Dish/ESPN To Team Up To Finally Unleash Streaming Sports Without Cable

from the touchdown dept

For years, I've begged and pleaded with the powers that be for major American sports to be untethered from cable television and released into the world of real internet streaming options. Then the dominoes finally, albeit extremely slowly, began to drop. Even as some leagues wasted opportunities to expand streaming, like the NHL, other leagues are slowly beginning to let the door creak open. The most recent example was the NBA negotiating their broadcast contracts such that internet streaming was expanded considerably. While the expansion was real, the overall penetration in terms of the gross number of games that would be streamed is still limited. The other notable aspect of the NBA deal was that the streaming expansion was clearly being forced upon broadcasters by the NBA as part of the negotiations, rather than broadcasters themselves embracing streaming.

It looks like the times are a-changing a bit faster than even I would have thought. For what I believe is the first time, major cable sports is coming to internet-only subscribers in a partnership between ESPN and Dish.

Lots of people say they want to ditch cable TV for the Web, but can’t because they want to watch sports — specifically the stuff on ESPN, which has a hammerlock on much of the sports world. Now they will finally get a chance: Dish’s new Web-TV service, which the company is formally announcing today, lets you stream ESPN, over the Web, for $20 a month.

Dish’s “Sling TV”* offering, which the company says will launch “soon,” also comes with 10 other non-ESPN channels, including the Food Network, CNN and the Travel Channel, and the ability to add more networks for additional fees.

A couple of things that you'll hear from the detractors are obvious. First, twenty bucks a month for 11 cable channels added to your ISP bill doesn't sound like the greatest deal money-wise. Add to that that this deal has been done with Dish and not a company like Comcast, AT&T, or the like and it's easy to see this move as ESPN dipping its toe in the streaming waters to see if there be sharks down there. Let me respond to both of those points: neither matters even a little bit.

This is all about trending and the trends are clearly in favor of expanded streaming by all parties that desire to stay in business. If the price point is too high for the number of channels received, it will come down to meet demand, because the demand is the driving force. If this is a Dish-only deal today, it won't be the moment ESPN recognizes the value in offering it in the future. The company will either insist other carriers offer something similar or they'll simply open up their web product directly, which I think would be the better choice for them anyway, because this is ESPN we're talking about and having them stream matters.

Getting ESPN in the streaming game means the modern concept of cable television subscriptions has had its coffin built and is awaiting the final nails. When it comes to reasons for not cutting the cord, professional sports ranks number one, and ESPN is number one in cable pro sports. Re/code is exactly on point as to how far ahead of the game this puts things.

That wasn’t supposed to happen for years, but here we are. It’s not the end of pay TV — the networks that are doing this believe they can sell this stuff on the Web without compromising their existing businesses — but it certainly could be the beginning of the end. At the very least, it’s going to be hard to roll this back.

It's the opening of a floodgate and the waters are saturated with soon-to-be cord cutters. One wonders if Netflix's Reed Hastings had some idea that this was coming when he predicted the death of broadcast TV in 2030, because this sets that outcome in motion as well.

Filed Under: cord cutting, sling tv, sports, streaming
Companies: dish, espn

Dish, Fox News Feud Again Illustrates How The Cable TV Industry Is Digging Its Own Grave

from the burning-your-own-house-down dept

If you have cable you've probably been exposed to one of the increasingly ugly retransmission fee disputes occurring between cable operators and broadcasters. They usually go something like this: as the two sides fail to hammer out new programming contracts, programmers pull their content from your cable lineup. Both sides then use media campaigns, on screen tickers, and websites all trying to convince you that the other guy is a nefarious, greedy villain. Frequently lost in the festivities is the fact that consumers get to pay the same amount of money for cable, even though they're suddenly able to watch less content.

After a month or so of consumers being used as public relations pinatas the disputes end, confidential new contracts are signed, and the consumer is forgotten until they're socked with a new, higher cable bill down the road. While it's true broadcasters are responsible for the majority of programming increases, neither side is blameless, and both parties look for every opportunity to gouge their customers, making this a scenario where you truly wish both sides could lose.

The latest example of this dysfunction is the ongoing feud between Dish Network and Fox News, which resulted in Dish customers losing access to both Fox News Channel and Fox Business Channel roughly a week ago. As with other fights, both sides have loud websites trying to harness consumer outrage toward the other side. Also like similar fights, users get to keep paying the same amount of money despite getting less content. Unlike other fights where consumers may not actually miss what's been taken away (as we saw with the DirecTV, Weather Channel fight), Fox News viewers really love their daily smorgasbord of "fair and balanced" dance numbers, and have been driving a significant amount of annoyance Dish's direction:

"Since Dish dropped Fox News, Dish has focused on shifting blame instead of getting Fox News back on the air. But the facts speak for themselves – Dish has blocked more than 10 channels in the last six months alone,” said the network statement. “We continue to work on resolving this situation, but until Dish is responsive, we are unable to update you on when Fox News will be available."

Consequently, Fox’s fan base has besieged Dish with calls and emails since the channel went dark. By Fox’s tally, about 180,000 complaint calls have been registered with the toll-free line Fox established for the Dish fight. At last count, 140,000-plus emails have been sent as well."

Since Fox News has all the leverage here (Fox News continues to drive some of the only gains in cable right now) Dish will ultimately fold, offer up something close to what Fox originally wanted, and raise its rates sometime in the new year. But it's no victory; it's these endless programming increases that have many smaller cable companies dropping out of the TV business to just focus on broadband. It's of course these same rates that have customers looking increasingly to less-expensive TV options like Netflix or Amazon.

It is astonishing that the cable and broadcast industry continues to bicker over the body of a dying cash cow as its house burns down around it. It requires a very particular skill set to take an industry with some of the worst customer satisfaction ratings in the country and find a way to make the consumer experience notably worse. At this point, carriage fee disputes are akin to a beverage retailer and the White Star Line bickering over Scotch prices at the Titanic bar.

Filed Under: cable tv, fox news, retransmission, retransmission fights, tv
Companies: dish, fox

Negotiating Away Innovation: Dish Agrees To Kill Autohop To End TV Blackouts

from the shameful dept

The various TV networks have been suing Dish for the past couple of years because of its "autohop" feature, which automatically records prime time shows, and then lets subscribers watch them (starting the very next day) with commercials automatically skipped. So far, Dish has won basically every ruling in the case, showing that such technology is perfectly legal.

But now it's probably dead.

As we predicted would happen back in March, CBS has used its fight over retransmission to get Dish to agree to basically kill off autohopper, delaying it for 7 days after the show initially airs. In exchange, CBS will drop its lawsuit over autohopper, but also agree to allow Dish to offer its programming online ("over the top" as they say). This is basically the same deal Dish struck with ABC/Disney back in March as well, meaning that it's the same thing that every network will eventually agree to as well.

The retransmission fight was always lurking in the background of the autohopper lawsuit. The networks claimed that since Dish had existing negotiated deals for retransmitting network shows, the autohopper stuff was a contract violation (in addition to a copyright violation). So, basically, the legal fights lasted until the retrans negotiations had to come up again. Getting agreements for internet streaming is certainly nice, but to have it come at the expense of a nice bit of innovation like autohop is ridiculous. Perhaps it opens the door for third parties to make such technologies themselves, but these days standalone DVR products are pretty much a relic of history.

Of course, how long will it be until someone sets up a commercial system for acting as a DVR for internet streams, complete with commercial skipping features? It's doable today, but you can bet that even though it's just like a regular DVR/VCR, the legacy TV guys will flip out and call in the next coming of Aereo.

Filed Under: autohop, autohopper, blackouts, contracts, copyright, retransmission, tv
Companies: cbs, dish, disney

Dish Pulls CNN, Doesn't Think Customers Still Paying For It Are Missing Much

from the you-really-don't-want-to-buy-what-I'm-selling dept

As another shining example of the fading value proposition of traditional cable, Dish Network last month pulled all Turner Broadcasting stations (including CNN, Headline News, and Cartoon Network) from their lineup because the two sides couldn't agree on a new retransmission fee contract. As we just got done saying, these feuds are growing more and more annoying as paying consumers not only lose access to content, but get bombarded with marketing missives as both sides try to blame the other guy for being greedy (See Turner's SaveMyShows.com website and Dish's DishStandsForYou.com website).

In Dish's case, customers have lost access to content but they're still paying the same rates. Yet speaking this week on the company's earnings call, Dish CEO Charlie Ergen told customers eager to watch election coverage that not only may they never get CNN back, they really shouldn't miss it because nobody watches cable news these days anyway:

"When we take something down we’re prepared to leave it down forever. Things like CNN are not quite the product that they used to be. You can imagine: CNN down on election night would have been a disaster 15 or 20 years ago. Now there are plenty of other places for people to get news. In fact a lot of people get news not from TV but from their devices."

While that might be true (given that CNN, like most cable news, is now more unintentional cultural satire than news), it's odd to hear a cable exec telling people they don't need to buy what he's selling, especially since the majority of cable channel lineup bundles are increasingly bloated with similarly-inane content. Ergen added that while the company does listen to customers, they're not going to here, since it's nice that Dish will save a buck:

"If we’re not going to be in a relationship with Turner then we would not have to raise our prices next year. And that would be slightly cash positive for us from a cash flow perspective. Yes, we listen to customers. But we would save a big, big, big check from a cash flow perspective. And for those folks who don’t care about news and cartoons, we have other news and cartoon shows."

Again, that's probably not particularly comforting to Dish customers who are getting less content yet paying the same amount of money to Dish.

Some of this is just traditional Charlie Ergen negotiations bluster, given it's hard to sell TV content if you tell all of the people making it to go to hell. Unlike many cable execs, Dish and Ergen do see the cord cutting writing on the wall, and are planning to launch a live Internet video service sometime before the end of the year. However, that service again relies on the good graces of the broadcasters if it's going to survive; the same broadcasters who've been waging legal war against any disruptive technology that could possibly topple the traditional cable cash cow, whether it's Dish's automatic ad-skipping DVR or Aereo. Turner says they were originally on board with the project, but after the last month's feuding says they're reconsidering the green light.

Even if it's a little ham-fisted, Ergen's trying to make the point that the current TV ecosystem and these often bi-annual rate hikes simply aren't sustainable. It's the same point being made by small and mid-sized cable companies that have started to leave the cable business entirely because they can't afford to participate, and it's same point being made by cord-cutters who are tired of paying an arm and a leg for an ocean of crap content.

Filed Under: cable tv, charlie ergen, cnn, retransmission, retransmission fees, tv
Companies: dish, dish network, turner

Dish Wins Yet Again Over Networks Looking To Kill Off New Innovations With Questionable Copyright Claims

from the good-news dept

We've noted plenty of times how the legacy entertainment industry loves to attack every innovation it doesn't like with copyright claims, using them as a sort of whiner's veto on innovation. Too frequently, this strategy works. Thankfully, with Dish's AutoHopper, it's been a rather consistent failure. As you may recall, various TV networks sued Dish for its Autohop feature, which would automatically record all prime time shows to a DVR for people to watch later -- and, which then autoskipped the commercials, if you watched any day after the day it was recorded. So far, the lawsuits have not been going well, and that trend has continued with the latest tentative ruling in favor of Dish:

Dish Network Corp.'s AutoHop service, which lets subscribers watch recorded primetime television programs with the advertisements taken out, doesn’t infringe Fox Broadcasting Co.’s copyrights, a federal judge said in a tentative decision.

The judge noted that there may be a separate contractual issue, in that it's possible that Dish violated a contract with Fox, but that there isn't a copyright issue here. That's big, because it's yet another ruling that effectively ends the nonsensical argument that skipping commercials is somehow copyright infringement. The amount of legal gymnastics the TV networks had to go through to make that argument was fairly incredible, and it's good to see the courts aren't buying it.

Filed Under: autohopper, copyright, innovation
Companies: dish, fox

Fox Loses Yet Again Against Dish Autohopper; Appeals Court Ignores Silly Aereo Argument

from the innovation-allowed dept

Some good news on the innovation front. Following on Fox's big initial loss in trying to stop Dish's Autohopper DVR feature, an appeals court has upheld the ruling. The main issue? Fox completely failed to show how an injunction is necessary to stop "irreparable harm." The court is pretty sure that any "harm" would be quite "reparable." There isn't much analysis -- the court just clearly is not convinced. Beyond saying that the district court didn't make any legal errors in issuing the original ruling, the appeals court notes that the service has been available for a while already, kinda disproving the whole "irreparable harm" argument.

Here, the district court found that Fox’s lack of evidence that the complained-of technology, available for several years, had yet caused Fox’s business any harm weighed against Fox’s argument that it would be irreparably harmed absent a preliminary injunction. In so finding, the district court did not hold Fox’s evidence to a more rigorous standard than our law requires and so did not abuse its discretion.

Perhaps more importantly, the court totally and completely ignored Fox's ridiculous attempt to argue that the Aereo ruling supports its position. That was a crazy argument from the very beginning, and clearly attempted to stretch the whole "looks like a duck" test beyond the breaking point. As Dish had pointed out in its response, Aereo lost because it didn't have licenses. Dish has licenses, so it's not even close to being relevant. The court appears to have treated it with the amount of respect Fox's argument deserved: none.

Filed Under: autohopper, dvr, networks, place shifting, primetime any time
Companies: aereo, dish, fox

Aereo Fallout Begins: Fox Uses Ruling To Attack Dish's Mobile Streaming Service

from the because-welcome-to-this-new-mess dept

We've been saying that the Aereo ruling is going to create a litigation headache for a number of companies... and here we go. You may recall that a bunch of TV broadcasters have sued Dish over its attempts to provide innovative features to consumers, such as its Dish AutoHopper and its Dish Anywhere streaming offering. So far, those lawsuits have gone nowhere and fast. But Fox sees renewed life in its effort to shut down innovation thanks to the Supreme Court's unfortunate "looks like a duck" test.

Within hours of Wednesday's ruling, Fox had run to the 9th Circuit appeals court with the news. The 9th Circuit had previously rejected Fox's attempt to shut down the Dish technology, but Aereo has renewed its hopes of killing some innovation:

Fox's lawyers believe the Aereo ruling strengthens their case against Dish. In a letter to the court Richard Stone, partner at Jenner & Block, wrote that the supreme court had ruled Aereo's service constitutes an "unauthorized public performance of Fox's copyrighted works."

"Dish, which engages in virtually identical conduct when it streams Fox’s programming to Dish subscribers over the internet – albeit also in violation of an express contractual prohibition – has repeatedly raised the same defenses as Aereo which have now been rejected by the supreme court," he wrote.

Stone highlighted that the court had specifically rejected Aereo's assertion that it is "merely and equipment provider" and that Aereo's subscribers were the ones transmitting content.

Get ready, because Aereo is going to get cited a lot by the legacy entertainment industry as they quickly seek to destroy innovation.

Filed Under: autohopper, copyright, dish anywhere, dvr, looks like a duck, remote viewing, streaming
Companies: aereo, dish, fox

CBS Wants Dish To Make Their Ad-Skipping Hopper DVR Even Less Useful If They Want Streaming Video Rights

from the just-get-the-hell-out-of-the-way dept

As we recently noted, Dish has announced a new content distribution deal with CBS that's quite the double-edged sword. On one hand, Dish has agreed to cripple the ad-skipping feature on their Hopper DVR for ABC and Disney content for the first three days after a new episode airs. In exchange for Dish making their service less useful, ABC has agreed to drop their absurd lawsuit claiming that ad-skipping violates copyright. ABC has also agreed to loosen up restrictions on streaming content, allowing Dish to potentially offer an "over the top" Internet video streaming service sometime down the road.

This has, of course, resulted in the usual press hype from reporters who don't understand how difficult broadcasters make getting these types of services off the ground (just ask Intel, Sony, Microsoft, Apple, Google, and countless startups). Bloomberg, for example, right after telling readers it's too early to speculate on price for such a service, immediately proceeds to speculate on price for such a service -- claiming a new Dish Internet TV service would only cost users between "$20 and $30 a month."

There's still a lot of things standing in Dish's way -- assuming Dish is competent enough to craft a decent service in the first place. We can't read the contract, so we have no idea what restrictions Disney, ABC and ESPN are going to layer on this new licensing agreement to cripple it to the point of uselessness (oh hi Hulu, didn't see you standing there). Dish also needs to sign on a lot more broadcasters to flesh out a service catalog, something that's not going to be easy. Quickly proving that point, CBS CEO Les Moonves stated at an investor conference he's going to expect Dish to cripple Hopper much more severely if Dish expects a similar deal from CBS:

"Mr. Moonves, speaking at a Morgan Stanley investor conference, said the arrangement is "not quite enough for us." Several broadcasters, including CBS, say increasing numbers of viewers are watching TV shows more than three days after they air, via DVRs or on-demand services. Mr. Moonves has been among the executives pushing for the industry to shift to a model where advertisers pay for seven days of viewing instead of three. He said CBS's carriage deal with Dish expires this year, and he expects to take a different approach than Disney in the negotiations with Dish Chairman Charlie Ergen. "We are going to want to do some different things," he said, noting that Disney has different assets and priorities."

Who knows what kind of demands CBS is going to make, but it's pretty clear the demands will include making the Hopper DVR even less useful, while saddling any streaming agreement with just enough restrictions to prevent it from actually being disruptive. On one hand it could make sense for Dish to tell CBS to go to hell, as the broadcasters losing in court would set precedent that protects ad skipping from copyright claims. On the other hand, doing that would mean yet another over the top disruptive Internet TV service would die in the cradle thanks to myopic, terrified broadcasters.

Filed Under: dvr, hopper, television
Companies: abc, cbs, dish, disney

Dish Protects Its Hopper DVR From The Dennis Hopper Estate

from the hey,-man dept

Dish has already had a long and winding road getting its "Hopper" DVR first to market, then keeping it there. The company has been engaged in ongoing disputes with broadcasters, who continue to try and argue that the device violates copyright law because it skips commercials -- and generally provides consumers with interesting, convenient functionality that users might actually want. Fox had no luck killing consumer choice and innovation at the 9th Circuit, and ABC is currently in New York attempting to reverse a New York federal judge's refusal to issue an injunction.

While Dish is busy defending Hopper against broadcasters, it's also busy battling the obvious confusion people often have between digital video recorders and the deceased Easy Rider and Apocalypse Now actor Dennis Hopper. Responding to a broad trademark application by the Hopper estate (aka the Trustees of the Hopper Art Trust), Dish has filed an opposition to protect its ad-skipping DVR. The Hopper Estate registered the "Hopper" trademark in 2012 with an eye on "sunglasses, motorcycle helmets and all sorts of electronic devices." Dish itself filed for a trademark back in 2011 -- before Hopper's death:

"According to Dish's notice of objection, the Dennis Hopper "Hopper" mark "is likely, when used in connection with the goods covered by the subject application, to cause confusion, to cause mistake or to deceive, with consequent injury to [Dish Networks] and the public." Dish says it filed an "intent to use application" back in September of 2011 -- before Dennis Hopper's trustees, before TV broadcasters realized what Charlie Ergen's company was up to -- on "Hopper" in a class of goods covering electrical and scientific apparatus."

Surely after the dispute is settled by the USPTO, there's a middle ground here for both sides to jointly sell motorcycle helmets and a clothing line that somehow combines the edgy, quirky, rambling style of the deceased Blue Velvet actor, with the convenience of being able to "stick it to the man, man" by skipping advertisements.

Filed Under: dvr, hopper, trademark
Companies: dish

Another Day, Another Loss For Broadcasters In Quixotic Campaign To Kill Innovation

from the moving-forward dept

Just last week, we noted that a court in NY had rejected an attempt by ABC and CBS to shut down DISH's AutoHopper offering that helps users automatically skip commercials (along with their PrimeTime AnyTime feature that automatically records prime time network TV). That came after a ruling in California in a nearly identical case, this time by Fox and NBC. That case had moved forward and it appears that, yet again, a court has said no to the attempt to get an injunction against DISH. The full decision isn't out yet, but the parties have seen the ruling and it's clear that DISH won, and Fox didn't:

"We have just received the ruling, and while the judge found that Fox could prevail at trial on the merits of the case, she did not grant our preliminary injunction," says a Fox in a statement. "We disagree that the harms caused by Dish’s infringing services are completely compensable by damages, and as a result we are looking at all options. We will file a response in due course."

While the details matter, it seems pretty clear that (as the court has said before), even if DISH is found to have infringed (though it expresses some skepticism on the likelihood of such an argument working), the court doesn't see any irreparable damages from letting the technology move forward. This is a good thing. All too often, it seems that the copyright maximalist organizations view any possible infringement as "irreparable" harm, even though it's nothing of the sort.

Filed Under: autohopper, copyright, hopper, primetime anytime
Companies: abc, cbs, dish, fox, nbc