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It just wouldn't be the holiday season in Boston without Verizon threatening to block another TV station
By adamg on Tue, 12/05/2023 - 3:25pm
Verizon sent out its annual warning to subscribers that it's going to blank out a local TV station on FiOS because of a licensing spat with its owner. This year, Verizon is warning Ed Harding fans who subscribe to FiOS they will have to go elsewhere to watch the news if it can't reach agreement with WCVB owner Hearst by the end of Friday on how much it has to pay to carry Hearst TV stations.
If we aren't able to reach an agreement, we may be temporarily unable to provide Hearst's programming.
Last year, Verizon made a similar threat about WFXT and its owner, Cox (no, not Fox), then followed through on the threat in January.
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Comments
Why are carriage fees so high?
I never understood why carriage fees for local stations are so high for something that is free over the air. Local network access and regional sports access were about 30% of my cable bill and a large part of my incentive to drop cable and switch to internet only.
Internet, eh?
Internet, eh?
Fine Verizon but...
you are aware most smart televisions have an option to switch to over the air. If you are within 50 miles of their transmitter in Needham you can easily get a 4k signal.
Most folks I know do this on top of streaming.
WCVB probably would be happy to supply the antennas
You don't need a smart television for this either
A digital antenna is a few bucks at your local electronics store and will work with just about any TV.
Hearst's ask must be ridiculous
If Verizon is willing to go to the mat over carriage fees considering that the linear TV business is dying. Their FiOS video business lost about 9% of its customers between the end of the 3rd quarter 2022 and the same point in 2023 -- from about 3.3 million to 3.0 million. Comcast is losing video customers at a similar rate.
You'd figure at some point that if the price increases haven't driven the customers away yet, they just won't.
Must be contract renewal season.
I just got a letter from Tufts Medical saying they're going to have to stop accepting Cigna (my shitty health insurance provider) if Cigna doesn't agree to a better contract. I think the same brinkmanship happened around the same time last year as well.
Looks like it's resolved
Got an email this morning. Not that I care....