Class Action Law Suit Filed Against Time Warner Cable; CBS and Time Warner Resume Talks to End Dispute

Fed up Time Warner customers in Wisconsin have decided to take their complaints to court. Meanwhile, it was announced that the two feuding companies will resume talks to end the imposed blackout. 

Entertainment Weekly reports that Time Warner Cable customers in Milwaukee, Wis. filed a class-action law suit against Time Warner Cable on Thursday, Aug. 8 due to dropping local station WTMJ-TV from available programming, along with CBS and its subsidiary stations. WTMJ-TV is a Milwaukee-based station that is owned by the Journal Broadcast Group, and is also an affiliate station of NBC. 

Time Warner removed the local station from their lineup on July 25 due to a contract dispute, similar to the dispute with CBS that prompted a blackout of the station in many major U.S. cities.

According to official court documents, the three plaintiffs-- Paul Scoptur, Steven Delonge and Stephen Raymonds-- are seeking class action status on behalf of Wisconsin Time Warner subscribers. They assert that blacking out WTMJ-TV is a breach of contract between the cable provider and customers. The court documents state that the plaintiffs are seeking "a credit for one day of video programming for each day that the service interruption has lasted more than 4 hours," referring to a state statute. 

WTMJ-TV is one of six Journal Broadcast Group stations in Wisconsin, California and Nebraska to be blocked by Time Warner over contract disputes. 

Jim Prather, executive vice president of Journal Broadcast Group, made a public statement concerning the suit. "We are seeking fair market compensation for our signals in those markets," Prather said. "This is the first time in Journal Broadcast Group history we've ever come off a cable or satellite provider."

The class action suit is the first law suit filed by disgruntled customers after Time Warner blacked out CBS stations in New York, Dallas, Los Angeles, Boston and other major cities on Aug 2. over a failure to come to an agreement over the renegotiation of a carriage contract. CBS demands higher fees for their services provided via Time Warner, with Time Warner refusing to hike prices for subscribers over fear of customer defection. In effect, Time Warner blacked out CBS and Showtime in many major cities, provoking the ire of customers who cannot get access to their favorite shows. In retaliation, CBS blacked out their online programming as well, a service that Time Warner told customers to utilize in lieu of watching the shows on television. 

After a failure to reenter negotiations for nearly a week, it was announced at a New York City hearing on Thursday that Time Warner and CBS will be resuming talks to end the dispute. 

According to CNBC, Rory Whelan, the regional vice president of government relations for Time Warner, said in a testimony at the hearing that CBS has "coercive bundling practices" and that CBS' blocking of internet content for subscribers is "beyond the pale." 

CBS Executive Vice President Martin Franks said that Time Warner wants to extend the same contractual conditions from 2008. He attested that Time Warner is asking CBS to supply some online content for free, which many online providers, such as Netflix, pay "millions of dollars to distribute."

"Perhaps their real aim here is to use those outdated terms to hamstring our ability to do business with Netflix, Amazon, Hulu Plus and other new entrants that pose a new competitive threat to their former, cozy, unchallenged monopoly status," Franks said.

Earlier this week, Glenn Britt, chief executive of Time Warner, wrote a proposal to CBS CEO Leslie Moonves. The proposal included the option to sell CBS as a single channel instead of in a package, an option that Moonves promptly dismissed. CBS also refused a deal offered by Time Warner to carry its signal temporarily until the companies can come to an agreement. CBS refused the offer.

Aereo, an online television venture, said on Thursday that it was expanding its service to Dallas, one of the cities that was affected by the CBS blackout. Aereo is considered a controversial venture because it does not pay licensing fees to broadcasters, which would threaten Time Warner's business. 

Despite the recent setbacks, the two companies have said that they will make an attempt to renegotiate to bring an end to the blackout.