[Karl Foster]

I know this question has been asked before, but why doesn't Dish offer locals to Baltimore, MD subscribers? Baltimore is the 24th largest DMA in the country. I was surprised to see that they aren't offered. Albuquerque (no offense) but no Baltimore? Is there something I don't understand? What a huge loss of customer base for Dish.

 

[Geronimo]

There have been many threads on this. Appaently DISH had problems with retrans rights and more less passed this market by. Too bad. I have a lot of friends in MD some just close enough to get Balt locals over DC. they would love the supers but have opted for DTV because of this situation.


Perhaps someone else has a more current answer.

 

[AJ2086]

I think they pick the DMA to be added next out of a hat. Hartford took a while while others below 26 were added. Its annoying.

 

[BrettR]

Originally posted by Geronimo
Appaently DISh had problems with retrans rights and more less passed this market by.

Dish has retrans for all CBS owned stations and all Hearst owned stations. This includes WJZ 13 and WBAL 11, the top 2 stations in the market. This is all from press release I'm basing this information.

They carried DIY in retrans for of Scripps stations. As for Sinclair, I dont know how many stations their agreement covers but Dish has agreement for many Sinclair owned stations in cities like San Antonio, Pittsburgh, Tampa.

The problem is there is little space on E* spotbeam to fully accomodote the MidAtlantic region with mustcarry. Thats why Hartford and Baltimore and likely Harrisburg wont get locals soon enough.

 

[Scott Greczkowski]

Hartford took a while while others below 26 were added.

Hartford TOOK awhile? Hartford is STILL not available on Dish Network

DirecTV does have it though. I want my Locals!

 

[Geronimo]

Perhaps you re right Brett. Just repeating content of earlier threads.

 

[BrettR]

Peter, here are the press releases for Hearst and CBS

Hearst: http://www.corporate-ir.net/ireye/ir_site.zhtml?ticker=dish&script=460&layout=-6&item_id=120102

CBS: http://www.prnewswire.com/cgi-bin/stories.pl?ACCT=105&STORY=/www/story/07-28-2000/0001277947

Most of Baltimore DMA can get reception of their locals very good OTA. And there is so much of the market thats significantly viewed for other cities.

WGAL 8/NBC-Hearst beams through much of the market on the northern side. Hearst owns WBAL 11. WGAL is from the Harrisburg DMA. WPMT 43 (FOX) also.

All the VHF DC stations reach up to Baltimore and further north. WJLA 7 comes in very good in Towson. The UHF stations are strong also.

The Philly stations are significantly viewed in Cecil County.
The eastern part of MD, gets Salisbury locals with Baltimore.

However, there is still the PVR users or to be PVR users, that would want the locals and the cable subs for years that dont know you can use a rooftop antenna to get locals and wont switch to satellite because they think only with cable can they get locals. Or some cant put an antenna and a satellite dish, so wont go through the hassle.

The Baltimore broadcasters would WANT DBS carriage, because if a subscriber takes Baltimore locals over cable, they'll only see Baltimore stations. That increases their viewing share in the county.

Dish could have done Baltimore instead of Philly if they knew they would never get Comcast SportsNet Philly, and mustcarry overturned.

If DBS could reach 12% penetration in Baltimore, versus 4% in Phily (with churn as a big stepback), there would be more DBS subscribers in Baltimore region than Philly region, even though Philly DMA is a larger DMA. Plus, Baltimore only has 7 channels. There'd be no need for a 129.

 

[Geronimo]

Peace Brett. I said youa re probably right. Just explaining the background.

 

[Scott Greczkowski]

Vermont was added to satellite mainly because of Senator Patrick Leahy, who just happens to be the head of the
judiciary committee and was a big part of getting the SHVIA passed.

Charlie figures if he can make this guy happy then Sen Leahy can help convince others in political power that the merger is a good thing.

Vermont is the 90th ranked market in the United State, while Charlie did make political connections he did anger customers in Connecticut and Baltimore (The 26th and 27th ranked markets in the country)

Its not TV is a game of Chess by Charlie, and Charlie is looking to win.

 

[bryan27]

To add to what Scott said. Vermont is nearly all 1 DMA and Vermont has the highest DBS penetration % of any state. This makes Burlington a very logical LIL addition.

 

[Scott Greczkowski]

It may be 1 DMA, but you figure that if 500,000 people live in Vermont and 50% of them DBS service and 1 million people live in Baltimore and only 15% have DBS, Baltimore is still the bigger market and the bigger money maker.

Again I see this as a politicly motivated move by Charlie to get the merger pushed through.

 

[Geronimo]

I agree with Scott. The VT market is WAY too small regardless of market penetration. It is the Mumber 90 DMA with jusy over 300,000 TV homes. Even with a large buy rate it is behind several DMAS higher on the lsit. Burlington is a reasonable sized city but the state as a whole is quite rural. This is politically motivated and well my only question is why wasn't it added earlier?

:hi:

 

[Corey140]

I think all of the Baltimore members who wanted locals have long since dumped E for Directv. I haven't seen a new Dish Network install in my area in years. Everyone has Directv (or have E just for international channels and Directv for everything else).......

 

[PeterB]

Dish is pretty much finished here in CT if they dont get Hartford up soon, and I'm sure they wont becuase Charlie is banking on the merger. DTV was already the dominate presence here, and the locals just made it a lot worse.

I have seen more than 2 dozen new DirectTV plus dish installs in the area just after the locals were added.

The whole sad thing is I work for a store has a dish contract to sell thier equpiment and we havent sold a system since may. What compelling reason would ANYONE in the CT area want Dish? lets see Discovery HD, HBO Comedy, EWTN or your local stations?

Well there still is Extasy, so I guess that makes Porn freaks, Relgious nuts and HDTV lovers.

Now that would be an interesting convention.

 

[Scott Greczkowski]

Peter Welcome! :hi:

Yeah I have been seeing a lot of Plus Dishes popping up around here lately, the local Best Buy can't keep em in stock.

We are getting hit by the Boston spot beam so there should be no reason Hartford is not up yet.

Now that Charlie sweet talked Vermont into liking the merger, maybe he can do it in Connecticut, it might make Joe Leiberman happy.

 

[Mike123abc]

Dont complain about Albuquerqe, it is probably one of the best fitting DMAs for satellite along with like Salt Lake City. Both these DMAs cover a huge state, since the coverage area is so large it is likely that a huge number in these states can not recieve over the air transmissions (mountains everywhere in these states), and being so big, bet there is very little cable penetration.

You have a huge number of people that cannot receive OTA or cable, what more could a satellite operator hope for (not to mention that both are top 50 markets.

Hawaii is picked up because they scream loudly at the FCC not to be left out (plus you can point a spot over there and not have to worry about frequency reuse since they are way out of range), same goes for Alaska.

Don't worry too much about the NE markets, there is still an unused transponder on E7 pointed there (#3) and E8 has 4 pointed there. That will give them 50-60 new stations of capacity in that area. E7 transponder 3 is probably just waiting for Baltimore.

 

[Karl Foster]

Originally posted by Mike123abc
Dont complain about Albuquerqe, it is probably one of the best fitting DMAs for satellite along with like Salt Lake City. Both these DMAs cover a huge state, since the coverage area is so large it is likely that a huge number in these states can not recieve over the air transmissions (mountains everywhere in these states), and being so big, bet there is very little cable penetration.

No offense intended to anyone. The date of the original post was July 7th. Since then, I have educated myself quite a bit about the choosing of DMAs for LIL. I just find the choices E* has made recently to be curious, but I understand a little more about satellite capabilities and the political wranglings. Adding Burlington, VT was a very interesting choice, and I believe truly political. They are missing a lot of potential market share by not having Baltimore, Hartford, Memphis, etc. Perhaps with the launching of their new satellite, this will be alleviated. Again, no offense to anyone in Albuquerque, or anywhere else. :shrug: