Dear DirecTV and FOX (yes, you’re not completely innocent, FOX),
You’re losing. iPods, iPads, Netflix, Amazon, Pirate Bay, you’re losing. Television doesn’t necessarily have anything to do with the Samsung box hanging on the wall, and it certainly has very little to do with what comes through an ugly-ass satellite dish on the side of the house.You’re losing your customer base, so why do you insist on affecting your long-term bottom line by alienating your customers with a quick money grab?
Sons of Anarchy has an amazingly devoted following, but unlike most amazingly devoted followings, SOA fans actually tune in to the show every week. This isn’t your typical Arrested Development crowd: these people have made all of you a lot of money by tuning in live, every single week. Sons of Anarchy‘s Season 4 premiere was the most-watched episode in not only Sons of Anarchy‘s history, but in FX’s history. Season 4. We’re not talking a highly-anticipated season finale, or a hot new series premiere. This is season FOUR of a cable series. That’s a pretty impressive feat. So why are you insisting on screwing it up?
There’s a very good chance that because of an asinine money dispute, FX is going to be pulled from DirectTV on November 1. If this happens, fans are going to miss the last five episodes of one of the best series on television. More importantly, Kurt Sutter is going to lose his fucking mind.
Sure, the man is prone to overreaction and hyperbole on the internet, but I believe a few things: he will absolutely find a way to get people to watch his show, and he will cause such a shitstorm that your PR people will be racking up overtime and heavy bar tabs for weeks to come.
Sure, Sutter may have filmed a very restrained pre-Hulk Smash video urging people to tell DirectTV that they won’t stand for this nonsense, but he let loose a little bit more on his blog, saying,
“I know FOX has a horse in this race, but they’re trying to negotiate in good faith. DirectTV is shutting down all conversation and using their customers as leverage. In the process, you’re getting fucked over. They’re running ads with their corporate shill telling you how much “they care about your business;” That dude’s got one sincere hand on his heart while the other greases your unsuspecting backside. Because they’re about to flip you over and fuck you up the ass till you bleed.”
This is Kurt Sutter before his ratings take a giant dip next week after DirectTV drops FX. Imagine what he’s going to do a week from now. While part of me really wants to find out, a bigger part of me wants giant corporations like DirectTV to stop dicking around their customers. From a consumer standpoint, the issue is really quite simple: your customers pay dearly for a service every month. You are taking away part of that service without passing on any savings to them. That, my friends, is horseshit.
To all of DirectTV’s customers, I say this: Don’t let this stand. Yes, there are more important things going on in the world, but this is emblematic of a lot of the bullshit that’s going around. Even if you don’t watch FX, SPEED, or any of the other channels affected, don’t let them take away what you’re already (over)paying for. If you don’t stop them now, pretty soon you’ll be paying $130 a month for ESPN Ocho, some channel that only plays instructional art videos, and MTV. Because Jersey Shore will outlast all of you.
Plus, Kurt Sutter may spiral out of control. Sons of Anarchy may already be locked in for season 5, but if he goes too crazy, they could Charlie Sheen his ass right out of there and replace him with the kid who played Fez on That 70s Show. Then who will be to blame when he’s selling star maps and handjobs in front of the Manhole? Because he would. Even though he presumably has money; even though he’s married to the beautiful and talented Katey Sagal. Kurt Sutter could very well end up giving uncomfortable handjobs to people, in which he just stares angrily at the recipient the entire time, never breaking eye contact; trying to transfer some of the pain from his body into theirs, searching for some sort of redemption that just will not come, no matter how hard he tries.
That’s how much this magnificent bastard loves his show. So please, settle this so he can continue to lambaste people on the internet and make one of my favorite shows of all time.
Sincerely,
Kona Gallagher
Clacked by Kona Gallagher 
on Oct 26, 2011 @ 09:13 EST5EDT
Of course Sutter is going to take Fox’s side on this thing. I don’t know enough about the negotiations to comment on it, but as someone who doesn’t know anything about them, I’m not going to use Sutter as an unbiased news source :P
Our area is actually going through this twice right now. Dish Network and one of the local affiliates, I think ABC, are in negotiations too.
I’m just glad FIOS is staying out of the fray … For now :)
While I agree that Kurt Sutter in part is taking Fox’s side because that is what network his show is broadcast on, I highly doubt that is the only reason why he is speaking out about it. Last year when dish pulled FX he pretty much kept his mouth shut. I think that what it is coming down to is that Fox network is willing to keep it on the air through good faith and Direct TV is just going to pull it off the air, right before the last 5 episodes of Sons. If I were a direct tv subscriber I would be flipping out. No matter what anyone says Kurt cares about his fan base because with out us there wouldn’t be Sons Of Anarchy.
Let’s not forget that Fox is demanding something like a 40% increase.
Look at Brett’s comments below. If it’s always Fox that’s stuck in this hard ball negotiation style, at some point, the finger of blame needs to be pointed at them and not the cable companies.
Ivey, I’m pretty sure that DirecTV is not a cable company and you’ve probably been advised as much, but, bigger picture is that these subscribers that are losing everything FOX related are the ones who are going to affect the bottom line – SOA in the forefront for viewership / Sunday Ticket football fans running a close second – Speed for the gearheads – so on and so on. As far as I’m concerned, until basic cable drops FOX, DirecTV is the badguy in this story.
Don’t get me wrong: I’m not saying FOX is innocent in this. My point is that no matter how you slice it, the customers are losing.
Bottom line is I am switching to Dish Network. I have already had problems with them in the past over pricing issues and I am sick and tired of Direct TV catering to new customers and shitting on us long time faithful ones. They change programming but increase prices while I receive less and less every time. SOA is our favorite show and we watch a lot on FX and I will not give that up while paying the same price or more.
Did you mean switching to cable?
I DVR everything and usually watch shows slightly after they air. The FX shows were always the exception..I always watch live. I can’t stand to wait even the usual 20 minutes so that I can skip the commercials.
I would freak out if my overpriced cable company took the channel away and Kona you are right, Kurt Sutter will lose his freakin mind!!!
There is another side to this. If Direct TV customers (of which I am one) call DTV and throw a hissy fit, thus forcing them to accept Fox’s terms, then Fox can basically charge whatever they want. I only recently got Direct TV, and it was specifically to receive Fox Soccer Channel in HD. Now I may loose that for a few weeks or a month. I’m not happy about it, but if DTV is held hostage by Fox, that wouldn’t be much better.
It seems like these disputes, regardless of the carrier, always revolve around FOX.
Yes, this is much the same as the Dish and Cablevision deals from last year. And Sutter was every bit as “fair and balanced“ in those exchanges as well.
FOX vs Dish… FOX vs Cablevision… FOX vs DTV… There might be a trend!
Why is it when there is a awesome show on a channel, there is always some bull of change. There is not much too look forward to anymore, such as employment, schools, gas prices and groceries! you name it,as much as I pay for this basic cable package you would think they would take something else off, we have too many Life Time Channels!!!!
Both parties are to blame. Part of me hopes that SOA loses 25% of its audience come Tuesday as a result of DTV not carrying FX. If SOA loses 25%, advertisers are going to pull or reduce advertising. This means less money for FX.
My advice? Customers should force the advertisers to pull from SOA and FX altogether.
Your argument defeats itself here Kona. You tell DTV customers not to let this stand because “pretty soon you’ll be paying $130 a month for ESPN Ocho, some channel that only plays instructional art videos, and MTV.” That has it completely backwards. You’re arguing that DTV should cave to FOX. But if that comes with the 40% increase that FOX is reportedly asking for (totally not mentioned by Sutter. Surprise!), what do you think is happening to prices for subscribers?
If DTV doesn’t give in and give the oddly large bump to FOX, do you think that’s the end of it? That FOX will never try to get back on DTV? Or, maybe… perhaps… considering that the shutdown is going to happen right at the kickoff to sweeps… FOX might be motivated to renegotiate the terms of the deal before they see ratings for all of their programming start to drop at such a crucial time?
You are correct that either way the customer is going to get screwed, but didn’t the customer know that before they signed up for cable service anyway?
I definitely don’t put all of the blame on DIRECTTV’s doorstep. FOX is also guilty of pulling a bullshit money grab. Viewers should absolutely be pissed at both of them, and Sutter has definitely railed against FOX on twitter too, even going so far as to threaten to flood the internet with rough cuts of the episodes, which would directly hurt their bottom line. Of course, whether or not he would actually do that is an entirely different matter.
My point is that you should put very little of the blame on DTV, and the vast majority of it on FOX. The fact that the title is ‘Dear DirecTV, and not Dear Fox’ suggests you’re doing the opposite.
We’ve seen this play out twice before, and the story was the same. FOX wants a huge increase in carriage fees, and says that the carrier is hurting the customer by not giving it to them.
The worst thing that could happen is if DTV did just give in. Because then you’ve set a precedent. Now, what happens when NBC/Universal comes up for negotiations? Or Disney-ABC? Or when FOX wants to redo the deal with Comcast?
And on that last bit. No way in hell Sutter releases anything on the internet without the express written permission of his network overlords.
For some reason, FX has pulled the episodes from Hulu as well, so you can’t even stream them now. Which is odd since Fox is a part owner in Hulu.
I hate to say it, but DirecTV may be right here. Whatever price increase they receive, they are going to pass on to the customer. Fox knows this, and could care less. DirecTV is actually fighting to keep the prices down. I mean, it’d be really nice if they would just absorb the extra costs, but that’s not going to happen. In these economic times, it’s just not fair to raise costs. I love FX and even moreso, I love Sutter for his genius work. But he is just wrong here and he knows it. He wants his ratings so I can’t blame him, and FX is the greatest so I see why he has their back, but let’s be real, both companies are screwing over the customer’s. The difference is, Directv is trying to prevent an unfair price increase. I do wish they would release the actual dollar amounts though. If it’s $2.00/customer/month, who cares, make the deal. If it’s 10.00/customer/month, that’s a big issue. I wish they would release the raw data so we could know what they are fighting to get.
I remember when Sutter shared his “opinions” about my employer and TV provider DISH Network. FOX was asking for a similar increase and used viewers as leverage. DISH held out until a fair agreement was reached guaranteeing programming for a long time. I understand he is sticking up for his show but he should leave the negotiations to the companies actually involved. I doubt that he has any actual knowledge in the process being that he is neither a part of Newscorp or Directv. I wonder if he understands that when he comments without knowledge, he becomes the corporate “shill” he so venomously attacked Directv for.
I do feel bad for Directvs customers. They already pay so much for service. I really feel bad for the customers that switched to Directv from Cable Vision or DISH Network. Not only do they now pay more for service but they will go through this FOX issue again. What makes that worse is Directv spent millions last year trying to lure customers away from other companies and the whole time they knew that they would have their own FOX issue within a year!
Even though there are two sides to the DirecTV and FOX negotiations, I know that it all boils down to the customers. I know that the process to working out an agreement can be a tough one, and when it involves removing channels from a TV provider, then it is almost painful! I know exactly how DirecTV customers are feeling right now because as a DISH Network customer, I experienced the same thing last year. I remember when my employer DISH Network was going through similar negotiations with FOX when the channels were removed. It was so frustrating not being able to see Sons of Anarchy. That is my favorite show and it made me angry that I couldn’t watch something that I paid for! Eventually, an agreement was worked out and now I know I won’t have to worry about these channels for a long time. I can only hope that everything goes smoothly for DirecTV customers.
Fox is being greedy. They make huge amounts of money already and if Direct tv gives into them we the customers will pay for it. Fox is holding Direct tv hostage and making it look like Direct tv is causing the problem, when Fox is the problem. Their shows are very popular so they apparently think they can charge whatever they want to. I would miss the shows but I would live.
//Standing O for Brett Love and others
FINALLY, other non-lemmings who took 5 minutes to look a little further than Twitter (and/or applied a little HS Economics) to see what is going on. I’ve yet to see anyone tell me how DTV giving in to FOX is going to benefit me as a DTV subscriber. Yes, it will suck that SOA gets yanked but I’m not paying whatever termination fees there are over a show. Especially when I can watch them for $2.99 on Amazon. Hmm, $15 vs up to $480?? This is a no brainer kids.
By the way Sutter, I’ll be more impressed with you following through with your threats to Fox than I am with your vast and talented vulgarities.
Kurt has basically said he’ll go against both companies and release his copies of the final cuts of the remaining episodes of Season 4 on the internet if both Fox and DirectTV don’t pull their socks up and do right by their customers. Of course the guy is going to stand by Fox, they’re the ones who have given him the platform to be able to put the amazing show that is SoA out there for us fans so he has to stick by them to a point. However I suspect Sutter will stand by what he said about releasing the final cuts if an agreement isn’t reached, and that’s despite Fox threatening to have him fired and then arrested if he does. Say what you like about him but the guy does genuinely appreciate his fans (and the ratings, which he is perfectly entitled to do as SoA is his baby and he is understandably proud of it).
The best thing to do is, rid yourself of Direct TV. In my experience, they have the worst service around except compared to Dish Network.
Shady business practices and some of the worst customer service I have ever experienced. I was so excited when my contract was over that I almost destroyed my phone trying to get to it fast enough to cancel.
Oh and when you cancel, make sure you tell the representative about 100 times that you want it canceled. Apparently, the one I talked with didn’t know what “cancel” means. Those idiots still send me a bill for service I NEVER had from 5 years ago. That’s okay though, every time I get one, I file a complaint with the FTC.