The legal volleying between Bloomberg and Comcast over the
news neighborhooding condition in the NBCU deal continued Monday.
Bloomberg told the FCC in a filing opposing Comcast's
request for further review of an FCC clarification that Comcast cannot comply
with the FCC mandate that it group Bloomberg TV with other news nets on its
systems by doing so for HD channels rather than standard-definition versions
"No further guidance regarding the different nature of
High Definition (‘HD') and SD network feeds, therefore, is needed from the
Commission. It is time for Comcast to neighborhood BTV in all news
neighborhoods."
In its own FCC
filing, Comcast fired back at Bloomberg that its filing was
"largely an irrelevant reiteration of its dissatisfaction that neither
Comcast nor the Bureau has capitulated to Bloomberg's effort to rewrite the
News Neighborhooding Condition to its liking."
TheFCC in May upheld a complaint by Bloomberg against Comcast that it was not
complying with the neighborhooding condition. From the get-go, Comcast said it
would fight that decision, and has proved as good as its word.
That decision has been followed by a series of legal moves
and counter-moves by Comcast and Bloomberg. Comcast says the NBCU condition
does not mean that Comcast is required to relocate Bloomberg TV to three-and-four
channel groupings "almost" all of which were in place "years
before" the NBCU deal, which is why it is fighting the FCC decision.
Bloomberg says it is fighting to stall having to comply with a condition it
agreed to as part of the deal.
