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ESPN Sues Verizon To Stop New Sports-Free TV Bundles

Posted by samzenpus on from the sports-or-nothing dept.

Mr D from 63 writes: ESPN isn't a fan of Verizon's new way of offering cable channels under its Fios TV service — they're now suing Verizon for it. The lawsuit comes after Verizon unveiled new bundles that allow customers to choose specific packages of channels that can be swapped every 30 days. ESPN claims this offer is not in compliance with their agreements with Verizon. In the U.S., ESPN depends heavily on viewership during the football season, then basketball. "ESPN is at the forefront of embracing innovative ways to deliver high-quality content and value to consumers on multiple platforms, but that must be done in compliance with our agreements," said an ESPN spokeswoman in a statement. "We simply ask that Verizon abide by the terms of our contracts."

31 of 329 comments (clear)

  1. well then it's a bad contract by roman_mir · · Score: 5, Insightful

    If Verizon is in fact breaking a contract it has with ESPN then all I can say is that it is a horrible contract.

    I don't watch TV, haven't for more years than I can remember, I don't care for commercials and I don't care for the content. I have 0 (zero) interest in watching any sports on TV whatsoever, never had any interest in watching sports, never will have any interest in watching sports.

    Just saying, forcing somebody like me to sign up for a service that provides sports information as part of the package is a 100% way to have me avoid that service.

    --
    You can't handle the truth.
    1. Re:well then it's a bad contract by ArmoredDragon · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Forced inclusion of expensive channels that I never watch was the primary driver of me dropping my cable sub. I was thinking about doing Dish's Sling TV, but it has guess what as part of the base package? ESPN. I don't want to give that fucking company a dime, even if Sling TV is cheap.

    2. Re:well then it's a bad contract by JimFive · · Score: 4, Insightful

      The fact that both parties agreed to it does not mean that it isn't a horrible contract. People sometimes agree to things that turn out to be bad.
      --
      JimFive

      --
      Please stop using the word theory when you mean hypothesis.
    3. Re:well then it's a bad contract by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

      What planet are you on?

    4. Re:well then it's a bad contract by chipschap · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Yes, it doesn't apply, and that's the point. This person, like myself, avoids TV, because I simply don't want to pay for all this stuff. I might pay for/watch TV if companies offered me acceptable choices.

    5. Re:well then it's a bad contract by edawstwin · · Score: 3, Insightful

      It's horrible to you, but illegal? Which law or case establishes that?

      And yes, personal choice is the best that I have. I cut the cable cord years ago. How is that nonsense? At least in the US we have a choice about what we pay for (probably in other countries too, but you never know). Bundling is common with many things, and has been the standard in the cable industry since its inception. How is this any different? It's suddenly illegal and falls under RICO? How many legal dramas do you watch?

      --
      I don't want to achieve immortality through my work. I want to achieve it by not dying. - Woody Allen
    6. Re:well then it's a bad contract by SeaFox · · Score: 3, Insightful

      If Verizon is in fact breaking a contract it has with ESPN then all I can say is that it is a horrible contract.

      It's nothing new. The NFL Network did (and probably still does) something similar. They had a contractual requirement that they be part of the "basic cable" package and not a special sports tier, and at the same time wanted to get paid per viewer, which means that they get paid for every subscriber that a carrier has, regardless of whether they want the channel or not.

      ESPN and Verizon both realize the same thing, lots of people don't care about sports and lots of people are aware that ESPN is one of the most expensive channels to carry. Consumers want out of paying for crap they don't care about, Verizon wants to hold onto video subscribers, and ESPN wants to keep their gravy train rolling.

    7. Re:well then it's a bad contract by Registered+Coward+v2 · · Score: 3, Insightful

      It's not a horrible contract if both parties agreed to it

      It's a horrible contract if it purports to require that consumers pay ESPN even if they don't want it. In fact, that's arguably illegal.

      It's not good for the customer, but no one is forced to sign up for cable

      Seriously? That's the best you have? It's OK for asshole cable companies to force you to buy something you don't want, and if you don't like that you're free to not have cable at all?

      Complete and utter fucking nonsense.

      Sorry, but ESPN has no legal standing to force the consumers of Verizon to essentially have a package which kicks back to ESPN.

      That should get you a RICO conviction. Because if someone says "oh, sorry, but we have a contract with my cousin Vinnie, and you have to pay him every time you buy something from us".

      Yeah, sorry. fuck that.

      I'm not sure what legal argument and case law you are using for your argument; but there is nothing illegal about a company offering a bundle of services on a take it or leave it basis. You might not like it, but they can offer their product in any way they chose; no one is forcing you to get a cable subscription. RICO? Seriously? Your argument is like saying McD's and their hamburger supplier are violating RICO laws since the burger maker gets a kickback overtime McD's sells a burger and you can't buy just the bun without paying for the burger as well. To make it a /. preferred car analogy, forcing you to do that through the drive through.

      As for your "it's not good for the consumer" argument I'd counter argue that it is good because the bundle price is probably less than what it would cost to get a separate set of channels a la cart; since ether bundle spreads the cost around a lot of consumers. In auditor, it makes channels you may be interested in but have very low actual viewership sustainable since they get money form all subscribers, not just the 2 that actually watch them.

      --
      I'm a consultant - I convert gibberish into cash-flow.
    8. Re:well then it's a bad contract by jonwil · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Don't blame Verizon for signing this "bad contract", blame Disney.

      Disney refuses to sell ANY of its vast portfolio of content to ANY cable provider unless that provider agrees to put ESPN in the base package.
      The problem for Disney is that if they allow cable companies to separate out ESPN (into a separate "sports" package, into a higher tier or on its own) then the number of ESPN customers drops dramatically (those who never watch it and those who watch it but wouldn't pay for it separately) which means they have to spread the cost of buying all that expensive sport across far fewer customers.

    9. Re:well then it's a bad contract by Solandri · · Score: 4, Insightful

      It's a horrible contract if it purports to require that consumers pay ESPN even if they don't want it. In fact, that's arguably illegal.
      [...]
      Sorry, but ESPN has no legal standing to force the consumers of Verizon to essentially have a package which kicks back to ESPN.

      You've got this backwards. The consumer has no standing because they never contracted with ESPN. The contract is between ESPN and Verizon. Customers are never paying ESPN. Verizon is paying ESPN. Customers are paying Verizon, but that doesn't give them standing on a contract between ESPN and Verizon. Just like if you bought something from Walmart, that doesn't give you standing to modify Walmart's wages to their employees.

      Legally, the proper solution is for Verizon to charge all customers enough so that they can fulfill their contractual obligation to ESPN. If their contract says they need to pay ESPN $10/mo per customer (regardless of whether they view ESPN), then Verizon just needs to pay that and they've satisfied the terms of their contract with ESPN.

      If Verizon wants to then turn around and charge ESPN-viewing customers $20/mo to cover their shortfall (assuming half their customers don't want ESPN), then that is between Verizon and their customer, and ESPN has no standing. In fact that's probably what Verizon is going for here - they're trying to collect real data on exactly what percentage of their customers are willing to pay for ESPN and how much, so they can use those figures for negotiations with ESPN.

      That should get you a RICO conviction. Because if someone says "oh, sorry, but we have a contract with my cousin Vinnie, and you have to pay him every time you buy something from us".

      Totally different. Verizon isn't telling you to send a check to ESPN. They're offering you a price for your cable package, and you're agreeing to pay that price. If Verizon decides to use some of the money they received from you to pay ESPN or Vinnie or for hookers and blow, you have no standing. You got the cable package you wanted at a price you agreed to pay.

    10. Re:well then it's a bad contract by hesiod · · Score: 4, Insightful

      So if a company doesn't operate in a way I like, the best way to express that... is to invest in them? I don't think you thought that one through completely.

  2. ESPN can go eff themselves. by toonces33 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    There is absolutely nothing innovative about what they do other than pick the pockets of every cable/satellite subscriber in the country. It is attitudes like theirs that are pushing more and more people to just cut the cord and build their own a-la-carte bundles from Netflix or Hulu.

    1. Re:ESPN can go eff themselves. by toonces33 · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Ahh, but I don't want to each sports. Ever. And even if I did, ESPN effectively only has basketball and football - if there are other sports you want you are almost always out of luck as well. And yet I have to pay for it whether I want it or not.

      And what do they do with all of the money that they pick from our pockets? They overpay for the rights to televise sports. The scandals involving the huge amounts of money out there for both college football and basketball are directly related to how much TV money is floating around out there.

      And I would venture a guess that there are a far more people out there who don't watch sports that you might think there are.

  3. ESPN delenda est by Mike+Van+Pelt · · Score: 3, Insightful

    I would gladly pay more for a bundle that did not include ESPN, or any of the other "sports" networks, or Empty-V or any of its myriad clones. Or the shopping channels.

    1. Re:ESPN delenda est by OctoberSky · · Score: 4, Insightful

      I would gladly pay more for a bundle that did not include ESPN, or any of the other "sports" networks, or Empty-V or any of its myriad clones. Or the shopping channels.

      Wait, you would gladly pay more for less?

  4. Heavens forbid by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Insightful

    That someone doesn't want sports channels.

  5. Why would a non-sports person have cable? by netsavior · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I thought that was the only reason anyone had cable anymore, for the sportsing. Especially since HBONow is finally a thing.

    1. Re:Why would a non-sports person have cable? by mrchaotica · · Score: 4, Insightful

      If I could have gotten a cable package without sports channels (which would have been much cheaper than anything actually offered), I might actually still have it. As it is, the cable company lost me as a customer in part because of their dumbass deal with ESPN.

      --

      "[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz

    2. Re:Why would a non-sports person have cable? by Opportunist · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Cable? It's the only reason for having a TV anymore.

      --
      We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
  6. Cue the whiners by John+Napkintosh · · Score: 2, Insightful

    There's about to be way too many comments about how ESPN sucks and cable companies suck and everyone sucks for not giving me what I want. There's about to be not nearly enough comments about shutting up and voting with your dollars. Guess who enables this behavior? People who pay for it. Guess who has an option? People who pay for it. Guess who was never forced to pay for it? People who pay for it.

    Aside from all that, Verizon still has to abide by the contracts. It's irrelevant how shitty the contract is for whom or what could be done which is better for consumers.

    --

    Long signatures suck.
    1. Re:Cue the whiners by rogoshen1 · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Well dude, It looks like Verizon was trying to give people the option to vote with their wallets, and ESPN is preventing that (or trying to.)

    2. Re:Cue the whiners by ArmoredDragon · · Score: 3, Insightful

      In the United States, contracts are understood by the letter, so if it isn't explicitly written, then it isn't enforceable (as opposed to say high context cultures, where there's strong enforcement of "implied" language.)

      That said, it's entirely possible that Verizon's contract with ESPN is worded in such a way that they can get away with doing this. Verizon seems to think so, but ESPN seems to disagree. So that's where an impartial (theoretically) judge decides the result of how its worded, and how it will be enforced.

    3. Re:Cue the whiners by jedidiah · · Score: 1, Insightful

      > There's about to be not nearly enough comments about shutting up and voting with your dollars.

      Why should you expect the two to be mutually exclusive?

      You're just a jerk and a corporate toadie.

      --
      A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
    4. Re:Cue the whiners by Opportunist · · Score: 4, Insightful

      The problem is that the only real option you have is abstaining. You don't want this behaviour? No cable TV for you. Because there's no such thing as a "channel mix" that you want. Have you ever taken a look at the average "basic mix" of channels? Nobody, absolutely nobody, on this planet would choose these channels. No matter what his interests.

      If you're not happy with this, your choice is to do without. Not only without the channels you don't want, but also the ones that you would want. Don't want Sports and Bible TV? Ok, no SciFi for you either.

      And most people would rather grin and bear it than abstain. Essentially what it means to them is that they don't get the 100+ channels promised but actually just about 10, with 90+ more that could as well not exist.

      --
      We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
  7. 30% by Triklyn · · Score: 1, Insightful

    People realize that 111 million people tuned in for the superbowl in the US right? out of a population of 320 million? a good portion of that 1 in 3 americans loves the hell out of their cable package with sports.

    wow, go figure, slashdot is full of people who have no fondness of hand-egg ball and ball stick throw, and run run kick kick net.

    1. Re:30% by SeaFox · · Score: 1, Insightful

      People realize that 111 million people tuned in for the superbowl in the US right? out of a population of 320 million? a good portion of that 1 in 3 americans loves the hell out of their cable package with sports.

      Talk about a leap of logic. There's lots of people (myself included) for whom the Super Bowl is the only football game they're interested in watching.

      To suggest that someone wants a year-round pay channel based on the viewership of a single night makes you sound like an ESPN shill.

  8. Re:first by Andy+Dodd · · Score: 4, Insightful

    First what?

    First time you'll ever see me actually root for Verizon? If so, yes. First.

    --
    retrorocket.o not found, launch anyway?
  9. All cable providers should try this by xxxJonBoyxxx · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I know if my mother-in-law had just the Hallmark channel, the game show network and one other she'd switch providers, even it only saved her 30%.

    Alternatively, if there was a way to just get Netflix to stream random stuff in preselected genres all day I could get her off cable altogether - tens of millions of people just want the TV on all the time because they live alone, but can't stand the crap the broadcast networks have during the day and have no need for ESPN.

  10. PseudoTV on XBMC by MaizeMan · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I don't know if it is integrated with Netflix yet (or ever) but it address the exact use case you're describing. Picking random stuff from the set of all videos I have access to, group them logically into thematic clusters and just keep throwing content on the screen without the user having to invest any mental energy in choosing what to watch beyond "I feel like switching from the comedy channel to the science fiction drama channel."

    I've been surprised to see how many people like this method of interfacing with their video content libraries more than selecting something they'd like to watch.

  11. Begun, the content wars have by MetalliQaZ · · Score: 3, Insightful

    All of these companies are just going to sue themselves into oblivion. They've been raping and pillaging for so long, they don't know how to run an honest business. Too bad they are going to cause so much collateral damage on the way down.

    --
    "Here Lies Philip J. Fry, named for his uncle, to carry on his spirit"
  12. Hooray for Verizon, kind of by swb · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Hooray for Verizon for trying to challenge the fucked up cable system. Maybe, just maybe, they see end of "cable" as a thing when anything can be streamed instead and want to stave this off by making at least kind of sane channel choices available.

    Well, kind of. I think they made a lot of this mess for themselves. I think the TV channel sources saw the cable companies successfully ratchet up the prices continuously and figured they needed to be in on that money bandwagon. Enter in all the must-carry bundles and tier requirements and all the bullshit that got us to 800 channels of nothing for $150/month (and not even HBO, damnit).

    And the cable companies didn't care because they could just pass off the costs to their customers through ever higher prices and announce "Wow! We've added even more high value content, ESPN Classic 4 -- all those great historic bocce tournaments from the 1950s".

    And both the channel providers and the cable companies got fat and sassy.

    And now everyone hates cable, hates paying $150/month for a bunch of channels they never watch and is dropping it as fast as they can.