NATAS Files Petition to Vacate Ruling on New-Media Emmys

By Marisa Guthrie -- Broadcasting & Cable, 12/21/2007 4:38:00 PM

The controversy over jurisdiction and presentation of Emmy awards for new media content seems to be far from over despite a federal arbitration panel ruling last week.

New York-based National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences (NATAS), which hands out news, documentary and sports Emmys, has filed a petition to vacate a three-judge American Arbitration Association decision, contending that the decision violates the 1977 contract that separated NATAS from its Hollywood counterpart, the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences (ATAS).

The two parties went into arbitration in part because ATAS, which has jurisdiction over the Primetime Emmy Awards, objected to NATAS’ creation of a new category for content made expressly for broadband. NATAS handed out several broadband Emmys at the Annual News & Documentary Emmy Awards in September.

The arbitrators ruled that content made for broadband may continue to be submitted for consideration in established categories, as ATAS had argued, but may not have its own broadband category.

ATAS is now demanding that NATAS cancel its 59th Annual Emmy Awards for Engineering and Technology, which is scheduled for Jan. 7 in Las Vegas on the opening night of Consumer Electronics Show.

ATAS’ demand stems from language in the arbitration ruling that calls for the Emmys to be redistributed by “genre” instead of “daypart.” (Practically speaking, the Emmys have essentially been distributed by both genre and daypart since much of the news and documentary content recognized by NATAS’ News & Documentary Emmys airs in primetime, a daypart ATAS ostensibly has purview over.)

“Facing the expectation of sending hundreds of notices to already-announced winners and nominees that their outstanding work was no longer ‘Emmy worthy,’ that it no longer merited an event, the anticipated revenue loss for an event of this size occurring on the opening night of the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, the largest convention event in the United States, combined with the damage to the mutually held trademark of the Emmy Awards made this action a foregone conclusion,” said NATAS in a statement.

The organization has in the past year created several new categories, said a NATAS spokesman, and has also been handing out more than half-dozen gaming awards. Nevertheless, the Engineering and Technology Emmys are the oldest ceremony in NATAS history.

“The arbitration, which reflected the majority opinion, ruled resoundingly in favor of the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences,” said an ATAS spokesperson. “The ruling speaks for itself.”

NATAS’ petition to vacate the ruling dovetails with the stated opinion of the minority judge on the three-judge panel.

In a statement in the arbitration proceeding, George C. Pratt, a retired Federal Appellate Judge in New York, characterized the “genre” redistribution as “nothing more than ATAS' litigation-motivated attempt to force an ambiguity into an agreement it had followed for 30 years."