They had a monopoly for several years and then the package openned up to all providers.
DirecTV Defends Its Play for Extra Innings
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They had a monopoly for several years and then the package openned up to all providers.
Not only that... Lots of folks who get the benefits of the triple play discount with cable will not be happy to lose the discount.
I thought that too. Unfortuantely, it has a chance of being accurate if you consider it by the number of subscribers, not the specific subscribers.
Last year across all providers, EI had 600,000 subscribers, half via D*. He may be projecting that by changing the EI package a bit, and marketing it differently, D* can push their 300,000 subscribers up close to 600,000. I think it's a given that many more than 5000 of last year's subscribers will no longer subscribe (and won't change providers); maybe some small percentage (10%?) of last year's subscribers will switch to D*, and the rest are existing D* subscribers who skipped the package last season.
I think the net gap will be larger than 5000, but it's plenty realistic to think that the net EI subscriber loss will be less than 100,000.
Well if DirecTV gets the exclusive rights to EI and does something to improve the package. For example add home team telecasts of the San Diego Padres, Washington Nations, Toronto Blue Jays it might be Worth a little more money.
After all MLB has not said what the package will be like this season. Now if it does not go exclusive DirecTV can add the extras it wants for its own subscriber's and if its good then perhaps people might switch if they could see that Dish Networks EI package was inferior to DirecTV's or Cables.
Still seasons getting closer MLB needs to make a decision for the people who want to switch so that the installers will have the time to do the work.
personally if Id id not have a secondary account with DirecTV I would NOT switch just for EI.
After all MLB has not said what the package will be like this season. Now if it does not go exclusive DirecTV can add the extras it wants for its own subscriber's and if its good then perhaps people might switch if they could see that Dish Networks EI package was inferior to DirecTV's or Cables.
Still seasons getting closer MLB needs to make a decision for the people who want to switch so that the installers will have the time to do the work.
personally if Id id not have a secondary account with DirecTV I would NOT switch just for EI.
Time to propose sports broadcast laws like in the UK: they forbid exclusive contract to service providers must be viewable to viewer on any provider.
If E* received the exclusive rights to MLB EI would there be the same grass roots cry for help this site begs for?
All I see is sour grapes.
Perhaps E* customers just realize this is just the beginning. With the NFL now with D*, MLB with D*, local RSN's in HD on D*, Satellites being launched to increase band with, I would be really really nervous that Ive spent all that money on equipment that might only get me VOOM HD in a couple years.
But back to my original question...if E* gained the rights to the MLB would this site cry about it?
All I see is sour grapes.
Perhaps E* customers just realize this is just the beginning. With the NFL now with D*, MLB with D*, local RSN's in HD on D*, Satellites being launched to increase band with, I would be really really nervous that Ive spent all that money on equipment that might only get me VOOM HD in a couple years.
But back to my original question...if E* gained the rights to the MLB would this site cry about it?
Well I hope they wrap up something soon including cable or not, I want see what the details are and sign up for this package! Cant wait for Baseball!!!
This must be driving Directv crazy, they love to promote there sports packages months before the season starts!!
This must be driving Directv crazy, they love to promote there sports packages months before the season starts!!
Well, I wouldn't go that far. But DirecTV is viewed as "the man" a lot of times here and anything they do is bad for the consumer and Dish fights for the common man against the establishment. I don't think anyone would deny that.
But hey, that's ok. There are plenty of sites out there that are more DirecTV centric for people to go to if they don't like the coverage here. I'm not as active here because it is more Dish centric but I appreciate a different perspective on DirecTV issues and this site does provide that. For me anyway.
Actually I deny the Dish portion of your statement. If Dish fought for the common man, they would not have channels -- any channels -- go dark, ever. CourtTV would not have gone black earlier this year. When you fight for the common man, you stand up and fight: you don't resort to litigation or mediation. You don't have pissing contests with Viacom.
The common man occasionally watches his RSN. Not talking out-of-market, I'm talking his local RSN. But Dish subscribers can't do that everywhere. How many NY Dish subscribers rcv YES and get to watch the vast majority of Yankees & Nets games ? Zero.
The common man likes to get his local affiliates; he doesn't fight the law of the land to provide distant nets.
Charlie argues against D* for trying to get EI exclusively. Yet he lacks a full-slate of RSN's. He argues against exclusive sports contracts, but won't carry RSN's when they're available. AND, he has exclusives on some of the (relatively) most-popular Cricket teams (in US terms, it would be the same as an exclusive on all Yankees' games, and all Red Sox' games). How hypocritical is that?
That's not fighting for the common man. That's crying poverty and having a pity-party.
I have to believe that exclusivity could have been had by any provider as long as they were willing to jump through the same hoops D* did, but they chose not to do that. The others have to live with the fact they opted not to do that.
No crying in baseball or business.
No crying in baseball or business.
Seems to me that ALL of these providers try to get exclusive content don't they? I mean doesn't Dolan keep (at least so far) MSG-HD and FSNY-HD solely for his Cablevision subs? If I recall correctly, isn't there an issue with Comcast in Philly doing the exact same thing?
Dish (and just like all the others)" does what's best for them and only them. As stated, they have YET to provide the YES network in the LARGEST DMA - don't be fooled into thinking that this isn't the largest reason they are a distant player in this market. Even with the MLB-EI package, no games produced by YES are shown ion DISH - isn't that correct? Why, because, YES wants the same treatment as ALL the other RSN's - it wants to be carried on the basic tier. It is asking for mere pennies more than the other RSN's, but it is the MOST watched RSN, and that is how rights fees are established isn't it? Charlie is playing the same hard-ball he did with Court and Lifetime - that's all.
I really don't care if this is only on D* or not, not my problem - but to shed tears for ANY of the providers is ridiculous.
I can't agree more strongly. And that's exactly what the providers are trying to do: get sympathy from Washington.
Now on the other hand, D* reported that it was MLB who initially contacted them about an exclusive deal; not D* out looking for it. Sounds insignificant, but it's not. It means that MLB didn't give the others a chance. They didn't come out and suggest that an exclusive deal would be possible to the highest bidder; they allowed one provider the option to negotiate a deal. D* would have been negligent to its shareholders if it walked-away.
It also speaks volumes about the perception of D* in sports programming. Who's the first (only) provider MLB considered? Why is that? It's pretty clear that the sports programming industry considers D* the top dog.
Also, think about 2 recent branches in this thread:
1) last season Dish customers did not see games carried by RSN's that aren't on Dish (YES for one)
2) MLB is looking for changes to EI
My speculation: MLB thinks that EI had low subscribtion b/c fans could not see every out-of-market game, like they can for ST. And they want to 'fix' it by getting the only provider to actually cover all of the markets. If that's the case, if MLB wants nearly every game on EI, then it's entirely possible that D* might find hundreds of thousands of new subscribers. The net loss of EI subscribers might be almost flat.
For the DirecTV deal to work, they would need at least 500,000 people to sign up for $200 each year for the 7 years they have the deal.. all just to break even..
I'm not sure if that sound like a good deal on their part.. Do you think they would get 230,000 more subscribers if they are the only deal in town? I would see more people losing the spark for baseball..
I'm not sure if that sound like a good deal on their part.. Do you think they would get 230,000 more subscribers if they are the only deal in town? I would see more people losing the spark for baseball..
If D* gets to insert their own ad's into the games that would help with their costs. Plus maybe they'll do a MLB-IE SuperFan deal, where if you want the HD games and other bells and whistles you pay extra.
Well, not exactly, they obviously believe that they can leverage this to get subs to switch from other providers. If they increase their sub base and revenue because of the offering, it can work for them. At least they believe so.
You are only looking at RESIDENTIAL customers. Consider the much higher rate paid by the COMMERCIAL customers, sports bars and such. They already have a large number of such customers who pay a much higher rate for the NFL package, now they can also offer them baseball as an exclusive, at a much higher rate.
Sports bars need those games. Couple the residential customer revenue with the addition of hundreds if not thousands of sports bars converting from cable, and THEN do your math.
A lot of those sports bars were already getting EI from D*. Remember, the same sports bars carry ST, and therefore have D* on their premises.
If the package is done right, I really think they could scrape 50,000 new subscribers from the existing D* base without any trouble. Promos and a marketing blitz, maybe they push that close to 80,000. Most people won't switch just for EI, but some will; figure that number around 10,000. If EI was popular enough for a large number of subscribers to change to D*, then there would have been many more than 600,000 EI subscribers last year.
That's from 60,000 to 90,000 new EI subscribers. Throw in additional advertising revenues and the break-even is within reach.
Not to mention make up for all of the current subscribers they will loose, if they start jacking up the price every year, like they have done to ST. If they get the monopoly on it and start the outrageous price increases every year, like they have done to ST, I for one will cancel it like I did ST. But I hope it doesn't get to that point, competition is good for business.
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