Fox says no to Cablevision’s latest offer
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Sorry, Cablevision subscribers. It’s looking more like you’ll have to leave home to watch Game 1 of the World Series on Wednesday night.
News Corp.’s Fox has rejected the latest offer from Cablevision Systems Corp., meaning that about 3 million homes in New York, New Jersey and Connecticut will continue to be without the signals of Fox’s New York and Philadelphia TV stations.
Earlier Wednesday, Cablevision offered to take a one-year deal and pay the same rate that Time Warner Cable pays for Fox’s WNYW-TV New York and WTXF-TV Philadelphia.
However, Fox is interested in a deal that includes WWOR-TV New York as well as cable channels Fox Business Network and National Geographic Wild. Time Warner Cable’s deal does include those channels. Cablevision did not indicate that it would be willing to do a deal that included those networks.
In a statement, Fox said Cablevision’s offer was ‘not acceptable’ and was the latest in a long line of ‘publicity stunts.’ Fox said it would negotiate a deal based on ‘an entire suite of channels’ or a stand-alone agreement for the three TV stations.
Cablevision said Fox’s rejection showed ‘beyond a shadow of a doubt that News Corp. is operating in bad faith,’ and the company again asked the Federal Communications Commission ‘to intervene immediately to restore the Fox signals to Cablevision’s 3 million homes and order News Corp. to agree to binding arbitration to resolve this conflict.”
The FCC has resisted an urge to intervene but has suggested that both sides consider a third-party arbitrator. Cablevision has said it was willing to go that route, but Fox has said it was not interested in bringing in an outsider to cut a deal.
-- Joe Flint
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