Cite as: 520 U. S. 180 (1997)
O'Connor, J., dissenting
broadcast licenses, curtailed their broadcast operations, or suffered a serious reduction in operating revenues" because of adverse carriage decisions. Id., at 667. The record on remand does not permit the conclusion, at the summary judgment stage, that Congress could reasonably have predicted serious harm to a significant number of stations in the absence of must-carry.
The purported link between an adverse carriage decision and severe harm to a station depends on yet another untested premise. Even accepting the conclusion that a cable system operator has a monopoly over cable services to the home, supra, at 237, it does not necessarily follow that the operator also has a monopoly over all video services to cabled households. Cable subscribers using an input selector switch and an antenna can receive broadcast signals. Widespread use of such switches would completely eliminate any cable system "monopoly" over sources of video input. See 910 F. Supp., at 786 (Williams, J., dissenting). Growing use of direct-broadcast satellite television also tends to undercut the notion that cable operators have an inevitable monopoly over video services entering cable households. See, e. g., Farhi, Dishing Out the Competition to Cable TV, Washington Post, Oct. 12, 1996, at H1, col. 3.
In the Cable Act, Congress rejected the wisdom of any "substantial societal investment" in developing input selector switch technology. § 2(a)(18). In defending this choice, the Court purports to identify "substantial evidence of technological shortcomings" that prevent widespread, efficient use of such devices. But nearly all of the "data" in question are drawn from sources predating the enactment of must-carry by roughly six years. Compare ante, at 219-220, with Defendants' Joint Statement of Evidence Before Congress ¶ 725 (JSCR) (citing ELRA Group, Inc., Outdoor Antennas, Reception of Local Television Signals and Cable Television i-ii (Jan. 28, 1986), App. H to NAB Testimony in Cable Legislation before the Subcommittee on Telecommunications and
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