AMENDMENT TO H.R. 2223 2. This amendment would make the fee schedule in H.R.2223 applicable only to revenues in excess of the first $25,000 of quarterly gross. It is felt that this initial $25,000 reflects, on an industry-wide basis, the amount of revenue earned from the carriage of purely local signals. On page 16, line 20, strike out "up to $40,000* and insert in lieu thereof "totalling more than $25,000 but not more than $40,000". At present only one of the four market stations requests exclusivity protection. Yet, in a recent week, requests for protection from this one station against one of the inported stations resulted in the 'blackout' of 21 percent of the full-day programs on the distant station. (3) The cable Wauwatosa, Wi., is located in television market #23 (Milwaukee, Wi.). There are three network stations and one independent station in the market. system, presently under construction, will import two independent stations when it becomes operational. Although the system is not yet in operation, it has already received written and verbal requests for syndicated program protection from all four market stations. The requests require that 62 percent of the daily programming of one distant station, and 58 percent of the daily programming of the other distant station be 'blacked out'. The devastating effect of the program 'blackouts' is illustrated in the following three pages. Pages 5 and 6 represent the Friday, January 24, 1975 schedules of the two Chicajo independent television stations to be imported into Wauwatosa. Page 7 shows the limited number of programs from the two stations that would be permitted to be shown by the cable system. Program titles which must be 'protected' are 'Xed' out, and would not be available to cable subscribers. |