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No one knows just how much of the increase being asked for (200%-300%) was actually agreed to by Dish. As Dish stated, they were willing to go to 200% but not 300%, so it was probably somewhere in between. Also, the fact that Dish was willing to agree to 200% says that most of it was just market rates. Sure in the big picture, many local channel owners will try to use AutoHop as a bargaining chip, but how many of them will really succeed? The big picture also gets muddied by the current AutoHop lawsuits, so it's too early to claim that AutoHop will be the death knell of lower prices.

dare2be said:

No one knows just how much of the increase being asked for (200%-300%) was actually agreed to by Dish. As Dish stated, they were willing to go to 200% but not 300%, so it was probably somewhere in between. Also, the fact that Dish was willing to agree to 200% says that most of it was just market rates. Sure in the big picture, many local channel owners will try to use AutoHop as a bargaining chip, but how many of them will really succeed? The big picture also gets muddied by the current AutoHop lawsuits, so it's too early to claim that AutoHop will be the death knell of lower prices.

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I'm not saying that the auto hop will cause the death knell of lower prices. I am saying that when all the local channels come up for renewal , that the auto hop threat will be used in order to extort better carriage deals from DISH , than they have ever been known to pay in the past. Now when you add all these companies over the country up , that is going to be a lot of extra money that somebody is going to pay. It won't be DISH paying these added costs. It will be you and me , the subscriber. I am saying that the increase next February ,will most likely include an increase to cover these added costs for DISH. The ironic thing is that the auto hop threat was supposed to be used to keep prices low by DISH and now it is being used as a threat to extort better carriage fees for the local channels.

THANK GOD they don't use auto hop on the other national cable channels, like TNT , USA ,Syfy etc . Can you imagine how much they would ask to keep their channels on the air ,because of auto hop feature being used? It would be the end of DISH, because when DISH passed the increased carriage cost on to their subs, they would leave to avoid paying the increased costs. IN the end I see DISH dropping auto hop feature, in order to avoid continuing to pay the increased costs for local channels. Not right now. But look at Blockbuster. Now, Charlie is saying it might of been a mistake to buy this failing company. I see a similar statement about the auto hop feature , but will probably never hear him say it publicly. It will just be turned off via software someday.

MikeD-C05 said:

I'm not saying that the auto hop will cause the death knell of lower prices. I am saying that when all the local channels come up for renewal , that the auto hop threat will be used in order to (1) extort better carriage deals from DISH , than they have ever been known to pay in the past. Now when you add all these companies over the country up , that is going to be a lot of extra money that somebody is going to pay. It won't be DISH paying these added costs. It will be you and me , the subscriber. I am saying that the increase next February ,will most likely include an increase to cover these added costs for DISH.

The (2) ironic thing is that the auto hop threat was supposed to be used to keep prices low by DISH and now it is being used as a threat to extort better carriage fees for the local channels.

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1. That sounds like a chicken little death knell to me.

2. Again, you read that "somewhere", yet are using it as fact, just like you said earlier that your opinions are not fact, then why are you treating someone else's opinion as fact?

dare2be said:

1. That sounds like a chicken little death knell to me.

2. Again, you read that "somewhere", yet are using it as fact, just like you said earlier that your opinions are not fact, then why are you treating someone else's opinion as fact?

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Okay I give up since your are obsessed with what you consider facts. I guess I should now preface all my posts with "In my opinion" in order to discuss any ideas I have. Will see what happens come the new year and the next price hike. But mark my words, like all gimmicks that DISH rolls out and uses in their advertising campaigns (Blockbuster, TURBO HD, SLING LOADED 922 , DISHONLINE/TV Everywhere) they will drop their focus on the auto hop feature as well ,when it becomes to costly to keep fighting the added costs to keep it going. I don't see the auto hop feature staying around if all the local channels start pulling the same tactics as Gannett.


After all if this auto hop feature was going to be an easy software update , then DIRECTV , the #1 satellite company, would of already added the auto skip feature to their Genie receivers. Why didn't they? They will let DISH fight the legal battles and take on all the disputes over channel carriage , before they jump on the bandwagon. Because why ? THey don't want their costs to go up. They see the writing on the wall and they are more than happy to let DISH pay the costs. Every Local channel they lose in a dma , is another reason for a sub to churn to DIRECTV ,if they still want satellite tv.

MikeD-C05 said:

Okay I give up since your are obsessed with what you consider facts. I guess I should now preface all my posts with "In my opinion" in order to discuss any ideas I have. Will see what happens come the new year and the next price hike. But mark my words, like all gimmicks that DISH rolls out and uses in their advertising campaigns (Blockbuster, TURBO HD, SLING LOADED 922 , DISHONLINE/TV Everywhere) they will drop their focus on the auto hop feature as well ,when it becomes to costly to keep fighting the added costs to keep it going. I don't see the auto hop feature staying around if all the local channels start pulling the same tactics as Gannett.


After all if this auto hop feature was going to be an easy software update , then DIRECTV , the #1 satellite company, would of already added the auto skip feature to their Genie receivers. Why didn't they? They will let DISH fight the legal battles and take on all the disputes over channel carriage , before they jump on the bandwagon. Because why ? THey don't want their costs to go up. They see the writing on the wall and they are more than happy to let DISH pay the costs. Every Local channel they lose in a dma , is another reason for a sub to churn to DIRECTV ,if they still want satellite tv.

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Sorry about the whole "fact" symantics. What I should have said was where and who did you read that from?

We are in agreement that the implementation of autohop is a high risk/reward proposition for Dish, yet I don't see one of the outcomes being ballooning rate hikes (in relation to other providers or market rates). A leopard does not change its spots, and Dish is not going to suddenly start giving in on carriage deals. It will be an interesting battle to be sure.

MikeD-C05 said:

THANK GOD they don't use auto hop on the other national cable channels, like TNT , USA ,Syfy etc .

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I have thought that too. I may not see the same outcome as you do, but it's a rocky one....

Tampa8 said:

I have thought that too. I may not see the same outcome as you do, but it's a rocky one....

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Yeah, heaven forbid that they are prevented from blatently double-dipping their revenue stream. Cable channels have a lower percentage of revenue from commercials compared to subscription revenue than broadcast channels, so they shouldn't protest as much as broadcast channels, right?

I'm glad Dish did not implement the skip feature for cable, yet. My hope is unless the Court calls it illegal, they won't be the only one with a feature like that, making threats by channels over it less meaningful. If Direct TV was a little more on the side of it's subscribers, and a little less a follower, they would implement their version. (assuming the info from Scott is correct)

dare2be said:

Sorry about the whole "fact" symantics. What I should have said was where and who did you read that from?

We are in agreement that the implementation of autohop is a high risk/reward proposition for Dish, yet I don't see one of the outcomes being ballooning rate hikes (in relation to other providers or market rates). A leopard does not change its spots, and Dish is not going to suddenly start giving in on carriage deals. It will be an interesting battle to be sure.

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I don't remember where I read all the different things about the reasons for auto hop being used for DISH's advantage in channel negotiations. The point is I can extrapolate and speculate what will happen based on the past history of DISH . DISH uses gimmicks that they promote in their advertising campaigns. IN the past we used TURBO HD . Then there was TV EVERYWHERE. Then last year it was Blockbuster@home . As you see all have been dropped from the main focus of their advertising . I see the same future for auto hop ,considering that the networks are suing them and the locals channels are extorting more carriage fees then DISH has ever paid. I don't think that DISH will continue to pay higher fees to carry the locals and not pass it on to the subs. If they pass it on to subs , this will force their "low priced " leader status to be in jeopardy. So this will force them to lose the auto hop feature ,eventually. Time will tell if I'm right .