Will dish not have the Disney channels come September?

[tomcrown1]

Dish contract with Disney will be up come September. I am curios if Disney would require as part of the contract, that auto hop not be allowed on the ABC network.

can this be the sticking point, would Dish not agree to stop auto hop even at the the risk of having the Disney channels pulled?

what other factors can come in that would lead to dish not having the Disney group of channels?

 

[osu1991]

Money, autohop will be the sticking points.

If Disney continues to demand dual payments for the SD and HD channels then there will be a problem, if Disney demands Autohop to be dropped on ABC Owned and Operated affiliates, there will be a problem, if Disney demands an absurd increase in addition to the other points, there will be a problem. On the other hand Disney can't afford to have some of their most expensive properties in college football, Monday Night Football and the new primetime season pulled from 14 million subs either.

 

[Mister Coke]

I hope they drop Disney with no HD....

 

[HanoverPretzel]

I think any television provider losing all the ABC-Disney channels long-term is a potential corporation-killer. That's because they have properties that cut across a large swath of viewing interests.

First, you have sports fans for whom ESPN and ESPN2 are must haves, and for whom ESPNU and some of the other channels are important added-value things. Now, I know Dish has talked about abandoning sports fans and going after non-sports viewing TV consumers, which is a tough proposition even in and of itself, because most families have at least one or two at least casual sports fans in them even if the main TV decision maker is not a sports fan, and you have to at least give enough so that the main television decision maker isn't suddenly very unpopular with the rest of the family, but it goes beyond that in this case, because these aren't just sports channels in the mix.

You go after that non-sports demographic and a big chunk of that is probably women and children. Guess what an important channel for the kids is? Disney. I would assume, anyway. ABC Family is probably also something there's an interest in from that demographic. And there's a whole package of other channels that have nothing to do with sports or children that would also be lost.

You lose all those channels and $5 off a month or something won't cut it. You'd have to discount your packages so massively that you wouldn't make any money. People might buy an ABC-Disneyless package without the ESPNs and everything else, but they won't pay much for it. I mean, they'll always be a few people, but I am talking the majority of your customers.

You'd almost have to come back and offer something like AT200 for $30- regular price- to keep customers in place. That's not financially doable, I'd imagine. Which is why everyone always works something out with ABC-Disney. They don't really have a choice.

Plus, in the modern world, live stuff like sports and news is what keeps subs. If people mainly want to watch movies, they can rent them individually streaming direct to their television with a roku or something more cheaply than buying a broad package if they want new releases, or do a broad subscription service for like $8 a month to get an unlimited mix of older titles and B-movies. Most TV series are similar. Want to watch Dr. Who? Episodes are $1.99 to buy to stream until the end of time from Amazon- or $15 for the 8 episode DVD set of the most recent half season. Dish pointed this out to a ton of their customers when they lost AMC and told them how they could watch Mad Men for less monthly through the Internet.

It's the exclusivity and the live nature of sports that makes it harder to duplicate on the Internet, at least legally. If the local teams say you can only watch our games through your cable or satellite service, that's just how it is. If you're a fan of a team, that keeps you around.

I've gotten rid of pay television for a while because I am in the process of moving and I miss sports and live news, and that's about it. When I want to watch movies or dramas or comedies or whatever, there are other less expensive ways to do it right on my television. I pulled out some old DVDs I had in boxes, I bought some episodes of Dr. Who streaming, I get Netflix DVDs in the mail one at a time- all at a cost far less than any pay television service. What I miss is watching my favorite baseball team (That's the main sport going on this time of year) and my favorite news channel. And there is not yet live legal streaming of teams from your home region- the MLB streaming package are for out of market games only. And I don't know of a live streaming news channel that would be to my tastes (I like MSNBC). But the Internet has movies and TV shows mostly covered.

 

[satjay]

As strange as it sounds, September not to far off. Will be an intresting fall, I wonder if talks will start up soon?

 

[Mister Coke]

If they drop ESPN in September, it would be good for Monday Night Raw...

 

[osu1991]

rant on now :rant:

Live sports is the only thing that many would miss. I like sports too and went without all the Fox channels on Dish for a month missing 3 OU and OSU football games a few years ago. I survived, listened on the radio and life went on!

You can get better up to date news online than the sensationalized drivel you get from CNN, Foxnews, MSNBC etc..

You've got a few hard core sports fans around here that mouth off that they would leave, but I don't think many regular customers would leave for at least 30 days or more. Most would let it play out, not wanting to fork over early termination fees. So it would not surprise me to see Dish kick the Disney group to the curb for a week or two if it comes to it. Disney accounts for probably a 1/3 of everyone's bills, since the espn channels alone are over $5 a month, then add in abcfamily, A/E, History, Lifetime, LMN, Disney, ToonDisney, Disney XD, Soapnet, H2, Bio.

It going to happen more and more often now as Dish isn't the only one getting into these fights. Someone has to stand up to the media groups. Time Warner is already in a standoff with both CBS and Journal Broadcasting, so I fully expect Dish to stand up to Disney. If we lose channels so be it, I'm tired of being force fed a gazillion channels of repeats and eternal daily loops of programming. I'm also tired of espn buying up programming rights and pushing them on to espn3 while they show sportscenter repeats or talking head repeats on the broadcast channels.

 

[sam_gordon]

If the Disney owned networks are dropped in September, there won't be an immediate rush for the exits. I give it a week. HanoverPretzel pointed it out very well. It's not just sports fans (even the dedicated), it's families (because of the Disney channels). You want folks to stick with Dish to "fight" Disney? Find out when the Disney contract is up with Direct. If they're scheduled for negotiations in October (or sometime close), it doesn't make sense to jump quickly.

If Direct is smart, they'll be advertising consumers are guaranteed Disney channels (ESPN, etc) for 'x' number of years. People would jump off Dish in a heartbeat.

ETA: It looks like ESPN will be on DirecTV until 2015. http://www.sportsbusinessdaily.com/...eks-Issue/Directv-ESPN-Sign-For-10-Years.aspx

 

[Scott Greczkowski]

I don't see the channels going anywhere.

I know both sides are working hard on getting a deal done. THEY NEED EACH OTHER AND THEY KNOW IT!

 

[tomcrown1]

I don't see the channels going anywhere.

I know both sides are working hard on getting a deal done. THEY NEED EACH OTHER AND THEY KNOW IT!

scott if the sticking point is auto hop to you see Disney blinking or dish?

ABC believes it is losing revnue due to auto hop. will Disney demand a higher fee from dish to make up for the perceived lost revnue from auto hop. Will dish pay the higher fees? Or will dish drop auto hop or take the tactic of dropping Disney to get them to tow the line?

 

[ashutto20]

My thing is that...if the channels are lost...they will have the same presses...abc wants to much money ... we care about our customers...we want to keep cost down

Ff a few months and the cost is the same if not more...I see them working a deal...not sure about details though...but prices will be raised in feb and then people will be upset and blame abc for the price increase

 

[KAB]

It will be what it will be.

 

[osu1991]

It will be what it will be.

a sane voice among the turmoil

 

[dare2be]

scott if the sticking point is auto hop to you see Disney blinking or dish?

This is what burns me about the media ownership oligopolies. Autohop is exclusively a network locals issue, but since a few of the ABC affiliates are O&O by parent company Disney, this will become a sticking point on Disney/ESPN channel negotiations. Ridiculous.

 

[Teehar]

I didn't think ABC was even involved with the auto hop lawsuit?

 

[dishfan82]

If dish drops Disney channels then I'll drop dish. It's as simple as that. It's bad enough espn u isn't in hd and no Disney jr either so a measly " oh we're sorry about Disney but we can offer you 5.00 off for 6 months" ? Isn't going to cut it. I'm sick of these disputes. I like dish and although there are minor hiccups to the service for the most part it's not too bad. We as the customer suffer in the end from the dropping of channels.

 

[DishSubLA]

I suspect Disney will use the suit (agreeing to DROP the suit, that is) as leverage to either get Dish to take additional Disney channels or a commitment to take one or a few FUTURE Disney owned channels. Disney could even leverage Dish to uplink its Living Well HD Channel or to uplink the OTA channel (7.2 here in L.A.) in Disney's O&O's to get the channel greater exposure. I do look for Disney to drop this suit, but they will get something, not cash, I'm guessing, else they want, while Dish can also move on. The way I would see it is that it is an opportunity to get Dish to take more Disney product or better position that product. I do think this will all be settled and not result in Disney owned stations being dropped from Dish.

 

[gadgtfreek]

It's easy for me. If they lose ESPN's in the fall, you can find me in the Directv forums

 

[mike123abc]

Disney is not as invested in O&O ABC stations as other networks are. ABC owns 8 stations. Yes the largest markets (NYC, LA, Chicago, Houston, etc).

CBS has 16 CBSs, NBC has 10, FOX has 18.

Autohop probably has the least effect on Disney given the huge amount of money they get from Dish for the cable channels.

 

[HanoverPretzel]

Live sports is the only thing that many would miss. I like sports too and went without all the Fox channels on Dish for a month missing 3 OU and OSU football games a few years ago. I survived, listened on the radio and life went on!

I'm missing a lot of Orioles games right now (Due to currently being without a television service provider), but I'm not paying to miss a lot of Orioles games right now. There's a big difference for me. I agree life goes on, and I think there is a local radio affiliate that carries games, so I might catch a game or two that way. I used to listen to baseball on the radio all the time as a child and haven't done so in a really long time.

And if I'm not in my new place with some sort of television service connected by the time the NFL preseason rolls around, I'll drive to a relative's house or a bar and watch my favorite team's games in one of those places. That's an expense (Even if it's just gas money to watch at a relative's), but it can come out of what I would be paying for television normally. If I were paying a full television bill and weren't able to watch, I might not have the money to go places, and I'd resent that, because that's the reason I normally pay the fee, to watch the games.

But it depends on why you're paying for television. For me when I was a kid and my family first subscribed to cable, it was specifically for sports. When I tried to "cut the chord" because of rising cable prices as an adult, I was back in a couple weeks, except with Dish instead of cable, specifically because of sports and news.

You can get better up to date news online than the sensationalized drivel you get from CNN, Foxnews, MSNBC etc..

It's true that there a lot of written news resources online that in some cases have better international and more in-depth domestic coverage than what you can catch on TV. There are also a lot of good podcasts (Radio-style downloads). Plus, I just discovered the other day that my Roku can stream legally stream some a free weekly PBS roundtable show with that African American woman who hosted one of the Presidential debates one year hosting the discussion.

Still, I like some of pundits on MSNBC and I like having the option of watching video feeds of live news and events with anchors covering stuff live as it happens. That's just a personal preference. But I agree it's not like I am cut off from the world without paid television.