Baseball fans with Cablevision couldn't see Cliff Lee get pummeled by the Giants during Game 1 of the World Series last night because News Corp. has yanked its Fox programming from the cable system since October 16. The two companies are arguing over transmission fees—and whether the other side is even attempting to negotiate—and Cablevision's 3 million-plus customers in NY, NJ and Pennsylvania are without their fixes of Glee, the World Series, NFL games, and Fox News. So yesterday, after another failed attempt to get News Corp. to settle and shortly before the Rangers-Giants game, Cablevision issued this statement:
Cablevision Systems Corp. (NYSE: CVC) today announced that its customers can watch World Series games live on the Internet through MLB.com and the company will fully reimburse the cost of the online coverage.
MLB.com’s 2010 Postseason.TV package features live coverage of all World Series games and includes the option of choosing from eight different fixed camera angles and displaying up to four cameras on the screen simultaneously, along with in-game highlights and other enhancements.
Customers who purchase the package and forward their purchase confirmation to Cablevision will have a $10 credit applied to their monthly bill within two billing cycles.
Earlier in the day, Cablevision, which wants FCC intervention, made a new offer to News Corp. to restore programming, only to be rejected, prompting EVP of communications Charles Schueler to say, "On behalf of our customers, we are very disappointed that we offered News Corp. what they asked to be paid for Fox 5 and Fox 29 and News Corp. has said no. It is now clear beyond a shadow of a doubt that News Corp. is operating in bad faith. We call on the FCC to intervene immediately to restore the Fox signals to Cablevision’s 3 million homes and order News Corp. to agree to binding arbitration to resolve this conflict.”
