Dish, Univision Blackout Deepens, With More Channels Going Dark

Univision and Dish Network -- blaming each other for a blackout (see 1807020030) -- are now pointing fingers at one another about disruption of the remainder of Univision's networks. Univision said Tuesday it had "made every reasonable effort and beyond to reach an agreement." "Given that Dish experienced its worst-ever quarterly subscriber losses after dropping the bulk of Univision’s networks and stations, its unwillingness to recognize the power of Hispanic consumers and the popularity of Univision’s leading news, sports and entertainment programming is bizarre and disappointing," it said. Dish said it "offered to extend our existing agreement so that negotiations could continue without further impacting our customers, unfortunately, Univision refused" and blocked Deportes, Forotv, Tlnovelas and El Rey from its DishLatino. Univision's “content, on the whole, continues to decline in viewership, and as a result, the economics of their proposals do not make sense" even as it sells its direct-to-consumer Univision Now service at a lower price than it wants to charge Dish, the direct broadcast satellite operator said.