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Comcast Flirts With Purchasing NBC

If this does occur, will Versus produce sports for NBC Television?

I can see rebroadcasts of Notre Dame football on Versus.
 
Or perhaps you will no longer see any NBC programming on DirecTV?
 
I know this is disputable, but if Comcast gained serious share which I'm assuming is the eventual goal, I think it'd be bad for broadcast TV, to (pay tv) Comcast's gain, just so Comcast has some additional content in their vault to play with.

NBC and the O&O stations would be marginalized much quicker than otherwise. First with recurring contract disputes with DirecTV and Dish Network and Verizon, as Comcast hikes the retransmission rates, cited by programming increase because of sports rights (NFL). I'm thinking Comcast NBC will outpay the other networks for sports access. Dish would be forced to drop stations during renewals, cutting exposure at times. Local newscasts in some markets like Philly NBC 10 could follow CN8 news, CBS Detroit news. Overall reducation.

Leno and Today would make it to the On Demand system, and overexposed, but other units like the network news division and Telemundo would see cost cutting and noticeable quality reductions and/or divestiture, with those channels following a path like CW, MyNetwork and Pax/ion.

The cable channels would have a few new quality shows (mainly shows that would otherwise have gone to NBC) repeated multiple times, but the channels would be overall poorly handled with reruns of a couple shows, blocking schedules with a huge on screen logo (think Lifetime TV) covering 1/8 of the screen, making even the HD channels unwatchable. Atleast with the broadcast network model, you'd have affiliates that wouldn't put up with that.
 
I think it makes for interesting speculation about the need for affiliates at all. Simply have repeater stations for OTA and a few times a day perhaps a local man reading local news and weather.

NBC-Comcast would become a cable network and the OTA affiliates would have to adopt that mode too.
 
If this goes through then I wonder what would happen to Universal Sports. Would Comcast put all the big individual competitions, like the Tour de France, there or would that and the main important track and field events move over to Versus? Perhaps Versus and Universal Sports could merge and create Versus 1 and Versus 2 or Universal Sports 1 and Universal Sports 2. In terms of the Olympics, I think it makes it more likely that NBC would retain those rights for the foreseeable future. The NHL could find its position a bit improved, as they would have some more options for exposure of their product, which they might use to leverage ESPN into giving them a better TV rights deal.

This may also be the start of an inevitable migration of the big networks permanently to cable. A few O&O's could still be retained to simulcast important shows in the huge markets. All the big networks have cable interests, anyway. So it would be natural for the networks themselves to be on cable at a point in the future, notwithstanding the must-carry rule for major affiliates. As an aside, this is what should've been done with The CW and ION. Now is the time to do it before it's too late.

It would be interesting, if that radical shakeout occurs, how the OTA stations would respond. Certainly, plenty of stations would go dark as a result. But many, including O&O's and other major stations groups, could survive as long as they can adapt by offering a variety of programming that would be overlooked in the old days of OTA broadcasting.

What would happen to Telemundo? I say they'd be sold to a major Latin business group as I don't think NBC Universal knows what to do with it.
 
There will be a problem for Comcast if this goes through.

FCC rules prohibit ownership of a TV station and a cable system in the same market. This would be a problem in San Francisco, Chicago, and (gasp...) Comcast's home city of Philadelphia. They will have to sell either the NBC O&O, or their systems in those markets.

I don't see this passing antitrust muster. Again, this is only a report.
 
jal41 said:
There will be a problem for Comcast if this goes through.

FCC rules prohibit ownership of a TV station and a cable system in the same market. This would be a problem in San Francisco, Chicago, and (gasp...) Comcast's home city of Philadelphia. They will have to sell either the NBC O&O, or their systems in those markets.
Click to expand...

That's sort of an amusing speculation, if one thinks about NBC winding up on KRON again, because NBC sells KNTV. :)
 
JayR said:
If this does occur, will Versus produce sports for NBC Television?
Click to expand...

It would probably be the other way around. NBC Sports is probably a bigger outfit than Versus' production center is--they're certainly more established.
 
Please DON'T let this happen! They'd raise my rates again...wait...they're already doing that by $2 in November. Oh how I wish I could have better OTA reception and not have to deal with these idiots.
 
If this deal goes forward, hopefully it will not be approved by the Justice Department -- allowing even greater concentration of media ownership isn't what we need right now.

As an alternative, perhaps it might be worth considering to just spin NBC Universal off as a separate company. There's recent precedent with the Viacom spinning off CBS into a separate company and with Time Warner splitting its cable segment off from the rest of the company.
 
TexasTom said:
If this deal goes forward, hopefully it will not be approved by the Justice Department -- allowing even greater concentration of media ownership isn't what we need right now.
Click to expand...

Ah, Texas T....that's where you're wrong! For here in Pennsylvania we know that Comcast has very deep and corrupt ties to our two-term Gangster Gov, Fast Eddie Rendell. And Fast Eddie is a major power Playa inside the Democrat Party. So if Comcast wanted to buy NBC I am certain that Fast Eddie could prevail upon the powers that be to stand down.

GO DirecTV! I Hate COMCAST more than I love hockey!!! :mad:
 
Let's not forget that Eddie Rendell was a surrogate for Hillary Clinton, and was strongly anti-Obama. Some of that bad blood may influence Obama's friends at the FCC, if this issue arises....
 
I'm sure they'd much rather settle any fines emanating from the SNL "F-bombs" with NBC before anything else...
 
DToTheJ said:
I'm sure they'd much rather settle any fines emanating from the SNL "F-bombs" with NBC before anything else...
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Why should there be any fines? SNL airs in the "safe harbor" after 10 PM everywhere in the country -- therefore, the "F-bombs" shouldn't be considered a violation of the FCC's indecency rules.
 
TexasTom said:
DToTheJ said:
I'm sure they'd much rather settle any fines emanating from the SNL "F-bombs" with NBC before anything else...
Click to expand...

Why should there be any fines? SNL airs in the "safe harbor" after 10 PM everywhere in the country -- therefore, the "F-bombs" shouldn't be considered a violation of the FCC's indecency rules.
Click to expand...

Can the F-word be said in broadcast media? Don't the "7 dirty-words you can't say on television" still apply to this day?
 
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