I’m a Time Warner Cable customer, and I’m not happy with what I am reading.
First they fought with the NFL Network, and as of now, remain the only major cable provider who doesn’t offer the channel (a channel your humble author would really like.) Now they are getting into it with FOX. There’s a decent chance that FOX could go dark on 1/1 for all TWC customers (this means I might miss more football.)
Time Warner Cable’s argument is basically this: “we want to protect our subscribers from increasing fees”.
That’s a sappy sentiment, for sure, except that I don’t believe it for a second. Am I really to believe that TWC would stand alone on an island like they are to protect little old me??? I seriously, seriously doubt that. TWC wants to protect their profits, and wants the NFL Network and FOX to charge them less (and they hide behind “well, if NFL and FOX knuckle, we won’t have to raise fees. Aren’t we swell?”)
Now, this could be a nice “little guy stands up to the big guy” story, except for one little thing: Time Warner is in the business of providing me programming. They aren’t in the business of watching my wallet. Sooner or later, any choice for television comes down to channels/services provided. We’re probably talking less than $2 a month for subscribers. Believe me, nobody chooses cable TV providers for $2 a month. They choose based on other factors (channel lineup being king.) TWC is gambling we want our $2 instead. They are going to lose.
They are standing alone here, and it’s going to cost them. Don’t they understand that the public won’t see FOX (or whomever) as the villian here? People aren’t going to say “FOX abandoned Time Warner” – they are going to say “Time Warner isn’t getting me FOX“. And then they will switch to someone else.
I’m baffled how they can be so blind. But hey, even the insane guy thinks everyone else is insane.