What Do New Drug Ad Price Disclosures Mean?
Last week, the Department of Health and Human Services adopted a new rule mandating, at some point later this year, that prescription drug advertising on TV contain certain price information. Specifically, HHS will require TV ads for prescription drugs covered by Medicare or Medicaid to include the list price for a month’s supply or for the usual course of therapy, if that price is $35 or more. While some advertising groups argue that this requirement is an unconstitutional infringement on free speech, assuming that the rule goes into effect as planned, what effect will the rule have on TV?
FCC Chairman Ajit Pai put in a plug Wednesday for giving the FCC some fast track broadcast deregulatory authority. In a House Communications Subcommittee FCC oversight hearing, Pai said that the disconnect between a moving marketplace and the “stasis” of FCC rules was the fundamental issue the FCC had with its media ownership rules.
Free Press has issued a damning report on the FCC’s response to communications outages in Puerto Rico after the September 2017 one-two punch of Hurricanes Irma and Maria. “It’s deeply troubling how little interest the FCC has shown in analyzing what went wrong and using this information to shape its policies on communication rights and public safety,” the group said.
Broadcasters have more friends in high places, as in on The Hill, for their effort to sunset the satellite distant signal license, though that is itself a high hill to climb. “It is clear that the distant signal license has outlived its usefulness,” said Rep. Jared Golden in a letter to the leadership of the House Energy & Commerce and Judiciary Committees, which together will consider how and whether to renew the STELAR Act.
Exclusives
The group says the proposed station buys by Terrier Media, controlled by Apollo Global Management, of properties of Northwest Broadcasting and Cox Broadcasting will “impede competition and diversity and raise prices for consumers.” It urges the FCC to study what it calls “public interest harms” if the deals are approved.
BOSTON (AP) — Actress Felicity Huffman is scheduled to plead guilty Monday to allegations she paid $15,000 to rig her daughter’s SAT score as part of a nationwide college admissions […]
SAN DIEGO (AP) — Conan O’Brien has made peace with a man who heckled him not from the crowd but the courts. O’Brien and several co-defendants, including his writing staff, […]
National Telecommunications and Information Administration chief David Redl resigned abruptly from his position on Thursday, officials confirmed. Redl has been at the helm of the NTIA, the body tasked with advising the Trump administration’s telecom policy within the Department of Commerce, since November 2017.
The House Energy & Commerce Committee Communications Subcommittee has scheduled an FCC oversight hearing for May 15 at 10 a.m. The subcommittee leadership says all five commissioners —the chairman is also a commissioner — have agreed to testify.
The full House Appropriations Committee has proposed to increase funding for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, approving the recommendation of the Subcommittee on Labor, Health and Human Services, Education and Related Agencies, which last month approved a funding boost of $50 million (or about 15%) to $495 million for fiscal year 2022.
Nexstar Sues DirecTV Over Unlaunched Station Fee
Nexstar has sued DirecTV in a New York federal court, claiming breach of contract. At issue is an “unlaunched station fee” that it says DirecTV agreed to pay for not being required to immediately launch Nexstar station WHAG (aka WDVM). The Hagerstown, Md.,, station lost its affiliation with NBC on July 1, 2016.
At the Justice Department last Friday, broadcasters were joined by Facebook and Comcast Cable in arguing that they all compete with each other for local advertising dollars. Winning that argument is the first step in convincing the DOJ to stop blocking duopolies of network affiliates. “There’s a really high overlap between these media types,” said Marcien Jenckes of Comcast. “Advertisers have shifted focus from this type of media or that type media. They think instead about their overall return on their media spend.”
Speaking yesterday on day one of the Department of Justice’s two-day workshop on the local advertising market, BIA Managing Director Rick Ducey said digital media are the fastest growing sector of the market. Digital, he said, will get 40% of the local auto spend this year and nearly 50% by 2023. DOJ is holding the workshop as it reconsiders its policy of blocking duopolies comprising network affiliates in light of changes in the ad market.
In a stunning win for Fox, a California judge on Thursday tossed most of the $179 million that Bones stars Emily Deschanel and David Boreanaz and executive producers Barry Josephson and Kathy Reichs were awarded by an arbitrator earlier this year. Judge Richard Rico has stripped all of the $128 million in punitive damages that Fox was contesting off the award granted by former judge Peter Lichtman in late February.
MALIBU, Calif. (AP) — Actor Rick Schroder has been arrested on suspicion of domestic violence for the second time in a month. Los Angeles County sheriff’s Deputy Juanita Navarro says […]
The cable trade association says the commission should not only retain its ban on the common ownership of two full-power Big Four network affiliates in the same market, but should also close a “loophole” that allows affiliates to double up by carrying Big Four programming on low-power stations and multicast streams. NCTA such deals give broadcasters an unfair advantage during retrans negotiations.
Washington communications law firm Lerman Senter says David Burns has joined the firm, bringing more than 30 years of experience representing communications and media companies. His experience and practice cover […]
Washington, D.C., is locked in a court battle with entertainment cable channel BET over land the city practically gave away to help launch an African-American entertainment center in 1992.
BOSTON (AP) — “Desperate Housewives” star Felicity Huffman will plead guilty on May 13 to charges that she took part in a sweeping college admissions cheating scam. Huffman had been […]
Jessell | Winning Over DOJ On Duops Won’t Be Easy
This Thursday and Friday, at a “workshop” in Washington, broadcasters get to make the case to the antitrust division of the Justice Department that TV stations compete not only with each other, but also with cable and digital media like Facebook and Google. It’s nice that Justice is giving broadcasters this opportunity to air their grievances, but I’m doubtful it will trigger a change in policy, at least not in the short term.
Abigail Slater, who will be Fox Corp. senior vice president of policy and strategy, had been special assistant to the President Trump for technology, telecommunications and cybersecurity, advising National Economic Counsel President Larry Kudlow as well as the president.
The FCC’s Media Bureau has accepted for filing the TV station spinoffs that Nexstar said gets its merger with Tribune — just barely — under the 39% national audience reach cap. With that info in hand, the bureau has set the comment dates for what is the now-consolidated application for transferring stations from Tribune to Nexstar, which combines the original application and the info on just what stations are being spun off, and to whom. Petitions to deny are due May 27; oppositions to those petitions are due June 11; replies are due June 18.
Broadcasters have told the FCC not to pay attention to the tech companies seeking to harpoon the great white (spaces) whale by preventing broadcasters from using vacant channels to help in the transition to next-gen ATSC 3.0 TV transmissions. That came in a call this week between NAB execs and officials at the FCC’s Media Bureau and Incentive Auction Task Force.
