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Ownership of the largest cable television company in the Oklahoma City area could change hands twice _once under a sale announced Monday and again if media ownership laws do not change.
On the other hand, the sale announced this week could instead result in the sale of an Oklahoma City television station.
Gannett Co. Inc., the nation's largest newspaper publisher and owner of KOCO-TV Channel 5, announced Monday a deal to buy Multimedia Inc. The two companies agreed to the $1.7 billion purchase at an auction over the past weekend.
Multimedia supplies cable television service to more than 110,000 subscribers in 17 Oklahoma City suburbs, including Norman, Edmond, Moore and Midwest City.
Under current federal communications law, no company can own both a cable television system and a television station in one market. Gannett would have to sell either Channel 5 or the Multimedia cable operations in Oklahoma City.
Also, existing law prohibits one company from owning more than 12 television stations nationwide, so Gannett would have to sell three of its stations because of the Multimedia deal.
But laws affecting both cross-ownership within a market and the number of television stations one company can own could change this year.
Congress is considering legislation that would deregulate the cable television industry, allow one company to own an unlimited number of television and radio stations nationally and remove at least some media cross-ownership restrictions, including that banning ownership of a newspaper...