Disney Loses Bid To Block Sling TV's One-Day Cable Passes (theverge.com) 19
A federal judge in New York denied Disney's request to block Sling TV's short-term passes, which give viewers the ability to stream live content for as little as one day. From a report: In a ruling on Tuesday, US District Judge Arun Subramanian ruled that Disney didn't prove that Sling TV's passes caused "irreparable harm" to the entertainment giant, as reported earlier by Cord Cutters.
Disney sued Sling shortly after the live TV streaming service started allowing viewers to purchase temporary access to its library of channels, starting at a single payment of $4.99 for a one-day pass. Several channels included in the package are owned by Disney, including ESPN, ESPN2, ESPN3, and Disney Channel. In its lawsuit, Disney argued that the passes violate an agreement with Sling TV that says the service must give subscribers access to its content through monthly subscriptions.
However, Judge Subramanian argues that this claim isn't likely to succeed, as the contract doesn't stipulate a "minimum subscription length," adding that the agreement's "broad definition" of a subscriber "clearly covers users of the Passes."
Disney sued Sling shortly after the live TV streaming service started allowing viewers to purchase temporary access to its library of channels, starting at a single payment of $4.99 for a one-day pass. Several channels included in the package are owned by Disney, including ESPN, ESPN2, ESPN3, and Disney Channel. In its lawsuit, Disney argued that the passes violate an agreement with Sling TV that says the service must give subscribers access to its content through monthly subscriptions.
However, Judge Subramanian argues that this claim isn't likely to succeed, as the contract doesn't stipulate a "minimum subscription length," adding that the agreement's "broad definition" of a subscriber "clearly covers users of the Passes."
Disney should hire better lawyers (Score:2)
I would have thought they had the best lawyers, given how often the litigate. But maybe Disney's lawyers should focus on writing better contracts instead of billing Disney for costly litigation efforts.
Dish / Sling will be in for an long outage next ye (Score:2)
Dish / Sling will be in for an long outage next year
How did they lose a slam dunk? (Score:2)
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I'll go one further, Disney trying to cram ESPN into every streaming and cable package is just wrong. I have noticed that any package that includes ESPN is almost automatically 4 times more expensive than any package without it. ESPN is way over-priced.
That's not just an "I don't like sportsball" rant. I do like baseball. I *DO NOT* like ESPN's coverage of baseball. I have seen games where the announcers don't seem to know anything about baseball. I have seen "coverage" where 3 announcers talk about basketb
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I'll go one further, Disney trying to cram ESPN into every streaming and cable package is just wrong.
Disney has used it's O&O ABC stations to force ESPN and Disney Channel into most TV packages. When ESPN costs were much smaller many customers just did not care all that much. Now that ESPN adds somewhere in the ballpark of $10/mo to the monthly bill, customers who don't watch sports are far less likely to let that slide. While the numbers are a bit fuzzy, only about a third of a TV providers customers are serious sports fans who might pay for ESPN if it was offered a-la-carte. I don't think that it
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I used to work for Sling TV, and you basically have that backwards. ESPN is the part of Disney's package that people are willing to pay money for. The shutdown and negotiations every year is just Disney forcing the various providers to pay for and carry their other channels. That's why Disney always holds these negotiations during football season, so if they have to shut someone down their customers actually care. Every year viewership on Disney's other channels (and non-sports channels in general) is l
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Nevermind that. Disney's lawyers are dumb for going after the length specifically. It's a day pass that doesn't renew. It's not a subscription by most conventional definitions, though I don't know about legal definitions because I'm sure their contract probably has its own definition for the word. Calling a one-day pass a "subscription" isn't a lie because of the length. It's a lie because it's not a subscription. There's no auto renew, nothing to cancel.
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I used to have many magazine subscriptions.
They would each mail me a reminder to renew my subscription.
If I sent them a check my subscription would continue. If I didn't send them a check my subscription would end.
I didn't have auto- anything. I didn't have to call to cancel.
The same went for when I was a paperboy. You pay for your week or you stop getting papers. When you remember to pay you start getting papers again.
I think this is how subscriptions have worked for hundreds of years, with auto-renew
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How did they possibly lose this case? This could easily destroy Disney's bottom line because people will purchase sling for 1 day for only for sports events instead of a monthly subscription.
Per TFA:
Disney argued that the passes violate an agreement with Sling TV that says the service must give subscribers access to its content through monthly subscriptions.
However, Judge Subramanian argues that this claim isn’t likely to succeed, as the contract doesn’t stipulate a “minimum subscription length,” adding that the agreement’s “broad definition” of a subscriber “clearly covers users of the Passes.”
Seems Disney never though a streaming service
This is why people hate lawyers (Score:2)
Disney Lawyers: Our contract with Sling specifically says they have to have customers on monthly contracts. Slam dunk win for us, Judge!
Judge: Did you actually the contract you referred to?
DL: Uh, well, no, but somebody told me that is what it said.
J: Well I did actually read it as it's kind of important to this case and it says nothing of the sort in there.
DL: Um, still win for us, right?
I love the 1 day passes (Score:2)
It's like I'm paying $20-$25/month for an ESPN subscription for the content I want, on the one day I want it.
I imagine that the NEXT contract with Sling will ban the day passes.
Illogical (Score:2)
Optimally, there should be a credit based system that counts seconds or so. Per program pay is probably more realistic though.
It is a waste to pay for total availability, when the real use can be much less, and 99% of the content is uninteresting.
Logically if you were to watch everything 24/7 you would pay the full price.
TIL about reasonable one day cable passes (Score:2)
.... And today I learned that daily passes to "cable tv" are a thing. Bye bye, YouTubeTV. Don't mistake my cancellation as evidence I ever wanted your service in the first place.