Fans plan assault by phone

Will an old-fashioned electronic lynching budge satellite companies into accepting a Mountain West Conference sports channel?

Quasi-organizers of a call-in campaign today wish it so.

The frustration of MWC fans, primarily from Utah and BYU faithful, is so intense the past two weeks there could be an assault on the call centers of DirecTV and DishNetwork during appointed hours today — a show of frustrated fan muscle.

One fan postulated that if those who signed an online petition — some 8,200 — made phone calls today during an organized move, it might rattle some tee times by bigwigs at the dish companies.

Maybe.

Trouble is, the phone lines might get jammed. Trouble is, you will most likely get a phone call center lackey, who may or may not be fluent in English. That person will likely not know anything about The mtn. channel, the station that fans are seeking to get up on the satellites.

But if those on the other end of the phones are jammed or a call rep is required to log your call, add the Post-it, or have the log passed up the food chain, it makes an impact.

According to Kim Carver, chief operating officer of The mtn. network, who has worked in the business for years, those calls really count. And people in those companies are counting, making check marks. And if you can believe it, fans making calls is one of the biggest tools in getting programming, he said.

Well, biggest tool besides making a "fair" offer at the negotiating table.

Phone call campaign? Carve 'em up, you say. Some fans have already called in a sick number of times to no avail.

Still, the energy surges on.

The fan online petition is located on the Internet at www.petitiononline.com. See the accompanying box for service center call numbers, if you are inclined to join in today.

Clayton Burke of Denver is calling for frustrated MWC fans to join in a phone assault to dish companies to get attention of upper management they cannot reach. Burke is planning to target the national call center for DirecTV en masse between 2 and 2:30 p.m. today, then assault DishNetwork's call center from 2:30 to 3 p.m.