FCC: Comcast should stick to Tennis ruling

The FCC's enforcement bureau states Comcast needs to be bought to comply "immediately" getting a ruling the cable operator place Tennis Funnel on equal footing within the selection with channels which includes a stake, like the Golf Funnel and Versus. Lately, an administrative law judge ruled that Comcast had violated program carriage rules if the rejected to place Tennis Funnel ready similar to people of sport shows it has. Tennis Funnel contended that it's positioning cost it advertising revenue, which it absolutely was put in upper tiers even though its ratings consistently beat people in the Comcast-affiliated systems. Following a ruling, Comcast contended it were not needed to comply until its appeals fully FCC also to legal court of Appeals were exhausted. In comments released Thursday, the FCC's enforcement bureau mentioned that carriage laws and regulations and rules "unambiguously" demonstrate that orders from administrative law idol idol judges work "upon release" in the ruling. Their articles are recommendations fully commission. Throughout time of Administrative Law Judge Richard Sippel's ruling lately, Comcast mentioned it "gets the contractual to distribute Tennis Funnel since it does presently, and Comcast firmly thinks the exercise of the to reduce costs to clients is not discrimination." After Comcast's merger with NBC Universal, it re-named Versus as NBC Sports Network. Tennis Funnel mentioned in the statement that "the recommendations are apparent that Comcast now must give to us the identical carriage it gives towards the own Golf Funnel as well as the NBC Sports Network." Contact Ted Manley at ted.manley@variety.com