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On Thursday, HBO and Cinemax went into darkness for some Dish customers across the country, as the feud between the carrier and the parent company of the pay channel intensified. And now, this quarrel could have a huge impact on cord cutter customers who rely on over-the-top (OTT) type services like Sling.
For the first time in the history of the channel, HBO is now masked for some viewers, reaching approximately 2.5 million of Dish's 13 million customers, including Dish's Sling streaming subscribers. And both sides accuse each other.
In a statement to United States todayDish claims that HBO's parent company, AT & T, has pulled out the channel because it wants "a guaranteed number of subscribers, regardless of the number of consumers who actually want to subscribe. at HBO ".
Meanwhile, HBO claims that Dish is to blame and that cutting the channel is only a "bargaining tactic". The fact that the carrier has the habit of removing channels from its service in such disputes, as was the case with CBS last year and Fox News in 2015, does not help Dish.
Whatever the reason, if you subscribe to Dish or Sling, no Game of thrones chills for you yet.
This proves that subscribers to relatively new OTT services are not immune to power outages that have previously affected cable subscribers. Dish owns Sling, while AT & T owns DirecTV and its OTT DirecTV Now service.
As Chaim Gartenberg points out at The Verge, this conflict could create a path in which services for channels such as HBO could serve as leverage to move customers away from OTT services and to DirecTV Now from AT & T, where HBO and Cinemax cost just $ 5 more. a month. Customers could also keep their current subscription and pay an additional $ 15 for HBO's HBO Now standalone service.
That sounds pretty bad, but it's not a new strategy in the ongoing war either. For more than a year, we have been discussing on a smaller scale Disney's intention to pull its content from services such as Netflix and broadcast it on its own streaming service.
This fight also has links with President Trump, if you can believe it. Several months ago, when the Justice Department filed a lawsuit to prevent the merger between AT & T and Time Warner (HBO was the property of Time Warner at the time), this decision was considered by much like a terrifying political gesture related to the quarrel between Trump and CNN (also owned by Time Warner).
But, now, DOJ officials cite the HBO dispute as a reason they oppose the merger.
SCOOP: DOJ spokesman said @HBO – @dish Deadlock on the distribution of programming confirms its decision to stop @ATT – Time Warner case. "This behavior is unfortunately consistent with what the Ministry of Justice expected to result from the merger," says DOK Spox.
– Charles Gasparino (@CGasparino) November 1, 2018
Eriq Gardner presents a compelling argument to THR why the DOJ's new claims are more than dishonest, making it all the darker.
One thing is clear: whether we are talking about HBO or Disney movies, companies are not afraid to lobby by exploiting their content to allow us to offer more and more services. It's true that the future of entertainment is streaming but who knew that it would be so expensive and so messy?
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