Latest in Regulation

Tencent lost about $20 billion in market valuation Friday, as Chinese regulators took steps to limit the number of online games and reduce screen time. China’s leader, Xi Jinping, expressed concerns this week that game play was damaging children’s eyesight. His remarks telegraphed for tighter regulation over the…

Extending a string of 2017 de-regulatory moves, Ajit Pai, President Donald Trump’s appointee to lead the FCC, has formally begun the process of reviewing rules limiting the number of TV stations a single owner can control. If the ownership cap is eased, as expected, by the Republican-controlled, 5-member commission…

Big cable operators took a punch to the solar plexus this morning, at least as far as Wall Street is concerned. MoffettNathanson Research’s Craig Moffett — a regular among Institutional Investor‘s annual list of top cable analysts, and a longtime industry supporter — downgraded Comcast, Time Warner Cable and Charter…

The country’s television regulators took a potentially big step in that direction on Friday — and it could reverberate in the U.S. where Big Media companies are determined to keep their lucrative pay TV packages intact. The Canadian Radio-Television and Telecommunications Commission said that Bell Media — the…

The MPAA is leading the charge on behalf of showbiz guilds against California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger’s 2005 California law banning the sale of violent video games to minors. The lobbying group for Hollywood studios is urging the Supreme Court to uphold a 9th Circuit Court of Appeals ruling that…

Broadcasting & Cable just reported that the FCC says Comcast/NBCU returned incomplete answers and did not follow the directions in responding to a May FCC request for a bunch of information. Wanted was everything from organizational structure and channel lineups to copies of all programming agreements and detailed…

UPDATE: In connection with the summary judgment ruling today in its litigation against Google and YouTube, Viacom Inc made the following statement: “We believe that this ruling by the lower court is fundamentally flawed and contrary to the language of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, the intent of Congress, and…

Robert Swagger, CEO of the Trend Exchange, gave a press conference detailing his progress — or lack of it — in swaying DC politicians to remove movie futures exchanges from the financial reform legislation that is expected to be signed into law later this year. After gaining approval last week to launch from the…

I asked Andrew Jay Schwartzman, the SVP and Policy Director of the Media Access Project in Washington DC (http://www.mediaaccess.org) to write up his thoughts on the proposed merger: Why Hollywood Should Care About  the Comcast/NBCU Deal By Andrew Jay Schwartzman Comcast's proposed acquisition of NBCU is bad for…

Washington, DC – The Writers Guild of America, West called on regulators today to impose strict guidelines on the proposed merger of Comcast-NBCU in order to protect competition, ensure the value of creative product, and to promote broadcast and cable program diversity and independence. In its filing to the Federal…

UPDATE WRITE-THRU: Last weekend, Karate Kid vastly outperformed estimates, proving that even though the plots of films are predictable this summer, the box office outcome certainly isn’t. It was in that climate that the creators of the new Media Derivatives box office futures business held its press conference after…

The Federal Communications Commission proposed a $25,000 fine against the Fox TV stations today for not providing requested information about sexually suggestive scenes in an episode of American Dad that had drawn more than 100,000 indecency complaints. The scenes from the January 3 episode of the animated Fox comedy…