In January, Time Warner Cable customers narrowly avoided losing stations when Time Warner and Fox went down to the wire in contract negotiations.
Now, TWC is in another tough negotiation, this time with Disney. If a new agreement isn't reached, viewers could lose channels, including ESPN, Disney Channel and ABC Family, and with them such popular shows as Monday Night Football, ESPN's SportsCenter and The Suite Life of Zack &Cody.
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Disney's current agreements with TWC expire next Thursday. In some markets, including Raleigh, local ABC affiliates that are owned by Disney may also be taken off the air. That won't be the case here because WXLV ABC-45 is owned by another company, Sinclair Broadcast Group.
Time Warner and Disney are both using websites and advertisements to give consumers information. What they aren't doing is giving details about the negotiations.
"All of the negotiations are private," said Scott Pryzwansky, a TWC spokesman. "Just like other distributors, TWC negotiates with television networks all the time for the rights to air their programming."
He was optimistic that a compromise would be reached. "We successfully negotiate dozens of programming agreements every year with no service interruptions for our customers," he said. "Negotiations are well under way and we don't anticipate any loss of programming for our customers."
"We are really focused on reaching an agreement," said Katina Arnold, the vice president of communications at ESPN. "We are focused on keeping the negotiations in the boardroom, not in people's living rooms."
Disney's site -- ihavechoices.com -- includes a countdown clock, descriptions of its channels and suggestions of services such as DirecTV that consumers can switch to if TWC drops its channels.
TWC has revived rolloverorgettough.com, the site the company used during its negotiations with Fox. On the site, TWC says that 40 percent of consumers' monthly cable bills goes to the programmers, with another 54 percent toward operating expenses. Any rate increases will likely have to be passed on to consumers.
Disney countered on its site: "Programming costs do not drive the rates Time Warner Cable charges its customers. Time Warner Cable has a very successful business, and the programming ESPN provides is a big part of that."
Neither side would say how much of a bump in its monthly rates Disney is asking for.
One possible beneficiary of the debate is DirecTV, which some consumers may turn to if TWC drops any channels. But DirecTV has not yet seen a bump in subscribers so far because of the negotiations.
"You typically won't see a significant migration from one platform to another until a channel black-out actually occurs," said Robert Mercer, a director of public relations at DirecTV.
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