Time Warner Cable and Fox are now into their final day of negotiations before the agreement expires governing Fox-owned affiliate stations and cable networks.

One thing that the dispute has accomplished is increasing media attention on both companies and a spotlight on the business models of television programming and distribution.  It used to be so simple – television programming would air on broadcast television, enjoy massive audiences and the lucrative ad revenue that comes from having top-rated programming.  Cable networks couldn’t survive on the much smaller ad revenue they earn from their smaller audiences, so they charged cable operators a small fee for every subscriber who could watch their channels.

With the advent of TiVo and other digital video recorders, online viewing, and the audience erosion that comes from both, what worked for more than 50 years didn’t work so well anymore.  Time-shifting viewers no longer felt committed to watching live television, satisfied with being able to watch when they want and fast forward past the increasing amount of advertising television stations crammed into programming.  With broadband, viewers could download or stream their favorite programs online, often for free and with limited (if any) commercials.  Cable networks that used to be content running older syndicated programming, movies, and low budget documentaries and specials began creating their own original programming, often just as good as anything the networks produced.  Subscription fees charged programmers increased accordingly to help finance these shows.

Today, some cable networks are coming close to rivaling the viewership of broadcast networks’ lesser-watched programming.  If the economic downturn didn’t challenge the advertising industry, the ongoing loss of network television viewers would have accomplished the same thing – lower ad rates for ABC, CBS, NBC, and Fox.

At the heart of the debate is a new discussion about whether “free over the air television” is a sustainable business model.  Networks like Fox evidently don’t think so, which is why they seek payment from the pay television industry, be it cable, FiOS, U-verse, or satellite.  Since the majority of Americans now watch television through one of these services or through their broadband connection, there is plenty to be made from such payments.  Of course, those costs are passed on to you.

The result?  You are now paying for “free television.”

The hardball game between Fox and Time Warner Cable will be replayed often between the other networks and programmers and pay television companies.

Today’s video reports include another update from the business side of the story, several additional reports from impacted Fox stations, and basic education about what television antennas are all about.

[flv width=”640″ height=”500″]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/Bloomberg Reporter Stelter on News Corp Time Warner Cable Talks 12-31-09.flv[/flv]

New York Times reporter Brian Stelter reports the two parties remain “pretty far apart” from an agreement in this report from Bloomberg News. (2 minutes)

[flv]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/CNBC Time Warner Fox Dispute 12-31-09.flv[/flv]

CNBC discusses the business side of the Time Warner Cable-Fox dispute, and now Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.) has put himself in the middle of the dispute as well. (1 minute)

[flv width=”480″ height=”380″]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/KXAN Austin Cable dispute could turn off bowl games 12-31-09.flv[/flv]

In Austin, KXAN-TV reports Time Warner Cable has been telling Texas viewers they can watch most of the Fox Network programming on Hulu for free.  Some Austin residents are sick of hearing about the dispute and are abandoning Time Warner Cable for DirecTV.  “Football is everything in Texas,” say some who are watching the dispute with concern. (3 minutes)

[flv width=”640″ height=”500″]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/KDFW Dallas Watch FOX 4 without Time Warner 12-31-09.flv[/flv]

Some local Fox stations are teaching their viewers how to receive their stations if Time Warner Cable no longer carries them on their lineup.  KDFW-TV in Dallas went to Best Buy where they’re only too happy to sell antennas and digital converter boxes to Metroplex residents. (2 minutes)

[flv width=”640″ height=”500″]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/WOFL Orlando Fox Orlando Affiliate Teaches Viewers About Antennas 12-30-09.flv[/flv]

WOFL-TV in Orlando spent part of the newscast teaching people what a TV antenna is.  For many under 30, television viewing has always been through cable or satellite, never over-the-air, so the concept of rabbit ears is a new one for some. (1 minute)

Lots more to watch below the page break.  Click the link below to continue!

… Continue Reading

Bright House Networks, which has had a close association with Time Warner Cable for years, launched its own version of a “roll over or get tough” campaign through its new Your Right to Watch website.  The launch of the site comes in response to Fox’s own critical ads warning Bright House subscribers access to Fox programming was about to go dark on the cable system unless the two parties reached agreement by December 31st.  Bright House Networks has been negotiating through Time Warner Cable, which is why Fox targeted both in its most recent ad campaign.

The website, stark in appearance, contains just a few sentences on its home page.

“During negotiations, some program providers threaten to take their channels off the cable system. Using this tactic only hurts TV viewers – causing confusion and concern — and is a no-win for everyone,” the site notes.

[flv width=”480″ height=”380″]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/Bright House Your Right to Watch Ad.flv[/flv]

Bright House Networks includes this video on their new ‘Your Right to Watch’ website.

Tomorrow is the final full day when Fox cable network programming will be available to Time Warner Cable subscribers, unless negotiations achieve a breakthrough.  Spectators watching the back and forth don’t anticipate any agreement, but suspect the companies will agree to some sort of extension over the holiday weekend to keep the viewing public reasonably happy.

Today several Fox-owned broadcast affiliates began reporting on their own potential involvement in the dispute — Time Warner Cable stands to lose the rights to carry several Fox broadcast stations in major television markets like New York, Los Angeles, and Dallas.  Stories about the dispute began appearing today on several TV news outlets.  In areas where Fox affiliates are independently owned and operated, most have tried to reassure viewers they won’t immediately lose access to the Fox station in their area, but several Fox cable networks could be impacted.

We have several reports on where things stand at the moment, including some additional background to help people get up to speed on why this battle is taking place in the first place.

[flv]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/CNBC Time Warner Fox Dispute 12-30-09.flv[/flv]

CNBC ran this extended piece today debating the changing business model for television programming, which explains why these carriage disputes are increasingly contentious. Brian Seltzer, New York Times media reporter and Vanity Fair columnist Michael Wolff join Julia Boorstin to discuss Time Warner Cable’s showdown with News Corporation’s Rupert Murdoch. (6 minutes)

[flv width=”640″ height=”500″]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/Bloomberg Talks Continue TWC Fox 12-30-09.flv[/flv]

Bloomberg News also explores the changing business model of broadcast “free” television.  Can it survive against cable and online program distribution?  News Corporation and Time Warner Cable are pessimistic that question can be answered before the deadline expires at midnight, December 31st. (6 minutes)

[flv width=”640″ height=”380″]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/WNYW New York FOX-Time Warner Cable Deal Unlikely 12-30-09.flv[/flv]

WNYW-TV, the Fox affiliate in New York, started reporting to its viewers Fox’s position on the carriage dispute, warning them an agreement by December 31st is critical if Time Warner Cable customers are to be assured of watching Fox sports coverage on New Year’s Day.  (3 minutes)

[flv width=”640″ height=”500″]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/KDFW Dallas FOX, Time Warner Still Negotiating 12-30-09.flv[/flv]

KDFW-TV, the local Fox affiliate in Dallas, took issue with Time Warner Cable’s claim that even without an agreement the Fox station would still be shown on the local cable system. (2 minutes)

[flv width=”480″ height=”380″]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/WLUK Green Bay Jay Zollar on Time Warner 12-30-09.flv[/flv]

Some Time Warner Cable customers in smaller cities have been confused by national wire service reports which, to them, suggest their local Fox station will be affected by the potential programming blackout as well.  Some Fox affiliates have devoted time on their newscasts to clear up what programming or channels will be affected in their respective areas.  WLUK-TV in Green Bay, Wisconsin was one such station.  (1 minute)

[flv]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/WENY Elmira Fox Time Warner Battle 12-30-09.flv[/flv]

Another small community getting some local coverage of the story, and its potential impact on Time Warner Cable-carried Fox-owned cable channels, is Elmira, New York.  WENY-TV, which serves southwestern and south-central New York around Elmira and Corning, explained things to viewers.  (1 minute)

OnLive puts the processing power to render and play games on their end, and streams the result to you over your broadband connection (click to enlarge)

OnLive, the cloud-based videogame streaming service, was on display during a live dem0 of the service at Columbia University.  The service, which literally streams game play across fast broadband networks, could seriously challenge the videogame console marketplace.  Instead of using an expensive piece of hardware at home to play videogames such as w88, OnLive puts the hardware at their end and streams the results to any computer or television.  If it works, it means consumers won’t need the highest performance videocards or latest new CPU.  They’ll just need a fast broadband connection to let OnLive’s own servers do all of the processing.

The founder and CEO of OnLive, Steve Perlman, shows considerable enthusiasm for the concept, and several major investors including AT&T and Time Warner have backed the venture, which could help guarantee smooth passage on their broadband networks.

Still, a product that requires a minimum of a 5Mbps broadband connection for HD-quality streamed game play could consume an enormous amount of data — up to 2.25 GB per hour of gaming.  Although cable and fiber-based broadband connections will suffice, many DSL customers don’t have service fast enough to support OnLive.  Among those that do, any usage caps or allowances will significantly reduce the value of the service to potential subscribers.  Frontier Communications’ infamous 5GB “acceptable use” per month, for instance, would allow just over two hours of use per month, assuming you did nothing else with your DSL service.

Even Comcast’s 250GB usage allowance cuts game play to a little over 100 hours per month.  That’s a ludicrous amount of gaming for most of us, but not for some gaming addicts who may have tried games like 핑카지노.  Besides, it also assumes you don’t use your Comcast broadband service to watch video or other bandwidth-intensive online services.

Time Warner Cable’s proposed 40GB usage limit, shelved indefinitely in April after consumer protests, would permit less than an hour of play per day, assuming your Road Runner service was for nothing but OnLive.

In short, assuming OnLive works as promoted, its biggest threat to success will come from external factors mostly outside of its control — namely cap-happy ISPs that could quickly make streamed cloud computing untenable for all but the wealthiest among us.

What could OnLive do to reduce its risk from caps?  Partner with ISPs in a non-Net Neutral broadband world, of course.  That investment from AT&T, for example, could theoretically pave the way for AT&T to exempt OnLive from any usage limits that come from its own Internet Overcharging experiments in Beaumont, Texas and Reno, Nevada.  That would be a clear violation of Net Neutrality, if enacted into law.

Scenarios like this should drive consumers to support Net Neutrality policies.  ISPs forming “preferred partnerships” with innovative services like OnLive might seem consumer-friendly at first, but not in the long-term because it spells the death of would-be “non-preferred” start-ups, and helps pave the way even faster to Internet Overcharging schemes letting broadband providers pick the winners and losers of the future.

[flv width=”484″ height=”292″]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/OnLive Columbia University Demo.flv[/flv]

OnLive founder and CEO Steve Perlman demonstrates OnLive and talks about cloud-based, streaming game play at this gathering at Columbia University in New York. (49 minutes)
(If stream stops for buffering, pause it for a few minutes to let a significant amount of the file pre-load, which should reduce re-buffering problems.)

In the multi-million dollar game of chicken, observers are waiting and watching to see who will stop the inevitable consumer train-wreck that will occur if the nation’s second largest cable operator Time Warner Cable fails to reach an agreement with News Corporation, owner of Fox television and several Fox cable networks.

Another day, more negotiations, but still no end in sight.

[flv]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/CNBC Time Warner Fox Dispute 12-29-09.flv[/flv]

The battle between Time Warner Cable and Fox is coming down to the wire, reports CNBC’s Julia Boorstin. (2 minutes)