Time Warner Cable and News Corp. continued their public slap fight today when News Corp. declined Time Warner’s offer to enter into binding arbitration to solve a dispute over how much the cable company should pay to carry Fox, Fox News, FX and Fox Sports. Fox wants $1 per subscriber. Time Warner wants to pay 30 cents. And you don’t want to miss Glee.
The deadline to reach an agreement is 26 hours away and News Corp. president Chase Carey said today that he’s not interested in granting an extension. After all, his company has been “trying since the summer to negotiate a fair deal,” he said. Predictably, Time Warner spokesman Alex Dudley did not agree with that assessment, saying, “He should call it what it is, an extortion attempt necessitated by a poor advertising market and an innate desire to fatten his wallet at our customers’ expense.”
As long as the two companies keep up this public battle we won’t need Fox. This is far more entertaining.
News Corporation Declines Arbitration Offer from Time Warner [Media Decoder/NYT]
