According to Om Malik Viacom to Take Jon Stewart, MTV & SpongeBob Off The Air on Time Warner Cable Networks. Yep, it's about money. Viacom packages up several channels including Comedy Central, Nickelodeon, MTV and VH1. Cable providers like Time Warner, buy these and make them available to their customers, for a fee. Viacom wants more money. According to the article it's either $0.25 a month or $3 a month, I'm not sure.
Viacom claimes "Americans spend more than 20% of their TV viewing time watching our networks, yet our fees amount to less than 2.5% of what Time Warner generates from their average customer." Though I don't know what an additional $0.25 a month will give them; 3% of generated revenue?
Time Warner doesn't want to raise prices for their customers given the economic situation (or something). They're saying they will tell their customers where to find the Viacom shows on the Internet (using presumably, Time Warner broadband).
I don't know who's right here but, TV is as broken as music and investment banks. It's just going to take a little longer for the system to collapse.
I know this. I'd change cable providers to find The Daily Show. And I think that my friends with kids would rather do the same than to explain why their kids can't watch Nickelodeon anymore.
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