Surprise. A Semi-Autonomous Carr Doesn't Crash.

I can't imagine it's easy being Brendan Carr these days. He's only one of five commissioners serving the Federal Communications Commission these days, but he's undoubtedly the most prominent and polarizing. Sort of comes with the territory when you've emerged as the de facto hatchet man for the "game plan" that your exceptionally media-obsessed and thin-skinned boss seems to have. Ya know, like where the seeming extortion of millions of dollars apiece from otherwise desperate networks and platforms who somehow allow something perceptually unflattering to slip through their cracks seems to be becoming standard operating procedure.

He's clearly been able to make an impact on ABC and CBS, who each ponied up roughly $16 million for some unfortunate errors of omission--or, in his boss' mind, commission--on the parts of their news departments. And he followed that up by arguably dangling the approval of Paramount's deal with Skydance with conditions that got the incoming nepobaby to agree to an "independent" ombudsman and a $20 million "time buy" that will help fill some of those needless promotional voids once original late night talk/variety shows vanish completely by next May (or perhaps sooner, if you buy into my Nostradumbass prediction).

And fresh off those "hits" this week he turned his attention to the third of those traditional "Big 3", as VARIETY's Gene Maddaus reported yesterday:

FCC Chairman Brendan Carr informed Comcast on Tuesday that he has launched an investigation into the company's relations with its NBC affiliates, days after President Trump called for the network to be held "accountable" for favoring the Democratic Party and threatened to revoke broadcast licenses.

In a letter to Comcast CEO Brian Roberts, Carr argued that the national network has increasingly asserted control over local stations, and that that has eroded the public's trust in news coverage. "Americans no longer trust the national news outlets to report fully, accurately, and fairly," Carr wrote. "The FCC has an interest in and the authority to promote the public interest and to ensure that local broadcast TV stations retain the economic and operational independence necessary to meet their public interest obligations."

There's little doubt that the motivation for this is rooted in his boss' deep disdain for what he cannot not reference as "MSDNC" in the same manner that a Tourette's baby can't help but curse. So I'm fairly certain that Carr was under some sort of mandate to ramp up the accusatory tone in said letter.

But by referencing the entirity of the affiliate-network relationship as he did, Carr either unwittingly or deftly opened a window into the very concept of why in this day and age local broadcasters continue to pay millions per year to an entity that no longer provides them exclusivity of any content, news or otherwise. And clearly seems to give favored nations status to the streaming platform they are trying desperately to build the value--even when the most favorable numbers continue to point out that despite all attempts to paint as rosy a picture as possible for its growth the majority of viewers are still watching via traditional means--and a clear majority are coming from those indentured affiliates.

Take the example of the 2024 Paris Olympics. You'd be hard-pressed to find even a supposedly objective third party that didn't conflate linear eyeballs with digital traction. Witness the pecking order than CNN's Liam Reilly used in his congratulatory coverage of the company's success last August:

The 2024 Summer Olympics in Paris drew a combined average of 30.6 million viewers across NBCU’s constellation of platforms, marking an 82% jump in viewership compared to the Tokyo Games and making the Games the most-streamed Olympics of all time.

The media giant on Monday shared that its coverage saw a whopping 23.5 billion minutes of stream time, a 40% increase compared to all prior summer and winter Games combined, while its total audience delivery in “Paris Prime” — afternoons in the US — and prime time drew in 4.1 million daily viewers on Peacock and NBCU Digital platforms.

You'd be correct that those are apples and oranges comparisons to an extent, but after an extensive search of other non-paywall protected sources this was the only one that even casually referenced Peacock's actual Nielsen-approved viewership. Which by my math means that it represents a mere 13.4% of that record-breaking delivery.

Now further factor in that the coverage of the 11 NBC-owned stations is just under 26% of U.S. TV households. To me, that implies that 74% of that network delivery is coming from those old-school affiliates that Carr is implying are being mistreated.

Here's an open question: What kind of payment structure are those stations making to their sister division, if any? Is there a possibility that their terms might be a bit more favored nations that, say, those of affiliates owned by the likes of Nexstar and Sinclair--which in aggregate are a total of 50 markets and a sizable chunk of the country in their own right?

And to be sure, their respective ownerships look much more favorably upon the current administration than perhaps the "Concast" braintrust does--and back that up with financial support from their management. Everywhere you can look, Nexstar chairman Perry Sook repeatedly donates multiple times more money to Republican campaigns than he does to Democrats. And he's been actively lobbying Carr to relax the ownership rules to allow him to scoop up many more stations--an agenda Carr appears more than favorably disposed of.

All of that may not make those who somehow see this sort of consolidation as destructive. The kind of mindset that seems to think rallying around the firing of a money-losing late night talk show host is somehow a sign of the fall of democracy.

Put the rhetoric and hand-wringing aside. Let's say you operated a chain of stores that sold an awful lot of Scrub Daddys. Let's say you proportionately sold more than, say, Home Depot does. Trust me, I see how many of them are still on the shelves of the ones I regularly visit. Should you not want a better unit price as a reward for your efforts?

I recently did a deep dive for a major MVPD that confirmed that virtually every significant piece of content that NBCU airs on its stations are available on Peacock. Despite this, the MVPD's first party data confirmed they contributed exponentially more viewers to those programs than Peacock did--though the omnipresence of that offering resulted in increased marketing costs to reinforce their value proposition. The MVPD's contention was strongly pointing to not only should they not be paying Comcast as much as they were, but arguably they should be paid proportionately.

At one time, networks did pay their affiliates. They were trying to establish footprints and, moreover, were looking to incentivize those local stations to help them promote their lineups. Those that delivered more audience to a program or a daypart than they would be expected to deliver as a proportion of how much of the country they covered got more favorable terms than those that did not. The dawn of retransmission consent changed that, and until now no one empowered at the FCC has made a serious attempt to revisit it.

You can rightfully question the motivations that have motivated this coming to light, especially in an era where this adminstration is repeatedly looking back into history to times long gone when America was simpler. I can't speak for the logic and reason behind some of those efforts; go reread Project 2025 if you must.

But when it comes to the MACA movement--Make Affiliates Compensated Again--I'll wear that particularly hat gladly.

That may not have been Brendan Carr's most reported intention of this inquiry, but it will likely come into greater focus. Thankfully, at least per Reuters' David Shepardson, it appears Roberts and company will at least contribute to the discourse:

Comcast confirmed it had received the inquiry and will cooperate. "We are proud that for many decades we have supported local broadcast TV stations with world-class sports and entertainment... We will continue to invest heavily in this partnership to keep the broadcast business strong."

Carr has at least begun a process long overdue for examination. That blind squirrel can sometimes find his nut, even if his boss can't easily do same.

Until next time...