Endzone dance after NFL suspends blackouts
TheHill
THE LEDE: Regulators are taking a victory lap after the NFL announced that it would abandon its powers to black out football games for the 2015 season.
The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) "did great work in paving the way" for the NFL's announcement, agency Chairman Tom Wheeler tweeted. "Good riddance!"
Last autumn, the commission unanimously voted to kill its four-decades-old sports blackout rules, which banned cable and satellite providers from showing NFL and other sports games that had been blacked out on local broadcast television. But the NFL still had a policy of forcing local broadcast channels to black out games that don't sell out 72 hours before kickoff, opening the door to private negotiations between the league and individual television providers to black out the games. On Monday, the league announced that owners had voted to kill those rules for the year and evaluate the impact after the season.
"This is a big win for sports fans across the country, from Buffalo to San Diego," said Republican FCC Commissioner Ajit Pai, who makes no secret of his allegiance to the Kansas City Chiefs. "Today's announcement by the NFL is a big step in the right direction."
In 2013, Sens. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) and John McCain (R-Ariz.) introduced the FANS Act, which would have eliminated the FCC's rules and required that leagues like the NFL make games available online. Blumenthal on Monday called the NFL's policy an "antiquated, anti-consumer rule" that "has for too long served only to protect the NFL's bottom line at the expense of sports fans."
http://thehill.com/policy/technology/236638-after-federal-rule-change-nfl-drops-blackout-policy-for-2015
