News Corp.'s Fox, Time Warner Cable strike deal to keep signals on

The agreement was reached late Friday afternoon, less than a day after the current contract between the two companies expired. A series of extensions meant that consumers never lost their Fox programming.

The high-stakes game of poker between media mogul Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp. and Time Warner Cable Inc., the nation’s second-largest cable operator, reached a peak in the last few days, with lawmakers and regulators pleading with both companies to hammer out a deal or face their wrath. While both companies publicly attacked each other, talks continued around the clock among executives hunkered down on Fox’s Century City lot.

For consumers, the good news is that the new pact means they won’t have to hook up rabbit ears to their televisions or find an alternative TV service to watch Fox’s programming, including college football or the return of “American Idol” in two weeks.

The bad news is their cable bill may go up.

Fox had initially been seeking $1 per subscriber each month for its television stations. Time Warner Cable’s initial response was to offer 25 cents to 30 cents. The terms of the new deal could not be immediately learned, but industry observers and analysts had been predicting that the starting price tag would ultimately be in the range of 50 cents. Typically these deals run for several years and contain annual increases.