Originally posted by Tim
there's nothing in your customer agreement that guarantees anything close to what you are looking for
Thats incorrect. Echostar DirecTV would be acquiring all contracts they have made with each subscriber. When the successor corporation [from a merger] is sued on an inherited liability, it cannot raise the defense that the plaintiff did not have a contract with it. From Anderson's Business Law and the Legal Environment.
DirecTV, Hughes the obligor is the party who makes a promise. And the promise given to the customer is lifetime service for PVR functions for a unit that receives DirecTV programming. Echostar would have to honor this contract. A breach of contract is the failure to act or perform in the manner called by the contract. Echostar and DirecTV do say programming and pricing subject to change without notice (even though they usually give advance notice if channel is being dropped, like PAX on DirecTV). However PVR functions are not programming. A PVR without fees (either lifetime service or no fee to begin as cost was included with purchase of box) would have to be replaced with a PVR without PVR fees. I dont see how this is so hard to see. If Charlie pulls a stunt like charging former lifetime users, I be frustrated. And the chances of merger dont seem so bright anyways as there are serious antitrust implications.
However antitrust laws are being disregarded in some cases already. Some of those laws were obsolete. The networks who are making profits on advertising and want to protect commercial advertising might pay off the right parties in Congress which might lead to eventual killing of the PVR anyways. NBC though has a stake in TiVo IIRC though. Cant imagine NBC though who is paying lots of money to Warner B for Friends West Wing ER isnt at all concerned if large numbers of viewers ignore the advertising NBC is making money off of. A loss of PVR would not be good for the satellite provider as the integrated PVR was a huge advantage over parochial outdated cable systems.