Judge clears way for NBC to leave WHDH
A federal judge dismissed a lawsuit from WHDH-TV against Comcast Corp. on Monday, reports The Boston Globe.
WHDH has aired NBC programming since 1995, but that’s about to change. Comcast, which owns NBC, announced earlier this year it would end its contract with the station by the end of 2016 and launch its own new Boston TV station in 2017. As a result, Ed Ansin, the owner of WHDH, sued Comcast in March for breach of contract and antitrust violations. The judge ruled in Comcast’s favor, saying WHDH couldn’t demand contract renewal negotiations with NBC and didn’t prove Comcast used unfair or deceptive practices.
“WHDH’s loss of the NBC affiliation is no doubt a blow to the station’s profitability. But absent any actionable harm attributable to Comcast, it is simply an indurate consequence of doing business in a competitive and unsentimental market place,” Judge Richard G. Stearns wrote in his 23-page decision. “For the foregoing reasons, defendant’s motion to dismiss is allowed.”
Read the full story in the Globe.
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