to enrage hordes of Wisconsin football fans to protect such loyalties, what are they willing to do for issues far less transparent?
Harry Waisbren (waisbren@wisc.edu) is a senior majoring in communication arts.
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I live in a small town in Kansas and the local cable outfit has both NFL and Big10.
HA HA
Harry-
This was one of the best Badger Herald articles I’ve seen in my three years at this school. Hats off to you dude.
-Brad
We feel your pain in DC. Great article, Harry!