Fans of Channels 2 and 27 are seeing black today. Well, not everyone, just subscribers to DirecTV and AT&T U-Verse.
According to DirecTV owners of the stations, Hearst Television, "are preventing their signals from reaching those homes unless they receive a significant increase in fees..."
WESH (Channel 9), released this statement on their website;
"DirecTV and Hearst Television have reached an impasse in negotiating a renewal retransmission consent agreement for the carriage of Hearst Television’s broadcast stations on DirecTV’s systems. We have made significant investments to deliver top tier programming to our viewers and DirecTV is seeking the right to carry our stations at below market rates, which is neither fair nor reasonable.
We regret the inconvenience DirecTV’s demands have caused its subscribers, and we will keep you fully informed of developments.
To be clear, we have not “blacked out” our station. You may continue to receive our station for free, over the air, or by other satellite distribution, and, where available, from cable operators.
You can determine the type of antenna needed to receive the signals of our station at http://www.antennaweb.org/.
To contact DirecTV regarding the inconvenience caused by its unreasonable demands call DirecTV customer service at 1-800-531-5000."
Hearst Television says that it owns and operates local television and radio stations serving 26 media markets across 39 states reaching over 21 million U.S. television households.
Both Hearst and DirecTV indicate that negotiations are continuing. The same dispute affected WFTV and WRDQ for several hours yesterday, but those stations are now back on the air
Use this link to read WESH's statement.
Use this link to read DirecTV's statement, which includes information about bowl games.
