Here we go again. After failing to close a new carriage deal, Cablevision at midnight ET dropped the Fox network from its system in the New York area that serves more than 3 million homes. Viewers through Connecticut, parts of New Jersey, the New York area and a small part of Philadelphia area will miss today’s start of Major League Baseball’s National League Championship Series and the New York Giants/Detroit Lions game on Sunday if Cablevision stands firm and continues to blackout Fox programming on Fox5, My9 and Fox29. The World Series also begins on Fox Oct. 27.
Charles Schueler, Cablevision’s executive vice president of communications, released this statement late Friday: “News Corp.’s decision to remove Fox programming from three million Cablevision households is a black eye for broadcast television in America. News Corp has refused to negotiate in good faith and rejected calls from dozens of political leaders to not pull the plug and join Cablevision in binding arbitration. We demand that News Corp. put the viewers ahead of its own greed and immediately restore these channels to our customers and agree to binding arbitration to reach a fair agreement. What is News Corp. afraid of?
“News Corp.’s pattern of destructive tactics has become clear. First, they terrorized Time Warner Cable customers for weeks; then they pulled regional sports and cable channels off Dish Network; and now they have pulled the plug on Fox 5 and My9 for 3 million Cablevision households. Further, they are now threatening to pull their broadcast stations away from Dish Network’s 14 million customers in two weeks. It is clear that News Corp. will pull the plug on any viewer, served by any cable, satellite or phone company, to get the money they want.”
Cablevision claims that it already pays News Corp. more than $70 million a year for its channels, and News Corp. is demanding more than $150 million a year for the same exact programming. Cablevision has reached agreements with every other major broadcast station in the market – NBC, ABC, CBS and Univision – and offered News Corp. as much or more for Fox 5 as it pays any of those stations. But News Corp. is continuing to demand more for Fox 5 than Cablevision pays all of the other broadcast stations combined.
Yankees won the first game of American League playoffs.
In the event that the Phillies and Yankees would go to the World Series, and this dispute is not settled, the resulting outcry in the Northeast would make the Tea Party look like a demure debating society.
Who watches baseball? Most boring sport of all-time made for the most boring people in the world.
And yet not half so boring as your post.
and this said by whom?
ohyeah and idiot!!!
Let me guess, you like football right? Run 5 yards fall down pile up, walk around for 5 minutes, repeat for 5 hours.
I happen to agree with you, baseball is boring. Very little action and a lot of wasted time.
wow. Do these spam posts actually work? Pathetic.
Boring? This coming from someone who uses someone elses name when posting. You couldn’t even make something up? How original. You’re not boring at all, Larry.
C’mon! Back to the topic fellow posters!
Wow. It really is starting to look like Fox might be the bad guy here. All I know is, I have Dish and I better be able to watch my Fringe when it comes back.
we have Dish Network too…and my family is threatening to switch to a different company if we lose Fox…and that in effect means losing all that is saved on my DVR…I don’t have time to watch shows and I don’t want to lose what I have saved! Fox needs to get their act together.
Why not just watch Fringe on Hulu.com the next day? I’m a Dish customer too, and I’m not about to drop it just because the Evil Empire (Fox) disappears.
Doesn’t matter what the facts are. I will always side against Cablevision, and so will most of the people who’ve ever been their customers. For almost 30 years I put up with their business model of “You’ll do whatever we want because we’re the only game in town.” Now that they’re not, they’re suffering the consequences of the bad will they generated.
Simple solution, put FOX channels on a pay tier with either single channel or optional bundled pricing and let the market determine how much is appropriate.
This is sick! With all of our economic problems facing this country and unemployment we are learning the meaning of “greed” on both parties and we, who pay such enormous rates, are once again the losers. This is a “shonda” and a pox on our homes. How can anyone of us feel sorry for these major players when we are all in the “minor” leagues. There has to be arbitration so we can get back what we always thought we would never lose….the baseball playoffs, the World Series,”Fringe” and “Glee”. It’s a good thing my favorite team, the Yankees, was on TBS last night. What a fantastic comeback. Now let’s all pray together.
Cablevison is the worst. They make Fox look good.
I don’t care about baseball but so help me God this better be back on by Thursday for Fringe or I will be LIVID.
Viewers in CT lost the NYC affiliates, not the Hartford/New Haven ones. CT still has FOX and my9.
DUMP FOX!!!!!!!!
These retransmission fees should be outlawed. I can understand it for basic cable networks. But these broadcast networks are using *public* airwaves for their signals and the cable companies should be able to retransmit those signals without cost. And if the broadcast nets don’t like it, then they should become basic cable networks.
To everyone here: I am sorry for making stupid, lame and humorless posts using someone else’s name. I am a loser who has no life and no friends, so the internet, and all of you, are really all I have. Please be my friend. I am so lonely.
I’m glad this didn’t happen while new episodes of Fringe were still airing. Hopefully it will be resolved later. Who cares about baseball.
I would wager that there are more people in the cablevision area who care about losing the World Series than who care about Fringe. I wouldn’t be so dimissive.
newscorp is making cablevision seem reasonable which is amazing because that company is terrible.
If you want FOX, you can still pick it up wit a digital antenna and tuning into channel 5. Takes a little effort but not the end of the world.
Fox should do us ALL a favor and go off the air nationwide!!!
Switch to FiOS they still have it.