Dateline: 07/20/2012
Surprise! Surprise! What a difference a day makes. It looks like after over a week of claims and counter claims as to who was responsible for the removal of 26 Viacom channels from DirecTV's line-up, resulting in a dispute that analysts were predicting could go on for some time, both DirecTV and Viacom have now issued joint announcements that their dispute is now settled. As a result, DirecTV is restoring access to the Viacom channels that were affected, immediately.
To review, Viacom was demanding that DirecTV pay higher carriage fees for its programming, but DirecTV balked at Viacom's proposal.


This resulted in DirecTV removing subscriber access to 26 channels. With 20 million DirecTV subscribers, Viacom's ratings for the affected channels began a downward slide, and DirecTV began giving service discounts to complaining customers.

However, that is now all "water under the bridge" with the settlement. The channels affected that will now be re-accessible by DirecTV subscribers include: BET, Comedy Central, CMT, Logo, MTV channels, the Nickelodeon channels, Palladia, Spike, TVLand, the VH1 channels. Also, Viacom has dropped its negotiating position that DirecTV also add the Epix movie channel.

The agreement also includes new access for DirecTV customers to view Viacom programming on portable digital devices, such as laptops and tablets.

It will be interesting to see how the DirecTV/Viacom settlement will affect the Viacom's position when it comes time to negotiate with other cable and satellite services as contract renewals come up.

For more details on the settlement known so far, read the official statements issued by DirecTV and Viacom.

Check out an interesting analysis on the winners and losers of the DirecTV/Viacom dispute by TV Predictions.

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