For about five weeks, Dish Network customers haven't been able to catch the nightly news from two metro Detroit TV stations.
WXYZ and WMYD, both of which cover the Detroit area, are "blacked out" from Dish subscribers as the cable provider negotiates with the E.W. Scripps Company, which owns the two stations, have been in negotiations for the past five months.
"Scripps continues to advocate for market-standard distribution terms while Dish attempts to control our local stations’ signals and limit our ability to create new services with other cable and satellite companies," the company said in a statement.
According to Scripps, WSYM in Lansing and WXMI in Grand Rapids are also unavailable to Dish customers right now. Across the country, the issue affects 42 local stations.
Back to school: Schoolcraft, Madonna prepare for uncertain year as college students head back to campus
Class of 2021: Principal: Seaholm students gathered maskless in parking lot to celebrate senior year
Pandemic summer: 'Boring, beautiful' pandemic summer is over. Local families reflect and look forward.
The blackout is the only time in the company's history contract negotiations have caused such an impasse.
Dish is facing similar disagreements with the NFL Network and Cox Media Group, which are also currently unavailable to customers. According to Scripps, the disagreement has no end in sight.
"At this point, we recommend that Dish customers in our local markets seek out a different service," Scripps said in a statement. "It appears that Dish is not interested in reaching a fair agreement with Scripps. With college football and the NFL season right around the corner, we do not want our viewers to miss the sports programming they care about in addition to ongoing important local news."
According to Dish the cable provider continually hopes to reach a "fair" agreement.
"DISH routinely completes deals with station owners while avoiding service interruptions for subscribers, and we have recently worked with several broadcasters to complete these kinds of deals," a statement from the company reads. "It’s disappointing that Scripps is using this blackout as a tactic to raise fees and restrict consumer choice."
Contact reporter Shelby Tankersley at stankersle@hometownlife.com or 248-305-0448. Follow her on Twitter @shelby_tankk.
"dish" - Google News
September 03, 2020 at 01:42AM
https://ift.tt/3biu6cq
Metro Detroit Dish viewers miss out on ABC, CW channels as company, stations negotiate - Hometown Life
"dish" - Google News
https://ift.tt/2MXZLF4
No comments:
Post a Comment