Dish dispute with KFJX Joplin
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Here is my 2 cents. I know the GM who is or was over KFJX and KOAM. He is not a very nice man. His name is Danny Thomas. He refused me waivers years ago for Fox when we both knew I couldnt get his signal. He told me that he used to work for another TV station that they granted a waiver for someone that had DirecTV and proved they could not get his signal. He said the next thing he knew was that he had received a letter saying if he didnt grant waivers for everyone else in that area he would be sued. He told me he would never allow his channels on DirecTV. A couple years go by and all the sudden his renewal was up on Dish and it was rumored Dish was going to drop them. Right before the Dish deadline, all the sudden his channels magically appear on DirecTV. My guess is he was covering his ass in case Dish Network decided to stick with telling them to kick rocks.
I have issues with a few of Darrin Dishman's comments in his statement about KFJX. Here is the first one.
Agreements come up for renewal every three years with all of our cable and satellite partners. That's normal. In the past six months, we have amicably worked out agreements with more than 40 cable and satellite providers. That's normal. No other cable or satellite provider has blocked our signal from their customers while those negotiations were successfully completed. That's normal. In fact, no cable or satellite provider has blacked out our signal in more than nine years. That's normal.
As far as I know, its not Dish that takes the signal down. Why would KFJX let Dish have control over weather they can air that channel or not. KFJX owens it but really has no control over if its aired for free? Come on. If you believe that, I have some ocean front property in Arizona to sell you to.
DISH Network is the only difference between then and now. DISH Network is the only satellite provider that has not worked with us. Out of forty-plus systems, DISH is the only system with which we have not been able to reach an agreement.
This one makes them out to be the hero but I am telling you from experience that these guys are not! They with held from DirecTV until they thought they were gonna lose Dish Network and then suddenly inked the line. Smells fishy to me. We will see what happens when their contract with DirecTV comes up. I will be shocked if there isnt a dispute with them as well.
Also someone else mentioned that this could also have something to do with the ability to skip commercials. FOX filed a lawsuit years ago on this. I remember a couple years back the Nascar Daytona 500 was airing on FOX and Dish Network was one of the cars main sponsors but when they were announcing the cars on live TV they made sure to skip that sponsor since they had filed that suite already. How ridiculous can you get?
Your crazy if you think this dont come down to money. Could be VOD availablility or able to stream the channel but in the end it equates to money. Maybe KFJX wanted to deal with it in the next contract 3 years down the road when their rates would be even higher and Dish said no. Also it always comes up that people can either switch providers or get an antenna and get the signal for free. I have 2 questions for you if you think those are great options. If you switch to another provider and then KDJX stiffs them and you are in a 2 year commitment will you still be mad at the provider? Also if everyone out there that watches KFJX gets an antenna and gets the channel for free how would they stay in business? Years ago locals didnt charge anything for their channel to be rebroadcasted. They made their money from advertising. Now they claim that advertising and retrans fees are sitll not enough? Sounds like their business model is not sustainable. To me it comes down to can KFJX afford to not have those paying customers. I say history says no because when they about lost Dish Network last time they added DirecTV to make up the difference. Then they had both which was probably great for them. Ask yourself what would happen if all the providers that have deals with them dropped their channel tomorrow? This is Wal-Mart all over. Wal-Mart bullies companies into giving them a price that they cant make as much money on because they can. If all companies that did business with Wal-Mart refused to sell to them they would be screwed as well. Since we all know that isnt going to happen, it gives the Wal-Marts and the KFJX's of the world more power than they should have. That is my 2 cents.
I have issues with a few of Darrin Dishman's comments in his statement about KFJX. Here is the first one.
Agreements come up for renewal every three years with all of our cable and satellite partners. That's normal. In the past six months, we have amicably worked out agreements with more than 40 cable and satellite providers. That's normal. No other cable or satellite provider has blocked our signal from their customers while those negotiations were successfully completed. That's normal. In fact, no cable or satellite provider has blacked out our signal in more than nine years. That's normal.
As far as I know, its not Dish that takes the signal down. Why would KFJX let Dish have control over weather they can air that channel or not. KFJX owens it but really has no control over if its aired for free? Come on. If you believe that, I have some ocean front property in Arizona to sell you to.
DISH Network is the only difference between then and now. DISH Network is the only satellite provider that has not worked with us. Out of forty-plus systems, DISH is the only system with which we have not been able to reach an agreement.
This one makes them out to be the hero but I am telling you from experience that these guys are not! They with held from DirecTV until they thought they were gonna lose Dish Network and then suddenly inked the line. Smells fishy to me. We will see what happens when their contract with DirecTV comes up. I will be shocked if there isnt a dispute with them as well.
Also someone else mentioned that this could also have something to do with the ability to skip commercials. FOX filed a lawsuit years ago on this. I remember a couple years back the Nascar Daytona 500 was airing on FOX and Dish Network was one of the cars main sponsors but when they were announcing the cars on live TV they made sure to skip that sponsor since they had filed that suite already. How ridiculous can you get?
Your crazy if you think this dont come down to money. Could be VOD availablility or able to stream the channel but in the end it equates to money. Maybe KFJX wanted to deal with it in the next contract 3 years down the road when their rates would be even higher and Dish said no. Also it always comes up that people can either switch providers or get an antenna and get the signal for free. I have 2 questions for you if you think those are great options. If you switch to another provider and then KDJX stiffs them and you are in a 2 year commitment will you still be mad at the provider? Also if everyone out there that watches KFJX gets an antenna and gets the channel for free how would they stay in business? Years ago locals didnt charge anything for their channel to be rebroadcasted. They made their money from advertising. Now they claim that advertising and retrans fees are sitll not enough? Sounds like their business model is not sustainable. To me it comes down to can KFJX afford to not have those paying customers. I say history says no because when they about lost Dish Network last time they added DirecTV to make up the difference. Then they had both which was probably great for them. Ask yourself what would happen if all the providers that have deals with them dropped their channel tomorrow? This is Wal-Mart all over. Wal-Mart bullies companies into giving them a price that they cant make as much money on because they can. If all companies that did business with Wal-Mart refused to sell to them they would be screwed as well. Since we all know that isnt going to happen, it gives the Wal-Marts and the KFJX's of the world more power than they should have. That is my 2 cents.
I know that. I just had insite on this specific station and the guys who run it. They did change owners though. Sagamore isnt making me like them anymore either though. I am with DirecTV so this does not even affect me. I just know how they are. Thought everyone else should too.
The only way to truly know if the antenna will work is to buy one at a place where you can return it, put it up and see if it works.
That antenna has a rather paultry VHF element but who's to say it will not work from looking at a picture of it.
Then again their 70 mile claim is rather bloated because for UHF 70 miles is mostly over the horizon and UHF does not bend much over obstructions.
That antenna has a rather paultry VHF element but who's to say it will not work from looking at a picture of it.
Then again their 70 mile claim is rather bloated because for UHF 70 miles is mostly over the horizon and UHF does not bend much over obstructions.
Just so you know, no one at the station has any say so on contract negotiations like this. It will be handled at the corporate level.
I agree. Most channels out of Boston are on UHF and are only placed on what would be a VHF channel via PSIP. It truly depends on terrain and distance. My FOX affielate is the toughest ones to get, due to its distance. There are independents that also have the same issue, but of the big four, when Dish has a dispute, it's only FOX that makes me nervous when it is pulled.
Just so you know this was back around the digital transition. Not sure if he had more pull back then or not but he was very vocal about never adding service to DirecTV until all the sudden Dish was gonna pull their feed. Then the job got done. He seems to have mellowed out some over the years. Still a dick! The channel is still down and the NFL season is upon us. Lets see how many mad Cowboys fans call on this crap. They should be ashamed of themselves.
Cowboys? There are more Chiefs fans in Joplin than Cowboys. My daughter lives there, I should know
Maybe the guy was a disgruntled Directv dealer at one point.
I know if I worked at a Tv station I know I would purposely mess with dish’s agreement.
These agreements affect hundreds of thousands, sometimes millions of people. It's a shame that one person's personal grudges could affect so many.
I would run crawls blaming the issue on Dish and just laugh as customers cancelled their accounts over it.
Not for anything, Dish didn’t care about me or the few dozen employees who I had working for me at the time.
A few of my employees lost their house, and got evicted from their apartment because they couldn’t pay their bills because of what Dish did to me.
So some people can’t watch a Tv program. I never saw what the big deal was. The world is not going to end if I miss my favorite tv show
Incredibly, I agree with Claude. Even when affected by blackouts, there are hundreds of other channels. In addition, there are thousands of different ways of getting the channels temporarily/permanently. Dish really only is hurting themselves with constant blackouts. They’ll win the battle, but they are hurting in the war. Episode 1 of the new season of suits, Dish is like the Harvey Specter, and the competition right now is the Robert Zane’s. Charlie should put a checks and balances in place against himself. He is great at what he does, but not infallible.
I hear what you're saying, and it makes total sense. KFJX is the market's Fox affiliate and it isn't a strong OTA signal, so I would think Dish would be concerned losing that channel
Old info, but pertinent:
"Two weeks into a blackout of SagamoreHill Broadcasting stations in 11 markets, DISH is levying a new complaint. The satellite provider says Sagamore is requesting payment for all DISH subs in its markets—even those that do not access its channels through DISH’s satellite service. DISH customers can opt to drop local from their TV package and save $12/month"
DISH-SagamoreHill Dispute Rages On
"Two weeks into a blackout of SagamoreHill Broadcasting stations in 11 markets, DISH is levying a new complaint. The satellite provider says Sagamore is requesting payment for all DISH subs in its markets—even those that do not access its channels through DISH’s satellite service. DISH customers can opt to drop local from their TV package and save $12/month"
DISH-SagamoreHill Dispute Rages On
So Sagamore wants paid for subs that do not subscribe to their channels, just as long as they live in the area? Sounds like Sagamore really is stretching here... and should honestly lose their broadcast license for that one. That is not something that is reasonable. OTA should always be their main source of income. It’s not on Dish customers that can receive OTA to pay for channels they can and do choose to receive OTA. That is crappy.
Their current OTA signal, on VHF-13, is very weak and doesn't even cover all of Joplin proper. They have applied to significantly increase their power as part of the repack, and IMHO they should be focused on that instead of sucking at the teet of Dish
It isn't just one channel though, it's channels in 11 markets. That is one big teet.
The broadcasters shouldn’t get anything to retransmit their signal.
If anything they should be happy to be on as many platforms as possible.
IMHO, if they want to charge for their content they should shut down their transmitter and return their license to the FCC. TheY can then be a cable channel
If anything they should be happy to be on as many platforms as possible.
IMHO, if they want to charge for their content they should shut down their transmitter and return their license to the FCC. TheY can then be a cable channel
