Bundle of grief for networks: Time Warner N.Y.'s low-price offer leaves a few out in the cold.(Time Warner Cable launches television, Internet and voice services )

Multichannel News, January, 2006 by Farrell, Mike; Haugsted, Linda

Time Warner Cable has introduced a $99 "triple play" of television, Internet and voice services in New York City that excludes some of basic cable's big programming names, including the sports channel ESPN, FX and Court TV. That angers some programmers, who are excluded from the digital channels provided in this package.

They said this means of attracting new customers is a backhanded way for the cable giant to, in effect, place some of the more expensive basic-cable networks, such as ESPN, on a tier. "This at the very least goes against the spirit of [an] affiliation agreement and at the worst is in definite violation," said one network executive who asked not to be named. "This was introduced without our knowledge. We feel pretty confident that one...

Read the rest of this article with a Free Trial at HighBeam Research.

Premium Content Partnership | HighBeam Research provides an in-depth online archive library of reference works.