Wednesday's Spokesman.com had a story on the four-week truce between Northwest Broadcasting, Inc., and DirecTV over the retransmission fee to be paid to carry KAYU signals.

Bottom line, folks don't have to buy an antenna or drive miles to see the Super Bowl this weekend.

There are still issues to be resolved; the two sides agreed to get together and push for an agreement.

One of the notable terms of the ceasefire was a request by Northwest's CEO and President Brian Brady that the negotiations become one-on-one. That request included a specific request that Brady meet with  DirecTV's CEO Michael White in a one-to-one session.

Which tells people: these two companies tried to resolve this dispute through proxies and totally by phone or e-mail. With disappointing results.

Notably, Brady's announcement on Tuesday included mention of the fact that DirecTV had agreed to start refunding the high-priced early termination fees some subscribers had to incur to leave DirecTV.

DirecTV said: No, we're not agreeing to do that.  Dan Hartman, the senior VP of programming for Los Angeles-based DirecTV, said those refunds are not part of the negotiations.

That doesn't mean refunds won't be provided. It just said they are not linked to the contract talks.

---

---