But while lots of pay-TV operators are happy to keep things the way they are, Ergen keeps trying to blow them up: The Dish Network co-founder and chairman is constantly fighting with the rest of the TV Industrial Complex, in disputes that often end up in court.

His most recent and prominent battle is also the most important one: Dish’s new “Auto Hop” technology lets satellite TV subscribers automatically skip commercials, and that has both advertisers and TV networks in fits, for obvious reasons.

But that’s just one of Ergen’s recent adventures. He has also bought Blockbuster out of bankruptcy in an attempt to take on Netflix, engaged in bruising battles with Cablevision and its AMC Networks spinoff, and rattled his saber against ESPN and its ever-increasing sports fees.

Oh. He’s also talking to Google, and everyone else, about getting into the wireless business.

All of which means the former blackjack and poker player is someone everyone in the media world watches very, very closely, even though he doesn’t say much in public. Which means we’re very excited to interview him at our D: Dive Into Media conference in February.

Ergen will be joining an all-star cast on Feb. 11 and 12 at the Ritz-Carlton in Laguna Niguel, Calif. Here’s who we’ve told you about so far: Sony Entertainment CEO Michael Lynton, Hearst Magazines president David Carey, Google chief business officer Nikesh Arora, Facebook partnership vice president Dan Rose, HBO co-president Eric Kessler, Live Nation CEO Michael Rapino, CollegeHumor co-founder Ricky Van Veen, Vice Media co-founder Shane Smith, Intel media head Erik Huggers and Samsung media head David Eun, Netflix content chief Ted Sarandos (and guest), New Republic owner Chris Hughes, and USA Today publisher Larry Kramer.

And there’s more to come! Stay tuned. Meanwhile, we’re getting close to showtime, so make your reservations now.

The satellite-TV company on Thursday is expected to disclose plans to sell broadband, at a speed of between five and 10 megabits per second, for between $39.99 and $69.99 a month for customers who also take Dish’s TV service. Those who aren’t TV customers will pay $10 more a month, a similar pricing approach to that used by cable operators.

Read the rest of this post on the original site »

But if it is, the numbers don’t show it.

It’s easy to be confused about this stuff, but it’s also easy to clear it up: If you want to evaluate the state of the pay-TV business, you have to include the results from the telco guys, who have been taking share from the cable and satellite guys. And you have to look at numbers for the whole year, not a single quarter.

Once you do that, you end up with numbers that are basically flat, give or take a few thousand subscribers.

Here’s the data from the Reuters story, which uses publicly disclosed numbers from the country’s biggest pay-TV providers, who have been reporting second-quarter earnings over the last few days.

Q2 Video subscriber losses:
DirecTV: 52,000
Time Warner Cable: 169,000
Comcast: 176,000
Dish: 10,000
——————-
Total: 407,000 lost subscribers

Those numbers will likely get worse once we see results from Charter and Cablevision, who report next week. And there are still a bunch of small cable companies that aren’t public, so sussing out those numbers involves some guesswork. For argument’s sake, let’s say those companies followed the trendline of the last few years, and ended up collectively losing another 300,000 subs.

Estimated total: 700,000 lost subscribers

Still, that’s a loss, right? Yes. But as the Reuters piece itself notes, the second quarter of the year is always the worst for the pay-TV guys. College kids move away, people move into new homes, etc.

Last year, for instance, the pay-TV guys lost 442,000 subscribers in Q2. But they still ended up adding more than 200,000 subscribers by the end of 2011. That’s barely any growth at all — something like 0.2 percent — but it’s better than a loss.

This year’s trends look similar. Pay TV added 422,000 subscribers in Q1 – which means they’re basically flat for the year. If recent patterns hold, they’ll have another flat or down quarter in Q3, and then add more again in Q4.

You can argue that the pay-TV industry’s no-growth or barely-there growth is due to a weak economy and lousy household formation numbers. Or you can argue that it’s because people really are swapping out pay TV for Netflix, Apple TV, etc. Or a mix of both, or whatever.

But for now, at least, you can’t argue that the pay-TV industry is shrinking.

And if you don’t pay for TV, you can also get it right now. Legally.

Less than 12 hours after the show premiered on the East Coast, Apple’s iTunes has the first episode available: $2 for a standard-definition copy, and $3 for HD. Amazon’s Instant Video doesn’t seem to have the show up yet, but it should also be there shortly.

If you’re a hardcore “Breaking Bad” fan without cable, you probably already knew that. But just in case, AMC wants to make sure you know: Last night, during live chat sessions the network hosted on the show’s Web site, an AMC rep would periodically remind users about ways to watch the show without paying for TV:

That kind of on-demand digital “windowing” is now standard for lots (but not all) TV, so it’s not news in and of itself.

But that kind of thing is one of the flashpoints in the fight between AMC and satellite-TV provider Dish Networks: Dish says AMC’s programming is “devalued” because it’s so easily available on digital outlets. So for now, you can’t watch “Breaking Bad” or any other AMC show on Dish, period.

The Dish fight is presumably what prompted AMC to flash those messages to its most ardent fans last night. Because AMC would really rather have its fans watch its shows on AMC, so they can get paid twice for the episodes: Once via advertisers, and once via “carriage” fees. And presumably, once the Dish fight ends, AMC will be a little less aggressive about promoting iTunes and Amazon for “in-season” viewing.

But, in the meantime, it’s yet another example of the pay-TV industry reminding viewers that they can watch their favorite shows without a pay-TV subscription. One day those lessons might really sink in.

Still, free content providers can’t be choosers, so: No need to provide details on this fight, because it’s just like every other pay-TV programmer versus pay-TV provider fight. Which means that once the two sides figure it out, pay-TV customers will end up paying more. The end.

But from this corner, the interesting part of these fights is the way the two sides use digital video. Because the Web is increasingly important, at least rhetorically, in these disputes.

Pay-TV providers, for instance, often gripe that programmers are increasing their prices at the same time that they’re giving away their stuff online. Or, in the case of Dish Networks, gripe about them selling their stuff via Amazon, iTunes and Netflix. Meanwhile, Fox (which, like this site, is owned by News Corp.) briefly tried to pull some of its shows off the Web when it was feuding with Cablevision a couple years ago.

Most interesting to me are the moves that pay-TV programmers make to convince their customers that they really don’t need to pay for TV, after all. Because they can get all the shows they like on the Web.

Time Warner Cable tried this in 2009, when it was fighting with Fox, and offered up a handy instructional video on cord-cutting. Now DirecTV is telling its customers how they “can continue to enjoy your favorite Viacom shows online.”

This one’s not very visually stimulating: Just a couple of drop-down menus that explain that you can watch episodes of “Jersey Shore” on MTV.com, or via iTunes, etc. Or that you can watch “Tosh.0” on, um, Tosh.0. And to be fair, it isn’t overtly suggesting that you dump cable: It gamely suggests, for instance, that if you miss seeing Jon Stewart on your TV, perhaps you could find something to watch on TBS.

Update: As BTIG’s Rich Greenfield notes (registration required), Viacom appears to have responded by pulling down some of its full episodes from its sites — a move that affects not just DirecTV customers but everyone on the Web. (See video below.)

And again, neither DirecTV or Viacom thinks the blackout is permanent. This is just the part of the negotiating phase during which DirecTV’s customers don’t get the TV they’re paying for. Which is followed by the part where DirecTV’s customers see their bills go up.

But wouldn’t it be something if DirecTV’s customers actually took the company at face value and decided that they didn’t need to pay the TV guys to watch TV anymore?

Maybe one day they will.

You can make that case, and if you want to hear an entertaining rendition of it, check out Peter Lauria’s live-on-tape report from Times Square here.

But here’s a less-dramatic reading of Ergen’s ambitions: Like everyone else in America, Ergen likes TV, a lot. He just wants to pay less to watch it.

TV programmers have been able to push up the price for their shows, year after year, even as the audience for those shows gets smaller and smaller. Their latest move: Convincing pay-TV operators to pay them “retrans” fees for the four broadcast networks, which are theoretically supposed to be available to anyone in the country, free of charge.

The pay-TV operators have been taking those fees and passing them along to consumers, because it’s easier to do that than anything else.

And in that context, Ergen’s ad-skipping feature makes a lot of sense, because it freaks the networks out, for obvious reasons. So if the courts let it stand, then Ergen finally has real leverage when it comes to fees: If the networks won’t lower them, he’ll torch their ads.

There is another way to negotiate with the programmers: Just don’t carry their stuff at all. And that’s what Ergen is threatening to do with AMC TV, the people who bring us “Mad Men” and “Breaking Bad.” While a bunch of us really love those shows, the majority of pay-TV viewers don’t watch them, so Ergen’s bet is that he can live longer without AMC than it can do without his fees. But he can’t afford to do that with the broadcasters, who still have mass reach.

Still, note that even in that case, Ergen isn’t saying that he doesn’t want to carry “Mad Men,” et al, on his service — he just wants to pay less for it.

“Obviously there’s a price where an [AMC Networks] product makes sense. We just don’t think that’s where we are today,” he told investors earlier this month.

My hunch: That’s what he’s saying to NBC, Fox, CBS and ABC, too. He’s just using technology and the courts to deliver the message.

Eventually they settle, and you, the pay-TV customer, ends up paying more.

And that’s what’s happening in the latest dustup between Dish Networks, the satellite TV service, and AMC Networks, the programmers now best known as the guys who bring you “Mad Men,” “The Walking Dead” and “Breaking Bad.”

The slight twist here: For argument’s sake, at least, Dish is saying that because AMC is selling digital versions of those shows to other outlets, its hit shows are worth less to Dish subscribers. “It’s actually devalued,” says Dish chairman Charlie Ergen.

The fact that networks are selling or giving away their stuff online has been a minor but growing issue in carriage fights for a while now. But this is the biggest stink that a cable/pay TV provider has made about it, at least in public.*

Dish first brought this up via a press statement last week, but Ergen went on about it at length today during the Dish earnings call.

It’s worth reading. I’ve cleaned up his comments just a bit for clarity (note that AMC Networks includes multiple channels, including AMC, IFC and Sundance):

We have very, very specific viewer measurement. Much more granular than somebody like Nielsen might have. So we’re able to watch our customer base and — we realize we skew a bit more rural — between [AMC Networks] programming, they have very, very low viewership, outside of a few obviously popular [shows] on AMC.

But those particular channels are also available to our customers on a variety of other sources, like iTunes, Amazon, Netflix and so on.

One of the things that programmers have done is that they’ve devalued their programming content by making it available in many multiple outlets. So, when someone asks for price increases …

We just look at it. Our customers are not really saying “We want to pay more money,” they’re saying, “We want more flexibility in our programming, and we don’t want to pay more.”

And when you look at that from a timing perspective, that’s just a contract that we can change. And we believe that the product is actually devalued. Not that there’s not some good programs, but that they’ve been devalued, because you can get it in multiple ways. And customers are asking for more flexibility, or have more flexibility to get the programming. So it’s not quite the same as something that was exclusive.

So we look at it and say, “This is a good opportunity to make a good business judgment call.” And obviously there’s a price where an [AMC Networks] product makes sense. We just don’t think that’s where we are today.

First things first: Obviously it makes the most sense to dump all of this into the “posturing” bucket, and treat it accordingly. The easy money here is to bet that, yet again, Dish and AMC will strike a deal, which Ergen, at the end of his remarks, explicitly says is on the table.

That said, a couple of points:

• Most of the big TV programmers seem to agree with Ergen’s point when it comes to free repeats of recent shows. Which is why they have been taking stuff that they’ve been giving away via outlets like Hulu, and either pulling them off the Web entirely, or requiring that customers “authenticate” — prove that they’re paying for cable or satellite TV —  in order to see them without delay. Note that Dish was the first pay-TV service to participate in the Fox authentication plan last summer. (Fox is owned by News Corp., as is this Web site.)
• TV programmers don’t seem to think that iTunes’ and Amazon’s a la carte sales of shows that aired the night before are devaluing their product. Because they’re still selling them, and by all accounts there doesn’t seem to be a ton of volume for those episodes. If there was, advertisers would squawk long before pay-TV providers would.
• The really touchy subject here is what happens to prior-season episodes of AMC hits like “Mad Men” and “Breaking Bad” on Netflix. Netflix has been arguing that these episodes are big draws for its customers, and that this is good for networks like AMC, because people discover the old shows on Netflix and then watch the new ones as they air. There is some evidence for this, too.
• But there is also evidence that Netflix repeats hurt some cable programming — like kids’ shows — too. And that leads to speculation that Viacom and Disney will pull back their shows from the service or raise prices when their contracts expire — even though Netflix is already paying big dollars for them. Netflix will have its hands on “Mad Men” and other AMC shows for at least a couple of years more. But it will be interesting to see what Dish’s complaint means for the renegotiations.

*There is also a wrinkle involving a lawsuit between Dish and a former AMC subsidiary, but that’s par for the course, too. All of these guys sue all of these guys, all the time. No recession, ever, for TV attorneys.

We saw the first signs of that last year, when Clayton bought Blockbuster out of bankruptcy, then used the video company to create a kind of Netflix challenger. Tomorrow we should see the next steps, when the company rolls out a big announcement at the Consumer Electronics Show.

Here’s a good bet on what that will be: A new broadband Internet service, along with a super-sized DVR.

Trade pub Multichannel News has the details, gleaned from a report that went up briefly on Dealerscope, then went away, presumably because it violated a pre-briefing embargo. (Thanks to Jason Hirschhorn’s very useful Media Redfined feed for flagging.)

Since we never agreed to the embargo, happy to summarize here (not surprisingly, Dish declined to comment):

• The Internet service will be marketed to 8 million customers, most of whom can’t get fiber or cable broadband.
• The giant DVR will be called “The Hopper” and is designed to save and transmit shows in different parts of your house, and presumably outside of it, via Slingbox. You can see a teaser page for that one here, or look at the screenshot at the bottom of this post.
• There’s a cool feature that looks like it will automatically record the primetime lineups for the four broadcast networks (News Corp.’s Fox, Comcast’s NBC, Disney’s ABC and CBS).

All of which sounds interesting, and useful for existing Dish customers. But it doesn’t sound like Dish is ready to try a true “over the top” Web-based pay TV service that would rival traditional cable.

A lot of people think someone, or many people — could be Dish, could be Apple, could be Verizon, etc., etc., etc — is trying to line up one of those. But figuring out how to do that involves lots of deals with TV studios and programmers, and I don’t get the sense that anyone has those pacts yet. If Dish does, and announces it tomorrow, then it will truly be a press conference worth tuning into. If not, no worries — I’ll be watching anyway and will report back.

MORE CES NEWS:

• Complete coverage
• HP’s Former CTO: Ultrabooks Are Nothing New, webOS Still Has Life Yet
• Walt Shows Off CES Gadgets for Fox Business News (Video)
• What Kind of Web Video Plans Does Sony Have? (Video)
• Fujitsu Seeking Way Into Crowded U.S. Smartphone Market
• Why Rhapsody Is (Probably) Bigger Than Spotify — In the U.S.
• Microsoft Beefing Up CeBit Presence Even as It Pulls Back on CES
• Inside the CES Lost & Found
• FCC Chairman Has New Tablet, but Same Script: More Spectrum!
• Verizon Wireless: We Want to Connect Five Devices for Every Subscriber
• Ultrabooks From HP and Lenovo That Are (Kinda, Sorta) Different
• Walt and Katie Take a Tour of CES (Video)
• Schmidt-Storm Alert: The Google Chairman Didn’t Like Your Question
• T-Mobile Expands Bobsled Messaging Service
• Intel Shows Just How It Plans to Get Into Phones (Video)
• Motorola CEO: We’re Going to Release Fewer Phones This Year
• Kinect Helps Keep Aging Xbox at the Top of Its Game
• More From T-Mobile CEO: On Pricing, LTE and That Ever-Elusive iPhone
• Exclusive: New Boss Acknowledges Windows Phone Still Has “Awareness Problem”
• And You Thought Jawbone UP Was Going to Miss the CES Party!
• Interview: T-Mobile CEO Says No Second AT&T Deal Out There
• Grover Is at CES and I Am Missing It
• BlueStacks Bringing Android Apps to Windows 8
• Why the Future of TV Won’t Be Here Soon
• Nvidia’s Tegra 3 Tries to Save Battery in All Sorts of Different Ways
• Dynamic Dual Coverage: Ballmer’s Last Act in Vegas and the BCS Championship in 3-D
• Microsoft Phoning In Its Last CES Keynote
• Myspace — Yes, Myspace — Says It’s Going to Sell You Web TV
• Samsung Unveils “Super” 55-Inch OLED TV
• Nokia Unveils That LTE Windows Phone It’s Been Dying to Share
• Steve Ballmer Gives Ralph De La Vega a Very … Vigorous Greeting (Video)
• Interview: AT&T’s De La Vega on LTE, Tablets and Life After T-Mobile
• AT&T’s De La Vega: Shared Data Plans Still in the Works
• LG: 55-Inch Glasses-Free 3-D Screen Is on the Way
• LG Pushes 4G Smartphone Through Verizon: The LG Spectrum
• Live: AT&T’s Vegas Act Stars LTE and, Making Her Return to the Stage, Nokia
• CES Notebook: The Constant Search for Power and Vegas’ Worst-kept Secret
• Belkin Bringing Mobile TV to Lots of Cellphones, Will Anyone Tune In?
• Acer Introduces “World’s Thinnest” Ultrabook and a “Me-Too” Cloud Service
• There Better Be Some Cool Stuff at CES, Because CE Holiday Sales Data Bytes!
• CES 2012: Snooki and Bieber Are In, Gaga Is Out!
• Coming to a Smartphone Near You: Gorilla Glass 2
• RIM Hopes Next PlayBook OS Will Impress at CES
• Ultrabooks, the Ultra-Fancy New Name for Laptops
• At CES, Expect More Gadgets Telling You to Get Off the Couch
• Intel to Detail Its Phone Plans at CES Next Month
• Microsoft Pulling Out of CES After Upcoming Show
• Intel to Detail Its Phone Plans at CES Next Month
• Dell Will Drop the Flashy Vegas Act for CES This Year
• Ultrabook Conga Line Preps for CES 2012

[Shutterstock/Marko Cerovac]

The reactions are all over the map, and no one is exactly happy. I’ve collected a few of the reaction statements below.

President Obama:

“This decision is an important component of our overall strategy to advance American innovation, economic growth, and job creation. As a candidate for President, I pledged to preserve the freedom and openness that have allowed the Internet to become a transformative and powerful platform for speech and expression. That’s a pledge I’ll continue to keep as President. As technology and the market continue to evolve at a rapid pace, my Administration will remain vigilant and see to it that innovation is allowed to flourish, that consumers are protected from abuse, and that the democratic spirit of the Internet remains intact.”

Rep. Fred Upton, R-Michigan, incoming Chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee

“The FCC’s hostile actions toward innovation, investment and job creation cannot be allowed to stand. We must use every resource available, including the Congressional Review Act, to strike down the FCC’s brazen effort to regulate the Internet. … Despite FCC claims that these are just rules of the road that everyone agrees with, anyone can recognize that what the Commission claims to be statements of broad industry support are really cries of ‘uncle’ resulting from threats of even more onerous regulation.”

Rep. Greg Walden, R-Oregon, incoming Chairman of the Subcommittee on Communications and Technology

“More troubling than the substance of the network neutrality rules are the legal theories underpinning them. If left unchallenged, this power grab will allow the Commission to regulate any interstate wired or wireless communication on barely more than a whim. For all these reasons, we plan to look at all legislative options for reversing the decision. We also plan to hold a series of hearings early next year on the substance, process and claims of authority underlying this proceeding.”

Sen. John Kerry, D-Massachusetts

“The FCC’s Democratic Commissioners should be applauded for reaching a consensus on rules that will protect network neutrality on the Internet. As Commissioner Copps, a lifelong champion of open communications and democratic discourse, said in his statement today, vigilant and vigorous implementation of the rule is critical to its success.”

Dish Network CEO Charlie Ergen

“DISH Network applauds Chairman Genachowski and Commissioners Copps and Clyburn for adopting critically important net neutrality rules. The Commission’s Order is a solid framework for protecting the open Internet. The new rules give companies, including DISH Network, the framework to invest capital and manpower in Internet-related technologies without fear that our investment will be undermined by carriers’ discriminatory practices. While we wish the Commission would have gone further to expressly prohibit discrimination on wireless platforms, we are pleased that there will be ongoing Commission oversight and enforcement authority.”

Kyle McSlarrow, President and CEO, National Cable and Telecommunications Association

“Our consistent view has been that the current ‘openness’ of the broadband marketplace can be preserved while simultaneously fostering the innovation and massive private investment needed to ensure the future growth and vitality of the Internet. While we agree entirely with Commissioners McDowell and Baker that new regulation is not necessary to accomplish that goal, it has been clear for some time that there were three votes at the Commission for rules that would go much farther than those adopted today. Thus, the question before us has been whether rules could be drafted in a manner that avoids a raft of unintended consequences and that preserves broadband providers’ ability to innovate and invest in a marketplace that justly represents a great American success story.”

J. Scott Holladay, Economics Fellow, Institute for Policy Integrity

“Today, the FCC voted on a batch of tepid new rules. Some net neutrality protection will be provided, but the exclusion for wireless will create barriers to new start-up content providers and chill content innovation over wireless Internet.”

“The new but not-yet-properly-defined ‘managed service’ exemption may amount to the first step down a slippery slope of non-neutral Internet service. The exemption should be carefully tailored to address only a small number of special categories of applications that cannot operate under the existing open framework.”

“The FCC rests these decisions on shaky legal ground. Rather than invoke its more robust regulating powers, FCC bases the new rule on legal authority that was called into serious doubt by court decision earlier this year making the long term prospects for the rule quite poor.”

The Writers Guild of America, East

“A compromise means the parties to a dispute reach agreement. Here, no one has agreed to anything. These tepid rules will be challenged in court and in Congress, and they fail in the most fundamental ways – permitting paid prioritization and all manner of discrimination in wireless. Our members write most of what people watch on television and in the movie theaters and increasingly, online. Today’s FCC vote will diminish our members’ ability to create and distribute innovative content and audiences’ ability to watch the content of their choice.”