14 DAY TRIAL // Time Warner Cable is asking the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York to rule that its rights under carriage agreement allows it to deliver programming over its cable systems for viewing on iPads.
Filed this week, the case comes after Time Warner was forced to pull a number channels from its TWCable TV iPad app launched March 15, following complaints from News Corp., Viacom and Discovery Communications.
Specifically, those channels are:
· Discovery channels: Animal Planet, Discovery, TLC · Fox channels: FX, National Geographic · Viacom Channels: BET, CMT, Comedy, MTV, Nickelodeon, Spike, VH1
A list of the channels currently available, as well as information pertaining to the updates on the application are available on the company’s blog, at www.twcableuntangled.com.
The networks reportedly demanded additional fees to be paid for delivering their programming through tablet applications, though Time Warner’s general counsel Marc Lawrence-Apfelbaum argues that the company has every right to do so, without any restrictions.
“We have steadfastly maintained that we have the rights to allow our customers to view this programming in their homes, over our cable systems, without artificial limits on the screens they can use to do so, and we are asking the court to confirm our view,” he said in a statement issued to the press yesterday.
“With over 360,000 downloads of our TWCableTV app, it is clear that our customers welcome the convenience and flexibility our new app provides,” he added.
Time Warner’s TWCable TV iPad app currently features 43 channels available to customers whose subscriptions include them.
Users can fire up the app and just tap to start watching live streaming TV instantly. Users can scroll through the Channel Guide to see what’s on now, and what’s coming next, and all this can be done over an existing WiFi connection with no need for additional setup.
The application is also free to download and use, as well as the customer is subscribed to a Time Warner Cable video package at the Standard (Expanded Basic) level or higher.