Cablevision yesterday responded forcefully to Tennis Channel's ad campaign , dismissing the network's message that Cablevision subscribers will miss "round the clock coverage of the 2009 US Open." Tennis Channel has obtained rights to the tennis tournament for the first time this year, a deal that includes exclusive primetime coverage on Labor Day weekend. Cablevision said, "No Cablevision customer is going to miss the U.S. Open on television, with the best and most significant matches available on CBS and ESPN -- in both standard-definition and HD." Cablevision called Tennis Channel's ads misleading, saying that it has an offer on the table to carry the network on its sports tier and one other digital tier, an offer that the channel is refusing. "Unfortunately, the leadership of the Tennis Channel seems to be only interested in money, and continues to demand that all of our customers be forced to receive and pay for its programming, whether they want it or not." Tennis Channel is resisting sports tier carriage, saying that cable's sports tiers are not widely distributed. Cablevision also defended Newsday's decision to not carry Tennis Channel's ad, calling the creative "nasty, unfair and intentionally misleading, and we don't think anyone should carry them." Cablevision owns Newsday ( John Ourand, THE DAILY ). A Tennis Channel spokesperson said, "We've been in talks to get launched on Cablevision for years. Tiers we don't think are very fair." CABLEFAX DAILY notes the "impetus for the [Cablevision] assault" is the 72 hours of U.S. Open coverage Tennis Channel will air "after joining with ESPN to ink deals last year to telecast the US Open, Aussie Open, French Open and Wimbledon through '14" ( CABLEFAX DAILY, 8/18 ). On Long Island, Neil Best writes tiers are a "frequent debate in the distribution wars, famously waged between the NFL Network and cable companies." But Cablevision is the "only major area distributor that does not offer Tennis Channel, and is the largest such company in the Open's backyard." Best: "Hence the channel's frustration, and its ad" ( NEWSDAY, 8/18 ). AD WARS : Tennis Channel said that the ad was "accepted by all the newspapers it was offered to" -- the N.Y. Times, N.Y. Post, N.Y. Daily News, Westchester Journal News and the Bergen Record. In N.Y., Richard Sandomir writes Newsday's decision not to carry the ad "raises questions about the paper's independence from Cablevision and whether it would have accepted the ad under its previous owner," Tribune Co. Newsday Editor John Mancini "would not comment," and Publisher Tim Knight "did not respond to requests for comment" ( N.Y. TIMES, 8/18 ).
 |
| Cablevision Says Their Customers Won't Miss U.S. Open On TV |
