NAB's Smith Seeks Help From MVPDs, Social Media Amid COVID-19

Communications challenges posed by the novel coronavirus prompted NAB CEO Gordon Smith to seek help from other industries. He hopes for no retransmission consent blackouts of TV stations' content on MVPDs. And he wants social media platforms to work with broadcasters to combat fake news.

"Broadcasters don’t want to see service interruptions of any kind," Smith said Wednesday late-morning in a C-SPAN interview for the Communicators, answering our questions. "Hopefully, our friends on the cable and satellite side will kind of stand down." In past crises, TV stations have a "history of doing that and I have no reason to believe that won’t continue," Smith said. FCC Chairman Ajit Pai made such a request Tuesday. His spokespeople didn't comment now.

ACA Connects backed Pai's request, a spokesperson for the association noted now. It endorsed Pai’s "suggestion that broadcasters and MVPDs work to maintain a 'quiet period' to avoid disruption during this national emergency. We will ask our members to respect this quiet period and expect that they will do so." NCTA declined to comment. AT&T, owner of DirecTV, and Dish Network didn't comment.

Smith wants to prevent social media from spreading what he called fake news. He thinks if those platforms work with broadcasters and with newspapers, they can promote "solid, factual journalism." The Internet Association, Facebook, Google and Twitter didn't comment.