There could be bad news ahead for fans of certain Fox cable channel series who use DirecTV. The network’s carriage agreement with the digital broadcast satellite service expired at the end of last months and since things haven’t been cleared up between Fox and DirecTV, the service may be dropping a number of channels as of November 1st.
Deadline posted the updated, including the statements made by Fox Networks and DirecTV. Fox states that while they offered an extension during the negotiations, DirecTV has announced that they will be dropping Fox’s cable networks as of November 1st if Fox doesn’t meet their demands. The affected channels included FX, National Geographic, Speed, Fuel TV, Fox Soccer, Fox Movie Channel, Fox Deportes, and 19 Fox regional sports networks. As Deadline notes, this happened a year ago with Dish and the channels did go dark until the service and Fox could come to a new agreement.
Looking at my ridiculously high cable bill, I can’t help but wish that issues like these would somehow benefit us, but a combination of realism and pessimism has me believing it’s paying subscribers who will end up paying for this in the long run. In the meantime, those of you who were looking forward to watching more Sons of Anarchy, The League, It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia, and American Horror Story may end up having to go without come next month if you’re a DirecTV subscriber (and locked into a contract).
