{"id":28026,"date":"2015-12-29T23:58:27","date_gmt":"2015-12-30T07:58:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/spijue.wpengine.com\/news\/amc-dispute-may-kill-the-undead-on-gci\/"},"modified":"2015-12-29T23:58:27","modified_gmt":"2015-12-30T07:58:27","slug":"amc-dispute-may-kill-the-undead-on-gci","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/news\/amc-dispute-may-kill-the-undead-on-gci\/","title":{"rendered":"AMC dispute may kill the undead on GCI"},"content":{"rendered":"
\u201cThe Walking Dead\u201d may be dead walking.<\/p>\n
Most Alaskans may lose access to the most popular scripted TV series in the U.S. if negotiations between the National Cable Television Cooperative and AMC Networks don\u2019t result in an agreement before Jan. 1. GCI and more than 750 other cable networks \u2014 including Ketchikan\u2019s KPU and MTA in the Mat-Su \u2014 negotiate collectively through the NCTC.<\/p>\n
In an email Monday to its customers, GCI said it \u201cwill no longer carry AMC Networks or Univision in the coming year because of substantial price increases imposed by these networks.\u201d<\/p>\n
Speaking by phone Tuesday, GCI spokeswoman Heather Handyside said while it\u2019s possible for the NCTC and AMC to reach an agreement before the end-of-the-year deadline, it doesn\u2019t appear likely.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe don\u2019t see any agreement right now,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
At issue are the carriage fees \u2014 money paid by cable companies to TV channels for the right to broadcast their programming. Popular channels tend to charge more. The most expensive, ESPN, charges $5.54 per subscriber, according to a 2014 analysis by consulting firm SNL Kagan. Those fees are charged whether the subscriber watches the channel or not. They\u2019re a big part of every cable bill.<\/p>\n
According to GCI, AMC is seeking \u201can almost 200 percent cost increase for all the network\u2019s channels as a condition of carrying AMC.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI think any business, if they saw a 200 percent cost increase in a product, would have to consider whether they could continue,\u201d Handyside said.<\/p>\n
GCI declined to release exact dollar figures, but Shenandoah Telecommunications Company, a fellow member of the NCTC, said in a statement that it expects it would have to pay $1.4 million per year to AMC, compared to the roughly $500,000 it pays now. Shentel has 60,000 customers in Virginia, West Virginia and Maryland; GCI has 110,000, according to Securities and Exchange Commission filings and company figures.<\/p>\n
In addition to seeking more money per customer, AMC Networks is asking NCTC members to pay a fee for each of the network\u2019s subscribers, rather than each of the channel\u2019s subscribers. NCTC CEO Rich Fickle released that information earlier this month in a conference call with the Federal Communications Commission, saying that it seems to be a move to force AMC onto the basic cable package.<\/p>\n
Right now, GCI has AMC on its \u201csecond tier\u201d of channels, those added after a basic cable package but before premium channels like HBO or Cinemax.<\/p>\n
Handyside said about 60,000 of GCI\u2019s 110,000 cable TV customers have service that includes AMC.<\/p>\n
In recent years, AMC has invested large sums in original programming, producing accclaimed TV series including \u201cMad Men,\u201d \u201cBreaking Bad,\u201d and \u201cThe Walking Dead.\u201d A recent Wall Street Journal article speculated that AMC\u2019s demands could be a result of that increased spending and stature.<\/p>\n
If the NCTC (and by extension GCI) reach a deal that keeps the channel, GCI doesn\u2019t yet know how much more customers would be asked to pay.<\/p>\n
Conversely, if the channel is dropped at the end of the year, customers will not see a break on their TV bills.<\/p>\n
\u201cGCI does not determine rates by individual channel,\u201d Handyside wrote in an email.<\/p>\n
If AMC disappears from the GCI TV lineup, fans of \u201cThe Walking Dead\u201d may turn to online streaming services when the sixth season of the show resumes in February. GCI\u2019s VUDU application, accessed through its TiVo service, offers a simple way to get \u201cThe Walking Dead.\u201d<\/p>\n
There\u2019s a significant drawback to that approach. GCI\u2019s TiVo service and other Internet streaming video applications consume bandwidth, and GCI Internet plans only allow a certain amount each month. Use more than the cap? Pay overage charges.<\/p>\n
GCI\u2019s basic Internet plan includes 40 Gigabytes of data per month. An episode of \u201cThe Walking Dead,\u201d according to GCI-provided figures, would consume 618 megabytes or 1.5 Gigabytes (in high-definition). Watching all three of the February-scheduled episodes would consume more than 10 percent of an entire month\u2019s Internet allotment.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
\u201cThe Walking Dead\u201d may be dead walking. Most Alaskans may lose access to the most popular scripted TV series in the U.S. if negotiations between the National Cable Television Cooperative and AMC Networks don\u2019t result in an agreement before Jan. 1. GCI and more than 750 other cable networks \u2014 including Ketchikan\u2019s KPU and MTA […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":426,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_stopmodifiedupdate":false,"_modified_date":"","wds_primary_category":4,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[230],"yst_prominent_words":[],"class_list":["post-28026","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-state-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28026","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/426"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=28026"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28026\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=28026"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=28026"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=28026"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=28026"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}