Armchair Quarterback
What would the holiday season be without having a fight between Dish Network and one of its program providers? As the new year gets closer to chime in it appears that Dish is once again in another programming dispute. In the past few years Dish Network has started the new year with some channels missing from it’s programming lineup, such channels as Lifetime, Court TV, Viacom, Outdoor Life (Now Versus) among others. This year (so far) it appears that the big programming scuffle will be with The Fox News Channel.
It was reported by Routers earlier this week that the Fox News Channel is suing Dish Network for fifty million dollars. It is being reported that Fox News is suing Dish Network because the satellite provider does not carry Fox News in its “most widely distributed package.”
Playing armchair quarterback for a moment, I believe that Fox News has no case here. When FOX News launched years ago it was launched on the same package it is in today, the middle package which is today called the “America’s Top 200 Package.” According to retailers I have talked to, the “America’s Top 200 Package” is the top selling package. To me this would make it the “most widely distributed package.”
According to the Wikipedia, Fox News launched back in 1996, and if memory serves me correctly Dish Network has carried the channel since it launched. So the question now comes why would Fox News be suing Dish Network 11 years later? According to Fox News “… since or about January 2007, Echostar has failed to comply with the distribution requirement.”
Fox News is in the same package it has ALWAYS been in. The name of the package has changed a few times but it is still the same package. I am wondering what DirecTV lawyer took a look at the recently settles lawsuit it was involved with against Mark Cuban and his HDNet channel and decided to go after Dish using the same argument.
It is my opinion that Fox News parent company News Corp is trying to play hardball with Dish Network to carry their new Fox Business Channel and Fox Business Channel HD. I don’t think that this lawsuit will encourage Dish Network CEO Charlie Ergen to play ball. To me what makes this lawsuit even sillier is the fact that News Corp owns Fox News. And we all know what other company News Corp owns, that being Dish Networks main competitor DirecTV. To me that fact alone speaks volumes about this lawsuit.
A Christmas Gift from Dish Network?
A number of Dish Network customers have reported on a number of online forums about getting an amazing deal on the pay television movie service Cinemax from Dish Network.
The deal being reported is that if a customer calls up and switches their account to “Credit Card Auto-pay” and “Paperless Billing” that they can get Cinemax for a year for only a penny!
At press time the spokespeople from Dish Network can neither confirm nor deny this promotion. But with the number of folks online who have reported taking advantage of this deal it appears to be a real offer. However with that said there is no word of when they will stop offering this promotion, so if you want Cinemax for a year for a penny get in now before they close the door to this amazing offer.
We will see you on Friday here at MultiChannel.COM!
MULTICHANNEL commented:
DISH NET SEEMS TO DISCRIMINATE AGAINST LOW INCOME VIEWERS BY PUSHING ONLY 1 SIDE OF THE NEWS;LIBERAL LEFT NOT MIDDLE AMERICA OR CONSERVATIVE VIEWS. THAT IS WHY CHOSE OTHER OPTIONS.
Newshawk commented:
Scott, I can see what FNC's complaint is. AT200 may be the package with the most subscribers, but unless it is a completely different package than AT100, it is not the most widely distributed package. AT100 is. In this case, you just can't count the subscribers for AT200, because a component of AT200 is AT100. Thus, if you want the most widely distributed package, you have to count the AT100 subs with the AT200, not have them separate from the AT200 subs.