{"id":133362,"date":"2025-11-13T18:33:14","date_gmt":"2025-11-13T18:33:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/133362\/"},"modified":"2025-11-13T18:33:14","modified_gmt":"2025-11-13T18:33:14","slug":"youtube-tv-and-disney-appear-close-on-espn-and-abc-deal-but-other-channels-could-stay-dark","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/133362\/","title":{"rendered":"YouTube TV and Disney appear close on ESPN and ABC deal, but other channels could stay dark"},"content":{"rendered":"

The battle between Google and Disney<\/a> hasn’t slowed down, leaving YouTube TV subscribers to decide whether to wait it out or switch to one of the best live TV streaming services<\/a>.<\/p>\n

There could be a light at the end of the tunnel, though, as a new report from The New York Times<\/a> suggests that ESPN and ABC may be close to returning to YouTube TV. However, the report indicates that the rest of Disney’s channels could remain unavailable on the Google-owned service. There’s no dispute that YouTube TV wants those two major channels, but the rest seem less desirable.<\/p>\n

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For most people, ABC and ESPN<\/a> are the main channels they’re probably watching and missing. If those two come back, it would make a large portion of subscribers happy, though it might not make Disney feel good, as its pricing model for cable providers has traditionally been to bundle all of the ESPN channels, ABC affiliates, Disney Channel, FX and Freeform. This is one of Google’s (and other carriers, according to reports) main gripes with Disney.<\/p>\n

You may like<\/p>\n

Disney may be willing to hold out longer<\/p>\n

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\"Youtube\n<\/p>\n

(Image credit: Getty Images)<\/p>\n

At the same time, Disney chief financial officer Hugh Johnston went on CNBC and said, “We\u2019re in the middle of negotiations right now. Things are live. They\u2019re happening. Obviously, as we entered the year, we knew this was going to be a challenging battle, and we prepared ourselves for it, and we\u2019re ready to go as long as they want to.”<\/p>\n

While some progress may have been made on at least the two major channels, it also appears that Disney is willing to hold out until it secures the deal it wants on all of its channels.<\/p>\n

Disney thinks its deal is good, as reported by Deadline<\/a>. According to CEO Bob Iger, “The offer that\u2019s on the table is commensurate with deals that we\u2019ve already struck with, actually, distributors that are larger than they are. We\u2019re trying really hard, working tirelessly to close this deal, and we\u2019re hopeful that we\u2019ll be able to do so on a timely enough basis to at least give consumers the opportunity to access our content over their platform.”<\/p>\n

As it stands, nothing is official regarding forward movement. The NYT is reporting based on sources it has spoken with, but officially, Disney sounds like it’s willing<\/a> to go the long haul<\/a> with this fight, which has already raged on for around two weeks.<\/p>\n

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\"YouTube<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The battle between Google and Disney hasn’t slowed down, leaving YouTube TV subscribers to decide whether to wait…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":124934,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[156,111,139,69,437],"class_list":{"0":"post-133362","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-tv","8":"tag-entertainment","9":"tag-new-zealand","10":"tag-newzealand","11":"tag-nz","12":"tag-tv"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/133362","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=133362"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/133362\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/124934"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=133362"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=133362"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=133362"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}