Washington — The FCC took a step toward changing the way customers access pay-TV service. The Commission issued a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking aimed at opening up the set-top box market to competition.
The Computer & Communications Industry Association hosts a website for the Consumer Video Choice Coalition aimed at bringing competition to set top boxes. The following can be attributed to CCIA President & CEO Ed Black:
“We welcome this important step by the FCC and look forward to working with the Commission to ensure that consumers benefit from a more competitive set-top box market. This rulemaking is all about promoting consumer choice and innovation. While the rest of the consumer electronics marketplace has flourished over the two decades since Congress directed the FCC to open up the set-top box market to competition, the cable industry has retained its iron grip on the cable box to the detriment of consumers. We applaud Chairman Wheeler and the Commission for taking this step to make good on Congress’s decades-old directive. Consumers deserve the same innovation and consumer choice in living-room technology as they have become accustomed to in the rest of the technology world. Let’s make the living room great again!”