Dish, Tribune Continue War of Words Over Blackout
Dish Network and Tribune Broadcasting continue to blame each other for the blackout of 42 Tribune channels in 33 markets on Dish. Tribune in a news release Wednesday said the direct broadcast satellite company "has been totally unresponsive in negotiating…
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a new contract" since receiving a proposal from Tribune Sunday. “We repeatedly offered Dish an extension through the end of August, more than 60 days, for precisely this reason -- they drag their feet in negotiations,” Tribune said. “Dish rejected every offer, which demonstrates a total disregard for their customers and our viewers.” NAB Associate General Counsel Scott Goodwin in a blog post Wednesday said Dish was "trying to manipulate the regulatory process," deliberately stalling negotiations and rejecting Tribune's offer for an extension so as to make a case for the FCC requiring interim carriage. "These just happen to be exactly the same rule changes DISH and its pay-TV brethren have been pushing for at the FCC, rule changes that DISH hopes will effectively eviscerate any broadcaster leverage in retrans negotiations," Goodwin said. In its own statement Wednesday, Dish said it "offered to extend the contract so that consumers would have continued access to the Tribune channels while negotiations continued. Tribune rejected our offer. Only Tribune can cause a channel blackout. Rather than continuing to negotiate in good faith, Tribune chose to remove their channels from DISH. Rather than negotiate in the press, we suggest that Tribune respond to our last offer with a meaningful and fair offer for our customers." The blackout began Sunday (see 1606130018).