HBO/Cinemax Takedown

That's a good point into why Dish might not want a subscriber guarantee. Maybe the satellite service is feeling the pinch on cord cutting more than they are letting on. You think they would be able to make up the difference with Sling. The only people who know who's telling the truth are the ones who are in the room.

Well, if AT&T's latest subscriber counts are anything to go by, I'd be worried if I were Charlie. Of course, he has already stated the writing is on the wall, which is why he bought all that spectrum. Now he just needs to do something with it.
 
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I hate what they are becoming. I am sure they think it is what they have to do to "survive," where surviving means bowing to the unreasonable expectations of Wall Street. The economic theory that companies in mature, saturated markets must continue to grow as if they are in emerging markets is just flawed. I wish they would stop teaching it in business schools.
 
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Let me make this very clear. I had a career with Pacific Telephone/Pacific Bell for 25 years. Pacific Telephone was a child of AT&T. When divestiture happened on 1-1-84 Pacific Telesis became a divested company and their telephone company was renamed Pacific Bell. Since those days SBC bought out Telesis and then changed its name to AT&T. I didn't mind the original AT&T. AT&T was called Ma Bell and at that time everything was a family. It was a good place to work and employees cared about service. After the SBC takeover things began to change. I was actually contracting at that time and I could see the light. This was no longer a good workplace. Today I hate AT&T. Mind you I'm not going to return my retirement check monthly or throw away my basically free landline telephone service or deny using my medical benefits because I am not stupid. But.... There is a very hot place waiting for those high level employees that make their decisions. ;)
 
Let me make this very clear. I had a career with Pacific Telephone/Pacific Bell for 25 years. Pacific Telephone was a child of AT&T. When divestiture happened on 1-1-84 Pacific Telesis became a divested company and their telephone company was renamed Pacific Bell. Since those days SBC bought out Telesis and then changed its name to AT&T. I didn't mind the original AT&T. AT&T was called Ma Bell and at that time everything was a family. It was a good place to work and employees cared about service. After the SBC takeover things began to change. I was actually contracting at that time and I could see the light. This was no longer a good workplace. Today I hate AT&T. Mind you I'm not going to return my retirement check monthly or throw away my basically free landline telephone service or deny using my medical benefits because I am not stupid. But.... There is a very hot place waiting for those high level employees that make their decisions. ;)
SBC AKA Cingular, at the time of the take-over Cingular bought AT&T then changed its name to AT&T but continued to be the same old evil company.
 
As everyone wants to scream leave politics out of it, unfortunately, this is one of the few times where politics has actually molded into satellite discussion. Consideration for that fact should be given. The I hate AT&T comments bring less value to the conversation than what the political ones do because the political comments are relevant in this case.

To the point, they own the content... They can do what ever they want with it. You cant go to a Ford dealership and hop into any Ford and use it just because you think you should have access to it. If Ford wants to give the car away to another part of the company they own that's within their legal right. You might not like it but you certainly can go purchase a car directly from Ford, or any other car dealership that sells Fords, but you can't just hop in and use it because you think you need access to one from your dealership of choice that now has pulled that Ford from the lot. Your even able to go purchase another type of car or in this case (Epix, Showtime, Starz, Ect.) In the case of Dish, Again the company was left behind when it failed to acquire any content. HBO is the same price on the web as it is through any other provider directly available through HBO Now. It's a free market, and the free market is doing what it's doing

First, speaking about politics outside of the Pit is grounds to get a vacation. Regardless how much you may feel it's appropriate, you can't discuss them by forum rules. Scott has made that clear. You want to discuss the link to politics and this situation, become a member, opt into the Pit, and create a thread.

Second, a free market is fair and competitive. Giving a service for free to your own subs, then trying to force your competition to agree to a mandated set of subs or not take the service is in fact limiting the competition. It's making it so subs will jump to your platform. Now, if HBO and Cinemax were created as DirecTV exclusive premium services, then that would be a different story. AT&T can't just buy the network then turn and say, Dish either needs to have X% of subs subscribe to our network or they need to pay for the difference. That's trying to devalue the competition. Because no matter what, Dish will lose subs. Either, due to no HBO and Cinemax, subs will leave, or because people who don't want to pay for HBO and Cinemax now have to offset the cost, subs will leave. It's a purposeful shady tactic to devalue the competition and artificially inflate DirectTV's value.
 
That sounds good, but for an inexpensive service, it kind of defeats the purpose when the phones are so expensive.

I'll stick with my $100 Galaxy J3 on Consumer Cellular for $40 for two lines.

$200 for the Moto G6 is I thought reasonable for a really nice phone. I got it a couple months ago and have been using it with Project Fi. Bill averages $25 a month.
 
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I have two questions: (1) Has anyone been talking about this on CNBC or FBNews? (2) I know HDNet was on free preview until Nov.1st and Dish said that they were giving HBO subscribers HDNET while this problem persists. I don't have HBO or Cinemax but I still have HDNET on channel 130 which was supposed to expire Nov. 1st. Does this mean I will get HDNET while this is going on?
 
First, speaking about politics outside of the Pit is grounds to get a vacation. Regardless how much you may feel it's appropriate, you can't discuss them by forum rules. Scott has made that clear. You want to discuss the link to politics and this situation, become a member, opt into the Pit, and create a thread.

Second, a free market is fair and competitive. Giving a service for free to your own subs, then trying to force your competition to agree to a mandated set of subs or not take the service is, in fact, limiting the competition. It's making it so subs will jump to your platform. Now, if HBO and Cinemax were created as DirecTV exclusive premium services, then that would be a different story. AT&T can't just buy the network then turn and say, Dish either needs to have X% of subs subscribe to our network or they need to pay for the difference. That's trying to devalue the competition. Because no matter what, Dish will lose subs. Either, due to no HBO and Cinemax, subs will leave, or because people who don't want to pay for HBO and Cinemax now have to offset the cost, subs will leave. It's a purposeful shady tactic to devalue the competition and artificially inflate DirectTV's value.

The free market is fair and competitive. Dish could have purchased HBO, just like Comcast did with NBC, and Disney did with Fox. You are free to get HBO from any provider that carries it IE: Comcast, Cox, IPTV, etc., including HBO themselves. No one says you must get it through Dish Network and just because you lost out on it because of dish's inability to see the market landscape is not ATT's fault. You keep referring back to the terms that AT&T wanted a guaranteed rate of subs. Those terms are for Dish to decide if they want it or not. Again, free market at work, and it's AT&T's content they can value it how they wish. That's the point you keep missing out on as your so enraged with anger against AT&T, you can't see the fact that Dish really has no say in how ATT values their content. ATT can ask for what they want and ATT does not have to give Dish subs HBO or Cinemax because didn't come to an agreement for ATT's content. If Dish wanted the content that badly they should have purchased Time Warner. You may not like it but that's the way the cookie crumbles and ATT isnt harming anyone. Dish harmed themselves by not following what the market was doing and that's the only one you should be blaming..

The argument that ATT should give you HBO doesn't fly, and If that's the case you need to ship me your car because I feel like you need to give me your car that I have no rights too, and we don't have an agreement on but clearly I should be able to use whenever with your logic. It's really simple, if Dish can't come to an agreement then they have no right to carry the content unless ATT says they can which ATT at one point did under the old contract. Even then Dish still pulled the content according to ATT. At this point, Dish can simply agree or counter or not carry it at all. It's really that simple as the ball really is in Dish's court. You see it as devaluing competition when it's really AT&T not giving their stuff away and maintaining a value to their content. You're also blaming ATT for Dish's mistakes in the market. Dish losing subs is not AT&T's fault. That's Dish's fault for not keeping up with the competitive landscape.
 
I have HBO Now for the time being. I wish there was some way to stream Cinemax without subscribing to Amazon Prime.

I buy a lot from Amazon so having the Prime account is good for me. Plus there tons of free movies & TV shows that are included with Prime are great. Many things that are not available elsewhere. The added on music is also good. But I do see that Cinemax does not have their separate streaming app as HBO does. I had to get a Fire TV to get TCM, as they do not have an app on Roku.
 
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I have two questions: (1) Has anyone been talking about this on CNBC or FBNews? (2) I know HDNet was on free preview until Nov.1st and Dish said that they were giving HBO subscribers HDNET while this problem persists. I don't have HBO or Cinemax but I still have HDNET on channel 130 which was supposed to expire Nov. 1st. Does this mean I will get HDNET while this is going on?
I haven't seen it on the air... But they have this on site

AT&T's WarnerMedia accuses DOJ with 'collaborating' with Dish in HBO dispute

You have to wonder if news channels have bias management on this. It seems like a hot topic but I am not seeing this on broadcast

Sent from my SM-G965U1 using Tapatalk
 
The free market is fair and competitive. Dish could have purchased HBO, just like Comcast did with NBC, and Disney did with Fox. You are free to get HBO from any provider that carries it IE: Comcast, Cox, IPTV, etc., including HBO themselves. No one says you must get it through Dish Network and just because you lost out on it because of dish's inability to see the market landscape is not ATT's fault. You keep referring back to the terms that AT&T wanted a guaranteed rate of subs. Those terms are for Dish to decide if they want it or not. Again, free market at work, and it's AT&T's content they can value it how they wish. That's the point you keep missing out on as your so enraged with anger against AT&T, you can't see the fact that Dish really has no say in how ATT values their content. ATT can ask for what they want and ATT does not have to give Dish subs HBO or Cinemax because didn't come to an agreement for ATT's content. If Dish wanted the content that badly they should have purchased Time Warner. You may not like it but that's the way the cookie crumbles and ATT isnt harming anyone. Dish harmed themselves by not following what the market was doing and that's the only one you should be blaming..

The argument that ATT should give you HBO doesn't fly, and If that's the case you need to ship me your car because I feel like you need to give me your car that I have no rights too, and we don't have an agreement on but clearly I should be able to use whenever with your logic. It's really simple, if Dish can't come to an agreement then they have no right to carry the content unless ATT says they can which ATT at one point did under the old contract. Even then Dish still pulled the content according to ATT. At this point, Dish can simply agree or counter or not carry it at all. It's really that simple as the ball really is in Dish's court. You see it as devaluing competition when it's really AT&T not giving their stuff away and maintaining a value to their content. You're also blaming ATT for Dish's mistakes in the market. Dish losing subs is not AT&T's fault. That's Dish's fault for not keeping up with the competitive landscape.

What you write makes sense in a truly free and unregulated market. In this case, the government heavily regulates the industry through multiple agencies, and there are a ton of anti-trust laws (and who knows what else?) which apply. Allowing the vertical merger just made the application of those laws more complicated.
 
The free market is fair and competitive. Dish could have purchased HBO, just like Comcast did with NBC, and Disney did with Fox. You are free to get HBO from any provider that carries it IE: Comcast, Cox, IPTV, etc., including HBO themselves. No one says you must get it through Dish Network and just because you lost out on it because of dish's inability to see the market landscape is not ATT's fault. You keep referring back to the terms that AT&T wanted a guaranteed rate of subs. Those terms are for Dish to decide if they want it or not. Again, free market at work, and it's AT&T's content they can value it how they wish. That's the point you keep missing out on as your so enraged with anger against AT&T, you can't see the fact that Dish really has no say in how ATT values their content. ATT can ask for what they want and ATT does not have to give Dish subs HBO or Cinemax because didn't come to an agreement for ATT's content. If Dish wanted the content that badly they should have purchased Time Warner. You may not like it but that's the way the cookie crumbles and ATT isnt harming anyone. Dish harmed themselves by not following what the market was doing and that's the only one you should be blaming..

The argument that ATT should give you HBO doesn't fly, and If that's the case you need to ship me your car because I feel like you need to give me your car that I have no rights too, and we don't have an agreement on but clearly I should be able to use whenever with your logic. It's really simple, if Dish can't come to an agreement then they have no right to carry the content unless ATT says they can which ATT at one point did under the old contract. Even then Dish still pulled the content according to ATT. At this point, Dish can simply agree or counter or not carry it at all. It's really that simple as the ball really is in Dish's court. You see it as devaluing competition when it's really AT&T not giving their stuff away and maintaining a value to their content. You're also blaming ATT for Dish's mistakes in the market. Dish losing subs is not AT&T's fault. That's Dish's fault for not keeping up with the competitive landscape.
Its called anti-trust and your accusation of me being "enraged" is quite telling of how much no matter what, this discussion will go nowhere.

You are lost to the argument. The network has been around since the 70s. It has always been known to call your local cable or satellite provider to get HBO. Essentially, it has grown to be known as something that all providers offer. Therefore, due to that status, this new owner is holding Dish hostage in a pay us situation.

Remeber when DirecTV tried to sign for exclusive rights for MLB Extra Innings? What happened? Congress stepped in and made the MLB offer a cooperative rate to Dish and cable. It's the same thing here. AT&T can't make a random mandate on Dish, who happens to be their primary competitor. The logic you present is one of a loyal fan who will turn a blind eye on the wrong doings.

As for buying that network. That is completely irrelevant. Anyone could have bought it. That doesn't mean anything. Due to the fore identified reason in my first paragraph, AT&T has essentially took a product that has become a staple of subscription television and used it against one of its competitors. That is shady business tactic and will more than likely hurt AT&T in the long run.
 
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What you write makes sense in a truly free and unregulated market. In this case, the government heavily regulates the industry through multiple agencies, and there are a ton of anti-trust laws (and who knows what else?) which apply. Allowing the vertical merger just made the application of those laws more complicated.

Except they cleared those hurdles, and the government has clearly set it's precedent when it approved the NBC Comcast deal. At that point, Dish should have responded by making their own content acquisitions and didn't. Nothing in the antitrust agreements says ATT must give HBO to DISH and they can't pull their content.
 
Except they cleared those hurdles, and the government has clearly set it's precedent when it approved the NBC Comcast deal. At that point, Dish should have responded by making their own content acquisitions and didn't. Nothing in the antitrust agreements says ATT must give HBO to DISH and they can't pull their content.

Even with the merger being approved by the courts, there are still many regulatory rules and actual laws that apply relating to pricing, media distribution, tying products, etc. Telecommunications and media are not an Adam Smith-style free market in the US.
 
You are lost to the argument. The network has been around since the 70s. It has always been known to call your local cable or satellite provider to get HBO. Essentially, it has grown to be known as something that all providers offer. Therefore, due to that status, this new owner is holding Dish hostage in a pay us situation.

Remeber when DirecTV tried to sign for exclusive rights for MLB Extra Innings? What happened? Congress stepped in and made the MLB offer a cooperative rate to Dish and cable. It's the same thing here. AT&T can't make a random mandate on Dish, who happens to be their primary competitor. The logic you present is one of a loyal fan who will turn a blind eye on the wrong doings.

As for buying that network. That is completely irrelevant. Anyone could have bought it. That doesn't mean anything. Due to the fore identified reason in my first paragraph, AT&T has essentially took a product that has become a staple of subscription television and used it against one of its competitors. That is shady business tactic and will more than likely hurt AT&T in the long run.

Actually, my argument is really rock solid. Nice try though. It doesn't matter when HBO was available and who owned it in the past. The reality is (which you cannot accept) is that Dish cannot come to an agreement with AT&T who owns the content. Dish has no leverage, and neither does your argument. Also, your MLB Example is not the same because DirecTV did not own the MLB content. MLB Media did and was forcing the other providers to match DirecTV's offer at the time and even said themselves it wasn't exclusive. MLB Pitches DirecTV Deal To FCC If what your alluding to was the case, then NFL ST wouldn't be an exclusive on DirecTV, still today as it is. Also, you fail to realize that AT&T can because there is no agreement and dish refused to extend the previous contract. You want to blame me for being a loyal fan when I have taken the standpoint that really the right standpoint to take as Dish doesnt have the right to that content. It's the same as an HOA trying to dictate what you can do with your house when your not apart of the HOA. Dish can't dictate how and who ATT can sell HBO too, neither can the government at this point. You dismiss buying the network as it doesn't mean anything when it clearly does. Had dish bough content they wouldn't be at a market disadvantage and was inept on Dish.
 

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