The waning hours of the contract between Fox (Parent company News Corp) and Time Warner Cable (TWC) is upon us.
Fox and Time Warner are locked in a legal battle about contractual renewal fees. Fox wants more while Time Warner is trying to keep costs down for customers. At least that’s what they say.
But some TWC customers may have noticed some ads on Fox that portray Time Warner in an evil light, perse, because they aren’t settling with Fox.
But what’s at the core of this spat? Retransmission fees. Despite the fact that networks haven’t ever charged cable companies for this fee, they are now as their ad revenue has taken a hit in the economy. Fox reportedly is asking for $1 per cable customer per week, while other networks are asking 50 cents per customer. Fox is counter-offering 30 cents per.
For now, the game of chicken is afoot while Fox threatens to pull their product from Time Warner.
TWC even asked for FCC arbitration, but Fox declined… after first accepting. Don’t let the words distract you from the fact that TWC has had a continuation extension offer on the table since Summer, but Fox isn’t budging on that either.
Let’s Cut Off Our Nose Despite Our Face
So if no agreement is reached (I keep checking my feeds while I type this) then News Corp says they’re going to pull their content off the air from TWC. That would be 14 stations that are Fox-owned, as well as the cable stations FX, Fuel, Speed TV and 10 other regional sports stations.
This is getting so ugly that even Disney stepped up with a supporting statement, backing Fox.
They pointed out that cable companies have only been paying $25 per month while turning around and charging the customer up to $70 per month for this same content. They then use the video product to pitch their other products like internet and phone services, which makes their margin much higher on that rebroadcast fee.
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The other cable companies and networks have yet to deal with this situation, so they’re sitting back to see what happens. Which, I’m guessing, is why News Corp is digging in. Because if they cave now, the other cable providers, the ones that charge you $70 a month for this content, will know they can pull the same thing.
Thursday will see face-to-face meetings between these sparring partners in hopes of meeting in the jagged middle.
In All This, Where’s The Customer?
Yes… you have to wonder about that one. Regardless of the battle between each other, there’s no mention of the customer. The same customer who is about to lose Football, The Simpsons and other venues we’ve come to enjoy.
Yes, we’ve not been mentioned, because it seems we’ve been put in the back seat of the car while the parents argue up front. We’ll get whatever comes out of the spat when it’s over.
The markets affected by this TWC / Fox issue are: New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, Dallas, Boston, Detroit, Orlando, Fla., Tampa Bay, Fla. and Austin, Texas. In Chicago, Boston and Detroit. But TWC only serves small pockets of viewers outside the central city areas.
I would not be surprised if TWC / Fox viewers are deprived of Football come January 1st. Fox, for me, has made some notorious decisions in the past regarding their programming, so slighting fans once again in this battle, would be no surprise. A shock maybe, but no surprise.
Fox needs to think of the end consumer for once. The whole country has been patiently waiting for January 1st to roll around while we enjoy our time off. This could be a boon for TWC. Maybe more people will hit up Pay-Per-View movies if they can’t get their sports?
Eh, who knows. If anyone reading this is going to be, or is affected by this situation, I’d love to hear what you’re experiencing from your end. Get the consumers point of view out there instead of the news media’s perspective.
My motivation for writing this is so that you, the Cinema Static, the SoB Consumer and my NASCAR Bits and Pieces readers are aware of what’s going on between whom, and what’s at stake. This covers all gamuts of my readership… television enertainment, consumers… for when they need to make decisions about some products, and my poor auto racing fan bretheren, who may go deprived at the beginning of the year.
Now you know!
Here are some good, last minute reads if you didn’t get enough of Cinema Static on SoB‘s take. Without preference, I’ve chosen the latest news / opinion updates in my feeds for these references:
-/Film, THR 1, THR 2, Variety.
