A quartet of western senators has introduced a bill to stall a steep increase in copyright payments to TV companies that provide programming for direct-broadcast satellite services.
The legislation, sponsored by Senator John McCain (R-Arizona) and co-sponsored by three rural-state colleagues - Montana Republican Conrad Burns, and Democrats Kent Conrad and Byron Dorgan of North Dakota - aims to stay an October US Copyright Office decision, ratified by the Library of Congress. The ruling awarded rate increases that would make some satellite royalty payments 10 times higher than rates paid for the same programming by cable-television operators.
A companion to the Senate bill, introduced Friday, is to be introduced in the House by Representatives Billy Tauzin (R-Louisiana) and Edward Markey (D-Massachusetts), both leading members of the Commerce telecommunications subcommittee.
A Copyright Office arbitration panel upped the satellite service payments from the current rate of 6 cents per subscriber for network signals and 14 cents for each superstation signal to a flat rate of 27 cents per subscriber. Cable rates for the same services are 2.7 cents and 9.7 cents, respectively. The increases are to take effect 1 January; the bill would delay the hikes for a year while Congress considers the royalty issue.
Lawmakers from rural states have protested that the higher rates for the satellite services discriminate against their constituents, who are more reliant on direct-broadcast services than those who dwell in more populated areas.
McCain and others dislike the higher rates for another reason: They see the increases as undercutting the satellite industry's ability to act as a competitive brake to cable price hikes.
