This is only a game of corporate chicken. Each side is waiting for the other to get nervous and cave.
Time Warner would lose large numbers of subscribers and Fox would lose tons of advertising dollars.
They will work out a deal.
Exactly. Broadcasters threatening to gouge cable companies has become as annual a tradition at New Years as the Rose Bowl.
Most cable companies settle without having to pay for over-the-air signal. What Fox *really* wants is to have more of their stations carried over similar programming provided by other carriers, such as Turner, Viacom, ABC/Disney, Discovery, etc.
It may drag for a week or more into the new year but both sides know they'll only lose money with a protracted carriage war.
Last year, it was NBC's turn to try to put the squeeze on cable companies. The local NBC affiliate was the one who took the bath of bad publicity. When your signal isn't received by many viewers, the local affiliate gets absolutely buried in the ratings.