[lrcasey]

Dear Larry,


Cox, our parent company, is currently in negotiations with Comcast for all of our stations. This is being handled from our corporate offices in Atlanta. We are hoping for a speedy decision.




Caroline Chang

Program Manager

KTVU

#2 Jack London Square

Oakland, CA 94607

(510) 874-0165



-----Original Message-----

From: Larry Casey

Sent: Monday, January 12, 2004 10:16 PM

To: Chang, Caroline (CBI-Oakland)

Subject: RE: Web Form Submission



Comcast has now added KPIX (CBS) in the Bay Area. They now have CBS, ABC, and NBC. KTVU (Fox) is the only large network not being carried by Comcast. Any update on when KTVU plans to join the "big boys"? Hopefully it is still not another 9 months away. There are many Fox shows and sporting events that people want to see in EDTV and eventually true HDTV.



Thanks.

-Larry Casey

San Jose



--------------------------------------------------------------------------------


From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]]

Sent: Thursday, August 28, 2003 12:07 PM

To: Larry Casey

Subject: RE: Web Form Submission


Dear Larry,

Thanks for writing. There is no estimated date for Comcast carriage of our digital channel. Negotiations must take place, and they haven't started, and as far as I know, have not been scheduled yet. We hope it will be before, or at least will coincide with Fox's airing of 720p. That is scheduled for Fall of 2004.


Caroline Chang

Program Manager

KTVU

#2 Jack London Square

Oakland, CA 94607

(510) 874-0165

 

[stickyfingers]

More appropriate in the Local Forum...


Brian

 

[SonomaSearcher]

Unlike the owners of KGO (ABC) and KNTV (NBC), Cox apparently wants monetary-- or some other form of-- compensation for allowing Comcast to carry KTVU's digital signal (like Sinclair Broadcasting Group and Emmis want for their stations' digital signals).


The owner of KPIX (CBS), Viacom, did not get specific monetary compensation for retransmission rights of KPIX's digital signal, but did withhold retransmission consent until Comcast and Viacom completed negotiations on the whole raft of Viacom owned cable channels and broadcast (CBS, UPN) channels.


Cox does not have nearly the negotiating leverage that Viacom does, IMHO (unless Cox is using its cable business's carriage of Comcast owned channels such as OLN and Golf TV as leverage). So I think it will be rebuffed in much the same way the Sinclair and Emmis have been rebuffed in their efforts to obtain consideration (monetary or otherwise) for allowing cable companies to carry their stations' digital signals.


If Cox and Comcast do reach an agreement before expiration of the analog retransmission agreement (and who knows when that is!), it will either be because (1) Cox gives in or, (2) Cox and Comcast renegotiate Cox Cable's carriage of Comcast-owned cable channels.


Ironically, Cox's cable division is fighting Emmis on this very issue-- it does not want to pay Emmis for the digital signal of an Emmis-owned, CBS-affiliated station in Omaha, Nebraska. And Comcast does not encrypt its local HD channels (so anyone with a QAM 256 tuner can receive them without paying anything above the charge for basic cable), whereas Cox apparently does (at least in Omaha). Go figure.