DirecTV Dropping 26 Channels Tonight

No more Spongebob Squarepants. No more Jersey Shore. No more Daily Show. DirecTV will be dropping 26 channels tonight at midnight, leaving millions of people without stations like MTV, Comedy Central, and Nickelodeon.

DirecTV will be dropping the channels due to a dispute with Viacom.

Viacom writes on its website:

“As of midnight on Tuesday, July 10, DirecTV will drop 26 Viacom channels, including Nickelodeon, MTV, Comedy Central, BET, VH1, CMT, Spike TV, TV Land and more. Viacom is the most watched programmer on DirecTV. Nickelodeon is the most watched cable network on DirecTV. We regret that DirecTV refuses to consider a fair deal that recognizes the value of Viacom programming.”

According to the Indie Wire, Viacom’s distribution agreement with DirecTV ends tonight at midnight. The two companies have been negotiating for months but have been unable to come to an agreement.

Viacom posted a message on its website urging DirecTV customers to contact the company and demand that they sign an agreement with Viacom.

Viacom writes:

“Despite our best efforts, DirecTV has rejected all of our proposals to renew our agreement.  This evening, DirecTV provided Viacom with a counter proposal that included a lower rate than Viacom receives from any other distributor in the industry.  With this offer, our negotiations have reached an impasse. This means that, as of tomorrow night, nearly 20 million DirecTV subscribers will be without entertainment from the programmer they watch most. “

The latest participants in the carriage dispute dance are DirecTV and Viacom, with the two companies attempting to reach a new agreement before their existing one expires tonight. If they don't, the network's 26 channels (MTV, BET, VH1, Spike TV, Comedy Central, Nickelodeon etc.) could be cut off at midnight. As usual, each has its own side of the argument with Viacom claiming DirecTV has been underpaying for years, while DirecTV accuses Viacom of seeking an increase that will add up to a billion dollars in a year and is responsible for pulling the channels while negotiations continue.

We're not particularly sympathetic to the plight of either corporate behemoth (or optimistic that any savings will ever reach customer's pockets) but if you must support one over the other then there's plenty of propaganda to be found at the links below. This may not be as crucial as Dish Network's (potentially) Breaking Bad interrupting tiff with AMC, but if we have to miss an episode of Workaholics or Awkward it's going to be bad for everyone.

Source :
http://www.inquisitr.com
http://hd.engadget.com/