Is Sinclair looking for life after broadcasting?
http://www.multichannel.com/news/satellite/dish-sinclair-blackout-due-content-aspirations/393256
Dish: Sinclair Blackout Due to Content Aspirations
Dish Network claims that its most recent retransmission consent dispute with
Sinclair Broadcast Group hinges on the station owner’s desire to start its own
pay TV channel.
According to Dish, it had agreed to terms for all of Sinclair’s 129 stations in
79 markets across the country. But the station owner insisted that an unnamed
cable channel – which it doesn’t own but someday hopes to own – would be
included in the mix. When Dish declined to do that, the stations went dark to
their subscribers.
Dish and Sinclair had been operating under a mutually agreed-upon extension to
their earlier retrans deal since Aug.16.
Dish did not identify what the pay TV channel in question was, but Sinclair has
made no secret of its content aspirations. Last year the station group formed
its own original content division – Sinclair Original Programing – aimed at
creating shows for its MyNetworkTV and The CW-affiliated stations. The company
also owns NewsChannel 8, a Washington, D.C. metro area cable news channel that
it hoped to expand to other areas and has launched Ring of Honor Wrestling and
the American Sports Network, which airs high-school and Division I NCAA college
sports contests.
“We have agreed to rates and all terms to carry Sinclair’s local stations,”
said Dish senior vice president of programming Warren Schlichting in a
statement. “But Sinclair is blacking out 129 local stations in an effort to
negotiate a carriage agreement for an unrelated cable channel that it hopes to
acquire, but does not own today. Sinclair rejected our extension offer and has
chosen to use innocent consumers as pawns to gain leverage for the economic
benefit of Sinclair, while causing substantial harm and disruption to the lives
of consumers.”
Sinclair general counsel Barry Faber did not return a call for comment, but on
its station websites the station group claimed that the dispute is not just
about price.
“Although we do not believe it is productive to negotiate its private business
relationships in the public, the inability to reach agreement with Dish Network
is about more than just money," Sinclair said on its station websites, adding,
“We do not know if or when Dish will resume carriage of these stations.”
The blackout, which Dish has called the largest in history, comes about two
weeks before the National Football League kicks off its regular season on Sept.
10. Sinclair owns several CBS, Fox, NBC and ABC affiliated stations across the
country, the primary broadcasters of NFL games.
Regards
Craig