I sent the following trail (and the responses) to (from) KOMO:
Colleen,
I suggest you quickly come to an understanding that your "modest" request for an increase may still be too much. Compare your request to local broadcast tv stations that are similar to yours. If you are requesting an amount that is similar to what other local broadcast tv stations are receiving, then your request is reasonable.
Wake up and smell the coffee. I have something to share which will soon not be a secret: Most Dish tv viewers are not missing your station right now. The longer we get used to you not being there, the less we will care.
Get smart.
Steve
--- On Wed, 12/24/08, CEO Colleen Brown <colleen_brown@fsci.com> wrote:
From: CEO Colleen Brown <colleen_brown@fsci.com>
Subject: Re: Not being carried on Dish
To:
no_regrets70@yahoo.com
Date: Wednesday, December 24, 2008, 5:38 PM
Thank you for your email.
We want to thank you for caring enough about our programming to take the time to write. Please know that we attempted to extend the expiration of our current contract with DISH to work out the terms of a new agreement, but they rejected our proposal. We're obviously disappointed by their decision as it is you who is hurt the most.
We know that you don’t really care whose fault this is, you just want to be able to watch your favorite programs and local news. But we thought you might like to know how this works. DISH pays a small amount of your monthly fee to every network or local station they carry. Please know that despite DISH's claim, our request is for a modest increase and is still considerably less than the amount they pay for less popular program networks. In fact, we have preliminarily agreed on the rate, but other issues are preventing a deal from being finalized.
While I can’t go into greater detail, you should know that we believe DISH Network has violated the terms of our existing agreement. They have failed to pay us for one of our stations for the past two years! I would expect that if I were a DISH subscriber and I didn't pay my bill for two years, they would shut off my service and seek my back pay.
Please know that we are continuing our negotiations with DISH Network and doing all we can to reach a settlement. Thank you again for your email and we regret this has caused you any inconvenience.
Sincerely,
Colleen Brown
President and Chief Executive Officer
Fisher Communications, Inc.
Text of original message below:
Shame on you KOMO. I can live without you on my dish network lineup. I do not support you charging dish more than other similar local tv stations. If dish caved in to you, they would cave in to others and the increased fees in turn would be passed on to dish subscribers.
Charge a fair price and don't compare yourself to national stations, you are a local station. I and I am sure many others can live without your station. Better make amends before we get used to the many other choices out there.
Steve
) Mr. Dunlop seems like a reasonable gentleman and we have established a friendly informal dialog. The last I heard from him on the 24th was that Fisher was awaiting a reply from Dish on a proposal they had made. I have no details on that proposal or whether it differed in any measure from their previous one.
