CBS Seeks to Unwind Retrans Agreement With Dish Network

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Hall said:
If CBS wins and AutoHop is eliminated, can we ask that CBS (and all networks) stop product-placement advertising ?
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Personally, I feel if any progammer accepts advertising/sponsor dollars, be they broadcaster or cablecaster, that their signals are to be made free-of-charge to any and all licensed MVPDs. The programmer wins because he is ensured of the widest dissemination of their Programming. With a capital "P" and that rhymes with "B" and that stands for Buckazoid$. But I digress with my slightly off kilter, yet always topical, Music Man analogy. Anyway, any broadcaster/programmer whom produces commercial/sponsor free programming can charge fair market rate for their channels based on the law of supply and demand. The video consumer (not the MVPD) establishers the price and it's the same price for everyone regardless if you're with Comcast, DirecTV, Dish Network, Internet, etc. The MVPDs earn their profit by providing value added services and, hopefully, increading operational efficiencies. There is certainly no need to waste administrative time and effort with these silly agreements since the customers decide how much they are willing to pay for certain "commercial free" programming. :)

That's the model I would like to see the FCC encourage/enforce...which means it will never happen. :(
 
riffjim4069 said:
Personally, I feel if any progammer accepts advertising/sponsor dollars, be they broadcaster or cablecaster, that their signals are to be made free-of-charge to any and all licensed MVPDs. The programmer wins because he is ensured of the widest dissemination of their Programming. With a capital "P" and that rhymes with "B" and that stands for Buckazoid$. But I digress with my slightly off kilter, yet always topical, Music Man analogy. Anyway, any broadcaster/programmer whom produces commercial/sponsor free programming can charge fair market rate for their channels based on the law of supply and demand. The video consumer (not the MVPD) establishers the price and it's the same price for everyone regardless if you're with Comcast, DirecTV, Dish Network, Internet, etc. The MVPDs earn their profit by providing value added services and, hopefully, increading operational efficiencies. There is certainly no need to waste administrative time and effort with these silly agreements since the customers decide how much they are willing to pay for certain "commercial free" programming. :)

That's the model I would like to see the FCC encourage/enforce...which means it will never happen. :(
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I'm totally with you. And like you say, it'll never happen since the only way to have true consumer-driven supply and demand determine market rates is to make forced bundling to MVPDs illegal.
 
dare2be said:
Yes, but the nature of on-demand streaming is that you initiate the playback of the program yourself, so there's no real need for timer recording when it comes to chase-play or archiving of on-demand streaming, except for instant timer recording (30-minute intervals).
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When I sit down to watch ondemand, I want it to be available on demand. So, if the process takes a while to download and save so I can use trick play, I would want to automate that in advance, like I do currently with timers.
 
wallyhts said:
My view if it comes over the airwaves in the clear free use for all regardless of what they are doing with it.
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If CBS were suing an OTA device that did autohop it would be a different ball game and they would probably lose. But, Dish is uplinking the signal and the transmission is coming from the satellite. CBS may indeed lose the autohop lawsuit, I could see it go either way in the long run. It is just then a matter of whether or not they will force it out in the next contract talk with Dish.
 
I see DISH winning this case, however I too think it will be bad for DISH (and us) in the long run as it will cost more for retrans agreements with the local stations going forward.

However with that said I still believe we could see autohop go away if DISH was given local insertion time to insert its own commercials during the prime time shows (Much as is done with many cable networks now, where DISH is given 1 to 2 minutes per hour to show their own ads. If DISH had this ad time available it would turn off AutoHop so that it could insert its own commercials.

For me I built a MythTV box which records all my network shows... and guess what it automatically removes the commercials for me too... ;)
 
Scott Greczkowski said:
I see DISH winning this case, however I too think it will be bad for DISH (and us) in the long run as it will cost more for retrans agreements with the local stations going forward.

However with that said I still believe we could see autohop go away if DISH was given local insertion time to insert its own commercials during the prime time shows (Much as is done with many cable networks now, where DISH is given 1 to 2 minutes per hour to show their own ads. If DISH had this ad time available it would turn off AutoHop so that it could insert its own commercials.

For me I built a MythTV box which records all my network shows... and guess what it automatically removes the commercials for me too... ;)
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Respectfully, I just can not find the logic in that. First, why would an affiliate want to give away that much time? They already complain Dish is not paying enough as is. And second, it would be bad news for us...no autohop...and more less than stellar Dish commercials. I'd rather let the game play out.
 
I would like to add my 2 cents to this thread.

1) Auto-hop is not automatic. The Dish customer MUST set it up (turn it on). Dish does not eliminate the commercials so no modification to the broadcast itself takes place. So auto-hop only takes place when the consumer asks for it. Dish does not impose it; it only provides a new method of skipping commercials if the consumer wants it.

2) Dish already eliminates network commercials from what I see. Many times, I watch a commercial and, when it ends, I see the tail end of the network commercial that Dish overlapped with their own commercial. That IS modification of the transmission and no network seems to be concerned about that at all.

3) Auto-hop only works with Primetime Anytime which only works for HD locals. Not all locals are HD. For example, in my area, none of the locals are HD (a separate issue). And dTV doesn't even provide locals to my area, so the networks do, at least, get some coverage in this area because of Dish (and the cable company). OTA here is limited to one CBS station and one PBS station. No Fox, NBC, ABC.

4) What is the difference (assuming I did have HD locals) if I manually press the skip-ahead button on the remote for each commercial (as I do now) or if I configure my Dish setup to do it for me automatically? It is still a decision that is left up to me, the consumer. Dish is not forcing anyone to use it.

5) Auto-hop is not available for non DVR customers at all! I am wondering which is higher, people with or without DVR receivers.
 
Your #2 - That is allowed and by design. Dish has that time to put their commercial just like the local channels have their time to put theirs, usually about their newscasts.

To play devils advocate - your #4 - the networks will say even though you initiate it, it's now the Dish equipment doing the skipping, not manually by you anymore.

Your #1 is what Dish and many of us are saying.
 
3.) PTAT also works in either 28 or 43 SD markets last I heard. I obviously can't test this, but if PTAT is recording in those SD markets, I would assume Auto Hop is available on those SD PTAT recordings just like they are for me on my HD PTAT recordings.
 
Tampa8 said:
To play devils advocate - your #4 - the networks will say even though you initiate it, it's still the Dish equipment doing the skipping, not manually by you anymore.
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Each time I press the button on the remote, it is STILL the Dish equipment skipping the commercial (or 30 seconds of the recording).
 
lucky86 said:
3.) PTAT also works in either 28 or 43 SD markets last I heard. I obviously can't test this, but if PTAT is recording in those SD markets, I would assume Auto Hop is available on those SD PTAT recordings just like they are for me on my HD PTAT recordings.
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That is news to me. Dish advertises that it is only for HD locals. If it is also available for SD, then I am being unduly restricted from using it. If it is available for some SD markets, it should be available for all.
 
riffjim4069 said:
It all depends on the contract language and what happened (i.e., what was asked and what was answered)
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Sometimes if you don't know the correct question to ask you won't get what you are looking for.... I do get what you are saying.....

riffjim4069 said:
However, they may also be victims of Dish/SATS chicanery.....
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Lmao Using that word alone will make me keep reading your posts... :)
 
Scott Greczkowski said:
However with that said I still believe we could see autohop go away if DISH was given local insertion time to insert its own commercials during the prime time shows (Much as is done with many cable networks now, where DISH is given 1 to 2 minutes per hour to show their own ads. If DISH had this ad time available it would turn off AutoHop so that it could insert its own commercials.
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But, they can, and do, do that now. Did you think Turner Broadcasting puts all those penis and breast enhancement commercials on CNN?
 
Bobsie has it correct. Cbs needs to sue the end customer since they are the "button pusher" not Dish and that will not fly.

But Claude is also correct and cbs will close it down or modify when the retrans agreement needs renewal.
 

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