Thousands in NY, NJ to lose access to NY1, News 12 in cable dispute

telcodad

Thousands of households in the NYC area will soon lose access to Spectrum News NY1 or News 12 due to an ongoing dispute between the cable companies that own the stations. But unlike with most television carriage disputes, it doesn’t seem to be due to money:

Thousands in NY, NJ to lose access to NY1, News 12 in cable dispute
By Jon Campbell, Gothamist - May 29, 2025
https://gothamist.com/news/thousands-in-ny-nj-to-lose-access-to-ny1-news-12-in-cable-dispute

Thousands of households across the New York City area will soon lose access to Spectrum News NY1 or News 12 thanks to an ongoing dispute between the cable companies that own the stations. Spectrum cable will stop carrying News 12 and Optimum customers will lose access to NY1 on June 30, recent filings with the state Public Service Commission show. The move abruptly ends an eight-year-old reciprocal deal where the companies carried each other’s 24-hour news stations at no charge.
:
Unlike most television carriage disputes, this battle doesn’t seem to be centered on money. Instead, a Spectrum spokesperson said Charter Communications, the cable provider’s parent company, decided to pull the plug on News 12 because Optimum’s parent company, Altice USA, dropped out of trade organizations that represent the industry, including one known as NCTA — The Internet & Television Association. …

CBusdude

telcodad Wow, that is interesting! I wonder why Charter even cares if Altice is a member of those groups.

px_eliezer_

CBusdude

I can see Charter’s point.

From Charter’s POV, Altice is acting like the guy in a lifeboat stranded at sea who does not want to participate in the arrangements with the other people to try to conserve and share their food and water.

It’s about, do you help your peers (and even competitors can have common interests) as opposed to, the hell with everyone else.

telcodad

CBusdude I wonder why Charter even cares if Altice is a member of those groups.

telcodad The move abruptly ends an eight-year-old reciprocal deal where the companies carried each other’s 24-hour news stations at no charge.

It’s like a cable company association (i.e., NCTA) peering arrangement - Charter/Spectrum provides Altice/Optimum with NY1 and in turn Altice/Optimum provides Charter/Spectrum with News12.

geek

Apparently, these companies are accepting of people hating them.

They all must have some secret “How can we make it worse?” departments hidden in their basements. Or maybe those people get corner offices?

Not_Sure

geek The number of people at will care about his is rounding error. So you think Charter is wrong? Ok why? Altice is like teh guy who refuses to join a union at works but demands the protection and benefits the union provides when he has an issue with the boss.

Also TV is becoming a less and less important area of cable. Not sure why people do not understand that. When TV is the 3rd most important business of a cable TV company that tells you all you need to know.

CommunityMember

telcodad It’s like a cable company association (i.e., NCTA) peering arrangement

NCTA, as an association, is considered a leading lobbying group representing the interests in the industry to the various government agencies and legislators. Altice actually left the NCTA in 2018 (they stated they wanted to more target their lobbying investment dollars, but the industry consensus at the time seemed to be that they wanted to save money).

Altice and Charter had agreed to cross-carry their news channels in 2017, about a year before Altice left the NCTA. It is not entirely clear why Charter choose now to end the agreement with the justification of Altice leaving the NCTA, although maybe the agreement term has expired, giving them an easy out.

Altice, Charter, and Comcast also have a joint agreement IRT advertising for the larger NY DMA (megaopolis) for one-stop contact for those companies wishing to place local advertising in that larger market.