Baker: Cable, Satellite Need Freedom To Package Programming

Speaking to the Media Institute, Federal Communications Commission member Meredith Attwell Baker stood up for cable operators' freedom to package their programming as they see fit, argued that the government should not rush to regulate online content, and suggested there were online speech implications to the network neutrality debate that bear close inspection.

"Content providers and distributors have First Amendment rights about how their content reaches their audience that must be respected," she said. "ESPN, Comcast, and DirecTV are speakers, and must remain free to create compelling programming in packages of their own choosing." She pointed to the Supreme Court's finding that when government defends its speech regulation, its defense must be more than that there is a "potential problem to be cured," adding: "We must protect that heightened standard. Baker's central point was that quality content is not free. She said that Googling "free TV shows" yields over 300 million hits. Next, she said, try Googling 'high-quality, expensive TV programming" and the result is zero hits. She said that more people last year watched Dexter and Heroes illegally than legally. "It is next to impossible to compete with free," she said, "yet this is the central challenge" to so many.