Cablevision/Fox Day Five: No Progress

Brief talks today, no deal

By Mike Farrell, Multichannel News -- Broadcasting & Cable, 10/20/2010 5:27:16 PM

Day Five in the battle between Cablevision Systems and Fox Networks ended the same as the days before: with no deal and little hope of one coming anytime soon.

According to Fox, the two parties had "brief" discussions today and are expected to continue talks Thursday.

Fox pulled its broadcast stations in New York (WNYW and WWOR) and Philadelphia (WTXF) and its cable networks Fox Deportes, NatGeo Wild and Fox Business Network from Cablevision on Oct. 16. The two parties are at loggerheads over what Cablevision has called Fox's unreasonable fee increase demands. Fox has countered that it is only seeking fair compensation for its content.

Cablevision has repeatedly called for the matter to be settled through binding arbitration, a request that has been echoed by several state, local and federal lawmakers. Fox has contended that business-to-business negotiation is the only path to a deal.

"Both parties have a position, but only Cablevision has joined with more than 50 government leaders with a solution, binding arbitration under the direction of a neutral third party," Cablevision Executive Vice President of Communications Charles Schueler said in a statement. "By now it should be clear even to News Corp. that binding arbitration is the fastest and fairest way to return Fox programming to our customers."

In the meantime, Cablevision subscribers will likely miss Game 4 of Major League Baseball's National League Championship Series, scheduled for 7:30 p.m. Wednesday night.