The ongoing (this is the fifth day of the blackout) retransmission dispute between Cablevision Systems (NYSE: CVC) and News Corp.'s (Nasdaq: NWSA) Fox Networks is drawing undue attention from federal regulators--unless that's what both sides in the dispute want.
FCC Commissioner Michael Copps, concerned at the subscriber-in-the-middle aspects of the dispute, has recalled the Commission's prerogative as a "consumer protection agency" while suggesting it should "take a very serious look at whether 'good faith' negotiations are indeed occurring.
"What, indeed, does 'good faith' mean in the dog-eat-dog world of big media?" he continued. Of course he also brought up Fox's move to block Cablevision subscribers from seeing its Internet content which he said "directly threatens the open Internet."
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