The folks at CBS and the folks at Time-Warner have broken off negotiations and the CBS-owned channels, including Showtime, TMC, FLIX and Smithsonian have gone dark for millions of Time-Warner subscribers in New York City, Los Angeles, Dallas and several other markets. I am one of them, having recently abandoned DirecTV for Time-Warner. Can I time it or what?
This is, of course, a dispute between two corporations that each make eighty truckloads of money per hour but want to make 81. This could probably be settled if the CEO at either company was willing to forego this year's salary increase…but those salaries are more important than the interests of the customers.
What should happen here won't happen. Congress should vote that the so-called "free" channels that use the public airwaves like CBS, have to be free to the public at all times. CBS shouldn't be demanding retransmission fees from cable operators for any channel I can pick up on my roof antenna. Then they could just duke it out over the premium channels at their leisure and with less urgency on anyone's part.
But like I said, that won't happen because Congress doesn't believe in passing laws that cut into corporate profits. The Republicans would vote for free abortion-on-demand and Democrats would abolish Social Security before they'd do that. It won't even be discussed.
I can live without any of those channels indefinitely. My next "must see" show on CBS is probably The Tony Awards and that's not 'til next May. Both companies may be surprised how many people will learn that they can live without them, too.