DIRECTV Drops The Weather Channel

As of today, The Weather Channel is no longer available on DIRECTV, which refused to come to an agreement on a market-based carriage deal. In a statement released by David Kenny, chairman and CEO of The Weather Company, he said:

“This is unprecedented for The Weather Channel. In our 32 years, we have never had a significant disruption due to a failure to reach a carriage agreement. We offered DIRECTV the best rate for our programming, and I am shocked they have put corporate profits ahead of keeping a trusted channel that subscribers rely on every day. We are not looking for a large fee increase. We are simply looking for a fair deal that allows our company to continue to invest in the science and technology that enables us to keep people safe, deliver the world’s best weather, and tell weather stories to help people be prepared and informed.



“At a time when DIRECTV has increased customer rates by 4 percent, they are trading safety for increased profits and replacing the experience and expertise of The Weather Channel with a cheap startup that does weather forecasting on a three-hour taped loop, has no field coverage, no weather experts--certainly not any on par with The Weather Channel network’s industry-recognized experts like tornado expert Dr. Greg Forbes and winter weather expert Tom Niziol--and no experience in severe weather emergencies. This is a dangerous gamble over one penny a month that puts DIRECTV customers at risk.

“This reckless move by DIRECTV will have an impact on our role as part of the national safety and preparedness fabric of our country at a time when the volatility and frequency of weather events seems to be increasing. The Weather Channel partners with humanitarian and emergency management agencies at the local, state and federal levels. We help people prepare before storms, stay safe during their effects, and find help afterward. If the network is not available to viewers, the effectiveness of these partnerships, which help make us a more weather ready nation, are jeopardized. I am hopeful DIRECTV will come to their senses soon and will not force its customers to change carriers to stay safe and informed.”

How the DIRECTV/Weather Channel dispute will affect wunderground
It has now been over a year and half since The Weather Channel purchased Weather Underground, and overall, I have been happy with how the merger has gone. There have been many internal changes at Weather Underground, but our web site has continued to function independently much as it always has. We pride ourselves on our ability to develop innovative weather products and interfaces unique to the Internet. The Weather Channel has helped with that effort, by giving us the money to hire additional staff, and by giving us access to some of their technology and resources that we did not have. With Weather Channel's blessings, I have continued to blog as I always have, without interference. I have been asked to blog about specific topics on only one occasion--to introduce their system of naming winter storms (though I have not been asked to use their winter storm names, and can choose not to do so if I like.) I was not asked to blog about the DIRECTV affair. The loss in revenue from DIRECTV's 20 million subscribers would be a major funding blow to The Weather Channel, and would also negatively affect the financial situation of the Weather Underground. Thus, I obviously cannot offer an unbiased opinion on DIRECTV's decision to dump The Weather Channel, but think this is probably a bad thing, and not just because of the reasons stated by TWC's CEO in the statement above. I've never seen the coverage from WeatherNation, the replacement for The Weather Channel on DIRECTV, and do not know if they have plans to do any climate change coverage as part of their programming. If not, this will mean there are now 20 million people seeing less climate change coverage, at a time when The Weather Channel is actively expanding their climate change coverage, and at a time when society greatly needs as much awareness of how our climate is changing as possible. I encourage those of you who think this is a bad decision to weigh in via social media or email:

• Visit keeptheweatherchannel.com where you can learn more and automatically send correspondence to DIRECTV

• Tweet @directv using the hashtag #stormdirectv

• Facebook: share keeptheweatherchannel.com and post to DIRECTV's Facebook page

• DIRECTV’s CEO cares about what customers think, so if you have friends or family who are customers, encourage them to reach out directly to mike.white@directv.com

Variety.com has an article explaining the economics of the conflict for those who want to understand the issue better.

Thanks!

Jeff Masters