The fight between Disney and DirecTV is getting political. Literally.
Via Variety.com, Disney offered to provide DirecTV customers with access to ABC News’ coverage of tonight’s presidential debate. DirecTV, however, declined.
“Unfortunately, returning only Disney’s ABC stations from the entire portfolio of channels for a limited three-hour window will cause customer confusion among those who would briefly see the debate only to lose the channel again shortly after,” DirecTV said in a statement.
DirecTV countered by requesting a return of all Disney content to DirecTV through the end of next week’s Monday Night Football game between the Falcons and Eagles. Disney refused.
“Returning the Disney-owned channels for the next week while we work to reach a new agreement would benefit customers who would regain access to ABC for the debate and the 76th Primetime Emmy Awards ceremony on Sunday, Sept. 16, as well as their favorite college and professional football games on ABC and ESPN, ACC or SEC networks,” DirecTV said.
Although ABC is hosting the debate, other networks will broadcast it. So it’s not as if DirecTV customers will be frozen out of seeing it.
DirecTV customers will be frozen out of seeing next week’s Monday night game, since it’s only on ESPN. With the exception of folks in Atlanta and Philadelphia (who will have access to an over-the-air broadcast of the contest), no DirecTV customer will see the game.
Which will only cause more DirecTV customers to switch to a different service. It’s far easier than it used to be to sign up for a streaming platform that provides ESPN and related content.
We’re not saying anyone should dump DirecTV to do that. We are saying it’s a no-brainer for folks who have DirecTV and want to watch content like Monday Night Football to ditch the service that doesn’t have pro football and sign up for something that does.