The phrasing from both sides is PR spin, attempting to cast the other as the "bad guys" when this is simply a business negotiation. However, it will be very interesting (and likely significant to the industry) to see where this ends up.
News Corp's Fox television unit said on Friday that testy carriage negotiations with Time Warner Cable Inc could leave viewers unable to see Fox programming, including "American Idol" and NFL football.
Fox said it has for the past nine months attempted to "negotiate in good faith" with Time Warner Cable, the No. 2 U.S. cable operator, which serves some 14 million customers, and said those talks are ongoing.
But there is a "very likely possibility that Time Warner Cable may choose to no longer carry Fox Broadcasting, Fox Cable and Fox regional sports programming," Fox said.
via THR.com.
This sounds like a good plan from Time Warner. They’d probably only lose about 7m of those 14 million customers.
wow, fox is kind of getting screwed here. Nice to see a little karma.
And Versus is still lights out with Direct TV, wit hno end in site….blah blah….this what TV has come too. Sweet!
It’s hard to tell which side is bluffing, but there’s no chance this actually happens.
Fox isn’t getting screwed, Fox is probably going to make billions because of this.
I doubt people would go through the trouble to switch to another cable company if this does happen. People could just watch it online. FOX will be the one thats screwed. It wont affect Time Warner Cable that much.
Fox is bluffing. They know their ratings are going to go down. Of course Time Warner is also bluffing since their subscribers, including me, would be very ticked off. Whose Poker Face do you beleive?
Rob you are wrong. If this actually happens (which it won’t) DirecTV, DISH, Verizon and AT&T will be falling all over themselves to get all the pissed off customers. It’ll be even easier to switch than it is now and they’ll all offer amazing introductory packages.
Rob, The stakes from this threat (which I agree are unlikely to actually occur) peak just before the NFL playoffs. Nobody’s watching *those* online.
What’s really going on here? Is this just gamesmanship or something serious?
Yea ur right this probably wont happen. Around the same time last year, Time Warner Cable threatened to get rid of Nickolodeon, The N, GSN, TV Land, and all those channels part of that company I cant remember and it never happened.
Time Warner really has no choice but to cave here.
Viacom. It was an 11th hour deal and I think Viacom ended up winning, if you read between the PR. TWC will fold again.
@ Julia
Something similar to this happened back in 2000 between Time Warner and Disney, resulting in ABC being blocked with a blue screen that ran a banner saying “Disney has taken ABC away from you.” Not very tactful on Time Warner’s part. I don’t remember how long it lasted, however; there would seem to be some precedent that this could happen with Fox as well.
No matter which way this goes the people getting screwed are the viewers. Both companies will still make a ton of money off off of us. Even if Time Warner doesn’t cave, I guarantee they will raise their rates yet again. If I had any other choice besides satellite where I live, I would have left them years ago.
Packy, that lasted a whole 39 hours, and was only ABC in 11 markets. This deal we’re talking about involves all of Fox’s cable properties as well, and from the sound of it, all of Fox Broadcasting, not just Fox’s O&Os (of which there are 17, I believe, though half of those are MyNet stations.) It’s possible we’ll see Fox go dark for a few hours, but I wouldn’t bet on it.
In the fall of last year we (TWC customers in SW Ohio) lost NBC for about a month. Yes, TWC actually dropped NBC…and we still didn’t even have NBC in HD at that point. Took about a month before they brought it back.
It was at that time that I finally had enough with TWC and switched to U-verse with is vastly superior on every level. I’ve liuved all over the country and had service with many, many providers, but no one seemed to care less about providing decent, quality programming than TWC. I don’t doubt for a second that they’ll leave their customers go without FOX, I’ve had them take a network away from me in the past. I suspect they’d do it again.
theres more good drama goin on behind the cameras then there actually is on tv
I agree that it is a situation where both side have a lot to lose so it will not probably happen.
Still, I would love to see it happen just to watch what it would do to the viewer dynamics on both sides and for the precedent that it would set for future negotiations.
Is TWC going to block all of Fox’s online content too? I guess most people could watch those shows online then.
Whats the point of these fights anyway? there is too much overlapping competition these days for them to bicker about this stuff. How hard is it to come to an agreement and why do they wait so long before negotiating. If they did it a year before the contract ended then it wouldn’t effect people overnight and the companies involved can plan ahead for the rate changes.