"Shocking Showdown! Disney Channels, Including ESPN, Vanish from Charter Spectrum Amid Heated Battle!"
On one of the biggest cable providers in the country, fans of sports and other Disney content will have to make do without.
On
Thursday night, Disney yanked its programming from Charter Spectrum,
despite the Disney-owned ESPN networks airing live coverage of important
athletic events like the US Open and college football.
In a
presentation given before to an investor webcast, Charter Communications
stated that despite a broken "video ecosystem," Disney "has insisted on
a traditional long-term deal with higher rates and limited packaging
flexibility." Disney rejected our proposal, and on August 31 it stopped
providing its video channels to Charter's video subscribers.
The
cable company claims that the media conglomerate's proposal would
result in a huge price hike for consumers, who would also be forced to
pay for channels they might not be interested in. This kind of agreement
between cable companies and channel owners has long been the standard,
but the emergence of the streaming model has increased pressure on both
parties.
On its website, Charter claims to have 14.7 million video customers.
In
a statement, Disney Entertainment claimed that it "has successful
agreements in place with pay TV providers of all shapes and sizes across
the country, and the prices and terms we are asking in this renewal are
driven by the market. We want to work with Charter to limit the impact
on their consumers, and we're dedicated to finding a solution that
benefits all parties.
The conflict left viewers of sporting
events like the University of Florida vs. University of Utah football
game or the second-round US Open match between No. 1 men's tennis player
Carlos Alcaraz and Lloyd Harris waiting.
US Open Tennis wrote on
X, the social networking site that replaced Twitter, "We're very
disappointed for our fans and viewers around the country that Spectrum
and Charter could not resolve their dispute with Disney, resulting in a
loss of ESPN coverage of Thursday night's matches." "We're hopeful that a
swift resolution to this dispute can be reached."
Although
Disney had to settle a dispute with streaming provider YouTube TV in
2021, disagreements over carriage costs are nothing new, especially
since cord-cutting and streaming have eaten into the conventional cable
sector.
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