Wednesday, December 31, 2008

Say Goodbye to Nickelodeon, MTV, and Comedy Central for Time Warner

There seems to be some kind of dispute between Time Warner and Viacom over carriage fees.

Viacom has asked for fee increases of between 22 percent and 36 percent per channel, or a total of $39 million more, an amount that could increase customers' cable bills, said Time Warner Cable spokesman Alex Dudley.

"The issue is that they have asked for an exorbitant increase in their carriage fees and their network ratings are sagging," Dudley said. "Basically we're trying to hold the line for our customer."

Viacom spokeswoman Kelly McAndrew disputed the figure, saying Viacom requested an increase in the very low double-digit percentage range.

So bottom line is that if Viacom and Time Warner can't be in some kind of agreement then it might be time to switch to Hulu for your Daily Show and Colbert Report fix. I have been doing that for a while but I think more Americans might take the plunge if this thing drags out for a while.

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